The Tale of Hero Alice’s Social Death

"Alice! Terrible news!"

Zauna's voice came through the phone. Even though Alice did not set the call to speaker mode, Zauna's voice still reached every corner of her bedroom. Fortunately, apart from Alice and the unconscious Milu Rabbit, nobody else was present in the room right now.

"The Demon King has appeared! Did you hear about it on your side?!"

"Ahh… Of course I heard of it. I'm in the demon realm right now, after all," Alice said while holding her phone with her left hand and using her right hand to manipulate the crystalline device that resembled a crystalline mouse. Then, while looking at the computer in front of her, Alice continued, "Since the Hero has already appeared, isn't it normal for the Demon King to appear also?"

"That being said… You shouldn't underestimate the Demon King's Power. A LINK account going by the name 'Milu Times' has posted details regarding the Demon King's birth. It seems the Demon King this time is considerably powerful," Zauna said worriedly. Although was confident in the strength of Alice the "Hero," looking at the description written by Milu Times, the new Demon King seemed like a tough opponent.

"That Demon King managed to destroy something that even the demons' Four Heavenly Kings failed to break. I think you should be more careful, Alice. You mustn't let the Demon King find out about your identity."

"Relax. The Demon King won't find out about my identity." Alice said as she reached for a bag of snacks with her right hand. Then, after stuffing a biscuit into her mouth, she vaguely said, "Setting the Demon King aside, how are things coming along on your side, Zauna? Have you started classes yet?"

"What do you mean by 'setting aside the Demon King'… Do you think that my classes are more important than the Demon King?"

Zauna couldn't help but be frustrated at Alice's nonchalant attitude toward the Demon King. She had been worried sick over Alice when she first found out about the new Demon King's birth, yet the person she was worried about didn't feel anxious one little bit.

"I already reported in at the school this morning, and I'll officially start attending classes tomorrow... By the way, Alice, do you want to come to school, too? Although you seem to have received power from God, you still don't know anything about basic magic, right?"

"School, huh…"

Alice fell into thought. This wasn't the first time Zauna had brought up this suggestion. However, Alice had never made up her mind about attending school.

Thinking about it now, even if she were to attend school, Alice would definitely choose to go to a human school. After all, according to Flaman, the reason why demons could utilize the demon realm's polluted mana to cast magic was because of the unique filtration organs they possessed. As for Demon Kings, they could make use of the Demon King's Power as a replacement for the filtration organs, so they wouldn't have any trouble integrating into the demon realm.

However, it was a different story for Alice. She didn't have the Demon King's Power at all. So, if she were to attend school in the demon realm, filtering and manipulating the demon realm's polluted mana would become a huge problem.

Thinking up to this point, Alice said to Zauna, "That works. Zauna, help me ask what kind of procedures I need to go through to get enrolled. I think it'd be better if I learned more about magic. I can't always use my ultimate move for everything, after all."

"No problem. Leave it to me," Zauna said, a hint of joy in her voice. She was happy that she would get to attend school together with Alice.

Although Alice was still clueless about magic, that wasn't a problem. Zauna was only an apprentice magician herself. She had started officially learning about magic only recently, and she could only use some simple magic. Even if Alice transferred partway through the semester, she should catch up to the syllabus very quickly. Not to mention, as the Hero, Alice should possess frightening talent when it came to learning magic.

"Has the human realm taken any major actions after learning about the Demon King's birth?" Alice asked as she stared at the screen before her. "Didn't the demons say that they wanted to send assassins after learning about the Hero? Does the human realm have thoughts of assassinating the Demon King as well?"

"I don't think so… Everyone is confident in the Hero's strength," Zauna said, her answer surprising Alice a little. Alice had initially expected the human realm to send assassins after the Demon King, just like the demon realm had done so for the Hero.

Then, Zauna explained, "Only one Demon King has successfully invaded the human realm in the past, after all. Moreover, once that Demon King passed away, humans quickly recaptured their stolen territory. As for the other Demon Kings, every one of them fell to the Hero without fail. So, everyone is confident that the Hero will win this time as well, and nobody thinks that there is a need to assassinate the Demon King."

After pondering over Zauna's words, Alice found that Zauna's words were indeed reasonable. The fact that the demons were so eagerly trying to assassinate the Hero after learning about the Hero's birth could be seen as a form of distrust toward the Demon King. This distrust was also perfectly justified since only one Demon King had ever managed to defeat the Hero out of the dozen or so Demon Kings that had existed. This situation led the demons to believe that the Demon King was inferior to the Hero under normal circumstances. Thus, it was only logical that they disposed of the threat known as the Hero first.

Humans, on the other hand, were different. Only one Hero had ever met with failure out of the many Heroes that had appeared in the human realm. So, it was only natural that humans were confident in the Hero and saw no need to send assassins after the Demon King. Of course, it was also possible that the human kings might have sent their subordinates to locate the new Demon King and assassinate the Demon king if possible. It was just that such information might not be available to the general populace.

"Thankfully, Milu Times not only revealed information about the Demon King's birth, but it also provided a general description of the Demon King. It seems the new Demon King has registered a LINKS account and provided information about herself," Zauna said. "Anyway, if you come across a red-haired woman with brown skin and a good figure, make sure to stay away from her. That person might very well be the new Demon King."

Alice was momentarily rendered speechless when she heard Zauna's warning. She was flabbergasted by how gullible the humans and demons of this world were. How could they so easily trust something others said?

The so-called red-haired woman with brown skin and a good figure was naturally the fake image Alice had created for herself to fool others. Moreover, different from the Hero's LINK account, Alice had even posted a few photos of "herself" on her Demon King's LINKS account to verify her claim.

Of course, the images Alice posted weren't those of a real person. Instead, they were photoshopped images of Heris. Heris's blazing-red hair was darkened in the photos, her body proportions were exaggerated, and her facial features were made more flirtatious. Although Heris was used as the base model, after the modifications were made, it was almost impossible to see any semblance between the "Demon King" and Heris.

Alice had heard that the photoshopped images were made by the demon realm's best photoshop artist. After the artist completed the commission, Ellu Shax, the Heavenly King of Water, had turned the artist into her toy. Although Ellu did not kill the artist, Alice guessed that the artist would only regain his freedom after Ellu was done toying with him until he lost his memories.

Regarding this situation, Alice could only mourn in silence for the artist. He would get to keep his life, at the very least. It shouldn't be a problem if he lost some of his memories, right? However, through this incident, Alice could tell that her decision to get all of the Four Heavenly Kings to help her conceal her identity was the right call. With this, she would've fooled the rulers of the human and demon realms.

What she needed to do next was to try her best to find a solution to the demon realm's pollution problem. Either that or find a way to transmigrate back to her world. The first option would remove the cause for war between the human and demon realms, while the second option allowed her to flee from any potential wars.

There's still a long way to go…

Alice sighed. After ending her call with Zauna, she looked at her computer and saw that the game she downloaded from the internet had finished installing. Then, she double-clicked the game's launcher.