She blinks at me. New, fresh tears stream down her face. “P—please, spare him—”

“Okay, see, that’s question one,” I say, holding up my index finger. “Why are you calling this dumb inanimate arboreal nitwit a he? What’s up with that? Are you dumb or did you just not pay attention in tree class?”

She squeezes her eyes shut before slowly opening them again. Since she doesn’t seem especially willing to answer, I point my clawed index finger at the patch of bark right next to her head, and in one swift movement, I stab my finger into the wood down to the second knuckle.

Stab Lv.2>

Eww, it’s all warm inside! Gross. I pull out my finger and find it broken and slightly mangled, but that’s an easy fix. Sticking it into my mouth, I bite it off fully and swallow it down. The whole thing took less than five seconds, and by the end of it, when I turn my attention back to Lilette, she makes a sound I wouldn’t be surprised to hear coming from a startled rabbit.

“H—he’s—Petyr, he’s—um…” Her eyes frantically move from the blood-spurting hole beside her head to my bleeding hand to the blood-stained ground and then back up to my face. Ah, she’s crying again. It’s starting to annoy me for some reason. But before I can tell her not to, she swallows down a lump and says, “Two years ago, I and Petyr had recently been betrothed to each other. As part of our vows, we made a prayer to the God of Attachment, but… But the witch of ash must have heard us.”

Suddenly, her face perks up and she looks at me with such fierceness that I almost do a double-take. “She’s a jealous witch! She heard our love, and she despised us for it, as she has despised every unhappy inhabitant of these horrid woods. So, she transformed us. With a cruel spell, she turned Petyr into a twisted tree capable of feeling only pain, and me, into a horrible harpy, who can feed on nothing but flesh and blood!”

Transformed? “What were you before?”

“Before?...” Her brows furrow at me. “Why, of course, we were normal goblins. Though, at the time, we could not be thankful for this, and like all others, we foolishly cursed the God of Goblins! Ah, now, as I love, I understand why He should choose to love the Goddess of Dragons, even though our kind are mortal enemies!”

“Okay, so, to recap… You used to be goblins, and then an evil witch transformed you into harpies and trees.”

She scoffs self-derogatorily. “When you put it like that, it almost sounds like a fairy tale. Then again, in a sense, that’s what it used to be. There’s a story about these woods. An army heading to the nearby kingdom of Ret’inn stopped to rest here, not knowing that a witch had made her tower here, and when she heard them lamenting over how they missed their lovers from back home, she decided to curse them for… I can’t remember if it was that she was jealous or that she despised their lack of patriotism, but now that I’m here, I believe it was mere petty jealousy.” Her eyes turn muddy with memories. Then, she looks up at me. “But what are you? Why have you foolishly entered these woods?”

I purse my lips at her. “So you don’t have any idea about the fact that you’re in a floor?”

Her face twists in confusion. “A… floor?” She looks down at the ground. “No, I’m not… Why would I be in…?”

Hm. Pointing to the ground, I say, “This is the thirteenth floor in the tutorial. I’m here to beat the floor by going over to that tower you talked about and then probably kill the witch.”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

Her face lights up in hope and her lower lip begins to tremble. “R—really? Is that true? Have you truly come to save us all, to undo this horrible curse of bitter jealousy? Please, let me help you! Without my wings, I may not be able to fly, but I will do anything to see that horrible witch killed! I could ask for nothing m—”

Casually, I reach out my hand and grip her throat, squeezing it just enough to silence her. She gacks and gags for a few seconds, but just one starn look is enough to quiet her down. “Listen, that’s a very sweet thing to offer and all, but I’m trying to completely clear the floor, right? You’re not familiar with gamer terms so I guess that doesn’t mean all that much to you, but it basically means that I’ve gotta defeat all the enemies that come my way.”

“E—enemies?” she chokes out.

“Yeah, enemies. So, basically, anything that’s got a level is an enemy and needs to die, hopefully by my hand.”

She seems like she wants to say something, and since I’m such a lovely, merciful guy, I release my chokehold on her just slightly to let her speak. “Wh—what do you mean by level?...”

I blink at her. Huh. I… hadn’t thought about that. “You can’t…?” I point to the space above my head, where she should realistically see my level and race. “Can you not see levels? Don’t you have a system?”

“I—I don’t understand what—” Since I don’t need to hear any more on that, I squeeze her throat shut again. Hm, interesting. So, only the challengers have a system and can see levels? Interesting. And, to make things even more interesting, not every enemy I meet knows that they’re even in the tutorial to begin with. The shades know, and so did the gorgons, but I doubt the goblins on the third floor knew that.

So, what decides it?

I look back at Lilette to find her face turning a strange shade of blue and her eyes bugging out weirdly. Oh, right, I’m choking her. Letting up on my grip a little, she draws in a large, rasping breath, her eyes returning to their normal state. “Haah, haah, haah…” she pants. After a second or so, her eyes widen just slightly, and with mechanical movements, she turns to look at me. “D—do I have a level...?”

“Yup,” I reply simply. “Level forty-one.”

From being deep green due to the strangulation, her face almost instantly turns pale. It’s an interesting turn, and just for the sake of it, I try strangling her for a minute or so to make her face dark green again, but then when I undo it she doesn’t turn pale again. Shame.

With my grip released, she speaks again, her voice hoarse and raspy, “D—does… Does Petyr… have a level?...”

“Uhh,” I say. Arching my neck, I look at the tree.

Weird, I don’t even get a pop-up for it. That would almost suggest that it isn’t even alive anymore, but I can’t know that for sure, so, eh. “Nope, no level.”

The words bring surprising relief to her as she gives a long sigh, but it was apparently too much on her sore throat, as she begins coughing and gasping. After a few seconds, she’s able to pull herself together enough to speak, her eyes filling up with tears again. “Oh, thank the Gods, thank Them all… In that case—”

“Ah, but I’ll still probably kill them, ‘cause this whole area is pretty big, so if I can’t kill all the harpies by the end of this attempt, I’ll probably have to set a fire and try to take them out like that, which wouldn’t be very good since I don’t get as much exp from second-hand kills, but I still gotta do it ‘cause otherwise I won’t completely clear it.” I look down at her. “You understand, right?”

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a face show even a single fraction of the despair that I now see on Lilette’s face. It’s a marvel, really, but I don’t have time to fully absorb it before she snarls like a beast, her eyes flashing, and her clawed feet shoot up to gouge a massive slash along the side of my face. However, on account of her wings being crippled, this desperate attack only sends her flying to the ground, her ferocious talons losing power halfway through my face and therefore unable to cause any lasting damage. Since she’s already presented her legs to me, it takes barely any effort for me to just grab them out of the air, leaving her upper body to dangle mere inches above the ground.

“R—release me, you damned beas—”

Since she’s asking so nicely for it, I break both of her legs before letting her down. Hissing in pain, she squirms on the ground. I stomp my foot onto her exposed chest if only to keep her from uselessly writhing any more than she already is. A rib or two crack beneath my foot and she jerks in pain. “You done with your temper tantrum?” I ask, looking down at her.

Her eyes bore into me, burning with tears. “You’re a monster,” she snarls. “You’re worse than a dragon. A dragon at least kills quickly. Their teeth bite down and then you’re gone, but you…!” She grinds her teeth. “I don’t care if you were sent by the Gods Themselves. Whatever it is that you are, you are worse than the witch. She acts on emotion. Emotion, I understand. But you…!” Her face twists in disgust. “You’re below that. You’re a monster! A demon.”

Derecho. That was the goblin word for demon, wasn’t it?

I look down at her. At her bald head and her green skin and her yellow eyes. “I—I’m not a demon,” I say faintly. “I’m just following the floor clear requirements. It’s not like I have a choice, so…”

She glares up at me with eyes of yellow fire.

—So stop looking at me like that. Like I’m just doing this for fun. Like I want to hurt you. Like I don’t care. Like the city didn’t need to burn. Like I had a choice in any of this. Like I really am a demon.

Like I’m not your friend.