Using hair dye wasn’t that hard.
I just had to mix the dye with water and dip my hair in, but the dye felt so cold that my hair got cold too.
It was to the point where I thought it might freeze. For a moment, I remembered getting slammed by ice magic during the entrance exam.
It wasn’t like it was stored in a freezer, so did it give off cold air on its own? Maybe that’s why it’s called Frost Flower.
Anyway, I took my hair out.
After that, when I looked in the mirror, it seemed like a stranger was standing there.
I had no idea that just changing my hair color could make such a big difference.
My white hair was covered in blue. I had covered up something that stood out with something relatively normal.
Concealing my distinctive hair and eyes made me look a bit more human.
At a glance, I seemed no different from a human in the mirror.
I wished I had been born this ordinary from the beginning.
If I hadn’t eaten humans, could I have blended in with them? Could I have perfectly melted into their midst without any sense of discomfort?
I wanted to be born as a human too. I wanted to live so ordinarily, just like them.
“…”
It’s an old wish.
*
The Empire headquarters building was designed like a tall tower soaring upwards.
Did a basement really exist in a building that seemed solely to rise?
I didn’t know much about the Empire, but it wasn’t the most trustworthy group.
It wasn’t just because their main job was to hunt monsters; it was also because they disclosed overwhelmingly little information to the public compared to their influence.
I had never heard that there was a basement in the Empire headquarters. The ground level was a place where ordinary people could enter.
Were they hiding most of the confidential information underground while only revealing a part of it to the public?
Anyway, it was a suspicious place.
A group whose main job was monster hunting couldn’t be trusted. So I didn’t trust the Empire.
It definitely wasn’t because I hated them for being monsters.
…Probably.
“I’m sorry. This area ahead is restricted to the public.”
At a late hour, the process of entering the Empire’s basement wasn’t smooth.
Given the building’s structure, I expected there to be a path leading to the basement ahead, but the security guard stood in my way.
I looked into his eyes to subdue him.
“….”
“I told you, it’s a restricted area, right?”
“Eh.”
But nothing happened. I stared a little closer at his eyes. I blinked in that spot.
Still, nothing happened.
I had overlooked that he was wearing lenses.
It was uncomfortable that something that had been natural was now missing. It was a strange feeling, like I had lost a bodily function.
I didn’t panic and calmly took out one of the lenses. I locked eyes with him and placed him under my control.
“Urgh, what the…”
If I read his memories, I’d learn where the Empire’s basement was.
After spending some time reading, I was able to understand most of the building’s layout.
Of course, since his position here wasn’t that high, he didn’t know everything. He seemed completely clueless about the deeper parts of the basement.
But still, it was useful enough, so I decided to give him a particularly happy dream.
If I made humans dream too blissfully, they’d tend to ignore reality and cling to dreams, which was a downside, but after all, we probably wouldn’t meet again.
“Good night.”
After putting the guard to sleep, I put the lens back on.
I couldn’t use my abilities while concealed, so from now on I had to assume I wouldn’t get caught.
I entered the basement while concealing my appearance. It seemed darker than I had thought.
It wasn’t just the atmosphere; I felt magical energy emanating from deep underground.
Humans had an acute ability to sense mana, while monsters had an acute ability to sense magical energy.
Though it was faint enough that a human wouldn’t notice it, the mere existence of it held deep significance.
‘Did they sense me over there too?’
I was the Seed of the Demon King.
I wasn’t sure if it had always been this way, but recently I had certainly become a seed after consuming a fragment.
Since there was a fragment of the Demon King in my body, I could sense the Seed of the Demon King.
It was down here, something fundamentally the same as me.
The monsters in the basement seemed to regard me with caution, immediately gathering magical energy.
But since I already knew their general location, it didn’t matter. I would come to meet them soon.
Without regard for their wishes.
The reason I was acting so recklessly was that I had nothing to lose.
If things went wrong, I thought dying would be just fine.
It wouldn’t matter if I died. That would also be a form of liberation.
It wouldn’t matter if I didn’t die. I’d just find my own answer and return.
So was there really an existence down here that could kill me?
I couldn’t kill myself. In any way. So, it also meant I handed over my life to others.
If I had to live this way, I wanted to die.
But more than dying, I wanted to return. I wanted to live a bit more ordinarily.
That’s why I set returning as my top priority, and dying as my backup option.
The worst-case scenario I could imagine would be losing all memories of my time as a human and living as a complete monster.
If that time came, I wouldn’t be able to turn back.
*
Even though it had been hidden from the world, the Empire’s basement wasn’t too different from what I imagined.
I thought it would just be dark, but it wasn’t like that at all.
Most of it was offices where knights handled administrative tasks.
There was a man sighing while clutching a stack of papers, and a knight working with a cup of coffee in hand.
The common factor was that all of them had dead eyes. They all had eyes like Albert.
“You finished that proposal? The deadline is tomorrow, you know.”
“Damn it.”
“Life sucks.”
Is that how the Empire’s knights talked?
They seemed like pitiful souls. I thought to myself I shouldn’t end up like that.
Still, it wasn’t much to see given they were hiding things.
Though it might not be that far from the image I had imagined, as a dark workshop unlit by day, it was certainly not as bad as the slave basement I had been trapped in before.
But, well, I knew they weren’t hiding things like that.
Even the people here had no right to go that deep. They were practically outsiders too. Even they didn’t know what was going on down there.
Some might not even know of the existence of another space below this.
Maybe that was what happened to those who graduated from the Academy but couldn’t find decent jobs.
That’s why there didn’t seem to be any particularly gifted individuals. They weren’t students anymore, having gone through essential training, though.
Anyway, I decided to ignore them and move on.
“….”
After looking around hidden, I realized I would need a key to go further down into the darker area.
In a place where others’ gazes wouldn’t quite reach, there was a hidden door. It was locked, so I couldn’t get in.
There were two ways to go down: the first was to get the key through regular means, and the second was to break it down.
If I broke it down, it would definitely make a huge noise. I’d probably catch the attention of everyone there.
I really didn’t want that.
So I decided to go with the first option.
The corridor on the first basement floor had several rooms. Most of them were someone’s office or a meeting room.
Among the many people moving about the corridor, there was one room that they never entered.
As I got closer to read what was written on the door, it seemed to be the office of someone in charge.
Could it be the administrator? If my guess was right, the chances of him having the key would be high.
I planned to show him a hallucination immediately if I ran into him, so I took out one of the lenses and opened the door.
That was when I sensed something was wrong.
-Beeeeeep!!
“Huh?”
As soon as I opened the door to the room, the security system blared loudly.
It seemed to be designed to go off if anyone other than the designated human opened it.
There was a reason no one had been going in there. The emergency alarm sounded throughout the entire Empire building.
I was a bit startled, and then the invisibility wore off. In an instant, all eyes around turned toward me.
The Empire’s humans drew their swords and pointed them at me, while magic incantations filled the air densely behind them.
“Who are you there?!”
“….”
There were two ways to go down.
The first was to find the key, and the second was to break it.
Since all the gazes had turned to me, I had no choice but to use the second option.
I didn’t even need to bother going through the troublesome door. I just punched through the floor.
Boom, a huge noise echoed as the ground collapsed. Attack magic flew towards me, and sharp blades threatened me.
‘I wanted to move quietly if possible.’
After breaking the ground, I jumped down through the gap that had formed.
