Yiqing listened to Funai Er, gently waving the folding fan in his hand.
"I see." His voice was as clear as ever, with just the right hint of amusement. "Another standard villain who hates humanity and wants to make a mess of the world."
Funai Er tilted her head slightly.
She lived in the Victorian era. Although she had met merchants and investigators from the East, she was unfamiliar with a teasing phrase like "standard villain," which came from modern, broadly shared popular culture. She couldn't fully grasp its precise meaning or the mockery behind it.
Still, judging from the context, she could guess it wasn't a compliment.
She wasn't angry. On the contrary, she was quite frank.
"I won't deny it." Funai Er looked Yiqing in the eye. "Humanity is a deeply flawed species. They're selfish, shortsighted, and greedy. They adorn themselves with tasteless desires and crude rituals. Their bodies are fragile, their reproductive capacity laughably low, and yet they occupy most of the world and call themselves its masters."
Her tone carried a cold, condescending judgment.
"Their existence makes the 'beauty' of this world monotonous and dull, tainted by nauseating greed and moral shackles. So..." Her red lips curled, and her smile finally revealed the unmasked wickedness and fervor of a monster. "I'm very fond of the Fusion Ritual. It lets those fragile human bodies merge with other ancient, elegant, powerful beings amid pain and ecstasy... myself included."
As she spoke, the curve of her lips widened abruptly, and a slit soundlessly opened in her skin.
A pair of slender butterfly antennae emerged slowly from the opening. Their tips were forked and covered in fine, dark green fuzz. They swayed gently beside her beautiful face.
"See?" Funai Er's voice took on a bewitching quality. Her inhuman eyes fixed