Chapter 1

It was a fine day, until trouble came my way through vice chief Wozma.

“Chief Keima. Do you have a moment?”

“What, again with the brothel? I didn’t know you were this much of a dirty old man.”

“No, this is not about that.”

It wasn’t long ago that Wozma had been charmed by Succubi (probably) and started pushing for me to approve plans to build a brothel here, but it seemed he had gotten over that already.

“A letter from the Tsia Archduke has arrived and it requires your attention.”

A letter? At first I got annoyed since I had set up elaborate systems of bureaucracy to avoid having to deal with this kind of thing myself, but then I remembered that the Tsia Archduke was a member of the nobility. The one job I had as a town chief for show was dealing with the nobility and other high-profile individuals.

I took the letter from Wozma. Uhhh, alright, let’s see here. In this season blessed by the graces of the God of Mountains, we have experienced the divine graces of the Ivory Goddess dancing from...

“Wait, why the hell is this greeting so wordy? It’s a pain to read. Is there a summary?”

“Right here.”

If he had gone out of his way to write a summary I would have preferred him to just give that to me first, but still, he had done good work. He was skilled at showing off his own competence... I would expect nothing less from one of Haku’s spies.

Incidentally, the summary was three lines long.

1. The Tsia family holds my skills as an adventurer in high regard and wishes to show their support.
2. They have a quest for me, but they can’t give details through a letter.
3. They would like to discuss things further and request that I visit them at their home with one servant. (Not optional.)

I asked Wozma about his thoughts on the letter.

“It seems the Tsia family wishes to give you an exclusive quest. Perhaps they are using the opportunity to meet you. Up until now, you’ve only done quests through the Adventurer’s Guild and the opportunity has never arisen.” It took me this long to realize that the city was named Tsia because the Archduke’s family name was Tsia.

“But man, I’m impressed they managed to turn these three points into a huge letter. I’ve gotta respect the nobility, they’re something else.”

“They disguise hidden codes within the purple prose and use euphemisms to convey the true extent of their sincerity. Said euphemisms can also be used as a trap to see if the reader is too ill-mannered or ignorant to see through them. There were no hidden codes in this letter, however.” Whiiich means the euphemisms were used. Well, that’s what Wozma’s here for.

“But I believe that you are only a D-Rank adventurer, Chief Keima. That can hardly be considered too skilled, so I must question how he discovered your true talents.”

“...Hm.” It wouldn’t be odd if Wozma knew about my B-Rank guild card, given that he was Haku’s spy. Maybe he was hinting at that.

“By the way, it says ‘not optional’ on the third bit. Do I really have to go?”

“He is a noble with land, and one who has been permitted to govern the land surrounding Tsia City. The position of Archduke is not a lowly one. A mere town chief would not be capable of refusing an Archduke’s invitation unless under dire circumstances; especially in your case, given the small distance between Goren and Tsia.”

“Alright. Is being sleepy considered a dire enough circumstance?”

“Nap on the way there. Taking care of this is your highest priority as town chief. Here is the sealed letter of invitation.”

Yeaaah, figures. I took the letter of invitation from Wozma. There was clearly some kind of plot going on here, since he summoned me as an adventurer but not my entire party. The letter said I could bring a single servant and no more. Which meant... Well, who else but Niku? A safe choice, but the best one.

“Haaah. Alright. Guess I’ll go see what they’re up to.”

“My, you don’t seem enthusiastic. Normally one would be overjoyed at the chance to form connections with an Archduke.”

“Do I seem like that kind of guy to you?” I replied jokingly, to which Wozma shrugged.

“You don’t. I cannot imagine you caring about status or fame, nor are you struggling financially.” Yep, that’s right. The nobility sounds like a pain to deal with and that ain’t me. Plus, there’s no stronger connection than Haku.

“So maybe I don’t have to go?”

“Chief Keima. This has some relevance to the situation at hand, but the majority of food in Goren is purchased from Tsia. We get most of our wheat from there, not to mention vegetables and the like. We have fields by the town but their yield is low. Pavella is an option, but factors make it less than ideal. In summary, it would be unwise to displease the Archduke.”

“R-Right.” Wozma really drove the point home. But no matter what I did, our food problems could be solved by making rice and vegetables into common drops in the dungeon. That would be kinda suspicious, though. Anyway, it’s a good plan B so now I don’t have to worry.

All that aside, it seemed I had no choice but to go to Tsia soon. For now, it would be smart to drop by and tell Rokuko (who we had just recently established was now my partner, in a more meaningful sense than before) about this.

I went to my room and explained the situation to Rokuko, who was rolling around in my futon for some reason. Why was she in my room when she had a room of her own? And why was she in my futon? I mean, I know we’re partners, but I think even partners should respect each other’s personal space. Not that I mind smelling Rokuko on my bed.

“And that’s the situation. Gonna go to Tsia and turn their quest down.”

“Take Niku with you. I won’t feel safe with you going out there alone.” Huh? She didn’t have any problem with me leaving before, has she lost some trust in me? I mean, it’s fine, I was planning on bringing Niku with me anyway, but still. “...Um, cause like, Leona did all sorts of stuff to you, remember? There needs to be someone with you to stop you in case you go crazy like earlier. Niku’s proven she can do that, so.”

“Ahhh...” I understood where Rokuko was coming from. She was just worried about me.

There had been a whole day where I went crazy, and I didn’t remember any of it. Apparently I had flirted with Rokuko and basically every girl I saw. The monster girls, Niku, Ichika... Well, I had just been clearly out of my mind.

It was all Leona’s fault. Yep, yep, it was Leona’s fault, all Leona, blame Leona. I could blame her and get away scot-free. The best part was that it was true.

“Sure, I was planning on bringing Niku from the start.”

“Okay. I’ll still be a little worried, but you can go. Come back if you start feeling off or sick.”

“You got it. Don’t wanna put myself at risk out there. But anyway, I’ve gotta get ready to go now. Gonna need to bring my futon and stuff.” I kicked Rokuko out of my futon and put it into {Storage}.

“Oh right, Keima, bring some DP with you,” suggested Rokuko while I was getting ready.

“You can take DP to other places?”

“Mhm. Or it’s more like, if you want to use DP outside of your dungeon, you need to prepare the DP ahead of time. Haku taught me how to do it earlier.”

“Oh, cool. Didn’t know that.” Now that she mentioned it, I had tried using the menu in the past but I had never tried using DP. I had just unconsciously assumed I needed to be in the dungeon to use it.

“So, DP is like, fundamentally stored inside of me, since I’m the Core.”

“Yeah.”

“That means I need to give you the DP myself.”

“Yup.”

Suddenly, Rokuko’s eyes started shifting. She held her hands together and fidgeted, looking suspicious as heck.

“Um! That means I need to give you the DP myself!”

“Yeah, that’s what you said. Hand it over.”

“When giving DP to their Dungeon Masters, um, Cores have to... K-Kiss them!” said Rokuko as she blushed bright red and furtively glanced in my direction.

“What’re you talking about? You can just use your hands.”

“.........”

I didn’t know that for sure, but Rokuko looked away awkwardly and confirmed it for me.

“You practiced trading DP with Haku using your hands, right?”

“...I did.”

“Leona gave me DP using her hands, too.”

“...Sh-She did.”

“So you can use your hands, right?” I said again, this time with more confidence. Rokuko looked away and held a hand out. I squeezed it and safely absorbed about 1,000 DP from her. Now I could use DP in Tsia too. She would probably die if I asked why she had lied about needing to kiss me, so I didn’t say anything.

“...A-Also, I’ll, um, give you a goodbye kiss!” Despite my tactical choice to drop the subject, Rokuko immediately launched another attack.

“Hey, where’d you learn about those?”

“There was something called manga in my DP Catalog, so I bought it. Oh... And right. I’ve learned a little Japanese. There’s a lot of simple stuff I can read now.” W-Wait, she just went and learned Japanese, the madwoman?! Putting aside all that about buying manga with DP, I’m pretty sure that Japanese is famously hard to learn! “There was a skill scroll called {Japanese Language}. It was only 5,000 DP.”

“That’s a weird skill.” As expected of a fantasy world, you could learn languages as skills. Maybe I should make Niku and Ichika learn it too?

“But uh, anyway. You don’t have to give goodbye kisses. They’re not important.”

“They’re important for partners. I just decided on that now. So give it up and stick your cheek out!”

“A-Alright.” Just decided now, huh? But fine, alright. A kiss on the cheek should be fine. I don’t have any proof of that, but I’m sure it’ll be fine.

I bent my knees a little so Rokuko could reach me and stuck out my right cheek.

“W-W-Well, Keima. Bye bye... nmmm!” Rokuko then hesitantly kissed me on the cheek.

Oh man... My face is heating up. Her squishy lips are tickling my cheek. Is Rokuko okay? I glanced at her and saw she was looking away with bright red cheeks. She was so embarrassed she was trembling while holding her mouth down.

“...C-Come back safe, okay? And bring back souvenirs?”

“Yeah. See ya later.” I didn’t know what the quest was, but well, now I really felt like coming home safely.

＊ ＊ ＊

We rode a cheap cart to Tsia, one that regularly bused customers back and forth between here and Goren. We got off by the gate and while everyone else lined up to go inside the normal way, we went through the side gate for nobles and those on royal business. They let us right through after I showed them the letter of invitation. Both Niku and I got in for free. It’s a good day for penny pinchers, thanks Archduke.

We passed through the gate to go see the Archduke as soon as possible... after dropping by some stands for food. I didn’t want to stay there for so long, so I intended to visit right after lunch, the most awkward time for visitors. There was still some time to kill.

“Oh, there’s a kebab stand. Smells good.”

“Agreed, let’s buy some.”

“Welc— Woah, hey, it’s you two! Been awhile since you’ve dropped by!”

Huh? Who’s this douchebag...? At first I didn’t recognize him, but then I remembered that there was only one guy I knew who ran a kebab stand. It didn’t take long for things to click into place from there. He was the guy we’d sold rabbit meat to before.

“Surprised you recognize me. We’ve only met a few times.”

“You taught me about blood draining, I wouldn’t forget that. I’m guessing you didn’t come to hunt rabbits today?”

“Yep, I’ve graduated from all that. I’m D-Rank now and not that desperate for cash.”

“That’s a shame, but congrats. Just bring some rabbits over if you ever get in the mood to eat’m. I’m always ready to buy good meat.”

“Thanks. Anyway, I’ll go ahead and take five kebabs.”

“Coming right up. But wait, what flavor? I’ve been buying somethin’ called tare sauce from some merchants and I’ve got lots of flavors now. The main stuff I use goes real good with rabbit meat, it tastes great.”

That was probably the tare sauce from my dungeon. Pretty sure I started dropping it in the dungeon so I could use it in the inn. All I can say is, I’m not surprised it’s been commercialized like this.

“I’ll have some tare kebabs then. Kuro, you good with that too?”

“Yes.”

I paid twenty-five coppers and he threw in a sixth kebab for free.

“Oh, thanks man.”

“Don’t sweat it. I’m making the big bucks thanks to you.”

I went ahead and gave a kebab to Niku. Yep, her tail’s wagging like crazy. Must be pretty good.

I had one myself. You couldn’t go wrong with tare sauce. The kebab tasted great. The meat was denser than chicken, though, so it was a heartier meal than what I was used to eating with tare sauce.

“Master...”

“Ah, right, have another. You can have the rest, actually.” I gave the remaining kebabs to Niku and her tail went crazy. She stuffed her face full of kebabs right away. Tare sauce got all over her face, so I wiped it for her. Wipe wipe... Yep, what a cutie. I rubbed her head.

“You two are close as ever, I see. You sure you should keep her a slave?”

“Hey, tell that to her, not me. She won’t budge.” In reality, it wasn’t that I didn’t trust Niku. I was mainly worried that she wouldn’t be able to enter the Master Room with us if she wasn’t a slave. We were probably only managing it now since I had convinced Rokuko that slaves were items. Nobody had ever told her otherwise, so it was probably still working. “And well, basically, there’s some complex circumstances here.”

“Alright, I won’t dig too deep. Just take good care of her, y’hear?”

“Yeah.” I bought twenty more kebabs and stuck them into {Storage} to give to Rokuko and the others once I got back. There would probably be enough for the Succubi too.

We had filled up and the time was right. There was no reason not to go to the Archduke’s manor.

“Alright, let’s go. And uh... By the way, where does the Archduke live?”

“...I don’t know.”

We went back to the gate.

＊ ＊ ＊

Naturally, the guards at the gate were also public officials who knew the way to the manor. The letter of summons worked its magic and we were there in no time. I’ve marked it on the map so I can find it on my own next time!

The Archduke’s manor was in the rich northeast of the city and it was large even compared to other fancy residences nearby. It was a white western manor, three stories tall, and despite the size of its garden behind the gate it was well kept. It almost felt like an entire park.

I handed the letter of summons to the guard by the gate and he let us inside. We passed through the large garden, entered through the front doors, and were immediately taken to a parlor. The guard didn’t start ranting about dirty adventurers or anything. He treated us politely. Looks like he trains his workers well.

The sofa in the parlor was soft, although not as soft as the ones we used. The room in general had just enough vases, potted plants, and so on that it was neither bare nor too gaudy. The tapestry hanging on the wall was pretty nice too. It depicted Tsia Mountain. I get it, he’s kind of marketing the area here.

After a bit of observing the parlor with Niku sitting beside me, there was a knock at the door.

“Ah, right.” I reflexively stood up to greet the visitor and in came a sharply dressed, handsome gentleman. He was somewhat muscular, but what stood out was the pair of white wings growing from his back.

My eyes were drawn to them. They were long enough to reach his knees from his shoulders. Ngh, the heck is this? How cool is it to just have wings growing from your back...! I wonder if he can fly?

“Kept you waiting, huh? I’m Bonodore Tsia. But maybe the Archduke would be more recognizable for you.”

“I’m Keima. This is Kuroinu. Please call her Kuro. It’s good to meet you, Archduke.” I nodded and Niku did too. Naturally, I couldn’t just up and call her Niku in front of him.

“You can call me Bonodore, Keima.”

“As you wish, Lord Bonodore.” The Archduke must have noticed where my eyes were going. He bent his wings a little.

“Is this your first time seeing an Avian?”

“Yes. As you guessed, I’ve never seen an Avian before. The wings seem pretty warm.”

“I see. There aren’t many of us in this region and it can be hard to tell us apart when we shrink our wings beneath our clothing. You may have met some of us without realizing it.” You can shrink those wings? Wow.

We exchanged a handshake then sat down, facing each other. Under the surface, Bonodore had hit me with a clean jab and started our meeting with the upper hand. I mean, Wozma did tell me that he was an Avian. I just didn’t expect the wings to look so cool in person. Though actually... Wouldn’t they get in the way when he tries to sleep on his back?

“Now then, before we talk about why you’re here, would you mind having a little chat? I would like to hear about your village.”

“I’m not sure exactly what you mean.”

“I’m talking about Goren, of course. Let’s see... How many Iron Golems are hunted there, for example?”

“Well, let’s see if I can remember... I don’t have concrete details on things like that. I think we hunted about thirty over the winter. I guess that’s something important here?”

“Each town impacts the territory’s wealth in its own way. Thirty in a single winter. That’s a decent amount. With thirty Iron Golems you could make two hundred sets of full armor, or otherwise around ten thousand swords.”

When he put it like that, the numbers seemed surprisingly big. He can really make that much from them? Well... I guess Iron Golems are just big clumps of iron, yeah.

“How many of those did you hunt yourself?”

“I hunt with parties, but I think I’ve been involved with hunting about six of them.”

Wait, is he trying to fish out information about how skilled of an adventurer I am? He better not boost the difficulty of the quest or something.

“Er, if possible, I would like to talk about the quest now.” I tried changing the topic and at that moment, someone knocked quietly on the door.

“That’s my daughter. I called her ahead of time, since this quest involves her. Let’s talk about it with her. Mai, come on in.”

“Excuse me.” A girl with blue hair walked into the room. The two bangs on either side of her head curled forward a bit, but everything else was perfectly straight. She wore chaste white clothing and she was about ten years old. When she turned to close the door, I saw that she had wings on her back as well. But they were much smaller than the Archduke’s and looked about the size of a dove’s. Maybe they were small because she was a child, or maybe because she was a girl. It could be both or it could be neither... But either way, they were small enough that they probably didn’t bother her when sleeping.

“I am Maiodore Tsia.” She lifted her skirt slightly and gave an elegant bow while bending one knee. In other words she curtsied, the greeting of dignified ladies.

“It is an honor to meet you, my lady. I am named Keima, and I am an adventurer. This is Kuroinu. Please call her Kuro.”

“I’m Kuro.” Niku lowered her head in a small bow.

With our introductions done, Maiodore sat next to Bonodore.

“Cute, isn’t she? I’m very proud of my daughter.”

“Well, she certainly seems like a fine young lady.”

“Oh my, what a gentleman. Father, this man will be my bodyguard?”

“Indeed. I was just about to discuss that with him.” Bodyguard? Uh, I’m pretty sure they could find a better bodyguard than me out there. But despite my doubts, I decided to hear him out.

“I can’t give you all the details just yet, but right now my family is being targeted by a criminal organization. I want to take this opportunity to strengthen my daughter’s guard.”

“Right... But surely there are more skilled adventurers than me that you could hire. Why call me out specifically?” I just went ahead and asked the question that came to mind a second ago. Bonodore gave a firm nod.

“You are correct. We are seeking more of a supporting role from you.”

“Support?” That could mean a lot of things, from helping her go shopping to buying her enough time to flee from an army. I’m not gonna say yes to that without some more specifics.

“The quest consists of two stages. One, gather information on the organization. Two, protect my daughter... Mai.”

“Can you elaborate?”

“The organization is based in the southern slums. The skilled adventurers and soldiers here are well known enough that infiltration is impossible. That’s where you come in, Keima.” Okay, that makes more sense. I’m famous in Goren, but I don’t travel enough to be well known in Tsia.

“Once you’ve finished that, I want you to protect my daughter while I send my men to raid the organization. And that’s the quest.”

Maiodore was apparently the younger of three siblings, but the oldest brother was a soldier leading the charge, and the second brother had already hired another adventurer. “Okay, I see what you mean now.” In short, he wanted me to protect Maiodore on the side while I’m information gathering. My main job wasn’t guard duty after all.

“We have some information already, which I will give to you later. But we need a lot more information than that. We know enough to raid the organization now, but we think that they still have a lot of escape routes left. I want to close off as many of them as possible.” The organization was originally a bunch of smaller ones. But recently there was a shift and they ended up fused into one large organization.

“Their leader made one mistake. They let themselves get big enough for us to notice. Our citizens are already being negatively impacted by their presence.” As the Archduke, it was his duty to destroy the organization and protect his innocent citizens.

“Mai, this is relevant to you too. Be ready when it’s time for him to guard you.”

“Understood, Father. My life is in your hands, Keima, Kuro.” Maiodore sure is a sweet girl, huh? ...Wait. Crap, they’re just moving forward like I’ve already said yes. Hold up, hold up, hold up.

“Uhhh. We’ll need to discuss my payment before I accept this quest.”

“Oh yes, I forgot about that. You can leave now, Mai.”

“Uh-huh. Keima, when it is time for you to guard me, please tell me tales of your time adventuring. I am ever so looking forward to it,” said Mai before standing up and leaving the room. Once she was gone, I looked back at Bonodore.

“Now then, about your payment.”

“I’m warning you now: if I don’t think the pay is worth it, I will absolutely turn this quest down.”

“Yes, naturally. However, I don’t think you’ll want to pass up on this opportunity.” He must be pretty confident in his payment. But let’s make it clear. I’ll turn down an average payment. Money? Titles? Women? I don’t want any of those, I have enough. What can you offer me? I readied myself on the inside, but in the end, I wasn’t ready for him.

“Your payment will be information on the Divine Pillow.” ...How’d he know exactly what I want most?!

The Divine Bedding. Seven pieces of a bedding set that if collected will turn the owner into an immortal demigod. He was offering me information on one piece of that set.

“Why would you give that information as a reward?”

“Because I heard you were interested in it. If you don’t want to know, I can prepare another payment.” The Archduke’s information network is far stronger than I could have imagined! I hate it, but he knows what I want...! Actually, wait, after deciding to gather the Divine Bedding set I submitted an information gathering quest to the Adventurer’s Guild. Under the Beddhist Church’s name. Yeaaah... Okay. I made it easy for him.

“What kind of information?”

“How much I tell you will be determined by how well you do. But for example... I could tell you where it is.” Where it is? Okay, yeah, that’s exactly what I want to know. Crap. I lose.

“Unsatisfied?”

“...No, that payment is enough. I will accept the quest.”

“Good, glad that we’re on the same page here,” said Bonodore with a smile. “Naturally, I have a monetary reward prepared as well. Ten silvers as an advance payment. The rest depends on how much information you gather. If you fail and cause collateral damage, the fees will be subtracted from your reward, but I’m sure you’re skilled enough for that not to happen.” I guess it could be bad if the fees end up too high. “Additionally, I will not question what methods you use to gather information.”

“You won’t question my methods? Really?”

“Do show some restraint, I don’t want you damaging the town. But if you don’t go too far, we won’t ask any questions. I’m sure you have some tricks hidden up your sleeve.” Yeah, that’s fair. It would be a disaster if I set the town on fire just to gather some information.

“Can I charge you for my expenses?”

“Up to twenty silvers, but you’ll have to give a report on what you used them on. Naturally, I can’t hand out money for free.” In other words, spill the beans or pay for it yourself.

“Time limit?”

“You have at most one month. Of course, you can finish before then. You just need useful information.”

“...And the information on the organization you said you would tell me?”

“It’s nothing major, but the organization is named The Last Commune. Their base is somewhere in the slums outside of the southern gate. Everything else I can’t tell you, for fear you will leak the information elsewhere.”

“Alright.” Okay, this quest... How should I finish it off? I have some ideas and it doesn’t seem like it’ll be too hard. Not taking this quest would be the dumbest thing I ever did. But since he flashed information I want, I think I should go a little overboard here.

“Oh yeah, there’s something important I forgot to ask. Mind if I ask one more thing?”

“What’s that?” I looked at Bonodore and gave a fake grin.

“...You don’t mind if I destroy the organization myself, do you?” Bonodore’s eyes widened, then he spread out his wings and laughed in amusement.

“Heh, hahaha! Of course not. Do what you can, and if you actually manage it, I’ll help you get the Divine Pillow myself!”

“You sure? I’ll destroy them even if you end up being the mastermind or something.”

“Feel free. I imagine the mastermind is a regional noble. I give you permission to take him down. Ah... But if someone of my family is the mastermind, I would appreciate you telling me ahead of time.” Alright, I got a nice promise from him. Guess I’ll take this seriously.

“Okay, let’s make this official. I accept your quest, Lord Bonodore. Please wait for my report.”

“Very well then, Keima. I expect good things from you.” I went ahead and asked Bonodore to send a message to Goren stating that I had accepted the quest and wouldn’t be back for some time. Eh... The faster I finish this, the better. Yeah.

＊ ＊ ＊

“Master, what’s the plan?” asked Niku, held tilted. We had left the manor right after the discussion to get started immediately.

“Our strategy will be built around infiltration. The easiest way to learn more about an organization and destroy it is to infiltrate it.” A group of people doing not so morally correct things would make sure to keep information locked tightly within the group. Our dungeon was the same way.

But organizations needed manpower to operate. Our dungeon could use monsters in place of people, but a criminal organization needed to find members somewhere. Slaves were an option, but skilled slaves were only sold in official slave markets and would be difficult for criminals to obtain. Which meant that, well, birds of a feather flock together. Criminals got their manpower in the form of more criminals.

Not to mention that an organization breaking the law could never have too many bottom tier lackeys around for doing chores and taking the fall when caught. I wouldn’t be able to just snap my fingers and become an administrator there, but infiltrating the bottom layer should be incredibly easy. Then you just have to remember that there exist people giving orders to the bottom layer. There are people ordering around those people, then people ordering those, and so on and so on. Follow the chain of command up high enough and you’ll reach the top dog.

“The problem is how to climb the chain of command, but well... I’ve got her.” I looked at my Succubus ring, Kosaki.

A Succubus’s charm powers. Nothing would be faster for making people listen to my own orders. On top of that, my research showed that the charm powers could even interfere with the target’s memories. I could seal memories, erase them, and even modify them. Charm powers were just ridiculously overpowered.

“...Hey, you awake?”

“Fwaah, um, what? No, I’m not sleeping. I’m a ring, how could I sleep? Don’t be ridiculooous, ahaha.” She was sleeping. Not that I mind, as long as she does her job.

“So, here’s the question. Do you think you could use charms to dig deep into a criminal organization?”

“Definitely, though it’ll be kinda hard if they have anti-charm skills or items.”

“...Guess I’ll just pray they don’t.”

“I mean, there’s something you could do to make all this a lot more reliable.”

“Reliable?”

“If you become a Succubus yourself, Master, you’ll be able to use your overwhelming dream powers to smash through resistances. You could even charm other Succubi. With a smile for weaker ones, even!” The heck is dream power? And why is she saying become a Succubus myself? Wasn’t I turning into a femboy or whatever?

“...Niku couldn’t do it?”

“You don’t want to get charmed yourself, right? Do you think you could stop yourself after Niku goes Succubus? She wouldn’t stop you herself, so.”

“Ahhh...” As a slave, Niku wouldn’t be able to reject me. Nice catch. It’s good to have skilled subordinates. And either way, I don’t want Niku using charms much. I’ll do the dirty work myself.

“Alright, I gotta make contact with them before I can do anything, but it wouldn’t be smart to go out there without a disguise.” There was no internet or photography in this world. I didn’t think that my appearance would be linked to my identity very easily, but it was possible that somebody would recognize me. My black hair and black eyes stood out around here, for instance. Barring all else, they had to go.

“Hm...? Oh. Understood,” said Niku.

“What?” asked Kosaki. “You wanna hide your face? Are you gonna sleep some more to get rid of the bags under your eyes or something?” She hadn’t guessed what I was thinking, but Niku had. I could change my appearance easily and completely with my {Ultra Transformation} skill.

“Let’s go somewhere outside of the public view.” We left the main street and went to a back alley. I found a random building and hid in its shadows, out of sight, then looked around. Nobody was nearby.

“This should be good, I guess?”

“No, Master. I can sense people watching us. They followed us here.”

“...Seriously? I didn’t notice them at all, holy crap.” Did Niku learn a skill that detects people staring at her or something like that? Either way, I went further down the alley. Before long we ended up in the shopping district.

“Well, uh, here we are.” I remember doing a toilet cleaning quest here at some point. “Did we lose them?”

“...Several presences united and are still following us.”

“They’re persistent. Spies from the Archduke, maybe? Makes sense they’re fast, this is their home base.” I didn’t want spies to see me using {Ultra Transformation} under any circumstances. Which meant I had to suck it up and start Plan B. Let’s just think of this as, uh, a little experiment. Things could get real bad real fast if this fails, but Bonodore said he wouldn’t question my methods. I could just ignore any complaints he throws at me.

“Niku. Are they all looking at us?”

“Yes. The alley is narrow enough that I believe they are all looking in our direction.” Alright. I don’t see anyone around us. That means the only people looking at us are the people following us. Here we go.

“Kosaki. You have my permission. Possess me. No fancy special effects.”

“For reals? Alrighty then, here I go!” I immediately felt a heat rushing from the ring to the core of my body. I visualized making gates within the walls of my spirit to allow her inside and with a thump of my heart, my line of vision shrunk closer to the ground. It felt similar to when I transformed into Rokuko earlier. It seemed that my femboy Succubus self was smaller than my normal self.

The heat within flowed throughout my body like blood in the form of pure power. This is what it feels like to be possessed, huh?

“...Looks like you managed to hold in the special effects this time. Good, and also, dang my voice is high pitched.”

“Fwaaah... Hoooly fuckin’ succuballs... This is some shit, bro... We could conquer a whole friggin’ kingdom like this...! Oh, no way, I can’t even move a single one of your fingers. Yo, but still, this power feels so GOOOooooOOOoooooOOD!” Kosaki was tripping the heck out.

Anyway... I looked at my chest. Nothing. I touched my crotch. Something. Alright. I’m shorter, but I’m still a guy. Feeling some relief, I went ahead and tried giving orders to our pursuers.

“Everyone, look at me. Make all of your companions who were following me look at me. Respond if you understand. Tell me once everyone’s here.”

“Understood...” I heard several people reply in unison. Niku included, for some reason. It seemed that my orders had worked. Anyway, setting aside Niku, who was looking at me with flushed cheeks like she had gotten drunk, I decided to look over my new appearance while waiting for all of the pursuers to see me and get charmed.

I was wearing a white dress, which covered a surprisingly large amount of skin for a Succubus outfit. Though to be fair, it was a short dress overall. I also had on black socks that went up to my knees and black boots. Not to mention two long white gloves that covered my squishy, slender arms up to the elbows. I could see my straight black hair beside my eyes.

Wait, what’s gonna happen with my Golem Assistance? Is it gone now? I think I remember Niku’s clothes changing and then going back to normal afterward. I’ll have to experiment with this later.

“Princess, we have assembled. We all weep tears of gratitude for being given the opportunity to see your blessed visage.” It wasn’t long before our pursuers assembled. Wait... By princess does he mean me? Uh, sure, alright.

“Everyone, come out where I can see you.”

“As you wish!” At once, four average-looking citizens appeared in front of me. But they had arrived out of nowhere like ninjas. They legitimately just jumped down out of nowhere in front of me, holy cow.

“Is this everyone who was following me? What’s your organization structure? Who do you work for?”

“This is everyone. We work in two teams of two. We belong to the Tsia Army Intelligence Division.” Perfect, they’re charmed and listening to everything I say. It’s hard for me to tell, but I guess I’m just that attractive right now? Maybe I should look in a mirror... actually, nah, I don’t want to charm myself by accident. Guess I can just ask Niku how I looked later. Anyway, two teams of two, huh? That seems reasonable. Though really, that seems like a few too many men to dedicate just to following me.

“Shouldn’t an intelligence division or whatever have charm resistance, though?”

“I have charm resistance, but how is that relevant here? I don’t need to be charmed to expose my heart before my princess. This is the natural state of all living beings.” Wait, he has charm resistance? And he got charmed? At first I was confused, but then I remembered that my own sleep resistance skill had a level. Charm resistance probably had levels too.

“What’s your charm resistance level?”

“It’s level 3. Strong enough to resist a Succubus’ charm.”

“Y’see,” interjected Kosaki, “You need at least level 5 to completely nullify a normal Succubus. But you’re a Queen-class Succubus right now, Master, so you’d be hard to resist without something higher than that.” Dang, I’m a great Succubus. I don’t want to be, but here I am.

“Is it easy to develop charm resistance?”

“Up to about level 2. Level 3 is rare enough that acquiring it would put one in good standing for becoming the commander of an intelligence squad.” Alright, that’s good to know. That basically means the only people who will be able to resist my charms are basically general-tier, big deal dudes. A criminal organization based in the slums shouldn’t have too many people like that.

“Okay. All of you, wait for ten minutes aft—... Nah, actually, that’s too long. Once I leave this alley, lose your memories and lose track of us. Overwrite your memories to fill in these gaps. That’s all. Go back to the main street.”

“As you wish.” replied all four of them at once. Eugh, that sent chills down my spine. I don’t like seeing dudes look at me like that. All horny and dopey. I’m definitely not gonna let Niku do things like this. My dakimakura would end up soiled. The spies returned to the main street, acting dreamy.

“Master...”

“Whoa! Wh-What’s with you, Niku?” Niku hugged me out of nowhere, making me let out a weird cry. Does my dress not have a back part? It’s not that cold, but it definitely feels like she’s touching my skin.

“What should I do?”

“U-Uh, right. Let go of me for a second so I can end the possession.” She gave me one tight squeeze and a long sniff before letting go.

“...Possession, end.”

“Geheh... Ngh! The second you took back permission... gaaah!” The heat in my body shot back to the ring. Simultaneously, I returned to my original height. My clothes returned to normal too. My Golem Assistance... was working, yep. Whew, it would have been a huge pain if its memory got reset or whatever.

“Alright, Niku, check and make sure nobody’s around us.”

“.........”

“Niku? Wake uuup, Niku.” I poked her on the cheek and she snapped back to her senses.

“I-I’m okay. There’s nobody around us.”

“Perfect. {Ultra Transformation}.” I transformed into a gruff looking dude. Since {Ultra Transformation Lv3} could only transform into things that existed in real life, I chose to transform into the guy I met back at the imperial capital’s Adventurer Guild, Don Tokoi. Well, one of his small-time looking subordinates, anyway. He’s about as tall as me so I don’t need to change my clothes. Feels good.

“I kinda want to disguise you too, Niku, but eh. You’ll be fine. That collar will prove that you’re my slave, it shouldn’t be an issue. Maybe we should change you into raggedy clothes? Nah, it’d be weird if you were clean but not your clothes. Guess I’ll just pass you off as my prized slave that I’m putting a lot of money into.” Wait. That’s not technically wrong, I guess. She just happens to be my dakimakura too.

“...Even your smell changes. It feels like someone else is wearing your clothes, Master.”

“Well, it’ll be fine. Let’s go to the slums outside the southern gate.”

“Understood.”

I took Niku and headed for the southern gate. Despite having walked all the way to the shopping district, we didn’t have anything in particular to do there.

I showed my guild card at the gate and paid the fee to get through. There weren’t any issues since guild cards don’t have photos or anything, but honestly, that felt kind of like a problem. What if someone used a guild card they found on the ground? Pretty slack if you ask me. Maybe them being so slack is how a slum ended up being built in the first place?

South of Tsia, Slum Town.

There were small tent-like homes built from combining sticks, boards, and cloth into square boxes that looked like cardboard houses. They were lined up next to each other along makeshift roads and sometimes four of them were built together into one larger home. The people were clothed in rags and had either harsh or defeated looks in their eyes, nothing in between. I couldn’t see any children other than babies, but it was possible that they were all inside.

The slum was indeed a slum no matter how you painted it. At best it had a lot of personality, at worst it was like a hotbed for crime. My first impression after stepping into it was that it didn’t stink as bad as I expected. Everyone could use {Purification} so it was probably a lot cleaner than any slum on Earth.

“Let’s go, Niku.”

“.........”

“Uh, Niku? Can you hear me?”

“Ah, s-sorry. It’s just really hard for me to remember that you’re Master when you look like that...”

“No helping that.” The fact that {Ultra Transformation} was powerful enough to trick even Niku was actually incredible, no way around it. That’s a Hero skill for you.

In any case, I tried talking to a guy nearby. One with a defeated expression, rather than a hostile one.

“Hey, I wanna talk to whoever’s in charge here... Know where I should go?” I asked, holding out a sandwich. The guy snatched it away in less than a second.

“...Go down that street and there’s a bigger shack. Ask there.”

“Alright.”

The guy pointed at a street that was so small I kinda had to question if it was a street at all, but either way, I walked down it. There was a wood shack at the end of it. It wasn’t a makeshift tent like what I had seen, it was an actual shack. Looking closer, I could see there were other fairly normal shacks in the general area. This was probably where those with authority lived, or maybe it was a workplace of some kind.

I looked around to check and indeed Niku was still behind me. Don’t go and get kidnapped, alright? I mean, I may be weaker than you, but still.Anyway, I knocked on the shack’s door.

“What?”

“Uhhh, well, some stuff happened and I wanna join you guys. I asked where I could talk to the boss of this place and they said here.”

“Tch. Come in.” I walked in and immediately a guy hiding by the door threw a punch in my direction. I had expected something like that to happen here, so I bent my knees to dodge the blow using Golem Assistance to boost my speed. Niku leaped over me and grabbed the guy’s arm, twisting it behind his back and forcing him onto the ground. Uh, is she part of a SWAT team or something? That was definitely the kind of thing a special forces operator would do.

“You bastard! Who sent you?!”

But that just pissed the other dudes off. Some of them drew knives. Oh crap. We came here to infiltrate them, not to fight. But I mean... There’s only four people here (including the guy Niku’s holding down), so this wouldn’t be a hard fight to win. Especially since they seem to be at the bottom of this organization. Can’t imagine these guys are anything but low-ranking thugs.

“Sorry, I just thought you guys liked to haze newbies like this. Let’m go, Niku.”

“...Yes, Master.” Niku let go of the guy she was holding down. He stood up awkwardly and rejoined the other three, whereupon he got smacked on the head. Didn’t seem like too hard of a smack, though.

“You friggin’ idiot! Everyone looks down on you ’cause you can’t even beat kids like that!”

“S-Sorry, bro. I just... She’s so strong.”

“Tch, enough with the excuses. Anyway. Who’re you?” The thug glared at me. Yeah, I don’t feel any pressure from him. He’s afraid. Not surprising for someone who just saw a little girl beat the crap out of his pal. Hey, I’d be on my guard too if that happened. I’d be scared as heck. I can’t blame him. Thus, I answered him calmly.

“I’m Keima. Or at least, that’s the name on this guild card I found.” I said, showing them my Adventurer’s Guild card. It had D-Rank Adventurer: Keima written clearly on it and there was no mistaking that it was a legitimate card.

“...How’d you get your hands on that?”

“You really wanna make me say it? Hey, I can reenact what happened if I gotta.” I said, looking at the thug’s neck meaningfully and touching the hilt of my beloved Siesta. Thankfully, the thug picked up on my implication without me having to lie. He put a hand on his neck and stepped back. “Nah, no need for that. I get ya. What business do you have with us?”

“Business? Nah, I just uh... I heard that la... la... Last Call? Some group here runs the place. I want money, so yeah. Need some extra muscle or whatever?”

“Last Commune. Don’t make that mistake again if you wanna work for us.” The guy corrected me with the exact name of the organization I was looking for. No doubt this was the place, then.

“I guess you’re not the boss of the Last Commune?”

“’Course not. All I manage is this shack and the tents around it. We’re basically like the guards of this spot.” It seemed that the Last Commune had established their territory and were basically governing the areas they controlled. Did that mean the slum would become a lawless wasteland after I took the organization down? Probably, but that wasn’t my problem.

“...Wait, why don’tcha just take some quests from the Adventurer’s Guild? ’Specially if you’re confident in your skills.” He had a point. But that was one point I had expected him to make.

“Let’s just say I have a history. I don’t wanna take quests if I can help it.” Yep. Because I’d rather be sleeping. I’m only doing all this ’cause I want the Divine Pillow.

“Alright. Guess working here would be the fastest way to make money for ya, huh?” The boss thug signaled to one of his lackeys, who then went to some other room in the shack.

“So, what’s happening? You gonna hire me? I’m gonna be more useful than that idiot over there, at least.”

“...Vog, he’s talking shit to you.”

“Ngh...” He couldn’t talk back since he had indeed just been beaten by a little girl.

“Basically, just gimme a job and watch for a week. You can pay me and her together as one person.” I patted Niku’s head.

“May as well, then... I’ll give my boss the heads up about you.”

“Yeah, thanks.”

“...And what’s with that niku of yours, anyway? She some kinda monster?”

“She belonged to the owner of this card. Pretty nice pick up, huh? She’s pretty cute, but don’t think about touching her.”

And so, I successfully infiltrated the criminal organization known as the Last Commune. I was being started off as a guard at the bottom of the bottom. Time to get serious and see how far I can go.

＊ ＊ ＊

One week later. I sincerely regretted my decision to get serious.

“Aboooo. Mamaaa, pat my heaaaad.” Okay, did you hear that? I bet you would think that’s coming from a three-year-old kid or something. But no. It came from a muscular, battle-scarred mercenary named Hugo (32 years old).

Even when being generous, he was pretty clearly an older dude. A macho man who had clearly spent his life on the battlefield. But Hugo here (32 years old) was using my lap as a pillow and spitting out lines fit for a three-year-old. To be clear, I was in my Succubus femboy form, but still.

“...Good boy, goood boy. You’re a very, very good boy, Hugo.” And in turn I spat out that empty line while gently patting his head. (I used to hate touching these people at all, but I had gotten used to it.)

“Mamaaa, aaah, Mama’s smell... You smell so niiiice... abooo...”

“Eugh! Uh... N-No teasing, okay? Good boys don’t tease their mothers.”

“Okaaay, sorry Mamaaaa.” Goosebumps covered my skin after he rubbed his bearded face against my stomach. I had been dealing with this kind of thing for a solid week and had learned to look at them with dead eyes and an empty mind to survive.

The people on the bottom were so much easier. They got charmed just by looking at me. I thought this whole thing would be a cakewalk and I’d race up the ladders, each boss introducing me to his boss in turn, but the upper echelons of the Last Commune had higher charm resistance than I expected. To be precise, it all started with the boss of the slum’s illegal slave trade (rank wise, a guy similar to the owner of a large store). He showed just a little resistance after I turned into a Succubus. It went like so:

“Ngh... gah...!” For the first time, someone remained standing after I said “kneel before me.” I was so surprised I reflexively asked Kosaki what was up.

“(Hey, Kosaki, what’s going on here? Why’s he still standing?)”

“(Oh, don’t worry. He’s just a little resistant to Succubi, he’s basically got a charm resistance level of about 4.)” Kosaki answered without missing a beat.

“(Didn’t you say they’d be defenseless up to level 5?)”

“(Are you saying he’s not defenseless right now? He’s just standing still, stuck in place.)” Well... That is true.

The kind of bad dudes that lived in slums were always living on the edge of death. One wrong move and their life would be over. That kind of lifestyle subconsciously built up self-restraint in them, which in turn resulted in a surprisingly high level of charm resistance. And on top of that, they basically never let their guard down under any circumstances. To put it simply, they had mental firewalls that were much sturdier than the average person’s.

“(Anyway, for this guy, you just gotta say ‘Big bwudder, what’s wrong?’ and he’ll be down in a snap.)”

Uh? I doubted my ears for a second. The hell is this slut saying?

“(Didn’t you hear me? Say ‘Big bwudder, what’s wrong?’ with a cute voice.)”

“(Nah, I mean, I heard you... Do I really have to say that?)”

“(You know Succubi usually have to charm and seduce people, right? You gotta be a real genius to charm people with just your looks. You wouldn’t eat food on the ground no matter how good it looked, right?)” It seemed that working around mental barriers was second nature to Succubi. Everyone knew how Succubi worked. That was so normal in this world that Kosaki didn’t even feel the need to explain it to me.

Indeed. Seduction.

You could crack mental barriers through seduction. Those cracks could then be exploited to charm them. Which reminded me that Neruneh hadn’t really affected me much when she turned into a Succubus. That wasn’t because I had resisted her, it was because Neruneh simply hadn’t tried seducing me.

“(You are still technically a dude, Master, so that’s probably holding him back a little.)” Technically? I’m not just technically a guy, I am a guy! “(Anyway, skilled Succubi can just instinctively tell what kinda things peeps are into. I only know what this guy’s into since I’m possessing you right now, so I’m figuring you can figure it out on your own too.)” I took another look at the guy struggling in front of me.

...This guy, likes... little sisters. Yeah, there’s no doubting that.

“(Alright, I get it. That’s why you mentioned that line.)”

“(Yup, exactly. But well, you just need to tease him a bit and he’ll be done for. Aaah, I love easy jobs.)” Seduction could be accomplished with simple words. Okay, let’s give it a shot.

“Uhhh... Big, brother... what’s... uh... wrong?” I said the line in a flat monotone and the struggling man immediately fell to his knees as if he hadn’t just been resisting me at all.

“Aaah, nothing at all, li’l sis. Eheheh.” I sensed the perverted lust in his laughter and a chill ran down my spine.

“(...Uh, isn’t this gonna be a little annoying?)”

“(You wanna be like a normal Succubus and use your whole body to seduce him like a real pervert?)”

“(Ah. Right. I’m sorry. This is a piece of cake, I’m glad it’s so easy.)” The day I did something like that would be the day I lost my chastity, no doubt about it. I wanted to avoid that by any means possible. At the time I successfully seduced him with just a few words, so I tried not to think about what I was doing.

But my next target was the female boss of an unlicensed brothel, and well, she fought back a little harder. I think I have to give up on getting through this without any mental scars, I thought while she sniffed my belly button. What kind of fetish was a fetish for belly button smells?

In the following days I charmed an endless number of villainous looking people by touching them a little, getting touched a little, and calling them names like “big brother,” “darling,” “papa,” “my love,” “big sis,” “Master,” “pig,” and so on with a blank expression.

Luckily, my charm powers were strong enough that they would ignore me cutting corners or acting off. Just like Rokuko had seen the Succubus Niku as me, people were looking at me with a mental filter (normal Succubi had to pay more attention to the details when seducing people).

Well, in my case, I could instantly seduce just about anyone by taking their lust head on, but that would be saying goodbye to my chastity. Thus, I had to delicately dance around their lust without their knowing, approaching them through indirect means. It slowed things down but kept my chastity safe.

I now looked at the spies I had charmed during my first Succubus transformation in a new light. They had been charmed so easily because they had low charm resistance and weren’t on guard against being charmed. Small fry, in other words. Consider me surprised that villains were much better than the good guys at keeping their desires in check. Maybe it’s partially because they’re already doing what they want every day, so seduction is less meaningful to them? Well... Either way, I’ve finally reached the administrators of the organization.

It took a whole week. It felt like a very short week and a very long week.

The guy on my lap (Hugo, age 32) was the number two of the organization. He had the mental strength you would expect from a hardened warrior. He could still move and talk normally even after seeing me in my Succubus form.

But naturally, I sensed his incredibly perverted desire to have a young girl pat his head like a mother. I sat on a couch in his dirty room and patted my lap, saying “It’s okay. Come here, little boy.” to seduce him. Judging by the stupid grin on his face, he was about ready. All I had to do was get him to spit out the location of the organization’s top dog.

“Hugo, there’s something I want you to tell me.”

“What is iiit, Mama? Ask anythiiing.” The older dude looked up at me with wide, round eyes. Yuck.

“Uhhhh, well, do you know where the top of this organization is?”

“Mmm. I’ll tell you if you kiss my foreheaaad.” It was already hard to pat the head of an older muscular dude as he babbled like a baby. Like, really hard. But through sheer determination I managed to force a smile on my face (it looked like a compassionate smile to him).

“...I haaaate selfish kids.”

“Noooo...! I’m a good boy, so I’ll tell you!” Looks like he’s finally gonna tell me... Finally, that took awhile. This guy sure had a strong mind. But it’s my win. Tomorrow, I’ll finally be meeting the head of the organization.

I was laying down in a fancy room much better than the little tent given to me as a lowly guard. I could only use {Ultra Transformation} three times per twenty-four hours, and I couldn’t transform into a Succubus while already transformed (my compatibility with the Succubus transformation changed depending on who I had transformed into). I had thus asked the female boss of the unlicensed brothel to give me a room I could relax in untransformed. It was normally a room where the prostitutes worked, but it was at the same time the best place in all the slums to keep to myself out of sight. I added on a lock and key bought with DP just to be safe.

“Good work, Master.”

“Yeah... I’m exhausted. But this will all be over tomorrow.” I healed my tired body, transformed into neither a thug nor a Succubus.

The first two days I had slept while transformed, but that really bothered Niku so I stopped. Niku was my bodyguard and I wanted her to always be at peak performance. That was partially why I had secured this room for us.

“I wonder what I should do once I have the whole organization charmed.”

“...Destroy it?”

“Yeah, but how? Maybe I should just send all the administrators to the city guards.” That would definitely end up destroying the organization. Yeah, sounds like a plan.

“Will you bring them there yourself?”

“Nah, I’ll have the Last Commune people have a moral awakening and turn themselves in. All I’ll do is convince them a little.” While I was at it, I would have them gather evidence on themselves. That would save me time.

“Okay, guess it’s time to sleep. Niku.”

“Right.” Niku climbed into bed with me. She was a skilled dakimakura who made each night better.

...Suddenly, I remembered that I had given an older dude a lap pillow today. Aren’t I basically forcing Niku to do the same thing here?

“...♪” Nah, it’s different cause Niku actually enjoys it. Right.

Anyway, the next day went by smoother than I expected. Basically, the top of the organization was a noble living right in Tsia City. He had a pretty nice villa and everything. The Archduke had basically been right about everything.

Naturally, the top of the organization had charm resistance. But his right hand man Hugo was a lot stronger than him. The top guy had a foot fetish and snapped the moment I stepped on him.

...I can sympathize with his fetish, I really can, but it’s kinda gross seeing him go all out over it. To think a dude clinging to my feet would look this gross. Guess fetishes are stuff you should just keep to yourself... On that day, I swore to myself to show more self-restraint in the future.

Also, between you and me, the second I did that Kosaki murmured something about me developing charm resistance.

After defeating the top, I summoned the administrators and got to work deconstructing the organization. Naturally, I hadn’t charmed every single one of the administrators yet, so I summoned them into a different room, one by one, under the guise of the leader wanting to talk to them, and then charmed them.

Once that was done, I had them gather again and convinced the perverts — admittedly, they were people I had turned into perverts myself — that they were in the wrong and that they should all turn themselves in tomorrow.

The next day, they each gathered as much evidence of their crimes as they could and proudly gathered before me.

“Everyone, I’ll be waiting for you to come back as nice and good people...!” I said, making them all sob, but I wouldn’t be waiting. I was going home as soon as I could. Really, I wanted to forget all this happened as soon as possible... Oh hey, I could ask Niku to seal my memories maybe. I’ll ask once we get home.

# Criminal Organization Administrator’s Perspective

I’m Jondoe, a high ranking administrator of the Last Commune. Yeah, it’s a common fake name.

I may be living in the slums now, but I used to be a good-hearted merchant working inside the city. Sure, I ended up as a criminal slave after stealing some of my boss’s profits to keep for myself, but still. Everyone was doing it. Only reason I got in trouble was because everyone else lied and said I was the one taking all the money. Not my fault I ended up in the slums. I only took ten percent of the profits, y’know?

After fleeing to the slums, I used the skills I learned as a merchant to rise the ranks in the Last Commune. Ended up as the treasurer managing all of the organization’s funds. Naturally, I was keeping some of it for myself, but not so much that I would get caught again.

Today the head of the organization had called for me, apparently to thank me for my hard work himself. I had only ever heard of the top dog through Hugo, the second in command. He was supposedly a real monster, managing this whole organization that ruled the slums. What kinda guy was he? I couldn’t wait to find out.

He summoned me to the best brothel in the slums. Cheaper brothels used tents (which were the prostitutes’ homes), but this place had actual rooms. We were gonna meet in one of those rooms.

“Go in.” Hugo was waiting by the door and let me in. Inside was a beautiful girl who fit my tastes exactly. She had long black hair and a flat chest. She was the kind of chaste, pure girl that had no place in the slums. But her eyes had the sharp, merciless look of someone who could stand at the top of a criminal organization and keep it in order.

There was no doubting it. She was the head of the Last Commune. I found myself so enraptured by her that I couldn’t even move. She looked at me carefully as if ascertaining my worth and I felt a tingling pleasure rush from my toes to my head. Her eyes were falling directly on me. Could there be anything more blissful in the world?

“Ah... aaah...” I was so anxious my throat dried up. For real? Am I a kid having his first crush? I swallowed hard.

“Kneel before me.” I immediately knelt. I couldn’t resist her; I didn’t want to. Ahhh, I was so happy.

“Uh, let’s see... Your name’s Jondoe, right? The treasurer?”

“Yes, that’s me.”

“Okay. Tell me what bad things you’ve been doing.”

“Bad things? I haven’t been doing anything bad.”

“Going to play dumb too, huh? Come on. Why do all you criminals have to justify yourselves and pretend to be good people like that?” The girl sighed.

Aaah. If I had done anything bad, it was frustrating her just now. There was no greater sin than hurting her mood for even a moment.

“It may not be a sin if you don’t realize it’s evil. But it’s bad to hurt others for your own benefit. Even if you don’t hurt people directly, you’re impacting the world. You’re hurting the people of Tsia, and that’s bad. Now think back and tell me what you’ve done.” Now that she mentioned it, I had been working for a store owned by a Tsia citizen. It was bad to steal his money for my own purpose. Indeed. I had done something wrong, something bad.

“People who do bad things are called bad people. What are you?”

“I’m a bad person.”

“Good.” I could now accept that I was a bad person. She approved of my growth as a person. I couldn’t help but smile.

“Now then, Jondoe. What bad things have you done?”

“Right. I took money from my store’s profits. But not very much.”

“Not very much? I’m not asking about quantity here. I am just asking you what you did wrong.”

“Right! Forgive me! I committed the evil act of stealing money.” That was close. I almost started giving excuses. She would just hate me if I did that. I couldn’t say that everyone else was doing it, either. Two wrongs did not make a right. It would just make all of us bad people.

“So in short, you did bad things and are a bad person.”

“Well, I guess, basically...”

“I hate bad people.” I flinched so hard my entire body lurched. She hated bad people, which meant... She hated me? No, no way, no way! I didn’t want her to hate me. I started to sweat in panic.

“That’s right. I hate how you are right now.”

I wanted to cry. I hung my head, depressed.

“However.” Yet, in all her glory she gave me hope. “However, bad people can become good people by atoning for their crimes.”

“Atoning, for their crimes?”

“It’s simple to atone for your crimes. If you gather proof of your wrong doings and turn yourself in to the guards, they will give you a punishment befitting your crimes. Apologize and accept the punishment. Once that’s done, you will no longer be a bad person. As long as you don’t do bad things again, you will be a good person.”

Would that really be enough for me to be a good person? Of course it would be! This girl would never lie to me! If I do what she says, I won’t be a bad person anymore!

“Will you turn yourself in?”

“Yes! Right now, even!”

“...Uh, hold on. Do it with everyone else tomorrow. Use that time to gather evidence of your crimes and information on criminals you’ve done bad things with before. Okay?” Right, I couldn’t turn myself in immediately if I needed to gather evidence.

“Understood!” I replied with joy from the bottom of my heart and strode out of the room. It would take me all night to gather all the evidence and information she wanted. But by doing so, I could become a good person. What was one night’s work in the face of atoning for my crimes? When I got home, I would need to stick all my ledgers into a bag.

Also, there was a pig sleeping at that girl’s feet. I didn’t recognize them, but whoever it was, I was jealous of them.

# Tsia Guard’s Perspective

The sky was blue and the weather beautiful. The slum in front of me was as dirty as ever, but still. I could imagine that today would be yet another peaceful day where nothing happened. There was no doubt in my mind that absolutely nothing strange would happen today.

It was about then that a large group of people came walking toward the gate. They were all striding forward confidently. Those at the front were better dressed than I would have expected from slum dwellers. The person in the front especially looked like a noble.

Said noble-looking individual stepped forward and spoke to me, acting like the representative of the group.

“Aaah, excuse me. Could you get your boss for me?”

“Uhhh. What business do you have in Tsia?”

“We came to turn ourselves in. We are the administrators of the Last Commune.”

For a second I didn’t believe what I had heard. The Last Commune was a criminal organization that controlled the slums and dragged Tsia City down with crime. Any guard working at the southern gate knew who they were.

“Did you not hear me? We came to turn ourselves in.”

It was incomprehensible. The Last Commune had grown so powerful that we were ready to burn down the entire slums to get rid of them. And yet, its leaders had come to turn themselves in. Not just one or two of them, either. Twenty of them. And again, these weren’t low-ranking members. They were the top twenty of the organization.

The top dog was a noble, too. It was a scandal so large in scope that his entire family could have their rank stripped from them. I didn’t know why he had come from the slums. But.

“Take us to prison already! We have the evidence against us right here!” he said, thrusting mountains of paperwork my way. I had no idea what to do anymore.

“W-Wait just a moment!” I rushed to get the captain of the gate. But he didn’t know what to do either and ultimately sent a messenger to the villa of the commander of the southern gate... but he had left for the slums yesterday and hadn’t been back since. I told that to the noble at the gate, who was actually sobbing while begging to be sent to prison.

“Idiot! I’m that commander! You don’t even know what your own commander looks like?!”

“Wha...? S-Sorry!” There was no way I would know what my commander looked like when he was the kind of guy to leave everything to other people without ever going to work himself. I had never seen him in the flesh before.

“So, uh, what should we do then?”

“For now, put us in prison. Then go directly to the Archduke and tell him what happened!” The commander gave orders on how to arrest him. Thus, all twenty administrators were taken to prison with satisfied expressions on their faces. They were all obedient, and some of them had blissful, madness-tinged grins on their faces.

It took thirty minutes for Archduke Bonodore to hear of what happened. The evidence the administrators had brought with them was investigated and ultimately led to the capture of spies from other countries, criminals within the city itself, and even other nobles who had been partially funding the organization.

The situation would come to be known as “The Last Commune’s Change of Heart.” What had encouraged their sudden change of heart? Through interrogations (wherein they were surprisingly cooperative), each of the administrators spoke of various women who had helped them see the error of their ways. But the Archduke instructed us to dig no further, as there were more important things to do. No investigation was started to find those women, and in the end, their identities were never discovered.

# Keima’s Perspective

It was the day after the Last Commune administrators all turned themselves in. I woke up in a Tsia inn. It was solidly noon and since I had only paid for one night, they kicked me out. But I still felt like the king of the world.

Reason being, I didn’t have to turn into a femboy Succubus and seduce perverted weirdos anymore. If this isn’t the top of the world, what is?

“Okay, Niku. Let’s go to the Archduke’s manor.”

“Understood.”

I figured that the buzz from yesterday would have probably calmed down by now. Or so I thought until I went to the manor and saw a bunch of people rushing in and out of the front gate. Uh... Maybe I should’ve waited longer? Yeah, I’ll come back tomorrow. But just as I started to turn around, a guard at the gate called out to me.

“H-Hey, you! Er, you’re the adventurer who came here earlier, right? Do you have business with the Archduke? You do, right?”

“...Ahhh, yeah. I do, but it seems pretty busy here, so...”

“Not at all! We’ve been waiting for you. In fact, I’ve been waiting since yesterday for you to come. After all, I’m the only guard who knows what you look like so... Er, the Archduke himself ordered me to stand guard here in case you came.” Maybe waiting as long as I did hadn’t been so nice after all.

“Right, good work. Uh... And sorry?”

“It’s fine, just please let me finish my job. Follow me.” The guard took me inside and I was taken to the same parlor that I’d been to about a week prior. Just as I was starting to lay on the sofa to get some sleep, Bonodore came walking in.

“Keima! I’m glad you came!”

“...Hello again, Archduke Bonodore. How are you?” Bonodore was wearing a full smile and looked very excited.

“No need for formal greetings! More importantly, all of the Last Commune administrators turned themselves in yesterday. It’s safe to say that was your work, yes?” I told him ahead of time that I would be taking down the entire organization. I had no reason to hide anything and thus replied with a nod. Immediately, Bonodore’s wings spread out wide and he held out a hand. I reached out a hand to give him a handshake but he went for a friendly hug instead. He must be pretty happy.

“You did great, Keima! So great we’ve been breaking our backs since yesterday. This is pain that feels fine, to be sure... What in the world did you do to them?”

“You promised not to ask that, Archduke.”

“Right, right. Forgive me.” Bonodore sat opposite me like before.

“Your work was unbelievable. I didn’t expect that you would actually destroy the organization. In a single week, at that.”

“...To be fair, I definitely wouldn’t want to do it again.”

“Which means you could if you wanted to, huh?” Dealing with those perverts really messes with your mind. The more perverted and degenerate they act, the more your Succubus powers drain energy from them. It feels like eating the meat of a particularly nutritious animal.

“...Between you and me, I expected at most that you would bring information that would at worst weaken a branch of their organization before our assault or at best identify which of my subordinates were dealing with them. Nobody could have predicted that the head of the organization would come begging to be sent to jail.”

“Was it a mistake to have them bring a bunch of evidence with them, then?”

“Not at all,” said Bonodore with a broad grin.

Man... Succubi really are overpowered when I think about it. If nobody has a high enough charm resistance, they can destroy a sizable criminal organization in a single week. Kosaki said in the past that I had the power to conquer a kingdom and it looks like she wasn’t wrong. Not that I intend to try it.

“In any case, time for your payment. I’ll send the money to you through the Guild, so now... I will give you information on the Divine Pillow.” Finally! This is the reason why I worked so hard to take the Last Commune out from the ground up. Information on the Divine Pillow! I tensed up and leaned forward, waiting for Bonodore to continue. “...The Divine Pillow is one part of the Divine Bedding set. They’re all precious treasures to the Laverio Empire, so keep what I say here between us.” I nodded.

“I’ll only say this once, so listen closely.” I swallowed hard.

“The Divine Pillow is in the possession of my daughter, Maiodore. At the direct request of the Ivory Goddess, the women of my house have taken care of it for generations. Therefore,” Bonodore continued, “the Divine Pillow is here in Tsia.”