Good. Looks like I fooled Cao Cao perfectly. My flawless disguise has triumphed!
Cid checked his surroundings with X-ray vision. Apart from a mature woman behind him who looked like a foreigner and was toying with a sword as she walked, there was no one else in strange clothing who seemed likely to be following him.
Even that blonde, blue-eyed woman did not seem like much of a problem. She was far too obvious, strolling openly down the street and even looking bored enough to play with her sword. What kind of tail would practically beg the person they were following to notice them?
Because she looked too suspicious, Cid ruled her out first. Surely no one was stupid enough to follow someone while looking that shady. She was probably just an ordinary cosplayer. No need to pay her any attention.
Still, she did look a little familiar... Hm? Wait, this feeling is...
Cid suddenly shuddered, which immediately caught Asia's attention. Perhaps realizing something was wrong, Asia began asking anxiously.
"Cid-san, what's wrong? Did something happen nearby?"
Cid watched with interest as Asia nervously looked around like a startled little animal. Then, just as she seemed to notice something and raised a hand to point behind them, about to say something, Cid placed a hand on her shoulder and cut her off, then gave an exaggerated sigh.
"Cid-san, look, she's..."
"It's nothing serious, Asia. I was just sighing over Cao Cao's lack of foresight. If it were me and I ran into someone as suspicious as myself, I would have sent someone to tail me by now. Better to kill by mistake than let a threat slip away..."
"Eh?"
Asia played along beautifully, letting out a cute cry as panic spread across her face. She really was a top-tier straight man, Cid thought with admiration, while continuing aloud.
"If he'd done that, I'd probably be finished by now. Hahaha..."
By the end, Cid was covering his face and chuckling under his breath, completely failing to notice Asia's eyes widening more and more beside him, her mouth hanging open.
"Hello, Ophis. Nice to see you again."
"...Cid, hello."
Feeling that long-lost sensation of being watched, Cid greeted the little girl crouched by the convenience store entrance, the one who had been staring straight at him from the moment he appeared. At the same time, he pulled the bewildered Asia over and introduced her to Ophis.
"Asia, let me introduce you. This young... girl is a friend of mine. Her real identity should be the Infinite Dragon God Ophis that Cao Cao mentioned earlier, the one he's hunting."
It was not as though he could not pretend he had failed to realize Ophis's true identity, but Cid refused. Even the slowest normal person would have caught on by now, not to mention Ophis had clearly locked onto him. Continuing to play dumb would just be rude.
Besides, this identity was already more or less ruined. Rather than burying his head in the sand and lying to himself, he might as well face these inexplicably approaching powerhouses head-on, put his acting skills on display, and seize his fate with his own hands.
"Um... my name is Asia. I'm Cid-san's... friend. Hello, Miss Infinite Dragon God..."
Asia instinctively followed Cid's lead and greeted the little girl in front of her. But halfway through her self-introduction, she suddenly froze, blinking rapidly as her small mouth fell slightly open.
"Eh, eh, eh...!!! The Infinite Dragon God? The Infinite Dragon God Cao Cao-san said he was going to kill!?"
Asia let out an extremely shocked cry, staring at the little girl before her, who was not even as tall as she was, then turned around in astonishment to look behind them.
Fortunately, there were not many people around. Asia also realized something was off afterward and lowered her voice. Only one or two people in the distant crowd turned to glance at them. Otherwise, that commotion would have drawn everyone's attention.
"...Hello, Cid."
Completely unaffected by Asia's outburst, Ophis merely glanced at Asia from where she crouched on the ground, then ignored her outright and greeted Cid again.
"Come on, at least say hello. Ophis, that's a little..."
Cid was speechless at how Ophis had ignored Asia so completely. Although he still did not particularly care, he was curious. Where exactly had his flawless disguise failed, and why was Ophis so fixated on him?
"Hello, Asi...a?"
After hearing Cid's words, Ophis looked at him in silence for a moment. Then she turned toward Asia, whose gaze was still shifting between Ophis and the street behind them, and offered a perfunctory greeting before turning her attention back to Cid.
"..."
"Forget it. Goodbye, then. It was nice seeing you."
Not wanting to continue talking with Ophis, Cid simply pulled the still half-frozen Asia away and resumed their stroll.
It was understandable. Back when Cid first discovered that Ophis, the source of that watched sensation, was actually a little girl, he had been shocked too. Powerful people really did have their own peculiar tastes.
"Um, Cid-san..."
"What?"
For some reason, Asia stared straight ahead while pressing closely against Cid, as though she wanted to say something.
"Behind us..."
Hearing Asia's voice, and sensing the gaze locked firmly onto him from somewhere behind, Cid frowned slightly.
"No need to worry. If she wants to follow us, let her..."
"Eh! Cid-san, is that really okay? Didn't you say Cao Cao-san and the others are looking for Miss Infinite Dragon God?"
"Yeah. So what's the problem?"
Hearing Cid's question, Asia sensed the light energy radiating from the Holy Sword in the hands of one of Cao Cao's teammates behind them. She also recalled Cao Cao's own words during his self-introduction, when he had said he was hunting the Infinite Dragon God.
"Do you have some kind of plan, Cid-san?"
Asia asked uneasily, feeling for some reason that she was about to hear something extremely serious.
"No. I just kind of want to help Cao Cao find Ophis."
Mainly because it felt like he could stir up trouble. He had not figured out how yet, but that did not matter. He could just take advantage of whatever opening appeared. If that failed, he could pin everyone to the ground and beat them up.
Just imagining that scene made Cid excited. Sure enough, he was a bloodthirsty villain. Unfortunately, as an Eminence in Shadow, there was no way he could take the initiative in doing something like that.
Lost in thought, Cid completely failed to notice Asia beside him going pale the instant she heard his words.
She did not understand. Hadn't Cid-san said he and Ophis-san were friends?
If they were friends, then why had Cid-san deliberately greeted the Infinite Dragon God when he knew someone was following him?
Or was it... that Cid-san was confident he could stop Cao Cao and the others from fighting the Infinite Dragon God?
All kinds of doubts echoed in Asia's mind, and all sorts of conspiracy theories flashed through her thoughts, but she still could not think of any reason he absolutely had to do this.
"I understand, Cid-san."
Asia nodded firmly. She did not understand, but if it was Cid-san's plan, then Cid-san must have his own reasons.
"Asia, are you worried about her?"
Cid's sudden question snapped Asia out of her thoughts. Feeling his questioning gaze, Asia nodded.
"I see. All right, then..."
Muttering to himself, Cid looked away and slowed his pace for a few seconds, allowing the little girl who had been following them to walk up beside him.
"I've been looking for you..."
Ophis seemed to react half a beat late, only realizing then that she was walking side by side with Cid. She was the first to break the silence, her hazy eyes, unreadable and devoid of emotion, fixed on him.
"Why wouldn't you talk to me just now?"
"To be precise, it was because I didn't think we had anything to talk about. After all, the difference in our positions is pretty big. I feel like we're not on the same wavelength at all.
"And before today, I had no idea you were looking for me. Or rather, since I didn't know why you were looking for me in the first place, talking would have been pointless. It would just be a waste of time."
Cid spoke bluntly. He would not assume Ophis was easy to fool just because she looked young. No matter how bad a powerhouse's temperament was, it could not be that bad, so he basically said what he truly thought.
"...I can help you."
"Huh?"
After a few seconds of silence, Ophis suddenly said something shocking without warning. Even Cid was left baffled, having no idea what he needed Ophis to help him with.
"A trade. I give you a snake, give you this, and then you help me..."
Watching Ophis condense an ouroboros ornament from within her body, Cid's mouth twitched. He placed one hand on Ophis's head and cut off whatever she was about to say next.
"Thank you, Ophis, but I don't need it."
"You need it."
"No, I don't."
"No, you need it..."
"I..."
Looking at Ophis, who seemed determined to force the deal no matter how many times he refused, Cid's fist... clenched!
"Leaving aside whether I actually need this thing that looks like a shady, no-name product, Ophis, do you know what your reputation is like right now?"
"...I know."
Ophis frowned, as though thinking back for a while, then nodded with certainty.
Sure enough, she did not care about her reputation at all. She barely even kept it in mind.
"Then you should know that the moment I show even a portion of the power of you, the so-called world's greatest evil, I'll be making an enemy of the entire world. I'm weak, so a bunch of powerhouses will gang up on me and beat me to death..."
While marveling at Ophis's incredible worldview, in which she seemed not to care about anything, Cid tried to reason with her.
"So I'll help you."
"?"
"When they attack you, I give you a snake to help you. Then you help me..."
"?"
Are you trying to get something for nothing here? If you don't give me the snake, why would they attack me?
Under Cid's stunned gaze, Ophis tilted her head.
"What's wrong? Is there a problem?"
Cid met Ophis's dreamlike, deep, beautiful purple eyes. After a brief pause, he shook his head.
"...No, nothing. There's nothing wrong with your logic. I'm just a little curious. Ophis, where exactly does this mysterious confidence you have in me come from?"
It was not a tempting whisper, nor was she joking with him. Ophis truly thought that way. Cid could clearly sense that much.
As ridiculous as it sounded, Ophis did not regard "making an enemy of the world" as a required condition for her trade with him. To her, it was more like a bonus condition, or a premise. In other words, Ophis sincerely believed that even without the snake she gave him, he could still reach the level of making an enemy of the world.
"Because you are Cid."
She said it with absolute certainty, but even Cid did not understand where the conviction and confidence in Ophis's voice came from.
"All right, all right. Let's say that's true. Then, Ophis, what do you want me to help you with?"
From that one statement, Cid clearly understood that Ophis had already formed a closed loop of logic only she could understand. So he stopped wasting words and simply tried to clarify a few things.
"Defeat the Great Red."
"You want me to die!?"
In that instant, Cid even suspected his disguise had failed and his strength had been exposed. But he also knew very well that while his flawless disguise might go wrong in any number of ways, his strength was the one area where exposure was absolutely impossible.
"?"
This time, Ophis was the confused one. She looked at Cid in puzzlement.
"Don't you think defeating the Great Red is completely incompatible with the image of a bit player like me?"
As he spoke in confusion, Cid became even more curious about Ophis's thought process. He had learned from Kuroka Toujou that the Infinite Dragon God's target was the Great Red, but he had no idea how the Infinite Dragon God had connected him to the Great Red.
"But Cid will become stronger."
"I'm truly sorry, but no matter how strong a bit player becomes, there's no way he can defeat a world-class boss like the Great Red."
Even with Ophis's thought process, Cid's answer left her mind frozen for a moment. Her beautiful eyes, filled with confusion, stared at him.
"Cid can't become stronger?"
"At the very least, I can't think of any way to make myself stronger right now."
Hearing that, Ophis grew even more confused. She could feel that Cid was telling the truth, but that was exactly what she could not understand.
If Cid truly thought that, then with that mindset, he should never be able to become stronger. But that contradicted what she had seen in him. So what exactly was going on?
"Silly girl..."
Looking at Ophis with pity as her thoughts stalled, Cid finally understood the source of the contradiction he sensed from the Infinite Dragon God before him.
"Yo! Ophis, Cid..."
The sound of several sets of footsteps came from nearby. Looking toward the source, Vali and his teammates appeared at the end of the street and walked toward them.
"What are you two doing he..."
Vali's words cut off halfway. Kuroka Toujou and the others, who had been walking at a leisurely pace, abruptly shifted their movements. Their expressions turned serious as they looked at Cid and the others.