The girl could not have been unaware of the sword’s purpose.
Nor could she have failed to hear the metallic clang as the blade struck the hard ground.
Humans, lacking both hide and claws, had fashioned weapons and armor in imitation of beasts.
To discard them all was no different from a creature retracting its claws and exposing its vulnerable belly.
Normally, such an act was a sign of submission, but now that Alje had shed her disguise and her clothes had been torn to shreds, leaving her bare.
Licking and pressing one’s flesh against another was an extreme display of affection, reserved only for members of the same pack.
“…Mister…”
Alje whimpered like a child and burrowed into Hans’s chest, much like a baby seeking the warmth of its mother.
Of course, no milk would come from him, but what she truly craved was not nourishment—it was warmth, the embrace of someone who would hold her.
Fortunately, Alje, who was not a monster but a mere girl, was small even by human standards, and Hans, being larger than most, could easily wrap her up in his arms.
She clung so tightly that he could do nothing but accept her affection.
Her little hands clutched at the straps of his armor, pulling insistently.
Seeing her forehead bump against the hardened leather and her face scrunch up in distress, Hans sighed.
In the end, he removed his armor as well.
It was a tedious process since the girl refused to let go, but he somehow managed.
Unlike Alje, however, he was still wearing protective undergarments, meaning he was not entirely exposed.
“Hehe…”
Satisfied at last, the girl let out a foolish giggle and relaxed in his arms.
Her scent was stronger than that of an unwashed, cheap harlot doused in perfume.
But unlike the sickly mix of sweat, bodily fluids, and narcotics that made one nauseous rather than aroused, her scent remained distinct even amid the smell of dirt and blood.
With his thinner clothing, every sensation against his skin was nearly overwhelming.
It was not uncommon for lingering excitement after battle to shift in another direction.
But.
“…”
Hans felt peculiarly calm.
Was it because he prioritized survival over reproduction?
Because the rush of power from the miracle had faded, leaving only exhaustion in its place?
These could all be reasons.
But humans are creatures ruled by what they see.
Hans had witnessed the true form of the shapeshifting monster.
He had seen how it morphed into a human.
The most crucial parts may have been hidden within the rocks, but still.
How could he forget what had just happened before his eyes?
Alje’s mortal wound had only healed after she devoured a monster—a powerful one, no less.
Though partially closed, the wound had not disappeared entirely, making it all the more terrifying in its realism.
Hans had seen countless wounds, had watched people die from them.
He could assess an injury at a glance, though treatment was another matter.
That wound was one no one should have survived.
She should be dead, and yet.
She was moving, so vividly alive.
“Mister, mister, mister…”
The girl’s voice was as clear as the chime of a bell.
The warmth of her body pressing against him was unmistakably that of the living, not the dead.
Drip.
Something trickled down from her body onto his.
Some of it was blood, some of it was tears.
“I… I thought you were going to leave me.”
“…Leave you? What are you talking about?”
Though his response came a beat late, Alje either did not notice or pretended not to, continuing to murmur.
“I thought you’d abandon me, just like the others did. That you’d turn your back on me and stab me with steel, as if we’d never laughed together…”
“Why would I do that?”
Their time together had not been long, not yet, but still.
For the first time, Alje admitted it.
“Because I’m a monster.”
It was a truth everyone knew but had deliberately ignored.
The body pressed against him trembled violently, the shaking so intense that Hans himself felt unsteady.
In her fear, Alje tightened her grip on him.
Her arms were as thin as twigs compared to his muscular frame, yet the sudden surge of strength made it momentarily difficult for him to breathe.
Whether she realized it or not, she showed no intention of letting go.
For a fleeting moment, a strange thought crossed Hans’s mind—was she trying to squeeze him to death?
But Alje had no such intent.
Like a child tasting sweetness for the first time, she was simply overwhelmed by the warmth she had long been deprived of.
“I’m not human. I’m a monster. That’s why I must have ended up in the labyrinth.”
“…”
“Even now… even this form of mine—!”
She started to cry out but swallowed her last words at the last moment, barely restraining herself.
What had she been about to say?
That even now, this was all an act?
That this body was nothing but a stolen shell?
Hans did not know.
His understanding of monsters was straying further and further from the truth.
“Mister… You won’t abandon me, will you?”
Hans said nothing, but Alje acted as if she had heard an answer.
“Yeah, yeah. Of course. You didn’t swing your sword at me when we first met.”
Not even afterward.
In fact, you must have known I was a monster, but you never said anything.
“You pulled me out from where I was trapped, stayed with me even after we got out, worried about me, looked after me…”
Ironically, the emotions Hans was feeling at this moment were tied to the moment he had first met Alje.
Back when he had been dangling from a rope, with a pack of three-eyed hounds above him and a bottomless abyss below.
When, rather than let himself be torn apart by monsters, he had chosen to sever the rope with his own hands, clinging to the dignity of a human being.
Now, once again, Hans stood at a crossroads.
Instead of a rope, a monster’s arm was holding him tightly.
Instead of the abyss, there was the face of a girl so beautiful it seemed to draw him in.
“I even liked it when you scolded me. Because it was for my sake.”
The girl’s murmuring was tinged with an odd, giddy excitement.
Hans once again recalled what he had thought many times before when looking at Alje.
She was too pure.
And deceiving something pure was never difficult.
“No.”
Hans spoke, his voice slow and deliberate.
“Huh?”
“It wasn’t for you. It was for myself.”
A confession, as if he were reluctantly admitting the truth.
“That’s not it, Alje. You’re too naive. The people in the labyrinth—they’re all selfish and conniving. That includes me.”
Taking her in had been nothing more than self-satisfaction.
It wasn’t because of any virtues like morality or altruism from the outside world.
He said it as if making a confession.
But before Hans could demean himself further, Alje’s finger pressed firmly against his lips.
“I understand how the labyrinth works now. I know how awful people can be.”
Her gaze was gentle, almost saintly.
In truth, though she had only been a novice, Alje had never not been a saint.
“You never laid a hand on me. You even tried to be considerate of me.”
Of course, that was only because if Gretel ever caught him with another woman, he’d be burned alive.
If not for that, how could he have possibly kept his composure with someone as beautiful as Alje right in front of him?
“When you were in danger, I ran away.”
“And then… you came back. You waited for a better chance, for the best option available to you. Even after knowing I was a monster… you risked your life for me.”
But Alje, a girl who longed for fairy tales, had already twisted the story to fit her own desires.
The space between them was too close.
If a shapeshifting monster could mimic another being this perfectly, then of course, that imitation would include desire.
She likely didn’t even realize how painfully tight she was holding Hans.
“So I… I also…”
Her whisper was as sweet as a dream.
Her soft, curvaceous body felt like drifting clouds.
The face shining with pure, passionate love was as beautiful as an angel descending to earth.
Everything about her—so overwhelmingly innocent, so desperately longing for him—was too much for someone like him.
Before he could resist or pull away, Hans’s breath was stolen.
To someone else, it might have been the most beautiful, romantic first kiss in the world.
A moment of mistaken certainty that they had finally confirmed each other’s feelings.
The moment when the person who accepted even the monster inside her—the one more wonderful than any prince in a fairy tale—reached out his hand and pulled her from the crevice filled with inedible corpses.
A moment that had led to this, bearing fruit at last.
But to someone for whom this was neither the first time, nor romantic, nor a mistake, nor a moment of acceptance.
It was nothing more than the continuation of that moment hanging at the edge of a cliff, on the verge of death.
The worst experience of his life.