“I don’t get it! Brother, what are you saying?!”

“Because I’m always here, you can never become ‘first,’ ‘supreme.’ So you can’t grasp my confusion. You say I’m always staring at the horizon—hah. That’s because I’ve got no drive. I’ve even run aground while looking for a goal.”

Become the strongest. Already done.

Save the one I love. Almost done.

Defeat my enemies. No one even dares make me their foe. Siblings or ascended Demon Kings, every attitude toward me is half dread, half retreat.

Save the world. True, half the Demon Kings lean toward ruin. But the world stands like bedrock. The Starry Sky Divine Kingdom looms, vast as constellations. Those so‑called evil gods are Bronze Age shadows, birthed after the first ancient god died in light. On the Demon Realm side, every elder Demon King is a double agent, ready to clamp down on the Ocean of Darkness whenever it heaves.

I have no wish. Fine. I also lack the usual protagonist’s whip—no forced motive, no clean reason.

“That’s why I say I’m a washed‑up protagonist, now playing the villain… oh, that joke probably flies over your head.”

I like telling jokes—the present’s trash talk, tomorrow’s memes, future punchlines—words tossed like pebbles on a river.

So—

Stini tilts her little head, a curious sparrow listening for rain.

Elina gives a graceful smile, gentle as moonlight, never awkward.

Raven puffs her cheeks, chin up, steaming like a teakettle, thinking alone.

Even Vega keeps that unchanged eerie smile, as if a few seconds of laughter were skipped like a scratched record.

Others… Augustus, Alpha, Abigail. They flare with anger, thinking I’m mocking them with nonsense, like sparks blown by a bitter wind.

Only two are different—

Ferrel keeps pace with me. We can’t understand each other on the deep axis of good and evil, but in language and banter, she matches me note for note, playing happily, like two larks riffing at dawn.

The other is Anna—

“I don’t understand! I get sad over it, I’ve cried for it, and I won’t deny any of that! But I’ll listen. I’ll push myself to understand with all I’ve got!”

“Just like you said…”

“Even if no one in this world understands you, even if everyone denies you, I’ll still stand beside you. Always.”

Steel clashed and screamed, a choir of blades, each note sharper, the pitch climbing like frost on glass.

Air burst and tore the sky. The boom shredded our eardrums. Blood welled from ear, eye, and nose. We swallowed the iron taste back down, like tide pulled by a black moon.

Cracks webbed across bone. I could feel muscle fibers snag in those fissures, pain scraping like salt on stone.

Organs screamed. The tremors broke the soft ones first. The blood‑flow system frayed, ready to collapse like a dam in flood.

Ah, a mortal body is so fragile, a clay lamp in a storm.

Hard to believe humans fought with such clumsy engines of flesh, and still smashed Demon King invasions time and again. A joke. An unbelievable tale told around a rain‑soaked brazier.

One piece ends; every melody must fall silent. So a deathmatch reaches its last step.

“…I don’t believe in forever, because I can’t understand forever. Not ever.”

Savior Demon King Andor said it, at a moment made for vows, for promises, for mountain‑oath and sea‑pledge—and chose denial instead, like blowing out a lantern at midnight.

I caught the tip of my beloved halberd. The point slid into Anna’s heart, and the shaft drove across, tearing two thirds of her chest like a split in winter ice.

“Then do you believe in the now?”

She should have had a chance to take my head with her Giant Scythe, a final stroke before our bodies cracked apart. But at the last moment—

She let go of her weapon.

One hand gripped the Long Halberd’s haft, bracing a body on the edge of unraveling.

Her other arm circled my neck. Her head rested on my shoulder, soft as a feather settling on river water.

She kissed my ear, warm as a candle in snow, and said:

“I’ll trade you ‘now’ for your ‘belief,’ again and again. How’s that, my timid brother?”

Do I need to ask?

Of course, when a girl wants a promise, saying yes boosts goodwill like spring rain on seedlings.

“All your terms lean my way. Why refuse? I’ll speak it, yes, yes—my ally, my lover, my sister—cooperation, delightful.” I kept the halberd steady. If I let go, Anna’s body would scatter like ashes. We held a brittle balance. “But why didn’t you cut me? Weren’t you set on a duel?”

“You said you wouldn’t die. I believe you. Even knowing you’re lying, I’ll still believe what you say.”

Is she… grinding my favor score?

“…Does it matter?” I asked, genuinely puzzled, a drift of fog over a deep lake.

“The duel was fierce, but the result—draw. The ending isn’t. The ending’s already written by you. The Savior Demon King saves Vineri’s royal capital. Yes, just like we planned. Haha. I won’t meddle.”

Anna leaned closer. Her lashes brushed my neck, ticklish like moth wings.

“…Even if you cut off my head, I wouldn’t die, dummy.”

“But… it would hurt.”

“No…”

“My heart would hurt.”

That kind of love line shouldn’t be spoken like a hammer to an anvil…

But it means her heart’s steady. She cares about herself, and caring for me comes from her own conviction. So she’ll follow it through, like a reed bending and never breaking.

I like independent girls.

“Well, by the plan, now we should—wait, something like that. But I hate bureaucratic tones. I’ll try to handle your leftover mortal troubles. You’ve done too many unforgivable things. The massacres, and the Catherine affair. A nightmare to untangle.”

“As long as you acknowledge me. Let me stand at your side. Tell me where you’re looking, what you’re thinking, who you want to kill, who you want to rob, what you want to destroy. Then I’ll be your subordinate, or your rival. As long as your legend still has me—can still add me—I’m content.”

“If you don’t mind, it might take five hundred years before you can visit the human world again. Worst case, we wait for a generation of humans to pass, for the elves to forget their pain, for the Aerian and the Demonfolk to make peace.”

“Mmh?”

The air turned awkward, like wind stuck in a bell.

Seems we misunderstood each other.

“…Uh, Brother, what did you say?”

“Wash your name clean, then bring you back to travel. Is… that wrong?” I asked, careful as stepping on thin ice.

“Hahahahaha—good, good. I only wished you’d tell me something. And now you’ll let me see the scenery in your eyes? Ku‑ku‑ku. My brother, you’re wonderful.”

Anna laughed with a sob in her throat, patting my back hard. She laughed till tears spilled, crying and laughing, soaking my shoulder like warm rain.

“What you give me… is far more than I imagined.”

She sniffed, then nuzzled my shoulder with a small bite, playful as a fox.

“The performance is over. The audience will go home. But no one said the festival must end after the music. Maybe we can slip to the afterparty?”

I moved my free left hand to wrap her waist, but she caught it, cool as a night breeze.

“No need… you can stay a bit longer…”

She took the posture of a secret tryst. Her arm rested on my shoulder. Our faces held a brief distance, space enough for a kiss to light.

Her face was pale, tears dried at the corners, yet her smile was light as dawn.

“But someone’s waiting for you, outside our little world. Miss Hero, Miss Arcane Engineer, Miss Priest, the young prince. They’ve all arrived.”

“Mm… from my pickup experience, when you’ve got a girl beside you, don’t say other girls’ names. But if she brings them up…”

“I’m magnanimous! Go play… I don’t care!” she said through clenched teeth, fierce as a cat guarding a dish, hesitating mid‑growl.

“Really?” I asked, knowingly foolish. Flirting needs that fog.

“How long can they live? A hundred years? Two hundred? I’ll always be here.”

That’s not generosity—more like looking down from a high tower. No need to poke the sore.

“Goodbyes are near… There’s time before I build the surface Demon Kingdom and the permanent gate. We won’t meet. As new lovers, shouldn’t you ask for something?”

“I think such requests should be made by the man.”

“Mm, but a girl’s shy request is more romantic.”

“Ku‑ku‑ku, Brother… fine, fine, I’ll say it. Parting is close. My fickle lover, will you give me a hot, passionate, romantic kiss?”

I cleared my throat and shifted into an operatic tone, velvet over steel.

“Of course. Your wish—let me fulfill it.”

Given Anna’s body—split horizontally across the chest, spine and ribs severed—there’s no way we can go further as a farewell. Our pocket world obeys physics. With a broken spine, the lower body won’t feel.

So, instead, a skilled kiss, loaded with feeling, solves most emotional storms. The rest we’ll have to break up to fix.

Tongues tangled like river vines. Lips met like warm tide and shore. Even our teeth nipped, affectionate as sparrows at seed.

Predators courting, painted scarlet, full of hunger and taking. Wild, ancient, seemingly without restraint, like fire dancing on old stone.

Yet beautiful. Sweet. Satisfying from the marrow—

—A kiss.