I'm the Villain, But the Heroines Keep Choosing Me-Chapter 106: You’d be Dead

The flat refusal clearly surprised them.

"Excuse me?" Veyra’s voice was sharp.

"I said no. My methods are my own business. I don’t submit to invasive magical examination just to satisfy paranoid concerns." Damien’s voice carried quiet steel. "The Emperor trusts me. That should be sufficient."

"The Emperor isn’t infallible," Lieutenant Kross said. "And your refusal to submit to examination is suspicious in itself."

"My refusal to submit to examination is about maintaining autonomy," Damien corrected. "I don’t answer to you, Lieutenant. I answer to the Emperor directly. If he requests magical examination, I’ll consider it. Until then, this conversation is pointless."

"You arrogant – " Sergeant Tyrus started to rise from his seat.

"Sergeant," General Blackthorne’s voice cracked like a whip. "Stand down."

Tyrus subsided, but the hostility remained palpable.

Colonel Venn spoke again, her voice measured. "Lord Valcrest, you must understand the position you’re putting us in. We’re investigating demonic infiltration at the highest levels of imperial government. Then you appear – using dark magic, killing demons with suspicious efficiency, refusing examination. From our perspective, you look like exactly what we’re hunting."

"From my perspective, you look like imperial mages wasting time on internal witch hunts instead of focusing on actual threats," Damien replied. "But I’m not questioning your loyalty, am I?"

"You’re not in a position to question anything," Captain Veyra said coldly. "We’re Imperial Guard. We’ve served the Empire for decades. You’re a minor noble from a backwater kingdom who showed up last week with convenient shadow powers."

"And yet the Emperor trusts me more than he trusts his own guard," Damien observed. "Interesting, isn’t it? Makes you wonder what that says about imperial institutional reliability."

The room went very quiet.

"Careful, Lord Valcrest," General Blackthorne said softly. "You’re in a room full of people who could make your life very difficult."

"Are you threatening me, General?" 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

"I’m advising you. There’s a difference." The General’s expression was unreadable. "You’re protected by imperial authority, yes. But that protection has limits. Push too hard, insult the wrong people, and you’ll find those limits very quickly."

Damien considered pointing out that this entire meeting was an exercise in imperial forces pushing him. Decided against it.

"Is there anything else?" he asked instead. "Actual intelligence to discuss? Operational planning? Or are we done with the interrogation you’ve disguised as debriefing?"

"We’re done," General Blackthorne said, standing. "For now. But Lord Valcrest – expect more scrutiny going forward. Your methods may be effective, but they make people nervous. Nervous people make bad decisions."

"I’ll keep that in mind."

Damien stood as well, preparing to leave. The three Imperial Guard mages watched him with expressions that promised this wasn’t over.

As he reached the door, Lieutenant Kross spoke one last time.

"Just so we’re clear, Lord Valcrest – if we find out you are like them, if we discover you’re corrupted or compromised or working with the demons..." His voice was flat, cold. "We won’t spare you. Or those women you came with."

The threat hung in the air.

Damien stopped. Turned slowly.

The shadows in the room seemed to deepen, though no light source changed. When he spoke, his voice carried the absolute certainty of someone stating simple fact.

"No."

Lieutenant Kross blinked. "No?"

"No. If I was one of the demons, you’d be dead. The lot of you." Damien’s eyes were completely calm. "I wouldn’t need to spare you because you’d never have the opportunity to threaten me in the first place. Your corpses would be decorating this conference room before you finished that sentence."

The temperature dropped further. Captain Veyra’s hand moved toward her weapon.

"And if you keep making foolish threats – " Damien continued, his tone conversational, " – I’d have no choice but to demonstrate precisely how incapable you are of carrying them out. Not because I’m a demon. Just because I’m significantly more dangerous than you’ve accounted for."

Silence.

No one moved. The Imperial Guard mages stared at him with expressions caught between rage and something that might have been fear. General Blackthorne’s hand was on his sword hilt, though he hadn’t drawn.

Damien smiled – polite, professional, completely unthreatening.

"Well then, if you’d excuse me. I have an investigation to conduct."

He left the room without looking back, walking with unhurried confidence through the corridors of military headquarters. No one tried to stop him.

---

Outside, the afternoon sun felt too bright after the oppressive atmosphere of that conference room.

Damien walked through the military district with his mind racing. The imperial mages’ hostility was expected – shadow magic always provoked that reaction – they didn’t understand it, and people feared what they don’t understand.

But the depth of their suspicion, the willingness to threaten his anchors, the barely concealed desire to find any excuse to eliminate him...

That spoke to something more than normal paranoia about dark magic.

The Archdemon’s words echoed: *The infiltration is extremely deep.*

How deep? Deep enough that Imperial Guard mages were compromised? Or just deep enough that everyone was suspicious of everyone else, creating the paranoia and division that helped demon infiltrators operate?

Either way, it meant his investigation couldn’t rely on official channels.

The conspiracy had either corrupted imperial institutions or so thoroughly poisoned trust that legitimate forces were attacking each other instead of the real enemy.

He needed information. Real information, not filtered through official reports and political considerations.

Which meant operating outside official channels entirely.

Damien waited until evening, until the city’s character shifted from imperial efficiency to something more organic and chaotic. Then he changed into nondescript dark clothing, covered his face with a simple cloth mask, and became what the shadows had been training him to be.

A hunter in the darkness.

He moved through the city like a ghost – using shadows to mask his presence, to avoid detection, to slip between lit spaces without being seen.

The shadow comprehension gains from last night made it almost effortless. He could feel the darkness responding to his intent, wrapping around him like a cloak.

The taverns were where information flowed most freely. Damien visited five in the River District alone, listening to conversations from shadowed corners, picking up fragments of rumor and fact.

Demon sightings in the eastern territories.