The Demon Lord's Bride (BL)-Chapter 24: There’s a reason people hate cliffhanger

Should I...kept reading?

I must have been staying still for too long since Jade had managed to climb into my head and made a harsh dive into my face.

"Ouch!" it was perfect to snap me out of my dazed state, so I forgave the little guy for now. "Aren’t you overreacting? I was just lost in thought for a bit..."

The green eyes stared at me mercilessly, as if telling me they didn’t care and that it would keep headbutting me if I were to fall into a daze again.

Haa—damn this bird. If it knew what I just read, then my messed up mind should be understandable.

"Don’t you know I’m in a perilous dilemma right now?" I poked its chubby cheek as it chirped aggressively.

Hmm, yeah, to read or not to read?

I stared hard at the small, slightly worn-out decades-old notebook in my hand. But...I’ve read this far, which meant I already jump into the fire. So...might as well get burned?

Haha...look at me trying to reason my own curiosity.

"Sorry, Jade, your master is a trash," I patted the little bird and it flew into my shoulder, nuzzling on my cheek while giving out a sound like a whimper.

With that accompaniment, I turned the notebook page again.

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[Day 1, Month 9, Year 1766

So I’m back at the academy again. Such a bad timing to have this ability awakened. Now I can sense all of them—the hostility, the fear, the hatred.

The guy who was always friendly had been envious of me all this time. I found out he was the one who stole my thesis.

Half of the people in my class feared me, I wonder why.

The professor...hmm, it’s complicated.

Ah, I have to avoid the vice headmaster, he seemed to have some interest in dissecting me.

Day 4, Month 9, Year 1766

Someone thought my family is cursed.

Someone thought I am cursed.

I heard it too, actually, so kind of pointless sensing it.

It’s hard concentrating in class with all of these thoughts swirling around. Most weren’t even thinking about the lecture.

Day 6, Month 9, Year 1766

I got the hang of it, so I don’t have to throw up every time the class ended.

If I can’t take it anymore, I’ll just close my eyes.

people thought I’m creepy and heartless.

people thought I might kill them someday. Do they have some trouble with me in the past?

intense hatred. They’re not another killer, right?

I think there is at least 2 surveillance from the Lord on me.

It’s funny though, that the only nice thought I have today was from that one guy who always shot daggers at me. Turned out he just wanted to spar with me. Hmm, I’ll have a spar with him I guess.]

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Most of the page’s entries after that were filled with the thought of the other academia and professor, even the academy staff, just like how he did it with the list of servants in his mansion.

At first, it was kind of a detailed explanation, and he would put down the name of the person if he knew and recognized them. But the more pages I flipped, the more it became monotone. At some point, he would just group those thoughts and made headcounts.

XX people hated me.

XX people are afraid of me.

XX people have neutral thoughts.

That people really want me dead but have no courage to kill me; that people want to scam me; that people this, that people that.

But I didn’t read many happy thoughts.

It was...suffocating, reading this. And it went like that for months, until he stopped.

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[Day 18, Month 12, Year 1766

I’m tired.

Is there any way I can mute all of these aside from closing my eyes? Sometimes I can even sense some thought coming from outside, from somewhere I couldn’t see.

Or would it just go as mother said? I just have to get used to it, and treat it like people’s talk.

Perhaps someday my mind can just choose to ignore it...

Day 3, Month 1, Year 1767

I heard about the war between a human kingdom and a druid one. If it spread to the demon realm, it will be the Lust territory.

Should I ask how my distant cousins have been doing there?

Day 11, Month 1, Year 1767

It doesn’t seem like the war will spread.

I had this thought that I might be going crazy if I joined a war effort without getting used to this first.

Day 13, Month 1, Year 1767

There’s something called jinx.

I am to join in the eastern beast subjugation effort on the border between Greed and Hailyn Elven Plain.

Apparently, they considered me as father’s replacement for times like this.]

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I had to pause here because I feel like I was going to read something heavy after this. The fingers that I used to turn the page suddenly felt like leads.

Holy shit, my Lord. What kind of life did you actually have?

I want to find out more about the accident during the banquet, but I didn’t think I could ask something like that to him in person. It would be hard asking Angwi about this, but would Zia even know if I asked?

Huh—without realizing it, this investigation about his ability suddenly turned into an investigation about his past.

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[Day 18, Month 1, Year 1767

Even before arriving at the barrack, all those strong thoughts already attacking me.

The anxiety of new conscripts and fresh graduates.

The excitement bordering arrogance.

Screw that—they were arrogant, proudful knights and martial artists.

And then among them; the usual scorn.

—Ah, the son of the traitor—

Or so they thought of me.

If only that thought made them exclude me from this campaign.

Day 20, Month 1, Year 1767

I didn’t know how helpful it would be, but Teacher told me to keep on writing out those thoughts I sensed. It’s even more important when there are a lot of them.

So I don’t get confused about which one is the other’s and which is mine.

So I don’t lose myself beneath those swirling egos that people threw out each time.

Day 23, Month 1, Year 1767

So much excitement for the first campaign.

I guess since it’s still the easy stage and the beast is still weak, we lost no one.

This is good. When most of the thoughts were identical, it didn’t confuse me much. Just felt like one big thought.

I think I can handle this much.

Day 26, Month 1, Year 1767

Excitement is gone with the first casualty. There are 29 of them.

Some drown in sorrow. Anger.

I felt a lot of fear and anxiety.

Joy. Relief. That it wasn’t them.

But what did I feel?

I don’t know.

Day 28, Month 1, Year 1767

Fear.

Agony.

Anger.

There is no more positive emotion left.

Day 29, Month 1, Year 1767

I can’t do this.

I’m going crazy.]

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From that point on, the previously neat handwriting changed. It gradually became sharper and uneven. There was so much tension and pressure that there would be a mark on the next page. The papers too, started to get wrinkled and smeared.

I started picturing it in my head, the young Natha in his tent, scribbling the horrible thoughts other people projected in the middle of a chaotic battlefield. The anxiety of the soldiers, the agony of the injured, and the desperation of those in the death door.

I could feel the trembling in his hand through the barely readable writings, pages which had probably been written while crouching on the field, surrounded by malice and fear.

Just for a semblance of sanity.

He wrote and wrote until some of the pages were torn, trying to unravel the swirling vortex of egos and emotions, detaching himself from them, trying not to drown.

It was hard to think that the Demon Lord I met a few days ago—the one who always had a confident gaze and looked as if he had no worries in this world—was once quivering under stress and pressure. He looked so much like a perfect specimen that I just thought he was born like that.

But he was once young and hurt and confused. I was always thinking that his ability to sense people’s thoughts was such a cheat. An unfair trait that made me look for its weakness.

But while it was indeed an unfair ability, it wasn’t just unfair for the target. First and foremost, it was unfair to the bearer. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so much of a burden if Natha could choose when to use it instead of it being so indiscriminate.

Now, reading this, it felt much like a curse instead.

His last writing was less of a report than an incoherent jumble of words projecting the thoughts. Fear. Warning. Danger. Death. Curse. Curse. Curse. The page looked like something from a psychiatric ward.

And then, the notebook was empty for a few pages. The next time he wrote again, it was back in neat handwriting and calm manner.

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[Day 11, Month 3, Year 1767

I’m glad they didn’t throw this book away and gave it back to me. This turned out to be a good outlet to manage my chaotic head.

Hopefully, I wouldn’t lose myself as I did during the campaign.

Although I remembered everything fully, and could still watch things unfolding, it was a horrible feeling to be controlled by instinct.

No, it wasn’t even my instinct. To be controlled by the amalgamation of all those shards of egos...it was a good thing that the automatic consciousness that surfaced was the instinct to survive. Thanks to that, my body even managed to take care of the people who tried to assassinate me during my berserk.

But, indeed, I am still lacking.

So I understand the family’s decision to pull me from the academy and just send me to Teacher’s abode.

How long would it take, I wonder? Ten years? Twenty? I don’t think I’ll be able to write here anymore. There will be nothing to write, anyway, since there will be just me and a handful of other disciples there.]

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Ah...I had this kind of feeling, but...

Lord Natha...were you perhaps a novel protagonist or something? Was that author girl had another novel with you as the main character? This guy even had a training arc during his youth.

I had thought that would be the last page, but surprisingly, the diary—ahem, the report—continued with a five-year gap.

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[Day 22, Month 5, Year 1772

I didn’t think I would meet my belongings faster.

It’s not that my training is complete, however. Teacher told me Great-Aunt sent a letter, which had an alarm so Teacher couldn’t ignore it.

Thanks to that, I was to leave this place for a while. Apparently, not even Teacher could ignore such a request.

Tomorrow, I will travel to the Sanctuary.

The King had summoned me.]

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I blinked and widened my eyes.

The King? As in the Demon King? The one who couldn’t be met, even by the Lord, unless they were being summoned?

And that King summoned Natha way before he became the Lord?

This guy really was the protagonist, wasn’t he?

It filled me with so much curiosity, as if I was reading a novel. It was certainly more interesting because the main character was someone I knew.

Why was he being summoned? What did the King want? Did it have something to do with the reason Natha had so much trouble during his early life?

With mounting excitement, I flipped the notebook.

Only to realize that it was the last page.