Chapter 161: Mono Doll - Avarice

Avarice, a strange name extremely on the nose, especially for an automaton who had great potential to grow stronger the more she fueled herself with magic. But alas, the humanoid girl was no fighter for the battlefield, but a simple maid to the young prince who would one day take the throne of his father.

"Remember your task, okay? Keep the prince safe." Those were her first orders given to her by her creator–a female wizard with an iron arm. The bubbly face of her creator was still fresh in her mind, giant goggles on her eyes, a wooly pink hat, but what set her apart from the rest of the engineers working for the king, were her tank top and jeans with nearly a hundred different pockets.

"Why did she never give me pockets?" Avarice mused, her cheeks puffed up with annoyance.

"Maybe she thought you wouldn't need them," replied the young prince, his hand scribbling through some notes on his desk

"As if! I'm a maid, of course, I'll need pockets!" Avarice retorted, glaring at her master's back.

"Maybe you can ask her later?" The prince added. Having forgotten that she was dead, he posed the question in a carefree manner, but the moment Avarice heard it, the always caring maid sparked her first flicker of annoyance.

So far she'd been growing alongside the prince and shared only compassion and love, however, a simple nudge in the wrong direction made her angry at him for the first time. Her maker was dead, how could she ask her anything? And if that wasn't a sign of disrespect Avarice didn't know what would be.

Time passed, and she continued to serve the young prince, although at times she would trip on purpose and splash him with steaming drinks. Growing into an arrogant narcissist from the moment he learned he would one day be king, Zeil would shower her with insults which only soured their relationship.

'I'll kill the sisters if needed, and Zeil won't lift a finger to do anything without my permission...' All alone inside her overly decorated room, a creepy smile crept up her lips. Walking over to the mirror, she settled in front of the vanity and began brushing her lush dark hair. Peering into her red eyes, she couldn't help smiling. 'A whole kingdom...And I get to control it!'

Chuckling at the thought, she imagined herself a queen with the sisters licking her feet alongside Zeil. Power–a force that could corrupt even an iron heart, she wondered if it was a trait her maker–Mono, the iron-armed wizard intentionally placed in her? She had to, right? A master of her craft that can breathe life into metal, how could someone like that be mistaken?! There was no way!

She wanted her to rule this kingdom, and eventually everything!

Or at least that's what Avarice thought, and it served as justification for what she was about to do. The first order of business was to ruin the timeline over which the sisters planned to kill the king because once their plan was thrown off, she could put her own ideas in motion.

"Your father, I'll up his dose so he'll die sooner, and when you realize, let's see how you handle a real murderer within the castle walls," she whispered to herself, intending to ruin their plans to spew chaos into the mix.

Will the sisters simply assume it to be their father's age that killed him sooner? Or will they suspect that someone spiked him more than what they'd planned? Either way, suspicion was bound to rise, and when that happens, all Avarice had to do was turn the sisters against each other.

'And then they'll die!' Covering her mouth, she held back her laughter. If anyone heard her laughing like a maniac, then her facade of an innocent maid was bound to be over. 'Once the sisters are gone, I don't have to pretend anymore.'

"They might already know a speck of what I'm capable of, but they're still so so so ignorant!" And that night, a month before the king's death was when the mono-doll Avarice lost any empathy that she had left.

[Note: Characters mentioned in this chapter will be better described later]