I Took the Demon King as My Wife

In the endless darkness, Eilena was walking.
Where she was heading, what she was chasing—she knew nothing of either.
As if entranced by something, she was simply moving her feet aimlessly through the darkness that resembled an abyss.
-Splash. Splash.
In the darkness where not even a hand in front of her face was visible, though nothing could be seen, the wet sensation under her feet was clearly felt.
The unpleasantly sticky sound was an added bonus.
“Where is this place….”
After walking absentmindedly for a while, Eilena suddenly stopped and looked around.
A space endlessly stretching in pitch-black darkness in all directions.
A strange and unfamiliar space where she was losing her sense of direction, unsure if she was even moving forward.
In a space difficult to describe in words, Eilena was left alone.
Why she was here, how she had come to this place—she couldn’t remember anything.
“……”
In this bewildering situation, Eilena kept turning her body around, examining her surroundings.
-Splish… splash….
While looking around in the darkness, footsteps began to sound from behind her.
-Splurt! Splurt!
The small footsteps gradually evolved into larger, rougher ones.
The sound, barely audible at first, was getting closer and closer to her.
At the sound that could no longer be ignored, Eilena turned around.
The owner of the footsteps slowly began to emerge from the darkness.
“…!”
Facing him, Eilena froze in place with a breath that seemed to stop.
“F-Father…?”
“……”
A man of about 3 meters in height, with a rugged appearance.
Baalrotte, the former Demon King and her father. He who was called the Emperor of Operations.
Eilena looked up at her father with a face pale as if she might pass out at any moment.
Empty, gray eyes without focus dropped toward her.
Eilena instinctively began to retreat with trembling steps, trying to avoid her father.
However, before long, her back hit something.
Startled, Eilena turned around again.
“Huők…!”
Eilena gasped as if she would faint when she saw who was standing behind her.
Thud! With her legs giving way, Eilena fell backward, landing on her bottom.
A skinny man with a similar build to hers was staring at her blankly, his head drooping.
“B-Brother….”
It was Zerhan, one of her half-siblings.
“H-how… B-Brother was definitely….”

“…Eilena.”
A chilling voice, consumed by resentment, flowed through pale lips.
Eilena shook her head repeatedly and placed her hand down, slowly backing away.
Splashing sounds echoed as her dress began to get wet.
“Th-this is…?”
Eilena could now confirm the identity of the sticky liquid on the floor.
Sticky, dark red blood was soaking her hands abundantly.
“Huk… huk….”
Unable to properly control her increasingly rapid breathing, Eilena continued to struggle to escape from her dead brother.
But soon she was blocked by yet another figure.
“Me-Mesif?”
“…Eilena.”
Another of her siblings was staring at her blankly with a vacant expression.
“N-no way… E-everyone….”
Eilena backed away again, shaking her head repeatedly as if denying reality.
Then, gradually, one by one, new siblings of hers began to emerge from all directions.
Agares, Lucien, Bine, Astarote….
Her kinsmen who had departed for the other world hundreds of years ago surrounded Eilena, approaching in the same state they had been in when they died.
“Huk… huk….”
Her irregular breathing became even more rapid.
Then Baalrotte, who had been her father, squeezed through his children and slowly approached Eilena.
“…Ah.”
Seeing her father approaching her step by step, Eilena turned pale blue and couldn’t close her mouth.
Her heart pounded as if it would burst, and her lips began to tremble.
“F-Fa…ther….”
She called her father with a trembling voice.
In response, his heavy lips opened, and an ice-cold voice flowed out.
“Lowly wench….”
“…!”
The voice that flowed out rode her memories and became a sharp dagger, stabbing her heart.
“Ugh…!”
Eilena clutched her chest, expressing pain.
She tried her best to calm her rough breathing, but it was impossible with gazes pouring from all directions.
“Huk… huk….”
Eilena continuously exhaled anxious breaths.
Then Baalrotte, who had been silently watching her, slowly bent down and extended his hand toward her.
“F-Father…?”
Eilena stared at her father’s face with wide eyes.
She slowly lowered her gaze and stared at the hand extended to her.
Her father’s palm, which she had never seen even once in his lifetime.
“……”
After hesitating for a moment, Eilena barely moved her trembling hand to grasp the hand he extended.
At that moment.
-Grab!
“Uugh! F-Father…!”
The hand that had lowered before her instantly snatched her thin neck.
Eilena, caught in one hand, was raised high.
“Uhek…! Kugh…!”
Eilena grimaced deeply and tried with all her might to break free from his hand.
But no matter how much she struggled, her father’s thick hand didn’t budge at all.
-Squeeeeze.
“Kuhub…! Uugh…!”
The strength in his grip intensified. Eilena felt as if she would pass out at any moment.
White foam-mixed saliva began to drip from her mouth, which was becoming increasingly pale.
Eventually, Baalrotte, who had been staring at the saliva dripping down his hand, slowly opened his mouth.
“Such a weak and lowly wench… unable to fight until the end….”
“K-kurub…!”
“Finally, you commit this act… Indeed… you were not fit for the title of ruler….”
“Ah-ak…! Kuhek…!”
Baalrotte, who had been speaking with deeply furrowed brows, tightly closed his mouth and glared at his daughter as if he would kill her.
“You are a disgrace to demonkind.”
“Huők…!”
Eilena began to roll her eyes as if she would pass out at any moment.
Crack. The veins in Baalrotte’s hand rose prominently.
“…Die.”
“U-ugh….”
Eilena’s body trembled as she gradually lost consciousness.
.
.
.
“Hwaak!”

With a sharp scream, Eilena kicked off the blanket and rose.

Eilena looked around hurriedly, gasping for breath.

Eventually, the landscape of the mansion she had seen yesterday came into view.

Only then could she slowly regulate her breathing.

“Hah… a-a dream….”

Plop, drop.

A few large drops of sweat fell under the blanket.

Eilena belatedly discovered herself drenched in cold sweat.

“Hah….”

With a sigh, she wiped her cold cheek.

She seemed to have struggled all night, as her long hair was tangled and stuck to her in various places.

Brushing her hair behind her ears, she wiped away the sweat that flowed from her forehead.

After composing herself for a moment, Eilena got out of the blanket and sat on the edge of the bed.

“Hah….”

It was a dream, but… it was so vivid.

It felt so real that even now, it seemed as if her neck was being constricted.
Eilena caressed the throbbing area around her neck.

“Why on earth….”

Eilena gritted her teeth as she clutched her pounding head.

People she had lived forgetting for a long time, people she had wanted to forget.

Every one of them was an existence she wanted to erase even from memory.

She didn’t want to recall them at all.

Especially her father Baalrotte and her brother Zerhan.

‘I thought I had lived forgetting them until now…!’

Eilena tried to clear her complicated mind by running both hands down her face.

But the vivid nightmare of memory had already perfectly consumed her body.

“Damn it…! Damn it…!”

It was painful.

Why would those who had been dead for over a hundred years suddenly torment her now?

How much effort had she put into forgetting them all these years.

Why now.

“What do you want me to do!”

What were they appealing to her for?

Eilena swallowed the welling tears.

Instead of the suppressed tears, a drop of sweat like a blood drop fell from the tip of her chin.

“Oh my….”

As soon as Hans opened his eyes, he headed to the stairs where the accident had occurred last night.

The Demon King seemed to still be sleeping as it was still early dawn.

Thanks to that, he had a bit of trouble finding tools and spare boards alone, but he found them sooner than expected.

He knew how to hammer, and simple tasks were no problem at all.

The issue was that the condition of the broken stairs was more serious than expected.

He had thought that he just needed to attach some boards, but that wasn’t the case at all.

It wasn’t the boards, but the stair frame supporting them had rotted and completely broken.

In other words, to fix it, he had to completely tear apart a portion of the stairs.

“Damn it… that woman….”

At the work that had grown larger than expected, Hans glared with all his might at the room where Eilena was sleeping.

Then he shook his head and brushed up his front hair.

“Ugh…!”

As he was scratching his head, he accidentally touched the injured area from yesterday and flinched.

“Hah….”

With a sigh, he carefully caressed the wound.

The skin was completely peeled off, and it stung even with just the touch of his hand.

Was it because his power was completely sealed? The wound wouldn’t heal easily.

He had never dreamed that such an injury would occur just from rolling down stairs.

Having lived with a hero’s body for over a decade, it felt so unusual to bleed from such a minor accident.

“I hope it doesn’t leave a scar….”

If even his nape scarred, he would have to wear a coat with a scarf even in midsummer.

He couldn’t properly check as there was no mirror in his room.

With the thought that he should visit the bathroom later to check, Hans put down his tools and grumbled.

“Why am I doing this….”

He had been told that a hero only needed to swing his sword, but it seemed he had been thoroughly deceived by the Emperor.

-Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

The sound of vigorous hammering echoed throughout the mansion.
Hans, who had eventually started a major construction project, completely exposing part of the stairs and replacing them from the inside with new ones.

The construction, which started at dawn, was continuing even as the sun reached its zenith.

“Whew….”

Hans roughly wiped away the sweat flowing down his cheek with the back of his hand.

‘Has the weather already become this warm?’

Hans fluttered his clothes to cool off the sweat in the bright sunlight shining through the window behind him.

When he had left to subjugate the Demon King, it was clearly the middle of winter with cold waves approaching.

Now, it had already passed the warm spring air and was approaching summer, with the sun feeling hot.

The long-sleeved clothes reaching his wrists and long pants made it feel even more stuffy.

‘I need to finish quickly and pour cold water on my body….’

Gasping for breath, Hans picked up the hammer again.

Just as he was about to start hammering again, a presence and voice came from the top of the stairs.

“I wondered why it was so noisy….”

“…?”

When Hans turned around, Eilena was standing with her arms crossed, deeply frowning.

“Can’t you stay still for even a moment?”
“What…?”

Eilena spoke with a tone full of complaints.

At her behavior, Hans’s under-eye involuntarily trembled.

“Hey, can’t you see what I’m doing right now?”

“I can see it perfectly well.”

The words “And you still talk like that?” rose to the back of his throat, but Hans barely swallowed them.

Then, taking a deep breath, he tried to calm himself and answered.

“You don’t mean to say you don’t remember what happened yesterday.”

“……”

The other party must not have forgotten about this either, as she tightly closed her mouth.

Hans sighed again and continued.

“The stairs you broke are more of a mess than I thought. I’ve been fixing them all this time, and this is still the state they’re in.”

Hans leaned forward to show the construction site where all the stair boards had been removed.

He tapped the rotted, crumbling frame part with the back of the hammer.

After watching this scene blankly, Eilena opened her mouth.

“… So?”

“What?”

Even after hearing Hans’s words, Eilena still maintained her thorny tone.

“So what do you want me to do about it?”

“Hey, Demon King… are you now….”

“After stealing all my magic, are you telling me to fix it?”

“When did I ever say that?”

“That’s how it sounds to me.”

Her tone suggested not only a lack of apology but also an absence of any guilt about what had happened.

Rather, completely turning the tables, it even sounded as if he were the one at fault.

“Huh….”

He was so dumbfounded that he couldn’t say anything.

They say that when a person is too shocked, they don’t even get angry, and that was truly the case.

Hans let out an empty laugh.

Far from anger, he couldn’t even move a finger, and could only blankly stare at Eilena, whose expression was completely distorted.

After a moment of silence, Hans shook his head and waved his hand at her.

“Fine. I understand, so go about your business. Either way, the stairs need to be repaired.”

With those words, he roughly pulled the tools that were in front of her feet.

Rusty nails fell with a clatter in front of Eilena’s feet.

“……”

Eilena merely glanced at them without opening her mouth.

-Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!

Hans deliberately struck the hammer roughly, creating a sharp noise.

The awkwardly risen air settled heavily.

“……”

Eilena, who had been staring at Hans, who had resumed hammering in silence, returned to her room, her red hair fluttering.

“… Whew.”

As her footsteps faded, Hans slowly released the strength from his hammering hand.

He slightly poked his head up the stairs, looking blankly at the corridor where she had disappeared.

Phoo. With a deep sigh, he turned his head again.

“Damn it….”
He knew to some extent that the marriage would be different from what he had imagined….
Honestly, he hadn’t expected married life to be this arduous.
He was overwhelmed by this first experience of marriage.