“How did you end up here?” I asked once my sudden rise of emotions seemed to settle.

“Once I entered the dungeon, I appeared lost in the forest. While trying to find my bearings, I stumbled onto a caravan being attacked by demons. I decided to try to help, but halfway through, I realized the caravan was full of the undead! I stabbed a zombie wearing a dress, and suddenly the demons were trying to capture me while calling me princess.

“They said they would take me to their lord, and I thought that perhaps you would be him, so I went with them. Instead, I was attacked by this freak! He said he fell in love with me at first sight. He made me put on these embarrassing clothes. It was then that I realized I lost all of my combat ability. Even then, I was about to escape seriously, but I was hoping to get more information from him before I left.”

“Hmm? Really? Oh… right.”

I was confused until I remembered that I no longer had my blessings and I didn’t have Harem Master or Slave Master equipped. Since I had been on my own, I hadn’t considered that cutting off my jobs would also cut off her jobs. She was back to being just a Paladin. I felt guilty as soon as I realized it. Overall, without my boosts, her combat ability was only okay. Compared to standard riffraff, she was fine, but it wasn’t at a level she could fight armies, especially with her limited attack abilities.

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I considered immediately restoring her abilities, but it would be weakening me to strengthen her. Since there were just the two of us, it didn’t make sense. Instead, I accepted her back in my party.

“We need to escape before they realize we’re here,” I said. “Ah, but I wonder if there is anything we can do about it.”

“About what?”

“The Demon Prince was supposed to arrive and save you from being raped. Then, you were to fall in love with him.”

“Huh? I absolutely wouldn’t!” She said, and then blushed. “B-besides… I already l-l-love…”

“That’s right!” I interrupted her, “You don’t know you’re the princess.”

“Princess? Huh?”

“This dungeon seems to use miasma to infect people with karma,” I explained. “I don’t know much about it. Shao or Astria might be able to explain it better. Simply put, when the princess touched you, she gave you her identity. I don’t think that you chose to be captured just to meet me. You were compelled to be captured because that was the role you needed to play in the dungeon.”

“R-really?”

“So, for some reason, the Prince didn’t show up. Did my actions somehow delay him? In that case, what does my stopping the lord cause? If we take you out of here, how will that disrupt the dungeon’s lore? Where is the Prince? Was he killed?”

“I wasn’t. It just turned out… that I showed up a bit later than expected.” A voice came from the doorway.

The two of us turned to find an unexpected man standing there. It was the Demon Slayer, Bernard!