The hall of the Pioneer Covenant Association was as noisy as ever.
Adventurers gathered in groups of three to five around the mission board, loudly discussing rewards and danger coefficients.
The air was a thick mixture of laughter, cursing, and the smell of sweat, cheap ale, and various alchemical potions.
Katy and Gray walked through the boisterous crowd one after another, heading straight for the mission reception counter.
“Good afternoon, how can I help—”
A familiar and somewhat tired voice came from behind the counter.
When the short-haired girl wearing black-rimmed glasses looked up through her thick lenses and saw the newcomers, her professional fake smile instantly melted into a radiant glow of surprise.
“Ah! It’s Gray and little Katy!”
The receptionist sitting there was none other than Lily.
With the powerful intervention of Ingram and Eve, she had successfully escaped the deadly clutches of the Military Department and changed back into her sleek Association uniform.
Though her face was still a bit pale, compared to the girl full of despair and the smell of blood in that dark cave, she looked like a completely different person now.
“Good afternoon, Sister Lily,” Katy said with a sweet smile.
“It’s so good to see you back safe and sound.”
Gray smiled as well, his tone relaxed.
“It seems the Saint and the Saint Knight carry quite a bit of weight. They managed to make the Military Department—who usually never let go once they bite—take a loss and even obediently send you back. They truly live up to their reputations.”
Faced with their smiles, Lily dropped her usual quirky and sharp-tongued demeanor.
Her face flushed with slight embarrassment as she stood up and gave them both a deep, solemn bow.
“It’s thanks to both of you that I can return to work like this.”
“Oh, Sister Lily, you’re being too polite! Aren’t we friends?”
Katy quickly waved her hands.
Gray followed with a nod, indicating that it was just a small favor not worth mentioning.
After the girl sat back down, she took a deep breath to calm her emotions.
She then put on her professional face as a top-tier receptionist.
“Are you two here to take on a new mission today? Or is there a Labyrinth you’re planning to visit?”
“The latter,” Gray replied, nodding as he got straight to the point.
“We’re preparing to venture into the Third Labyrinth.”
“The Third Labyrinth!?”
Lily’s voice spiked in pitch, drawing side-eyes from several nearby adventurers.
Realizing she had lost her composure, she quickly cleared her throat and leaned forward, lowering her voice.
Her face was written with deep concern.
“Gray, you’re not joking, are you? The Third Labyrinth is Night Glow Level. Are you sure you want to take little Katy there? I doubt you could even make it past the first floor on your own.”
Seeing Lily’s expression—so frantic she looked like she might leap over the counter—Gray gave a helpless smile.
“Don’t worry. I’m just taking the Star of Tomorrow of the Church inside to gain some experience. This trip has the personal authorization of the Saint herself. It’s mainly to evaluate her potential; we won’t actually be going deep.”
The black-haired girl nodded, seemingly understanding, but the worry in her eyes didn’t diminish in the slightest.
Katy, however, wasn’t listening to Gray at all.
Her vision was occupied entirely by Gray and Lily leaning close to each other and their interaction.
The little Priest’s arms subconsciously tightened around her gun-sword.
The light gemstone serving as her casting medium pressed against her chest, making it ache slightly.
‘Damn it, is the side effect of the power granted by the Demon Lord still active? Why is my lower abdomen still so hot!’
Under the influence of that strange heat, the normal interaction between Gray and Lily, who were old friends, became incredibly irritating to her eyes.
‘This guy’s luck with women is a bit too good, isn’t it? Even after falling from grace, he has a serious, responsible, and caring short-haired glasses girl in the Association to bicker with. Back when he was in the Dawn Blade, the team was full of beautiful girls. Lobelia and Eve, one pungent and one playful, were both different types of beauties.’
Katy’s mind was a mess.
Her reason told her that Gray was likely just reassuring an old friend so she wouldn’t worry too much and didn’t mean anything else by it.
But she just felt a surge of inexplicable irritability and grievance.
It was like the instinctive reaction a member of the Demon Race felt when seeing pure Holy Light.
‘I’m just seeing this guy interact with another beautiful girl. I’m a soul who has lived two lifetimes and seen countless grand scenes; how could I be like this?’
To answer her own question, Katy subconsciously began a deep search of her knowledge base.
‘Feeling irritable and uneasy while seeing Gray interact with another woman, wishing to interrupt them…’
‘Oh, isn’t this just jealousy?’
‘Nonsense.’
‘Am I jealous of Lily? Because she’s chatting with Gray!?’
The girl’s lower abdomen jolted, and she almost lost her composure, nearly revealing her demonic pupils right then and there.
‘Wait, why would I be jealous because Lily is chatting with Gray? And… jealous of Lily?’
A prominent blush accompanied by heat rushed up the girl’s fair cheeks.
She quickly used the wide sleeves of her Saint robes to cover her face, avoiding any notice of her abnormality.
‘B-but according to the contents of those romance light novels, manga, and anime, the heroine getting jealous is a sign of falling for the male lead!’
‘Could I have actually fallen for Gray? No, impossible!! I could absolutely never turn into a little Priest who truly likes him! Every bit of gentleness and consideration toward him is just acting!’
‘What a joke! I am one of the strongest Calamity Pillars. How could I fall for a weakling, “Weakest Winless” human Hero who hasn’t even conquered—cough, successfully completed a run against me once!’
‘It must be a plot by the Demon Lord to see me suffer! Definitely!’
On the other side, the two didn’t notice the blonde little Priest’s internal struggle.
To prove that what he said was true, Gray pulled a scroll stamped with the Church’s insignia from his coat and handed it to Lily.
“Is that a special permit from the Church? Don’t only Bishops carry those around?”
“Is that warrior a Black-robed Bishop? But don’t they usually carry lanterns and rapiers? Since when did they start using that weapon?”
“Shh, look at the beautiful girl following behind him. Her clothes look exactly like the Holy Maiden’s. Don’t talk nonsense and offend some high-ranking person we can’t afford to provoke.”
Hearing the surrounding adventurers’ guesses about his identity, Gray rubbed his chin with some helplessness.
While having a common face had its benefits—it made it harder to be recognized—being mistaken for a Black-robed Bishop, the kind that had almost executed Katy, was a bit awkward.
Behind the counter, Lily’s eyes also widened in surprise.
She carefully received the scroll, and after confirming it, she sighed helplessly.
“The thirteenth Saint, Eve Avalaisia… Gray, just how many important people do you know that I can’t even dream of?”
“Ah, not that many. Probably only four or five.”
Gray gave a weak laugh.
Fearing that staying longer would attract too much attention, he urged Lily to process their registration for entering the Labyrinth.
The black-haired girl handed him two identity tags engraved with their party information.
In the end, she couldn’t help but nag.
“Please… please be extremely careful. Whether it’s Miss Katy or you, I hope you both come back without a scratch.”
“Don’t worry, I’m actually quite strong.”
Lily pushed up her glasses and returned to her usual self, offering a wicked smile and a heartless jab.
“You seemed to say the same thing right before you returned to Knox City and immediately became the laughingstock of the ‘Weakest Winless.'”
“Pfft! A real man doesn’t mention the embarrassments of the past, okay!”
Gray’s face turned red.
Watching the natural, familiar interaction between the two, the unpleasantness Katy had just managed to suppress seemed to sprout again.
‘…As a Calamity Pillar, a Great Demon, and the wearer of the Abyssal Magic Armor, it’s a thousand percent impossible for me to actually like this idiot Gray!’
‘Actually liking him? I’d rather become a plaything in that “Tyrant Gray” timeline!’
‘At least then, I could comfort myself by saying I was unyielding and resisted to the death, and that I only fell because my reason was eroded by pleasure—due to an irresistible force!’
‘If I just fell for this guy so easily now…’
‘Am I some cheap woman?! No, wait, I’m not even a woman to begin with. I’m part of the Demon Race! I’m a Great Demon, you bastard!!’