Once this suspicion became clear, Valo could feel the oddity in Kaika’s behavior more than ever.
For example… after the tour, she was actually willing to go shopping with her and Finney in the Imperial Capital, and she even took the initiative to buy her a small dress!
Good grief! If it were the usual Kaika, shouldn’t she be full of sarcasm?
[Picking one out? Mother, why don’t you just go to the children’s section next door and grab whatever? That would suit you better.]
For another example… while they were eating lunch together, she actually copied Finney and started a feeding play with her!
It gave her goosebumps! Under normal circumstances, shouldn’t Kaika avoid the utensils she touched like the plague, her face filled with disgust?
[Mother, could you please not scoop soup for me with a saliva-covered spoon like a barbarian?]
Finally, night fell.
Finney had to leave early due to her official business with the Hero Party, and it was time for Valo and Kaika to head home.
At this moment… her “dutiful daughter” finally showed her fox tail.
“Mother, I have some homework that must be completed in the Clock Tower.”
Passing in front of the Clock Tower’s main spire, the girl suddenly stopped and gave Valo a very polite bow.
“Could you please return to the dormitory first? Please be safe on the way back.”
Kaika was now a rising star in the Clock Tower, her popularity rivaling even that of the Female Hero, Finney.
With such an elite daughter acting like a study-holic, Valo, as the mother, could find no excuse to stop her.
She could only wave goodbye and watch Kaika walk into the Clock Tower under the cover of night.
However, her suspicions regarding Kaika’s recent abnormal behavior now had a focus: today, in particular, Kaika seemed very excited!
It was as if something good was about to happen.
Valo shuddered instinctively in the evening breeze.
All the evidence suggested that Kaika was planning something against her!
Was her daughter so happy because she had already found the perfect place to imprison her mother in a small dark room?
If so, wouldn’t chasing after her now be a suicide mission?
Just as Valo was hesitating, her gaze inadvertently swept across the area and caught sight of a familiar figure.
The person was sneakily hiding in the shadows under a streetlight near the Clock Tower entrance!
The attire of a trainee nun of the Hidden Sea Church and… that white hair with pink highlights?
It was Emma!
This little pink puppy said she would scout for information on the Holy Relics for her, but she hadn’t been seen lately.
Valo had ended up discovering the Holy Relic on her own by accident.
Now, Emma was hanging around the area like a thief. It looked… like she was spying on Kaika’s movements?
Valo frowned, lightened her steps, and quietly approached Emma from behind.
Then, she suddenly spoke!
“Emma? I’ve finally found you.”
“Eek!”
As expected, this little pink dog of the Blood Tribe was hiding something.
She was so startled that the wings representing her Blood Tribe characteristics even sprouted from behind her waist!
“De—Teacher Valo, I’m sorry! I didn’t recognize you just now!”
Emma quickly retracted her wings and turned around in a panic.
Even though the girl was slightly taller than Valo, she forcefully made herself look as though she were cautiously peering up at her.
This reaction, like a puppy who had done something wrong and was afraid of the owner finding out, intensified the suspicion in Valo’s heart.
Thus, she stood firm and asked, “I ordered you to gather information regarding the Holy Relics for me. Why haven’t you come to the Infirmary to report to me?”
Silence fell. The girl from the Blood Tribe timidly lowered her head.
Beside them, the light powered by a magic stone flickered for a moment, perhaps due to its age.
At the same time, Emma forced a smile and replied softly and calmly, “I’m sorry, Teacher Valo. I… I’m too useless. I couldn’t find any clues about the Holy Relics, so I didn’t dare disturb you.”
……
“Forget it, next question.”
Valo waved her hand and continued, “Emma, when you’re usually studying at the Clock Tower, you should occasionally see Kaika, right?”
“Has she shown any strange behavior lately?”
As soon as she finished speaking, the little puppy in front of her blinked her large, watery eyes and shook her head with an innocent and confused expression.
“I don’t know, Teacher Valo.”
“Isn’t Lady Kaika studying normally at the Arcane Society?”
“Uh… Teacher Valo? I—I can ask around for you tomorrow?”
Valo did not immediately respond to Emma’s offer.
Because… it was enough.
In the game’s [Fall of the Country Route], if one chose Emma as the starting daughter, Emma would serve as a trainee nun under a powerful Sister Superior in the Church after the mother and daughter infiltrated the Clock Tower.
Although Emma wasn’t her daughter in reality, her current identity in this sequence shouldn’t have changed.
Therefore, given that Valo had already discovered the Holy Relic this morning, it was impossible for Emma not to know about it!
This little pink puppy was lying!
The reason for the lie was also obvious — after all, Kaika’s behavior had been extremely abnormal these past few days.
Valo’s gaze gradually darkened as she looked at the Blood Tribe girl before her.
Without even needing to put on an act, she simply said in a cold voice, “You don’t know… do you?”
“Emma of the Blood Tribe, is it that you don’t know… or that you don’t dare to speak?”
As the girl in front of her suddenly shuddered, Valo added another sentence: “You gave the information about the Holy Relic only to Kaika, didn’t you?”
The girl’s legs trembled.
She shot Valo a panicked look, then quickly averted her eyes with a guilty conscience and lowered her head.
A moment later, the seemingly terrified Emma shrugged her shoulders and began to confess, her voice wavering with a sob.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Teacher Valo! Actually, I wanted to bring you information about a Holy Relic, but I was cornered by Lady Kaika on my way to the Infirmary, and she took it from me!”
“After she questioned me and got the information, she warned me not to tell you.”
“Waaa… I really didn’t mean it, Teacher Valo!”
The Blood Tribe girl spoke with such distress she was almost in tears, looking like a puppy that had been bullied outside and was crying to its owner for comfort.
But Valo had no time to deal with her now.
This… must be the reason why Kaika had been acting like such a good girl lately, and why she was so excited and happy!
She had intercepted the exact information about the Holy Relic from Emma!
She was keeping it from her mother and preparing to act on her own…
Combined with Kaika’s sudden excuse to part ways tonight for “tutoring” at the Clock Tower.
Valo suddenly clenched her fists.
Kaika had known about that Holy Relic in the Hidden Sea Church’s small chapel for a long time, and tonight, she was going to take advantage of the end of the tour activities to steal it!
This was bad!
Because Kaika’s actions perfectly matched a bad ending in the [Fall of the Country Route] that was essentially a point of no return for the protagonist and Kaika!
In this branch of the route, if the daughter Kaika’s [Blackening Value] remained high and her relationship with the protagonist was poor, Kaika would choose to act on her own and steal the [Holy Relic] in secret!
They were supposed to be under deep cover!
Therefore, if the protagonist did not notice and prevent Kaika’s reckless behavior in time, Kaika’s attempt to steal the Holy Relic would inevitably be exposed, and she would encounter an extremely powerful opponent!
At that point… there were only two endings.
Either Kaika would have an awakening in a life-or-death moment, seize the Holy Relic, and achieve a miraculous counter-kill — as the daughter with the highest cultivation difficulty in [Valorant], Kaika was naturally hard to raise for a reason.
But this was not a good ending.
The Kaika who walked the line between god and demon would never again be the slave-like daughter who could be ordered around at will.
Afterward, the girl would calmly wield her power to seize one Holy Relic after another.
With her strength greatly increased, she would use her identity as the “protagonist’s daughter” to successfully restore the Demon Clan and become the new Demon King.
As for Valo, her mother? Ha… she would naturally enter the [Imprisonment Revenge Ending].
Only one path would remain, with no room for struggle or choice.
She would be imprisoned by her own Demon King daughter, never able to escape Kaika’s control and revenge.
Alternatively… Kaika would be killed by the powerhouse while stealing the Holy Relic because her stats weren’t high enough.
This would drag the protagonist along into an abyss of eternal destruction.
Neither of these two endings was what Valo wanted to see.
The former went without saying, and as for the latter “tragic lovers” ending, even though she knew of some choices to “sell her daughter to save herself”…
She didn’t want to do that at all.
She was just a villainous loli Demon King who wanted to cut ties with her status as Kaika’s mother and live a peaceful, undisturbed life with her rebellious daughter.
She had never thought of actively or indirectly causing Kaika’s death.
Even if the Kaika in this timeline had been raised poorly long ago and hated her mother to death.
Even if her daughter had turned into a “Demon Seed” crawling in the darkness, with a maxed-out Blackening Value and constant Matricide Plots.
But…
Kaika was her daughter, after all.
Whether it was through a computer screen in her previous life.
Or in this reality she was experiencing personally.
When a daughter was no longer just a pile of data made of code that could be restarted with a simple save/load, but had become a living, warm, human being.
Then there had only ever been one choice for Valo.
“Emma, you are to leave the Clock Tower immediately. Act as if we never met tonight.”
Valo calmly gave the order to the Blood Tribe girl.
“Huh? But Teacher Valo…”
“Are you deaf?”
“Eek!”
Emma trembled all over and ran away in a panic.
Valo took a deep breath and walked quickly toward the Clock Tower, which was now shrouded in darkness and silence.
She had to change the upcoming bad ending for this mother and daughter, because a mother cannot run away from the battlefield.
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