Apotheosis of a Demon - A Monster Evolution Story

Chapter 10

I detected a few magical signals approaching the small elven settlement, most likely humans. Combined with the word 'slave hunters' I heard, I had a bad feeling about this.

I headed towards them. An hour later at normal walking speed, I saw nine humans.

They... probably weren't beta players.

Dirty, unkempt looks, ratty leather coats. Unlike the players I met before, they weren't paying much attention to their appearance. Of course, they might be players roleplaying as bandits, but I doubted that. It had only been 10 days since the game started. I didn't think those kind of roleplayers would show up so soon.

I got as close as I dare, to take a closer look on their equipment.

They had more handaxes and bows than swords, plus plenty of ropes on their belts. Only one looked like a magician. That one was fiddling with a choker.

...that was way more evidence than I ever asked for.

Let's assume they were truly slave hunters.

If this game event happened due to the kid's talk about slave hunters, then their target must be the elven settlement.

Maybe they were a group of simple animal hunters making a living. The ropes were to capture large animals like deers, the magician was fiddling with that choker because he was bored... yeah, I know, that was a stretch even by my standard.

So then, what do I do?

My original goal was to gain strength and survive until the end of the alpha test, for ten years of life and a new identity.

The experiment's goal was to investigate the mental stress of the 'disconnect' born from using a monster avatar extremely different from the human body. There was no need for me to clear the game.

Being slaves did not necessarily mean being mistreated. The elven villagers were just NPCs, there was no need for me to care...

Sorry, I lied. I cared a ton.

I might have become a lot more apathetic to sapient life ever since my mental health started plummeting, but I had met this boy. I'd talked to him. I couldn't let anything bad happen to him.

There were two choices here.

One, I warn the village of the danger... if only I could speak. I could try to threaten them, but what if their programming didn't allow them to run? Then I'd be their enemy.

Two, I deal with these people before they could find the settlement... well, they wouldn't be here if they didn't know where it was already. Before they could approach the settlement, then.

I couldn't just chase them away. I needed to make sure they never come back.

I didn't know if I could even win here, though.

Unsurprisingly, they were weaker than beta players. But they still had around the same power as a black caterpillar, plus human intelligence and magic. They weren't exactly easy opponents. Intelligence was what allows one to defeat more powerful enemies, and was the reason why humans were so scary. Yet that was still no reason for me to retreat here.

...but what if they weren't actually slave hunters? As soft as I was, I couldn't act until I was 100% sure. I made plans to confirm.

First off, I used [Human Form (Terrible)] – a skill in name only, as what should have been processed by the system was all offloaded to my brain – to turn humanoid, then wore the cloak.

I approached, then stopped hiding myself when I was close enough and started walking towards them, taking several seconds for a single step.

The day was nearly over. I supposed the (probable) slave hunters were planning on making camp until morning.