After a while, Solitär, with a blissful expression, led Fíliya into her guest room.
Of course, that's just what she called it. In Fíliya's eyes, the room was completely unsuitable for receiving guests.
First, the lighting was poor, giving the entire room an oppressive feeling, but that was an easy problem to solve.
Almost at the same time, Fíliya and Solitär tacitly used Lighting Magic to illuminate the space.
And then, Fíliya saw it.
The densely packed bookshelves lining the room weren't filled with books, but with rows of labeled jars and bottles.
As for the contents of the jars, they were, naturally, the corpses of various small animals or Monsters. However, these weren't taxidermied specimens; they were preserved whole, submerged in some sort of strange liquid.
This demon... she was exactly as I'd guessed.
Fíliya looked proud.
From the moment she first met Solitär, she had guessed that the demon might be building a nest out of corpses.
Looking at it now, while she wasn't entirely correct, she wasn't far off.
Solitär lived among countless corpses day in and day out, occasionally fiddling with a new one to make another specimen... No wonder the stench was overwhelming.
Hmm?
An idea suddenly struck Fíliya.
Right, why did it take me so long to realize?
She immediately asked Solitär.
"Solitär, don't you think this house stinks?"
Solitär was clearly taken aback. She paused to think for a moment before finally replying.
"I've gotten used to it. Besides, I'm a reclusive member of the Demon Race, so humans and other demons rarely intrude on my space... But by human standards, I suppose it is quite foul... Oh, so that's what you were disgusted by, Fíliya. I was wondering why you kept wrinkling your brow."
Solitär wore a dazed, slow-to-realize expression. If Fíliya didn't know she was sitting in front of a monster, she might have even called her cute.
Fíliya silently grumbled to herself.
So she can smell it. I thought the Demon Race couldn't perceive smells... What a major discovery.
"Mmm, but there's so much of this stuff piled up. It'd be a pain to try and clean it all out on short notice."
Solitär rested her chin on her hand, looking troubled.
This made Fíliya raise an eyebrow.
What did she just say? Clean it out?
"Eh? You're... you're going to throw all this away?"
Fíliya's tone was one of shock. As a scholar, she knew exactly how much effort it must have taken to collect everything in this room. Even if the Demon Race lived long lives, this was just wasteful.
"Yes. If you don't like it, Fíliya, I'll just throw it away. I've grown tired of studying all that anyway. I have something far more interesting right in front of me now, don't I?"
Solitär said, smiling radiantly at Fíliya.
Hey, could you stop calling me 'something'? I have a name.
Fíliya muttered under her breath, but it wasn't enough to make her truly angry, so she quickly dismissed the minor detail.
Fíliya looked up slightly, glanced around the room, and then shook her head.
"Forget it. This is all your life's work. You need to treasure it more. What kind of scholar would be willing to throw away treasures like these?"
Fíliya spread her hands in resignation.
"Eh? Fíliya, you're so kind, actually thinking of me... I'm starting to believe you really are a 'Demon Race enthusiast'."
So you didn't believe me before, huh.
Fíliya shot Solitär a look.
Besides, I'm not thinking of you. I just feel it's a waste of all this material.
"But, if you absolutely have to throw something away, could you get rid of the human specimens on the first floor? They make me uncomfortable."
Fíliya suggested to Solitär with a look of annoyance.
"Yes, whatever you say."
Solitär agreed readily.
Seeing that she had agreed, Fíliya continued.
"But this still isn't a solution... I can't live in this environment long-term."
Fíliya frowned slightly.
"Long-term?"
Solitär blinked, as if savoring the phrase.
"What else? Are you going to let me go back?"
Fíliya said irritably.
Of course, she was just complaining. The situation was different now. Even if Solitär were to actually let her go, Fíliya would adamantly refuse to leave.
Solitär saw her as an important human, and Fíliya, in turn, saw Solitär as an important, long-sought-after member of the Demon Race.
For Miss Fíliya, this feeling of dancing with death stimulated her pulsating ambition every single second.
At first, there was a tiny bit of fear, but now she had grown increasingly audacious and bold.
Her relationship with Solitär was no longer that of prey and predator, but a rather twisted, mutually demanding one.
Solitär's eyelids twitched slightly. It seemed that for this great demon, who had lived for who knows how many years, 'living with a human long-term' was also a unique experience.
"I'll take care of it."
Seeing Solitär's pensive expression, Fíliya had no intention of provoking her further. She simply stood up slowly.
"Hmm?"
Solitär snapped back to her senses and looked at Fíliya curiously, wondering what she was about to do.
Fíliya, however, wore a confident expression. Because, just a moment ago, she had used her remaining balance to exchange for another magic spell.
Magic to Keep a Room's Air Fresh
And so, Miss Fíliya's final savings of over a hundred thousand points vanished, and her dream was completely reset to zero.
It's fine. It's just a hundred million points. I can definitely earn it back before I die of old age.
Miss Fíliya reassured herself.
Next, Fíliya channeled her mana and, in one go, cleansed the entire house of its foul odor—not just the room.
Of course, this was only a temporary fix. As long as those things remained in the house, it wouldn't be long before the stench returned.
In other words, Miss Fíliya would have to use this magic about every other day.
The only good news was that this kind of folk magic didn't consume much mana.
"Wow, Fíliya, you're amazing."
Solitär said with a very exaggerated expression.
But Fíliya responded with a rather peculiar look.
Solitär tilted her head, a little confused, wondering if she had said something wrong.
"Most of the stench has been cleared... but there's still one source of the smell that magic can't solve."
Fíliya stared at Solitär with a dark expression.
Solitär's eyes widened as if in sudden realization, and she pointed to herself.
"That's right, it's you. Now go take a bath!"
Fíliya snapped.
______
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