The Empire's Hidden Enemy
The filthy bastards of the Magic Kingdom!
Aileen and her subordinates were marching toward the imperial capital. Yet at this moment, their steps felt incomparably heavier than when they had first left Thebes. They had departed the city burning with the desire to repay the grudge they held against the demons. But the ones waiting for them at their destination were not demons at all, and the very demons they had sought had mysteriously vanished without a trace. After having their momentum shattered like this, it was only natural that their enthusiasm had completely evaporated.
Among those caught in the heavy, sunken atmosphere was Aileen herself, the one leading the group. Though the root cause differed, she was just as unmotivated as the rest. Until the moment she had set out for the capital, she had at least carried a sense of duty to carry out her responsibilities with sincerity. But now, after some time had passed and her head had cooled, the sense of loss hit her with crystal clarity, sending her mood plummeting.
Torare-nim is gone… That damned bitch Shude took Torare-nim…
Aileen had thrown herself into the expedition with genuine fervor to rescue Torare from the demons’ clutches. Yet in the end, Torare had fallen into the hands of Shude—who possessed legitimate claim over him—rather than the demons. Of course, it was far better than her beloved man being in actual danger. Still, the fact that she wouldn’t be able to see his face or share his bed for the foreseeable future was more than enough to plunge her into depression.
Just then…
“Um… Lady Aileen?”
“Yes?”
A group of subordinates approached her cautiously. As the de facto leader of the unit, she turned to them with a calm voice.
“What is it? Is there something important you need to report?”
“Ah, well… it’s just that…”
“Hmm…”
The soldiers hesitated at her question. Aileen offered them a benevolent smile befitting her role and spoke gently.
“It’s all right. Speak freely if you have something to say. Though I may be the high priestess, as a servant of God I have a duty to listen carefully to all of you.”
She wondered if they wished to make some kind of confession. The soldiers seemed to shed some of their tension and began to speak in measured tones.
“The truth is, Your Eminence… while we were traveling here, we kept thinking about it, and… something feels very wrong.”
“Wrong? In what way?”
“Those witches we encountered before. It was dark at the time so we couldn’t see clearly, but one of them looked remarkably similar to a demon I saw once in Thebes.”
“What? What do you mean…”
“I… I feel the same way. She didn’t have horns like a demon, but I remember it clearly. There was a witch there who looked exactly like the one who killed my friend.”
“!...That would mean… could it be?”
As she listened to her subordinates’ testimony, something clicked in Aileen’s mind. It was the racial disguise magic she already knew about. A spell that utilized illusion magic—adding horns to one’s head or elongating ears to masquerade as a demon or elf. Changing one’s entire facial structure required fairly advanced magic, but altering minor features to disguise one’s race was surprisingly simple. For the highly trained witches of the Magic Kingdom, such racial camouflage was practically a basic requirement.
“And… there’s this as well. We found it at the site of the recent demon raid. I remember the witches wearing brooches very similar to this one.”
The female priest carefully produced a single brooch with a tense voice. The moment Aileen took it, she felt as if every piece of the puzzle had finally clicked into place.
“So that’s what happened… I did think something felt off. No matter how late I arrived, there was no way the demons could have slipped out of my detection net that quickly…”
Aileen spoke in a tone laced with quiet fury. The realization that everything had been orchestrated by Shude from the very beginning ignited a deep, sincere rage within her.
That woman… I thought she had simply schemed to take Torare-nim, but that wasn’t her only goal. Her other purpose was to sow chaos… to throw the empire into turmoil under the smokescreen of a demon attack.
The Falcon Empire had already suffered a catastrophic failure in its previous expedition and was now at war with the Elf Theocracy. If the demons were to launch provocations at a time like this, the empire would find itself in an extremely difficult position on multiple fronts. Even for the mightiest nation on the continent, assembling another overseas expeditionary force at this stage was impossible. Enemies who could not be touched were deliberately provoking them—this could only deepen the empire’s internal chaos and serve as the spark that would worsen an already unstable political situation.
“Those Magic Kingdom bastards… to think they would resort to such dirty tricks from the shadows.”
“Kgh…”
“To do something like that to fellow humans who aren’t even demons…”
The soldiers expressed their intense anger at Aileen’s conclusion. She looked at the men before her, her voice thick with fury.
“It seems we must hasten our journey. We need to inform His Majesty of the Magic Kingdom’s filthy schemes as quickly as possible.”
“I agree. We must spread word of their atrocities across the entire empire and take appropriate measures.”
“Those filthy Magic Kingdom dogs… to think they would go this far just to deceive our empire.”
Just like that, the soldiers redirected the rage they had held toward the demons and turned it squarely toward the Magic Kingdom. However, while the soldiers were consumed purely by anger, a different emotion began to bloom inside Aileen’s heart alongside the fury.
This… in a way… might actually be a good thing. If Shude really committed such dirty deeds, this could give me the perfect excuse to eliminate her once and for all.
The last remaining rival who had stayed by her side after the other two had vanished. The thought that the opportunity had finally arrived to erase the woman she had been unable to touch for lack of proper justification brought a dark smile blooming deep within Aileen’s heart.
Hero Hector. At this very moment, as he led the demon forces toward the imperial capital, he knew exactly what he was doing. Only a few weeks ago, he had believed the Demon Kingdom and its people were enemies that must be destroyed without fail. Yet now, Hector was pouring his heart and soul into helping those very same beings.
“Is this path definitely correct?”
“Of course. Once we cross that hill, the imperial capital will be right before us.”
“Hmm…”
Legion Commander Shamyuel continued to watch him with eyes full of suspicion. Nevertheless, regardless of how much trust she placed in him, Hector simply continued guiding them with steadfast sincerity. At the same time, while Shamyuel had not let go of her caution in case of an emergency, she had come to hold a certain degree of relaxed trust in Hector’s conduct itself.
Judging from his behavior so far, he cherished his comrades with terrifying intensity and would readily throw away his own life for them. Those comrades were currently held hostage in the Demon Kingdom, and any suspicious behavior on his part would result in their immediate execution. That alone made it reasonable to believe he would not act recklessly.
Yet apart from Shamyuel’s cold calculations, there was another reason Hector was devoting himself so completely to this mission.
To think there would come a day when I would genuinely want to help the demons like this…
If his past self from just a few weeks ago had seen this, he would have called himself insane and tried to wring his own neck—and Hector would have had no words to defend himself. While the lives of his precious comrades were certainly important, before that, Hector had possessed a strong sense of pride as a hero. Had they taken his comrades hostage and issued such orders, he would have chosen to flee or even commit suicide to protect his honor.
But the Hector of now no longer had any such thing as a hero’s honor left.
The memory of that moment still refused to leave his mind. Right before he had received this mission. The shocking scene that had appeared before him and his comrades while they were locked in the Demon Kingdom’s prison had made one thing painfully clear: the grand cause of the racial alliance was nothing but an illusion, and the demons were far more trustworthy than humans.
The hero’s downfall, huh… In that sense, maybe a guy like me was actually quite lucky.