chapter 23
23. Sorry, the hidden BOSS can do as he pleases.
According to Noah’s observations, the incident triggered by Prince Mori had indeed not caused any ripples. For the general public, it was merely that the previously arrogant Fury Group had suddenly quieted down.
Noah had no interest in getting involved in what happened next, so he didn’t pay much attention. After all, he was just an Evil God who had been expelled by the goddess in the setting. Although he had high combat power, he was not omnipotent, and he had neither the interest nor the ability to save the world.
Of course, Noah also kept an eye on the mysterious nun, Clotilde, who was secretly exterminating the Fury Guild.
However, due to Clotilde’s overly calm daily life afterward, Noah didn’t keep a constant watch on this different protagonist who had yet to start her own story.
His main focus was still on Valentina.
Now that she had witnessed the ugliness of humanity, it was time for her to see the might of the monsters.
Without Noah’s interference, Valentina would take the initiative to handle the monsters around the royal capital, and after exterminating them, she would usually go find her childhood friend Clyde to chat and have dinner.
In the original story, if Clyde’s personal event continued to trigger, it would chain into the personal event of the blonde-haired Alan.
Upon learning that Valentina was with her childhood friend, Alan would act with even more fervor than before, and one misstep could lead to a dangerous situation involving the Minotaur route, making it quite perilous.
Even if Alan was discovered to be one of the Four Heavenly Kings of the Demon Lord’s army and was ultimately designed to be eliminated, he would suddenly resurrect in the later stages of the main storyline, making him the blonde-haired character most obsessed with taking the protagonist away from her tormentor.
Thus, Noah’s goal was to prevent Valentina from deepening her relationships with either Alan or Clyde.
To stop Valentina from moving toward a -like future, Noah fretted like a concerned father, needing to guard against both the blonde-haired Alan and her tormentor, while also playing the role of another blonde-haired character who would pop up to annoy Valentina when she was happy.
Sure enough, on the third night after the incident with Prince Mori, Valentina, who was resting and reading in her room, was suddenly pulled into a dilapidated temple by Noah.
“…Here we go again. You really are obsessed with this kind of ghostly nonsense, Evil God.”
Having experienced this several times before, the sudden change in scenery only slightly surprised Valentina, but she quickly regained her composure and shot a disdainful glance at Noah, who was not far away.
Recently, she had come to feel that the Evil God wasn’t such a big deal after all; he wouldn’t dare to kill her, and at most, he would just annoy her.
And she had almost gotten used to it, okay?
However, it turned out that this was her moment of complacency. When she saw Noah’s figure, the princess’s expression immediately froze.
Because she thought the Evil God would never show his full face!
And it turned out to be her own face!
“E-Evil God, what’s going on with that face of yours!? C-Could it be that I…”
Unable to comprehend that the Evil God had a face identical to hers, Valentina lost her composure and hurriedly touched her own face, as if afraid that Noah would steal her appearance.
“Don’t worry, I haven’t taken your looks. This face is just a manifestation of your panic. As expected, Princess, you really suit this foolish look; a calm and capable woman is completely unsuitable for you.”
At that moment, Noah not only wore Valentina’s head but also spoke her words in her voice, while below the neck, he was his own male self, creating a striking visual impact.
“…Hmph, you’re just trying to provoke me into action so you can knock me down, right? Your scheme has already been exposed!”
Though the sight of the street brawler-like Evil God made Valentina feel physically uncomfortable, she still held back her urge to strike, turning her head away with an angry yet composed expression that showed her unwillingness to comply.
“No, I’ve had enough of that game. Right now, I want to see other things.”
Seeing Valentina’s angry demeanor, Noah naturally wouldn’t hold back, merely wearing her identical face and saying things that perfectly matched the ‘Evil God’ persona.
“W-What do you want? You’re not planning to go out and cause trouble in that form, are you?!”
The thought of such a future made Valentina a bit anxious.
What a terrible future this was!
Couldn’t he refrain from doing bad things while wearing someone else’s face?!
“Ah, it seems you have quite the opinion, so you have no objections now, right?”
Anticipating her response, Noah seamlessly transformed his body below the head to perfectly resemble Valentina.
“That’s a bigger problem! So your previous appearance was also just a disguise?!”
At that moment, Valentina, who looked like she was staring into a mirror, completely lost her composure. She thought she had grasped some of the characteristics of the evil god’s appearance, only to find out it could change at will!?
“Oh, you thought what you saw before was my true form? Heh, how adorable.”
Naturally, Noah, who had misled Valentina in this way, wouldn’t explain that her guess was actually correct.
Not only that, but Noah, using Valentina’s appearance, rested the back of his hand against his delicate chin, slightly tilting his head to cast a disdainful glance at the true princess.
“Uh, this feels terrible. Why do I have to see this?”
Seeing the ‘self’ in front of her, which looked even more like a villainess than her half-sister, Valentina felt a wave of darkness wash over her, nearly fainting on the spot.
She swore she would probably never see a worse sight than this.
“Is this not acceptable? Then if I were to connect your head to that muscular man, wouldn’t you explode?”
Unfortunately, she was still too young, for Noah had even more weighty words to share.
After thinking for a moment… no, there was no need to think at all; Valentina was already drenched in sweat. She let out an unprecedented sound of disgust and quickly squatted down, hugging her head.
“Please stop! That’s too disgusting! Just kill me instead!”
She had initially thought it was hard to look at her head connected to the previous male, but the moment she imagined merging with a muscular man, Valentina found the previous image much more palatable.
After all, that male had a decent physique and was somewhat handsome, at least by rough standards.
“Heh heh heh, nice reaction! Yes, this is exactly what I wanted to see! Well then, let’s meet again tomorrow morning. Good night, Princess. I hope you dream of your muscular self tonight.”
The annoying Noah returned to his original form and promptly kicked Valentina out of his dilapidated temple.
“Since you’re a god, why not do something good for me? What is this? A curse? It must be a curse, right?!”
Just as the princess, who had just returned to her room and was about to breathe a sigh of relief, heard Noah’s original voice echoing in her ears.
This made her jump up, voicing strong complaints in her familiar personal space.
However, all that responded to her was Noah’s unfathomable laughter, which seemed to carry nothing but malice.
Ugh! How infuriating! He’s treating me like a child! I will make him regret messing with me!
Realizing she had been completely toyed with again, the princess couldn’t hold back and dove onto her bed, clutching her pillow tightly to her chest, imagining it was Noah in his black-haired youth form. In a mix of anger and embarrassment, she squeezed the pillow with her arms and legs, venting her frustrations.
The poor pillow bore the brunt of the princess’s wrath, being squeezed for several minutes before she finally released it.
“…Huh? Wait a minute, didn’t he say tomorrow morning? I’m supposed to go out of the city to hunt monsters tomorrow morning! Does that scheming evil god really plan to gather followers?! I even thought he wasn’t that bad! Isn’t this just terrible?! I’ll strangle you instead!”
However, due to the princess suddenly noticing this blind spot, the poor pillow was once again subjected to several more minutes of squeezing, and that night, when she actually dreamed of her super muscular self, it was thrown across the room in a fit of rage.
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