The Hero Who Became a Monster Girl Will Never Fall to Evil

So I could strike down those monsters without the slightest burden on my conscience.

Aurora thought that to herself, then suddenly shifted her tone. She looked at Vieya, scrunching up her delicate little face, and said bitterly:

“Look, I’ve been kneeling here for so long already. If you’re feeling merciful and don’t plan to kill me, could you at least let me stand? My knees hurt...”

“So what. It’s not my knees that hurt. Keep kneeling.” Vieya smiled sweetly, her soft lips speaking out words colder than ice.

She wasn’t someone to hold petty grudges. This punishment wasn’t revenge for the pain of being stabbed through the stomach—it was to make sure Aurora remembered: after failing in an assassination, an assassin unlocks a certain defeat CG.

That damned hag! Aurora cursed inwardly, though outwardly her face carried a fawning smile. “Then how do you plan to let me go?”

“Let you go?”

Vieya looked at Aurora as if she were an idiot. Her emerald-green eyes sparkled with strange amusement.

“You must have water in your brain. A war prisoner like you—if I don’t take you to a human city and trade you for bounty money, that’s already a massive favor. And you still fantasize that kneeling a bit will make me let you go?

You like assassinations, yet you don’t want to pay when you lose. You think the world is so full of good fortune that all of it should fall into your lap?

Or is it because I look harmless, so you subconsciously assumed I’m some kind and easy-to-talk-to person? Naïve! With intelligence as pathetic as yours, I advise you to stop being an assassin and go back to the countryside to cut grass and herd sheep with your sister.”

Aurora’s cheeks flushed red at once. Her eyes looked as if she wanted to bite a chunk of Vieya’s flesh right off, but her endurance served her well. Her face only flickered red and white, and after a quick glance she lowered her head fast:

“I’m sorry...”

“Sorry won’t cut it.”

Vieya snorted lightly, bent /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ down to sit on an ice block, shivered from the cold, and then stood back up again, annoyed. She immediately dragged the topic back onto track:

“How many of you came for this ambush on the Starbell Lily? How strong are they? Do you have any other backup plans?”

“...” Aurora fell silent for a moment, embarrassed as she touched the green ponytail hanging over her chest. “Sorry, I don’t really pay attention to that stuff... I didn’t take note of the exact personnel distribution...”

“...”

Braised pig’s head!

Vieya let out a breath. She had already half expected this, so she changed the way she asked:

“Among them, how many are stronger than you—people you couldn’t kill?”

“People I couldn’t kill...”

Aurora thought seriously, wracking her brain. Then her eyes lit up as if she’d realized something, and she raised her right index finger.

“For now, none. After all, there really aren’t many super tough bosses like you. My weapon was coated with poison, you know!”

Saying that, Aurora sneakily glanced toward Vieya’s abdomen. That was the very spot she had aimed her sneak attack. Logically, there should be a bloody gaping hole there. Yet Vieya’s lower stomach was perfectly intact, her milky-white skin even carrying a faint healthy pink glow.

If not for the hole in her clothes still being visible, nobody would think she had suffered a fatal wound there.

“What are you staring at?” Vieya suddenly felt a chill run all over her body and wanted to find something to cover her navel.

“I’m just curious...”

Aurora was utterly baffled. The questions waiting for answers in her heart only grew. “I clearly remember my strike hitting you and that shell monster. So how are you still hopping around lively? Hm... and that shell monster seemed alive too. How exactly is that possible?”

“Your skills aren’t up to par.” Vieya couldn’t be bothered to explain that she was a slime, immune to poison and bodily damage. “Also, while that mirage demon’s main body shattered, it was still a seventh-rank monster. It could nurture a pearl sub-body in its belly. So I stepped in to protect its sub-body at the last second. If you’d read more books, you’d know that much.”

“So shell monsters can give birth to sub-bodies...”

Aurora froze. How had she never known this? And... why was Vieya’s knowledge so deep?

She opened her mouth, but in the end she didn’t ask the question “who exactly are you?” Most likely, she wouldn’t answer anyway...

Even so, in her heart Aurora felt a spark of curiosity toward this mysterious white-haired girl who had captured her. When had her sister come to know such an enigmatic figure?

Curiosity. Such overpowering curiosity.

She truly wanted to rip away Vieya’s veil and see what identity was hidden beneath. Was she a crisis born of the abyss, or a new star of transformation?

...

To be cautious, Vieya sorted through the information she had gathered so far. Aurora most likely hadn’t lied—unless in the past three years she had joined some cult and trained herself to a supreme level of deceit where lies could pass for truth.

But that was obviously impossible.

On the ice-covered trail, Vieya turned her head. Aurora had hung her hand-drawn mask at her waist. Without that ferocious, frightening mask, the petite assassin actually had a decent appearance. At first sight she could give the impression of being innocent and naïve.

Aurora pointed to the waterfall at the end of the trail and said: “This was once the place where a big shot of our organization advanced from eighth rank to ninth rank. By the waterfall there’s even a stone stele that records his life story.”

The cave was freezing. The waterfall was slender and frail, the water flowing slowly, yet mysteriously it hadn’t frozen. It spilled into a pool of clear water.

Beside the pool stood a stone stele, its dense words dizzying Vieya’s eyes.

But the general meaning was this: once there had been a man named Lampard, born five hundred years ago, who had been active before the Human Alliance was ever formed.

Back then, humans lived scattered across four domains, each ruling its own territory. Four kingdoms stood in stalemate. They fought constantly, noble clans and magnates oppressed the people, smoke from wars filled the skies, monsters ravaged the lands, and the world was drenched in suffering.

At that time, the four great dynasties had to split forces both to resist monsters and to guard against the ambitions of the other three nations. Thus they dragged into a decades-long tug-of-war, while the common people were plunged into misery.

Lampard, then a seventh rank, traveled widely for years. He personally witnessed this misery. One evening at dusk, filled with anger, he happened to stumble upon a tavern by the docks where another man was also giving an impassioned speech—the one who later became his comrade.

Together, they formed a resistance army, broke the stalemate of the four nations, and won a short reprieve for the oppressed people.

“Seventh rank was that impressive?” Vieya’s face was full of doubt. “The seventh ranks I’ve seen are nothing close to the word ‘badass.’”

Aurora’s mouth twitched. She hadn’t expected such crude words to come from Vieya’s lips, but considering her status as a prisoner, she held back her urge to mock and explained patiently:

“You don’t get it. I’ll tell you a secret. The level of human development back then was completely different from now. There were no magic runes, no magic cannons, no magic arks. Those precious mana crystals—you humans couldn’t even use them!”

“That’s no secret.” Vieya spread her hands. Even she, a Hero summoned only in recent decades, knew all that. Could that count as a secret?

“Ugh! You’re so annoying!”

Aurora squatted by the pool, washing her hands, as she continued: “The secret I mean is this: back then, monsters were nowhere near as strong as they are now, nowhere near!

The stronger humanity grows overall, the stronger the Demon Kings born among monsters become. The stronger the Demon Kings, the more extreme and terrifying their underlings.”

“Monsters may have Demon Kings, but humans also have Heroes.” Vieya shook her head. She had fought many Demon Kings, and their power wasn’t much to boast about... but thinking back now, those Demon Kings who fell under her hand had always managed to escape with their lives. Perhaps that had something to do with Flaviel’s little tricks.

“...Sigh.” Vieya let out a breath and shifted her attention. “So, that Lampard and that tavern speaker guy—are they still alive?”

Aurora shook her head. “It’s been nearly six hundred years. Humans aren’t monsters. They’re long dead. But I’ve heard our organization still sends people to their graves every year to pay respects.”