Chapter 3: Obtaining the Game Interface

After shutting the door, Xia dropped heavily into a chair.

That chosen heroine was completely unreasonable.

She had firmly decided that he was possessed by the Demon God.

And he had no convenient way to explain himself to Philly.

The moment he showed even the slightest sign that he knew about the Blood Demon God, Philly would immediately send him to the afterlife.

There was no way he could mention his memories from his previous life either.

Philly already didn’t trust him.

If she found out he also had memories from a past life, she would probably think the Demon God had reincarnated too and cut him down on the spot.

Xia himself also wanted to know where the Demon God had gone.

Ever since he fell into the ruins that morning, he had never heard the Demon God’s voice again.

Even after drawing the sword, there had been no reaction whatsoever.

The more he thought about it, the more terrified he became.

Wasn’t a silently vanished Demon God even scarier than one appearing openly?

It was like finding a spider on your head.

The scary part wasn’t the spider itself.

It was the moment the spider suddenly disappeared.

Could it have escaped?

Xia paced around the room while thinking for a long time before ultimately deciding to stop worrying about it.

No matter how much he agonized over it now, it wouldn’t change anything.

And if the Demon God had really escaped, there was no way a weakling like him could capture it anyway.

Right, he still hadn’t properly examined that sword—

No, that wand.

Xia pulled the wand transformed from the sword out from beneath his cloak and carefully inspected it from every angle.

Its length was only half that of the original sword, and its appearance wasn’t much different from the practice wands he used at the academy.

Speaking of which, could this thing transform back again?

He waved the wand around several times and even tried chanting a few spells, but nothing happened.

Could it be that it only turned back into a sword after he transformed?

Xia hesitated for a moment before walking to the door and locking it.

Then he closed the curtains.

Tsk~ Why did this feel so suspicious now?

It was like he was sneaking around doing something shameful.

After confirming once more that the door was securely locked, Xia picked up the wand and silently recited the sword’s name in his heart.

It was the name that had appeared in his mind while wielding it inside the ruins.

“Castillo.”

A dazzling flash of light erupted.

The black-haired boy inside the room vanished, replaced by a silver-haired girl.

Whoa, why does the transformation come with special effects too?!

Good thing she had closed the curtains beforehand.

Otherwise the entire street would have been lit up.

The girl held a silver sword in her hand.

When she saw the unfamiliar face reflected on the blade, she froze.

Under the glow of the room’s magic stone lamp, silver hair cascaded down to her waist like a waterfall of moonlight.

Those dark golden eyes were filled with shock.

She had already transformed once inside the ruins.

But back then she had been busy fighting monsters and had no time to examine her appearance.

The ruins had also been extremely dark.

Even if she wanted to look, she wouldn’t have been able to see clearly.

But now that she looked carefully…

This appearance was absolutely on par with any female character in the game.

Still stunned, she lowered her gaze.

Two full mountains blocked her line of sight.

“…What a nuisance.”

What came out was a pleasant girl’s voice, as clear as wind chimes.

She froze for a second and wondered if she had heard wrong.

Clearing her throat, she tried again.

“What a nuisance.”

Same result.

Aaaah, whatever.

She bent down and peeked past those obstructing mountains, only to discover that her lower body was dressed in a female academy skirt along with white thigh-high stockings.

Even her shoes had become women’s short boots.

Wait a second.

When did her clothes turn into the female version of the academy uniform?

There was no way she had been wearing women’s clothing from the start.

Did the transformation even change clothes too?

No wonder her lower body had felt chilly inside the ruins earlier, and something had been tightly wrapped around her legs.

At the time, she had been too busy running for her life to think about it.

No, hold on.

Why didn’t she feel embarrassed wearing this?

She was a grown man.

So why did crossdressing feel completely natural to her?

Wasn’t that weird?

Before she could recover from the shock, a silver magical projection suddenly appeared before her eyes.

“Wah?! You scared me!”

“This is… the character interface?”

The girl staggered back half a step in fright from the suddenly appearing panel, but quickly calmed down.

She was more familiar with this projection than anyone.

In her previous life, she had seen it countless times.

She had even constantly switched between character panels while calculating limit stats.

She had thought the transformation alone was already a cheat ability.

But now there was also a game interface?

Didn’t that make her practically invincible?

The girl scanned through her status panel and discovered that every attribute was even higher than she had imagined.

In the game, these stats were already twice—

No, three times the level of an ordinary person.

Even the growth attributes were incredibly high.

A pure stat monster.

Her gaze moved upward toward the name section.

“Dolores Castillo.”

“So this is the name of this body?”

“The surname is the same as the sword…”

“Hm? Why does this surname feel so familiar?”

The girl lowered her head thoughtfully, resting her chin in one hand as she searched through her memories.

A moment later, she recalled that the legendary Silver Radiance Sword Princess also had the surname Castillo.

And if she remembered correctly, the Silver Radiance Sword Princess also had silver hair and golden eyes…

Could she be some descendant of the Silver Radiance Sword Princess?

Then did that mean the sword in her hand was the Sword Princess’s holy sword?

But this sword looked all battered and worn down.

It didn’t resemble a holy sword at all.

Forget that for now.

She should check what skills she had first.

Dolores switched the interface to the skill menu.

Inside were mostly various sword techniques.

Currently, only level one skills were unlocked.

Further upgrades required skill points, which could only be obtained through leveling up or meeting certain conditions.

A huge number of other skills were locked.

She had no idea what they were, and clicking them provided no explanation.

Wait a minute.

If Dolores had an interface, could she view Xia’s panel too?

Dolores found a switch icon beside her name.

After clicking it, the displayed name immediately changed to Xia, and the silver interface became black.

She quickly glanced through the panel and discovered that it basically summarized him with one single word:

Weak.

“How can he possibly be this weak?!”

“His attributes aren’t even half those of a normal person?”

Dolores instinctively covered her forehead.

She knew her original body had been weak, but she never imagined it was weak to this extent.

Even his mana pool wasn’t one-fifth of her current one.

Maybe his skills were strong…?

When she opened Xia’s skill tree, the contents nearly sent her away on the spot.

Xia’s skill tree was magic-based.

Its countless branches were as complex as the limbs of a giant tree.

Aside from the four standard elemental systems of water, fire, wind, and earth, there were also special racial magic branches.

For example, humans possessed holy magic, while demons had dark magic.

Compared to Dolores’s relatively simple skill level upgrades, Xia’s magic skill tree was incredibly rich in content.

Not only did it contain various magical disciplines, it also included countless combination techniques created through mixing elemental magic together.

Looking at it this way, Xia seemed to be the kind of character who relied heavily on mechanics.

Though he was weak now, his future potential looked enormous.

“Time to check the leveling system.”

The explanation for levels consisted of only a single line:

Defeat opponents to gain experience. Leveling up grants skill points.

“Defeat opponents?”

Within two seconds, Dolores understood what it meant.

In most games, experience was gained by killing monsters.

But the wording here was “defeat opponents,” meaning it wasn’t limited to monsters.

It also included humans and other intelligent races.

And importantly, it specified “defeat,” not “kill.”

That meant during battles against humans or other races, she only needed to beat them to gain experience.

She didn’t have to slaughter anyone.

That was actually pretty great.

Her cheat ability seemed absurdly powerful.

Feeling reassured, Dolores happily closed the interface and prepared to transform back.

Only then did she realize she had absolutely no idea how to become Xia again.

Although reciting the sword’s name transformed her into Dolores, she had no clue what the wand’s name was.

She hurriedly reopened the interface and searched frantically through it for ages, but couldn’t find any method to revert.

That was until she noticed a tiny exclamation mark beneath Dolores’s mana bar.

An ominous feeling rose in her heart.

And after clicking it—

【Note: Dolores can only transform back into Xia after exhausting all mana. Xia transforming into Dolores has no such restriction.】

What?

She could only revert after running out of mana?

Noooo!

With such a gigantic mana bar, how long would it take to empty it all?!