“Hey Jonah! Did you come to save us, Black Blade?!”
“Of course it’s Jonah!”
“No, I’ve been captured too.”
“???”
“???”
The two, lost in confusion.
What can I say? When you look at me with such eager eyes, it makes me want to betray that expectation, right? That was just my instinct talking.
With a chuckle, I untied their ropes with the Unicorn Dagger.
“I’m just kidding. But it is true that I didn’t come to save you.”
“Oh, thanks. But you didn’t come to save us…?”
“Then how did you know where we were? Wasn’t it Eve who asked you to come?”
“How would Eve know you got caught to ask for help…”
“Oh.”
“Ah.”
Oh, these idiots.
But they are my idiots.
“Is there anywhere you’re hurt?” I asked, poking and prodding at Lemon and Apple’s bodies.
“Those guys. They are One Who Devours the Twilight, right? It’s the rule to take out heretics wherever you find them… But more than that, they’ve got their eyes on what I’ve been eyeing. So I’m going to take them out here.”
“Yikes!”
“Dominators of the back alleys…!”
Why is that being said here? One Who Devours the Twilight isn’t some neighborhood thug.
Anyway, since it seems like they aren’t hurt, I guess there’s no need to pour Holy Water on them.
“Now, if you understand, Lemon, get away.”
“Are you saying that Jonah-nem is going to fight?”
“It doesn’t mean Jonah-nem is weak, but you’d be a hindrance there.”
“Who’s going to fight? I just told you to move away because you stink. Oh, Apple is fine to stay.”
“You’re so mean!”
“Of course, Jonah-nem. A brilliant judgment. Stinky Lemon should run away quickly.”
With a shushing noise, Apple stuck close to me. Meanwhile, Lemon dragged his feet away with the face of someone whose world just collapsed.
He seemed to be worried about his weirdly swaying posture.
With our stances lowered, I gazed at the battlefield with Apple by my side.
The miscellaneous enemies had already been cleaned up by Lydia and Karen. The remaining ones were just Ellie and a little body.
But the fight between those two was surprisingly fierce.
Boom!
It sounded like a bomb exploded. The shockwave from Ellie’s punch uprooted the ground.
However, that overwhelming force never reached the little body. It can’t, or else the shockwave wouldn’t be smashing the ground.
As time slowed partially, the translucent warrior continued to burn with spirit, lightning raining down from the dry sky, and even the bodies of the already dead heretics crawled towards Ellie.
Of course, most of them couldn’t do any real harm to Ellie.
Breaking through the temporal barrier with sheer force, the translucent warrior had faced death dozens of times by now. The lightning was split in reverse at Ellie’s capital, and the corpses that clung to her burst apart with a single kick.
The little body was mimicking the powers of various dead gods using the Divine Power received from the Goddess of Love.
Sure, it was weak compared to actual divine miracles, but it still held terrifying power like a natural disaster.
So what is Ellie, who can easily dispel such chaos?
“Ellie is strong….”
“She’s a monster.”
“Not human.”
“Haha! Ellie is an ordinary person! Despite her age and power, she struggles with being single and endures ordinary daily life… No, I mean, she’s not a child. Anyway, she’s an ordinary girl!”
“Suddenly, an affinity rises.”
“Once a comrade, right?”
With a wry smile at the suddenly relaxed voices of Lemon and Apple, I focused on the battle ahead.
Even without an arm, Ellie was strong. Incomprehensibly strong.
But Ellie wasn’t just strong. She overwhelmed with sheer physical ability while systematically dismantling her opponent’s resolve.
In her dual role as a priest, the more cornered she became, the more desperate and miraculous she could be… yet, the little body continued to falter due to Ellie’s precise combat style.
She fought cunningly, wielding pure strength without the room for tricks.
This was a hunt. Ellie was the wolf, and the little body played the role of the sheep… a predetermined play.
The little body, knowing it was being hunted, couldn’t help but be dragged along. Any efforts to create a variable were shut down by Ellie’s experience, and any potential assistants were killed by Lydia and Karen.
Lydia and Karen didn’t eliminate the miscellaneous enemies just to join Ellie; they were content to watch.
There was no need to add or subtract anything. This moment was just right.
If things continued this way, the little body would ultimately be cornered and allow Ellie a clean hit, and then its head would fly.
No matter how much One Who Devours the Twilight might be, there’s no method of resurrecting from death… No wait, can there be?
There is a way to turn into an undead using the God of Death’s powers. But in this case, it would be barely the same as before, and most would be even weaker.
The undead form has several advantages, but far more weaknesses.
Sure enough, it seems Ellie’s attacks started landing, as the little body’s robe was shaking violently, almost about to come off. And then…
“Ugh!”
Boom!
Stepping on the threshold, Ellie launched a punch that was pulled back to the limit. That strike broke through all the powers and finally shattered the holy barrier protecting the little body.
Clang!
With a sharp sound, the purple Divine Power shattered into fragments.
Unfortunately, while breaking through the barrier, Ellie’s punch lost most of its strength… but there was enough left to unrobe the little body.
Whoosh!
Ellie’s punch stopped just at the little body’s nose. Then the belated shockwave blew back its robe.
“…Huh?”
Then Ellie uttered a silly voice that shouldn’t have left her lips.
Her face twisted in horror as if she had seen something she shouldn’t have, and the rage filling her yellow beast-like eyes turned into guilt.
I was just as shocked.
Pink hair and pink eyes just like mine. But those pointy ears weren’t human. Amidst a sea of otherwise handsome elves, it stood out, with a beauty so stunning it could send shivers down the spine of any man.
Overall, it had a rather gloomy impression, but thus radiated a worn-down charm, a beautiful boy standing there.
No, wouldn’t it seem like I was astonished at the male beauty?
To be more precise, I was shocked that the face I had imagined and set was standing right before me.
Yeah. The little body that Ellie had been fighting until now. To my surprise, it was the one that should have been my protagonist.
…I don’t know why Ellie was surprised. Is it because we have the same pink hair?
However, something felt odd about calling it my protagonist.
The fun in gender-reversed novels comes from the gap of common sense. That’s why it takes the form of reincarnation or possession.
My protagonist wasn’t that different. He was set to be possessing the body of an orphan, retaining memories of Earth.
So I couldn’t comprehend why.
Why was the protagonist siding with One Who Devours the Twilight?
He didn’t just join an evil organization out of shock. Born on Earth, his faith should be faint. There’s no way he could become a zealot.
Moreover, true to his protagonist nature, his main instinct is that of goodness.
He’d never think, “Maybe I should sacrifice people after monsters?”
What on earth happened…?
“You… what on earth happened…?”
Elli’s trembling voice asked as if substituting what I wanted to say.
That made the protagonist pause for a moment and look Ellie in the eye.
His lips were entirely still. But indescribable fervor surged in his half-dead eyes.
“You remembered me, sis.”
“Of course! But why… No, that’s not it. Right now there’s no one watching, so it’s okay. We don’t have to fight. Just pretend to be dead here, and follow me. This time for sure…”
“Hehe. To say such a thing after being stabbed by me and losing an arm.”
What?
Ignoring the fact that they seemed to know each other, did he say Ellie lost an arm because of him?
That kind of setting… No, is it possible? The settings I explicitly stated were well-followed, but there were indeed many cases that didn’t follow my assumptions.
In such a case, it could be seen as an added backstory to Ellie being an unconditionally friendly and loyal supporter of the protagonist.
Ellie and the protagonist had a history even before this, but when the protagonist possessed that body, only Ellie remembers him.
That would give an adequate reason for Ellie to aid the protagonist.
…But the more I looked, the more it seemed the protagonist remembered Ellie.
In other words, what’s inside that body isn’t the original protagonist.
For some reason, the spirit of the Earth didn’t possess the protagonist’s body.
Perhaps it wasn’t time for him to possess yet, or something went awry, and he may not possess for a long while.
What’s certain is that the one there is not the protagonist I know. And Ellie feels indebted and guilty about something.
With her fist clenched, Ellie spoke in a frantic voice.
“I understand that now… It must have been sudden for you, and it felt like the world was collapsing. But it’s not anymore. There’s a kid in a similar situation. Surely, this time, we can show you the real world!”
“…Sis, you haven’t changed. But I haven’t either.”
The protagonist, mechanically lifting the corners of his mouth, pulled out a blood-stained dagger from his bosom. It was unmistakably a holy item due to the divine power emanating from it.
However, the divine power didn’t feel like that of the Goddess of Love. Rather, it was more alien… it wasn’t simply distorted. It was likely another god’s relic that was already dead.
Ellie’s body began to tremble as she saw the dagger. In stark contrast to her previous strength, she looked weak.
With a doll-like expression empty of emotion, the protagonist swung the dagger at Ellie with a peculiar heat only in his eyes.
“You can’t save us. If you want to… please die by my hand.”
“……”
Ellie’s complexion turned pale.
No, that bastard?
Lydia and Karen, sensing trouble, shifted from spectators to combat mode. But I was faster than them.
Sound-eating footsteps, Transparent Cloak, Haste Boots.
All of it activated simultaneously, temporarily separating my presence from the world.
I dashed with a speed that startled even me and arrived behind the protagonist.
With the Unicorn Dagger, I stabbed his heart from behind.
Thud.
His wide-open eyes. The shivering neck barely turned to look at me as I whispered in his ear.
“You shouldn’t chase after other people’s women.”
Then, I twisted the dagger to completely crush his heart.
“Farewell. Cena.”
“……!”
He just opened his mouth in shock before collapsing and closing his eyes.
I killed the protagonist.
No, to be precise, I killed the one who was supposed to be the protagonist.
