“Sir, we have received a report from an Instigator. Apparently a monster with a transformation Skill has appeared in the far southeast of the continent. From what they heard through listening in on [Telepathy], it seems this monster is the tamed companion of a certain Simon Krol. How do you want them to proceed?” A woman in a black coat reported to a man with a crown sitting on a throne.

The man seemed very bored and tired. He didn’t even react to the woman’s report.

“My lord? Are you alright?” The woman asked with concern.

The man finally reacted with a sigh, “How nice it must be to not be burdened with the knowledge of an emperor. I don’t care what that Instigator does, they can desert and it won’t change anything.”

The woman became alarmed and quickly said, “Sir you can’t be serious! Perhaps you just need a break. Yes that’s it, why don’t you take a walk around the capital? You can go and visit your favorite places.”

“So? What does that change? I’ll still be emperor out there and when I return. Tell me, how long have you been my spymaster?”

“I’ve been serving you for ten years my lord.”

“How long have you been the spymaster for this empire?”

The spymaster froze for a moment but still responded, “I can’t remember exactly how long it’s been. Why do you ask?”

The emperor gave a small chuckle, “I have access to the most information out of all three of the empires. I always attributed that to you and your abilities but it seems I’ve been giving too little credit. So tell me, what reason do you have for disguising yourself and becoming a spymaster?”

“What are you referring to when you say disguise? I may hide a few things but I’ve never hidden anything dangerous from you.”

“For the goddess with the aspect of the unknown you aren’t good at hiding secrets that are already known.”

The spymaster changed from a slightly strained face to one of annoyance before saying, “You found out about that huh? Yes, my actual name is Faler, the Goddess of the Unknown. You're not the first human emperor to find out about that. Do you know why no one else knows about it?”

The emperor sighed once more, “Of course I do. You can’t hide things that are already known but you can make known things unknown. You’ll just make me forget that I knew about your secret. Anyone that I had told would also receive the same treatment.”

Faler was a bit surprised by his words, she didn’t think he would’ve known what she would do since every person who had known about her identity no longer knew, meaning there was no reason why anyone would know what happened after they found out about her identity, “How did you know?”

“Do you want a lie or the truth?”

“Of course I want the truth. What use is a lie?”

“Then don’t blame me if you don’t believe what I tell you. The reason I know is because of the Demon Realm.”

Faler was confused and then began laughing, “Ahaha, the Demon Realm? That’s how? That’s more ridiculous than if you claimed I had told you.”

The emperor smiled bitterly, “You wanted the truth so I gave it to you. There is something you should know though.”

Faler stopped her laughing but still looked at the emperor with an amused expression, “Yes? What else do you want to tell me? Perhaps you’ll say that there’s a secret group of mortals that are powerful enough to kill the gods.”

The emperor lost his bitter smile at her words and stared at her with an emotionless face before saying, “Laugh all you want, the thing I’m about to tell you is very important to you.”

Faler didn’t say anything this time and just listened.

The emperor didn’t change his expression, “You won’t remove my memories as easily as you think. So, try all you want.”

Faler was stunned before bursting out into laughter, “Ahahah, you, you really think that you can stop a god? Ahahahaha, that’s just, ahaha.”

The emperor finally changed his expression to a smile before saying, “By my authority as emperor, I name my son as my successor. May he live well and have a long reign when I leave the Mortal Realm.”

“Ahaha, naming a successor? What? Do you think I’m going to kill you?”

The emperor still had his smile, “No, you’re not going to kill me. However, I can try to kill you. By my authority as the contract holder of the Demon King Grau’athame, I request to trade my life in exchange for the death of my spymaster, the goddess Faler in disguise.”

Faler finally stopped laughing and became extremely angry, “You! You dared to contract a demon!? You would die to merely harm me!? You fool!”

The emperor didn’t change his expression, “Oh? Am I a fool? You don’t seem to realize the implications of what I’ve done. I’ll let you think about it with a single hint. I won’t die, I’m merely trading my life for another. Now, I have places to be, I hope this is the last time I have to meet you but I know we’ll meet again.”

The emperor started to be covered in silvery white flames after he finished speaking.

The flames crawled up from his fine shoes as they seemed to want to consume him entirely.

“NO!” Faler didn’t waste a moment and immediately lunged towards the emperor before he was consumed in flames.

She reached the emperor a moment too late and grabbed only air from where the emperor had been.

Faler, seeing that the emperor had burned to nothingness, kicked the throne as hard as she could.

A large dent was made in the throne and it was thrown from its spot at the middle of the throne room at the back all the way to a wall where advisors and guards would stand to either provide protection or advice. Neither guards nor advisors were around due to the spymaster being enough protection and any operations being secret.

“He just had to make things complicated didn’t he? Now I have to deal with getting a new ruler and an annoying Demon King.” Faler muttered.

A voice echoed through the throne room, “I’m so glad you didn’t forget about me. I was worried you had. Now then, how exactly do I deal with you?”

“A mere Demon King I’ve never even heard of wants to act arrogant? Do you want to die?”

“Hm, death is a peculiar thing. Everything fears it yet it is used so often to deal with problems. You’re a bit strange and remove memories instead of killing but that could be seen as killing memories.”

“You seem to have an odd view on death. Why don’t you talk about it some more?” Faler said while looking around the room.

“Well, how about I have a question for you instead? What restrictions are there for non-native inhabitants in this realm?”

“All beings from outside the Mortal Realm must deal with half of their abilities and Stats blocked. You must be so weak to have never traveled to the Mortal Realm before. You probably hid in some cave and slowly became a Demon King.”

Grau’athame chuckled a bit, “Heh, that’s where you’re wrong. You see, I was asking to see if the restrictions were lifted a bit from when I was last here. I had to leave for a while due to an issue but it does feel quite nice to be back.”

Faler shook her head, “The restrictions haven’t changed in a few thousand years. Not since the System was in place.”

“Ah? It’s been a few thousand years? I haven’t been able to keep track of time you see, very difficult when dealing with Time magic.”

Faler paused for a second, “You’re from before the System? Why have I never heard of you then?”

A small wisp of silvery white fire floated down from the roof while Faler stared at it.

Grau’athame spoke once more, “Actually, you have. I just had a bit of a name change in the time I was away. You see, my current title is the Demon King of Fortune. Can you guess what it was before?”

“Demon King of Fortune? Sounds more like Demon King of Greed.”

“Close, I had a few titles before I went away. One was The Hoarder but can you guess what another one was?”

The wisp of fire continued to float to the ground.

“The Demon King of Speech? You seem to talk a lot.”

“Not even close.” The wisp of fire touched the ground and made an explosion of silvery white flames that pushed Faler away.

From inside the explosion came a voice that belonged to Grau’athame, “I was called Death’s Harbinger. The head priest of the being that controls death. Now, it is time to give you a taste of what that title means.”

The explosion formed into what seemed to be a flower and opened as it bloomed, revealing a figure within.

“So, do you have any last requests, words, or emotions?” The figure within the fire flower said.

“Yes I do, I refuse to die to a coward like you. Do you think that hiding and then appearing suddenly with your supposed titles will make me afraid?” Faler responded without any of the amusement or anger that had existed before.

The figure chuckled, “Hehe, you call me a coward? Let me tell you something important. Cowardice can be a tactic but tactics aren’t cowardice. The time I spent away from you was spent gathering a few items I loaned.”

“What kind of items would a Demon King like you loan? I bet they are just sticks coated in a thin layer of gold.”

“Not quite, although I couldn’t reacquire quite a few of my weapons, the ones I did acquire are quite powerful.” Saying so, the figure raised up a seemingly normal warhammer.

Faler seemed disappointed and said, “Really? That’s it? I was expecting a magic weapon at least.”

“Don’t underestimate the seemingly ordinary. Some things became ordinary but still hold some of their original properties.”

“Now you’re just spouting nonsense.”

The figure didn’t say anything but instead walked forward with the warhammer in hand.

“Do you really think you can harm a god? What gives you that confidence?”

“This does.” Suddenly the figure moved much faster and appeared directly in front of Faler.

“What!?” Faler shouted in shock before the hammer hit her.

Faler felt no different. The hammer didn’t even feel like it weighed anything.

“Wha-? This was your amazing plan? That’s… ahahaha” Faler couldn’t contain her laughter.

Although the Demon King had left the explosion he was still covered in the silvery white flames. Even though he was covered, Faler felt like he had a smile as he said, “That was part one. The second part is much easier now.”

The Demon King raised his other hand that held a sword. This one was clearly enchanted with runes and made Faler wary.

No words were exchanged as the Demon King slashed with his sword.

Faler attempted to use mana to defend herself but found that she was seemingly no different from an ordinary person. No connection to mana nor the general feeling of how high her Stats were that she normally had.

‘That hammer, did it cut me off from the world?! Just how powerful is it to cut me off from the System? I can’t save this disguise but I can return.’ Faler thought as the sword came closer.

“A warhammer to restrict and a sword that can harm anything. Those were the items I managed to retrieve. Now perish as the contract states.” Grau’athame said as his sword beheaded Faler.

Even though her head was cut off, Faler said one final sentence, “I will kill you Demon. Whether I need to sacrifice five lives or ten.”

Grau’athame smiled, “I look forward to your attempts.”

As Faler’s disguise was killed, the contract was complete and Grau’athame returned to the Demon Realm.

Now there was a missing emperor, a dead spymaster, an angry goddess, and a Demon King that had too many titles.