“I won!”
“…”
The fifteenth challenger falls on the table. The guys around her seem used to this sight, as she is, as always, undefeated when it comes to drinking.
I was going to wait for her to be done, but as challengers keep coming, I see no end in sight, so I talk to her.
“Sasha!”
“Kyle!? What is it?”
She immediately notices me, and waves with a smile.
Her face is red, most likely because of all the booze. Her tone feels kind of merry too. But since she’s drinking more often than not, she’s pretty much always like this.
“I need to talk to you. Do you have some time?”
“Hn? Sounds serious. How about we go somewhere else?”
“That’d help.”
“Okay. Owner! I’m borrowing the room on the second floor!”
She says to the person behind the counter, who says sure.
Sasha suddenly gets up and heads upstairs, so I rush after her.
“It looked like this happens all the time.”
“Yeah, sometimes when I’m drinking here some drunk customers start annoying me. If I wanna drink alone, I come up here.”
“I see.”
That’s some nice service. And I guess what I’m thinking is showing on my face, because Sasha turns around and chuckles.
“They heard rumors about me. They don’t want me blowing up their tavern, so they let me drink here.”
“Now I get it.”
She has a bad reputation. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, considering she’s in the hero’s party. No, it’s bad.
Even the owner here knows about her bad habits when she drinks.
As I look at her back as we go upstairs, I wonder where all that alcohol goes in her small body.
Of all the times I’ve seen her drink, I’ve never seen her lose.
“It’s here.”
We reach a room with a bed, table, and chairs.
She goes in, looking like she’s used to this place, and sits down on a chair before putting her elbows on the table and her smiling face on her hands.
“So, what do you want?”
“I want your advice on something.”
“Oh, that’s rare.”
She says while laughing.
Still, I’m not going to tell her about the demon king being in our party. I want to ask her about magic.
“It’s about Dal’s magic.”
Sasha’s smiling face twitches.
She takes her elbows off the table, taps her cheek with her right index finger, and looks around. The air is more tense than I expected, and it wounds my stomach.
“Are you asking if Dal is a demon?”
She asks while looking straight at me, and I tense up.
She’s sharp. She immediately understood what I was hinting at.
When Mirabel told me about the demon king, my mind went straight to our thief, Dal.
We were all invited to the hero’s party by the country, but I didn’t know about Dal. I heard at least a bit about everyone else, but not about Dal. And no one else knew anything about her either.
But at the time, I didn’t think much of it, and we set out on our adventures. It was only when Mirabel said that, that I started thinking about it.
The biggest problem is her magic.
I learned recently that she can use magic. Not as much as Sasha, but multiple attributes too. And the problem lies within said attributes.
Dal can use fire and darkness magic.
There are seven magic attributes, and it’s said that people can use six. The last one never had any users in recorded history, and that’s because only demons use darkness magic.
Everyone who uses magic knows this, so it’s reason enough to suspect her of being a demon.
The fact that she uses an attribute only used by demons makes her a likely candidate to be the demon king.
The reason why I want to talk to Sasha, is to make sure what I know about the darkness attribute is correct.
And judging by her reaction, it is.
“Yes, only demons can use that attribute. I get why you’re worried, after that demon pretended to be a guide and attacked us.”
“I trust Dal, so I don’t want to pry, but I’m starting to see some suspicious stuff when I think about her history. I don’t want to suspect her, but…”
I stop there. And Sasha laughs when I abruptly go quiet.
I wasn’t expecting that reaction, so I’m taken aback, but she puts her elbows back on the table and says it’s okay.
“Dal can use darkness magic, and I’m pretty sure I know why.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why don’t you ask her? I think she’ll tell you.”
“…”
“It’s okay. Trust Dal, even if there’s some stuff to her. She loves you… She loves her friends.”
She says with a gentle smile.
It doesn’t look like she’s going to tell me, so I guess I really have to ask directly.
Sasha is more clever than me, so if she says so, it must be right.
At the very least, talking to her made that hazy feeling inside me disappear. Now I guess I should talk to Dal…
Dal might be a demon, or at least half demon. And yet, Sasha deems her to not be dangerous.
Should I trust that? If Sasha is the demon king, she’s definitely plotting something, but I want to trust her kind smile.
If the demon king looks into her heart, all she’ll see is that I wondered if Dal is a demon because she can use darkness magic. And since it’s common knowledge that only demons use that attribute, there should be no reason for alarm.
She won’t think I suspect that the demon king is in our party.
Come to think of it, there isn’t that high of a chance that Dal is the demon king.
A sly demon king that can read minds wouldn’t use magic that would make people suspect her of being a demon.
That makes me feel a little better.
“Ah… I’m sobering up thanks to a certain someone.”
She says, but she doesn’t sound upset. She sounds expectant somehow.
“Sorry. I’ll join you for a drink.”
“All right!”
She immediately takes a big bottle from under the table, and places it on top.
I said one drink…
She has glasses too all of a sudden, and is already pouring.
She prompts me to drink with a big smile on her face, and I gulp it down, because I lost the will to argue.
“Nice drinking! I’m not losin’ either!”
“Lose what?”
After I drink, she immediately pours more, so I sigh thinking this is going to take a while.
