Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka?

Chapter 260 - Just who created all this chaos!?

It seems vampire girl has charged into the mansion in a somewhat confused state. Well, okay, whatever. Actually, it’s not okay but, well, this is the vampire girl we’re talking about. From the monitoring done by my clones I have a rough idea what happened anyway.

But, you know? Once the mood progressed to a dubious stage I cut the monitoring, but when they came out there was a new vampire. Peeking in on a love scene is certainly too much so I had cut the monitoring, but I seriously wonder what happened.

For starters, I’ll silence the vampire girl, who is squawking noisily.

「Bleaugh!」

Today we have a beautiful demonstration of a く shape by vampire girl. The moment the boy with her sees that, his eyes open wide.

「How dare you!」

He comes rushing at me. Drawing his sword he attempts to stab me. Ah, vampire girl, I guess you haven’t disciplined your retainer yet huh?

The moment I decided to deal with him properly, a figure suddenly landed between the boy and me. The figure used something like a Judo throwing technique to push the boy down onto the floor, locking his elbow joint. Since he’s a vampire I’m sure he could deliberately break his arm to escape from that, but he’s fresh out of the oven though. I’m sure such an unconventional technique wouldn’t occur to him yet.

「Ugh, let me go!」

「I will not. This is for your sake as well, Waldo-sama. You must not oppose this lady.」

「That voice… No way, Felmina!?」

Ooh, he noticed. That’s correct. The one who’s on top of you is actually your ex-fiancée Felmina-chan.

She’s a pitiful girl who made valiant efforts to try to save the poor boys under the Charm of vampire girl, and on top of being crushed, or rather ignored, she was then cast aside by the fiancé she tried to save. To take care of and support such a girl - I’m super nice! In addition, I’m giving her training and work to do as well - I’m super caring!

「Waldo-sama, please calm down. Otherwise you will be killed.」

Oh, you think she’s looking at me with fearful eyes? It’s just your imagination. I won’t kill him okay? That kid is technically the child of a big shot noble anyway. Killing him would lead to bothersome stuff. So you don’t need to be so afraid, okay? Really?

「Gahah! Uh, uuhhn. Cough. Goshujin-sama, could you please not kick me every time?」

Ah, vampire girl has revived. She’s wiping away blood that slipped from her mouth with a handkerchief. Don’t mind the little things. It’s not like she’d die anyway.

「By the way goshujin-sama, who is that girl? She seems to be an acquaintance of Waldo though.」

「Eh?」← Felmina

「Eh?」← Waldo

「Eh?」← Me

「Eh?」← Vampire girl

Heavy silence. Umm, vampire girl, seriously, could it be that you don’t remember Felmina-chan? Or rather, you never even had any awareness of her? How wretched…

Sorry, our vampire girl is a bit like THAT on the inside. She doesn’t mean any harm. Because she doesn’t mean to she ignores her own wickedness though.

While sitting astride on Waldo-kun, Felmina-chan’s shoulders start to shiver softly. Waldo-kun drops his gaze to the floor with an ashamed expression. Vampire girl realises she’s done something bad but doesn’t know the cause, and while pretending to be calm she’s totally giving herself away with her flustered eyes.

So this is a love triangle huh. It’s nothing to do with me though so I’ll evacuate. Let’s go.

「Don’t you run away!」

Tsk, vampire girl caught my sleeve. Even if you beg me with such a face, there are some things that even I cannot do anything about! In other words, friendship, effort, conquest, love or passion infused communication, and most of all, I don’t understand the human heart.

Gahh! Let go! I’m escaping from here! Or rather, don’t drag me into this! Isn’t this a bomb you planted! It’s already exploded beyond hope so just beg for forgiveness on your belly! Well, it’s not like she herself even realises what she did wrong though anyway.

「Erm. Just how did things end up like this I wonder.」

Oni-kun! You came at a good time! Save me!

「In short, the start of the incident was Sophia-san turning Waldo-san into a vampire then.」

「Indeed.」

Things have calmed down for the moment, so we started holding an inquiry in a relatively small conference room inside the mansion. After all, this mansion has rooms as big as university lecture rooms apparently are. I’ve not been to a university lecture, so the only image I have is of a large sprawling classroom with university students milling around.

In contrast to oni-kun’s weary expression, vampire girl replies with a brazen expression, or at least she thinks so herself. It’s obviously impossible to smooth over a face that’s so close to crying though.

「Then, when Waldo-san became hostile towards Shiro-san for kicking Sophia-san, Felmina-san stopped him.」

「Yes.」

「Indeed.」

The apparently calm looking Waldo-kun, and the still somewhat depressed looking Felmina-chan reply.

「So, that’s when Sophia-san asked who Felmina-san was.」

Silence. Vampire girl’s face has cramped, Waldo-kun is trying to keep his face immobile but surely he’s not calm on the inside and Felmina-chan’s response was to start crying again.

「Felmina-san tried all sorts of things to rescue Waldo-san from the effects of Sophia’s Charm, but in the end those failed. Waldo-san then denounced and expelled her. Afterwards, she was taken into Shiro-san’s care and worked as a subordinate.」

「Indeed.」

Felmina-chan confirms oni-kun’s words while crying. Against the opponent she fought so hard against, she’d obviously be downhearted to have not even been recognised.

「In conclusion, it’s Sophia-san’s fault.」

「Objection!」

「Objection overruled.」

Oni-kun’s decrees his judgement, vampire girl demurs. Oni-kun immediately overrules. No mercy at all.

「No matter how I look at it, it’s Sophia-san’s fault. In the first place, are you using Charm on people and brainwashing them as a joke? That’s not something you should do to the same people as yourself. It’s an atrocity.」

Scathing criticism, as if despising her utterly. I’m somewhat surprised. Oni-kun has a rather gentle personality after all, so I wouldn’t have expected him to express his emotions in words so strongly. Well, after thinking about it for a bit I guess I can understand. When all’s said and done, oni-kun is the Ruler of Wrath. Deep in his heart dwells an endless rage. Instead, his gentle everyday guise should be considered the exception, and this guise should be considered the norm.

In response to the unexpectedly strong criticism, vampire girl shudders for a moment then looks downward. Felmina-chan looks on at that vampire girl with a cold expression and Waldo-kun doesn’t interpose himself. That Waldo-kun has decided to stay beside vampire girl still despite being cut off from Charm, suggesting he’s taken a side. Or rather, if he’d just casually tagged along here without thinking then he’d have to be a seriously shallow guy.

「…am not…」

Vampire girl mutters in a subdued voice. Even with my sense of hearing that’s all I could hear, that’s how soft a mutter it was. However, it was clear that it was a mutter with real determination behind it.

「What?」

「I’m not the same!」

This time she shouts.

「I am a vampire. I’m not a normal person. I’m not the same.」

Most likely, I’m the only one here who comprehended the weight of the words she has said here and now. Those words are a declaration that vampire girl will completely cast aside her humanity. But…

「And, what of it?」

The mood in this chamber, has gotten as heavy as lead. Anger is pressing down so hard it might as well have mass.

「There’s good deeds and then there’s evil deeds. No matter what reasons you might have, evil deeds are still evil. What you’ve done, is evil no matter how much you protest.」

Felmina-chan gulps. Waldo-kun’s face stiffens while not being able to preserve his poker face.

「What you call evil deeds, is the way of life for vampires. To deny me that, means to deny my very being itself. If it’s evil then fine. That’s who I am.」

All by herself, vampire girl directly accepted that anger head-on.

They glare at each other.

Only time passes by.

Umm, I’m getting pretty hungry, so mind if I leave?

—

“love scene” - the word used here (“nureba”) originates from Kabuki theatre. It can also be used to refer to love/romantic/sex scenes in films.

“くshape” - a follow-on reference from “Oni 11”.

“he’s fresh out of the oven though” - the implication here is that Waldo has only just become a vampire. A newly baked vampire as it were, so isn’t used to things.

“beg for forgiveness on your belly” - Shiro suggests that Sophia do a “dogeza”. historical

When Sophia says “I’m not the same” that’s in response to Wrath’s “same people as yourself”. Here, the “same people as yourself” has the sense of “fellow humans” but without explicitly saying “human”.