I’d Rather Be Healed by a Pure-Hearted, Beautiful Demon Lord Than by a Yandere Saintess! ~Even if I Run Away, the Yandere Saintess Keeps Coming After Me. If I Get Caught, It Seems Like I’ll Be Forced Into an Engagement!?~ - Chapter 22 & 23

Saint vs. Demon King, and the Unexpected Interference

“What… Hey… Lady Lucilphia!? When did you make that kind of promise!?”

“Be quiet, Yukina. As a strategist, just trust in my victory and stay silent.”

Atop the walls, I flailed in protest as Lady Lucilphia covered my mouth.

Somehow, I had ended up as the prize to be “given” to the Saint.

This was no joke. Don’t gamble me away without my say-so.

But Lady Lucilphia’s eyes held no trace of humor. She fully intended to settle things in a one-on-one duel with Erixia.

…No, wait a minute.

This might be part of the “psychological war” I had mentioned.

I had just said we wouldn’t play on the enemy’s preferred stage, and now we were offering the one-on-one duel they most likely craved. This was reverse psychology, a higher tactic that flipped the script on their script…?

(Could it be…!? Lady Lucilphia understood the essence of my plan and took it even further…!?)

As I marveled to myself and fell silent, Lady Lucilphia nodded in satisfaction and leaped lightly from the walls. Dark magic enveloped her body, allowing her to descend like a feather and land gently before the gate.

Erixia, in turn, stepped forward alone from her army, and the two faced off, glaring at each other.

On one side stood Erixia, the continent’s mightiest wielder of holy magic, the Saint.

On the other stood Lucilphia, the Demon King who reigned at the pinnacle of demonkind.

With thousands of soldiers from both armies watching, the curtain on their battle was about to rise.

“I shall begin, you little demon girl.”

“I’ll make that insolent mouth of yours shut forever.”

Erixia moved first.

As she swung her staff, over a dozen spears of light, “Holy Lances,” materialized and hurtled toward Lady Lucilphia.

Lady Lucilphia did not budge an inch from her spot. A dark barrier, “Dark Protection,” unfurled before her and effortlessly caught the spears of light.

“Is that all you’ve got!”

Lady Lucilphia raised her hand, and countless shadowy tentacles erupted from the ground to lash at Erixia.

But Erixia twirled her pure white dress and evaded them with graceful, dance-like steps.

Light and darkness. Sanctity and chaos.

Their magics were polar opposites. Their exchanges were on such an exalted level that to an amateur like me, it looked like nothing less than a clash between gods.

“Amazing…”

“Yes… They’re evenly matched.”

Atop the walls, Borgannon and the others watched with bated breath.

The fight seesawed back and forth. Erixia unleashed wide-area annihilation spells, which Lady Lucilphia countered with pinpoint dark magic, while Erixia’s barrier spells deflected Lady Lucilphia’s tricky assaults.

But in a prolonged battle, the disadvantage was clear.

“…Her Majesty’s magic power is gradually being whittled away.”

Necros analyzed calmly.

“The Saint’s seems inexhaustible, as if it springs from an endless well. The faith of the knights behind her must be fueling her strength.”

As he said, a faint sheen of sweat had begun to bead on Lady Lucilphia’s forehead.

At this rate, she would wear down. This was bad. If things continued like this, Lady Lucilphia would lose. And then, I would…

As I paled, the battle finally shifted dramatically.

Erixia began gathering the largest surge of magic power yet.

“This ends it. Vanish, embraced by holy light!”

A massive magic array of light appeared above her head, rivaling the one she had unleashed during the siege.

Lady Lucilphia, in response, released all her magic power and cloaked herself in a pitch-black aura.

Their ultimate strikes were about to collide.

No!

Taking that light head-on would leave even the Demon King unscathed no longer!

Terror and panic boiled in my mind.

There had to be something, anything, to help her…!

That was when something caught the corner of my eye.

It was a water bucket the soldiers had used during the siege. It still brimmed with water.

For some reason, I scooped it up with all my strength.

From the edge of the wall, I yelled at Erixia below, who was on the verge of unleashing her spell.

“—Cool your head!”

I upended the bucket.

SPLAAAASH!!!

With a tremendous splash, a torrent of water arced through the air and poured down onto Erixia’s head.

Silence…

The battlefield fell still as if doused by water.

Saint Erixia, who had radiated divine light and stood on the brink of her ultimate spell.

A deluge cascaded over her from above, soaking her platinum blonde hair and pure white dress through.

The gathered magic power dispersed into mist, and the massive magic array vanished as if it had been an illusion.

Drip, drip. Droplets fell from the tips of her hair as Erixia slowly, oh so slowly, looked up at me standing atop the walls.

All expression had drained from her face.

“””””…………Eh?”””””

The Holy Knights, the Demon King’s army, and even Lady Lucilphia. Everyone present froze, unable to comprehend what had just happened.

Had I done that?

To the sacred one-on-one duel between the Saint and the Demon King.

Had I just doused her… with plain water?

My utterly out-of-place, irreverent, and fatally anticlimactic interference.

That was what would twist the outcome of this battle in a direction no one had foreseen.

**

The Conclusion, Holy Water (Just Plain Water) and Shattered Pride

Time stood still.

The thousands on the battlefield had all frozen, unable to process the scene before them.

Saint Erixia, who should have been a divine and absolute presence, was utterly drenched.

From the crown of her head.

With nothing but water.

From the Demon King’s castle.

In a bucket.

The incantation for her ultimate spell had broken off, and the holy aura that had filled the space around her had vanished as if washed away by a shower.

Her beautiful platinum blonde hair clung to her face like wet seaweed, and her pure white dress stuck to her skin, clearly outlining the simple undergarment she wore beneath.

A sight so utterly lacking in sanctity, so profoundly human, so… utterly ridiculous.

The silence broke first with a stifled chuckle from a goblin soldier at the rear of the Demon King’s army.

It spread like a contagion. One by one, the demons doubled over, rolling on the ground in laughter.

“Buh, buhahaha!”

“L-Look at that, the Saint, done in by just plain water…!”

“She looks like a drowned rat!”

That mockery cut deeper into Erixia’s heart than any powerful spell could have.

Even the Holy Knights’ soldiers hung their heads, faces flushed crimson. Whether they were holding back laughter or simply could not bear the shame of their lord’s appearance, either way, it was poison to Erixia’s pride.

She trembled violently as she slowly glared up at me atop the walls—the culprit behind this catastrophe.

Her eyes held no trace of the saint’s compassion or the glow of a lovestruck maiden. What burned there was one hundred percent pure murderous intent and humiliation.

That was when Lady Lucilphia snapped out of her daze and moved.

She had been one of those stunned by my outrageous action. But she grasped it in an instant: this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Still wrapped in her grand misunderstanding, Lady Lucilphia sprang into action.

But she did not unleash a follow-up spell. That would have been too crude.

Instead, she condensed a tiny speck of dark magic at her fingertip and snapped her fingers with a click.

The dark mote landed a few centimeters from Erixia’s feet and burst with a small pop.

It was not even an attack.

It was a silent, absolute declaration of victory: “I could finish you anytime.”

Erixia’s body jerked at that tiny burst.

She looked at Lady Lucilphia. She looked at the jeering soldiers of the Demon King’s army. And she looked at her own wretched reflection in the puddle at her feet.

Something inside her snapped with an audible twang.

“…The match is decided.”

Lady Lucilphia’s quiet voice rang out.

“Honor the agreement. Lead your army away from here.”

Erixia said nothing.

She could say nothing.

She turned slowly on her heel and began walking back to her camp, one step after another, heedless of the wet dress trailing behind her. Her back seemed so small and trembling.

…Soon after, she signaled a full retreat to her army.

The Holy Knights began their withdrawal in confusion and shame, scattering like frightened spiders.

And so, Saint Erixia’s invasion of the Demon King’s territory over me concluded in the most anticlimactic and unsatisfying way imaginable, all because of one bucket of water.

The moment the enemy army vanished completely from view, the Demon King’s castle erupted in the loudest cheers of the day.

“”””Uoooooh! Yukinaaa! Yukinaaa!!””””

At some point, a massive chant of my name had broken out.

When I returned to the balcony, the three executives greeted me with eyes like they were beholding a god.

“…Lord Yukina. To think there exists a tactic that attacks not with force or magic, but the very soul… This Borgannon suffers his greatest humiliation of a lifetime…!”

“To strip away a woman’s pride so vividly, right in front of the grand audience… Lord Yukina, you truly are a devil♡”

“Hmm… The phenomenon of forcibly stripping sanctity via holy water… I’ve found a new subject for my research…”

Their praise came in three flavors, each at maximum intensity.

Then Lady Lucilphia floated down gracefully. She stood straight before me and fixed me with serious eyes.

“Yukina.”

“Y-Yes.”

“…Thank you. You’ve saved me again.”

With that, she smiled, like a flower blooming. That smile hit me like a shot to the heart.

I had only acted on impulse, panicked because I did not want to see her get hurt.

My head rang with cries of, “How did it come to this!?”