Home/The Seven-Year-Old Village Chief of Exile/ch 13

Chapter 13

I pulled myself together again.

Right now, more than my petty jealousy and worries, saving a child who had been unjustly separated from her mother was the priority.

"Libby unnie, Aunt Daliss. You heard that, right? We're going home now. I'll contact you again once we're in the forest."

[Okay. Come back safely!]

[Everyone...]

Aunt Daliss pleaded with tearful voice.

[Please, take care of Flora...!]

"I'll protect her with my life."

Ian said in a rather dashing tone.

After the video call ended.

"If someone saw you, they'd think you rescued Flora all by yourself?"

I glared at Ian with half-lidded eyes.

Embarrassed, Ian cleared his throat awkwardly.

"Ahem, th-that was to reassure Aunt Daliss..."

"Yeah, sure. Ian oppa, who wants to be Flora's new daddy."

"That's not it!"

Ian denied it with a red face, but no way.

"Don't worry."

I patted Ian's arm as if to cheer him on.

"I actually knew you liked Aunt Daliss."

"Wh-what...?"

"And I'm not the only one. Everyone knows."

"Even I, who's only been in the village for a day, knows."

Verity quickly chimed in.

No matter how tolerable it was, exile life was mentally taxing.

In such harsh conditions, Ian's hopeless crush became a small amusement. It also gave hope that life was still bearable.

"They say misery loves company."

I cheered on Ian's love.

"There's only a fine line between a slave and a prisoner, so the chances of you and Aunt Daliss getting together are huge. Of course, if she doesn't like you, I'll take her side."

"Oh, that brings back memories. The ancient nobles used to hold things like 'you're a slave,' 'transfer slave,' 'breeding hell' to increase their slave numbers."

Verity murmured wistfully, "Those were the days without human rights..."

---

I made a wish to Verity and received some clothes, then dressed Flora in them.

Flora's current attire was worse than a prisoner's uniform. If I took her back like this, Aunt Daliss would surely be heartbroken.

"Flora."

After she was fully dressed, I spoke.

"From now on, you must never cry. You can't make any noise either."

"Mo, Mommy..."

"That's right. We're going to your mom."

"Mommy..."

"Yeah, let's go together."

To Flora, who was sobbing and repeating "Mommy," I put on the cloak that erased presence.

"Can you do it?"

"...Yes."

As if vowing not to cry anymore, Flora pressed her lips together, tears beading on her long lashes.

"Good. Let's go!"

We retraced the route we'd used to sneak into the Deste mansion.

For faster movement, Flora was carried in Ian's arms.

The mansion was still quiet.

"......"

I voiced a question that had been nagging at me.

"For a place with no people, isn't the mansion too clean?"

"Maybe the employees are locked up somewhere?"

At Ian's counter-question, I nodded.

"From what we've seen, this mansion is in the hands of that fat rat and the demon. But I don't think they'd clean the mansion themselves."

"Add the skinny rat, and that's three."

Verity reminded us of the other rat we'd forgotten.

For the record, the fat rat Ian had knocked out was injected with a sedative.

It was me who gave the injection. The reason was that since I was a minor, even if I got caught, it would end with a warning.

"We can't save the employees too. We have our own priorities right now. But if what we're doing ends up hurting them..."

The words "that would be a big problem" never came out.

Because it was already a big problem.

Verity and Ian spoke in turn.

"Wait a moment. I feel something..."

"Lord Verity, I smell blood."

"My Lady, stay close to me."

Ian held Flora deeper in his arms so she couldn't see outside.

Verity also brought me to his side and wrapped his arm around my shoulder.

Soon, we arrived at the second-floor hallway, which overlooked the first-floor entrance hall.

"......"

We found the bodies of the employees we'd been worried about just moments ago.

A mountain of corpses piled up in the spacious entrance hall.

And beneath them, an inverted pentagram and a circle drawn in dark red blood.

A summoning circle...!

It was a demon summoning circle, now all too familiar.

"Oh dear, oh dear."

Someone leisurely walked out from behind the pile of corpses.

The gaunt man smiled with a troubled air and pushed up the bridge of his glasses with his finger.

"You've seen it."

"......Wow."

Stunned by the shock, we miraculously came to our senses at the man's cringey manner and fled in a hurry.

"I'm telling you, nothing makes people's faces go blank faster than socially inept otaku speech!"

"Lord Verity, what's an otaku?"

"Ian oppa, that's not what's important right now."

"Right. The real problem was that smug finger, perfectly angled as he pushed up his glasses, reveling in his own cringeyness...!"

"That's not what's important either!"

As my running speed slowed significantly, Verity hoisted me onto his shoulder like a sack of rice.

And he explained about the horrific scene we'd just witnessed.

"That is the biggest reason the succession ceremony is forbidden."

Succession ceremony.

The worst taboo of forcibly transferring the payment for summoning a demon to another person.

"As I said before, the succession ceremony requires a price comparable to, or even greater than, demon summoning."

The cost of interfering with dimensions is originally the summoner's burden.

Because the cause created the result, they must bear the inevitable causality.

But trying to pass it on to someone else is a direct denial of causality.

"Ordinary payment isn't enough. So they usually have to offer a price close to a life."

"Life..."

I recalled what I'd read in Clavis in One Volume.

'Life.'

The one and only resource that cannot be replaced by anything else.

That's why life is the most valuable payment in demon summoning.

But since you only have one life, people usually offer something that contains the traces or symbolism of life.

'Like bodily fluids...'

Hadn't I traded with demons using spit and blood?

"So all those...!"

Were they killed? Ian, who wanted to ask, kept his mouth firmly shut. He was careful not to let Flora, in his arms, hear.

But there was no need.

"Mommy was..."

Whether the vibrating scent of blood triggered a terrible memory, Flora, with a frightened face, kept muttering the same thing.

That Mommy was there.

'Viscount of Deste, you insane bastard...!'

I glared at the receding Deste mansion.

'You showed your own daughter the succession ceremony?'

Surely, just like now, there had been a mountain of corpses offered as payment. He showed that hellish sight to his young daughter!

Rage burned inside me. Why do bad people commit such horrific acts so casually?

And why can't they just stop at one?

Just then, a dreadful guess crossed my mind.

"Verity..."

I forced my trembling voice steady and spoke.

"What happens to the victim who is forcibly made to inherit the payment?"

Ian's sharp gaze met mine. He probably also guessed what I was getting at.

After a moment's pause, Verity spoke.

"...Forcibly bearing someone else's causality is extremely dangerous. It's fundamentally impossible. That's why such a huge price is needed."

"So, what happens?"

"They die."

"So..."

So Aunt Daliss was the only one caught in the act.

'She should have died in the succession ceremony, but because she survived, they made her a criminal and got rid of her. Because she knew the Viscount of Deste had summoned a demon.'

And behind the Viscount of Deste was the Emperor.

'Maybe this isn't the first time...'

The Deste side knew enough to execute demon summoning and succession ceremonies. That meant the Emperor had provided that much support.

'That means they have experience. This is absolutely impossible with just one or two attempts.'

There might be demons summoned this way all across the empire.

'Emperor, you absolute bastard...!'

---

After escaping the Deste mansion, the four of us ran without stopping.

"...Isn't this strange?"

Ian panted, catching his breath.

"Has it always been this quiet here?"

True to its reputation as a city of magical engineering, the Deste territory sparkled with bright lights until late at night. There were many people out and about.

But now it was as quiet as if the world had fallen asleep.

"We weren't in the mansion that long..."

"It seems to be the ability of that demon."

Verity set Hebenia down on the ground and said.

"Demons each possess a unique ability. From the looks of it, it seems to have put the entire city to sleep. Something like 'silence' or 'sleep'..."

"But why are we fine?"

At Hebenia's mutter, Verity pointed to the cloak.

"The cloak doesn't just hide presence—it also has protective magic."

"Protective magic...!"

Hebenia's eyes widened as she recalled an article she'd read in the newspaper.

"The Crown Prince is staying at the temple to reinforce the defensive magic spells..."

But she trailed off at the end.

She couldn't bring herself to say they should go to the temple.

'If the Crown Prince is at the temple, that means the imperial knights guarding him are there too.'

For Ian, who had been framed for embezzlement and sent to exile by his comrades' betrayal, imperial knights were an uncomfortable presence.

Moreover, if he ran into someone he knew, things would get even worse.

But Ian was composed.

"The temple always has protective magic active, so it won't be affected by the demon. We need to go there now."

"Ian oppa, are you sure you'll be okay?"

"With the cloaks, we won't be easily spotted."

Ian gently lifted the corners of his mouth as if to say not to worry.

"And it's better for Lord Verity to be able to fight freely. Flora must be exhausted too."

Ian glanced down at Flora, whom he'd been carrying in his arms.

Flora was keeping her promise not to cry. But since smelling the blood at the mansion, she had become noticeably more anxious.

They needed a place to rest, even for a moment, and the temple was the perfect spot.

"...How did you know?"

Verity's eyes went round in surprise.

"That I need to catch and beat that demon?"

"That's because of what we saw and heard earlier. Right, Ian oppa?"

"Yeah."

Hebenia and Ian exchanged glances and nodded.

"Just from what happened at the mansion, that demon is an irredeemable bastard."

"Bastard?"

"A no-good, absolute bastard."

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