Every Morning, My Mirror Saves the World - Chapter 31

Chapter 31

His long mithril hair, slightly fluffy in texture, seemed almost alive as it shimmered in the warm yellow candlelight. His dark skin was like thick honey set firm, so rich it seemed as if it might give off a sweet fragrance. He looked somewhat like that member of the Dark Elves they had encountered before, but since he was only a boy, his features had not fully grown into themselves. They were not yet refined to an impossible degree, but they were clearly more natural. His slightly short-limbed body was bundled in an extremely adorable little bear pajama set, and the hat on his head, complete with bear ears, sat askew over half his long hair. On the other side, one pointed ear stuck out, twitching every so often even as he slept.

One of his arms was draped over the back of a deep red velvet chair. As he slept quietly, his long silver lashes rose and fell slowly with his breathing. For an instant, Ruiyin almost thought he was Sleeping Beauty slumbering in a tower, waiting for a prince to wake him, his whole body suffused with an unreal, fairy-tale quality.

No one felt any urge to speak. They seemed to reach the same tacit agreement at once, not daring to make the slightest sound for fear of disturbing the beautiful boy’s sleep. And yet he still seemed to sense that someone had arrived. He frowned, rolled over, and sat up in one smooth motion. Rubbing one drowsy eye with one hand, he mumbled, “Is there food yet?”

In that instant, that beautiful face seemed to overlap with the skeletons on the stairs shouting their slogans. It gave them a profoundly vivid understanding of what people meant by beauty being only skin deep…

The beautiful boy knelt on the soft bench with both hands gripping the chair back. A pair of crimson eyes blinked at them. When he saw that none of the three were holding any food, he deflated again. “What… So you’re not here to deliver food…”

“Um, excuse me…”

“If you’re not here to deliver food, then hurry up and leave!” The beautiful boy waved them off in disgust. “So annoying. You’re interrupting my sleep…”

As he spoke, he curled back into the pile of cushions. Before long, a faint snore rose again.

The three of them looked at one another. Lars silently drew his sword and took a step forward. “Ruiyin, do you need me to wake him up?”

Galahad clenched his fists. “No need. A brat like this, I can beat him by myself… Oh, wake him up! Don’t steal this from me!”

Almost at the same moment, they reached a consensus that this fellow was asking to be hit. It even escalated into an internal dispute over who would get to hit him. The three discussed it for a long while without reaching an agreement, when the beautiful boy asleep in the cushions suddenly sprang up and glared at them warily. “Huh? Wait, that’s not right. If you’re not here to deliver food, who are you? How did you get in?”

They all staggered.

Just how long was this guy’s reaction time supposed to be?!

“From the city, of course,” Ruiyin said. “Then who are you? And why are you in this tower?”

The beautiful boy dug at his ear in distress. “You ask so many questions. Obviously I’m here because this place is comfortable! As for who I am, don’t you know you’re supposed to introduce yourself before asking someone else’s name?”

He sat swaying atop the pile of cushions with one leg crossed, propping his chin on one hand as he raised an eyebrow and looked at Ruiyin with great interest.

“Is that so?” Ruiyin said slowly. “My name is Ruiyin. A traveler.”

Lars hurriedly stepped forward. “My name is Lars. I am an Apprentice Knight.”

Galahad cleared his throat. “I am a Silver Knight, by the name of…”

“Never mind. Suddenly I don’t feel like listening anymore.” The beautiful boy waved lazily.

…Now they wanted to hit him even more!

“My name is Tio.” The beautiful boy pouted and poked his own cheek. “As for my race, you can tell just by looking, right? I’m one of the Dark Elves!”

Judging from his appearance, he did indeed belong to the Dark Elves, but… were there really Dark Elves this friendly?

In everyone’s impression, creatures of that race were inseparable from words like cold-blooded, ruthless, treacherous, cunning, bloody, and cruel. And yet the boy in front of them, who was undeniably beautiful but obviously missing a screw, was claiming to be one of the Dark Elves?

“But this is the Royal Capital.” Lars narrowed his eyes, the line of his mouth tightening with a touch of cruelty. “You aren’t Undead. How could you possibly stay here?”

“Because I’m Tio!” The beautiful boy abruptly turned and ran to the messiest corner of the room. He dove in and rummaged around for ages before finally dragging out an old, battered wooden board. Biting a quill, he pulled a jar of dark jam over from the shelf beside him, dipped the quill into the jam, and wrote crookedly on the board: Tio’s Home.

Then he ran to the door, moved over a little stool, stood on it, and hung the board on the door with a smack. Turning back with a beaming smile, he said smugly, “See? Now I can stay here, right?”

…This was no longer a matter of missing a screw. Had all the nourishment in his entire life gone straight to his face?!

This time, even Ruiyin joined the faction cracking their knuckles.

“Wait.” Lars suddenly shouted as if he had remembered something. “Do you know what the Dark Elf Queen’s name is?”

“It’s Tio.”

“You’re the Dark Elf Queen?!” Galahad cried in shock.

“Of course not. Don’t you know? Every girl among the Dark Elves wants to name herself Tio.” Tio waved a hand and said it as if it were perfectly obvious. “Because the first Tio could speak with the God of Darkness, so everyone loves the name! So? Am I trendy or what?”

As he spoke, he puffed out his cheeks, his expression clearly saying, Hurry up and praise me!

That was… a lot of information…

Lars clearly had the strongest resistance. While everyone else was still too devastated by the truth to lift their heads, he was still barely managing to search for that elusive main point. “Hold on. Since it’s the Queen’s name, why are you called Tio?”
Tio cupped her face in both hands and turned away shyly. “I really am an adorable girl, you know *^_^*~~”

“…” Lars silently clutched his stomach and moved over to stand on the same side as Ruiyin and Galahad.

But this time, it seemed he had hit Tio where it hurt. That pretty little face collapsed at once. She jumped up in a panic and shouted, “Hey! I’m serious! You don’t believe me? I’ll show you proof!”

All three of them were busy holding on to the wall, and none of them had their guard up against an idiot like this. So in that instant, no one managed to stop her.

With one swift yank, her pants were pulled clean down to the floor. The idiot pretty boy… er, pretty girl stood there with two bare legs and a bare little pink backside, hands on her hips and smiling proudly. “See? No ding-dong, right? I told you, I’m a girl!”

It was true. There! Was! No! Ding-dong!

Galahad stared blankly ahead, two red streams silently hanging beneath his nose. Lars almost instantly slapped a hand over his own eyes with a loud smack, his face turning as red as a little chili pepper. Trembling, he muttered, “I don’t know, I didn’t see anything, I know nothing,” while using his other hand to fumble around and cover Ruiyin’s eyes too. (Hey, wait, something’s wrong here!)

Only after the whole house had nearly been turned upside down did Tio finally put her pants back on, then sat down with the other three looking terribly wronged.

“…Why would your first thought be to take off your pants?” Ruiyin asked, speechless and nursing a headache. “Under normal circumstances, even if you wanted to… ahem… prove your identity, wouldn’t people usually show their upper body?”

Galahad and Lars, the latter still beet red, both looked at her like she was a monster. Nobody would take off their shirt either, okay?!

“I tried that,” Tio said, pouting in grievance. “But when I took off my shirt, they still didn’t believe I was a girl!”

She had only gotten halfway through speaking when her smooth, flat little chest was already neatly presented to everyone. This person undressed faster than the speed of light.

Ruiyin scrambled to shove her down into the pile of cushions and roughly yanked her clothes back on.

“We came from the outside world,” Galahad asked in a friendly tone. “Someone told us there was a path here leading back outside. Do you know how to get out?”

“Out? Why would you want to go out?” Tio lay in the cushions pretending to be dead, dragged over the plate of cookies beside her, and spoke indistinctly while eating. “It’s so comfy here. Why leave?”

Ruiyin rummaged through her bag, pulled out a pouch of rations, and waved a piece of jerky in front of her. Tio immediately bounced up full of energy, wagging her tail happily as she said, “Yep, yep! Wait a second, I’ll open the passage for you right now!”

As she spoke, she stretched out a finger and poked the eye of the plush bear beside her. The bookshelf next to Galahad immediately slid aside without a sound, and a black hole breathing cold air appeared before them. The whole process was so smooth and so quick that it was almost impossible to believe this was an adventure.

“This isn’t a trap, is it?” Lars asked, looking at Tio suspiciously.

“How could it be?” Galahad strode over carelessly and leaned in to take a look. “She’s this stupid. One glance and you can tell she has absolutely no idea how to scheme. Lars, have you been around Ruiyin too long? Have you stopped believing in truth, goodness, and beauty?”

Whenever Galahad was this confident, Ruiyin always got a faint feeling that something was about to go wrong. She took two steps forward and was just about to reach out and pull him back when a mottled, scaly lizard head suddenly shot out of the black hole. With one chomping bite, it clamped down on Galahad’s shoulder and rapidly dragged him away. The Silver Knight’s howl seemed to last only an instant before the entrance immediately closed.

“…”

Intelligence was never the standard for measuring how powerful a boss was. Also, Galahad, as a member of the team of justice, wasn’t your casualty speed a little too fast…?

Faced with this divine plot twist, Lars moved almost instantly. With one hand, he quickly pinned down Tio, who was waving her arms and legs and giggling. Then he grabbed a rope and, in no time at all, tied her up like a rice dumpling. Ruiyin picked up the plush bear, but no matter how she pressed its eye, the bookshelf didn’t budge.

“Who exactly are you…?” Lars stared at her with icy eyes. “Release our companion at once. Otherwise, I won’t care whether or not you’re a lady.”

Still bound, Tio lay on the floor laughing. It was the happy laughter of a child who had just completed a prank. Precisely because it was so innocent, it seemed all the more terrifying.

“I’m Tio,” she said with a snickering laugh. “You already knew that, didn’t you? I am the Warden of the Royal Capital. Two hundred years ago, I was even the Queen of the Dark Elves. I’ve been a good child from the very beginning. I haven’t told a single lie.”

Her laughter gradually died down. Tio grinned maliciously, her crimson eyes narrowing. When the corners of her eyes tilted upward in that flippant way, there was actually a hint of seduction in her expression.

“But you lot are the bad children, aren’t you? Who brought you here? As living beings, how did you reach this tower?”

Author’s Note:

Pfft hahahahaha, I really want to see the faces of all the girls who were looking forward to a pretty boy right now!!! I told you it was “she,” and you still didn’t figure it out~~ This one is the true Her Majesty the Queen!

Galahad: Hey, wait! Why did I leave the stage before I even got to see how I disappeared? Give me an explanation, damn it!