The Heavenly Demon's Sorrow

That day, a girl with a body so slender she looked as though an embrace might break her was climbing Lindholm Sacred Mountain.

"Can I… climb…"

She had already come a fair way up, but the unease in her chest had not let up.

The northern climbing route, the gentlest, she had checked with her own Magic Eyes, but the four limbs that actually had to lift her body were, somewhat, unreliable.

— Even with these eyes, I, can do nothing.

〈The Heavenly Demon's Magic Eyes〉.

Special eyes with a long-sight ability, named so because the viewpoint is set far above the user.

The phrase: eyes of a demon dwelling in the heavens.

Because of these, her line had been certified as 〈Demon Lord〉.

— These eyes are, outside of fighting, unnecessary.

In war, the strength contributed greatly to reconnaissance and tactical planning — that was the say. In peacetime, the story differed.

Anyone in the vicinity of a 〈Heavenly Demon's Magic Eyes〉 bearer, friend or foe, was driven by the suspicion of being seen.

Everyone has things they do not want others to see.

So — these magic eyes were, with respect to relationships with people, very fraught.

— Mother. Father.

A month ago, her parents had been killed.

From two generations back, her line of 〈Heavenly Demon〉 had stopped using the magic eyes for anyone, and lived in the most human-distant way possible.

Even so — they came after.

Once, when convenient, they had come to borrow the strength; the moment the line stepped away, they came in opposition.

If they were that afraid, they should not have asked for the strength in the first place.

If they had not made contact in the first place.

Just leave us alone, now.

Even thinking it — too late.

The girl was, also, being chased.

Through her father and mother's sacrifice, on the vague wish please live her ear had caught — she had run.

Using the 〈Heavenly Demon's Magic Eyes〉 to keep clear of pursuers, she had run, anywhere.

She had the magic eyes, but no fighting strength.

How long was she to keep running.

Half-absent of mind, what she had run to was Lindholm Sacred Mountain.

There, regret-bearing spirits were said to gather.

Possibly, her ancestors might be here. — Father, Mother, possibly.

If running was all that was left, going to look for them on the sacred mountain was, she'd thought, perhaps better. — On that, she'd resolved to climb.

---

Along the way, she found a few spirit-bodies and mountain-beasts, but thanks to the magic eyes, she was, somehow, not found by them.

Having come this far, no going back.

The bitter wind beat the body, and a ground in places mixed with snow tangled at her feet like an earth-bound spirit.

Once cold-stroked cheeks lost feeling, she climbed the mountain near-thoughtless.

And, finally — reached the summit.

There stood a young man with snow-white hair and bright-red eyes, and a very beautiful black-haired woman.

---

— Who… are they.

The young man, with his not-of-this-world shape, read almost like a wraith.

The woman, by contrast, looked richly alive.

Black hair, slightly damp with sweat, carrying a charge.

Healthy-coloured skin, on a well-trained body without waste.

A body without waste must be the phrase for that.

She was tall for a woman, with a clean-straight spine, and looked rather larger than the girl.

Smaller than the young man beside her, certainly — but the force came off the woman.

— What… do I do.

Should she say something.

While she hesitated, the line came from the other side first.

"…Are you a lost wanderer too?"

The young man turned, eyes on her in a something-rare register.

"Ah, um… er…"

She is not good at speaking with people.

The bill of having lived human-distant because of the magic eyes.

"I'm not, particularly, planning anything, so don't tense up. — I am also, basically, talking to a lower-world person for the first time, so I'm tense too."

That was tense.

A spaciousness showed on him — but possibly that was simply his baseline.

Once he opened his mouth, an eased air about him, in spite of being a first meeting, gave him an unexpected approachability.

In contrast to the transcendent shape, somehow a people-friendly impression came through.

"…Is that, so?"

"Yes. Right now I'm focused on this grave-building, so I may look settled — but if I dropped focus, I'd flinch back from the woman beside me. I just met her too."

"…Hehe — somehow, funny — yes."

Why she'd thought that, even she could not say cleanly.

But seeing him shrug theatrically certainly slackened her caution.

The beautiful woman beside, busily setting gravestones into the ground, was wearing a soft smile too.

A strange place she'd wandered into.

— I couldn't see Father and Mother, but…

In their place, two strange people had crossed her path.

Lindholm Sacred Mountain's summit had the impression of being cut off from the outside.

Possibly because of that, being chased, she found a small space opening in her chest.

"Could I, also, the… graves? Help, build…"

"Of course. Grateful. So, then… can you fix the bases of the standing graves with small stones, so they don't fall over?"

"Yes. Understood."

The young man had said he, also, was not used to talking with people much.

Was it presumptuous to feel a faint closeness on that?

"Ah — I'm Merea, by the way."

As if remembering, the young man gave his name.

And — beyond that, asked nothing.

He moved his eye away quickly, in a gesture saying if you don't want to give a name, don't.

"Ah, um!"

"Mm?"

"A-Aiz. My, name… Aiz."

The courage to give the family-name was not in her.

If, from the family-name, the 〈Heavenly Demon〉 title was read, this strange meeting might break.

But she wanted him to know the name.

Even if thin — that the two of them know each other's names — she wanted that connection.

"Right. Then — kindly, Aiz."

"Y-yes!"

The girl set her luggage down somewhere convenient and rolled up the long sleeves of her loose clothing.

Then she walked to the ten-or-so already-standing stone graves and began fixing the bases with small stones.

— Whose graves are they.

Names were carved, but each was different. The family-names were not unified.

Strange — but asking too much would, again, by feel, break the space, so she set into the work, no-mind, moving the hands.