Chapter: 188
In the pitch-black space, we both squatted down with a fist’s distance between us. No matter where I looked, the thick black tar flowed around, creating an unsettling atmosphere that made it hard to distinguish up from down.
Even breathing felt like a chore. It’s obviously the case since I’m dissolving in real-time.
This black stuff absorbs tightly bound information while loosening it up. You could say it’s like having a constant decrease in defense and taking DOT damage.
I was spinning useless information back into my skin for cosmic defense. So, what about Pinkvalez’s situation?
Our senior in being devoured, Pinkvalez, was in a state where her information felt quite mushy like aged kimchi. When I first saw her, she could hardly maintain her form, lacking two legs.
So, I reshaped her appearance to look a bit prettier. I carefully clustered her information to create legs and optimize it.
In reality, it’s nearly impossible to arbitrarily manipulate someone else’s information. However, since this was a conceptual world and Pinkvalez was slushy, such feats were possible.
As it stands, enforcing a forced TS on Pinkvalez isn’t just a dream anymore.
While I was lost in those pointless thoughts, Pinkvalez suddenly spat out, “Why did you come to rescue me, you fool?”
“… you should be grateful if I came to rescue you. Why add ‘fool’ to that?”
“It’s cooler to be rescued, but you got caught while trying to rescue me. And… you’ve shown all kinds of ridiculous antics. You know, I’ve been thinking about what love is until now.”
“If you use that phrase one more time, I’ll hit you with a confession attack—!!”
Provoked by the triggering word, I rolled around and fired off some threat shots.
I knew well that reacting strongly to someone teasing tends to encourage them to have even more fun with it. Originally, it should’ve been to ignore them without giving them any satisfaction at all to establish defense.
But this long thing was a shame I simply could not suppress or dodge. I must have lost my mind.
Fortunately, after the declaration of a confession attack, Pinkvalez took a deep breath and turned her head away. A ceasefire was established.
Under normal circumstances, mentioning a confession attack would warrant mockery, but right now, it was fully functioning as the ultimate weapon against Pinkvalez.
Because… we were connected.
The emotions of Pinkvalez, stolen by the Queen, were affecting the original owner as well. She was in love with me. And I felt the same way.
That fact filled me with joy. The moment I locked eyes with hers, I could sense the emotions tethered by a red thread. My heart thumped along with a delightful excitement bursting out—
But no, I shouldn’t go there.
Clap clap. I slapped my own cheek. The inner romantic poet kept trying to spring up.
Seeing that, Pinkvalez wore a wobbly smile.
“Your eyes seem like you’d write me a poem, mad wizard. Or perhaps a lengthy love letter?”
“C’mon, stop teasing me!”
“But… ‘Mima’ dear? Isn’t it rather fitting for you to ask me to tease you at this moment?”
What on earth does she mean by that?
Twisting my body in embarrassment at her ‘Mima’ attack, I looked up at Pinkvalez, and her expression… what could I say? It looked like a bubbling pink volcano.
Though disguised as playfulness, it was firmly suppressed by sheer belief. That expression was revved up, and she was growling.
“You’re trapped with a succubus who’s smitten with you and can’t leave before melting away, waiting for her death day.”
And any beast tends to experience a surge in reproductive instincts right before death. I briefly thought that it would actually be advantageous to get things done before I kick the bucket.
But then I shook off that train of thought, re-immersing myself in the sobering reality that I could actually die here if I wasted time indulging in whims.
“I surrender! Please tease me, Pinkvalez!”
“You’re a good kid. But mind your attitude from now on… Do you have a plan?”
“I should endure a bit longer. You know, this black tar? If I do it right, I think I could hack and use it against them. They move in a way that consumes information. So, I’ll lure them with info and draw magic circles with…”
Drip, splat!
“Prah.”
A bucket of sticky black goo poured over my head.
It seemed that the refreshed black tar had curiously edited what I had just said. With a frown, I looked up at the sky.
That Queen, the little brat—she’s listening in.
“Well, we are inside the Queen’s Stomach. If the prey babbles on and on, she’ll pick it up.”
“What does this mean? We can’t even have a strategy meeting? Hey, if that jerk is watching us, let’s just share a deep kiss.”
“… huh?”
Pinkvalez asked back with a somewhat strange expression.
Was she thinking ‘Have you lost your mind?’ or ‘I absolutely refuse’? No, it wasn’t that. It was a purely concerned look as if asking if I was ready to handle the consequences.
But there was something I wanted to check.
When I unexpectedly got hit with a surprise blow from the Queen, I definitely saw sorrow and pain reflected in her demeanor. Isn’t that odd?
Suppressing that series of thoughts looping from that hint, I pushed it away. I wouldn’t even say it aloud. Since we were inside the Queen’s stomach, if information flowed out, she’d know it too.
So, I just blurted things out without thinking.
“What does a demon feel when watching another demon’s meal being eaten?”
“Must be thinking, ‘Looks delicious….’ Right?”
“Exactly, and just until recently, the Queen enjoyed a similar kind of romantic fun with me. I’m leaning into her hunger… to lure her out for a late-night snack. That’s when the chances will appear.”
“Just honestly say you wanted to kiss before dying, you mad wizard. What’s disgraceful about that?”
I acted like a mad wizard desperately flailing around trying to find an escape route just before death. It was like scratching at the wallpaper in an escape room after failing to find clues.
Was my intention communicated?
Rather than spiraling into despair, I was subtly enforcing something to be confirmed… Did Pinkvalez catch on?
“If you’re having trouble breathing, do tell.”
“What do you mean?”
Pinkvalez grabbed my shoulders tightly with both hands like a falcon. The force was so strong it hurt a bit. Her face was close.
She must have figured it out, right…?
She was close enough that our breaths were mixing. My heart raced like it was about to burst. I wondered if I should have taken a different approach. But this seemed like the only option to verify things.
“Wait, cancel that… Ump!”
So…
Swordsmanship divides into slashing and thrusting actions. Depending on how those actions are combined and executed, they distinguish between forms like the Triangular Sword Technique and the Spear Dance.
Even the atoms that make our world, depending on how protons, neutrons, and electrons are combined, change what substance they become. It’s like that. Every technique starts from the basics.
Who would have thought a simple combination of three actions – biting, sucking, and licking – could blossom into such variety?
What began as an awkward fluttering of a butterfly’s wings gradually transformed into a storm as I grew accustomed.
Pinkvalez, who had practiced tying cherry stems, proved that the effort wasn’t in vain. That’s good.
And she never closed her eyes while kissing. Every time I cracked my eyelids open to check, they were wide open, staring right at me with predatory eyes as if warning me not to try and escape. Thus, I stood frozen like a rabbit caught in the gaze of Medusa…
From here on, for the sake of my dignity, let’s skip the details.
The five minutes of deep kissing felt like an hour, and it all ended with another refill of the Queen’s jealousy-laden tar.
Yes, jealousy. It was unmistakable. I wanted to ascertain that point.
The Queen still held a fondness for a fragmented Yuli.
In obtaining a piece of the key toward victory here, I also… lost something akin to innocence. I felt utterly shredded.
===============================================================
Pinkvalez, saturated in the black tar, wiped her saliva-covered lips with her suit sleeve. Then, with extremely bright eyes, she asked me, “I enjoyed it. Although the rain made for an interrupted meal… seems like a main dish is ready, can I continue?”
“… Hey! You’re such a pervert for teasing someone like that!”
“You did ask me to do it, yourself. How was it? Did you enjoy it?”
“Isn’t that kind of a mood-killer to ask?!”
Watching me back away all disheveled, Pinkvalez seemed to conclude recklessly.
“Ah, so that means you liked it. Got it. I’ll do it again when we get out.”
“… … …”
I could not deny it. I couldn’t refuse either.
“If it were up to me, I’d want to move to the next step, but it’s almost time.”
“What time?”
“The time for this disguise. Aside from the black stuff, there’s another digestion process. It has summoned old nightmares.”
As Pinkvalez spoke, the glee from earlier had all but settled down. Nightmares, huh.
When the lively prey enters the stomach, it would need to be more actively ‘digested’ rather than slowly melted. Watching Pinkvalez get ready for battle, I slowly rose, my body creaking from all the previous exertion.
After that key hit, my condition was less than optimal.
It felt like my stats were halved in a harsh way. I was lucky not to be dead after suffering a surprise blow, but the bitter taste lingered.
Bubble bubble bubble.
From the black tar, bubbles began to rise and swell. Then, one by one, shadows that resembled people started to ooze out.
An old man, a child, and a young man with a tool… they all dressed as if they belonged to some rural village.
Pinkvalez laughed fondly, perhaps nostalgic, as she introduced the stained shadows.
“Those are the people from my hometown.”
“… … … Your hometown?”
The one that got wiped out due to the Queen, perhaps.
“Yes. The Succubus Faction that opposed the Queen escaped into the human world from her kingdom. My mother said they had to wander a lot in the beginning.”
Even if the succubus group told humans, “We want to coexist with you,” there was no way they would accept it so easily. Even if they were accepted, the intent wouldn’t have been pure goodwill.
They eventually reached a quiet little rural village.
“It was a nameless small village. A self-sufficient place, located in the high mountains where travelers were almost non-existent.”
Initially, the villagers were naturally suspicious of the succubus. And the succubus, weary from long persecution, hardly trusted the humans. However,
it was when a succubus fell head over heels for the village chief’s son at first sight that things began to change, and somehow they coexisted.
“Romeo and Juliet… that’s what they called it, right? It was exactly like that. But the outcome for us was different from that story. Unable to resist the fervent love of the two, humans and succubi came together to live.”
And it all worked out quite well. The succubi no longer viewed humans as prey, and humans stopped seeing the succubi as monsters.
“I still remember that place well. The man who handed an apple to my younger self, or the friends I played with. In all those memories, I felt acknowledged.”
That continued until the Queen arrived…
Thud, thud, thud.
The unsettling noises snapped me back to reality. The shadowy villagers were staggering toward us.
They bore no malice but were hostile. This was like an informational necromancy, using the information gleaned from Pinkvalez to resurrect those shadows as soldiers.
Pinkvalez, as if quite accustomed to this situation, displayed no strong emotional change, swinging her fists to smash the shadows of her hometown.
“It was a game of hide the twig. I used to play it often with Nicole, Elliot, and Senia. The three of us would gather and play together often.”
She kicked a child barely reaching her waist, and his head came off with a thud.
“That person ran the blacksmith shop, but his blade-making skills were pretty bad, so he got chewed out a lot.”
A middle-aged man with a bushy beard wielded a dull sickle. Pinkvalez dodged and smashed him.
“… … …”
She pretended she was fine, but she couldn’t possibly be doing alright. Experiencing the need to kill the faces of friends, family, and neighbors from memories over and over again must have been horrifically unsettling.
She probably hesitated a few times at the start.
While I was lost in infatuation with young Yuli, Pinkvalez had been fighting endlessly against her memories resurrecting in this dark stomach.
It was something that had to be fought against. The data resembling them was attacking us.
But, at the very least, it would be too sad for that task to be done by Pinkvalez’s own hands. I stepped forward, clapping my hands.
“Step back.”
“… … …”
“This battle, I’ll handle it. You take a break, and leave the pesky ones to this genius wizard.”
“Do you really think it’s okay to leave it to you, given your condition?”
Quite so. What do you think I am? Feeling confident, I jumped into the battle!
===============================================================
Huff…
I barely crushed the last shadowed villager. That was a close call…!
The decrease in my stats was more significant than expected. Most importantly, the very space itself was greatly unfavorable in this situation. I was low on resources to draw from.
If I tried to take the information and fire magic, the speed of absorption would accelerate, and I would take losses.
If I handled the black tar poorly to fire off magic, the Queen would swiftly patch the bugs, resulting in losses for me.
So in striving to limit losses while fighting, this was the result: grinding it out with bare-handed combat against the villagers.
It was only natural I almost died trying to fight like a warrior instead of a wizard. I panted while muttering to myself.
“Maybe I should have exercised a bit…?”
“Once we’re out, I’ll help you do a full-body workout. In bed.”
“Just do it in the barracks. The barracks…”
Pinkvalez placed a hand on my head as I collapsed in exhaustion. At this point, I thought I’d done enough. I appreciated her caring for me, but there was no need to fuss over me that much. That thought lingered.
“… no, it was doable. I’ll handle the villagers from here on out.”
“The guys tend to show off in front of the girls they like. Is this the power of newfound love or something?”
“Yeah, I want to take on a bit more of the struggle than seeing you suffer.”
Thwack. Pinkvalez hit my back, as if my counterattack had landed.
“Seriously, now is not the time for showboating. Here comes the next wave.”
“No, I can manage three… no, two waves. No, I’ll handle it until this wave is clear.”
“They’re not just villagers, mad wizard. Also, it’s not just one person who got ‘swallowed’ by the 【disguise】, it’s two.”
“… … …”
Right, that’s correct. If the villagers crawled out of the information absorbed by Pinkvalez, then the data absorbed from me would also be processed into the enemy.
Bubble bubble bubble.
The bubbles swelled higher and higher, pop, bursting open.
The darkened vision revealed the dual-wielding swordsman, Bennett, awakened in a grotesque form.
“… Why is he holding dual swords?”
“Ah, I figured I could use his data for this session, so I tinkered with Bennett’s data a bit… it’s more like a ten-year-trained version. I lightly customized it and embedded it.”
Pinkvalez, her throat almost popping, raised her voice.
“Why do you even bring data for me when you came to save me?!”
“I was just going to fold it into a magic bullet! Hey, knives are coming at us. The first attack will be a flurry pattern, so duck!!”
My past sins came flying at me!
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