Chapter 18: Vampire Incident (Part 1)

This life as a woman wouldn’t be so bad.

This wasn’t a joke, it was sincere.

From Leo’s point of view, he might think this was nonsense, but whether it was a side effect of becoming a woman or not, it was clear that his personality had mellowed out a lot compared to before. Leo was visibly flustered by my calm words.

“…What?”

“Didn’t you hear?I said it wouldn’t be bad to live as a woman.”

“Is that even a…!”

“It is you don’t seem to have any particular difficulty living as a woman.Is there really a need to go through the trouble of turning back into a man?”

Listening to the two of them talk, it seemed like it had been quite a while since Leo had turned into a woman. And unlike me.

“You also seem to have adjusted to a woman’s body.”

Even if the curse is lifted, there’s no guarantee he’ll return to a man’s body.

There’s a chance he’ll never return.

Honestly, it was amazing to me that Leo had become a woman, and instead of complaining, he accepted it and acted like it was nothing.

“It’s not like you’ve lost the most important thing, the hero’s power.”

He hadn’t weakened or lost the power he had as a hero.

He seemed to be used to living as a woman now and didn’t seem to have any particular difficulties, so I thought, half-seriously, that he might not need to go back.

To be honest, I’m in this state, in this mess, so if only Leo goes back to being a man, I’d be pissed.

If he’s going back to being a man, we should go back together.

I had no intention of helping him go back to being a man alone, especially since he hadn’t lost his hero’s power.

That was my true intention.

Although I didn’t show it on the outside.

I made the first move, pretending to scan Leo, who was flustered, with my eyes with a nonchalant expression.

“How long has it been since you turned into a woman?”

“…It’s been a little over two months now.”

“It’s been longer than I thought.It’s just the right amount of time for the curse to seep into your soul.”

Two months was enough time for the curse to completely cover the body and invade the soul.

Leo seemed to know that, too, and silently closed his mouth.

Any curse would be accompanied by pain when it began to seep into the soul, but I didn’t know about Leo.

Let alone touching an artifact containing the curse of an apostle, who was called the right arm of the Demon King, not just any ordinary demon ,And the artifact itself was said to be cursed.

Even if he didn’t know, it wasn’t something he should have done in his right mind.

“Didn’t they teach you in school?You shouldn’t carelessly touch artifacts in dungeons.”

A dungeon is a crystallization of mystery, a connecting device between the demon realm and the middle realm, and also a kind of passage that doubles as a summoning device to summon apostles or the Demon King’s army.

It might be easier to understand if I called it a gate.

You know, like in web novels with hunters.

It’s a device that connects the Earth to another dimension.

It’s a similar structure here.

Only the Demon King can create it, and it’s similar except that the Demon King makes it for the purpose of moving his army.

I couldn’t even fathom how much mana it would take to move a large army to another dimension, but the fact that the Demon King was a monster who could do it remained unchanged.

Even if there was help from apostles or demons in the process, the fact that he could execute it was already out of the norm.

A large-scale group space movement.

I laughed inwardly at the dizzying sensation I had felt firsthand on the battlefield.

I had really prepared myself for death at that time, but I was still alive.

Anyway, it was a great achievement just to drive out such a monster, trying to defeat it.

Of course, we didn’t know that the Demon King we were facing would have his son say, ‘Father, I will inherit the throne.’

I rubbed my eyes.

“The fact that your gender changed is all the karma of that stupid hero who carelessly touched the demon’s belongings or other artifacts in the dungeon.”

“Hey, you’ve been crossing the line since earlier?

It’s true that I acted foolishly and got cursed, but I don’t like the way you talk as if you know me well.”

Leo’s face contorted at my words that stimulated his nerves.

He was reacting emotionally.

His expression was full of a look that he didn’t want to talk to demons.

He was trying not to show it, but it was obvious that he didn’t want to talk to a half-breed mixed with demon blood anymore.

‘I was going to try to provoke him a little more, but this is enough.’

There was no need to provoke him anymore.

I let out a deflated sigh and looked at Leo.

I wondered if he had noticed my identity, but it seemed like it was just my imagination.

There’s no way he would have noticed.

I smiled slowly with a straight face.

“Don’t be emotional, it’s scary.”

“You really…!”

“Don’t raise your fist first.Remember that I’m the only demon who can break your curse.”

Saying that while raising my index finger to my lips and winking, even I thought I was being obnoxious.

If I was like this, how would Leo feel?

He must be furious.

“It’s also one way to ask another demon besides me.But if the demons find out that the hero has become a woman, what kind of reaction would they have?I’m curious about that, too.”

I could see Leo grinding his teeth.

Oh dear.

If it were his original form, I would have been a little scared.

But it just looked like a blonde, beautiful girl puffing up her shoulders and huffing.

Actually, I don’t know the exact way to break the curse.

But I’m not stupid enough to openly tell him that.

Even when I was Damian Radius, I had never heard of a curse that changed gender.

Leticia knew that and summoned a demon who would follow her will.

That’s why I can act like this.

Whatever the method, Leticia would need me.

Leo wouldn’t be able to act rashly either.

The only demon who could break his curse was me, so he wouldn’t recklessly explode his emotions.

After taking a deep breath, Leo took a deep breath and continued speaking calmly.

“…I can just not break this damn curse.”

“Huh?That’s different from what you said earlier.And I told you, right?If you don’t need to break the curse, live as a woman.”

I’m bound by a contract with Leticia, so I can’t act carelessly, but I never had any obligation to help you from the beginning.

The contract I made with Leticia was to stay by her side for a year, there was no mention of helping the hero.

With a pleasant expression, I hummed annoyingly, and Leo let out a groan, grinding his teeth in frustration.

I chuckled as I watched.

Oh, the feedback is great.

The feedback was much better than before.

Does a person’s personality really change when they become a woman?

Even though I knew I shouldn’t do this, I felt like I wanted to keep teasing Leo, who was reacting sensitively to the provocation, unlike him.

‘This guy, he’s become really gentle.’

Is this what Leo is like without the sexual jokes?

It’s a not-bad, stable taste.

Maybe it’s okay not to break the curse.

I don’t know if Chloe and Irina are the type to welcome same-s*x relationships, but I think they’ll be satisfied with this.

You’ve become a perfect female in the meantime, my friend.

I was just curious what he had gone through in the two months after he turned into a woman to make his personality so docile.

Was it Chloe and Irina’s doing?

Considering their personalities, it wasn’t entirely impossible.

Leticia, who was quietly watching from the side, also seemed to be enjoying the situation, judging by the fact that she was not intervening between the two of us with her lips curled up.

Then should I cross the line a little more?

Now, the final point here.

If I tilt my head slightly to the side and stick out my tongue, it’s perfect.

“I don’t have anything to be sorry about.Ah, it’s not me who’s sorry, it’s you.”

“…Phew, okay.I don’t have time to play these childish word games, so just tell me if you can break the curse or not.”

“I can’t.”

I cut off Leo’s words sharply.

I can see it in these eyes.

Not to mention the mana itself flowing in the air, the flow of mana flowing through the bodies of living things.

Should I call it the ‘magic eye’ that is often mentioned in creative works?

Since my eyes turned red after eating blood, I have been seeing the flow of mana and the sign of the unidentified curse that was deeply rooted in Leo’s soul.

“Of course, there is hope.”

I said.

“Your curse, if we take the time to interpret it, we can thoroughly extract the curse that has engulfed your soul, down to the roots.Then you can return to being a man.”

But the probability of not being able to return is higher.

This method is better than having no hope at all.

I got up from the bed and whispered to Leo, who had a sorrowful face.

Leo frowned because the wind on his ear felt ticklish.

When Leo trembled slightly at the distance where our lips could touch, Leticia separated the two of us.

“Okay, that’s enough.”

Leticia, who appropriately separated Leo and me, said.

“Anyway, we should be grateful that there is a way to turn Leo back into a man.If you said you couldn’t turn him back, I don’t know about Irina, but I would have been scolded by Chloe.”

“…No, rather than Irina, Chloe is more intense at night…”

It sounded like I heard something I shouldn’t have, so let’s forget about this part.

I fanned my burning ears and asked.

“By the way, you said this is an academy.There must be a lot of students, is it okay to come with that flashy holy sword that says ‘I’m a hero’ on your waist?”

Adding that even if he had avoided the students as much as possible, coming to this room at the end of the hallway on the first floor of the academy would have attracted a lot of attention, Leo grumbled back, asking if she hadn’t explained it to this guy.

The truth that came out of Leticia’s mouth, who made an ‘oops’ expression at Leo’s grumbling, was shocking.

“A few days ago, a second-year student was found near the academy with all the blood drained from their body, so the academy is currently under a closure order.”

…Oh my, what a coincidence.