Trash of the Count's Family Vol 2. Chapter 488: Gray Rain Falls (20)
Cale felt it.
We won.
The Water that Devours the Sky had temporarily become four times stronger.
She fell upon the sea and swallowed it whole.
KWAAAAAA—
The rain clouds were thinning.
With the dark clouds fading, the sky now nearing dawn revealed the bluish color between night and morning.
—Shall we break it?
The Water that Devours the Sky asked.
Cale forced strength into his trembling arms and shouted.
“Let’s break it!”
Raon flinched and looked at Cale, but Cale’s eyes saw only the two enormous masses of water tangled together.
—Ahahahaha!
The Water that Devours the Sky burst into a refreshing laugh.
—Good! We break it!
With those words, Cale felt a tremendous vibration.
After the white curtain took on gray, it began seizing and swallowing the sea.
The black sea was eaten by the gray and lost its color.
SHWAAAA—
The whirlpool had shot toward the sky like two snakes twisted around each other.
The water, most of it now turned gray, soon lifted its head toward the heavens.
“Go.”
The moment Cale’s indifferent voice reached the gray water—
—Hahahaha!
Feeling stronger than she ever had before, the Water that Devours the Sky surged toward the sky.
Could they break the sea?
Could water be broken?
The question itself was meaningless.
Neither Cale nor the Water that Devours the Sky wanted to shatter water and erase it.
All they wanted was to eliminate the sea trying to kill them, the sea trying to sweep everything away.
KWAAA—
The enormous whirlpool, the gray whirlpool binding the sea with its entire body, tearing into the sea as it struggled desperately not to be eaten, dyeing it in its own color—
BOOM!
Kicked off the ground once and shot toward the sky.
“Ah—”
“Ah, aaah—”
The demons who had been fleeing could not think at all when they saw the sight.
The white curtain had stopped the sea that was trying to sweep away their home.
Then the power of the ancient site of the demon god filled that curtain, turning it gray as it snatched up the sea and surged into the sky.
“The sky... it’s been pierced—”
The gray water shot high, so high into the sky, piercing even the last few remaining dark clouds.
It looked like a gigantic arrow had pierced straight through the heavens.
KWAAAAAAANG—!
A roar rang out.
But it did not hurt their ears. It was different from the roars that had kept their hearts tense all night long.
Very far away.
Very high above.
It was a sound coming from somewhere beyond them.
A roar that made them feel it had been created by something immensely large and vast.
And the cause of that roar entered everyone’s eyes clearly.
The gray whirlpool exploded in the sky.
“Ah—”
“G-Gods—”
The moment the last of the dark clouds was pierced, they scattered.
The bluish sky told them the night had not yet ended, but at the same time, the moon and starlight were fading, announcing the arrival of morning.
Drip.
Drop.
The roar vanished.
The sea vanished.
Even the gray whirlpool that had protected them and broken the sea vanished.
Drip. Drip.
The demons felt water droplets patter against their cheeks.
They reached out their hands.
“...Gray—”
Gray droplets of water were falling from the sky.
“It’s cold.”
The moment the cold droplet touched the demon’s cheek, the demon felt alive.
And the demon could clearly tell that this sight was not a dream, but reality.
Drip. Drip.
The gray whirlpool had not disappeared.
Instead, it had broken its enormous body apart, split into tiny pieces, and descended back to the ground.
Drip. Drip.
Those who had been fleeing in panic.
Those on the city wall, preparing for the final moment.
Those who had stepped forward to protect the ancient site all lifted their heads and looked at the sky.
Drip. Drip-drip.
At this hour when darkness vanished and dawn arrived.
From the clear indigo sky without a single rain cloud—
SHWAAAAAA—
Gray rain fell.
That rain did not grow fierce.
It did not try to sweep everything away.
It was not strong enough to leap over their homes and the city wall that had protected them.
No wind blew.
It simply descended quietly.
And softly.
Yet coldly, vividly.
It came down over the demons and their home.
And drenched them.
“Ugh, sob—”
A mother who had purified her gray-sick child and fled while carrying the child, still not fully conscious, surrendered herself to that gray rain and shed tears.
“......”
An old demon who had been forced to abandon his home and flee in a panic after an urgent crisis suddenly arose in the city, without properly understanding a single thing, sank down on the spot.
Mud stained his pants and his body grew wet, but he raised both hands high.
Thud.
His luggage slipped from his hands, but he did not care.
With both hands stretched toward the sky, he closed his eyes.
“......”
He welcomed the rain with all his strength, letting the gray rain pouring down on him—rain that did not sting, but felt instead gentle and soft—drench him completely.
“...Haa—”
With a deep sigh, a soldier of the Demon King’s army sank down against the parapet of the city wall.
It was something he would never have done normally, but before that enormous sea, before death itself, he had endured with a shield in his hands.
He had truly thought he was going to die.
But he could not run.
Because if he ran, someone else would die.
Thud.
He turned his head at the sound of someone sinking down.
It was a territorial soldier.
They had been wary of each other and baring their teeth at each other just yesterday. The soldier of the Demon King’s army suddenly thought how meaningless that had been.
“......”
“......”
The territorial soldier and the soldier of the Demon King’s army looked at each other in silence, but in their eyes was relief that I survived, and you survived too.
Yes.
We survived.
The soldiers, finally recognizing the reality that they were alive, slowly moved their heads.
It was a natural action for them.
“......!”
“!”
And then they sprang to their feet.
Where their gazes had moved.
There stood Cale Henituse.
He had purified the gray sickness.
He had made the sea raised by the enemy third Emperor disappear.
Even the ancient site of the demon god had responded in the process.
The one who had done all of that—
“N-No!”
“Oh, no—!”
Was slowly collapsing.
His body pitched forward.
The parapet of the city wall.
The place where he had stood closest to the sea and faced it head-on.
The body of the one standing there leaned forward.
He’s falling!
Below the city wall.
The human who saved us is collapsing.
The moment that realization filled the faces of those who understood it with horror—
“Cale.”
Choi Han swiftly caught Cale’s body.
As the demons felt relieved to see Cale’s knight save him, another sight soon entered their eyes.
“Urgh!”
Cale’s body jerked.
“Guh—!”
His face tipped upward.
“Kh!”
And blood sprayed from his open mouth toward the sky.
Three times.
Blood burst from his mouth like fireworks, three times.
And it was pitch-black blood.
“......!”
“!!”
SHWAAA—
The gray rain was still pouring softly.
But the person who had created that sight violently vomited blood three times as though he might die at any moment, then trembled and kept coughing up blood in smaller bursts.
“Cough, cough, ngh, cough—”
His companions beside him, as though they were used to it, laid his body on the floor, wiped around his mouth with a towel, and rubbed his body.
Then they prepared to move him.
“......”
Strategist Ed could not say anything.
He could only watch it all.
Cale was pouring up so much blood that even Strategist Ed, standing on Midi’s city wall, could see him clearly on Mika’s city wall.
“Why would he go that far—”
A subordinate’s voice suddenly reached him.
Exactly.
Why did that man go that far?
There was no one to answer that question.
“!”
Because Cale Henituse had finally collapsed.
Everyone saw him go limp as they were laying him on the ground.
“Human!”
Cale, whose mind was growing hazy and whose eyes were closing, could see Raon flying toward him.
“D-Dam—”
Damn it.
Cale had used the Water that Devours the Sky more than he ever had before.
“Cough—!”
Blood kept flowing out.
—Hehe.
The Water that Devours the Sky must have been thrilled, because she kept laughing.
—My insides feel so clear.
The gluttonous priestess sounded happy too.
—What terrifying people......!
Only Heart’s Vitality, the crybaby old man, whimpered and vented his resentment.
“Cough, cough—!”
“Human! When you faint and wake up, I’ll give you apple pie!”
At Raon’s words, spoken while his plump cheeks trembled, Cale gave a faint laugh and let the strength leave his body.
It was time to faint now.
But there was one more thing he had to confirm.
“Yes, Cale.”
Choi Han reacted when he saw Cale’s eyes, and Cale slowly opened his mouth.
“The th-third Emperor?”
With those words as his last—
Thud.
Cale’s body went completely limp, and he fainted.
“......”
General Mol was left speechless by the sight of Cale thinking of everyone else until the very end rather than his own body.
Wooooong, wooong—
He thought he could no longer ignore the God of Sacrifice’s divine relic vibrating.
And, following the last message Cale Henituse had left behind, his gaze moved.
“...Ah......”
There, the third Emperor lay with his body buried in the muddy ground, the Demon King’s foot trampling his back.
“Ah, aaah—”
The third Emperor was staring blankly at the sky.
SHWAAAA—
He looked dazed as he watched the gray rain drench him.
“M-My sea... lost?”
The sea that took everything from me lost?
And more than that, what was that power?
The water that had turned gray.
The power contained in that water.
It was something the third Emperor had never experienced before.
Even after facing only the smallest strand of that power, goosebumps rose all over his body.
Yes.
Enough that he forgot the pain in his body—
“Guh!”
But his pain was only beginning now.
“Ugh!”
The Demon King grabbed the third Emperor by the head.
His clothes were clean, without a single smear of mud.
In contrast, the third Emperor’s arms and legs were broken. The inside of his mouth had been torn open so badly that even spitting out a single word was not easy.
This monster—
The Demon King was not a god.
He was simply a monster.
A bastard with horrifying power.
One that rejected everything—
“!”
The third Emperor’s eyes widened.
His face, lifted by the Demon King’s hand.
The Demon King’s appearance was reflected in his eyes.
SHWAAAA—
The gray rain was soaking the Demon King.
His sea had never been able to reach him.
Yet the rain created by a mere human was soaking the Demon King.
He had lost.
That was the only thought that came to him.
My sea lost.
For the third Emperor, who took enough pride in the sea to call himself Dragon King, that fact planted a deep fear in his eyes.
It was not the Demon King, who might kill him, that he feared.
It was the gray rain slowly soaking the Demon King.
He feared that one drop of water.
“Why are you trembling?”
The Demon King smiled broadly and let go of the hand gripping the third Emperor’s head.
Then he seized the third Emperor by the throat.
“—!”
The third Emperor soon fainted. The Demon King gave an order to the approaching commander of the royal guard.
“Bind him with the Demon King’s castle’s holy relic.”
Restraints said to be impossible for even a god to escape once subdued.
After ordering them to use that item, the Demon King silently watched the commander of the royal guard bind the third Emperor, then stretched out his hand.
Drip. Drip.
Raindrops rested in his palm.
“...Cold.”
He could feel the temperature.
And the raindrops soaked into his clothes.
“Ha, haha—”
He burst into laughter.
My heart moved.
Because he had met someone interesting.
Because of a fragment of some memory that person had shown him.
And—
“How astonishing.”
Because of the wondrous power he had unfolded.
For the first time in ages, the Demon King’s heart had moved.
It was something similar to curiosity toward another existence.
“Fun. Very fun.”
The Demon King moved, leaving the gray rain to soak his body.
The sensation of rain touching him after so long was quite pleasant.
The demon god reacted, did it—
Contrary to his words about having fun, expression gradually vanished from his face.
Instead, something bleak rose in his eyes.
Demon god.
What gathered in his eyes as he recalled that word was neither wonder nor joy, but something close to hatred.
Cale Henituse was being carried away unconscious from the city wall.
In the Demon King’s eyes as he looked toward him, something chilling gathered alongside curiosity.
*****
“Mm.”
As Cale slowly came to, he realized it was time to open his eyes.
Am I going to see the God of Death?
Since every time he fainted like this, he ended up meeting the God of Death or similar gods, Cale opened his eyes without thinking much.
With an endlessly irritated expression.
Because the God of Death had not been answering his attempts to contact him at all.
“!”
And Cale, having opened his eyes, was startled.
“Human!”
Raon shoved his face right up to Cale with swollen eyes.
On and Hong were beside him as well.
Huh?
I’m not meeting the God of Death?
...Why has that bastard not been showing up lately?
The God of Death was certainly not a pleasant face to see, but not seeing him still left Cale feeling uneasy. Raon thrust an apple pie toward him and said,
“It’s been fourteen days!”
Hm?
For a moment, Cale doubted his ears.
Looking at the average ten-year-olds’ swollen eyes, he belatedly realized something had happened.
No way—
Fourteen days meant—
“Human, you didn’t wake up for fourteen days!”
Mm.
He fainted for two weeks?
For this long?
“...Uh, mm, ahem!”
His throat was clogged, and he could not speak properly.
Drip, drip—
Ron the attendant approached and poured warm water into a cup as he spoke.
“To be precise, young master, you woke after fourteen days, two hours, and thirty-one minutes.”
Damn.
This was bad.
Before Cale realized it, words spilled out of his mouth.
“Aren’t there still many cities we haven’t purified?”
Among the cities carrying seeds of corruption of chaos, he had purified only three.
There were still far too many places left to purify.
But two weeks had passed?
As Cale’s pupils shook—
A gentle voice reached him.
“Cale. Do not worry.”
Clopeh Sekka spoke with a gentle smile.
“The Demon World-wide tour for the gray rain ritual is prepared. Whenever you wish, you need only give permission, and I will cooperate with the Demon King’s castle to begin touring the entire Demon World continent immediately.”
Demon World-wide tour?
“All demons in the Demon World are waiting only for your recovery, Cale, so for now, please rest with an easy heart.”
...Why are all the demons in the Demon World waiting for my recovery?
No, why do all those demons know me?
Cale’s pupils shook.
Pat. Pat.
Ron, watching the startled Cale, pulled the blanket up and covered him again, then patted the blanket kindly as he said,
“Please rest for now, young master.”
No, I don’t think this is the time to rest?
Cale’s pupils shook, but—
Munch, munch.
For now, he ate the apple pie the average ten-year-olds gave him.
“Heh heh.”
However, at the sound of Clopeh Sekka’s laughter, Cale’s body twitched beneath the blanket.
Something had gone wrong.
The moment Cale opened his eyes, chills ran over his entire body.
