Demon's Virtue

Eiro and Nelly swam through the castle. The demon was guiding his contracted spirit to the room that the queen was currently in. It didn't seem to be her bedchambers like last time, but something more adjacent to a sitting room. At the end of the day, it was still just another space for her to lay and do basically nothing in, though.

The king was in the throne room, talking to some of the naiads and spirit people that worked at the castle. He did have his own space here too, but Eiro hadn't noticed him return there even once in the time that he had been here. This was the naiad queen's own castle, and whenever the king was here, the two spent their nights together.

They did really seem to be in love, so at least Eiro was glad that the former queen didn't let go of her position for nothing.

"Are you ready?" Eiro asked, looking over at Nelly, but she just shook her head with an annoyed roll of her eyes.

"Of course not. But let's just get in there already and let's get this over with," she replied, so Eiro slowly nodded his head. He looked over at the guard stationed outside of the room, thinking about what to do for just a moment. In the end, he simply took a deep breath, infusing the water that had moved into his lungs with conceptual magic.

The concept that Eiro chose was 'distraction', which should make it easy for the guard to find something else more interesting than actually guarding the door.

He pushed that water back out and carefully manipulated it so that the guard would breathe it in next. It took a few moments for the magic to take effect, but before long, he had started fiddling with the flaps of his armor and seemed particularly curious about the buckle of his belt for some reason.

It being the perfect time, Eiro snapped his finger loudly, blocking the sound's ripples from moving into the guard's direction straight away, instead having them move around corners and jump from wall to wall so that it would sound like it was coming from down the hall.

The extremely distractable guard glanced over into the direction of the sound, following his new instincts and taking a closer look at what was going on. So, Eiro of course immediately swam over to the door, while Nelly glanced at the guard's back.

"Well, that... I didn't expect a person from this realm to be so easily influenced by conceptual mind magic," Nelly said, almost disappointed, and Eiro shrugged with a slight smile.

"To be totally fair, it wasn't just any conceptual magic. It was mine."

"Stop bragging like that," Nelly scoffed.

"Sorry. I guess I'm just happy to be talking to you again," with a smile, Eiro placed his hands onto the large door, and Nelly clicked her tongue while looking away.

"Fine, you get to brag a little."

Eiro pushed open the door with a smile, and the naiad queen snapped her head toward Eiro confused.

"How dare you- You did this last time as well, but stop just entering places you shouldn't be!" the queen exclaimed, "And where is my damned guard?"

"Checking out some random corner, I think," Eiro responded, "But well, I figured right now would be fine. We wanted to say goodbye."

The queen frowned confused, not entirely sure what Eiro meant. Why would he just be leaving like this without any warning?

"Goodbye? And 'we'?" she asked, and Eiro slowly turned his head to the woman behind him. Nelly hesitantly swam into the room, and the queen widened her eyes. She immediately swam toward her, "Nelissa! When did you wake up? You should have called us there, you should sitll be careful with your body, I-"

"Calm down, Laris," Nelly sighed loudly, swimming past the queen's hand as she reached out for something like a hug. Of course, the queen was a couple times larger than Nelly, so part of it might have just been something like an instinct, but Eiro figured that Nelly just didn't feel like being all too affectionate here for no reason.

The queen pulled back her hands, "Oh, I'm- I'm sorry, but... are you okay? Do you need me to heal you a little more?"

Nelly quickly shook her head, "Don't worry, I'm fine. If I ever need healing again, Eiro can do it from now on."

With a laugh, the queen held a hand in front of her mouth, "Quite a joke there, I don't remember you being so..." she started, though she soon saw Nelly and Eiro's expressions. The queen looked over at Eiro, "Wait, what... what do you mean?"

The demon smiled softly, his hands placed onto his back, "After observing your healing capabilities, I managed to replace them to some degree. I'm still not even close to as skilled in those particular techniques as you are, but I feel as though I'm well on my way of being able to accomplish similar results."

The queen silently stared at the demon, not sure what she was supposed to say. The healing powers of the naiad queen were supposed to be a unique quality; a power of recovery beyond any other, as it was supposed to be the only power that could heal anything, even spirits. But Eiro was supposed to have replicated that power after seeing it just once?

"That's not important right now, though," Nelly replied, looking up at the queen, "I'm here to see you just once before we leave. I don't know when or if we'll get another chance, after all."

Hearing Nelly say this, the queen nervously moved backward, "Why would we not get another chance to see each other?"

"Because I didn't directly make the choice to see you this time either. Eiro brought me here and convinced me to come see you."

"... Do you really hate me so much?"

"I don't hate you. Why would I?" Nelly responded, shaking her head.

"Then why do you act like this? Why have you evaded my attempts at contacting you, and... and why are you a supporter of the former queen?"

"Just because I support her does not mean that I don't support you, Laris. She is the one that earned the right to be queen. She did, truly and honestly. You lost to her in the race of becoming the queen. That doesn't mean that you didn't have the qualifications to be the queen, but you still lost. But even so, because you and the king were in love, she later rescinded her position.

She is the rightful queen, so why would she suddenly lose my support?" Nelly frowned, and the queen lowered her gaze.

"Is that it? Are you mad at me for falling in love?"

Nelly shook her head, almost annoyed, "Do you really think I would be mad about something like that? I was happy for you when you fell in love, and I was even happy for you when you became the queen."

"Then what's the issue?" confused and clearly growing a bit upset, the naiad queen stared down at nelly, who seemed practically angry at what the queen was asking.

"Really? You don't even remember what you did? Why am I even surprised, of course you don't... To you, it was the natural thing to do, right?"

At this point, even Eiro was growing confused. What happened between them that Nelly was this mad at her? From what she was saying earlier, it sounded like nothing but a personal disagreement, but there was clearly much more to it than that.

"I don't follow..."

"You tried to hunt down all the great beasts of the plane, Laris," Nelly replied, and the queen raised her brows in surprise.

It was like she didn't even understand why Nelly was mad about that, "But... they were dangerous. They took out dozens of ships every month."

"Dozens of hunting vessels! The beasts were trying to defend themselves, just- How can you not understand that? They're a pillar of this realm and magic as a whole, if you had gotten rid of them all, you would have... ruined this plane completely."

"I would have made it safer... plus, their bodies could have fed millions, created oils and medicines. And then, those corpses would have fostered new life that could feed off them. If killing one mindless beast could save my people, why wouldn't I do what had to be done?"