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«Mika’s side»

I was facing off with the excentric, or rather, perverted guy called Asmodens.

“Wha… what?!” he yelled. “My magic has no effect?”

He had been shooting magic in rapid progression for some time now.
He is also rapidly firing off indecencies and I’m completely fed up with it. If I don’t defeat him quickly…

All the magic was being absorbed into the bow Alim had crafted for me.

“Hey, isn’t this enough already?” I asked him. “I’ll defeat you, you know?”

I charged the bow with power and pulled the sinew to its limit. When I hit his head, he was brought down by the strike. As if to further increase the difference in stats between Asmodens and me, I felt magic power come streaming from my opponent.

The next one should definitely hit him; I’ll use Marking from the Secret Bow God Technique on the head that looks like a cow.
Marking had the effect, that no matter what direction I shot my arrows, they’d always hit the marked spot.

Soon, victory will be mine, won’t it?

“Haah… No way? Hey, you, little girl, do you maybe love him?”

Huh, just now, it looked like the sheep’s¹ eyes glowed…

Well, does that matter?
Because, even if I love my partner, it won’t change what I’ll do, right?

“I can tell how much you love him. Because I’m that kind of demon, right? Do you know? Your boyfriend… rather than you, I’d say he prefers the princess over there, you know.”

Does he plan to confuse me with these words? But it’s meaningless. We’ve known each other for 15 years and… Alim even apologized to me for sleeping in the same bed as Karua, and as an apology… erm… he hugged me closely when we slept.

So, I’m pretty sure that’s not the case.
But… but… maybe… huh? Perhaps…? Erm… what?

“Doesn’t it seem like that after all? You know, didn’t she sleep in the same bed with him right after they met for the very first time? No matter how much she asks of him? Compared to that, what do you have? Wasn’t it only recently, that you started to sleep in the same bed?”
“No… it’s different… she…”

My body trembled. I began to cry.

S-strange. What in the world?! Why would I start resenting Karua? Even though I never truly thought like that before! That girl and I are friends, you know! Moreover, Ayumu loves me…

“Did he tell you, that he loves you? That’s very presumptuous. I’d say, it was merely the influence of the joy of being reunited, that made him confess. The one Ayumu really loves, is Princess Karua. Because she has social standing, influence and money, and because of her attractiveness.”
“Uh… Ah… Karua… is not like that… Ayumu…”

It’s not like that, it’s not like that, it’s not like that! Ayumu loves me! And I love Ayumu! It’s absolutely not like that…

“You assert it’s not like that? Then let me prove it to you. Why did he give Princess Karua the accessory that bestows Great Protection upon her, and not to you instead? Shall I make a guess? Because…”
“Stop… no… it’s not like that… it’s not like that~…”
“Rather than you, it’s because Princess Karua is important to him. She’s the person he wants to protect. You… he just wants you to quickly get out of his sight.”
“It’s not like that… it’s not like that… he and… I… we’ve been together… since we were kids…”

Stop… already… please… stop… no way…

“Since you were kids? Heh, you make me laugh! Wasn’t he ready to skip out on his promise and leave his childhood friend out to dry, rather than miss out on a game? You know, as far as Ayumu is concerned, you are valued lower than a videogame. In short, he hates you.”
“That’s…”
“Yes, that’s right, I have more proof. Why did Princess Karua know about his squishy cheeks, and you had no idea about it at all?”
“Uuh… ah…”

Doesn’t Ayumu love me? Doesn’t he… ah-ha, ah-ha-ha!

“For one thing, that you still believe that, is good.”

Eh, wh-what…?

“If you get rid of your rival, it’ll be fine, you see. Look, who’s your real target? Him? Shouldn’t it be someone else? Shouldn’t it be the one who’s standing in the way of your love… that homewrecker? Look, just change where you’re aiming that bow, you have at the ready.”

Change where I’m aiming my bow…

“Shoot! Only then will Ayumu look at you again!”

Shoot… Ayumu will look at me again… Shoot at… the homewrecker…

I aimed my bow at her, pulled the string back, and let the arrow leave my hand.
The arrow flew towards Karua…

Never reaching her, it suddenly changed course right towards Asmodens, and pierced his sheep head.

The [Secret Bow God Technique – Quindecillion’s² Shot]… I forgot to undo… the Marking…

At the same time, my feelings of jealousy towards Karua cleared up.

Because it wasn’t true. If Ayumu hated me, he wouldn’t have shielded me from the falling glass shards, so… That about the Great Protection. Ayumu made me strong, and, for so many days, he leveled me up by continuously bringing down magic beasts. And furthermore, didn’t he give me lots of presents?

Isn’t this what being loved means? I wonder how I could have believed something so stupid. Moreover, he certainly slept in the same bed with Karua. But I’m sure he didn’t hold her closely, right? Heh-heh!

“No~~!? How? How did you unravel my illusion? Just how in the world?!”

Oh, so it was an illusion, huh? Because of that, I thought he knew about events from before my death. Those were my memories, weren’t they?

At any rate, if this was caused by magic power, it shouldn’t have been effective against me thanks to the difference in strength… Of course, it’s some kind of special ability, isn’t it?

Well, it was the right call to ready Marking! Because the direction was slightly off, I didn’t crush the whole head, but I’d say the result is all right!

“Fu̲ck~!? Since it came to that, I’ll do it this way~!”

The eyes of Asmodens’ bull head³ shone.

My breathing is getting heavy… my body, too… is awfully… hot… It’s suffocating…

Uh~, this sensation…
Ah…!

“Muah-ha-ha-ha… My magic bull eyes augment lust! Does your body feel hot? You probably can’t stand up? Isn’t your lower body lonely? Since you’re small, I’m not sure if it’ll fit, but I’ll make you regret being born a woma-… Aargh!?”
As I though, it was lust, was it?

I struck Asmodens’ bull head.

“Regret being born a woman… Did you just say that?”
“Y-you bi̲tch, how can you have such a calm face after being on the receiving end of my lust augmentation? How can that be? How~!”
“Well, how indeed? Take your time pondering about it in the next world, will you?” I told him and put all my power into the bow’s sinew.
“Gah… stop… stop it…”

I fired my arrow at Asmodens’ human-ish head in the center.

“Ghah~~!?”

The demon’s head flew off. A single SS-Rank magic core emerged from his body.
I defeated him, huh?

…Phew. Let’s reveal a bit, how my trick worked, right? It was because some time ago, Alim told me about the “zone”⁴… He taught me, that by going at a normal speed, I’d encounter situations, when I’d see things in my surroundings too late.

Really, that demon’s ability was powerful… Yeah.

However, during that interval, while I could see my surroundings in slow motion, I desperately… uh… thought, with all I had… about Alim’s smell… about the time we went into the bath together… about the time we slept in the same bed… Thanks to that, I managed to keep my self-control… And then, I took out an Amrita and drank it.

Of course, it completely recovered my health.

But… how can this be? I feel somewhat lonely, huh… The heat in my body and the weird… sensations have disappeared, but…
Yeah… When this incident is over, I should spend some time with Alim again. On that occasion, it’d be good if we had a lot of physical contact, right?⁵

Ah… but what if I can’t keep my self-control for several days…
After this, we’ll surely be busy, won’t we?

TL notes:
That was… not what I was expecting from a chapter focused on Asmodens. I guess it’s nice (or not so nice) to see that sky-high stats don’t make one immune to psychological attacks. Mika just got lucky when she was under Envy’s influence, this might have turned out very differently. The last serious battle for the protagonists we’ve seen in this series was… all the way back in chapter 22?

It’s also interesting to see how Asmodens’ dialogue changes once Mika is affected by the illusion; he stops using profanity and sexist/sexual remarks and his use of slang is much reduced (though the latter isn’t really visible in my translation), so it’s easy for the reader to realize, there’s something wrong.

1. This was the bull’s eyes in Japanese. Since the bull’s eyes causing lust was described in chapter 130, it’d make more sense for his other ability to be caused by the sheep.
2. This is 極一 in Japanese, meaning 10⁴⁸+1. That’s a 1 with 48 zeros, Quindecillion seems to be the English name for it. I might change this when I go over ability names in earnest.
3. Again, this was the sheep’s head in Japanese. Makes no sense the exact same ability that was described in chapter 130 would switch from the bull to the sheep.
4. Probably some time around chapter 102.
5. Looks like Alim is in for a tough (?) time.