Translated: Sei, MTL-sensei-tachi
Edited: Sei, Grammarly no Danna
Source: Syosetu

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Chapter 257


　When I was about to catch a soldier of the Demon King's army at a corner, but somehow I found the commander of the Third Corps.
　When I fought to break the illusion magic that had hit me at the beginning of the encounter, she begged me for her life with a look of fear on her face.

"What on earth is going on..."
"Usato, is she the commander of the Third Corps?"
"Yeah, that's... right"

　Leona-san's gaze turned to the woman sitting against the wall.
　The twisted horns on her head are characteristic of the demon tribe.
　Hannah, a woman with light purple hair that is pulled through one of the horns like a side-tail, notices my gaze and begins to tremble.

"...Really?"
"That should be... her."

　Maybe she's been through too much trauma?
　Seeing Hannah's frightened state, Nea speaks to her in a hushed voice.

"Well, it looks like I'm the reason she's like this, so I'll interrogate her."
"All right. ...Blurin, you're on the lookout."

　Spreading magic like a shadow from my feet, I brought out Blurin.
　She is even more frightened by Blurin that comes out as if summoned from my feet, and Nea, who bends down, talks to her while looking down at her.

"We meet again"
"...Eh?"
"Ara, you can't remember? Then maybe it's easier to recognize me in this form?"

　When Nea transformed into a black owl, Hannah stepped back in surprise.

"T-That owl from that time...?!"
"Yes, I'm going to ask you some questions now, and you're going to answer them honestly."

　Nea, who had returned to her demon form again, began to ask questions to Hannah, who nodded her head in fright.

"State your affiliation."
"...I am Hannah Romia, commander of the Demon King's Third Corps."
"Why were you here?"
"..."
"Say it. Or may I leave it to my master in the back?"
"I-I-I-I was trying to escape from here!"

　Nea pointed at me with a nasty smile on her face, and at the same time Hannah confessed.
　I was gradually becoming dissatisfied with the way I was being treated, but more than that...

"Escape...?"
"What do you mean? Explain properly."

　According to her, she was trying to escape before the battle between us and the demon king's army got into full swing.
　I wondered why she, the commander of the third army tried to run away? But the situation with the Demon King's army ——— the demons was worse than we had thought, and having decided that there was no future on them, she was about to give up on the demons when we captured her, and that's how we got to this point.

"That's why the demons..."

　If she wanted to run away then we should let her... No, should we at least get some information out of her?
　Either way, if she has no intention of harming us———,

"Usato, don't underestimate her."
"...Hmm?"
"I know what you’re thinking right now. I'm sure you're thinking that once we get the information out, it’ll be okay to let her go———"

　Nea turned her face towards Hannah with a glare.
　Hannah tries to look away from her, but Nea holds her cheeks with her hands and forces her to look at her.

"Fu, fumuh?!"
"This woman will betray any person to save her own skin. Even if she pretends to be obedient now, she may give us false information or reveal our location to our enemies."

　When she sees Nea's eyes up close, her eyes shine for a moment, but after a few seconds or so, she suddenly turn pale.

"See, she just tried to cast an illusion spell on me, didn't she?"
"Y-You're wrong..."
"Not wrong. But unfortunately, I'm a familiar of the devil so it won't work on me."
"Ah, uwhh..."

　What exactly am I being shown?
　Is it bad girl vs bad girl? The one with the worse personality will probably win.
　Well, the reason why illusion magic doesn't work is because Nea had cast a resistance spell in advance.

"It's better for you to be honest. We don't have much time. In some cases, I have to do the thing you hate the most, but ...... I don't know what I'm going to do about it."
"Hi-Hiiii..."

　It's plain scary.
　I wonder why it feels like I am naturally part of the things she dislikes.
　But I did think that this was a bit too much.

"Wait, Nea."
"...What is it?"

　Nea looked away from Hannah and turned towards me.

"I don't think fear alone is enough."
"......?"

　For a moment, Nea tilts her head, a look that says she doesn't know what I'm talking about.

"What's this fear-monger saying?"
『Is that a devil joke? I don't hate that sort of thing』
"Guaah"
"You noisy little animals."

　Oops, I shouldn't, I shouldn't be so pissed off here.
　Taking a small deep breath, I drop to my knees on the ground to make eye contact with Hannah-san after taking a turn with Nea.

"Hannah-san."
"Y-Yes..."
"If you give me the information honestly, I'll let you go free."
"...Eh?"

　If what she said was true, it meant that she never wanted to take part in the battle in the first place.
　I don't know the reason for this, but it must be something she dislikes so much that she avoids fighting.
　I don't want to imagine a reason that would make her, with her strong magic of illusion magic, want to run away, but if she is not lying in her words, I think it would be okay to let her go.

"If you want to get out of here, then do so."
"A-Are you going to let me go...?"
"Yes. I won't lie."

　I smiled as naturally as possible and Hannah-san regained her composure.
　Okay, I won't just be called the devil forever.
　Let's get the information from her.

"T-The terrain here is———"

　At that moment, a faint sound of flapping wings echoed overhead.
　Instantly reacting, I turn around and at the same time throw a healing magic bullet from my right hand.

"There you are!"

　The healing magic bullets, which were released, hit the wall with the explosion sound of "ba-ba-ba," and disappeared as green particles.
　After that, a single black feather fell from the sky.
　After all, someone is watching.

"Don't think you can get away with this! Next time I'll definitely take you down...! ...Ah, sorry. So, the continuation of what I was saying earlier."
"I-I'll show you the way! I'll be by your side! So don't kill me after you let me escape!"
"E-Eeh?"

　...Oh no, I've done it.
　I nodded to Hannah, who was desperately trying to accompany us, and Nea had a beaming smile on her face.

"As expected. You managed to get her cooperation! Yoo, devil!"
『I know it can't be helped, but the change is just frightening』
"Usato..."

　Ferrum was pulling back and Leona was holding her forehead.
　And then there was Hannah-san, clinging to my leg.
　After checking my situation once more, I crossed my arms and closed my eyes.

"All right, let's go!"

　After thinking about it, I decided to just go ahead.
　I decided to give up my thinking for this one time.

●
——— seireitranslations.blogspot.com ———

　Then, following a frightened Hannah's lead, we proceeded through the interior of the city, which had been reconfigured by the Demon King's sorcery.
　Before we left, Ferrum suggested that we could use Nea's vampire ability to control Hannah-san, but it seems that this is not possible.
　She has a magic called "illusion magic" that affects the mind, so the same kind of magic is not effective on her, and if things go poorly, she will not be able to speak or even hear anything.
　This is one of the reasons why we have her in the lead, but of course we also encounter soldiers patrolling the area.

"Hannah-sama?! Why are you here?!"
"...I-I am currently searching for the heroes myself. You guys should continue your search."
"Y-Yes!"

　However, as expected of the commander of the Third Corps.
　As a matter of course, she was able to part with the soldier we encountered without being suspicious ... but then Nea patted the soldier's hand on the shoulder as we parted.

"You should do your best too, okay?"
"Haah? Ah, yeah!!"
"Well then"

　Nea waved at the soldier nonchalantly.
　As I tilted my head at her mysterious behavior, Nea turned forward and grabbed Hannah's shoulder.

"Did you do anything suspicious?"
"I, I swear I didn't do that..."
"He~e... so what is this?"

　Nea showed her something that looked like a small piece of paper.
　When Hannah-san saw it, she let out a high-pitched cry.

"I saw this stuck in the armor of the soldier from earlier, but I wonder what on earth it is?"
"..."
"Ara?! Looking closer, I see it's a piece of cloth! It looks like it's been forcibly torn off, and it says "help me!""
"..."
"Ara ara! And now that I look closely, the bottom of your dress is torn too. What a disaster! I wonder why! It wasn't torn a moment ago!"

　Her face is pale.
　As she looked down, no longer even meeting her gaze, Nea brought her mouth close to her ear, still smiling the same way as before.
　She then wrapped her arms around her neck to stop her from escaping.

"Next time you do it, you'll know what will happen, right?"
"...yes."

　It's scary~!
　I am scared of both Hannah-san, who asked for help from the soldiers without me and Leona-san being aware of it, and Nea, who saw through it in an instant and then tried to threaten her!
　I am honestly scared by the fact that something like a battle is going on outside of our knowledge.

"Your familiar is scary."
"Yeah, I think she's probably scarier than me."
"... I guess so."

　Leona-san, what's with that silence just now?
　While being mindful of her reaction as she walked next to me, I followed Hannah-san's directions.
　We arrive at an open space.
　The place is still surrounded by black walls, but there is something like an iron door on the ground in the center.
　It's about three or four meters in size...it's pretty big.

"This is the entrance to the underground castle. But it will take a lot of manpower to open it———"
"Usato"
"Yes, yes."

　I thrust my fingers into the large door and gather my strength.
　...If it's this much, there's no need for dark magic.

"Mmmph!"　

　Lift the door and flip it over, knocking it to the ground.
　Looking at the place where the door was set aside, we see that there is a staircase at the back.

"Okay, let's go in."
"As expected. Let's go, Leona."
"Yeah"
"..."

　Pushing Hannah-san's back, who has her eyes wide open, Nea and Leona-san descend the stairs that lead to the basement.
　After descending the stairs a short distance, we come to an old-fashioned passage lined with stone pillars and cobblestone pavement.

"We've come to a very old-fashioned place."
"...T-This is inside a remodeled castle. Demon King-sama is on the upper floors of the castle... No, he's currently on the lowest floor."

　If that's the case, we'll need to go down to a lower level.
　If the black thing I let go earlier is monitoring our movements, we should do our best not to stay where we are.

"Well then, show us the way."
"...B-But, I'm sure if I walked around here it would look suspici... Yes! I'll show you around!"

　Perhaps thinking the same thing as I was, Nea is urging Hannah-san.
　Using Blurin's ability to search for the enemy, we walked through the passageways and descended the winding staircase as we steadily made our way underground.
　Is Nagi-san, who is fighting Nero Agence, safe?
　Is Kazuki, who is fighting in the sky, okay?
　Did Senpai and Amako make it into the basement properly?
　Walking in a place where only the sound of our own footsteps echoed, I found myself thinking.

"Hannah-san"
"W-What is it?"
"I want to know why you tried to leave the Demon King's army."
"... i-It's because of you."
"Hmm?"
"It's nothing!"

　After a brief moment of stiffness, she mutters something in a whisper, and when I tilt my head with a smile on my face, she shakes her head and then corrects her words.
　While giving a healing flick to the forehead at Nea, who for some reason spurted right behind Hannah-san, I listened to her as she took a small, deep breath.

"The demon race has been finished for a long time now."
"...Is it finished?"

　In a sense, this might be the first time we hear about the demons' internal affairs.
　Ferrum was clueless about those things, and we should ask her now while we still can.

"The land of the demon king's territory is dying. It is hard to say how long it has been so, but the land is losing its fruitfulness and is steadily pushing us towards extinction."
"...But we didn't see any signs of that happening until we got here."

　I said this as if to confirm something.
　Now was the time to make this speculation more precise.

"That's ... because until recently Demon King-sama had been channeling his magic power into the land and bringing about a bountiful harvest. Demon King-sama who used his power to let us escape in the last battle is..."
"So weak that he can't flow his magic power to the land. This is just as Falga-sama guessed."

　Leona-san nodded in understanding to Hannah's hesitant words.
　To let the demons escape, huh?
　I guess she means the fireball he dropped at the end.

"...The truth is, if Demon King-sama had never woken up... We might have perished without even having a dream."

　...Until now, Hannah-san's words and actions showed that she was frightened, but now her words she uttered were a little different.
　A face stricken with despair, unable to even imagine what the future holds.
　From the first time I encountered her, I had the impression that she was a cunning and cowardly person, but that impression had changed drastically by this time.

——— seireitranslations.blogspot.com ———

Author's Notes:
The Demon King and Ciel caught a glimpse of Usato for just a moment using his magic familiar.
Ciel could see Usato looking down at the frightened Hannah with a smile.
The next moment, Usato turns his head and her eyes meet with his angry look.