Book 1: Chapter 35: Lisha’s Secret, Past and Present

This was a strange graveyard with only tombstones, each engraved with densely packed with various different scripts. Apart from the tombstones, there were only a special wooden crate with a large lock behind each tombstone.

Facing of one of these tombstones, two figures silently stood, seeming to be mourning the tombstone’s owner. One of the figures bent down and placed a bouquet of white lilies in front of the tombstone.

“I’m starting to hate all these reincarnations, Rebecca.”

The female demon king in front of the grave stone had a face of solitude, she was Lisha’s previous incarnation and had removed her fearsome mask. The only thing that this incarnation of Lisha reminded Bella of the Lisha that Bella knew was her figure, there were quite a few differences between the two. If it wasn’t for the same cursed ring around her finger, Bella wouldn’t have been able to confirm that she was indeed one of the previous incarnation of Lisha.

【Demon Dragon Empress】 Medys Alisha, the strongest existence that Bella had seen in this world of Lisha’s memories. Judging by power, Alisha should be stronger than Bella’s twelve demon kings, probably somewhere on the level of Kriss’ dark form.

Alisha was the past incarnation of Lisha, her power was beyond that of most demon kings. Because Alisha had slain too many dragons and had been showered in their blood so often, Alisha had somehow also gained the bloodline of a dragon, as well as her title of 【Demon Dragon Empress】.

Apart from dragons, Alisha had also defeated everyone who had dared to provoke her, regardless if they were gods or heroes, she had never lost a fight. None of the ambitious demon kings who had tried to take her position survived to tell the tale.

It was quite lonely being undefeatable, it was also a shapeless form of torture. Because Alisha had crushed all her opponents, there were eventually no longer anyone willing to challenge her. Because Alisha was a dragon demon that had no limits on lifespan, everytime she destroyed a world she would leave the ‘worthless’ world in tatters and brute force herself into the reincarnation cycle to enter another world before continuing the cycle.

Alisha had already reincarnated into and had destroyed four different worlds, in each reincarnation she would keep all the power of her previous world. In her fourth reincarnation, Alisha met someone that changed her forever.

Looking through the demon marshal Rebecca’s eyes at the tombstone in front of them, Bella knew that the person buried here had a deep relation with Alisha. While Alisha wasn’t willing to mention her name, that optimistic and bright heroine had completely gotten through to the cold heart of the ruthless 【Demon Dragon Empress】.

During Alisha’s fourth incarnation, she had disguised herself and entered the demon king subjugation force of this world out of boredom. During her absence she had let her most loyal subordinate, the one who had followed her through all four incarnations, Rebecca, pretend to be 【Demon Dragon Empress】 in her place.

Later, Alisha met that naive heroine during her time as a member of the world’s allied forces, Rebecca never heard what happened between Alisha and the heroine after. This world’s subjugation force had met the same fate as their predecessors in all of Alisha’s previous incarnations, eradicated by the demon king’s subordinates before they even reached Rebecca, the fake demon king.

Perhaps it was something about the heroine that moved Alisha, who then decided to end her sinful existence after she had destroyed this world. Not long after this trip to the graveyard, Alisha chose use the deceased heroine’s special sword to end herself, forever, as it would even destroy her soul. Leaving everything she had to her most trusted subordinate and friend, Rebecca.

However, Alisha did not truly die. While Rebecca didn’t show her disapproval towards Alisha’s decision, but right before Alisha thrust the blade upon herself, Rebecca had used magic to replace Alisha’s soul with her own temporarily. Meaning that the soul who was destroyed was that of Rebecca, not Alisha.

In her 5th incarnation, Alisha transmigrated to Earth and became an average female office worker. Due to some special circumstances, the power of the 【Demon Dragon Empress】, which had followed her for four reincarnations, had been sealed. On Earth, Alisha had became a completely normal human.

However, the amount of lives that Alisha had taken in her past incarnations were too much. All of their malice had been absorbed by Alisha’s cursed ring. Back when she was 【Demon Dragon Empress】, these malicious spirits were completely unable to do anything to her at all, but now that she was just a normal human, these malicious spirits felt free to harass Alisha at will.

The result of this was that Alisha’s 5th incarnation wasn’t very peaceful. Alisha was surrounded by misfortune and supernatural events, all caused by the malicious spirits who had followed her through multiple incarnations.

This Alisha was just a normal human, not having any memory of her previous life, nor the ability to see the cursed ring on her right hand, she had no idea why all of this was happening to her. After seeking aid from various psychologists and exorcists to no avail, Lisha could no longer bear the torture and chose to drown herself and end her miserable existence.

Alisha’s soul transmigrated once again after the death of her human body, the 【Demon Dragon Empress】 took this opportunity to return during this and possessed to body of Lisha, who had coincidentally also just drowned.

Because when when Lisha had unintentionally killed Rebecca, who was on the level of a high demon king, with the weapon of a hero; due to some unknown regulation, had been assigned to the side of the Saviours as a hero that had slain a demon king.

The current Lisha’s power were the fruits of her own hard work over the past year and a bit. Her ability to use all sorts of magic was granted by the Saviour’s guide of this world. As well has her storage ring of outrageously large storage and the ‘Eye of Treasure’, all of these were given to her by the guide which Lisha had never seen in person.

Bella was suspicious that this mysterious ‘guide’ might be this dimension’s Creator. Bella didn’t know, however, that this world’s Creator had already… there was something off putting about to ‘guide’ who had led Lisha and Kriss, as well as any other Saviours to this world.

Bella hadn’t paid much attention to the discussion between 【Light Creator】 Vianne and the male Creators who had invaded this dimension, causing her to left in the dark on some very important information.

Lisha didn’t use her own ‘cheats’, even though she had regained the memory of her previous incarnations, Lisha considered herself a human from Earth and refused to accept her first four incarnations that were full of sin.

___

Back in the Dark Sanctum, Bella who had returned from the world of Lisha’s memory, looked uneasily at the still sleeping Lisha. Now that Bella knew about Lisha’s past, she was quite surprised to find out that Lisha had been part of the dark side from the very beginning, and one that was almost dark to the core.

This was different from Kriss, who Bella had yet to fully confirm was a transmigrator, while Kriss did have memories of ‘darkening’ and even if she was a demon king it was probably due to some external reason that caused her to do so. Lisha’s past, however, was unable to be explained as anything other than a villain that was evil to the root.

But after experience all of Lisha’s memories, she could tell that Lisha’s sisterly feeling towards Felia were real. Due to her peerless power, Lisha had spent the most of her incarnations in near solitude, there were only three people who she had really accepted and conversed with: The heroine with whom she had travelled with during her 4th incarnation, her loyal subordinate Rebecca who had followed her for four lifetimes, and Felia who was her older sister of this world.

Rebecca was also a demon of few words and didn’t talk much with Lisha. The ones who had truly spoken heart-to-heart with Lisha were the heroine and Felia. Felia also coincidentally happened to be the same class as the heroine, being a knight, so there were some other elements mixed in with Lisha’s feelings towards Felia.

She even had another reason for creating the Anti-Demon Knight corp apart from building merit; Lisha cherished the time that she had spent adventuring with the heroine, back when they had also been part of a large force with the ultimate goal of defeating the demon king, Lisha wanted to relive some of the moments from back then.

The current Lisha had returned to the form of 【Demon Dragon Empress】 ,Alisha, this was something that surprised Bella. Lisha was similar to the current Bella, being a person that took possession of another body and could freely switch between them. Lisha’s true form was 【Demon Dragon Empress】 Alisha while her substitute was the 10th princess of the Octavian Empire(Knights), 【Magic Dragon Knight】 Lisha.

The only difference between Bella and Lisha’s way of changing bodies was that while Bella could freely move around while Felia remained visible to others, meaning both of them could be in this world at the same time While only Alisha or Lisha could appear in the world at one time, with the other probably being in a special dimension akin to limbo. Which meant that if Alisha wanted to return to her human form, she would have to summon Lisha’s body which would swap places with the body of the 【Demon Dragon Empress】.

Even though Bella had seen quite a few beauties, the beauty of Lisha’s true form was something that she had not expected. Even though Bella had already seen her back in the illusory world of memories, Alisha’s beauty was still quite shocking when Bella saw her in the real world. On looks alone, Alisha could probably rank within the top three of all the beauties that Bella had encountered so far.

【Demon Dragon Empress】 Alisha’s hair was a pure black, similar to that of Bella’s true form, her eyes were currently shut but Bella had seen the dark-gold irises back in Lisha’s memories. Alisha’s height wasn’t noticeably different from that of Lisha’s, but the biggest difference were their looks and airs.

While Lisha was quite a beauty normally, her beauty level skyrocketed several levels in her true form, nearing that of Kriss’. As for the airs that Alisha gave off, Bella was able to feel an overbearing dragonic aura, probably due to all the dragons that Alisha had slain. It was fortunate that none of the other three girls in the room were unable to see the current Lisha, remaining in the dark about her secret.

“Where is this? I’m so tired, er, Felia-nee!”

Lisha finally woke from her slumber and wanted to stretch out the kinks in her body but suddenly discovered that her hands had been tied down by what seemed like translucent rope. A gentle breeze blew through the room’s open window and Lisha finally discovered the dilemma that she was in: All of the clothes on her body had disappeared and she had been tied down to a large cross.

What made Lisha more restless was that her true form had been exposed to Felia, she had managed to hide it for the past year without anyone suspecting a thing, she didn’t know what had happened while she was asleep that had made her true form take over.

“Who are you? You’re not Lisha, you vile demon, return my little sister!”

“Felia-nee, it is me, I am Lisha! Can you set me free?”

“You liar, I saw how you hid the real Lisha! On top of that you’re much prettier than Lisha, and your beautiful black hair is completely different from that of Lisha’s!”

Seeing Bella point all of this out as well as taking out Lisha’s cheat equipment, the ‘Eye of Treasure’ and her storage ring; Lisha wanted to make a run for it, but didn’t know that the ‘rope’ holding her down was in fact, the silk of the void monarch Yulysses. Yulysses’ silk had special effects towards dragons and dragonkind, Lisha as the 【Demon Dragon Empress】 had a bit of dragon’s blood running through her veins, meaning that the binding force of the silk was just that much stronger.

“Felia-nee, that is my ring. I am Lisha! Can you let me down first, I can explain.”

“The contents of this ring are indeed that of Lisha’s, but that doesn’t prove that you are the true Lisha. I suspect that you must be a demon that has possessed Lisha’s body, I’m going to ask Irene-nee and ask her for what to do.”

Only now did Lisha discover Irene and Lola were also in the room, while she was curious as to why they both nude as well, but she knew that this was not the time to consider those problems. Her secret was something that she definitely wasn’t going to allow any more people to find out, but now that she was tied down she couldn’t do anything about it, did she have to use the power of the 【Demon Dragon Empress】 to break this stalemate?

“I suggest you stop struggling, Alisha. You won’t have any more chances to transform back to Lisha when Irene and Lola wake up.”

Lisha immediately gave up the thought of using her true power, it was completely unexpected that Bella knew even the name of her true form. Lisha’s thought process had short-circuited and she wasn’t sure what to do, if anything, to get out of this situation.

Bella secretly let out a breath, it was fortunate that her predictions had been correct. Even though Lisha had once been the fearsome 【Demon Dragon Empress】but her most recent incarnation before current was just a normal girl who was terrified by the strange things happening around her. That incarnation had dulled Lisha’s edge, making it so that Lisha didn’t straight up go on a rampage and seal Bella’s mouth by force. If Lisha were to go on a rampage, Bella estimated that it might take the entire force of the Dark Sanctuary to stop her.

“Alisha, let’s talk. I think that there’s certainly a way for us to solve this together, so that we both can get what we want.”

“But you already know my identity…”

“You must have gotten dumber since the last time that I saw you, my little sister, have you forgotten that you’re nee-san is no longer a holy knight? I think that there are quite a few things that us sisters can talk about.”

Seeing Lisha’s inquisitive gaze, Bella knew that she had a shot, now it was up to her ‘persuasive’ ability to see if she could drag Lisha into the neutral side, if not the dark side.

___

The Gabriel Empire’s(Swordsmen) important military town of Sakerid had been quarantined by the empire’s forces with support from the Church of Light. It was the first time that the Church of Light had seen such a strange outbreak of zombies, the first batch of clerics who had arrived on the scene reported that the zombies here were unable to be cleansed using the light-type magic, 《Holy Light》, which had never failed before.

The Holy Pope paid much attention to this strange outbreak, so even though the three cardinals were away from on business, the pope still sent the holy maidens of all three factions to probe the situation.

This time the Church of Light had sent a total of three holy maidens, something that was quite rare even in the long history of the Church of Light. The holy maiden’s sent on the mission were the 1st holy maiden, Elizabeth Sophia of the Micah faction; the 2nd holy maiden, Alicia Hayley of the Alan faction; and the 4th holy maiden, Maria Daisy of the Salo faction. Along with the 3rd holy maiden, Antonia Susan who had been trapped in the quarantine zone, all four of the Church of Light’s holy maidens had assembled.

Apart from the Day of the Holy Spirit each where they would sacrifice animals to the god of light, as well as the pope’s birthday banquet, it was quite rare for all for of the Church’s holy maidens to appear together in public.

“Hayley, you should just leave this to us, the Alan education’s 《Holy Light》isn’t working anyways!”

“Daisy, my good friend Susan is still trapped in the quarantine zone! I’m going to save her, you and the Salo faction should stay out of this!”

“Could the two of you save the arguing for tomorrow? It’s quite tiring rushing here on such short notice, I kind of want to sleep. It’s dawn soon anyways, can’t you guys argue then?”

“This is something between our two factions Sophia, you as a third party should just stay out of it!”

The other members of the Church’s forces didn’t find the arguing between the three holy maidens strange, they even split themselves up into three evenly numbered sides. It was quite evident that the pope had taken the relationship between the three factions into account nd had sent an even number of people from each faction, that way they wouldn’t be so eager to break out into fighting.

The Gabriel empire’s royal guard had formed up behind the members of the Church of Light. Their main goal this time was to rescue Kriss, the empire’s 1st princess, they chose not to interfere with the Church of Light’s domestic affairs.

The commander of the royal guards was one of the empire’s three marshals, marshal Klemans. He was unable to understand as to why Kriss had not yet cut a path through the horde yet, he had personally witnessed Kriss’ abilities and it shouldn’t be hard for her to escape this situation. Had she been infected and became just another zombie?

That would be quite bad as the emperor had personally ordered him to rescue Kriss at all costs, because she was an important bargaining chip that he owned that he could use for political advantage. It could be said that the emperor had committed the royal guard to saving Kriss only because he didn’t want to lose such a valuable asset of his.

Klemans’ guess was close, Kriss had in fact been stopped from escaping due to the outbreak. But not because she had been infected by the virus, Kriss couldn’t leave because she didn’t want to have the awkward experience of cutting a path through a zombie horde completely naked.

ALISHA(Lisha)

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