Published: March 21, 2026
"I will accompany you to hell, Father."
Hearing those words dripping with a mess of emotions, I let out a wry smile.
The conversation beyond the door hardly sounded like something between parent and child.
And yet the speaker seemed to believe this was how a family should be.
A new cult or something, perhaps.
I shivered my arm and stepped away. How terrifying.
Since the hero summoning, the castle had gradually lost its bustle and fallen into silence.
Not only because the knights order had left, but because people had disappeared without a trace.
They vanished suddenly, without telling anyone, not even their families.
The king and princess were unaware of the abnormal state of their home.
Or if they were aware, there was nothing they could do.
The Royal Castle’s functions were on the verge of stopping, and it was only natural that the people would be affected. It was only a matter of time before this country collapsed.
"Well, that's exactly why I'm here."
My role was to keep this country standing until the appointed time.
No matter how many people disappeared, the price of keeping a nation intact was quite high.
To fulfill our king’s wish, I was to make effective use of that "price."
"Y-You…"
As I considered my next moves, a voice spoke from behind me. I turned reflexively, wary, and saw a pale-faced woman.
She must've been one of the princess’s maids.
"Do you need something?"
I was supposed to be known as a guest invited to Reytis Castle. There should have been nothing odd about that; until now I hadn't been subjected to suspicious looks.
And yet the woman in front of me stared at me with a frightened, doubtful expression.
There were too many things she might suspect.
Ah, humans are so troublesome with their prying eyes.
I felt like clicking my tongue at my own mistake.
"You — where did you take that child… Anje? I saw you with her yesterday. The moment you touched her she vanished. I searched the entire castle but she wasn't anywhere. Where did you take her? That child…"
"…fufufu, ahahahahahaha!!!"
Her anxious yet somehow certain tone made me blink, and then laughter escaped me.
My sour expression flipped into a grin so broad my body bent in half with laughter; I must've looked very eerie.
The woman took a step back.
I closed the distance until I could touch her. Unaccustomed to fighting, she couldn't even react before I grabbed her hand.
"Ah, you humans are truly amusing. Foolish, ridiculous, utterly hopeless."
My voice echoed down the empty corridor.
Not long ago someone would surely have been nearby to witness this, but there was no one now.
Of course. People had vanished.
"So you saw yesterday, did you? That was my mistake. As an apology, I'll let you meet that Anje — whatever she is."
I slipped my hand into my pocket and pulled something out.
A small stone rested in my palm.
"You said you'd show her! Where is Anje? Where is that child?!"
The woman screamed hysterically, thrashing to free the arm I held, but my grip didn't budge.
I tilted my head and held the little stone up before her, closer so she could see better.
"Look properly. This is the woman you've been searching for."
She froze instantly. Her lips trembled.
"Truly, the value of you humans is astonishingly low. That a life could be exchanged for a pebble lying around — well, maybe it's inevitable given how little magical power you possess compared to us."
"A-After all — a Demon Clan member here?! Someone help…"
The instant she realized my true identity and tried to cry out, her figure vanished.
When I opened the hand that had been holding her, there was a stone that hadn't been there before.
"Your life is a pebble too. How dull."
I tossed it casually alongside the other pebble.
Even if such things existed, they had no value to me.
How pitiable humans were.
My skill "Exchange" could swap things for items of equivalent value.
Well, I wasn't the one deciding that value; I could only perform the exchange.
When I tried swapping the person I cherished most, they turned into a small gem.
And those I had no interest in became magnificent tiaras inlaid with large jewels.