Otaku Witch

Dorothy: "...."

Hearing the Good Sister’s birthday blessing, the homebody witch was of course pretty happy.

But alongside the happiness, she was even more scared, okay.

It felt like getting caught by your parents right after doing something bad: you thought at the very least you’d get a good beating, but instead they didn’t lay a hand on you and even took you out for a fancy meal.

How are you supposed to enjoy a last meal like that?

Ahem, pfft pfft pfft, that’s not really accurate, seeing as I didn’t actually do anything bad, okay.

Dorothy thought this to herself.

But whatever, if I die, I die. I’m a pure-hearted little homebody, yet I’ve been shoved into an Asura Field between a domineering Ancestral Elder and a stern Good Sister. Where on earth did things start going wrong?

The homebody witch gave up on thinking and chose to just lie flat and let things happen.

Life is like, you know, that thing—if you can’t resist, then you might as well enjoy it.

Well, at least Denisha actually stepped out, and even personally came to attend my birthday banquet. No matter how you look at it, that’s a good thing.

Dorothy thought this to herself.

Earlier she’d already heard from the Underworld Shepherdess Sister that this God King Sister’s condition wasn’t great, that she’d been constantly blaming herself and brooding over that past loss of control. Now that she could actually step out, that meant that past autism had finally started to improve—this was really great.

So.....

"Mm, Denisha, I’m really happy you could come to my birthday banquet."

The homebody witch smiled happily, replying via sound transmission like this.

Denisha: "...."

The Divine King, who had just barely suppressed the impulse to immediately beat up Nidhogg and then drag her little sister away, fell silent for a moment.

Her gaze rested on Dorothy, who was currently smiling at her, and for a moment she felt dazed.

Of course she could tell at a glance that this sunny, cheerful look her little sister was wearing had been put on with metaphorical makeup. After all, in this life her little sister’s personality had really taken a complete turn from the last. The former sunshine and confidence were gone without a trace, replaced by a social-phobic salted fish.

Even though she had already confirmed multiple times that this really was Dorothy, the treasure she’d lost and then recovered, every time she saw this change, Denisha’s heart twisted and her guilt only deepened.

She truly didn’t know how she was supposed to repay what she owed her sister, nor what face a murderer like her should use to face her sister. What right did she have?

This time she had actually planned to come quietly. She had no intention of showing herself; she just wanted to silently stand off to the side and bear witness to Dorothy’s coming-of-age ceremony, that was all.

This kind of crucial moment in her little sister’s growth was something she must not miss.

After all, in that distant past, she should have personally placed the flower wreath on her sister’s head, smiling as she wished her a happy birthday and congratulated her on finally becoming an adult.

Only, she was the one who destroyed all of that with her own hands and made it so her little sister could never come of age.

Though now a miracle had occurred, and everything seemed to have gotten a chance to start over, and her sister had at last迎来了 that coming-of-age ceremony delayed by one hundred thirty-five thousand three hundred fifteen years and three hundred fourteen days, what did that have to do with a sinner like her?

Denisha didn’t feel she had any right to personally place a crown of flowers on her sister’s head the way she had once fantasized.

So she’d decided it would be enough to secretly watch from afar; as long as her sister lived happily and safely, she would already be very satisfied.

Yeah, that was the original plan—but Nidhogg was just way too lively, and that certain shady guy was messing around way too much.

Did those two bastards really take her for some emotionless Heavenly Reason? Just flaunting it right in her face? Did they not realize that after Witch’s Night, that Shepherdess humanity of hers that had once almost completely drained away had already come back?

So Denisha got carried away for a moment, couldn’t hold back, grabbed Gabriel as a human shield, and then plucked up her courage and jumped out.

Though the instant she appeared she regretted it, because she really wasn’t mentally prepared to face her sister head-on, okay. Even if she had already met her several times using her Shepherdess Incarnation, an incarnation is an incarnation, the main body is the main body—whether that layer of window paper has been pierced or not makes for two totally different concepts.

Last time in that Chessboard World she’d at least had a righteous excuse; in that moment of urgency she hadn’t thought too much, only that no matter what she had to get her sister to learn self-love, to stop immediately self-sacrificing every time something came up.

But this time....

Really, the instant her sister’s gaze first landed on her, all that lofty His Majesty the King of Gods stuff went out the window; Denisha went right back to being that village-girl Shepherdess.

Especially when her sister then asked why she was there, Denisha panicked so hard she lost all composure.

She kept feeling like her sister was questioning how a sinner like her even had the nerve to show up again.

She was truly terrified of seeing a look of dislike, or even loathing, on her sister’s face. That was the Heart Demon that had haunted her for more than a hundred thousand years.

Even though she knew her sister wasn’t that kind of person, those who fear ghosts often have ghosts in their own hearts—she was just feeling guilty, that’s all.

And those who feel guilty will subconsciously try to run, will quibble and make trouble, will shift the blame, will want to stand on some high ground and bare their fangs at others.

This was the ugly humanity of that once fragile, sensitive, self-abasing Shepherdess.

After all, she’d been a village girl, raised in the backwater countryside where the folkways were "simple" and the people were "crafty." In that kind of "honest" village, a girl raised by a widowed mother could only grow sharp-tongued and overbearing to protect herself.

So even though she was inwardly terrified, panicking to death, the moment she opened her mouth, what came out was sour, accusing words, as if everyone else was in the wrong and she herself was nothing but an innocent victim.

She even genuinely felt the urge to beat up Nidhogg—or rather, Emora—that guy, because this bastard had clearly recovered long ago, yet had played the honest, well-behaved act for so many years. His heart was truly deserving of condemnation.