Children of the Demon King's Castle

prologue

Children of the
Demon King's Castle
yanderelle

×××

"What should I do?"

Eirene sighed heavily, looking at the children dressed in clean yet fancy clothes in front of her. However, their hands were cuffed and there were mana restrain collar on their necks.

'I never thought those kingdoms would gave me children as offerings.'

This was her miscalculation, she just remembered that the previous demon king enjoyed eating humans, especially cute children—it was seriously a bad hobby. However Eirene had once been a human and she definitely didn't thought the same way.

'... I need to tell them to change the content of the offerings.'

Eirene sighed heavily once again, took a note on her mind that she should done it quick before the next festival came.

'... Now.'

She gazed down onto them from her throne inside the Demon King's castle dim hall. She realized how two of them trembled due to fear and weep silently, one of them tried his best to not show his fear even though he peed his pants and his body shook uncontrollably, the other one tried to stay strong and look at her fiercely even when she was scared, while the last child was the calmest yet his eyes seemed lifeless, it seemed like a person who had gave up living.

'... Should I return them to their kingdoms? Saying that I wasn't content with their children offerings and want another type of gift instead?'

But then, what would happen with these children if she done that? Their families should had agreed for them to be the country's sacrifice, right? Offerings the great Demon King didn't content with and didn't even touch, won't the kingdoms be embarrased and tried to erase the evidence of these failed offerings?

... However, still, just in case.

'If their parents did love them and were forced to sacrifice them, I would love to return their children to them.'

After all, Eirene didn't know what to do with them. She was always alone and it was the normality for her. Having people around, she didn't knew how to act, even if they were children.

'... Well, I need to make sure they were loved. Having these small children executed because of me would leave a bad taste on my mouth after all.'

Eirene snapped her right fingers and immediately, all the children widened their eyes as they found their body quickly teleported right in front of the Demon King, or well—Demon Queen.

Some of them even immediately gasped, either due to amazement because of her magic or terrified by the sudden closure in distance. Of course, Eirene thought it should be the latter.

'... How should I ask them?'

Honestly, Eirene wanted to just questioned them directly and quickly get over with this, however, now that they were right in front of her, she could prefectly saw the pitiful appearances of these children.

Their bodies were very skinny and their skins fairly rough, it was as if they weren't treated well for a long time. It seemed they were dressed up nicely and fancily just for the sake of 'packaging' present meant for the Demon King.

'... Though, I admit they are amazing.'

Probably because they mostly sacrificed children with nobility blood, as nobles are the ones mostly born with mana, all of them have their own beauty. Even if their appearance currently quite pathetic, Eirene felt if they grew nicely, they would have no problem with finding suitors. However, still, what more amazing was their quantity of mana.

'... It's overwhelming.'

For normal humans, their mana capacity should be around ten thousand when they were children, and it would develop into a maximum of fifty thousand as they grew. However these children all have more than a hundred thousand.

Having too much mana, especially with their feeble children bodies, it would had been very hard to stay alive. She can't imagined how much pain they had gone through to even grew this much. After all, there was no cure, only temporary items to held the mana in place.

Moreover, considering this amount ... even the highest grade item (that could easily be restocked) in the kingdoms would only be able to restrain them for about a day. Then after the mana restrain item broke, they would start to have symptoms, and if another mana restrain item not quickly put on them, they would die within hours.

Even when using it themselves, they should still felt the symptoms, although much less. About that mana restrain collars ... it probably were customized SSR items to use for this wonderful occasion made by the most talented magician in the world. Even so, it would only be able to hold their mana for five days.

'... I already knew since the beginning that they'll have a lot of mana, but not this much. Now ... it seems like sending them back right away isn't an option.'

Because if she did, they would probably die. Until when did their kingdoms would be willing to protect them? They seemed to be raised for today's Blood Moon Festival, which only happened once in ten years, and those mana restriction items weren't cheap.

What happened if she return them to their kingdoms, after everything they did to keep them alive, for the Demon King's offering with their current body?

'It's highly likely they didn't want to have a baggage that's just eating their money without contributing anything.'

After all, since their mana restrain is being used, they can't utilize mana, which means they can't use magic. No, actually, they could use a small amount, but it would be very risky, because it may make the mana restrain unstable and broke.

Unless there was a cure for their excessive mana inside their body, no one would want to spend their money for them, probably except their family, but since it was very pricey, they would eventually must be forced to gave up.

'But even if I'm a female, I'm still the only Demon King in this world, the mighty being above other creatures.'

Eirene went silent for a while and again, released a heavy sigh.

It seemed like there was no other option for now ... either for her and the children. Maybe because she had been a child too in the past, even if she can't remember much, that she felt pity for these children.

'They still had years ahead of them.'

Eirene look at their eyes one by one, the twins that at first weep let out a soundless shriek when their eyes met, the other two that peed and look at her fiercely flinched visibly, while the lifeless boy didn't even gave any response.

Looking at this, Eirene can't help but bit her lower lip. Since the changing of the Demon King was somehow a secret, she was obviously being viewed as the 'children eating Demon King' by these kids.

'... Well, looks like I need to make them comfortable with me first.'

Eirene quickly noted as she slowly stood up from her throne.

[13/06/2020]