IWMHWD 127

Chapter 127. My First and Last

2024.03.06

“Wait, Cordelia!”

Leonard had let his guard down, so Cordelia’s strike landed more effectively than expected. He staggered past the boundary circle, flailing his arms in panic. But this time, the pillar of light rejected him.

Cordelia, convinced she had successfully blocked the summoning, smiled triumphantly. Of course, that smile did not last long.

“Ugh!”

A dull pain pounded against her chest, forcing her to draw in a sharp breath. But that wasn’t all. Her eyes throbbed as if they might burst, and her insides burned so hot it felt as though fire would spew from her mouth the moment she opened it.

Clutching her left chest, she bent forward. The only mercy was that the agony did not last very long.

“Cordelia!”

Leonard’s urgent expression was the last image she remembered.

“Are you awake?”

A gentle hand brushed against her hair. Believing it must be Leonard, Cordelia opened her eyes—only to find herself staring into the face of a man she had never seen before.

“…Huh?”

Still groggy, she couldn’t tell whether what she was seeing was dream or reality. The man’s appearance was so unreal, so strikingly beautiful, that it only deepened her confusion.

And his eyes—eyes that mirrored her own as though copied from her soul—filled her with a strange, inexplicable feeling.

She quickly realized she was lying on a bed of grass and pushed herself upright. Looking around, she saw no sign of Leonard or Roti. Only the mysterious man stood before her.

“Who… are you?” she asked, her throat scratchy.

“Servet.”

“Servet?”

Her voice rasped. After a few coughs, she managed to speak properly again.

Though she hadn’t been asking his name, his calm, steady answer oddly reassured her.

It wasn’t just his tone. There was something deeper, a mysterious pull of affection toward him, for reasons she could not explain.

“You’re the one who summoned me.”

“Summoned? Are you… a demon?”

Until now, the only demons Cordelia had seen firsthand were Nazabut, who had possessed Lydia’s body, and monsters like the eyeball demon Kandias and Rkan. Compared to them, the man before her looked nothing like a demon. He looked like a devastatingly handsome human man.

“Yes.”

“But… have we met somewhere before?”

“My, to start flirting the instant we meet. Bold of you.”

“N-no, that’s not what I meant!”

Flustered, Cordelia waved her hands in denial. Servet gave the faintest smile. It was so brief, but Cordelia found herself staring, entranced. His appearance was almost as shocking as when she first saw Leonard.

“It’s just… seeing you makes me feel nostalgic.”

Only after saying it aloud did Cordelia realize the feeling she had toward him—longing.

But why longing? Why would she feel such a thing toward a demon she was meeting for the first time?

Servet simply gazed at her silently for a moment before lightly flicking her forehead with his finger.

“So, what did you summon me for?”

He was clearly changing the subject, but Cordelia, embarrassed at having spoken such foolish words to a demon she just met, quickly seized the chance to reply.

“Actually, I wasn’t the one who summoned you—my master did. Roti said that since cracks are appearing in this world right now, summoning a high-ranking demon would be dangerous, so I tried to stop her, and then somehow, well—ah!”

She broke off mid-sentence, startled by her own words.

“W-wait, are you… a high-ranking demon? Then this is bad…”

“This place is not reality, so there’s no need to worry.”

“Not reality?”

“To be precise, this is your mental world. Hmm… calling it a dream might be easier to understand.”

His voice was gentle as he explained. Everything felt so vivid that she found it hard to accept this was a dream, but she nodded anyway.

“Well, if it doesn’t affect reality, that’s a relief. Anyway, I only tried to stop my master’s summoning, and somehow this happened…”

“Why did your master want to summon me?”

“Well… I’m supposed to die tomorrow. I think she wanted to make a contract with a demon to save me.”

“Die? Why?”

Normally, Cordelia would never reveal something so private, even to close friends. But perhaps because this man was a stranger—or perhaps because of that strange familiarity—she found herself spilling everything.

“There’s this terrible man named Maximilian…”

Thus began Cordelia’s long, tearless tale of her tragic life.

She started with Maximilian, but before she knew it, she was recounting how her father abused her in Vasquez, how she was humiliated after marrying into the Abrams family, and how she miraculously met Leonard and became a mage.

“Ah, I’m sorry—I talked too much, didn’t I?”

“No. You’ve lived quite an interesting life. So this Anton gave you poison, he’s now on the brink of death, and if you don’t take the antidote by tomorrow, you’ll die as well?”

“Interesting… well, yes. That’s right.”

“But it seems you’ve already taken the antidote.”

“…What?”

“You don’t seem like someone who’s about to die tomorrow.”

“What? I… I already took it? But when? How?”

“You’re asking me?” he replied dryly, as if it were obvious.

Cordelia blinked, bewildered. She looked down at her body. Anton had said she had ten days, with one day left—but she did feel oddly healthy. If Servet was right, then her tearful farewells to Leonard and the others were somewhat embarrassing.

“But even if that’s true, if the Elector of Embly doesn’t wake up, I’ll still die.”

“…Hm.”

Servet stroked his chin, then looked straight into her eyes.

“Then how about this: I’ll save this Anton for you. In return, help me.”

“You mean… a contract?”

“No. You’re not strong enough to make a contract with me.”

His blunt words stung less than they raised curiosity.

“If I’m not even strong enough for a contract, how could I possibly help you?”

It was a sharp, reasonable question. Servet only smiled in that mysterious way.

“Because you’re the only one who can stop Nazabut.”

“Me? Stop Nazabut? What do you mean?”

Even Leonard, said to be the strongest mage in Ershe, had struggled against Nazabut. How could she, still only a mid-level mage, possibly stop him?

Cordelia pressed for an answer, but Servet offered none. Instead, he extended his hand with a benevolent expression.

“So, what will you do?”

“…Is helping you dangerous?”

“Who can say? Maybe yes, maybe no.”

It was maddeningly vague. But in truth, Cordelia had no real choice.

“I’ll do it.”

Compared to letting Leonard die so she could live, fighting Nazabut was nothing.

She grasped Servet’s hand. The moment she did, the world spun, blurring into haze. It was so unreal that she finally realized—yes, this really was a dream.

“Until the time comes, I’ll keep your lips sealed.”

His fingers brushed her lips as he spoke.

The dreamscape dissolved completely into mist. Sensing their parting, Cordelia quickly blurted out one last question.

“Wait—what rank of demon are you?”

“The twelfth, Cordelia.”

“What? The twelfth?”

Nazabut had called himself the ninety-ninth. Twelfth must mean extremely high… unless he meant twelfth from the bottom?

But in her shock, Cordelia failed to realize she had never once told him her name.

“When will we meet aga—”

She reached toward him, but her hand grasped only empty air as he vanished. Servet slowly closed his eyes, then opened them again.

[My apologies,]

A gray-furred wolf lowered its head beneath him.

[For making you come all the way here.]

“It’s fine. We were bound to meet sooner or later.”

[You resemble Lady Greeta greatly.]

“…So I’ve heard.”

For a moment, he recalled the past.

When he had first been summoned, his beloved contractor Greeta had trembled so hard she couldn’t even meet his eyes, yet never failed to speak her mind.

For a demon, the time since then had been but an instant. Yet Greeta was gone, leaving only her daughter who so closely resembled her.

[Nazabut is moving south from the north. They say the humans he’s already slain number in the hundreds.]

“…Troublesome. The more havoc Nazabut wreaks, the greater the cracks in the world become.”

[But if he keeps using that much mana, won’t his human vessel collapse first?]

“Normally, yes. But Nazabut can convert human vitality into his own power. That’s why he keeps slaughtering endlessly.”

[How dreadful…]

Laustonio—the beast Cordelia called Roti—gave a low groan.

He didn’t care how many humans died. But if the world itself fractured, that was another matter.

“…Perhaps all of this truly is fate.”

Servet murmured, gazing up at the sky.