Ch.201Putri’s Stage (5)

# 201. Putri’s Stage (5)

The Assassin Lesar Persuasion Route.

Strictly speaking, I wasn’t the first to achieve this accomplishment (though I did get it almost simultaneously). But I was the first to spread the strategy.

Make sure your body and clothes are as clean as possible to maximize cleanliness.

Wear clothes with some “exposure” that reveal skin in a precarious way (once each for top and bottom).

Have a slightly flushed face with a bit of sweat.

Meet Lesar while fulfilling these three conditions.

This was the first step to successful persuasion.

Currently, Snow White had the body of a girl who wasn’t a child but not quite an adult. That’s why users sometimes referred to Lesar as “that ambiguous bastard.”

Considering the standard of the famous “jailbait” meme, and that this was set in a real medieval era where women were called spinsters if they weren’t married by their early twenties… Snow White could be described as a beauty positioned at the exquisite point between pedophilia and jailbait. Exactly Lesar’s type!

The setting even established that Lesar hadn’t realized his own preferences until he saw Snow White in an alluring state.

So the moment he witnessed Snow White meeting these conditions, Lesar—a skilled professional personally appointed by the stepmother who wielded enough power to control the kingdom—would fall head over heels.

The problem was that I had to do this myself.

Of course, from my perspective, there wouldn’t be any truly fucked-up scenes requiring an R-rating. Snow White was clearly the heroine of the story, and if she were to suffer “that kind of thing” from a mid-boss like Lesar, the genre would shift from dark fairy tale to NTR.

It was just a matter of “persuading” him while dressed and posed in a very embarrassing way.

“…This is seriously fucked up.”

Even knowing all this, having to persuade a man by showing myself like this felt really unpleasant, but what could I do?

No.

Thinking about it, this was a hundred, no, a thousand times better than having one of my women play the role of Snow White.

Then I would have felt like I was being NTR’d.

‘Right. Being TS’d is better than being NTR’d… I guess?’

What kind of no-win balance game was this?

Putri was just an absolute fucking bastard.

That dog. That devil.

**

“But you know. Eventually Snow White meets the seven dwarfs, right?”

“Yeah.”

“So wouldn’t the fake dwarf be the one who overlaps with someone when we get there?”

It was time to write individual answer sheets for the second mutual hearing. That’s when the dwarf calling herself Soyoo raised her question.

“Logically speaking, you’re right, sis. But you’ve played through this before, so you know what happens if we meet Snow White without identifying the fake.”

The fake dwarf and Snow White.

The fake dwarf was essentially Snow White’s mental doppelgänger, and if the two met, the game would end right there.

After the unpleasant “BAD ENDING” message appeared, a brief cutscene suggested that the minds of the fake dwarf and Snow White would switch places.

It was a short but intense bad ending, memorable enough that everyone in the raid team remembered that cutscene.

“You should abandon any thought that things might be different from the game and that we can approach this with common sense. Remember. That’s Putri we’re talking about.”

“Sigh. I know. I was just saying it because I felt frustrated.”

The dwarf calling herself Subin remained cool and collected. The one calling herself Soyoo felt reassured, but her anxiety hadn’t completely disappeared.

What if that dwarf was actually the fake?

Once doubt takes root, it’s not easily suppressed. Add to that self-blame and self-loathing.

Even though this was a stage created by a devil, it was unbearably frustrating to be in a situation where you had to suspect people you’d known for a long time because you couldn’t find a way to properly distinguish them.

Seeing even Yuri, who usually made jokes and sexual innuendos, now writing her answer sheet with an extremely serious face, everyone probably felt more or less the same way.

“But if we find the fake.”

“You know what we have to do. Kill them.”

“…Will things go back to normal?”

“Let’s think about that when the time comes.”

In the game, you have to kill the fake dwarf you’ve identified. When you kill them, only the fake’s mind dies and disappears, and the real dwarf’s mind—with just a short period of memory loss, as if they blacked out—comes back and revives.

It’s not like exposing the fake will make them go, “Oh no! I’ve been found out! I’m too ashamed to stay!” and commit suicide or leave, so killing is the only option…

But what if they’re not the fake?

What if they are the fake and we kill them, but the original body dies too?

If we assume this is Putri’s trap, we should minimize such doubts. But that wasn’t easy.

Especially after the first mutual hearing ended in failure.

So the seven dwarfs, each with complicated feelings, wrote their answer sheets even more meticulously than before.

**

“Lesar.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“Do you know why I called you?”

“For a huntsman like me to be secretly summoned by the Queen, there can only be one reason.”

In the dead of night.

After confirming Snow White’s existence through the magic mirror and feeling unbearable rage, the beautiful “stepmother” was a woman of remarkable initiative.

The problem was her thought process: someone prettier than her perfect self? Then she should be killed and removed. But no one present could point out this issue.

She had summoned Lesar, the most skilled person she knew, and he had arrived already thinking he’d be disposing of another corpse today, kneeling on one knee before the Queen without much thought.

“I like how quickly you understand. This is another very simple request. Just hunting one person, that’s all.”

“I need information about the target, Your Majesty.”

“Ah, yes. Even an excellent hunter needs information about the prey… hehehe.”

The Queen laughed wickedly. Lesar thought it fortunate that he was keeping his head bowed. Even for someone who had hunted countless beasts and people without discrimination, he had no desire to face the Queen’s inner nature.

“She’s a girl with no special abilities. A desperately poor girl at that. A maid will give you a map of where she usually appears when you leave.”

“Is there any other information, Your Majesty, such as her appearance?”

A poor girl with no special abilities. Too vague. How many such girls were there? And considering the Queen’s personality, she probably thought everyone besides herself was poor and ugly…

Lesar barely suppressed a sigh as he waited for the Queen’s answer. But this silence felt ominous.

So despite knowing better, Lesar slightly raised his head, only to see the Queen’s face, colder than ice. Having seen what he shouldn’t have, he immediately bowed his head even deeper than before.

“…Sigh. You’re right. I can’t ask you to hunt without knowing what your prey looks like. I’ll include a rough sketch of her appearance with the map, will that suffice?”

“Of course, Your Majesty. I will handle this perfectly, as always.”

“Good. That’s all I need. Ah, one more thing.”

Whatever had soured the Queen’s mood, the conversation seemed to be concluding well. The Queen would be rid of her annoyance, and Lesar would receive a handsome reward.

But unlike usual, the Queen didn’t end the conversation immediately. Instead, she made Lesar wait a moment before handing him something.

It was an elegant box with an image of a knife piercing the center of a heart.

“Bring me evidence in this.”

“Evidence, you say?”

“The prey’s heart. Cut out her heart and bring it to me in this box.”

What could this girl have possibly done to make the already tyrannical Queen go this far?

Lesar briefly wondered about the prey but quickly dismissed the thought and quietly accepted the box.

Whatever the case, his job was to hunt and receive his reward, nothing more.

“The sooner the better.”

“Understood.”

Lesar quietly vanished from the Queen’s presence. After he disappeared, the Queen once again let out that wicked laugh.

“Hehehe… Yes. This will do. Right?”

“[….]”

“Magic mirror. When can you give another answer that stakes your existence?”

“[At least a few days later.]”

“A few days?”

“[Answers that stake my existence aren’t given lightly. They require energy. You call me a magic mirror, but do you know nothing about how I work?]”

Normally, the stepmother would have been irritated, but she seemed to be in a good mood and just chuckled.

“Fine. Even Lesar will need some time. A few days… I can wait that long.”

Seeing the stepmother laughing to herself in satisfaction, the magic mirror seriously contemplated the definition of “beauty.”

Somehow, it felt that even if that girl died, it could no longer tell this woman she was the most beautiful.