"The Young Demon king's... true body, yes, true body, is still on the distant shore. What you see is merely a bubble phantom."
"This is a phantom created by that little devil, hahahaha! It scared you, didn't it?"
A certain young man with bandages wrapped around his right hand suddenly began shouting loudly, bursting into laughter from time to time. He looked as though this truly were some clownish prank.
If ten were a perfect score, then disregarding the boy's face, flushed red from holding it in, Angel would have given his acting and adaptability an eight. Points were deducted for the stammering at the start.
But now? Probably around two points.
Why not zero? Naturally, because although the performance was riddled with flaws, it somehow struck a chord within Angel and pleased him.
"Oh, so it was a phantom created by the Imperial Daughter."
While everyone else stared at Blaze with dumbfounded expressions, Angel remained wholly unmoved and even smilingly played along.
"O-of course! That little devil has the foulest temperament. She created such a phantom specifically to scare you all. Right? Right? Right?" Blaze said "right?" three times in succession, each one aimed at Angel. Clearly, Blaze, already on the verge of collapse, desperately needed someone else's affirmation, even though he did not yet know who Angel was.
"The Imperial Daughter is indeed capable of such tactics." Angel gave him an earnest affirmation.
As soon as he said that, Blaze seemed to breathe a sigh of relief and began calling out even more fervently for everyone not to believe it—that what stood before them was an illusion.
"However, if you are an illusion arranged by the Imperial Daughter, why are you speaking against her? Since you are an illusion, shouldn't you address the Imperial Daughter respectfully, then do