“Now then,”
After leaving the guild, we had moved in an instant to the top of the city’s clock tower.
It wasn’t some special ability. We simply leaped here in a single bound.
“You’re Van, right? Considering that you have intelligence and can even undergo cellular human transformation, you must be a pretty high-ranking monster.”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
Van-kun proudly nodded.
No, this isn’t a moment to praise you. I’m trying to warn you here, okay?
“Tremble in fear when you hear this! My monster name is ‘The Scorching Destruction Dragon Vermilion Dragon!’ I’m one of the top-tier beings among dragon species!”
“Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch!”
Wait—he really is one of my kind after all!
Even the embarrassingly cringe-worthy name matches. It seems like some kind of creator of monsters came up with these names, but please stop—it’s just too much for modern sensibilities!
“Huh? Why did you just say ‘ouch’? Were you defeated by humans too and are now using your recovery time to investigate them?”
“Excuse me?”
So, “too,” huh? That means this guy also snuck into human society under similar circumstances.
“Ah, just thinking about it pisses me off. Look at these scars all over my body.”
With that, Van flashed his tanned skin. Even without looking closely, his body was riddled with wounds.
“What happened to you?”
“What do you mean ‘what happened’? Every time I tried to approach a human city or village, these insanely powerful attacks would come flying at me!”
Oh… wait a minute…
“Vermilion Dragon… Vermilion, if I remember right, refers to a red color, right?”
In other words, in his true form, he’s a ‘Red Dragon.’
So every time he approached the city, something shot him down with a vicious attack… wait,
“Ah.”
Wasn’t that… me?
“Huh? What’s with you?”
“N-nothing at all, Van-kun! It’s just that humans are terrifying creatures, so don’t provoke them carelessly, okay? Haha!”
Oh no, this guy was the Red Dragon I accidentally shot down a few times during stray attacks, wasn’t he?
I didn’t feel too guilty back then, but now that I’m face-to-face with him in this battered state, the guilt’s starting to get to me…
“Humans are such infuriating creatures. Right now, I’m in constant pain from my injuries, and I can’t even fully control this human form, so I’m pretty useless in battle.”
“Ah, that explains why the adventurers in the guild didn’t die.”
Well, the adventurers probably had skills and were trained too.
“You really dodged a bullet there, Van. Killing a human is a serious crime in their society. If you kill even one person, you’ll be relentlessly pursued. By, like, a billion people.”
“Wait, seriously?”
Total lie. While murder is definitely a serious crime, the billion people thing was a bit exaggerated.
“Totally. Trust me, I’m a fellow monster. (And with this, I can scare him into not trying anything reckless).”
If he gets exposed as a monster hiding in the city, it could lead to people thinking “there might be others,” which would put me in danger as well. It’s annoying, but I’ll have to teach him how to blend in with human society.
“You’re barely on the edge of being safe right now. If you had malicious intent, it’d be a different story, but for now, ignorance is your saving grace.”
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
“Oh, just talking to myself. Anyway, I’ll teach you the rules of human society, so get ready to take notes.”
“I can’t read or write.”
“…Alright, I’ll give you a simple crash course.”
And so, I ended up spending half a day teaching various things to the Red Dragon.
I even gave him some money to get by for a while (there goes my savings…).
