My Dad Is a Popular Villain in a Comic Book - Chapter 20.3

Padma, back in human form, calmly cooked his own flesh and blood, turning them into various delicious dishes filled with lethal poison.

Before the banquet began, he hummed a little tune and served the dishes mixed with monster blood to the priest who had been hired to cure the poison. Seeing that greedy, complicit priest die from the poison and unable to cure himself, Padma smiled and closed the priest’s bedroom door.

The grand banquet began.

The guests enjoyed the fresh monster meat, discussing how worthwhile it was to catch such a top-tier delicacy with just a slave’s child, sharing their experiences, and showering Padma with praise. As they were wined and dined, one guest’s face suddenly grew long hair, their eyes rolling back, and they rampaged into the dining table like an ox.

The surrounding guests burst into laughter; this was a sign of the toxicity taking effect after eating the monster meat. They didn’t take it to heart, for they knew the pre-arranged priest would cure their poison; instead, they found such a thrill in the risk of eating poison to grow non-human parts.

“Go call the priest.” The Earl said to Padma.

Padma left the dining room for a moment, and by the time he returned, three more guests had mutated. He approached the Earl, who was also starting to mutate, and under the other’s hopeful gaze, he bent over and said with regret: “Earl, I’m sorry, the priest has mistakenly eaten the monster meat and died from the poison.”

The Earl’s expression turned instantly terrified, but his throat could no longer make human sounds. Before the Earl’s consciousness was completely extinguished, Padma asked silently: “Are you satisfied with my cooking?”

The Earl’s eyes revealed a sudden realization and endless resentment. The guests on the side who were mutating more slowly heard that the priest had died, and their laughter ceased abruptly; for a time, despairing screams and angry curses echoed through the dining room. But soon, the dining room was left with only a group of non-human monsters, along with various sounds of attacking, destruction, and scuffling.

After that, there was no sound left from these monsters either.

Padma left with satisfaction.

In a good mood, he had a strange dream that night. When he realized that the texture of this dream was unusual and extraordinarily realistic, he immediately thought of Emerald’s description.

The “him” in the dream seemed to have committed too many crimes and had been discovered by the Temple’s forces, being hunted down by multiple Temple factions. Even with regeneration capabilities, blood would still flow just the same; the pink fox had turned into a matted, bloody fox.

Padma had long expected this and wasn’t surprised. The “he” in the dream was obviously well-prepared, having ducked directly into a semi-abandoned castle, having long since obtained a false identity and prepared a safe house.

[Fox]’s sense of smell was keen; as soon as he entered the safe house, he detected the presence of demonic energy and humans.

[Fox] looked at the uninvited guests, and one of them was his friend [Emerald Green Snake].

He glanced at the [white-haired boy] beside him, his irritable eyes stained with rage: [You actually brought a human to my place!]

[He’s not a human… at least, not necessarily a human.] [Emerald Green Snake] hurried to explain the cause and effect to him.

Despite this, [Fox] remained suspicious, scolding him for being an idiot.

The [white-haired boy] saw his fur matted with blood, as well as some healing wounds, and squatted down to ask cautiously: “May I help you treat your wounds?”

[Fox] had no fondness for humans, sneering: “Don’t you see I have regeneration capabilities? These injuries will be fine in a while.”

“Even with regeneration capabilities, it must still hurt, right?”

Under the repeated assurances of [Emerald Green Snake], [Fox] reluctantly allowed the other to approach him.

The [white-haired boy] condensed water elements, heated the water with fire elements, and after adjusting it to the right temperature, used a small water ball to clean his wounds.

[White-haired boy] looked ashamed: “Sorry, I haven’t learned magic, I don’t know how to use healing magic, so I can only do it slowly like this.”

[Fox] studied him: “I have indeed never seen a human use magic this way; they always have to chant for a long time.”

“This is something I researched myself when I was bored.”

After cleaning one part, he also used fire and wind to form warm air, gently blowing the wet fur dry and helping him comb it. Before he knew it, [Fox] was already lying comfortably on his lap. Not long after, [Fox] had turned into a clean, beautiful pink fox with fluffy, soft fur, having also listened to [Emerald Green Snake]’s long-winded introduction.

Degenerate!

Padma outside the dream ridiculed himself mercilessly, a subtle sense of jealousy in his heart. However, compared to Emerald’s retelling, which was filled with intense subjective emotions, Padma, who had seen the dream with his own eyes, noticed something.

The [white-haired boy] was clearly very knowledgeable about the cause of the monster curse and understood that everything was the work of the gods. This was clearly told to him by a monster. But the problem lay right there all monsters were cursed by the gods and could not convey the truth to humans in any form, so how did this human know?

Either another human knew this and relayed it in some way, or this dream was concocted by some monster and thus contained loopholes, or… this youth was simply not human at all. He wasn’t like Emerald, who, upon hearing the other could speak the Monster Tongue, rushed to recognize him as a monster, but this suspicious point did indeed lead him to believe that the [white-haired boy] might not be human.

In the dream, [Fox] also seemed to have thought of this, looking at the [white-haired boy] with a thoughtful expression. Because his thoughts drifted, by the time [Fox] recovered, he found the [white-haired boy] had flipped him over, face-up, and was cleaning the fur on his paws, pads, and belly.

Having his belly gently rubbed by someone, [Fox] instantly bristled and jumped away.

The [white-haired boy] looked blank and at a loss.

[That’s enough.] [Fox] changed the subject as if nothing had happened, his gaze shifting to the scar on the other’s arm, and asked the question that Padma outside the dream also wanted to ask.

[Do you not hate monsters?]

[You were imprisoned by monsters, kept as a blood slave, deprived of daylight, they hurt your body, they took your blood do you not hate monsters?]

The [white-haired boy] lowered his eyes, looking at the wounds on his hands.

“Father said this was done for my sake, and for everyone else’s, and isn’t bloodletting therapy also popular among humans? I saw it in a book in the manor.”

[Fox] pierced through his thoughts.

[Bloodletting therapy is only used when sick. Since you are not sick and have been bled again and again for monsters to drink do you truly not hate them?]

On the [white-haired boy]’s arms, besides the traces left by bloodletting, there were also tooth marks left by some unknown monster, likely because it was in a rush to drink blood and couldn’t wait to bite down after all, monsters never needed to care about the opinions of a blood slave. Or perhaps it was a brutal, out-of-control monster that intended to swallow him and bit down in a fit of rage.

Facing the fear of death, [Fox] didn’t believe he was indifferent. Even if it were self-deception, it was still built on the foundation of knowing the truth and escaping reality. At least [Fox], who was coveted by humans for his flesh and fur, could not show true gentleness to humans; even if he was smiling on the face, inside he was filled with disgust, thinking only of having the other party die. Only when humans died full of resentment and terror was his smile real.

Judging others by himself, he didn’t believe the gentleness the [white-haired boy] had shown him as a monster just now.

“I…” The [white-haired boy] opened his mouth slowly, “I am afraid of pain, and I have no trust in bloodletting therapy, and I am also afraid when I encounter brutal monsters, so at the very beginning, I also wondered in my heart, ‘Why me?'”

“But when I had suffered many injuries, when I saw my blood could make them calm down, my thoughts gradually changed.”

“I thought, thankfully it was me.”

“Because I did this, there won’t be another child in the world locked up and facing monsters. Because I have blood that can restore reason to monsters, I can indirectly save more lives. I only need to give a little blood, only need to hurt a little from small wounds, to save so many people, to make it possible for humans and a portion of monsters to live in peace, and to receive Father’s love—isn’t this a very good deal?”

He tilted his head and smiled, his crimson eyes full of sincerity.

“Father also said these scars are my merit. If you need my blood, please don’t hesitate to tell me—this is the only useful part of me, and I am very happy to be liked by everyone.”

Because of his words, [Fox] suddenly bristled.

This youth really didn’t hate monsters even a little bit.

This crazy way of thinking made him hard to understand.

Is this a little lunatic?

And outside the dream, Padma finally understood why this child could even be called an idiot by the idiot Emerald.

In the dream, [Fox] also harbored similar thoughts. Although he couldn’t understand the other party’s thinking, he wasn’t as guarded against them anymore. After all, it was pointless to be guarded against an idiot.

After listening to the cause and effect of the human and the snake, [Fox] turned into human form and led them to the castle’s study. This castle originally belonged to a noble scholar, and it contained quite a few books; to call it a study, it was actually no different from a library.

The [white-haired boy] thanked him happily and threw himself into the ocean of books. [Emerald Green Snake] tried to flip through a book, found he couldn’t understand the characters on it at all, and drifted off to sleep, dizzy.

They lived in the castle for quite a while. One day, [Fox] walked in with black tea and refreshments, flipped through a book to help them look, and noticed the [white-haired boy] beaming with joy, so he asked: “Did you find any clues?”

“Mm!” The [white-haired boy] nodded forcefully, pointing to the Misc. Notes of a Bard in his hands, “This bard was a priest in the Temple of Love. In his poems, when citing allusions, he mentioned a story about the gods conspiring to murder the Goddess of Love with the God-Slaying Spear, but I have never seen a similar allusion recorded in any other faith.”

“Perhaps it is a record only the victims have. I don’t know if it is true or false.” He mused, puzzled, “The allusion doesn’t mention why the gods wanted to murder the Goddess of Love at all; that is very strange.”

“The gods all have rather distinct personalities; in stories of past conflicts between gods, it was usually one-on-one. This is the first time I’ve heard of gods conspiring against a god, and among them were quite a few of the Goddess of Love’s past lovers. If this isn’t a forgery, there is very likely some unspeakable inside story.”

“And the allusion didn’t say how the Goddess of Love survived under the God-Slaying Spear either.”

[Fox] asked: “Are you going to look in this direction next?”

[White-haired boy] nodded: “This is the only content related to god-slaying that can be found at the moment. I want to go to the Temple of Love and investigate personally. Besides this, there are two other things.”

[Emerald Green Snake] asked: [What other things?]

[White-haired boy] said: “One is that I want to look into Zeman, the Saint of the Temple of the Sun who went missing six years ago. Almost at the same time he went missing, the old Pope also died, which is very unusual. Since Zeman was the strongest human, how could he have gone missing so inexplicably? The Saint and the Pope these two figures who met with accidents have identities that are too unique and closely related to the gods. There must be something wrong with it.”

“On the way to the Temple of Love, I will happen to pass through the City of Thorns; I want to investigate it on the way.”

[Emerald Green Snake] was puzzled: [Isn’t everyone saying the Demon Dragon of World-Destruction did it?]

“That is my second purpose. If the Demon Dragon could kill even the strongest human and the old Pope, then he must be very powerful. If we are really to slay a god, I’m afraid we will need his help.”

[White-haired boy] closed the book, eyes shining with expectation.

“I want to go see him and ask him to be our companion.”

[Fox] asked him: “How do you intend to persuade him? I have also heard of some monsters who tried to win him over, all of whom were destroyed by him. He’s not a guy with a good temper. Even if all monsters loathe the gods, he may not necessarily trust you or follow your goal.”

[White-haired boy] laughed.

“Don’t I still have something on me that monsters like? He has always lived in seclusion, and I think he actually doesn’t want to hurt humans.”

“I can give him all my blood.”

He had one other reason for going to see the Demon Dragon that he hadn’t said—that was a little secret selfishness of his.

—He liked dragons.