The Crowned Greed: Transmigrated into a Demonic Dragon-Chapter 207: A Kind Demon Sacrificing Himself For An Angel
"Thank you again." Dante whispered with the tiniest voice he could produce, barely moving his lips.
That was the best thing he could do to avoid feeling pain. It wasn’t like he was afraid, just that it made Anastasia feel uncomfortable.
Of course, there were some scratches that were unavoidable, which caused Anastasia to shut his mouth again.
That was the second day of Anastasia feeding him. As she promised, she truly returned.
"I’ll see you tomorrow then." Anastasia stood up with the plate: "And you don’t have to thank me every time. I’m just doing my job."
Dante blinked to her as an alternative to talking. Two blinks meant okay.
Simultaneously, a small obsidian-black coin materialized in front of him, attached to his Wheel of Luck through a string of misfortune, making it invisible to the others.
It had two different sides.
One of them had a dragon skeleton with a split jaw and four eyes wearing an upside-down crown with six gems, showing an expression that seemed to be a wide grin.
The other side showed the same dragon skull, but cracks spread across its features, giving it a sad appearance, and the crown wasn’t upside down, missing all of its gems.
Misfortune Spell — The Two-sided Sacrifice.
It was the best version Dante had made of his coin so far, getting the help of Azathoth in making it.
’Do you think that Charis can see the luck?’
Greed shrugged: "Who knows. Would it even matter? She can’t do anything regardless."
Dante nodded inwardly: ’I guess you’re right. Aza, can you please link it to her?’
Azathoth sighed and made a link between the coin and Anastasia’s Wheel of Luck.
Her Wheel of Luck looked completely ordinary, but Dante knew that it was a lie. After pouring some misfortune into it, he realized that her real appearance was completely hidden.
But that didn’t matter, because his next move had nothing to do with seeing her true luck.
As she got on her feet, the coin was already linked to her Wheel of Luck.
’Should I harm her or not?’ Dante questioned in his heart and ordered Aza to flip the coin.
Ting!
The coin fell on the floor, the skeleton side facing Dante’s eyes.
His eyes flickered for a moment, and he suppressed the urge to smile.
Anastasia noticed that his eyes were fixed on the floor, but she ignored his behaviour. He had been talking to himself to the point that she started ignoring anything unusual.
"They told me this is the day you’ll break the collar, so I can’t have a discussion with you now. If everything goes well, I’ll ask them to spend more time with you tomorrow." Anastasia said with an apologetic gaze.
Dante frowned and whispered: "Huh? Why would you want to spend more time with me?"
Anastasia looked around, scanning the dark cell: "Don’t you feel... lonely here? I thought that simply speaking with someone would make you happy, even if it’s a one-sided conversation. I won’t allow you to speak so much."
Dante glared at her for a moment before whispering: "I really don’t need that. Actually, I have two people in my head to speak with. The last thing I need is useless pity. If it’s about the fact that I helped your kingdom, just know that I only care about myself and have committed a lot of sins. You’re trying to help someone who doesn’t deserve any of your kindness."
He paused for a moment, letting her process his words, then continued without whispering: "Don’t you know that the guards are avoiding me? I think the best thing you should do is to leave the cell quickly before something happens to you. I’m pretty sure your father won’t like to see you with more scars."
Anastasia narrowed her eyes at his words and stayed like this for a few seconds, as if listening to something. Suddenly, her lips curled upward: "I see. Thank you for your warning, but I think I’m going to ignore it. See you tomorrow."
With a wide smile, Anastasia left the cell, leaving Dante alone again. He was left in a daze as he stared at the closed gate.
"Ah... is this how a traumatized person is supposed to act?" Dante wondered in confusion: "Actually, I expected something like hating men or avoiding them at the very least."
As a victim himself, he remembered how he acted after killing his teacher.
Back then, he had tried to kill an officer only because she was female.
They tried to send him to therapy, but his uncle refused because he didn’t want to pay. That left Dante with the trauma unhealed.
He avoided women, wished them death, and had to grit his teeth whenever he came close to one, suppressing the urge to kill them.
Only after two whole years did he become able to talk with women again from a distance.
The fact that she was touching him when needed, talking with him without killing intent, and even trying to spend more time with him, despite being tortured by men only a few months ago, was something that Dante couldn’t understand.
"Out of all people, are you really surprised at just that?’ Dante saw Aza rolling her eyes in his mind: "One year ago, you used to scream from one stab, but look at you now. You have become a monster! A monster!"
Dante gulped at recognition. He didn’t want to admit it... but he probably looked a bit terrifying in the eyes of the others.
"Well, compared to the soul pain, those are just scratches. This should explain it, right—"
"Oh."
Dante finally understood. Not fully, but he had a small idea.
After being struck by the same things over and over, a person would have a feeling of numbness or ignorance of the said thing.
Not full resistance, just some numbness and ignorance. Dante still felt pain, but he didn’t react the same way as before.
Maybe she’d have killed all men and giants on sight or become so scared of them if it were only a few months, but Anastasia had to endure that for around half a year.
She was certainly afraid, which was shown by her shaky body, but she was able to act against her instincts.
"There is also her Mind stat as a factor. This helps when it comes to enduring trauma." Dante nodded to himself. Actually, there were so many other factors he could think about.
One of them was the angel bloodline. Her instinct to show kindness to others was likely stronger than whatever her trauma was supposed to cause.
Another factor was her age, which Dante didn’t really know. But adults were more capable of facing their trauma than children, right?
"And maybe I’m a special case..." Dante frowned.
Did his condition remind her of herself?
If she had to stay alone in one cell with only torturing items for so long, wouldn’t Dante’s condition be similar?
That would mean her actions weren’t just pity, but empathy.
"And maybe she just saw through your words, don’t you think?" Greed coiled around Dante’s neck and closed his eyes: "The charity angels are pretty good at noticing the true intentions of people. Even if she couldn’t, Charis would know instead of her. And honestly, you are not that good when it comes to telling people to fuck off."
"Yeah, I admit." Dante sighed: "I was never good with words, but it doesn’t matter."
Dante’s eyes landed on his coin, which Aza dismissed immediately.
It showed the grinning skeleton, not the broken one.
After some modifications, he decided to not be scared of misfortune anymore.
Instead of searching for the path that had the least amount of misfortune, he decided to face the misfortune face-to-face. Now, both sides showed misfortune, and both sides answered Dante’s question with "Yes!".
However, there was a subtle difference.
The grinning dragon meant that someone or something would be sacrificed for Dante’s benefit.
The broken dragon meant that Dante would have to face misfortune for someone else.
That was why he named it The Two-sided Sacrifice. Misfortune was unavoidable—something had to be sacrificed for the other to survive.
By connecting the coin to Anastasia’s Wheel of Luck, Dante ensured that he and she were the targets of the spell.
And the result was simple.
’If I decided to harm her in any way, I’d be the one benefiting from that.’
Logically, Dante would only need to pour misfortune into her Wheel of Luck to hurt her... but he did the exact opposite.
He ordered Aza to absorb as much misfortune as possible, which was mostly caused by the misfortune plague that he had spread.
Why?
’Hey Greed, how does it feel to see me helping the one you killed?’ Dante smirked widely, his eyes flickering with hatred and amusement.
Of course, the only reason he did that was to annoy the stupid centipede around his neck!
It was a gamble, but not a blind one.
The only connection between him and Anastasia was the parasites they had. One had a virtue and the other had a sin.
So if Dante happened to help her at the cost of sacrificing himself, the one who would be affected was no one but Greed!
’Still, I wouldn’t have known about that connection if not for you telling me.’ Dante glared at Greed: ’You are taking the same gamble as me, right?’
Greed yawned: "Not really. You’re just overthinking. I don’t really care about what you do. I’m already living with a beautiful woman in Terra while trying to find you. I eat the best food, I drink the best drinks, and you are here eating trash and thinking that you caught me."
Dante narrowed his eyes.
That lie... was it truly a lie?
Or was he truly living in another vessel?
