"What do you know?" That was all that the white-haired sorcerer had told Leran. One would think it was her normal cold voice, but this time it held a chill that felt real, as if Sae was trying to fight the fear she had with anger; if there was any reason why she was called the Ice Mage, this was it.
The demon then replied: "not everything, but the gist of it." It was true. Considering he could not read the books written by her, he could only look for information using the books that had been published five hundred years prior, as he remembered that was the time when Sae decided to move to the mountains and live alone. Despite how many books there were from that period, not a lot of attention was ever given to the Ice Mage's story, which made the demon king believe that it might have been cancelled as an event from history by the people of that age. Despite that, not everyone had remembered to do so and there were accidental mentions that the library found and gave to the white-haired demon, allowing him to investigate.
He had to thank such a blissful library in which he never had to struggle to find anything, along with the witty and formal owl Jerome for the company. "That familiar has been so easy to trick." Leran thought to himself, thinking about how it was simply enough to say that his master was sleeping for him not to warn her of the demon's arrival to the library.
"I see." She said, feeling a bit relieved and still a bit scared, but more than anything angry. Then she gritted her teeth and tried to force a smile; only after a few seconds could she answer his proposal with considerations of her own: "I should punish you for what you did, but I can't because I didn't say you weren't allowed to do that. That was a good idea, I can't lie. Still, beware of my reactions from now on." The Ice Mage threatened with a chilly tone, not even bothering to ask 'how can you help me'? That was because, at her core, she felt a deep lack of trust towards everyone and Leran was no exception. She didn't believe he could really help her at all.
"There's no way you can gain my trust either." Sae said as he felt Leran leave the room satisfied. That was, more than a threat, a fact. After all, what the white-haired sorcerer could trust as a certainty was the fact that she was in no danger at all. If even the demon king, the next strongest existence in the world after her, one that could match her strength if he had the resources to, was easily dealt with in this state, then there was really nothing she had to be afraid of. Seeing how she wasn't in any danger to die, the next biggest danger towards her was the one that she had always fought against, the emotional pain. It was a battle that Sae could no longer win. She'd succumb to sadness and solitude one day if she kept refusing company and denying who she really was.
"I've been hurt countless times. I don't think you can be an exception." Those were the last words she pronounced to Leran's leaving figure before locking her door with magic in such a way that he wouldn't be able to access it. Then, she also used her mana to make the room soundproof and went back to viewing the state of the village, now with more than just one tear falling from her azure eyes.
Meanwhile, the demon king was perplexed by his own reaction to what happened. "I should be happy... shouldn't I? I beat her at her own game by playing fairly and regained my pride. Yet... my words were sincere." He thought to himself, arriving at the last realization. Initially, his idea was to tell her everything he now knew and to follow that confession up with the words she herself had said while peering through his private life, that he'd help her despite her not wanting him to, but he realized her intentions back then were not to break his heart, but to actually make sure at least he could be happy.
"Or, I'm not sure if she actually wanted me to be happy or was just trying to avoid feeling guilty, but I'm trying to understand her personality now. Sae didn't have any hesitation in saying I was not the culprit of the murders, so I shouldn't doubt her intentions either." He had arrived to that that realization. After all, if all she wanted was to remove the guilt from her mind she could've gone with the easy path of punishing him for the murders and moving on.
"Still, I don't want to interrupt her again. I should organize the thoughts inside my head first." He thought, still angered, confused and saddened by the outcome of things. "I don't want her to have secrets... it angers me how she is never saying the truth. So, I should tell her something about me too after I'm done telling her what I know. I don't know why but I see myself in her, just with a very different way of handling trauma. I'll avoid doing what would personally anger me." He rationally thought.
"Alright, so what I know for now about the figure of Saelyne the Ice Mage is that it's as she completely didn't exist before five hundred years ago. In fact, she told me about how she was already important in the shadows of the mage associations, helping with discoveries made from fake names. Then, to defeat the former demon king, she was forced to show her true form in front of the now crumbling mage association, threatened by a possible loss of the human race to the demon invasion. I don't know what happened then, but I know that the leader of the demon is now defeated and chained. The thing I really need to know, though, is what happened to her afterwards. Why did they force her to leave if she had done such an impressive feat? Was it her own choice? Still... I should be thankful for her for defeating him... but it should've been me." Leran said out loud, thinking about what he knew and what he didn't, reminded of the much hated figure of the previous demon king, a person he would've liked to kill with his own hands if there was the chance to.
"Oh, so that's what you know. Good to hear." He heard a cold tone of voice come towards him, then saw the white-haired girl he now knew very well get close to his thinking face. "You know. I'd really like to kill you right now." That's all she said, having regained her composure and being done with watching the village for now. "It seems there'll be no kills today. That's a bad thing, I could have stopped one and caught the culprit. It shows the person realized of the spies' arrival, maybe he guessed there'd be more people on his tail now. If there's something important to talk about, though, it's what you did." She said after explaining the situation, her azure eyes gazing deep into Leran's soul.
"I don't regret one thing." The demon king admitted, his voice proud. "If you weren't there, I'd probably have an enormous amount of mages trying to kill me coming from the capital, for murders I've not even committed. Still--" he started saying, then his tone of voice changed: "--that logic all fades if I decided to run from them. I could've left this place without any traces. I don't think I should be grateful towards a person that has kept me in a sort of imprisonment, rather than saving me. I had preparations, such as my clones, in case I'd really be chased down." Leran continued, his tone of voice not changing from the warm one he had previously started talking with, to oppose the cold one of Sae.
"Makes sense." She said, but Leran could see that behind her cold facade there was a little bit of sadness for her efforts to help everyone not being appreciated enough. But he wasn't done speaking -- what he wanted to say was much different than what he had said until now -- and smiled.
"Yet, I actually do feel grateful. Honestly, there was one goal in my entire life. The one thing I needed the resources was to obliterate the people who have betrayed me. Now that I'm so powerful, stronger than the previous demon king, I could definitely do it, but they're all gone. Vanished, they disappeared in the night and I can't find any trace; for how weak I am right now, I don't even believe I could win against them all. And the person I swore to kill the most has already been defeated and chained by your hands." He admitted, to which Sae was hit by an enormous amount of surprise.
"The former demon king?" She asked, to which he nodded. She realized he wasn't going to talk about his relationship to such a mortal enemy to humans, to which she nodded in approval then waited for him to continue talking. Sae really didn't mind. She was convinced she didn't care much about the information itself but more about the gesture of fixing the balance of secrets they kept, but it'd be a lie to say she wasn't curious. The figure of Leran had always intrigued her and at some point the Ice Mage even started to see some similarities with her own personality.
"Now that my goal is to find the other people who betrayed me, my life is way more boring than it previously was. I haven't had company for more than five hundred years and, if I can be honest..." he said, then sighed and talked again: "you're the first person that actually cared about me sincerely since I've been born. This is why I want to help you. I can't let you go, not even when I'm finished with my plans. Despite the fact we've known each other for such a short amount of time, I can already trust you and it's fine if you still can't; maybe it's idiotic for me to do such a thing considering I've been betrayed so easily, maybe a part of me is saying it's a terrible idea, but once I complete my goal, if I don't have anyone by my side, I'll be as good as dead anyway. Plus, I hope it can be a good inspiration for you to start trusting me as well." He finished.
"So, what you're saying is that you need me. Do I need you?" Sae said, her eyebrow raised, as she now was again smiling. "You know, I appreciate how you traded secrets. It means a lot to me." The Ice Mage repeated again, preparing to took her leave as she saw Leran not answering to her first question.
But then he answered. "I think you do, and I'll eventually show you." That made the white-haired sorcerer suddenly stop in her tracks. "This would be much easier if you just hated me. But if you're fine with gaining a little bit of my trust day by day, then so be it. I do promise you I'm really annoying, it's not an act." The mage concluded, laughing as she said the last sentence.
That laugh was something that Leran had heard so little of, but had learned to enjoy. It wasn't the usual laugh -- devoid of emotion, just to keep appearances -- but one that was sincere and heartfelt.
"It's been so long since I felt this good. Thanks for the heart-open conversation." Sae thanked Leran again, who nodded and immediately turned around to exit the room and leave her to spy on the village. Maybe because he didn't want to keep her busy any longer, maybe because he wanted her not to see how red he had become for a simple sincere apology.
But he knew something in his heart was changing, just like when he had met Ylenia.
