Ankoku Kishi Monogatari ~Yuusha wo Taosu Tameni Maou ni Shoukansaremashita~ - Chapter 156.2: Black Rose Garden

How long will it take for a murdered thief to distill into something monstrous? In this story the darkness only grows stronger, and its reach only grows wider as it expands by devouring the life that surrounds it. This is a dark fantasy where evil is a where, not just a who that focuses on slow progression, undeath, and atmospheric storytelling.

After getting betrayed and killed by the only person she’d loved, Miss Shang wakes up in the body of the cowardly crown prince Shang Wuxin, who, due to her own circumstances, was actually a girl cross-dressing as a boy. After inheriting the crown prince’s memories, Shang Wuxin has three things on her agenda:

1. Clean up the house

2. Gather loyal followers and soldiers

3. Get the throne

The fat and ugly Nora Smith is the laughingstock of the town when her fiancé breaks off their engagement.He says, “The sight of your gigantic face and thunder thighs disgusts me! Don't ever pester me again!”“What an idiot.” Nora scoffs and turns around, her lips curling up into a smile.Later, when Nora successfully slims down, she returns as an astounding beauty.Her ex-fiancé comes to her bearing flowers and begs, “I was wrong, Nora. I’m willing to do anything as long as you come back to me.” Nora rests her chin in her hands and smiles as she replies, “Real men don’t dwell on the past.” Angered, he says, “You’re just a dimwit saddled with baggage that I dumped, Nora. No one will want you except me!”But following that…A young and popular singer tweets: “Nora Smith is my goddess!”An internationally renowned surgeon asks, “Are you free tonight, Nora?”Even the rich and influential hotshot whom everyone is scared of comes forward and says, ”I can take care of my wife and children myself, thank you very much.”

A pill, a tiny capsule encased in a biologically harmless water-soluble shell; A shell whose very existence is a result of a century of research and technological advancement. A manmade synthesis of Chemicals and product of complex processes.

And in the end, a means to an end.

A way to deliver a concoction of other Chemicals for an agenda; Vitamins for nutrition, medication for treatment, or… perhaps more.

We trust that what we eat won’t do us harm, and trust that those who are responsible for its creation had the best of intentions. But in the end, it is difficult or perhaps impossible to truly tell what lies within a pill.

That is until one day I entered a research institution as a test subject. All I did was swallow a pill I was told to be a health supplement.