The look of utter dismay on Archbishop Luminol’s face as he peered at the Angel through his veil was palpable.

In his eyes, such a scene must have felt bewildering.

After all, under normal circumstances, the Angel should have rebuked the presence of a Devil’s Aura in me. But, what had happened was she only stood there stiffly, her gaze was fixated on me.

“...O Messenger?”

The Archbishop called out to her, but she still didn’t respond. Her eyes continued to tremble greatly.

“...”

Meanwhile, for me…

This was a huge jackpot.

Normally, this angel would have fled the moment I tried to meet her, but now here she was, boldly standing in front of my eyes.

[Y-You… W-Why are you here…?]

Her quivering voice that echoed in ‘my mind’ made it even clearer that she didn’t want to be here.

Keep in mind that whenever an Angel were to manifest themselves in the Material Realm, they had the obligation to maintain a devout and dignified atmosphere, and she wasn’t exempt from this obligation.

Yet, even with that obligation in mind, she still couldn’t suppress a groan out of her lips. All because I was the personification of her trauma.

Just by seeing me must have brought back the fear that she had when she was almost devoured by the White Devil.

“...D-Did he just say, ‘It’s been a while’?”

“Does that mean he actually met the Angel before?”

Such mutterings started to appear from the spectators’ seats.

After hearing those words, the Angel’s expression began to darken even more.

“...”

Iliya, who was still standing beside me, alternated her gaze between me and the Angel. There was a knowing look on her face.

Well, she was there when I met the Angel for the first time, so it was understandable that she made such a look.

“...Uh, Teach?”

“Yeah?”

“After observing you for a while, I’ve come to understand you to a certain extent.”

“Okay...”

“...From the look of your face, you’re about to do something incredibly shitty. Like, this would definitely go down on the history kind of level.”

“...”

I’ve always had the feeling that she had a good intuition.

Ever since she acquired the Eye of Truth or whatever, it felt as if she could read my mind directly.

Seriously, what kind of ability was that, anyway?

[What do you want from me this time…? Why do you have such a sinister look on your face?!]

“...”

Well, either Iliya got a good intuition, or everyone could see it from my face, I guess.

'Well, it's nothing much.'

Just like Caliban, it seemed like this Angel could respond to my thoughts directly.

A blessing to me, really.

Because I’d need balls of steel to say this shit out loud.

'You see, I’m trying to do an important thing, but some of these bastards are trying to prevent me from even starting it.’

Like, seriously.

Even back at Elfante and the Forge of Struggle, I had been pushing myself to death, trying to prevent the world from being destroyed by those Devils.

But for some reason, there were a lot of fuckers who kept on getting in my way for their own selfish goals!

This time, it was the Holy Land.

That was why...

I wanted to make a grand statement to put them in their place.

'Miss Angel, can you please testify on my behalf? Just this once?’

[...Testify? What is it that you need me to testify?]

Then, I conveyed what she needed to know through my thoughts.

And as expected, her reaction was pretty dramatic.

[T-This inhumane trash—!]

“...”

[H-How could you make me say such things!]

Well, I dunno.

But you better do it.

As I thought so, I manipulated the window to forcibly apply a skill on the Virtue.

Suddenly, she folded her wings and gently descended to the ground.

[H-Huh? E-Eh? W-What’s this?!]

What I did was using the oh so precious ‘command right that could directly manipulate even the Angels’.

So…

It was only natural that I made her use some words that were a little…out there…

“...Yes, it really has been a while.”

[W-Why is my mouth moving on its own?! W-What have you done to m-]

Her voice buzzed angrily in my head, but…

Before she could even finish her tantrum, the sentence I ‘requested’ her to say had already echoed throughout the venue.

“I’ve missed you, 'Master'.”

Then, when the next sentence followed.

“This lowly servant is ready to obey any command.”

The vast square…

Was suddenly enveloped in silence.

System Message

[ Target ‘Virtue A1101' recognizes you as a mortal enemy! ]

[ Marked with Negative Tendency! ]

[ 2 Stacks of Negative Marks! At 3 Stacks, a special effect will occur! ]

[ Skill: Evil Ruler has been activated! Obtained 1 command right over the target! ]

Wow.

That just straight out replenished the command right.

I smirked, looking at the window that appeared before my eyes.

As soon as the Virtue said those words, Archbishop Luminol hastily reversed her summoning, so I didn’t get to see her full reaction. This was good enough, though.

Well, I’d be worried a little if the command right wasn’t replenished, but as expected, forcing the poor Angel to refer to me as ‘Master’ had truly thrown her mind into disarray.

It was like calling your pet ‘Master’, it should feel disgraceful.

[...Is the Boy King sleeping right now?]

‘He almost always is. Why do you ask?'

Even if he was awake, he’d keep his silence.

He was a complete opposite to this chatty guy.

Anyway, he was holing himself up, preparing something that was related to Forbidden Sorcery. It would be nice if he showed his face once in a while, though.

[I know, right? What a shame. This would be the perfect time for him to give you another round of applause.]

“...”

[When it comes to anything except for the women around you, you won’t feel guilty about it, so it’s really quite the sight~! In fact I became quite fond of you—]

I ignored his nonsense and turned my gaze to what was above the desk.

“...A bombshell has dropped.”

Looking at the newspapers that are sensationalizing yesterday's events, such words spontaneously come out.

“Woahhhh... It's absolute chaos...”

Following my comment, Iliya, who was sitting on the sofa while going through the materials I had already reviewed, also let out a groan.

“I knew you said that you’d make me famous, but isn’t this a little too much?”

Iliya said as she read several headlines out loud.

[ The Declaration of an Angel's Submission, the Holy Land remains silent on the matt- ]

[ Archbishop Luminol raises the possibility of a 'mass hallucination'- ]

“...If he’s really using mass hallucination as an excuse…this whole thing must have been quite a shock to him.”

True.

For the Holy Land, this would be nothing short of a nightmare.

Their position and influence mostly stem from having produced the ‘First Hero’ and the religious authority of being directly recognized by the ‘Angels’.

Yet, an Angel directly referred to the person who they had thrown suspicion on as ‘Master’. The whole situation just turned them into an absolute fucking disgrace.

Of course, they could officially mitigate such facts. After all, their influence was still considerable. But, they couldn’t just silence the many witnesses.

The topic of my relationship with the Angel would still spread with terrifying momentum.

And as a consequence to that…

Their recognition of the ‘Hero Candidate’ whom I was an ‘attendant’ of would skyrocket.

“So, how does it feel to be one of the hottest topics across the continent?”

“...Honestly, I don't really feel like it’s real yet. Even if I've become the talk of the town, no, the continent, it's not like there's any immediate change around me. Like, I’ve been receiving a lot of attention in Elfante anyway.”

“...”

Must be nice to be popular.

As for me, my reputation of being a ‘somewhat suspicious bastard’, ‘a sinister human’, ‘a loner without friends, yet oddly surrounded by women for various reasons’ still lingered.

I was already strayed millions of light-years away from the ordinary school life I dreamt of when I first enrolled in the academy.

“...Teach? Are you crying?”

“No. It just seems like it because of how sparkly my eyes are.”

“...”

Anyway.

At least, at least this would prevent the Holy Land and the Pope from finding any pretext to hinder me throughout the Hero Selection.

So, I didn’t need to worry about them that much anymore, but…

“...By the way, what have you been doing all this time?”

Before I realized it, I already asked that question.

Look, I could still understand that she barged into my room and invaded my furniture, but that wasn’t the problem here.

She had been cutting something out of the newspaper for a while now.

“I'm collecting photos that feature both me and Teach together.”

“...”

“Ah, this one turned out well.”

And, why was she even doing it here?

Even someone as oblivious and dense as me can only think he's doing this as a blatant ‘appeal’.

'...Also, she’s becoming more proactive lately.’

No, seriously, she had been doing this a lot lately.

While I was at a loss for words after hearing Iliya say that, a voice came from Soul Linker.

[Can I just ask one favor?]

‘Huh?’

[If you two are going to go through some important event, do it where I can’t see. Please.]

‘...’

[I already feel like dying, so if I were to see something like that, I’d probably die a second time.]

‘...It won’t happen.’

Important event, my ass.

I could still remember the time when Yuria cut me in half. If I were to do that kind of shit, I’d get cut into more than twenty pieces by the other Devil’s Vessels.

Caliban’s nonsense made me let out a sigh. I turned my gaze to the documents Atalante had given me.

It contained the general itinerary of the Hero Selection that would be announced to everyone during the opening ceremony.

Well, the event that occurred during the ceremony was so explosive that it overshadowed everything else, but it seemed like all the relevant documents had still been distributed to the parties involved.

‘...The most important thing is…’

The list of candidates participating in the ordeals.

You could also consider it as the list of competitors, I guess…

Also, I had to infuriate these people somehow, so they’d go out of their way to kill me.

And…

This was also the part with the highest potential for 'variables' to appear.

Looking back at what had happened so far, these parts were the things that always got fucked over.

‘The Tribal Alliance has the Twin Berserkers. The Empire has Iliya and…’

Faenol Lipek.

A bitter smile formed on my face as soon as I saw that name.

As I started to think about her…

[ Main Quest ]

〖 Chapter 4 – Crimson Night 〗

[ Related Event will occur soon! ]

The main event of this chapter was 'Hero Selection', but the name of the Main Quest that formed the backdrop of the chapter was the ‘Crimson Night'.

It was the chapter where Faenol appears as its Final Boss, but the thing I needed to focus on was the reason why she became the 'Final Boss'.

“...”

During the selection, something would happen that would cause her to go berserk.

And it was my job to stop it.

[Can’t you just solve it quick and easy as usual?]

‘If there are no variables involved, I can.’

[Hmm?]

‘Since, this is something related to the Devils, there’s one more group of motherfuckers who’ll always stick their noses in, aside from the Holy Land.’

In terms of hindering my smooth scenario progression, they were much worse than the former.

Thinking this, I flipped to the next page of the document.

Anyway, up to here was a list I was familiar with. The list matched perfectly with the game.

These people were undoubtedly strong, but it was still manageable.

“...”

The problem was....

What came up while I was scanning the list from the Holy Land.

The 'variable' I had been so wary of was blatantly pushing its way into view.

Candidate No. 1. The top student of Great Temple's 1st-Years. A very standard selection. I could even applaud it as a good choice.

The problem was the other person, though.

“...Why can’t I take it easy just for once?”

Seeing the face reflected in their profile, such words escaped my mouth like a groan.

It was the picture of a man whose appearance screams frivolity, looking like a womanizer at first glance.

But, even so...

“...”

Just by looking at him, I already felt dizzy.

Enough to make my vision go white.

I even felt a sense of resentment, as if the world was blatantly trying to fuck me over with variables.

And that was because the identity of this bastard was…

“...He’s a balance breaker.”

A monster who could turn the Hero Selection itself into mere 'child's play'.

Talker.

The Prophet’s right hand man.

A bastard who was strong enough to subdue Eleanor who was fused with two fragments had blatantly made his presence known.