I don't want to be a heroic spirit

Chapter 280 A Monster that Mimics a Girl (30/31)

"Alice, do you live in the royal capital?"

At this moment, the three of them were walking on a path in the forest, and Youyou suddenly asked this question.

“Because… Alice and Nero-san didn’t act like ordinary people at all… and… Megumin said that before.”

Youyou is also a Crimson Demon and her intelligence is not low, but she seems a little stupid because there is always Huihui by her side who is more intelligent than her.

Besides...if you are too smart, it will be hard to make friends, so Youyou often pretends to be a fool.

"Even if they're not from the Dustinis family...Miss Alice and Miss Nero must be the daughters of other nobles, right?"

Nero could feel Alice's gaze, so he probably didn't know what to do.

But Nero knew that there was no need to explain... Yunyun said this after she had the answer.

Youyou should have figured it out a few days ago, and the reason she's saying this now is because...

"Will you... ever return to the capital someday?"

Faced with this question, Nero and Alice looked at each other, unsure of how to respond.

Because it is certain.

Alice must return to the royal capital.

Although he finally persuaded Darkness to keep it a secret from Claire and the others and postpone her return date for a few days.

But it's almost reached its limit.

Especially after hearing the news that the Demon King's army cadres appeared nearby, Darkness became more eager to get Alice back to the capital, and she would urge Nero to send Alice back when they met.

She seemed to not want Alice to run into the Demon King's Army cadres, even though Alice's fighting ability was no worse than that of the Demon King's Army cadres.

"Yeah……"

Nero and Alice did not give an answer, but this was precisely the most irrefutable answer.

There was a sadness and loneliness in his expression that was hard to ignore, but in the end he forced a smile.

"You guys have a reason to go back, right? Maybe you ran away secretly? If you don't go back, it would be bad to make your family worry."

He should be the one who hates separation the most, but he ended up comforting Nero and Alice.

Nero knew how much Youyou had longed to have a partner to go on adventures and chat with, and how much she liked this team now.

"Right...right! Alice, I saw a shop selling magic tools a few days ago. They had some really good stuff..."

Youyou took the initiative to find Alice and started chatting. It was as if the previous topic had never come up, and the heavy atmosphere was slightly relieved.

However, something invisible has indeed changed.

Nero walked in front and looked up at the position of the sun.

"Looks like we might not be able to make it to town in time for lunch."

"It's okay. At worst, we can just have lunch and dinner later. That way it won't affect anything."

"Eating dinner as a midnight snack? Occasionally it's not a bad idea."

The three of them were still on their way. This path in the forest was usually used for merchants' carriages, so the chance of encountering monsters was much smaller and it was also much easier to walk on.

Of course, it only means "the chance of encountering monsters is much smaller" rather than "you will never encounter monsters". Even on the trade route leading to the royal capital, we cannot say that you will not encounter a single monster.

Nero, who was walking in the front and in charge of guarding, had his servant's keen senses suddenly touched by something, and the laziness in his eyes was immediately replaced by seriousness.

"Hmm? There seems to be someone up ahead?"

On a protruding rock not far away, a green-haired girl was sitting on it, smiling and waving at Nero and the others.

"Why is there someone here? And a little girl like this..."

"Hey, she seems to be injured, I can't just leave her alone..."

The girl's right ankle was wrapped in a bloody bandage. She kept glancing at her ankle, frowning and showing a painful expression.

When Nero and the others came over, the girl looked at them with a pitiful expression.

Just looking at her like this makes me want to protect her strongly.

"Hey, what should we do? It seems like we don't have any healing magic, and we don't have any healing potions..."

The kind-hearted Alice and Youyou have already walked up to the green-haired girl and want to treat the wound on her foot but they have no way to do it.

"If...if it's Nero-nee, there must be a way, right? Nero-nee can do anything, so she must be able to use recovery magic, right?"

Alice placed her hopes on Nero, but Nero was more concerned about other things.

Nero observed the girl in front of him.

The girl in front of him didn't seem to be a human, but a monster.

Whether it is the stone she sits on or the clothes and bandages on her body, they are all part of her, that is, mimicry.

"Sister Nero! Sister Nero! She seems to be in pain..."

"Look carefully, she's not human but a monster. The bandages and wounds on her body are all mimicry."

Nero's words did work. Alice and Youyou subconsciously took a step back, looking at the girl with a hint of vigilance in their eyes.

This is probably because of trust. If it was Kazuma's team that encountered the girl-like monster in front of them, and it was Kazuma who said "this girl is a monster", the others would probably beat Kazuma up in order to protect the monster.

“…Hey, she looks like she’s about to cry.”

Stared at by the girl monster with tears in her eyes with pleading eyes, Alice and Youyou still softened their hearts even though they knew that she was a monster.

"She looks so pitiful... Is she really a monster?"

"Even if it's a monster, it doesn't matter, right? Maybe it's a monster that's completely harmless to humans? After all, she's so pitiful, and she doesn't seem like she would hurt humans..."

The two people's attitudes towards the girl monster began to waver again.

At this moment, the other party spoke with a pronunciation as unfluent as that of a child, in a voice so low that it was almost inaudible.

"...are you going to kill me...?"

Her hands were clasped together in front of her chest, as if she was begging for something. She sat on the rock and looked up at the few people. Tears welled up in her eyes and she trembled uncontrollably.

I believe that anyone with a conscience would feel like being stabbed deep in their heart when seeing the other person’s begging eyes.

"I'm sorry! Sister Nero... I can't do it..." Alice was the first to put down the weapon in her hand and looked at Nero sadly, "I can't force myself to kill such a poor child..."

Chapter 281: Demon King's Army Cadre Headless Knight (31/31)

Even though he knew that the girl in front of him was a monster, humans were still visual animals after all, and they also had an unnecessary sense of pity.

A beautiful girl looks at you with her big watery eyes full of pleading. I believe that there are not many people who can have the heart to kill the other person in such a situation.

Just at this moment, the girl monster spoke again, and her ethereal and hollow voice reached the ears of Nero and others.

"You look so miserable... I'm sorry... It's all because... I live in this world..."

It said this with a weak smile.

"It's all because... I'm a monster... It's all because... my existence... is a nuisance..."

"This is the first time in my life... that I've communicated with a human being like this..."

It clasped its hands together in front of its chest as if in prayer.

As if it had accepted its fate, it raised its head, closed its eyes, and exposed its neck.

"Thank you...you...it's great to meet you..."

"If... I could be reincarnated... I hope... I could become... a human..."

"Becoming friends with you..."

Then, Youyou also cried.

"She said she wanted to be friends with me! She said she wanted to be friends with me! Uwaaaaaa!"

Youyou's intelligence is not low, but she is surprisingly brainless when talking about topics related to friends.

It seems that Alice and Youyou are planning to let this girl monster go.

Is it true that the more conscientious a person is, the harder it is to harm it?

Looking at the monster girl who closed her eyes as if she had come to her senses, Nero...

He chopped off his head with a sword and burned his body to ashes.

No one really thinks that Nero is such a compassionate and kind person, right?

She was Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, a notorious tyrant whose life was adorned with conspiracy and poison.

She poisoned her mother, forced her mentor to death, and brutally killed all the nobles who resisted her. She is a rose flower soaked in blood.

Under the ground next to the girl monster, Nero and his friends dug out a corpse with only bones and clothes left.

Alice and Youyou then realized that everything the girl monster had said was a lie.

"Look carefully, this guy is not the harmless monster you think he is. What she just said is all lies."

"Your mercy this time may cause even more travelers to become food for this monster and die. Do you think you can take responsibility for your mercy and the deaths of those people?"

Nero scolded Alice and Youyou severely, hoping that they could understand their mistakes through this lesson.

The name of this girl monster is Anle Girl. She is an extremely evil monster that exploits people's sympathy to prey on them.

It is said that an adventurer once cruelly killed a girl of peace, and ever since then he has been devastated by his guilty conscience and has never been able to recover.

The Anle Girls basically have no means of attack. Because they are rooted in the ground, they cannot move. They can only lure others to eat their fruits. This fruit contains neurotoxins, which not only cannot fill the stomach but also block the eater's physical danger signals such as hunger, sleepiness, and pain. The eater will gradually become weak and die in the company of the Anle Girls.

Because there are always elderly adventurers who go to the habitat of this monster in search of a comforting death, this monster is named the Peace Girl.

It is said that there is a monster in the depths of the forest that is more powerful than an ordinary Anle girl. It is called the Anle Queen and its habitat is regarded as a suicide sanctuary.

Of course, the guild hopes to put an end to such things, but there have always been commissions to defeat Queen Anle, and it's not that no one has accepted them. However, after seeing Queen Anle, the adventurers who have accepted the commissions all gave up the missions because they felt it was too cruel, which gave the guild members a headache.

These were the information that Nero and the others learned from the staff of the Adventurer's Guild after they returned to it.

And now, they have just come out of the forest.

"After crossing this plain, we will reach Axel."

"I've never walked this far before..."

There was no shelter on the plain, and even the giant frogs were nowhere to be seen due to the presence of the Demon King's army cadres.

From here you can already see the walls of Axel.

"Sister Nero, there seem to be a lot of people over there..."

Alice said this, and Nero naturally saw it more clearly than her.

In front of Axel's gate, Nero saw many familiar faces, all of whom were adventurers who had appeared in the guild.

At this moment, all these adventurers gathered together, and each of them brought their own equipment, looking ready for battle.

The scene was similar during the previous cabbage migration.

The protagonists were also in the crowd, except Huihui.

Megumin was at the front of the crowd, talking to someone in jet-black armor.

Although she could see the scene in the distance, Nero could not hear what they were saying. She only had the skill [Clairvoyance] but not [Clairaudience].

"That... looks like the Headless Horseman."

It was wearing pitch-black armor, and the head that should have been on its neck was now held in its arms, with an undead warhorse sitting under its crotch.

Indeed, it resembles the headless horseman in horror stories, but...

"I remember the Dullahan didn't ride a wolf? His name was Blacksem Robert."

"Why would the Dullahan ride a wolf? And that Dullahan's name is Beldia, not Heisen Robert, and he's one of the Demon King's army cadres."

The Royal Capital was always engaged in battles with the Demon King's Army, so Alice was very familiar with the Demon King's Army, especially the information about the Demon King's Army cadres that had appeared.

However, if the other party is a general of the Demon King’s army...what is Megumin saying to it?

Could it be that Huihui finally put her idea of ​​"casting an explosion magic in the Demon King's Castle" into action?