A Misunderstood Mentor

About 10,000 years ago.
A time before humans existed.
Amidst the chaos, I was born.
Why was someone like me born I wonder.
I couldn’t find the answer no matter how much I tried so I immediately gave up.


About 5,000 years ago.
Over the past 5,000 years, I have simply continued to grow stronger.
Not of my own will. In the same way as breathing, my power expanded on its own.
Around that time monkeys known as humans came to be, elves and dwarves, dragons and goblins, all sorts of tribes were born and began to approach me.
However I was unable to hold back, anything that came close was destroyed.
That power eventually led to me battling against those known as gods.

I never wished for that battle nor for this power.

After that fight I sealed my body within the dungeon and turned to astral(spirit) form. In order to never hurt anyone again.


About 3,000 years ago.
In the 2,000 years I’ve been sealed, humanity has prospered the most and created cities and a country.
In my spirit form, I entered people and experimented with co-existing while suppressing my power.
However no human existed with the capacity to withstand my strength for a long period and I would change the human I possessed many times.
For some reason, during that time I gained subordinates known as the demon race and came to be known as the Demon Lord.
A clan of heroes also appeared and challenged me many times, but they could never compare.
Then I met a young elf named Chilt with a tremendous mana pool.
She would later be known as the Great Sage Nuruhachi.


About 2,000 years ago.
I entered Nuruhachi’s vessel and since then a long time has passed.
Her mana was vast enough to envelop me.
Within Nuruhachi, perhaps I would be able to coexist with humans. I thought that for a brief moment.

But her limits were slowly approaching.

Even within Nuruhachi, my power was steadily growing, and eventually even Nuruhachi’s mana was not enough to contain it.
Due to the influence of my power, Nuruhachi’s body began to change.
Her appearance began to match that of my true body and the overflowing power granted her abnormal regeneration ability. Nuruhachi became immortal.

Any further assimilation would cause Nuruhachi to collapse, destroying everything.

I separated from Nuruhachi, and shut my spirit form into the dungeon along with my true body.
I swore never to enter another person ever again.


“You don’t intend to leave ever again?”
“Yeah, I forbid my subordinates from coming here. There’s a seal on the door too”

I bid farewell to Nuruhachi who was standing before my frozen true body.

“I see, I’ll miss you”

Nuruhachi squatted before my body and began to do something.

“What are you doing?”
“I sowed some flower seeds. With the power flowing out from you, even without earth, water or light, they’ll surely bloom”
“Something like that…..”

I couldn’t say I didn’t need it.
An emotion I had never felt until then bloomed within.

“It’s just like me….. no, it’s just like Nuruhachi”

Looking at my body, Nuruhachi laughs.
From that time onwards, Nuruhachi began to refer to herself as Nuruhachi to distinguish herself from my true form.

“One day I’ll become stronger than you and come to see you again”

I knew that would never come to pass.
What a foolish idea.
Or so I should have thought but for some reason my chest tightened and a strange liquid flowed from my eyes.

In my 8,000 years alive, it was the first time.

I only truly understood that emotion a long time after Nuruhachi had left, when the buds were sprouting.


15 years ago.
For over 2,000 years, the doors have not opened once.
Nuruhachi came many times and spoke to me from beyond the door but I never answered.
Live on without me. So I wished.

The flowers that Nuruhachi had left bloomed splendidly, dyeing the room blue, bringing some peace to my lonely heart.
Why did Nuruhachi, who had no interest in flowers at all, do something like this. What feelings are put into these flowers I wonder.
Thinking about flowers is unlike a Demon Lord so I immediately gave up on it.


The seal on the door was actually quite simple.
The door was linked to my power and would not open for those with strength below mine.
Heroes and legends, dragons and gods, all came to open the door but it never budged.
I gazed upon the door that would never open again, this is fine, that was what I thought.

With a loud thud, something fell outside the door.
Someone disposing of a corpse perhaps, or maybe someone jumping down in suicide.
Those who venture into the Demon Lord’s Labyrinth, whether human, demon, or god, not a single one returns.
Nuruhachi said such a rumour was going around.
I wasn’t doing anything in particular.
Perhaps wounded adventurers with no chance of rescue chose this place as their final resting grounds.
It was a nuisance but, without any way of stopping them, I let it be.

However, that day, the one who fell down was different from those adventurers.

“Fuee”

The voice of a young girl could be heard from beyond the door.
I doubted my ears.
She survived after falling from that height?

Then an even more astonishing thing occurred.
The doors that had never opened for 2,000 years, began to creak and opened on their own.

From the gap, an overwhelming strength could be felt.
Standing there was a young girl around the age of two.

The door opened fully.
In the face of that overwhelming strength, the doors linked to my power opened as if in surrender.

A simple human child.
Why do they possess a power greater than mine.
With my mouth open in shock, I gazed at the child.

“Ah”

The child waddled into the room.
At the same time the doors closed automatically.
As if the master of this room had been transferred from me to them.

The child should have been unable to see me in my spirit from but they turned my way and walked straight towards me.

From that day, I began my strange life together with the child who would later be called Alice.