NOVEL NEXT Volume 3 – Chapter 6
I woke up feeling…like shit, frankly.
Guhhhh…
My head was swimming. I was a groggy mess, and no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't remember what I'd done last night that left me feeling this terrible. I think I went on a date, maybe? With who, though? Iori? Maybe Haqua and Mio?
Eh, if I can't remember anything specific, I must've dreamed it up. No use fussing over it, anyway.
I didn't even remember going to bed, honestly. My awareness was at an all-time low, but I was certain of one very important thing: I was comfy in bed, and wanted absolutely nothing more than to stay there.
Was it a work day? A weekend? I honestly have no idea. In that moment, nothing mattered more than the ultra-cushy pillows and ridiculously soft blankets I was swimming in. The whole world could fade away, for all I cared. All I needed was bed, and if I felt a little greedy, maybe some love from my partners.
And y’know what? I am feeling greedy!
I had to guess Iori wouldn't be around…probably. She stayed the night every now and then, but…did she stay over last night?
Uhhh…
No good. My head was blank. My brain just wasn't firing right, like I'd forgotten how to navigate my own neural pathways. Mutt behavior, honestly.
Ah well, it didn't matter. Even if Iori wasn't around, Mio and Haqua sure would be. They always teased me like crazy, but whenever I needed some warmth, they were more than happy to provide.
Sometimes, Haqua even went a step forward and mommied me like crazy. It'd be embarrassing if I wasn't a succubus, but it was always soft and comfy, so I never rejected it when she was in the mood.
In fact, in my groggy haze, a little bit of mommying sounded perfect. So I rolled over to her side of the bed, and outstretched my arms, preparing to give her a loving hug.
Ohhh, this is gonna hit so good…
My excitement, tragically, wasn't to last, though. Instead of Haqua's amazing body, I found myself tightly hugging…nothing at all.
Hm?
Had Haqua gotten out of bed early? I guess that's not too rare. Definitely nothing to worry about, anyway. After all, if I just rolled over onto the other side of the bed, Mio would be right there waiting for me!
Take a bet how that went.
I rolled over, and all that was there to meet me was more blankets and pillows, with nary a Mio in sight.
Awww, I wanted to cuddle…
Well, it’s fine. They’re probably just relaxing in the living room. I don’t wanna get up just yet, but it’ll be so nice to take it easy with them a little later…
So I decided to relax, contenting myself with laying in bed, listening out for the comforting sounds of my partners going about their day. I bet I'd hear Haqua grinding levels in an RPG, or Mio giggling happily over her own writing. Ohh, that was always the best!
But…nothing.
I wiggled around a little, and heard my blankets getting shuffled around me, but…that was it. No gaming, no giggling, no sizzling pan from a tasty meal being prepared in the kitchen. Hell, I didn't even hear the city outside my window.
Just…silence.
And as soon as I let that sink in, I felt extremely nervous.
I wished, so badly, that I could just laze about all day. Maybe go back to bed and hope I might dive into someone's dreams. But I just couldn't bring myself to try, not like this.
With no end of hesitation and worry, I forced myself to open my eyes, and immediately let out a loud, shocked gasp.
I wasn't greeted by the sight of the apartment ceiling I knew so well, but instead, an ornate, crisp canopy that surrounded my bed. The kind of thing that only the mega-wealthy tend to own. Real princess-types, y'know? It was the kind of thing I'd never even think about buying, which led me to an immediate conclusion.
This isn’t my bed!
“What the hell?” I asked, pushing myself upright. My voice sounded…weird as I did. Deeper and gentler than usual. I'll be honest though, I was too freaked out by my surroundings to pay that much mind.
It wasn't just my bed. That was different, sure, but that barely mattered next to the ornately decorated, palatial room that housed it, especially considering the damn thing must've been at least triple my entire fucking apartment.
“Wh-where the hell am I?!”
I shouted as loud as I could, and tore myself free of the thick, heavy covers. I was ready to make a mad dash for one of the room's gigantic doors. The sooner I could get out of here, the better.
Not that I got the chance. The second my feet connected with the floor, it felt…wrong, like I'd never taken a step before in my life. I couldn't even begin to put my finger on what I was feeling, only that it was about as far from what I should've felt as possible. So naturally, my very first footstep sent me clattering straight to the floor, landing face first in a ridiculously plush carpet.
“Shit!” I cried, wincing as I nursed the beginnings of a bump on my head. I'd been way too distracted to give it any real thought earlier, but now, it was impossible to ignore the voice I kept speaking with.
It…it just wasn't mine. It couldn't be mine.
It was deeper, carrying more maturity than my bratty self had possessed ever since Haqua branded me, but…it wasn't even slightly in line with what I’d sounded like as a human, either. No matter how scared and startled I felt, this voice sounded weirdly confident and strong, making my every word sound as though it was an order. No matter what form I'd taken, ‘confident’ and ‘strong’ were the absolute last words any of my partners would use to describe me. I'm too pathetic to exist in the same damn ballpark as descriptors like those.
And yet, that didn’t mean the voice wasn't familiar to me…
“Wh-what’s going on?!” I cried, mostly to hear myself speak once more. I needed to know if my suspicions were correct.
And sadly, it looked as though they were.
This voice, it’s…
My head was clearing now, thinning the fog around my memories, and making me realize the enormity of the situation I’d been forced into.
The date, the kidnapping, waking up in Hell, being brought before the King, and forced into making a bargain I didn’t fully understand.
“What I need from you, Rina Saeki, is your life.”
The words she’d spoken sank deep into my soul, forming a pit in my belly that left me feeling ill and unsteady.
“Y-you’re kidding me, right?” I spoke, the voice a dead ringer for the one I’d heard before my collapse. I could see her fiery eyes boring a hole right through me as she stood tall and proud on her sharp talons.
I winced and looked down at my feet.
They were talons, just like hers. I’d been stunned by how strange it felt when they touched the floor earlier, as though walking was totally foreign to me now.
I clenched and unclenched them, shuddering at how dangerously sharp they looked as I did.
“Hya?!” I gasped, though with the voice I now carried, it didn’t sound even the slightest bit pathetic. No matter what I might say, this voice warped it into something cool and striking.
“Y-you didn’t! You didn’t!” I cried, hanging onto her last words to me.
She wanted my life, but that wasn’t a threat of violence. She wasn’t trying to kill me.
No, she was trying to become me, and that meant…
“I-I’ve gotta be dreaming!!!” I yelled, looking down at the feathers sticking out of my arms. They were the color of flame, just like the raging fire that had consumed me earlier.
“There’s no way this is real!!!!” I screamed, leaping to my feet. I wobbled in place for a moment, but thought back to how I’d watched her walk when she was in front of me, remembering the way her talons gripped the floor beneath her, as though she were showing the very earth she trod on who owned it.
When I copied that, movement came easily, and I found myself running before I knew it.
I-I’ve gotta get out of here!!!
I didn’t know where I was going, and I didn’t care. I couldn’t stay here. This wasn’t my home, that wasn’t my bed, and this wasn’t my body. I didn’t belong here, so I just took off, hoping that it’d somehow land me back where I needed to be.
It didn’t.
In fact, the first, massive door I bolted through simply led to a staggeringly large bathroom, practically a bathhouse unto itself, and before I could even begin to stop myself, I skidded and fell right into a gigantic, steamy bath.
“Bllmmmph?!” I gurgled beneath the surface of the water, stumbling around for a moment before bringing my head up for air. “C-c’mon, dumbass! Get it together, we can’t stumble nowwwahh!” I barked, trying to pick myself back up, only to wobble unsteadily and fall right back onto my butt, my body suddenly feeling so much heavier than it did a moment ago.
“C’mon, this isn’t fair!” I whined, looking down at myself and seeing a pair of soft, perky breasts tenting out a now completely soaked and totally transparent nightgown that revealed an adorably pink pair of puffy nipples.
Th-they’re so sexy…
N-no, no they aren’t! This isn’t right, dammit! You’ve gotta get out of here, dummy! Haqua’s gonna kill you if you don’t get home soon!
Despite the extreme temptation I was facing, I slowly, carefully picked myself back up to my…feet—let’s just keep calling them that for my sanity’s sake, please—and hurried to head back to the bedroom, sure that the one of the other doors I’d seen had to lead outside.
Yet, before I could, my eye caught something on the far end of the room: A tall, wide mirror, somehow totally clear despite the foggy air in the room.
And even at this distance, I could make out enough of my reflection to bring my brain screeching to a halt.
There was a tall, confident-looking woman whose hair, even when it was drenched, looked every bit like a bright, blazing flame.
I-it really is…
I’d watched her strut back and forth in front of me, looking and acting like she owned the world. In a way, she wasn’t wrong to think that.
Despite my desperation, I found myself slowly heading closer and closer to the mirror, noting that my reflection showed me walking with a cocky, eye-catching wiggle in my hips.
I-it’s real, isn’t it?
I reached the mirror and rested a hand on it. It didn’t look like mine at all, but why would it?
No matter how hard I want to believe this is a dream…She did it, didn’t she?
I looked up, gazing right back into the now bright, blazing eyes I possessed. They were cool and measured, carrying the unwavering determination you’d expect to see only on royalty.
There was the Demon King Suzume, the ruler of Hell herself. And I was the one puppeteering her body.
Which could only mean one thing.
I threw my head back, and let out a cry loud enough to cause an interdimensional incident.
“I’VE BEEN TURNED INTO THE DEMON KING?!?!?!”
There was no denying reality anymore, and no hope that I could run and run and stumble back into my apartment, free to live my own life. I wasn’t a succubus anymore, I wasn’t a human like I’d once been, I wasn’t even Rina Saeki.
A certain deeply arrogant asshole king had stolen my body away, and forced me into hers.
I was Suzume, King of Hell.
“Dammit dammit dammit! OW!!!” I yelled, kicking at the mirror, only to realize what a terrible idea that was with talons and swiftly bring myself to a halt. “What the hell do you want from me, stupid fucking sparrow! I’m an OL, I can’t rule Hell! I don’t even know what kind of demon I am now, you damn jerk!!!”
No, this voice wouldn’t let me sound pathetic, but fuck if I wasn’t gonna try and make it work.
“Am I some sort of harpy, is that it?! You’re meant to have wings, jerk!” I yelled, sticking out my tongue at my reflection, as though Suzume might be able to see it. I didn’t, honestly, know the first thing about harpies, but I knew I was mad at Suzume, so that was enough for me to want to yell about this, all the same. Still, as I rested my hands atop a pair of cushy, feathery hips and looked back at the tailfeathers above my stupid, royal butt, drenched and weighed down by the bathwater I’d fallen into, it was hard to think of her as anything else.
A-and if I am, does that mean that I now…
I put a hand to my tight, firm belly, as thoughts of egglaying filled my stupid mutt brain.
“Oh fuck, that…that sounds pretty good, actually…”
“A-and I mean, if I’m gonna be in another body…” I murmured, posing in the mirror. I looked ridiculous in this drenched nightwear, and yet…that just made the appealing curves beneath it that much clearer to me. “I-it’s kinda hard to say I’m not a hottie, uehehehehehe…”
Oh, come the fuck on!
I wanted to scream at myself now. Here I was, forced into another body entirely, where I’d assuredly be made to play figurehead for all of Hell, and I was getting excited about…about what?! Being hot?! Laying eggs?! Getting forced into the most embarrassing job I’ll ever hold?!
…
Shut up, I know exactly what you’re thinking. I don’t wanna hear a word of it, got that?!
“I’m…I’m so hot that it’d be a shame not to do something about that, right?”
…Not when I have much bigger things on my mind.
“At the very least, I’ve gotta…gotta check this body out, right?” I asked, wearing an uneasy smile as I started to lift my clothes off. “R-right, I’ve gotta! After all, it might not really be her body, so…so… Screw it, it’s coming off!” I yelled, tearing everything off and casting it aside, leaving my kingly body completely, utterly nude.
“Huohhhhhh!! Suzume, you’re a bombshell!!!” I cried, my breathing growing heavy as I admired every one of her lovely curves.
She wasn’t as stacked as any of my other partners, frankly (though she was miles ahead of my bratty body, I’ll tell you that), but she made up for that with a toned, athletic figure that made what curves she did have that much more exciting, like every part of her body was begging to get squeezed, pinched, and played with. A king like her would never allow it, of course. She’d fend off anyone who even looked at her with anything less than the purest intentions, but while I was the one in control, she had no say of it, and the sight of her stupidly handsome face perving out over her own squishy butt and perky titties was way too hot to not excite me.
Honestly, were I in my own body, I’d have dropped all pretense and started masturbating right then and there, diving headfirst into the pleasure I so desperately craved.
So…why wasn’t I doing that now?
I wanted to. Hell, I felt like I needed to, but as I went to cup Suzume’s boobs, feeling their gentle weight between my fingertips, a part of me seemed to insist that…I shouldn’t? A voice, yelling at me about what’d happen if someone else saw me, how they’d see me bucknaked and playing with myself right out in the open.
L-like I don’t know that! That’s half the fun! Anyone might see me and…hoo, a-anyone might see me…
It was at that point that I realized that the baffling thing I was experiencing wasn’t new to me. In fact, it was something I’d once been deeply familiar with.
I was embarrassed.
And no, not in the mutt-ish way where I crave it and want more and more of it. No, instead, it was the kind of embarrassment that told me to hold back, to wait until I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was alone, so that nobody else would see me.
I’d lost all of this when I became a succubus. We were demons of lust, we had no need for such things. But while I was still a demon, Suzume simply wasn’t of the same ilk at all.
And so, though I’d lost them completely, I’d been saddled with a staggering debuff: Inhibitions, embarrassment, shame. No matter how confident Suzume might be, no matter how strong her brain might be at handling the attention a king warrants, when it came to all things lust, her reservations lay far more in line with the average human.
But no matter what body you stuck me in, or however many inhibitions you stuck me with, there was one thing you simply couldn’t take from me: I’d always be a horny mutt.
I-I shouldn’t. I really shouldn’t, it’s not even my body, but…
Slowly, I ran a hand down the curve of her waist, inching it closer and closer to her toned, yet wonderfully soft thighs.
“Nn~!” I gasped. Her skin was sensitive, her inner thighs not at all used to this kind of attention. Still, I brushed my fingertips across them, inching them closer and closer to the lips that so desperately needed my touch.
I dunno how I hadn't noticed it til then, but my eyes wandered to her crotch, and I felt my cheeks catch fire at what I saw.
I'd expect a girl this fancy to be clean shaven down there, but…well, that wasn't the case. It wasn't exactly like she had pubes though, either. Instead, where any hair might've been was…feathers. Soft, downy, currently damp feathers. It was deeply, deeply embarrassing, and also intensely fucking hot.
Fuck, harpies are real perverts, huh…?
My breathing was growing heavier and heavier. I felt like I was melting just thinking about playing with myself. I hadn't felt this excited, this ashamed in forever, and it was drowning my mind in ecstasy.
My finger rested on Suzume’s pussy for maybe a split second, before a loud, furious voice sounded out through the cavernous bathroom.
“DON’T YOU DARE LAY A HAND ON LORD SUZUME, YOU PERVERTED MUTT!!”
“Y-Yamada?!” I gasped, spinning around on my heels, turning bright red at the sight of a maid dashing towards me.
“My name is Radiata!” she corrected, before throwing a blindfold over my eyes and binding my wrists and feet with her web, sending me clattering straight to the ground.
“Gwuh!” I cried, as I slammed boob-first onto the floor.
“Ah! Lord Suzume! My apologies, I didn’t intend any harm to come to your body!” she panicked, scooping me up into her arms.
“I-It’s not Suzume…” I wheezed. “It’s Rina…Rina Saeki…”
“Y-yes, I understand Lord Suzume, but-”
Evidently, Radiata realized her mistake, as she froze, and quickly cleared her throat.
“I-I knew that, of course!” she insisted, and I felt the gentle rocking of her carrying me back to the bedroom. “My concern for my Lord only briefly confused me. Don’t you dare think that you possess even a fraction of Lord Suzume’s brilliance,” she scolded.
“Yeah, got it…” I sighed, remembering that, for as much as I wanted to trust the woman I’d thought was my co-worker, she was every bit as involved in my current predicament as the dumb sparrow I’d become.
I felt the bindings on my hands and feet get sliced clean off, and not a moment later, my body was thoroughly warmed-through, casting off all the chill of the water that had clung to my skin.
“My Lord deserves better than a drying spell,” Radiata started, sighing heavily. “But it would be a disgrace for me to dry her body by my hands, and I certainly don’t trust yours,” she spat. “Clothing, however, is another matter…”
I felt a blush creep into my cheeks at the thought that I was nude in front of a total stranger. Haaah, embarrassment is kinda fun~!
“I-I can dress myself, if you want,” I said, clearing my throat bashfully. “I know my word’s worth dirt, but I promise I won’t peek at the goods.”
“Cheap talk coming from someone who already has,” Radiata grumbled, making my blush come back even stronger.
“R-right, yeah,” I chuckled. “But unless you want Ms. Sparrow to be a nudist, we need to do something about this, right?”
“Her, and now your name,” Radiata started, evidently repulsed by her own words, “Is Suzume. You are not to shorten it, or give yourself any undue nicknames. Do I make myself clear, Lord Suzume?”
I gave a nod, but voiced a small objection.
“Look, could you at least call me Rina in private? I, uhhh, I’d like to still feel at least a little bit like me.”
“My Lord would prefer you embody your role completely, and I intend to follow her orders.”
“Right, but like, while I’m your lord, can I give any orders of my own? Even just the one!” I tried to reason with her.
“You may not,” she coldly replied. “But…as a matter of convenience, fine. I will, on occasion, call you by Rina Saeki’s name, though you’d best not take it as your own.”
She was doing me a solid, but with how she treated my own damn name like it was someone else’s, it hardly felt like it.
“Now stand still. I shall clothe you myself.”
“Is that really necessary?! I promise I won’t do anything bad! I swear!”
“It is,” Radiata bluntly replied, and not a second later, I felt clothes being pulled onto my figure. Radiata’s hands moved quickly, like she didn’t want to let this moment last even a second longer than it needed to. Every now and then, I’d feel her fingers brush against my skin, but before I could so much as think about saying something about it, she pulled her hands away again, taking great pains to not repeat her mistake again.
And soon, my blindfold was removed, and I was greeted by the face of my once-coworker.
“There,” she said, dusting off her gloved hands as I looked down at myself and saw the outfit Suzume had worn when she stole my body. “Be grateful, Honorary Lord Suzume. You are draped in the most radiant finery in this or any realm.”
I wish I could say any part of me was happy about that, but all this outfit did was make this absurd situation feel that much more real. I’d become the king of hell, a fine villainess through and through, with no part of me reflecting the yappy mutt I really was.
“Fuck, she’s pretty…” I muttered, turning and checking out my body as much as possible.
“Not ‘she’, you,” Radiata said.
“I get it!” I barked. “But give me some wiggle room, dammit! I just woke up like this!”
“‘Wiggle room’ will not be afforded,” Radiata told me. “Do you understand the position you’re in?”
“No, and that’s the problem!” I yelled, stomping a taloned foot. “Suzume didn’t explain a damn thing! At no point did she tell me she was taking my whole damn life from me!”
“She said exactly that, as a matter of fact.”
“R-right before she took it!”
I felt exasperated. Radiata was determined to not give me so much as an inch, it seemed.
“Lord Suzume expressed herself perfectly,” Radiata coldly replied. “It certainly isn’t her fault that your brain falls so woefully short of being able to understand her.”
“Well I’ve got Suzume’s brain right now,” I argued, pointing at my temple. “So any insults you throw at me are going squarely to her!”
“...A child’s argument. That you would muster it with a mind as remarkable as Lord Suzume’s is deeply shameful.”
“Guh.”
“But I will grant you that your soul likely hasn’t acquiesced to its new home just yet. Perhaps even your pathetic stench will mellow in time.”
“Ohhh, implying your king smells pathetic, huh?” I smirked, raising my arm and giving her a peek at my armpit.
“I-I am doing no such thing!” Radiata scowled. “Lord Suzume is the very picture of perfection, and no guest in her body could ever taint that!”
Ohhh, you might be fun to tease, Radiata. Wish you’d shown me more of this side back in your Yamada phase, I’d have fallen for you in no time.
“So,” I started, sitting down on the side of what was apparently now my
stupidly big, luxurious bed. “What position am I in? Explain it to me simply, I’m a birdbrain now.”“You insolent-”
“King,” I cut her off. “I’m a king now, and you’re my maid. No insults.”
I was being a shit, I knew that, but, frankly, I’d earned a little bit of a chance to bite back.
“My investigation was thorough, you enjoy being insulted.”
“Rina Saeki likes insults, but you keep saying I’m not her anymore, so I guess the luster’s just gone!”
Maybe soon that’d feel like daggers, absolutely slicing my heart to ribbons, but for now, I was having too much fun to tease her to feel any kind of regret.
Then again, her words hurt good… M-maybe later, I’ll rescind that order, and she’ll be so pissed off at me that she’ll really make me feel like a useless bitch! Doing that to royalty, fuck, that’s hot, uehehehehehe…
Still, I buried that lust as much as I could (which is much easier when you’re not a lust demon, naturally), and smirked as she bashfully cleared her throat.
“Very well, Lord Suzume,” she nodded, emphasizing the name harshly, reminding me that I was trapped in this role. “Allow me to clear any confusion.”
“Please do!” I grinned, crossing my legs and discovering that that’s way less comfortable when you’re part bird. I’d have to work on that.
“Lord Suzume is conducting a survey of your realm, but the throne of Hell simply cannot be left empty. To that end, she came up with an ingenious plan: To switch bodies with a demon who calls the human realm home, and entrust them with the throne in her stead.”
I seem to recall a certain someone trying to object to it last night, but now it’s ingenious?
I didn’t voice that doubt. It wasn’t important now. Radiata was obviously very dedicated to her job, so it hardly surprised me that she was playing nice.
“So I’m totally stranded here?! I can’t go back home, or see my partners, or any of that?”
“Many would kill to be ‘stranded’, as you claim,” Radiata sharpened her gaze, sending a chill down my spine. “But no, you are to act as Lord Suzume herself would, and she would not leave her domain so frivolously.”
“Can I at least call them?!”
“You may not.”
“Right, nice knowing you,” I said, matter of factly. “Nice knowing Suzume too, she’s screwed.”
In the blink of an eye, Radiata unsheathed the knife she kept strapped to her thigh, and held it to my throat, her eyes filled with murderous intent.
“Is that a threat, Rina Saeki?”
I was about ready to piss myself. I held up my hands, and started shouting.
“No!!! You’re way too jumpy! What the hell do you think I’m gonna do about it?!”
“...Your power is immense.”
“No it fucking isn’t! You were way off the mark with me!” I yelled. “Look, Haqua is very protective of me, and as soon as she realizes someone’s stolen my body-”
“Ah, then there’s nothing to fear,” Radiata assured me, not moving the knife away for a moment. “Lord Suzume is endlessly talented in everything she does. She will play your part to perfection. None will be aware of the truth of the matter.”
“R-right…” I muttered. I wasn’t sure how assured I was, but I also really didn’t like being inches away from a blade. “C-can you at least put the knife down? You don’t wanna commit regicide, right?”
“A foolish notion. None can kill Lord Suzume,” Radiata scoffed, but she relented, and stayed her weapon.
Right, but it’s me in here, you remember that, right?! You could probably kill anything, I’d be a total pushover!
“To that end, you and My Lord will act similarly. She will play you, and you will embody her. You will perform her duties to perfection, act as she would act, and allow nobody to see that the true king is absent. If that means you must scrub all notions of being Rina Saeki from your mind, then I suggest you do so quickly. You are Lord Suzume, burn that into your very soul.”
I gulped. She was being so hardcore about this, and undoubtedly with good reason. It’d be a huge problem if people caught wind of who I really am. Shit, it could throw all of Hell into chaos.
I…I really didn’t want to leave Hell’s people high and dry just because their king had decided to throw a fit and force me to work her job. What selflessness I had told me I needed to comply with this.
But I think it’s important to remember something here: I’m deeply pathetic.
So naturally, I replied the only way I could.
“Hell no,” I said, picking myself up off the bed and walking for the door. “Absolutely fuck this. There’s no contract, you’ve got nothing on me except my body, and I’ll just get used to being a bird if I have to. I’m going home and spending time getting my brains fucked out by my partners. I miss ‘em, and they might even miss me, and nobody’s taking me away from them. Find somebody else to play the sparrow, ‘cuz I don’t give a shIT?!”
A knife whizzed by the side of my head, before landing with a loud thunk in a distant wall, taking a few strands of fiery-red hair along with it.
“Wha…”
I felt my knees growing weak. I started to wobble where I stood, before dropping straight to the ground and letting out a loud cry.
“WHAT THE HELL?!?! YOU COULD’VE KILLED ME!!! I-I’M YOUR KING, DAMMIT!!!” I wailed, feeling ready to pass out.
“I’m so glad you understand, Lord Suzume,” Radiata said, as she fetched her knife from the wall, coldly stowing it away once again. “After all, while there may not be a contract, you made an agreement, did you not? One that I bore witness to. My Lord’s word is ironclad, contracts do not matter here,” she said, staring down at me coldly. “What do you think might happen to Rina Saeki if she breaks an agreement made with the esteemed king of hell, hm?”
Fuck.
I didn’t know what Suzume would do, but considering she was literally the king of demons, I…I had some guesses. I’d be lucky if I was put to death. Whatever she did, even a hardcore masochist like me couldn’t get excited by the idea. This was bad.
“B-but-”
“Nobody is to find out, do I make myself clear?”
“Y-yes, Ma’am…” I mumbled, too frightened to even be turned on by how thoroughly humiliated I was.
“My Lord, it is most unusual for you to address me that way. One might think you aren’t your esteemed self at all…” she said, her voice dripping with malice.
“G-got it, got it!” I yelped, leaping up to my feet and backing away from her. “I’m Suzume, I’m Suzume!”
“And that would make me?” Radiata asked, adjusting her skirt just enough to show me a glint of her knife.
“M-my handmaiden, Radiata…”
For a moment, Radiata just stood there, though there was an undeniable tension to the many legs on her back, like she was ready to strike at a moment’s notice.
D-did I say something wrong?!
Not a moment later, she calmed herself, wearing a gentle smile as she bowed gracefully.
“Indeed, and as your handmaiden, there is not a single aspect of your life that I am not intimately aware of. So fret not, My Lord, and place your trust in me,” Radiata said, holding out a hand for me.
“Y-you want to help me?”
“My life has always been dedicated to serving Lord Suzume, and I see nobody but My Lord before me now,” she smiled.
I still felt intensely scared, but…there was something calming about her smile. She’d threatened to kill me so many times now, and almost all of our relationship was predicated on lies, but…I really did want to trust her. Nobody else would recognize me like this, nobody would ever know who I really am on the inside.
“I have worked hard to keep your schedule as light as possible for the next week, My Lord, The work will surely prove to be no trouble to someone as capable as yourself.”
And here she was, someone who clearly hated me, at least trying to make things easier on me.
Call it intense Stockholm Syndrome if you want, but I just didn’t have it in me to reject that kindness.
So with a nervous smile, I took her hand, and gave her my best impression of Suzume.
“Indeed, Radiata. With you by my side, I shall show my denizens that I am a ruler without equal.”
Radiata looked stunned for a moment, her eyes widening in shock.
Too overblown? Shit, I thought it sounded good, but-
Suddenly, Radiata smiled at me, and she gripped my hand firmly, yet warmly.
“Just so, My Lord. As always, I place my faith in you.”
Well damn, maybe I’m not so bad at this kingly stuff! If Suzume’s really as good at impersonating me as Radiata thinks, then maybe this’ll all work out OK!
You hear that, Suzume?! I don’t wanna do this at all, and I’m still gonna give it everything I’ve got! So you’d better do the same!
Besides, if you don’t…
I started shuddering, thinking about what Haqua and the others would do to the girl.
Even I wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of that, damn.
