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Apparently, I woke up a few days later.

“Ah, he’s awake.”

Peering into my face was none other than Senior Marlene.
She pressed her forehead against mine, then nodded with satisfaction.

“Your mana and spirit waves are normal. No sign of aftereffects.”
“Uh, where…?”

Not that I really needed to ask.
This was my room inside Grünstadt Castle.

So, I didn’t die…”

I let out a breath of relief. If I’d died there, the Demon Lord would be scolding me in the afterlife by now.

But Marlene’s face turned stern.

“Charging recklessly like that—is that a habit of all werewolves, or just your personal flaw, Veit?”

Ow, ow, Senior, stop grinding your knuckles into my temple…

“So, uh, what happened after that?”

I ducked away from her persistent attack and asked what I most wanted to know.
She placed a hand on my shoulder and, in a voice gentler than I’d ever heard from her, told me:

“It’s all right. There’s nothing for you to worry about. Teacher handled everything.”

After I lost consciousness, the royal guards apparently carried me off. Then the dragonkin who had retreated were summoned back, and both the Demon Lord and the Hero’s bodies were laid to rest.
It was around that time that Master regained consciousness.
More precisely, she sensed the disappearance of those two overwhelming presences—the Demon Lord and the Hero—and forced herself to Grünstadt even though she was hardly in any condition to move.

Everything afterward was thanks to Master’s effort.
She spent the whole night exhausting every possible means for the Demon Lord’s sake, but in the end neither treatment nor resurrection was possible. Once death is complete, not even a Demon Lord or Hero can be revived.
At last, haggard and in tears, Master pronounced the Demon Lord dead.

The Demon Lord’s body was carried to the mausoleum beneath Grünstadt Castle and laid to rest in its underground tomb.
Among demons there isn’t much tradition of funerals or wakes. Living close to nature, they learned that if you don’t bury the body quickly, you can’t protect it.
A memorial rite would surely be held in time.

The Hero’s body was returned to the Miraldia army, who had been waiting outside the mist for his return.
Master had hoped to let his comrades mourn him properly—but apparently, they were terrified beyond their imagination.
The fatal wounds were the work of a great wolf’s fangs.
They assumed, wrongly, that the Hero had failed to slay the Demon Lord and been torn apart by his werewolf underling. Believing the Demon Lord still lived, they abandoned the body and fled.
We couldn’t simply leave him there, so the Hero was given a temporary burial at Grünstadt Castle. His bones would eventually be returned to his homeland.

Reconnaissance reported that the Miraldia army escaped the forest and returned to Bachen. The citizen militia dispersed in panic, and the regular army holed up in the city under the pretext of defending it.
I’ve heard ugly rumors are already spreading. Mostly about me. The Senate’s wanted notices will no doubt gain a few more lines.
In the end, neither army gained anything. Both of us lost our champions.
The Miraldia forces will stay quiet for a while.

The real issue is the Demon Lord’s Army.
With the Demon Lord gone, only the division commanders could lead—and Tiberit had already fallen. That left only my own Master, Gomoviroa.
In these past few days, she has comforted the dispirited troops, encouraged them, and at times scolded them into shape. Without her efforts while I lay unconscious, who knows what would’ve become of our dejected army.
By strength and by record, none is more suited than her to be the next Demon Lord.
She still hesitates, but I’ll persuade her.

After all, it was her who coaxed the Demon Lord into raising the banner in the first place. Until then it had been a mere small band of armed dragonkin.
With giants like Tiberit and countless demons joining, it grew into today’s Demon Lord’s Army. I myself was lured in by Master’s words.
So I’ll have her take responsibility to the very end.
And of course, I’ll stand at her side as her vice-command.

Still, what weighs most on me now is the Demon Lord’s mausoleum. I want to bid him farewell myself.
I rose from the bed. My body still ached in places, but I could at least move.

“I’m going to the Demon Lord’s mausoleum.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“No… if possible, I’d like to go alone.”

Marlene looked troubled, then smiled in resignation.

“…All right. Just don’t overdo it.”

She lent me her shoulder and, like in old times, stroked my head. A wave of nostalgia washed over me.
I must’ve made her worry quite a lot while I was unconscious.

When I stepped into the corridor, I was surprised to find the lieutenants of the First Division standing in formation.

Even Vice-Command Baltze was there, having arrived who knows when. Technician Kurtze and the royal guards as well.
When they saw me, they saluted in silence.
Their wordless feelings pressed upon me, and I silently returned the salute.
Then I left.

In the great garden behind Grünstadt Castle stood a stone mausoleum.
It was originally meant for the castle’s former rulers, but they never lay there. They’d been wiped out by fellow humans.
Now the Demon Lord slept within.

I placed an incense burner before the mausoleum and looked up at the solemn stone structure. There was no incense in this world, so I borrowed some fragrant herbs from Marlene.
After closing my eyes and pressing my hands together, I spoke.

“Demon Lord… going off alone like that is unfair.”

I had been reborn as a werewolf in this world—and at last I finally found another reincarnator. A fellow Japanese, no less.
The familiarity I felt with him was beyond words.
Neither of us spoke much of our past lives, but as fellow Japanese, we never ran out of things to talk about.

*‘Your Majesty. The bread in this world isn’t bad, but sometimes I just want rice.’*
*‘Mm. Compared to wheat, rice can sustain more people on the same land. We ought to spread its cultivation one day.’*
*‘Well, I was just saying I want to eat some…’*
*‘You are a werewolf, so you can eat grains. I, as a dragonkin, cannot. My body rejects them.’*
*‘That sounds rough…’*

Such conversations we often had.
I never learned who he had been in his previous life, but I could guess he’d been a workaholic.
Even in this life, he staked everything on his work and perished.
Quite the clumsy person, in retrospect.
Not even giving me his former name before he went.

Then a voice spoke behind me.

“So this is where you are, Veit.”

It was Master. When I turned, she was smiling at me as always.
But she looked weary, leaning heavily on her staff. Her complexion was poor.

“Are you okay, Master?”
“No need to worry. More importantly—you avenged the Demon Lord and Tiberit, didn’t you? Thank you, Veit.”
“I only struck down a wounded Hero who attacked me. Hardly something so grand.”

The Hero, Aerschis.
The man who took up arms, fought, and died, all to avenge someone with the name Meltia…likely.
Was Meltia his family? A lover? A master or perhaps a disciple of his?
Now that I think of it, maybe Aerschis was a reincarnator too.
That, too, is a mystery that will remain forever unanswered.

Master held out a sealed letter to me.

“The Demon Lord’s will. He wrote that it is to be given to you.”
“To me?”
“I have my own, separate letter. When you’ve finished reading, come to my room.”

Saying that, Master turned to the mausoleum and bowed her head in silence.