If I were to die fighting, then so be it; there are no demons in this world who take their own lives. Jumping from the fortress was my way of trying to make them stop forcing me to feel emotions. By the age of six, I was able to manipulate my energy well enough to manifest a sword aura.

I would surround my body with energy to protect myself and deliberately jump onto a tree. If I got caught in the branches, it would look like I was lucky to survive. And that’s exactly what happened. After that, no one pressured me to express my emotions.

It was a peace that took six years to achieve. To those who didn’t know, it must have seemed like a child without feelings, jumping off in despair.

“I don’t want to go through that again. So please don’t force emotions on me.”

Just as I had finished speaking, the bell rang, signaling the end of the lesson. Zetak, who had been standing at the back without attracting attention, began to collect my books and writing materials.

“I decline your offer to help with lunch.”

If you’re going to interfere unnecessarily, don’t come any closer. Surely he’s not stupid enough to ignore the boundaries I’ve set. Bapharos didn’t try to stop me, so I made my way to the mess hall. As I walked down the corridor, a sudden thought crossed my mind and I turned to Zetak.

“How was it?”

“What do you mean?”

“You said earlier that you wanted to see me smile. Now that you’ve seen it, why don’t you share your thoughts?”

I was secretly hopeful. If he said it looked nice, I might consider smiling more often around him. A smiling face would certainly be more enticing than a blank one. But Zetak promptly dashed that expectation.

“It looked like a mask.”

With this answer, Zetak’s expression remained fixed. It was then that I realized he wasn’t in a good mood. For some reason, he seemed quite down, almost to a considerable degree.

“A mask? … Is it because I haven’t done it for so long?”

So I ended up being the laughingstock of the class for bragging about it. As I muttered to myself, Zetak seemed even more dejected.

“You said you jumped off the fortress when you were six. Did you feel the same way afterward?”

Caught off guard by his sudden question, I remained silent, unable to comprehend his intent, and he continued.

“You said that dying would bring you peace. I’m asking if you felt the same way when I served as your servant.”

“Oh…”

Of course not. It was a lie from the start.

“I’ve always felt that way.”

I replied, wondering if it might win me some sympathy. Even if it didn’t, if he took it as “He has no attachment to life, so there’s no point in killing him for revenge”, that would be fine too.

“I might still feel that way now. But I’m not sure. There’s no way to check if the emotions I feel are really like that.”

I wondered what kind of reaction I would get from him. I looked at him, but his expression was hidden under his hair. My words seemed to have little effect. As I started to walk again, I heard a low murmur behind me.

“So that’s why you were… standing by the window.”

What did he mean? As I thought about it, an old memory came back to me.

“It seems Your Highness really loves the garden.”

Whenever I stood on the balcony, Zetak would often ask me that question. He always did it, knowing exactly what my answer would be. It was as if he wanted to know what I was looking at.

“You’re always standing on the balcony looking down into the garden. What do you see?”

“I don’t look at anything… I just stand here.”

That was true. I wasn’t standing there looking at anything in particular. I opened the window and stood there whenever the wind blew. The cool air, which I couldn’t feel in the demon realm, was always refreshing. Did he think my behavior was that of someone contemplating suicide?

Was that a good sign? Or the opposite? I couldn’t figure it out, so I looked at his expression. But I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Was he reflecting on memories or lost in thought? Zetak’s expression grew darker.

“…So that’s why…”

After a long pause, he muttered something unintelligible. He muttered to himself and then walked past me. As I tried to follow him, I heard whispers from around us.

“Did you see that? That corpse was smiling. We’ve been in class together for years, but I’ve never seen that before.”

“Right? His whole appearance has changed. But it’s kind of scary… I mean, even if he’s smiling, it doesn’t mean he’s feeling anything in the end.”

“What does it matter? At least my eyes got a treat. I wonder if anyone has recorded it in their crystal ball?”

The students who had been laughing suddenly let out a strange squeal and ran away as their eyes met mine. At that moment, Zetak came to an abrupt halt.

“… Please go back to the dormitory. I will fetch the food.”

I wasn’t sure what he was so unhappy about; he was glaring at the noble children who had just whispered and run away. He already looked upset, so there was no need to provoke him further. I nodded in agreement and he looked at me in silence.

“… And.”

He hesitated for a long time as if trying to collect his thoughts. I wondered if he had something important to say, but after all that build-up, his words were disappointingly empty.

“Don’t smile recklessly.”

“Was it that weird?”

I touched my face with my fingertips. Judging by the reactions of the nobles earlier, it didn’t seem too bad… Zetak looked at me in silence for a moment before turning away. As I walked towards the dormitory, I noticed groups of students looking at me. Whenever our eyes met, they would quickly look away, seeming flustered as they rushed past.

It was quite fascinating to see five or six people rushing out together. How could they move in such a group without any disagreement?

“If you want, I can find you a pretty decent human. You’d merge with a human body. What do you think?”

The man with butterfly wings. Thinking back, he had also tried to form a group. Although it was more in the context of subordinates, he still made every effort to recruit me, even after I had torn off his wings. I thought it was strange even then.

No demon would offer a compromise again to a demon who refused to submit. Once negotiations break down, it’s a fight to the death for one of them. So, for him to make such an offer again was quite unusual.

“Why am I so obsessed? Well… it’s because it’s hard to find a monster that has lived as long as you have.”

He laughed as he touched the edges of his severed wings. His eyes were hazy, almost intoxicated.

“I said that even demons develop emotions if they live long enough, didn’t I? When you’ve lived as long as you have, there are probably times when you feel something. You may not even realize it, but you feel it all the same. Haven’t you ever felt something like that? Like watching someone cry and feeling your chest tighten for no reason? No, maybe it’s too early for you to feel that.”

He looked at me as he rambled on about something vague.

“It appears you need at least a hundred years of experience to truly understand emotions. Well, that’s just my guess based on my own experience, so I can’t be sure,” he said. “Why am I so fixated on you? Because I want you to become more like me.”

“No one else shares the feelings I have,” he said with a smile.

“If there isn’t anyone, then you’ll just have to create one, right? Find someone who’s lived a long life and nurture them until they learn to feel.”

I understood. He wanted to take me as his subordinate and help me develop emotions, assuming his claim that demons could acquire emotions was true.

“I think I understand what this is, is it loneliness?”

The man with the butterfly wings muttered as he pressed himself to his chest. Sensing an opening, I struck out with my tentacles and managed to cut off one of his unguarded tentacles. The taste of the butterfly’s tentacle was surprisingly good. Perhaps it was because it was covered in dust.

“Are you crazy..! Attacking while we’re talking…! I knew it, I’ll just kill you!”

I remembered how it had gnashed its teeth like a human and shot its tentacles at me. Although I lost three legs in that attack, I had no regrets. I knew from the start that I was at a disadvantage in that fight. I had already sensed that I would die fighting it.

If I was going to die anyway, giving up three legs to devour the butterfly’s tentacles seemed like a fair trade. I remembered him staring in disbelief as I slurped down his tentacles.

“Who eats in the middle of a fight… To think I lost both my wings and tentacles to such a thing…”

He spoke like a noble who had never known hunger. It seemed as if he had lived a rather lavish life. The worst suffering for any living being is hunger. Although I hadn’t experienced hunger since my reincarnation as a human, I knew the pain only too well.

In my previous life, when I was still weak, I had gone without food for more than three months after repeatedly failing at hunting. If I hadn’t come across scraps left by other demons, I would have starved to death. You must eat when you can. Don’t skip meals, even in the middle of a fight. If you have a premonition of death, you must eat even more. It could be your last meal.

The man with butterfly wings seemed as if he had never known hunger. While I was thinking this, I arrived at the room and unexpectedly met someone again.

“Your Highness. You’ve arrived.”