Volume 2, Chapter 5: Ira’s Resentment, Part 1: How Sad it Must be
“Oh… what beautiful crimson hair… this child will surely become a fine wielder of Ira.”
A large face with numerous wrinkles carved into it peered at me.
His height was twice my own, and it was likely that even if I squeezed out every ounce of mana in my body, my power wouldn’t even reach his feet.
Among the ruling Demons, he was a being with supreme power. With awe in their voices, those around him referred to him as such…
『Demon Lord』
And even among them, this man’s might made him a Demon Lord amongst Demon Lords.
He was a rare Great Demon King within this warring era, who even survived through the battles with heaven.
Fels Crowne.
His name was Fels Crowne, of 『Deceit』.
He was a wire-like man.
His thin stature was likely not graced by anything like muscles, and he had a characteristically kind expression one would think to be unthinkable of Superbia.
But even so, Fels was a long-lived Demon Lord.
… Even if that glory was a thing of the past.
“Ira… if you have that power, than perhaps you’ll even be able to unify the Demon World someday.”
While making light of all the other Demon Lords, but that being a case, the King who sat at the summit for much too long was already tired.
Desire wasn’t infinite. That’s why, while we didn’t originally possess lifespans, there are times when a longer life is the very reason for a decline in power.
He was severe, and vile, and merciless enough to earn the word 『Deceit』 in his name, and yet the one who had continued to pursue his desire all alone, the Lord Fels Crowne, was already dead.
Only because of his strong power, did he continue to sit on the Great Demon King’s throne.
Meaning in the end, that was the extent of his caliber.
His lukewarm bearing was enough to make me bear resentment just by looking at him, and yet, he was always nothing but kind to me.
Enough to make my Wrath grow hazy.
It was a tale of a time in the distant past, but even now, it remains vivid in my memory.
I would intently gaze up at his stagnant eyes, and wait for the next words to escape his mouth. And to me, the Great Demon King dropped to a severely dark tone.
The young me understood.
That was likely the reason an ordinary man like Fels was able to climb to the seat of Great Demon King.
“But this rate isn’t going to work out… we require the power of Leigie of Sloth, I guess…”
“Leigie… of Sloth?”
Unable to comprehend Fels Crowne… father’s words, I tilted my head, and he gave a grand nod, as if he had suddenly nodded off.
Only his silver pair of eyes continued to let off a dull light.
I’m not sure how much time had passed. Perhaps it was an instant, or perhaps there had been a space of several minutes of silence.
The Great Demon King slowly opened his mouth.
“Kanon. Henceforth… take up the name Ira Lord…”
“Ira… lawd?”
It was a name much too full of pride. I was a freshly born Demon, and I hadn’t even gotten to Knight Class.
But Father seemed quite certain of it. That I was to become a Lord of Ira.
Deceit was an accumulation of fiction.
The nature of Fels Crowne was to remove what existed, and build existence out of nothing.
That’s why me understanding the meaning of those words required the span of the next few thousand years.
Even if there are many who know my name, there are few who know its meaning.
The Castle of Shadows.
It was a palace, where even the shadows slept silently.
The ramparts that extended beyond the horizon was merely boorish, and its size rose great enough to befit the term, ‘towering above.’ The fortress of a Demon Lord.
The Lord of Sloth was to refer to a Demon Lord who forged himself in depravity.
This peerlessly vast Castle of Shadows was nothing more than that Lord’s bedroom.
His subordinates, whose numbers surpassed the thousands, existed for nothing more than to protect his sleep.
Heard Lauder. Boasting a rare kind of power, he was a Pride Demon who would never prostrate himself before anyone.
“Hm… Kanon… Iralaude, is it? Useless… do what you will.”
The strange Demons who held no higher directive than to attend to the ambitionless Lord.
“Kanon Iralaude… well, as long as you don’t try to disturb his sleep, then…”
Acting on an incomprehensible principle, the way of life of these Demons I had no way of grasping was something I had never witnessed before, and they delivered a bit of an impact to my mentality, but that was blown away when I saw the Lord himself. Blown all away.
Even now, I can recall it clearly.
The quiet air covering the entire fortress, and the black door, an incarnation of darkness.
On the other side of the door I had opened to introduce myself, the Lord simply whispered to himself alone.
… I’m kinda tired…
He didn’t seem to pay any mind to me, as I was taken up in silence, as the jet-black haired man directed his dead eyes towards vacant space.
The Lord of Sloth.
Leigie the Depraved. The sole Demon accepted to have pursued the foundation of Acedia to its limits, an ancient Demon.
As if he were the air, he lacked a distinct feel to him, but just by existing before my eyes, the vast amount of Magic you could even call absurd was clearly something extraordinary, even from the eyes of a fledgling like me, and he had much too less of a will.
It was such that even when I compared it to the preposterously high power of my father, I could quite distinctly tell that it was much, much higher.
At a single glance, I could tell by intuition.
Ah, so this is… the man who crushed a Great Demon King by merely being there.
No offense, or defense, but mere existence.
No charisma, or fighting spirit, or even intent, but power alone he possessed. If you call one who’s thoroughly learned their Sin a Lord, then… yes, I see, he is surely worthy of being a Lord of Sloth.
There was status, and honor, and then, there was a gathering of Demons that showed no interest in either of the two.
Even I, having seen all the Demon Lords that came to kneel before father, found that lifestyle to be exceedingly rare, and it invited on my anger.
These Demons… just what are they searching for in life?
Even when, as Demons, they possess power great enough to warrant the envy of others.
The haves, and the have nots. Talent can be cruel. The gap between my father, whose wrinkles grew deeper with age, and the one who came on as youthful after living an even greater amount of rime was more than clear, and for some reason, it irritated me.
And my father that brought me here, with nothing but a worn-out expression, pleaded to that Lord with a single sentence.
To the Lord who, while he wasn’t even doing anything, had an expression much more worn-out than father.
Those words were, quite likely, not what a Great Demon King was to address to his subordinates.
“Leigie… I’ll leave my daughter to you.”
I didn’t known the resolve or weight behind his words.
But the Lord of Sloth gave a response anyways.
He let only his face out from beneath the blankets, and the slovenly tone he answered in held no ambition. I couldn’t see a fragment of the makings of a Lord in him.
“… Just do whatever you want. It’s not like I’m the one who’ll be attending to her anyways.”
The compensation he paid for his power was… depravity.
A man adorned with the polar opposite of the anger that fueled Ira.
Change and stagnation. Perhaps precisely because they were opposites, that a principle exist in them to heighten one’s Wrath.
Father likely saw through that.
While staring at Leigie’s lifeless eyes, I frantically tried to think of the meaning behind father’s will, and unable to think of anything, what entered my eyes as they turned up to father expectantly, were dark eyes of nihilism.
If another were to see his spiritless expression, they likely would have evaluated it as not falling short of the Lord of Sloth.
As young as I was, his speech delivered a considerable shock to me.
“Kanon… introduce yourself. He is the lone one to have spent his eternity in solitude. In this endlessly vast Demon world, the sole… Lazy King.”
He pushed my back, and I took a step forward.
But I was still frantically thinking.
His recklessness. The intent of the aged Great Demon King.
Even before the Great Demon King, the eyes of the Lord who didn’t pay any mind to it in the slightest, were horridly muddled.
And oddly enough, that was the vey answer to the question of, ‘for what sake is he living?’ I had thought the first moment I met him.
There was no meaning in this man’s life. No goal. No reason.
His life that couldn’t be worn by any other Demon Lord was the cruel meaning behind the solitude my father spoke of.
Just how sad a thing must it be?
That was the first time I felt an emotion opposite to resentment.
Just as father said, I lightly raised the edges of my skirt in the gesture that had been thoroughly beaten into me, and gave a polite bow.
I didn’t feel anyone’s eyes on me. Even while his pupils were directed ahead, this man wasn’t looking at me.
He must be staring at whatever he does every day.
“Kanon Iralaude. The Sin I govern is Wrath. I’ll be in your care, um…”
I hesitated for a moment.
Leigie-sama? No, as the daughter of the Great Demon King, it’s unthinkable for me to use such an honorary title for another.
Leigie…san? That sounds too reserved. It doesn’t settle right.
Should I just drop the honorific? No, he’s someone father spoke up to this extent. He must be deserving of some respect.
Being left with him meant that we would be becoming family.
I already have a father. But let that be the case, there’s no way this one’s little brother material.
The hesitation was only an instant. With as much affection as I could muster, and, with Wrath backing my tone, I called that name… the pitiful name of the Lord o Depravity.
“… Leigie-niisama.”
That was likely the starting point.
And I, in the long life that followed… in spending a timeframe much longer than that which tormented my father before me, I came to know the significance of the Lazy King’s name.
But no matter how much time passed by, niisama was to stay as niisama.
And as if he were in hibernation, the way he would never leave the Castle of Shadows, was never to change.
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