But I refuse! 3 - or 'How I realized I became the MC/Cuck of a RPG game and decided to use all tricks and tools to dodge 'em issues!' (NTRPG Fantasy Games, SmartGamer!SI)

I have to admit I was miffed. Yesterday's little stunt had limited my chances to check if I could truly fast-travel in this new world.

Yet, I would be a liar if I saidy that the encounter I had with these two demonettes was something to truly dislike. After all, the fact I had encountered those two in the forest when there was no clue of this being a thing in the game itself was... interesting. And concerning.

Very concerning.

Rather than play the game of 'Mysterious MC doing some plottin' I have to expand on why this is huge. First thing first, I may have their names, but I learned Merii and Lorem's identities through their titles: they were Demon Princesses. This meant that their father was the previous Demon Lord/Demon King. The figure did appear in the game, but was more of a mindless entity that was brought up as a Trojan Horse.

While the new 'heroes' destroyed the previous Demon Lord, the 'dark party' tried to destroy the king and his clique. The plan was foiled (sadly) and that ultimately led to the Neutral/Bad Ending 1. I didn't get a chance to inquire about their background yet as I focused more on getting back home without disturbing my mother's slumber and then plan a way to keep these two out of sight and... then integrated in the village somehow.

Once the new chief arrived, there was no way she was going to willingly house them. Even if I coerced the two to pass as 'Dragon-Kemonomimi' that would still raise some issues since racism is a thing in most of the country- hence why most of the Kemonomimi were kept into a small village in the hot South-East.

So yeah, I had to find a convincing enough solution that involved the two girls shifting into more humane forms and actually give them homes within the village... when there were just three houses all around. Not exactly a good spot to find myself with, but there was more than just 'plot-development' behind my decision to keep them around.

I... I actually leveled up when I faced just Lorem. She had been at Lv. 5 when she rushed at me, but I got a lot of EXP from merely putting her to sleep.

Blade - Young Assassin
Lv. 16
HP: 1600
SP: 800
ATK: 47
DEF: 45
MAT: 39
MDF: 41
AGI: 99
LUK: 105

And as I was checking my stats, I also realized one thing that wasn't there before (and I am sure that it wasn't there until that day as I had double-checked for it) - I had skills.

Opening the Skill Menu, I was greeted by three peculiar-sounding skills that I should not be able to learn.

Wind Step (50 SP per 5 Min) - Increase your AGI and MDF stats by 25%.
Murderous Intent (50 HP per use) - Restore 25% of your SP.
Silent Shadow (5 SP per 10 Min) - User obtains 'Shadow Stealth' Status which increase Evasion.

Those are Rogue/Thief skills, when I should have been stuck with the Warrior/Hero Class. I can't recall the proper skills' names, but I remember all those being primarily centered around being a mini-tank with fire and water affinities with mana boosts to the sword.

It was clear that my actions in slaying the old man had led to the Class-Change, but I was also perplexed by the utility of those spells and...

How those could actually be used outside of battle.

Proof for this was when I decided to check how quickly I could make it to the former chief's house by activating Wind Step and I was positively delighted by the insane pace I could go for.

I AM SPEEEEEEED!

After that interesting experiment, it was time to finally face the duo. When I entered the manor, I thought that I would have been greeted by an inferno, something demonic in nature, or anything that could attest to Lorem's supposedly chaotic nature.

However, I was pleasantly surprised to find just Merii... using a broomstick to dust the floor. The dark-haired demon girl paused mid-chore, tensing up and giving me another full wide green-eyed glance.

"O-Oh, you are here... with food?" She had said, sniffing the hair and smelling the few berries I brought with me. It wasn't enough to act as a solid meal, but it was all I could snatch from the kitchen without my mother noticing something was missing.

I offered some to the tense girl as we sat by the big table in front of the fireplace, and I was able to glean some good news: Lorem was still asleep since she tended to wake up late. I was confused on how long she had been slumbering, but the more hours I had to brace myself to that sort of brat, the better.

Plus, I could deal with their current situation with Merii without having to get whined over and pushed back by some bratty attitude from the other side. Despite some reluctance, I got the two girls' backstory.

Both were born to the Demon Lord and one of the girls that was part of the original hero party. Merii didn't seem to know much about her mother, but she heard that the woman had been 'glad to leave that disgusting group' and that 'she had been happy to go to live with someone she loved'.

An early assumption that the Demon Lord had NTR'd the Hero was thus pushed aside for now as the rest of the story could be surmised in a few worlds: it was just Merii and Lorem, the old Demon Lord's nobles didn't want to support them and they had resolved to 'become stronger' by hunting the former army leaders of the king's army.

And the plan was-

"Dumb as rocks," I lamented, causing the green-eyed demon to flinch at my brutal honesty. "Like, you are rushing at powerful foes without a plan and-"

"Of higher level."

My smile froze and died as I digested what Merii had just said.

"You... You can see Levels?"

The girl perked up in surprise. "Y-Yes. Mother told us that most of the heroes like her could do that. She said it was something about the 'Player's Legacy'."

I frowned, my brain instantly tying this up to a very familiar isekai situation which involved a game-like setting and 'Players being isekai'd regularly in said world'.

"And you can see mine?"

She nodded. "Level 16," Then she paused and frowned herself. "And you can see ours?"

"Level 5 for Lorem and Level 4 for you."

"So, you are a player too, Blade!"

That was clear to me but... how many people could really have that sort of trait? My mother couldn't see any of the Game stuff- did my father have it so I 'inherited' it? I knew the old fart didn't or he would have noticed the changes to his medicines.

While that may sound like good news to Merii, I felt like this could really lead to some dire scenarios. Specifically, what if a bad guy had this ability too and had min-maxed the shit out of the system? The bad possibilities just left me with a bigger pile of shit to deal with and it forced me to further grow interested in train a lot to fix my paranoia.

"That's the case, yes and-"

"ATTAC-GAH!" Lorem's sneak attack was intercepted by an abrupt elbow move. The girl had it slam on her face right as she tried to rush me from behind, causing her sister to squeak her name and rush to her side.

She was lucky that I hadn't hit her with a well-meaning punch or she would have gone to nap-land once again. Instead her sister healed her while she growled at me.

"Y-You got lucky. Again!"

"You are a brat, and nothing can change that," I replied flatly, causing her to growl, but before she could have done something hasty to mess more with her situation, her sister took hold of her shoulders.

"Lorem, enough! Blade here actually brought us in this place."

Red eyes went wide open as Lorem frowned at me, and then gave a quizzical look to her sister.

"Really?"

"Yes. This was the old house of the village chief and... he is dead."

"Oh." The white-haired girl hummed. "Why is that import-"

"He was also the general we were hunting down."

And her confusion morphed in shock. "WHAT?! How?! Actually, how sure are you that-"

"Your sister saw the grave," I flatly remarked, and Lorem turned her full attention to Merii who nodded at the implied question.

"I-It was right near to wher we encountered Blade."

...

"So, what you're telling me is that the one we came here for died... of what?"

"Heart-related issues," I answered and Lorem turned to look at me with skeptical red eyes. "I may have upped the dosage of his meds and made him die."

...

"What?" "That's awesome!"

Merii looked aghast, while Lorem was clearly delighted by the news.

"W-Wait, why did you do that?"

"He tried to do bad things to my mom after having my father killed," I replied earnestly. "And before you ask for regrets - I have none. The old man was far too bad for this world to keep around any longer."

"Good riddance! And you know what? You ain't that bad."

"...You're still a brat."

"I am not!" Lorem whined back, being a brat.

I sighed. "Still, it doesn't solve anything to lament and do nothing. I am willing to be an ally of yours for the sake of removing the current leadership of the kingdom since it's corrupt, but I want you both to be willing to trust my orders when I give them."

"...Orders?"

I turned to Merii as she had asked the question. "I am not asking you to be my servants, but if we want to cooperate, it is fair to say that we need to form a party, one that has a leader and subordinates to it."

"And why would you be a leader when-"

"Higher level than you, princess."

Lorem scowled at the way I used her title, yet she paused at my choice of words. And then her eyes widened in realization.

"You can see levels too!"

I nodded. "Yes, and I know I am ten levels above you, brat."

The hideous look she adopted was just adorable, but I didn't stop too long in the comedic scene.

"Now, the point I was making is: by the end of the month, I will have you both raised up to around Level 10. Then, after that, I will try to find a way to justify a trip out of town so we can do more grinding to raise that at either 15 or even 20."

"And then?" Lorem inquired, sounding quite childish as it was all a matter of getting stronger and training which seemed to be enough to make her giddy.

"And then same situation: find a tougher dungeon, do more grinding, and do so until we are well above the King's group's level area."

Merii raised her hand.

"Yes?"

"What's 'grinding'?"

I opened my mouth-

"It means training with weak enemies, that's something mom told me about and-"

"And why didn't we do that?!" Merii interrupted her sister, causing Lorem to appear sheepish.

"I-It's kind of lame."

"LOREM!"

I shook my head, knowing that this was just the beginning of more trouble but... I think it was fair to say that having a solid group beside me now was better than going solo. While grinding was fine, some of the tougher enemies required for a large team to be employed to better distribute damage and handle stuff that my class limited- such as healing.

Since Merii was a healer, that shouldn't be a problem and, going by the fact that Lorem started to plot about 'becoming the strongest fire demoness in the land', I had a feeling I had a DPS character in her to rely upon.

With more plans happening, I was blissfully unaware that the plotting I was doing was going to gain the attention of a certain little girl that may or may not have a crush on her only childhood friend.

AN

Next time, Liese's POV and... a secret POV!