"This is my home."
The Gryffin Church still served as Alice's residence in Mana City for the time being. Meanwhile, many people still had their attention on the church. So, to avoid bringing unnecessary suspicion onto herself, Alice asked to hold their conversation in the thief girl's house instead. The thief girl naturally dared not refuse Alice's request since she knew that Alice was the Hero and that nothing good would come out of opposing the Hero.
Although Alice didn't look or feel like the Hero, the thief girl had witnessed Alice sending a Milu Rabbit smashing through a wall. Such a feat wasn't something an ordinary human could accomplish. Hence, even though the thief girl still couldn't sense any mana coming from Alice, she dared not act recklessly and obediently led Alice to her unremarkable home.
Alice didn't mind the modesty of the house at all. After all, she had originally been a commoner before transmigrating to this world. Instead, after entering the house, Alice found herself a seat and watched as the thief girl tentatively took the seat opposite her. Then, Alice began the conversation by asking, "What is your name?"
"My name is Rosa. I'm 19 years old, and I'm a thief," the thief girl named Rosa formally introduced herself, a hint of anxiety on her face. Rosa had initially thought that the Hero would spare her after she had contributed valuable information. She didn't think that the Hero would use a tailored commission to bait her into revealing herself.
Faced with such a situation, Rosa would be lying if she said she wasn't nervous. After all, the Hero was the final line of defense against the Demon King. All five human kingdoms treated the Hero as an honored guest. Should one offend the Hero, one would be offending all five human kingdoms simultaneously.
Previously, Rosa had thought that because the Hero had only appeared recently, the Hero shouldn't have much strength. So, it was unlikely that she would be discovered even if she secretly took photos of the Hero. Never did she expect her camera lens to give her presence away.
"How did you know that the Four Heavenly Kings were planning on assassinating me?"
Although Alice didn't want to admit that she was the Hero, she had to acknowledge that the Hero's identity could provide her a lot more initiative when communicating with others. Hence, Alice was no longer against the idea of communicating with others as the Hero. At the very least, Rosa was now behaving honestly in front of the "Hero."
"As far as I know, this information doesn't seem to be circulating in the human realm."
"Actually, the entire demon realm already knows of this information... News about holy light appearing on the Gryffin Church's second floor has already reached the demon realm last night. Based on this information, the demons guessed that the Hero must've appeared," Rosa explained. Then, she tentatively looked at Alice before she continued, "Afterward, someone discovered that the Hero's Sword had disappeared from the Gryffin Church's courtyard this morning, solidifying this conjecture. By noon today, the entire demon realm already knows that the Hero is born.
"Then, in less than an hour, the King of the demon realm's Fear Kingdom, who is also the Heavenly King of Fire, announced that he would personally hunt down the Hero. After his announcement, the other Heavenly Kings also made similar announcements, and I just happened to have used my bypass software at the time and saw these announcements..."
"..."
Alice sighed when she heard Rosa's words. If this kind of thing happened on Earth, she would rate the Four Heavenly Kings as capable politicians and treat their announcements only as a means of winning public opinion. She wouldn't think that they had any intentions of taking action.
However, it was a different story for the demon realm. The demon realm was a place where the strong preyed on the weak, and the four kings of the demon realm had risen to their position through relying on strength. If these barbaric kings declared their intent to take action, then there was a high possibility that they would act on their words.
"But it doesn't matter. Even though the Four Heavenly Kings aren't following routine, haven't you anticipated their actions already?" Rosa said. After seeing Alice remaining silent for a while, Rosa hurriedly started licking Alice's boots. "Just look at the current situation. Everyone currently thinks that you are a muscular male warrior with a delicate face. Nobody has guessed that the Hero's actual appearance is that of a harmless little girl. They couldn't even find their target even if they wanted to assassinate the Hero."
Alice could swear to the heavens that this hadn't been her initial intention. At the time, she had only wanted to avoid others disturbing her and escape from the Hero's duties. She didn't think that she would end up diverting the Four Heavenly Kings' assassination plot as well.
But this is only a temporary solution…
Alice frowned. Although she could indeed continuously mislead others by relying on the Hero's LINK account, it wasn't a long-term solution. The demons were bound to lose their patience sooner or later. Once that happened, nobody could guarantee that the demons would sit still and do nothing. In that case, she would become a sinner that sparked conflict between the humans and the demons.
Fortunately, there was a simple solution to resolve this conflict. The only reason why the demons were frantically thinking of attacking the Hero now was because they lacked a target to focus their attention on. In the current state where the Hero had appeared while the Demon King remained absent, it was only natural for the demons to panic. However, if the demons found signs of the Demon King appearing, they might start searching for the Demon King, just like how the humans were currently searching for the Hero.
At that time, the human side would be frantically searching for the Hero, while the demon side would be frantically searching for the Demon King. Both sides would be too busy to meddle in each other's affairs, and peace would remain between the two realms.
However, the problem was that Alice wasn't the Hero at all. She was a counterfeit who could only use the Hero's Sword by turning the legendary weapon into garbage. No matter how one looked at it, there was no way she could be the real Hero. Then, since the real Hero hadn't appeared, the real Demon King naturally wouldn't appear, either. And so long as the demons failed to acquire information on the Demon King, they would continue trying to assassinate the Hero.
In that case, there was only one solution to this problem.
If you don't have a Demon King, then I'll make you a Demon King!
But how did I get treated as the Hero in the first place…
Alice scratched her head as she tried to recall what led to her being publicly recognized as the Hero. From what she could tell, two points stood out from the rest. The first point would have to be the holy light blunder. The second point would be the Hero's Sword, which was akin to the Hero's identification card. In that case, if Alice wished to create a fictional Demon King for the demon realm, she could also replicate these two points.
With these thoughts in mind, Alice turned to Rosa and asked, "Do you know of anything that could serve as credentials for the Demon King?"
"Credentials for the Demon King?"
Alice's strange question stunned Rosa. However, as luck would have it, Rosa did have an answer to Alice's question. "I don't know if this counts, but there is a black crystal situated inside the abandoned Demon King City. The black crystal emits severe mana radiation that kills all life in its vicinity. It is said that the crystal is something the last generation's Demon King had left behind. Although the demons have constantly been thinking of reclaiming and developing that piece of land, they couldn't do so because there was nothing they could do about that crystal. According to rumors, only someone with power on the level of the Demon King could deal with that crystal."
"Okay, this is it!" Alice exclaimed, slapping her thigh as she made her decision.
Wasn't it just a shitty crystal? If it was anything like the Hero's Sword, it would turn into garbage as soon as her right hand touched it. And even if the crystal didn't turn into garbage, she should have no problems destroying the crystal with a few pairs of panties.
Since Alice now knew that there was something that could authenticate the Demon King's identity, there was only one thing she needed to do, and that was…
"Do you have any black panties here? Give me a few pairs."
"...??"