Chapter 111

Nikami POV

The two were on the ground, and although Shukona's hands were bigger than Raijin's, they still fit inside her palms. I stepped forward, the earth user was already alerted of my position and scowled at me. "Shiromoru! I heard what you did to Emi! You're cruel-"

"That's Nika, Shu!" Raijin corrected Shukona with a shake.

She froze, cleared her throat with a cough and bowed with her head. "I apologize for raising my voice, I was upset and-"

"Please don't treat me like some sort of superior. Scold me, like always. Yell at me with all of your frustrations that are deep in your heart. Don't overlook the smallest sins, we told each other to be more honest." I held out my palms to her, and she caught them. Shukona bit her lip while her body was completely still, before a groan escaped her lips.

"But that wasn't you, why should I do that?"

"That was me."

"Hold up, what?" Raijin stood up from the ground as well, and stood to the side of our intertwined hands.

"Sorry, I didn't clarify enough. Even if I wasn't in the right mind, in the end I still have to bear the responsibilities." Tingles of shivers came to Shukona's hand from my own.

I'm Shiromoru, she's the personification of my loyalty for the kingdom that I had slowly abandoned. Judge of the ruthless cold truth, a queen must not have any bias.

"I... I can't possibly do so..."

"Cut the polite language, please." From the mana on her head, she's being influenced by that curse. I remember that she called me Onii-sama once, is this about her inferiority complex towards her family? She can face me as Nika, yet that underlying sense of doom is still there.

"Shukona. It's fine to feel fear, I understand. You are not weak." The three of us have some pride problems don't we? Perhaps that's why we got along so well. Showing weakness is a sin, and that all developed in different ways. Be it complete emotional detachment, Constant Irritation, and the feel to always show off.

And she got it worse.

Despite the Adventurine kingdom being one of the most lax on strictness and prioritizes freedom, her father had retained traditional values. Women are lower than men, nobles must always be elegant, commoners are always going to be treated as slaves, those are only of the few she had been taught throughout her life.

"But I am. I have less worth than a dime! Look, sniff, I can't even control my emotions. Not being the scapegoat correctly, and I can't get to be the caregiver role! That was all of my use! Of course I never had I ONCE thought I could be on the same pedestal as both of you!" Shukona knelt to the ground and pushed my hands to her face, that elegant composure had been rotten with snot and grief. She threw away her pride, the thing she valued more than her life.

"And that's fine! Not being able to do things right, or hell even control emotions is fine!" Raijin yelled out, snatched one of our hands and so we formed a hand circle. Despite a smile that twitched, she remained cheerful.

"You don't need to do something like sacrifice yourself for us, I know you feel lower than us when you're not. Actually, fuck, you're honestly more than us." Raijin's hands shook as she inhaled, and gripped my palms tighter than Shukona. She glanced at me, before I nodded.

"That's not-"

"Nah! Don't say anything else!" Raijin shut her up, and the tall lady shrank in place by the sudden scold.

"I had so much anger balled up inside me because of the king training I went through. That I'll never be good enough, those assholes keep comparing me to Nika and how slow I am. I try to use that anger in sparring but I go too far and hurt people. I genuinely believed I will never be as good as Nika, or will always be a person who will always just hurt people." Raijin's gaze set into the ground, sniffles came from her as glassy eyes created tears. Yet they didn't fall, kept there by pure force.

That... Happened to her? And I always berate her for being worse than me, that I'm the better royal. Doesn't that just solidify what her teachers say? I... I really am terrible. Me and my mouth, it's not Shiromoru's fault. Even after all of that, she pushed through and still loved me. After all of those years of mockery and torment.

Fuck.

Without any warning a singular tear fell down my cheeks. I clenched my jaw to dam the emotions that welled up inside of me, yet it still snapped.

I don't deserve her. At all. Why does she still love me? I don't get it. What do I really have?

"Yet, whenever you visited me I felt like a child again! I could smile, relax, and rest. Each time we have a picnic and you feed me desserts, that is the only time I could feel bliss. Just unfiltered joy. And whenever I was upset, you always knew how to calm me or distract me."

"Same as with me. I had been numbed to myself and the world, the work I do each day sucks the life out of me. You were the only thread that could make me feel... Something. One of the reasons I held on." I followed up with Raijin's words as she started to choke on her emotions.

"And we never did anything for you. So to that, I really am so sorry."

"We both... Are." Raijin let go of Shukona's hand and dropped her body, both weak knees on the ground along with her forehead pressed against her palms. The biggest form of an apology coming from... A prince? Even I was confused on how easily she did it.

"Ra-rai?! No no, please, stand up, it's fine you don't have to-"

Her glacial eyes peeked at me, and I understood what I must do. I exhaled all of my pride, and did what Raijin was doing as well.

"Thank you for everything."

The already tall woman had completely looked down on us, sweat and panic from the shifts in her feet I could feel even if I hadn't seen her face at all. Then finally, after a few seconds of steps she knelt down in front of us and picked both of us in a bear hug. Shukona sobbed on both of our shoulders, wailed and whimpered without fear.

"You both are such fools, I can't believe you'd make me like this! I forgive you two, and I'm thankful for both of you as well." Shukona placed us on the ground after the air on my lungs had been pushed out by her hug, yet a smile was on my face.

"I had been left in shambles when my sister died, and so I took it out on the world. Yet you sliced all of that, and the toxic cover I had melted away." She took both of our hands while we just stood there and accepted everything she said. "Not to mention I am nothing more than a tool for my family... And I never even knew I was being puppeted. If it weren't for you two, I would have become a crazed high noble obsessed maniac as my father wanted me to."

That is what you actually became in the game. Someone who was so flamboyantly into royals and more that you became the villainess for the game, the one who was always aggressively thirsting over us. Now that Yuutsu told me about your family, you have been trained to grow up that way.

Even the fiance they chose for you is the most passive herbivore man I have ever met.

"Honestly, I can't imagine you that way. That sounds so fucking terrfying." Says Raijin, the person who had completed her route before. I agree with that though. That Shukona in another universe that we didn't befriend is so creepy.

"But, what will you do with your family? Now that I have caught wind of the Amatarini's schemes I have no choice but to report it. Worst comes to worse, they'll all execute you."

Nika! You and your bluntness again!

Shit. Sorry.

"That's fine! I'll drag them all to the guillotine with me." Shukona cackled, a smile that was so wide for a split second I saw Yuutsu's face instead. She giggled under her breath, gloom loomed over her eyes while she continued to cry. Yet the tears trailed down her large toothy grin as well.

What the fuck is that. Is the curse influencing her in this way too?

"H-hey what the fuck?! No, you aren't dying in our watch! That's way too much!" Raijin was quick to counter her statement with a yell, beads of sweat down her face and scoffed.

We were rightfully taken aback by what she said, after all that was crazy. To just sacrifice yourself like this... Shukona really would give up her nobility just for the sake of justice, that's the complete opposite of the Shukona in the game. Desperate to grow higher in power.

"I will do anything for the sake of the people my family had hurt, to think they would raise children to be their puppet...Even their own daughter. It's disgusting. I'd rather go to hell than let them keep this so-called eden!" Shukona once again cackled similarly to Yuutsu, her deep velvety voice that was honey had turned into a laugh that came from a devil. A succubus, even.

"That's stupid! You didn't do anything wrong, you don't deserve any punishment!" Raijin took a step forward and grabbed the Shukona that giggled by the collar, pulled it closer to her face so she would listen.

"No, Shu. It's not that easy to get a high ranking family like yours to fall." But as always, I had a plan.

"If you get enough solid truth that they are doing more illegal things and present it, that would be the end. But, that can also mean you can plead the queen to spare you as well, as you were the one who exposed them. That makes you clear, and that rotten family of yours can fall." This twist of Shukona is clearly her hidden contempt towards her family that she couldn't take out since it would ruin her pride.

I tapped Raijin's hand that crumpled Shukona's clothing underneath her palms, to tell her to stop doing that. And she took the hint and took her hands off before she huffed.

"That's... You really think of everything don't you?"

"That's why I'm Nikami Shiromoru, I try my best to think of the best path. But right now, I am no one more than a girl who wants to help her best friend." That smile that had been stuck in my face for more than 8 minutes had made my cheeks hurt. Is my face muscles so stiff that even smiling for that small amount of time makes it hurt? I really need to react more.

"Right! You know you have no fault, I don't care if your family did all of that terrible stuff. What's important is that you aren't involved in it!"

"You two..." She paused, pressed her lips together as her eyes swelled up with more tears and hugged us once again. Shukona is so quick to accept this side of her, but she is the most flexible one out of the three of us after all.

"I love you two so much."

"Me too! That's a no brainer!"

"Me as well."

"KyAH!" Raijin squeaked in her actual soft and high pitched voice, stumbled away from the group hug and covered her chest with a grimranced expression. Oh right. She only has bandages on currently.

"Wh...Rai...? What was that? I touched something soft and-"

"Hold that thought." I cut Shukona off and went to Raijin, a tap of my fingers had solidified her bandages to make them less loose. "Are your boobs okay?" I whispered and she froze up from those words, along with smoke that trailed from her cheeks. "A bit cold and actually hurts like hell but yeah I'm fine-"

"Should we tell her now? I think she deserves to know, and I promised her to be more honest." I tapped on her torso again to adjust the temperature, used what was left of my earth magic and stuck frozen mud to solidify it without being so cold. "A-are you kiddin me...? What if she doesn't accept me?"

"Rai, I understand the concern. But this is Shukona that we are talking about, she'd accept anything that comes to her as long as it keeps us safe. I'm sure keeping this for longer would worsen whatever tint of betrayal she'll feel." I placed a hand on her shoulder and rubbed her cheeks with my own. "You're going to be fine."

"You're not wrong... Ack, fine. But you gotta help me..."

"Of course."