THE HERO'S SON IS A MONSTER-Chapter 41: Lubbaly time 2

The abomination that was this baby kept changing endlessly, as if it were reflecting all the monstrosities that made it up in a spectacle that would make any unprepared onlooker faint. Its body was shifting in a process of never-ending self-destruction.

Ariane, who had just dodged it with nonchalance, took a step closer to the disgusting thing as it slowly started to spread.

"If this keeps up, I could lose a lot. This damn place contains too many precious things—it must not be wrecked like this!"

As she said this, she was already behind the creature. With a flick of her hand, as if swatting a fly or chasing away a parasite, she sent the misshapen mass flying, as if it were just a ball of cotton caught in the wind.

The monster was hurled toward the door, and as if responding to Ariane’s will, the door swung open. It was always worth remembering that the moving castle might have been her curse, but she had complete control over it. Except for the restriction on leaving, this place obeyed her every command.

"Well, you’re really going easy on him!" sneered the Ruler of Pandemonium.

She approached Ariane, and the two of them walked toward the door, heading to where their monstrosity had crash-landed.

"What you’re doing is basically child abuse," Ariane remarked before continuing. "But with all this, I think I more or less figured something out, and I suppose you’ve reached the same conclusion as me!"

"Go on, tell me!" asked the Ruler of Pandemonium, as if waiting for Ariane to confirm his suspicions.

"The reason you diagnosed him with a lifespan of three years is because of his life energy, isn’t it?"

"Yeah."

"Well, it’s actually pretty simple. At its core, this thing was never supposed to exist. The moment it was born, its instability should have led to its demise. But it devours everything!"

"I’m not following."

"I’m getting there. I assume it survived inside the creature that birthed it by slowly siphoning off its life energy and consuming it from the inside. Since you found it in a dungeon, which is already strange, we can assume it continued devouring everything in its path."

"Not a bad theory."

"And that’s where the real problem lies—the efficiency is terrible. Not only is the vessel damaged, but the fact that it’s been feeding off dungeon monsters’ life energy is an issue. The good thing is that it must have acquired something that stabilized it, allowing it to take the form of an egg and later a human after devouring one."

"So, what’s the plan?"

The Ruler of Pandemonium stopped for a moment at Ariane’s question. She had an idea, but she was still skeptical.

Ariane, in her excitement, rushed to speak.

"Giving it humans or other entities that don’t come from these wastelands would be a good idea."

"What a terrifying thing to say, Ariane."

"I don’t want to hear that from you!"

Finally, the two arrived at the spot where the abomination had landed. Now, it was a mass of flesh and bone, writhing in every direction, with tentacles secreting an extremely corrosive fluid that could slightly affect the floor of the moving castle.

Ariane rolled her eyes.

"Better and better," she muttered, unimpressed.

Ariane crossed her arms, watching the mass of flesh and bone twitch in shapeless chaos.

Every movement seemed like a desperate attempt to find a stable form, but each second, it collapsed in on itself, like a corpse in a state of perpetual reanimation.

"So, what exactly are you planning to do?" asked the Ruler of Pandemonium, casting an indifferent glance at the agonizing creature.

"First, keep it from making an even bigger mess," Ariane replied, raising a hand.

With a simple gesture, the air around the abomination seemed to bend under an invisible force. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

A sickening sound echoed as the mass violently contracted, as if a giant vice had just crushed it.

A guttural scream a mix of gurgles and inhuman rasps escaped from the monster. It was slightly different from what the Ruler of Pandemonium usually did. She was simply using raw force to make space bend to her will. Ariane wasn’t using any special ability either it was just a manifestation of her control over the moving castle.

"No need to scream, it’s just a little pressure," Ariane muttered with a sigh.

The Ruler of Pandemonium burst out laughing.

"A little pressure? You’re crushing it like an empty suit of armor."

The mass struggled again, but Ariane’s energy prevented it from expanding further.

Bit by bit, the thing seemed to slow down, its frantic movements becoming less chaotic, more methodical, as if it was finally realizing it had no chance of escaping. Or rather, it was being forcibly shaped into something uniform.

"Alright, it’s starting to get the message," Ariane said, lowering her hand.

"Now, let’s see if we can make something useful out of it."

"And if it’s only good for disappearing?"

"Then we’ll get rid of it. But since you want to raise it, I guess I have to bring it back to its original form," Ariane replied without the slightest hesitation.

The Ruler of Pandemonium smirked.

"You’re as gentle and compassionate as ever, I see."

She shrugged. "It’s a parasite, not a child."

The monster, which until now had been nothing but an amorphous heap, suddenly started twisting more frantically. Bones pierced through its flesh with a series of sickening cracks. Slowly, a silhouette began to emerge at first vague and indistinct, but soon, human-like features started forming within the mass.

Ariane and the Ruler of Pandemonium fell silent for a moment.

"Am I crazy, or is it trying to copy us?" she asked.

"If that’s the case, it has terrible taste in role models," the Ruler snickered.

The creature trembled again, its limbs contorting at impossible angles. Then, finally, it stopped.

A humanoid figure stood before them.

Its body was a pale imitation of human form, as if someone had sculpted it from a blurry and fragmented memory. Its skin was gray, and its eyes... its eyes were nothing but hollow sockets, black as an abyss with no end.

Ariane stepped forward slightly, assessing the creature.

"You think it understands what we’re saying?"

The monster opened its mouth, but no sound came out.

Then, slowly, it smiled.