Editing Ultimate Antihero:Volume 2 Chapter 2 (section)

===Part 3===

“Hafuu~…”

The three that had finished washing their bodies soaked their bodies inside the tub lining at each other’s side.

The fatigue had been piling up from watching over the children since the morning.

Sumika and Chikori looked as if they had completely forgotten that there was a demon right beside them and soaked in the hot water with a face without tension.

But more than the two of them, Elfiena that was between those two was completely melting.

In the middle of crossing over from the demon world to the human world, she met an accident of getting eaten by a kraken that met her completely tired.

Elfiena murmured with an entranced voice from the feeling of the heavy fatigue that had been piling up at her body’s core like a pile of lead melting out.

“…The goodness of a hot spring is the same whether in the human world or the demon world isn’t it?”

“Speaking accurately this is not a hot spring, but if the [Concept Translation] transmitted it like that then that means there is no culture in the demon world to heat hot water by yourself and everyone only uses hot springs then.”

“I think so. Everyone in the village use the hot spring inside the forest. We, the [Fairy race] live alongside trees and flowers, so we never really use fire.”

According to Elfiena’s story, it seemed that these females called as the [Fairy race] usually resided inside a tree or a flower.

In other words the nature itself was the town of the fairy race, their home.

That was why, these females didn’t really like fire that had the possibility to considerably damage their home.

What a really fancy story.

―However, when Chikori heard about the hot springs of the demon world, she thought of an unpleasant imagination.

“…By any chance, is it a hot spring of blood?”

Sumika herself didn’t say it loud, but the image depicted in her head was also similar.

After all, for humans, a demon was merely a terrifying invader that attacked humans earnestly, that made their image of the demon world from where the demons crept out was hell itself.

However, here Elfiena shook her head left and right in an overly big motion in denial.

“We, we would never soak ourselves in something so terrifying. It’s just a normal hot spring where underground water warmed by the geothermal heat gushed forth.”

“Tha, that’s right isn’t it. Sorry. That’s because I imagined the demon world as a horror place that’s more like hell. …I wonder if it’s actually really similar to earth?”

“Looking as far as possible from the demon world, there is not much difference between the demon world and the human world. There is land, there are trees and flowers, and there are lives that live here in the human world. The demon world is the same as that. No, by any chance perhaps there is a lot more of that kind of nature in the demon world.”

“Haa~. For some reason the image is far too different from what I imagined that it shocked me.”

Listening to the story of Elfiena, their images of demons and the demon world that they believed until now was broken down one after another.

And then Sumika realized.

That they, humans, really didn’t know anything about the demons.

Well, a method to cross over to the demon world from the human world’s side was never established, so it was also something that couldn’t be helped.

(…Perhaps through this encounter, it will be profitable for mankind if we can obtain information of the demon world even for a little.)

Like that, Sumika was thinking of serious things that was really like her.

“But if that place is really that full of nature, then it’s a place that is really comfortable to live for El-san and the others right~”

“……”

The exchanged conversation between Elfiena and Chikori beside her suddenly stopped.

When Sumika became concerned and turned her gaze at them, Elfiena’s expression that looked happy until just now had completely changed, her lips thinned with a sorrowful expression.

Looking at that Elfiena who suddenly turned quiet, Chikori tilted her head wondering if there was something wrong.

On the other hand Elfiena, she moved her trembling lips,

“…Yes. It’s as you said, but. But, the current demon world is already, become a place that we the [Fairy race] cannot live in anymore.”

Elfiena murmured so with a thin voice as if grieving for someone who died.

―It became a place they couldn’t live in, she said.

Just what in the world,

“What do you mean?”

When the concerned Sumika asked, Elfiena answered without hiding it.

“A war began. A really great war, so great that it swallowed the whole demon world.”

―Right now, just what was happening in the demon world?

“In the first place, the demon world is a brutal place that where power is everything.

It feels like conflict happened somewhere everyday, there is not a single day for a time of peace.

However even so, there is barely a gap for those like the [Fairy race] that doesn’t like conflict, and also races that don’t have sufficient power for conflict to live.

But, ―in the recent year, a big political disturbance happened in the demon world.

Due to the death of a certain demon king, whose name was famous through all over the demon world, a conflict for hegemony began due to the powerful clans of various places.

This struggle is extremely severe, in the blink of an eye the whole demon world was swallowed in the fire of conflict.

Most of the demons that once invaded the human world, were the [fleeing soldier] of this conflict.

Whether it was Jambure or Typhon―

They were defeated in this conflict and lost their territory, so they aimed for the new land called the human world.”

The current condition of the demon world that for the first time was exposed to mankind, and the other side of the invasion, the human world.

Hearing that details, Sumika and Chikori were both dumbfounded.

“Tha, that Thyhon was… fleeing soldier…… you said!?”

“Exactly. He was defeated in the struggle for hegemony, he was nothing more than a loser that escaped to the human world barely with his life.”

“…What, a thing.”

Sumika felt faint from Elfiena’s reply.

It was a too shocking fact.

The <Demon King class> that messed up the earth surface until that much was, that symbol of despair was―

Nothing more than the demon world’s, just a mere loser there.

(If that’s true……)

The power of the demons that drove off Typhon and Jambure to the human world… just how great could it possibly be?

She couldn’t even imagine it.

Elfiena continued her words towards Sumika who was at a lost for words from such too despairing a reality.

“And then, before long our village of the [Fairy race] was also swallowed into that war. Our village was burned, the forest was trampled down… many of our brethren were abducted. As the ration of the demons…”

“Ration…… wait, you mean they were eaten?”

Elfiena returned a nod towards the taken aback words of Chikori.

“The body structure of us [Fairy race] is an energy body that is made from magic power of high purity, so the absorption efficiency of magic power from our body is high. As food, we are the most suitable, seeing the circumstance where magic power is constantly consumed in large amount in war. The [fairy pill] made from the minced meat of fairy, just from a pill it can make you obtain vast energy to the degree that a <General class> demon can continuously exercise sorcery for three days and three nights.”

“Ho, how cruel…-“

Chikori closed her mouth with a pale expression.

Most likely, it was because she imagined the figure of a fairy being processed into mince meat while still alive.

And then it was not just Chikori’s imagination, even now it was a scene that was happening in the demon world.

The effect of [fairy pill] right now had been known all over the demon world. Causing the powerful clans to search for them in a frenzy.

“We the [Fairy race] don’t wish to fight.

However, the other demons don’t care for that and come to capture us.

And then, us [Fairy race] are excellent as food ,but… our fighting ability as a race is the lowest of the low even in the demon world. Even I who possess the strongest magic power among our race, only has strength on the level that was easily swallowed whole by a single kraken… our body size too, those that possess the size around your average human are only those to the extent like me, most of our people only has the size that can be put atop the palm of humans.”

If they were attacked, they could do nothing other than get trampled down.

In these few years since the war started, even the fairy race that was numbered almost at a billion, became reduced to only a number of two million, Elfiena talked of that with a heartbreaking expression.

“…The demon world, has already turned into a place where the powerless [Fairy race] cannot live in anymore.”

“El-san…”

Surely the current conditions of the fairy pained her heart.

Chikori whose grieving expression looked as if even now she was going to cry snuggled up to Elfiena and she hugged Elfiena’s body tightly.

It was an action that was really like the kind Chikori.

Although Sumika couldn’t take a honest action like Chikori, she felt an emotion as if her heart was squeezed from Elfiena’s story.

But that emotion―

“That’s why we resolved ourselves. We are going to abandon our birthplace, the demon world, and negotiate with the humans…

 

―to let us live in the human world.”

 

“Wha……-!”

Changed into a cold shudder following from the words of Elfiena.

“But, that’s……-“

After Sumika reflexively let out her voice like that, she shut her mouth in panic from having done that.

Saying it was [impossible], was not a word that she should say as someone who wouldn’t participate in the negotiation.

But, it was a little too late. Elfiena was also not an idiot.

She immediately understood, what the world was that would come out from Sumika’s interrupted speech.

“Is that, impossible?”

“…I, I’m sorry……”

“No, that’s fine. I too understand how hard this is. The story of what the demons that once visited the human world did here, has been circulated so I know…”

“Even knowing that… you are going to rely on humans?”

On the other hand Elfiena nodded without any hesitation.

“Because, we already don’t have any other choice. In order to survive, there is nothing that we can do except to do what we can. Because that’s… the duty of those that still live.”

“―-“

In order to live, they needed to do the only thing they could.

The words that Elfiena said shook Sumika’s heart greatly.

It was exactly Sumika’s way of life―

Because it was just like what she believed in front of the despair called Typhon, the way those who still live ought to be.

(…We are the same.)

Whether it was herself and also this girl.

Whether human, or fairy.

To continue to fight the unreasonable desperately in order to live.

There was no difference at all.

That was why, surely humans and fairies could understand each other.

Just like right now, where Sumika understood Elfiena.

―However,

(That’s, only if talking about individuals…-)

Elfiena didn’t understand.

No, she might actually understand, but she was looking at this naively.

The fear and hatred in human society towards the existence called demon that seeped right into the marrow of their bones.

Different with Sumika and Chikori who had a chance to talk directly with Elfiena like this, human society could only comprehend the fairy race as nothing more than demons.

Even Typhon and Jambure, for humans, those two were nothing more than the same demons.

There was no way, the human race could accept such thing.

Elfiena’s wish… would never be realized.

Far from that… if Elfiena ever said things like wanting to migrate to the human world in front of those people of the <United World Government>, surely they would never let Elfiena return home alive.

She would be killed. Cruelly. Unreasonably.

When she imagined such a sight, Sumika’s chest was burned in an unpleasant feeling.

And then that detestable feeling, made Sumika decide a single thing.

“…Elfiena-san. Will you mind if I also attend the negotiation meeting?”

Elfiena was making a shocked face for a moment towards this request, yet,

“Yes. That will be very reassuring if you would do that for me.“

She readily consented towards that proposal with happiness.

Surely it would be reassuring for her to have a human that could understand the fairy even for a little attending the meeting.

However… that wish couldn’t come true.

It was impossible to shake mankind’s decision with only Sumika’s backing alone.

Because Sumika understood that, she returned a bitter expression at Elfiena’s ready consent,

(For Elfiena-san’s sake… there is only one thing that I can do.)

For the sake of this girl who faced the unreasonable with all her might, similar with herself once before, Sumika swore to herself that she would do that much.