* * *
The first memory was of a forest in the rain.
Wooooosh—.
The noisy sound of rain.
Cold rainwater pounded against armor and fell endlessly onto black, wet soil.
I don’t know how long that sound continued.
Even the concept of time was faint.
That day, the sound of rain ceaselessly striking armor briefly awakened my consciousness from where it had sunk into a deep abyss.
I was standing in a forest.
Why I was here, where I was supposed to go, who I was.
I couldn’t know anything.
I tried to think of something, but my mind was filled only with thick darkness.
Yet within that darkness, there was one sensation that felt especially alien.
A powerful revulsion—a refusal to encounter something.
Soon, even the consciousness I had barely surfaced sank back into the darkness.
The second memory was also in a forest.
This time the weather was clear.
Sunlight poured through the leaves.
“Kyaaaah! A monster!”
I heard a noisy scream.
That sound awakened my consciousness once again.
I didn’t want to hear it.
So I swung the sword in my hand, and soon it became quiet.
And I sank back into the darkness.
The third memory was….
“Dullahan!”
It was someone’s shout.
But this time was different.
The moment I heard the voice.
Swoosh!
It was as if someone had grabbed the consciousness buried deep in a swamp with their hand and yanked it up in one pull.
The world became vivid.
Leaves swaying in the wind, the smell of soil and grass, the weight of the armor pressing down on my body.
And my own existence, which I had forgotten for so long.
Only then did I realize.
That my consciousness had been submerged in a deep sleep until now.
That was not a simple shout.
It was a call.
A command and an imprint that burrowed deep into my existence and carved itself in.
A powerful connection that could not be refused or escaped.
It was a dominion permitted only to the twenty-one rulers who governed magic.
Beings who had received authority directly from the Demon God and were permitted to command countless monsters and reign above them.
Lower monsters must answer their call.
It was an instinct carved into their very existence from the moment they were born as monsters.
A ruler had called me. So I had no choice but to listen.
Because that call pulled me out from the deep darkness I had been submerged in.
I could become fully myself again.
This was my second life. I, who had originally been human, was reborn as a monster after death.
But my memories from before death were as sparse as a cloth riddled with holes. There was far more I couldn’t remember than what I could.
It seemed I had a very close friend. It seemed I had harbored grand dreams.
But no matter how I tried to grasp them, the memories scattered like sand slipping through my fingers.
It must be because I lost my head. My memories are inside it, and that is why the current me is incomplete.
So I must find my head. If only I could retrieve it….
But why is it so noisy? What on earth has it been chattering about since earlier?
“Dullahan!”
Again, a voice calling me.
“Wouldn’t you like to work in a better environment than this? I’ll guarantee treatment befitting your abilities!”
Work? Ah, right.
Monsters must belong under a ruler.
That was the safest way of life for us, and the natural order that beings born from magic must follow.
But even that felt indifferent to the point of not caring. Everything was bothersome, everything was numb.
I wanted to do nothing but find my head.
“How long do you plan to wander this forest uncomfortably? Our Hermit’s Dungeon provides a stable space for you to stay!”
No interest. My head is somewhere here.
I can definitely feel it, but no matter how much I search, I cannot see it.
Without my head, neither a good dwelling nor good treatment had any meaning.
But it was strange.
It was definitely an annoying and noisy voice, yet strangely, I wanted to keep listening.
Because each time the voice reached me, my scattered, jumbled memories found their places one by one.
A rural village. Yes, I grew up in a small village.
I wanted to become an adventurer. So I learned the sword under my master….
And… there was someone. Someone very close.
As my memories gradually returned, I became a little more complete.
“Aaah… Did a Demon King come looking for me personally?”
I let out my voice for the first time. It was rougher and more broken than I remembered.
Yet strangely, it felt good.
That I could produce a voice. That I could turn thoughts into words.
Just that small fact made me feel like I was gradually returning.
“You could just give a command instead of doing such bizarre things.”
If the Demon King ordered me to come to them right now, I would gladly grovel at their feet.
I gathered my energy and spread it through the entire forest.
The energy extending like a spiderweb finally located the ruler who had called me.
Something was strange.
A familiar yet unfamiliar aura.
It possessed the authority of magic, yet its form was close to human.
At least among the twenty-one Demon Kings carved into my instincts, there was no one with that kind of presence.
A new Demon King? …No. There are no vacancies in the twenty-one seats.
Then what on earth is that?
For the first time, I became interested in something other than my head.
I observed that existence without revealing myself.
“If you come to our dungeon, there’s one more employee welfare benefit! Get this—we’ll find lost items for you immediately!”
My interest instantly snapped toward that.
You’ll find lost items?
I almost took a step forward without realizing it.
But I stopped. Not yet.
Just a little more. I wanted to hear this voice a little longer.
The more I did, the more my lost memories were returning.
I needed to know.
Who I was, what I had lost.
And above all.
How on earth I had died.
According to my incomplete memory… I was murdered by someone. My head was cut off without mercy.
Judging by how my heart stung so much just before death, I might have been murdered by someone very close to me.
Since I’ve been given a second life, wouldn’t it be possible to find the one who killed me and take revenge?
* * *
“Dullahan, could you fill out a resume while you wait? I’ll be right back.”
“Why say so much? It would be easier to just give a command.”
I handed the Dullahan a pen and a sheet of paper with the resume format, then quickly escaped the office.
The moment the door closed, I slid down with my back against the wall.
“What… what did I just hear?”
I had been sulking over the comment about resembling Ragner’s dog.
Then the Dullahan suddenly dropped a bombshell.
“I think my childhood friend killed me. Boksil, have you ever heard the name Ragner?”
How on earth does one make such an absurd conclusion from what misunderstanding?
Was it really not in its right mind because it still had no head?
At any rate, I had succeeded in making contact with the Dullahan somehow, so the next step was to arrange a meeting between Ragner, Ruadis, and Sabira.
But Sabira firmly believed that Ragner had killed her.
She believed it so absolutely that no matter how much I tried to clear up the misunderstanding, it was useless.
When I asked why she thought that, the answer was even more baffling.
The last thing she saw before dying was Ragner’s face, and in that moment, her heart ached with such sorrow it felt like it was being wrung out.
Therefore, she must have been betrayed and killed by her most trusted friend.
No.
The one who killed you was a powerful monster, and rather, you sacrificed yourself to protect your precious friend Ragner.
No matter how many times I explained it like a broken audio player, she wouldn’t listen at all.
It was clear her intelligence stat had dropped because she had no head.
At this point, I began to worry.
Should I really let the two meet like this, with Sabira’s memories incomplete…?
“Should I find her head first?”
If I brought her head before they met, her memories might return properly.
But there was a fatal problem with this.
It meant I would have to personally carry a severed human head with my own hands.
“Ugh….”
I absolutely couldn’t do that!
“Stop groaning and just discuss it. What’s the use of worrying alone? Asking the parties involved directly for their opinions is faster and easier.”
After all, humans are social animals, and conversation is the most correct and excellent means of resolving conflict!
