Then she lifted her face, put on a cheerful grin, and waved at Wangchuan.
"Oh, geez, sorry you had to see that. Don't mind me."
"It's just... it's been so long since I heard that guy's name, so I'm a little... um..."
She left the sentence unfinished and shook her head hard, as though trying to shake off some emotion.
Then her gaze returned to Wangchuan, looking him up and down.
"But you do look a little scary like that."
She pointed at Wangchuan's massive arm, then at his long, purplish-black hair, as though appraising a somewhat over-the-top piece of art.
"A black knight?"
"No, you're blue."
"A blue knight? That's not right either. A blue knight is blue, sure, but you're not a knight..."
She tilted her head, as though seriously considering a fairly unimportant question of classification.
Wangchuan's blood-red slit pupils shifted slightly.
His long, forked tongue poked a short way out between his teeth, then withdrew.
"Is that so?"
"Then I'll speak to you in human form."
As his words fell, his body began to change.
Purplish-black demonic energy surged from all around him, then dissipated.
Within a few short seconds, his pale blue skin lost its cold sheen and returned to a normal human complexion.
His long, purplish-black hair shortened and drew back in, returning to its usual short, slightly wavy state.
Wangchuan stood before her with both hands in his jacket pockets, his head tilted as he looked at Riko Amanai sitting on the ground.
"How about this?"
Riko Amanai looked up at him for two seconds.
Then her eyes lit up.
"Wow!"
She sprang up from the ground.
"You really are human!"
She stepped closer, looking Wangchuan up and down, her gaze moving from his face to his clothes and then his shoes.
"You're