Okay. Let me just explain this one more time. My name is Yumiella Right-Side Dolkness. I’m the one and only villainess of this world! Or rather, I was... I’ve apparently been split into two halves.
In the absolute worst turn of events, my left side died and is in a place called the Kingdom of Twilight, so I can only move the right side of my body. I won’t give up, though! I’ve faced plenty of difficult situations until now.
I’m definitely going to get my left side back, but in order to do that, I first need to...
“What should we do?”
“What should we do, indeed?” Patrick repeated.
I’d forced myself to feel motivated to solve this problem, but Patrick and I were just sighing deeply at this nonsensical situation where half my body had died.
After we found out that my left side was dead, we had tried asking Lemn various questions, but he didn’t have any useful information. It seemed that the Kingdom of Twilight, or whatever it was called, couldn’t be visited unless you died, and there was no way to come back to the living world from Twilight.
If Yumiella (right side) were to die in order to go to the Kingdom of Twilight and save Yumiella (left side), that would go against the whole point of trying to return to being a whole Yumiella. Well, you were a good person, Yumiella (left side). I’ll live a life full enough for the both of us!
“What should we do?”
“What should we do, indeed?” Patrick repeated once again.
We both let out our umpteenth sigh. I think we’re toast. Not only are we in an incomprehensible situation based on retconned lore, but our only clues lie with Lemn.
Lemn was rejoicing over the fact that my strength had been halved, so I couldn’t expect him to help us too much. The silver lining was that he would at least answer our questions.
I turned to the god of darkness to ask another question. “Is there truly no way to come back to life?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can’t we speak to them or communicate through letters or something?”
“I’ve heard of scents passing through from Twilight to here, but voices and text won’t work.”
Why can smells come through? Maybe I can use scents to use Morse code and communicate with my left half... No, that wouldn’t work. The me over there is me after all—she wouldn’t be able to understand a code that uses smells.
As I pondered a way to communicate only through smells, Patrick spoke up. “Even if Yumiella herself can’t, couldn’t you send a message to the Yumiella over there, Lemn? You can go to the Kingdom of Twilight, right?”
“Fine, I’ll send a message to miss’s left side. A letter would be fine too. I’ll deliver it to her!”
“We need to explain our situation, then...” Patrick trailed off. “Hold on. You seem too happy to do it. You’re saying you’ll go to the Kingdom of Twilight, but you’re probably just going to hide and stay hidden, aren’t you?”
Lemn fell silent. It seemed that was exactly his plan.
There was no way to directly communicate with my left half, and our messenger couldn’t be trusted. There was really nothing we could do.
It would be nice if she (left side) could contact us... Actually, Patrick said something about explaining our situation. I wonder how much she knows about what’s going on.
If I were to end up with only the left half of my body, I would think that my right half had disappeared. I would never imagine that my right half was alive and just my left half had died. Did my left side even know she was dead?
Lemn was here to explain the Kingdom of Twilight to us, but there probably wasn’t such a convenient character to explain things over there. Since my left half’s understanding might affect how we move forward, I decided to ask Lemn if he knew anything.
“Do you think my left half understands what’s going on? I think she might not know she’s dead.”
“I can’t say for sure since I wasn’t there, but I don’t think that’s the case. I think King probably told her about it.”
“So she knows that she’s dead... I didn’t realize the Kingdom of Twilight had a king.”
“He’s just acting like a leader on his own,” Lemn clarified.
I was surprised to learn that not only was there a leader, but there was a whole community in the Kingdom of Twilight. I was expecting some kind of lawless land where people do as they please. I expressed my honest impression to Lemn, who then confessed to his own atrocities.
“Well, I said the sunlight isn’t good for them, and everyone just believed me. They all stay in the shade of a mountain, which makes it easy for me to observe them. It’s been really helpful. I think your left side is at that settlement too.”
“Don’t you feel bad for the people who are earnestly following your words?” I asked.
“Erm, not really. King doesn’t believe me anyway.”
Wow...I should know this by now, but Lemn sure is thoughtless to the point it’s off-putting. Though I was disconcerted by the god of malice, Lemn, Patrick seemed to be concerned with something else.
“Why do you call this leader ‘King’? He doesn’t seem to have any kingly aspects to him from the way you’ve described him.”
Now that Patrick’s mentioned it, that’s true. He feels more like the leader of a neighborhood association or something. Does this leader call himself King? Or have people started to just call him that? There’s also the possibility that Lemn calls him King ironically...
The answer was none of the above. Lemn casually revealed the truth, which was a shocking fact we couldn’t ignore.
“Oh, remind me, what’s the name of this kingdom?”
“The Kingdom of Valschein?”
“Yeah, that’s the one. He’s the first king of this kingdom, so he’s King.”
Some facts were more significant to certain people, while not being a big deal to others. This should’ve been obvious, but Lemn’s sensibilities were that of an insane person when it came to these sorts of things. The fact that the first king of Valschein was in the Kingdom of Twilight might’ve not been the first thing, but surely should’ve been around the third thing to mention.
“Why didn’t you tell us?!” I asked.
“I mean, he’s just a guy.”
“He’s the king. He’s a special person. You should’ve told us.”
“Everyone is special to someone,” Lemn said. “Depending on who you ask, they might be more interested in the cat-eared man than the king.”
Lemn wasn’t wrong. This cat-eared man’s family would probably be more interested in hearing about him rather than the founding father of Valschein. Wait...is there actually a cat-eared man?
Wow, the first king, huh? Since I knew the truth behind the Demon Lord, I had a terrible impression of the king.
“Please tell me more about the first king,” I said. “I’d also like to know if there are any other important people there.”
“Important people...like the cat-eared man?”
“I’ve heard enough about him.”
After asking various questions to Lemn about the first king, the man’s peculiar nature came to light. Even setting aside his status of being a king while he was alive, he was quite the special person.
This King was acting as a leader of the Kingdom of Twilight because he was its longest resident. Most people in that world would disappear in several decades even if they’d died with regrets, but the king had been there for several centuries. Not only that, but the king ignored Lemn’s warnings and explored the sunlit world. His goal was to come back to life.
This King was the closest to the solution of how my left side might come back to life. Since they could cooperate under similar interests, the king was perhaps more helpful in this situation than Lemn was. I continued asking questions about the king, wanting to know more.
“What’s his motivation for coming back to life?”
“All humans try to return to the living world after they die.”
“That may be true, but the fact that he works harder than most normal people must mean that he has some great ambition he wants to fulfill in this world.”
“I don’t know, nor do I care.”
Ah, there’s that awful side of Lemn that doesn’t care about people’s feelings. Well, since the King is in the Kingdom of Twilight, he definitely has some sort of regret... I guess it’s no surprise for a king to have a regret or two, but the fact that he’s worked for centuries to find a way to resurrect himself without giving up must mean it’s a hefty ambition.
“What do you think, Patrick?” I asked. “What do you think the first king’s objective is?”
“I’m not sure. I can’t even begin to imagine what it could be since I don’t know what kind of person he is.”
Yeah, same. I still can’t figure out what kind of person he is. Though historical texts wrote about his personality, there was probably some added color that differed from reality.
What kinds of thoughts cross the mind of someone as important as the founder of a kingdom on his deathbed...?