Conquering The Novel

I was greeted by Aegis and Helena as soon as I reached the room where Mika was being held.

Helena seemed to have just arrived as well, and as they both spotted my entrance, Helena said,

"Oh, you are here too? Did Mika know you were also present to witness her match?" Helena was curious.

"No, Mika had no idea Ares was coming to attend her battle; I didn't inform her since I felt Ares wanted to surprise her," Aegis explained with an uneasy smile.

"Yeah, I was intending to come to visit her after her match, so as not to distract her before the match begins," I remarked as I sat on one of the sofas, Silvia following me and sitting alongside me.

As I sat down, I examined the room; the room was exceedingly luxurious, with every necessity available, and it does not appear to be a hospital room, but rather a five-star hotel room, and there were two more rooms connected, so it appears Mika is resting in one of them.

"Oh, it's a good thing she didn't know you were here, or she would have died of humiliation instead of being comatose," Helena remarked.

"When you say 'instead of comatose,' what do you imply?" I turned to face Aegis, ignoring Helena's sarcastic remark.

"Well, as she mentioned, Mika is in a vegetative state and it may take some time for her to wake up; her injuries are fully healed, but her defeat seems to impact her psychologically," Aegis explained.

"It was her first defeat since becoming an Ascended entity, so I imagine she wasn't anticipating it?" Helena spoke out.

Aegis didn't know how to respond because she believes the same thing.

"Well, if Mika didn't think she could win, she would never have challenged Tania; there were some unexpected elements that contributed to her defeat; of course, I'm not making an excuse since a defeat is a defeat," Aegis stated with an uneasy smile on her face.

"Is it because Tania is a Chosen one that you're mentioning the unexpected elements? But I believed Mika was already aware of it." Helena asked Aegis a question.

"Yeah, and Mika also challenged Tania for the same reason. She wanted to know how powerful she was in comparison to the Chosen ones." Aegis reacted.

"As one would expect from her," Helena remarked.

"I doubt Tania would have accepted this match so readily, as she wouldn't want to fight anyone unnecessarily," I questioned, casting a skeptical glance at Aegis, who appeared to be hiding something.

"W-Well, Y-You're correct. Tania refused Mika's every challenge until Mika slaughtered the entire negotiation team during her mission, which was crucial since it may have allowed humans to battle demons more efficiently." Aegis stated hesitantly.

"Allow humanity to fight demons more efficiently? Do you mean the custom-made holy weapons?" I wondered.

"Huh? H-How did you find out about that, because I only recently learned about it, and it isn't something that anyone could have learned so readily." Aegis seemed surprised with her eyes wide open as she inquired.

"Oh, I wasn't supposed to know that?" I said casually, knowing full well that I couldn't explain to her that I was aware of it because I had previously read about it in the novel.

"Didn't I tell you our Ares is a genius? He figured it all out just by hearing your description." Helena turned to face Aegis and laughed.

She was misunderstanding things again, but I didn't bother to correct her because it was also beneficial to me.

"W-What! D-Did he truly figured that out from my one sentence? But I don't believe that is the case" Aegis was still perplexed as to how I had learned about that classified information.

But when Iretheil and Silvia learned about the custom-made holy weapons, they gasped nervously, given that, it might be effective against both demons and vampires.

"You don't have to worry too much about it, because it won't affect you greatly," I reassured Irethiel telepathically, and Silvia, of course, eavesdropped.

Because, according to the novel, the negotiations were supposed to be completed and the opposing party likewise delivered the custom-made holy weaponry.

But the whole premise about custom-made holy weapons was a crock of shit.

These weapons were created by a corrupted priest with the ability to boost any weapon to give it a holy nature,...but it would only last for a few days or so and would only work on low-rank monsters.

As a result, many adventures were injured, and some even died, while fighting high-ranking monsters with flawed holy weapons.

The Adventurer Association was reprimanded for this scenario and faced the wrath of many adventurers.

I'm not sure how the negotiations failed this time; was it because Mika was involved in the negotiations?

And I don't know why the Adventurer association decided to give such an important mission to someone like Mika, but unknowingly, Mika ended up saving them...I guess.

"Wait! Now that I think about it, aren't you Silvia a vampire? What exactly are you doing by Ares' side?" Helena confronted Silvia with a serious inquiry.

Silvia swallowed uneasily, as she hadn't expected anyone to recognize her identity so effortlessly.

"W-What! a vampire? Is Silvia a Vampire?" Aegis exclaimed, perplexedly.

Helena, on the other hand, did not respond to Aegis and abruptly appeared in front of Silvia, grabbing her by the neck.

"Why don't you explain yourself before I snap this little neck of your Vamp?" Helena inquired Silvia.

All of this happened in a matter of seconds, and I was unable to catch a glimpse of Helena's quickness and couldn't respond on time.

Ahk!—

Silvia strained to say anything, and something unexpected happened before I could stop Helena.

"Whoa! That was very close." Silvia commented as she sat on one of the room's windows while swinging her legs front and back.

"Huh?" I was perplexed by what had just occurred, but Silvia, whom Helena was holding by the neck, suddenly turned into numerous bats and flew away, one of which reached Silvia and sat on her index finger.

"Clone huh?" Helena frowned as she spoke.

"Was that a clone? But how did she keep up with Helena's speed?" I inquired of Irethiel, thinking she could have noticed something.

"No, that's not a clone; she turned herself into a bat and fled, while Helena was merely holding the bat, which is currently perched on Silvia's finger," Irethiel clarified.

"Did Silvia has the ability to morph into a bat? But I didn't notice her turning into a bat though?" I inquired, intrigued.

"Yeah, I've seen some royal vampires with such abilities in my time, and Silvia seems to have quite a powerful illusion skill that fooled your eyes, yet she is still not strong enough to fool my vision," snorted Iretheil.

After hearing Irethiel, I understood the essence of it; she seems to be becoming better at explaining things after meeting with Silvia.

"You're not bad for a tiny vamp, and now I know, why the organization wanted to recruit you," Helena remarked.

"Recruit me?" Silvia uttered confused, and question marks seem to appear above her head.

'Well, they were partners in crimes in the novel, as Silvia eventually joined the Shadows Organization,' I thought to myself.

"Wait! Why is everyone ignoring the fact that Ares' fiancée is a vampire?" Aegis exclaimed, perplexed.

"Eh? Ares's fiancee? Is Silvia Ares's fiancee?" Helena inquired, shocked.

"Yeah, I'm Ares' fiancee," Silvia said, nodding numerous times.

"Why didn't my organization provide me with this information? And, maybe most importantly, Ares never mentioned her," Helena turned to face me as if waiting for an explanation.

"Well, even I didn't know about that until recently," I explained, averting Helena's gaze.

"Did you forget about your fiancee?" Helena appeared bewildered.

I didn't know what to say, so I used my right to remain silent.

"Now that I've focused my attention on you, who is that demon next to you?" Helena pointed at Irethiel who was now in her crow form and questioned me.

***

It took a long time to explain everything to Helena, while Aegis remained motionless.

"So, you have a demon for a slave and a vampire for a fiancee, huh?" Helena laughed nervously.

I didn't tell her about the chosen one, Meria, so as not to complicate matters further-.

"Oh Ares, I suppose you forgot to inform them about your other slave Meira," Silvia said casually as she ate a lollipop while still sitting on the window.

"...."

"Another slave?" Helena spoke out and looked toward Silvia for clarification.

"Yeah, he has a chosen one as his slave as well," Silvia said casually, her gaze fixed on her lollipop.

"...."

'I'll be damned, I had no idea Silvia was a whistleblower.' I thought to myself before hearing loud exclamations.

"HUH!!!" Helena and Aegis both exclaimed at the same time.

***************