Characters / Ambition of the Red Princess - Malty S Melromarc

Ambition of the Red Princess Character Index
Main Characters (Malty S Melromarc) (Naofumi Iwatani) | Three Heroes and Allies | Houses and Kingdoms [House De Gallia] (Siegmar Isaac Octavius Consevatie) [Melromarc Kingdom] | Religious Factions [Church of the Three Heroes] | Others

All Spoilers Off for the whole of Ambition of the Red Princess, and the many plot points the story lays out in later chapters.

Mein of Samphor/Sophia of Totela/Malty S Melromarc

Debut: Chapter 1/Chapter 1: The Royal Summoning

Origin: The Rising of the Shield Hero

Trustworthy, even though she is a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing.

This world isn't fair, Master Naofumi. We can't depend on other people to always do the right thing for things to work out. We have to grow stronger... and take what's rightfully ours by force. So don't you dare give up now. Not after you never given up on me, because I will not DAMN give up on you.

The main character of Ambition of the Red Princess. Malty S Melromarc, also known as Mein of Samphor is the First Princess of Melromarc. Rather than frame Naofumi Iwatani for raping her, she instead becomes his ally in hopes of gaining his gratitude and to get the chance to become the Queen of Melromarc.

If you were looking for Malty Melromarc from The Rising of the Shield Hero, then click here.

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A-C

• Abusive Parents: Her mother, Mirellia Q Melromarc neglects her when she is still a young child and barely spends any time with her. When Malty loses her pet Mein, Mirellia forces Malty to use her magic to kill her first monster, but it ends up backfiring into killing her Nanny.
• Accidental Hero:
  • In chapter 77, Mein's drunken mind from her empowered state ends up causing the complete destruction of the Boletaria Castle. Once calmed down from the power, Mein feels troubled at her actions unnecessarily bringing harm to everyone and Eclair's ancestral home. Even though Boletaria Castle is destroyed, instead of Eclair being frustrated at Mein, Eclair chooses to thank Mein in chapter 79 for uplifting a burden. With Boletaria Castle gone, Eclair doesn't have to bear the family tradition of having to constantly defend and can make her own choices.
  • Reconstructed. Cornered by a Hell Hound and Raphtalia being the only one with her in chapter 19, Mein chooses to ditch Raphtalia in favor of saving herself. However, what instead ends up happening is a Laser-Guided Karma of the hound coming after her to bite off chunks of her face. Afterwards the ordeal, though Mein did not want to save Raphtalia, she gained the latter's sympathies and respect as a big sister for looking like someone who was trying to act as a decoy for the dog. From later chapter onwards, the culminated respect Raphtalia had for her, eventually grows on Mein Taking a Level in Kindness as a child to care for, instead of competition taking Naofumi's attention away.
• Accidental Misnaming: She calls Naofumi as "Master Naofumi" in chapter 100, but quickly changes to refer him as "Siesta of Totela" to avoid exposing his real identity to everyone.
• Accidental Murder:
  • Malty in the past, accidentally murdered her own Nanny when Mirellia forced her to kill a monster during the same day that Mein had died.
  • In her battle against Aldrecht in chapter 77, Malty wishes to defeat him in battle but not kill him, since he was one of the people supportive to her during her childhood. Though in the end, Malty accidentally gets Aldrecht killed when she chooses to attack the ceiling of Boletaria castle to allow air in, but instead causes everything to crumble upon everyone.
• Accidental Truth: She makes a lie to Eclair in chapter 38 of Queen Mirellia selling Raphtalia as a slave to earn herself Naofumi's sympathies, and so Eclair could lose her loyalty to Queen Mirellia. Though Malty thinks she had made a lie, she unintentionally revealed what she had said to be true, since Queen Mirellia's interlude shows the type of person she and how she plans.
• Action Girlfriend: She is the first companion of Naofumi and someone he considers as a partner he wishes to cherish. While he does most of the defending, due to his Shield limiting his options to attack, Malty's swordmanship and fire spells act as a means to attack for him.
• Actually a Good Idea: Not thinking of more ways to scout around Potter's camp in chapter 122, she thinks of looking for potential threats to have a better outlook, that is until Malty suggests for her and Oersted to try looking inside a cave. By that suggestion, Malty feels shame inside herself for not thinking up such an obvious idea she overlooked.
• A-Cup Angst: In chapter 46, Mein sees a woman named Cattelya at the Queen's Blade and is left baffled from looking at the latter's incredibly large bosom. Although irritated at Cattelya's bosom, Mein calms herself down with the claim that Cattelya's bosom will never match her perfect hourglass figure.
• Accuser of the Brethren: Though Jackson came to Naofumi in terms of seeking the latter's help to topple over the Three Heroes Church, Mein is unable to accept Jackson's reformation in chapter 128. Suspecting Jackson to only be in Naofumi's group for a desire of revenge against Consevatie, Mein accuses Jackson of a selfish opportunist that will sell out others to get his own vendetta.
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade:
  • In The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty's source of angst came from Melty stealing her title of crown princess, despite Malty being the one to have ruined her birthright for being such a Royal Brat. Although sentenced to become the wife for the King of Faubley, Malty did nothing to escape that fate and instead focused on committing acts of villainy For the Evulz. Here, most of Malty's tragedy from the past came from external sources and the horrible events that befell on her is played for sympathy. Malty loses her title as crown princess due to Mirellia's standards being too high to overcome, getting blamed for killing her nanny, and losing her pet, Mein.
  • Regarding her selfishness to obtain the title of crown princess and as queen, Malty is left in angst if her own self-serving behavior is doomed to lead the people she cares for in danger, or whether it is truly possible for her to mature and not be a failure. Contrast to her canon self, she is seen by others to be Beyond Redemption and her characterization as The Sociopath that is motivated For the Evulz disables her from feeling any shame to any of her benefactors.
• Adaptational Backstory Change: Along with receiving an Adaptational Expansion and acting as an O.C. Stand-in to further show more of her life as a person, than a despicable villainess, lots of Malty's backstory were either changed, given additional content, or certain crimes were removed.
  • For Malty's education, The Rising of the Shield Hero had her go to Faubley Academy to grow out of her Spoiled Brat behavior or to be educated to better live on her own. In the end, all it resulted was Malty losing her virginity and becoming a worse person. At Ambition of the Red Princess, Malty never went to Faubley Academy, due to her mother wanting to slow down her education to give Melty an easier time to claim the throne. Malty does receive education, but it was mostly through homeschool and she didn't enjoy having to work hard.
  • As to what Malty does at her past time or for a hobby at the original story of Shield Hero, she has been falsely accusing men of rape For the Evulz to get them killed for her own entertainment. Here, she receives her entertainment by reading romance novels to pass the time and to free herself from the dreary world.
  • Malty in this fanfic includes a childhood filorial pet named Mein that she enjoyed playing with, until Mein's tragic death to protect her. From the original story, such connections and any sympathetic moment was nonexistent for Canon!Malty.
  • Aultcray had arranged for Malty to have three playmates being Katarina Claes, Iris Lana Amelia, and Bertia Noches, although Malty never felt like true friends to any of them. From canon, Malty's Only Friend was with Lesty from Faubley Academy.
• Adaptational Badass: From the original story, Malty rarely ever trained herself to become stronger with her fire magic and remained stagnant for the rest of the story. Here, while Malty in this story remained stagnant in her fire magic during her time as a princess, ever since she became Naofumi's companion, her level started to grow just like him, allowing her to use stronger fire attacks and to an extent, use water magic.
• Adaptational Comic Relief: Downplayed. Malty was never a comical person and each time she appears, since she is prone to Kicking The Dog and causing trouble to Naofumi that can make her a loathsome character. Here, Malty's evil acts are more downplayed and the few times she does something villainous or manipulative, they are laced with a sense of comedy that have her come across as Laughably Evil.
• Adaptational Heroism: Downplayed. Malty is much less villainous compared to her original counterpart, but it is mostly because she is more focused on achieving her goals of becoming the Queen of Melromarc rather than engaging in pettiness. While she does save Naofumi primarily to use him as a stepping stone to become Queen, she does help him perform heroic deeds.
• Adaptational Intelligence: Compared to her canon version who constantly makes decisions based an sadism which results in multiple Stupid Evil moments, this version of Malty instead focuses on Pragmatic Villainy to get what she wants.
• Adaptational Karma: In The Rising of the Shield Hero, while Malty does eventually get punished for her horrible actions, most of it either came from humiliation, getting called "Bitch", losing her title as princess, but rarely ever receives long-lasting injuries. Here, Malty is a lot less heinous than her canon counterpart and at the same time, she is frequently put into many situations where she is nearly killed in battle, and is treated more sympathetically.
• Adaptational Modesty: The canon version of Malty wears a revealing and good looking armor to wear as Naofumi's adventurer partner. In this story, Malty plans on buying the same revealing armor as her canon version, but Malty's choice to wear the armor is defied by Elhard. Elhard suggests that she wears leather armor instead, because the beautiful revealing armor that Malty plans on buying is only good for companying knights in court.
• Adaptational Nice Girl: Downplayed. While she does not betray Naofumi like in canon, she still has ulterior motives and is mostly nice through Pragmatic Villainy. While the original Malty had no standards, this version of Malty has standards related towards Abusive Parents, killing people, and Raphtalia's survival guilt.
• Adaptational Protagonist: At The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty acted as its main antagonist for being responsible for having driven all four of the Cardinal Heroes into despair in someway. She had caused most of Melromarc's problems by wasting its funds and for her destructive schemes to become queen. Here, she acts as one of the main protagonists of this work for never betraying Naofumi during Aultcray's trial. She stays with him to help him out on being the best hero, while also attaining the credibility needed to become queen.
• Adaptational Skill: In canon, Malty's only skillset of spells was by Playing with Fire, and while she does know some lightning spells, she rarely ever trains herself to unlock greater heights of her ability. For Ambition!Malty, she gets to have an easier time learning fire magic since it's her affinity for the bloodline she originates from and she can even perform water-based spells.
• Adaptational Sympathy: The original version of Malty lacked any sympathetic qualities and was designed to be a Hate Sink towards Naofumi, the world, and audience. The closest she gets to a sympathetic portrayal was in the web novel where she gets raped by the King of Faubley. Even then, she still got what was coming for having falsely accused so many men of rape. In here, most of Malty's despicable actions from canon were removed and her sentence to become King Egbert's wife is what led to the person she is today. From her past, she Used to Be a Sweet Kid that cared for her filorial, Mein, but was killed when they were both ambushed by monsters, resulting in Mein dying. A day afterwards the event, Malty was forced by her mother, Mirelia, to kill a monster, but ended up killing her own nanny, which had traumatized Malty.
• Adaptational Ugliness: Downplayed. She is still just as pretty like what she was at the official Shield Hero story, but her beauty is tainted after chapter 19 from getting nearly mauled to death by a Hell Hound.
• Adaptational Wimp:
  • Downplayed. At The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty is said to be a skilled fire mage and although lazy, she is capable of delivering proficient fire attacks before she Can't Catch Up. Here, Malty despite having learned some fencing skills by Zellus, Malty rarely ever trains herself to become stronger as a princess and she stays as a stagnant level 3. Later after becoming Naofumi's companion, Malty is hit with Adaptational Badass for putting in the effort to become stronger by battling monsters and practicing her spells.
  • Zig Zagged. Her canon self was able to perform a small variation of wind and lightning spells, while she herself is only able to perform fire spells, and water spells to act as the substitute.
• Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole: In The Rising of the Shield Hero were Malty is Made a Slave to either expose her lies or to minimize her as a threat, a slave seal getting implanted on her chest is able to work, because all living being in the world have the option to become slaves. By the worldbuilding of Ambition of the Red Princess, however, it is established that Vassal Heroes and Legendary Heroes need the Imperius Slave Seal to effectively both shut down their minds in being made a functioning slave. When Malty is enslaved by Consevatie, she somehow becomes his slave, despite being an official successor holding the Vassal Wand.
• Adaptation Name Change:
  • Downplayed. She gets to keep her real name as Malty S Melromarc in this fanfic, while her canon self from all iterations of The Rising of the Shield Hero has her real name be eventually changed into derogatory terms as an official punishment enacted to her by Naofumi.
  • Zig Zagged. In The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty's adventurer alias is called "Mein/Myne Sophia", whereas Malty in Ambition of the Red Princess uses the first name and surname of her canon self's adventurer name to form two different types of Secret Identities. Ambition!Malty's name as Mein of Samphor serves as her Meaningful Rename to dedicate herself into becoming a genuine adventurer for Naofumi, while her other Secret Identity as Sophia of Totela is for hiding her original Secret Identity from getting exposed to the Three Heroes Church.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: Exaggerated. From the original canon, Malty actively antagonized Naofumi out of her own sadism and petty spite. Ever since she framed him, they had become archenemies to each other ever since the whole story. Furthermore, she was despised by the world for her rotten attitude and never made an effort to be attached to anyone. At this fanfic, Malty's decision to stay with Naofumi causes the latter to develop an Undying Loyalty to protect her and all his companions at all cost. Malty also gets the chance to bond closer with her party members, although she is actively hiding her identity as a princess.
  • Towards Melty, Malty from the canon storyline of The Rising of the Shield Hero despised her from the moment they reunited and for all of the time they spent together. Malty would actively plot to become the queen of Melromarc and would do so by making sure Melty is killed at all cost. As for Ambition of the Red Princess, Malty still hates Melty for stealing her birthright to the throne, but unwilling wish harm on Melty, believing such things to be barbaric. Although Malty secretly lives in disdain of her sister, Melty actively tries to play with Malty whenever a chance presents itself, and the latter is willing to protect her from a noble known for having enslaved children.
• Adapted Out: In the web novel iteration of The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty was a fragment of a goddess named Medea, where her only existence as a person was to bring destruction to everyone in the Isekai world, because her only personality was to be Made of Evil and be based off of the goddess. By Ambition of the Red Princess, her origins as a fragmental goddess is left out in exchange of her receiving Character Development into becoming a more perceptive and competent person in Naofumi's party.
• Against the Grain: The disguise she plans is the best way to help Naofumi avoid getting detected by the public as a legendary hero is to have him dress up in something no one expects for him to be wearing. That disguise Mein thinks up of is to have Naofumi be crossdressing himself as a girl wearing a French Maid Outfit.
• A Lighter Shade of Grey: She sometimes acts as a manipulator using Naofumi's group as a way to gain the credibility to have the reputation to be queen of Melromarc, but isn't particularly malicious. When up against bandits, her abusive mother, and the wave monsters, Malty ends up being sympathetic in comparison in addition to the heroism she commits.
• Almost Kiss:
  • She looks as though she is going to kiss the male knight she seduced into letting her inside the throne room, but she instead chooses to blow his ears to thank him.
  • Played for Laughs. In chapter 10, she gets close to kiss Naofumi, so that they can better mend their relationship in the future, until getting a sudden interruption from Raphtalia's stomach.
  • Zig Zagged. In a dream from chapter 58, Malty looks as though she kissed Tact, but upon further investigation, Malty remembers she never actually kissed Tact in real life and that the kiss had a foul taste. When the dream ends, it turns out that she was kissed by Raphtalia as a way to be fed an antidote for poison.
• Ambition Is Evil: Played for Drama. Her main ambition in life is to become the queen of Melromarc and in order to achieve her goal, she needs to place her mindset into acting as a Manipulative Bitch to sway others into taking her side and to not allow emotional attachments cloud her mind. However, by being in a relationship with Naofumi and to an extent, the party members of the Shield Hero, Malty has their trust, praise, and loyalty to support her. If she were to reveal her identity as a princess to Naofumi, there could be a chance their relationship could not work out in the end, due to their divergent goals. Even to her party members, they may potentially lose their trust towards her and she may be left in position where her own decisions have hurt everyone for no gain.
• Ambitious, but Lazy: In her mind, she is motivated and is willing to do whatever it takes to have a chance to become the queen of Melromarc, but as Mirellia states in her interlude, Malty is far too lazy to put in the actual effort to become one. Malty lacks the academic intelligence and despite having the best tutors in Melromarc to learn from, she spends most of her time reading romance novels or playing with her friends. It is only when Malty leaves behind her princess life to join the Shield Hero is the moment where Malty starts getting the experience and credits to become queen.
• Amicable Exes: Although she and Jaune's courtship with each other is a past memory, both still remember each other and can get along. Even if their reunion with each other in chapter 79 is muddled with Malty blaming Jaune for getting Aldrecht killed, Jaune wishes to be the best he can be to support everyone and to stick with his morals.
• Amplifier Artifact: The Vassal Wand itself once claimed by her has boosted her general magical abilities. To a more specific form on what she wants the wand to look like, Malty can boost specific magical spells she is already capable of performing.
  • In chapter 109, she uses the [Fire Snake Wand] form, so as to boost her fire magic in performing a [Fiendfyre] spell to demonstrate her abilities to Felix that she is the first princess granted by her father Aultcray's wand.
• And Then What?: Implied. For most of her life and the efforts she made to travel with Naofumi, culminating in the goal to become the queen of Melromarc as her main ambition, Malty never thinks past on becoming queen. She claims to want the title to satisfy her desire for power, but doesn't think past on what she intends to do as the ruler of Melromarc.
• Anger Born of Worry:
  • In chapter 7, Mein hears Naofumi making loud noises that appear as if he is in danger. Realizing what perilous danger Naofumi might be getting himself into, Mein quickly worries for his safety and runs to see him as fast as she can. When it turns out that Naofumi was only fantasizing his thoughts out loud, Mein gets an uncontrolled outburst on how his behavior pointlessly worried her. Once she calms down and Naofumi feels the guilt of his actions, Mein assures him that her worries was only to make sure he stays safe.
  • To care for Eclair, Mein wants her to abandon being an overly honorable knight, since all it does is restrict Eclair from choosing the best options, even if they can be pragmatic or dirty. Each time Eclair chooses going for an honorable, yet dangerous route, Mein secretly chastises Eclair for recklessly endangering herself and wishing the latter to be more perceptive.
  • Aside from Naofumi risking his real identity to save the people of Graile in chapter 105 by pretending to be the Shield Hero without his Shield, Malty's anger towards him is to make sure his recklessness in always being virtuous is not what gets him killed.
  • Realizing that Mala is on the frontlines of Melromarc battling the Three Heroes Church's army for her own safety in chapter 119, Malty lashes out on Baldy and Blue eyes for putting her personal maid in a dangerous situation. Once her short burst of anger calms down from seeing Blue Eyes and Baldy being confused by her unusual behavior, Malty reflects on her past and feels shamed by her original treatment of Mala as a personal main in comparison to the present.
• Anti-Climax: Once the true boss monster of the third wave makes its appearance in chapter 93, Mein expected the boss to be more horrifying than the Void Dragon Leviathan that nearly swallowed both her and Naofumi. Instead, what showed up was an incredibly large fish monster,and listening to it flail and wail, Mein just feels sorry for having to end the wave with a pathetic obstacle.
• Armed Females, Unarmed Males: Downplayed. Both her and Naofumi are capable of wielding weapons, but the latter is limited only using Shield-based weapons from his Legendary Shield, Malty has access to swords and any variety.
• Armor-Piercing Question:
  • She brings up a good question in chapter 117 as to why Vicar Vittorio would leave an open camp outside of Melromarc, making him a good target to any assassins. With the question, she is able to convince her group to go back with the Lute Villagers to be more cautious in how they could confront Vicar Vittorio without getting exposed.
  • Played for Laughs. Just as Naofumi stuffs his face with Bed-Chan's produce in chapter 127, Mein brings up a question if Bed-Chan had intentionally or unintentionally made the fruits poisonous. Naofumi, pondering on Mein's words, he is left in dull shock from the possibility, and Bed-Chan walks away presumably from her own embarrassment. Though Mein's question shakes up Naofumi for a bit, he brushes away the chances of Bed-Chan killing him, since the latter had plenty of opportunities to kill him that were not taken.
• Armor-Piercing Response: To stop Zylden's worries of Naofumi being present in Balafon and risk the chances of death in chapter 131, Malty reaffirms Naofumi's personality as a hero seeking for his children and the people of Balafon to be saved, as he is not the type of person that leaves other behind for himself to be saved.
  Malty/Mein: I am offended for you to imply that I haven't told him this already. But honestly, do you expect him to save his own skin if he has a chance to rescue you guys? Raphtalia and Firo, his children' are right here in Consevatie's'' clutches, for Chief God's sake.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Once she recovers from her lightheadedness in chapter 91, Mein's thoughts of worries quickly fill her mind. The first is making sure Raphtalia and Naofumi are still safe without her, but most importantly, the main worry is if Melty calling her "Big Sister" will alert the other soldiers fighting the wave that she is a princess.
• Ascended Extra: The Rising of the Shield Hero had Malty be its main antagonist, and despite being the Archenemy of Naofumi, her appearances became sporadic after volume 1-4, as the series had moved on to arcs not focused on Melromarc and the royal family's conflict. By Ambition of the Red Princess, Malty takes most of the spotlight as the main character having the story be told from her perspective, while interlude/omake chapters are the ones focusing on different characters.
• Asshole Victim: She delivers a potential False Rape Accusation and blackmails a merchant in chapter 7 to have a sale, and to also have payback for the condescending attitude he displayed towards her.
• The Atoner: From blaming herself that the Three Heroes Church's betrayal is an indirect result of her lies to play the game of thrones, Malty offers to do her best to protect Naofumi from her mistakes in chapter 99 and make sure he survives the ordeal that has happened.
• Batman Gambit: Played for Laughs. Mein wants to have Firo and Keel be paired up together, since because Keel is demeaning towards Naofumi, Mein can use Firo's overprotective care for Naofumi to have her kick Keel. That way, Mein can in the aftermath, have extra reasons to convince Naofumi to be more firm at disciplining Firo for the future.
• Becoming the Mask: Initially in playing the role as Mein of Samphor, Malty secretly detested having to pretend being a commoner to gain Naofumi's trust. Her care for Naofumi was mostly for his prestige as the Shield Hero, but as time went on and they gained more members for their party, Malty starts to connect with them and doesn't want to break their trust. To Naofumi, she has feeling of insecurities over what he'll react once he finds out her identity as a princess and shatter his natural kindness.
• Belated Injury Realization: Played for Laughs. In chapter 50, she thinks towards lighting up Motoyasu's cloak on fire to see how long he will realize the pain taking a toll on his body, because of how childish he acts over gaining small victories against Naofumi.
• Beneath the Mask: Starting off as a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing where whatever nice face she puts on, it is usually to hide her behavior as a Spoiled Brat and her ambitious desire to be queen at all cost. From Character Development as an adventurer in Naofumi's party, her more secretive side is less on the "Bitch" part, and more on her pragmatism or irritation to people she can't stand. Outside of her inner mind, Mein shows her more genuine nice side to her party members or general manners to anyone else.
• Berserk Button:
  • A way that can set her off the edge, despite needing to cultivate her Mein of Samphor persona is her arguments with Naofumi on the topic of how they should manage Firo's behavior. Mein's approach is to always use a monster seal for desperate measures on Firo's behavior, but because of Naofumi's hatred to slavery, he never opts to with the option, causing him to look stubborn enough to grind her gears.
  • The constant Blaming the Victim coming from Kazuya and his glorified praising that Satellizer is the hero in chapter 110 pushes Mein, who is already tired of Graile's rebellion into the edge to murder Kazuya, as she can't stand more of his shrieking.
  • As much as she likes Naofumi's sentimentality towards her and the party, the sentimentality itself can become problematic for her to convince Naofumi to go through with any of her plans if it means endangering herself or others for success. Extended towards caring and saving commoners, Malty hates Naofumi's heart bleeding so much love that it ends up sacrificing his own self-preservation that she wants to keep safe.
  • In the case of Consevatie, one of the people she absolutely despises the most, Malty can get greatly infuriated or be ashamed to an extend whenever he is able to emerge victorious over her, despite many of his actions proving him to an idiot that should logically be a minor threat for her to deal with.
• Beta Test Baddie: A part her that gives her the motivation to strive for becoming the queen of Melromarc was at first to gain Mirellia's approval. Eventually, because of how successful and praised Melty became instead of herself, Malty dedicated herself to be queen to prove that she is better than Melty.
• Betrayal Insurance: To minimize the chances of getting betrayed by Jackson failing to grovel correctly towards the Three Heroes Church in chapter 129, Mein draws a fire rune on his chest to act as an Explosive Leash that can punish him for his actions.
• Big "NO!":
  • Malty yells loudly in saying "NO!" to stop Mala from taking the decision to have herself as a bait to fight against any Three heroes Church members in chapter 120, just so all of the remaining group members are provided better opportunities to escape.
  • Feeling desperate of her paranoia that Jackson can never change out of his selfishness in chapter 128, and suspecting him to be an opportunist that will exploit Naofumi's group to get revenge on Consevatie, Malty yells a Big "NO!" to refuse Jackson any acceptance.
  • Just as Naofumi suggests on killing Consevatie in chapter 130, Mein lets out a sudden Big "NO!", as if she does not want to murder the person she despises from her heart. To further clarify her disagreement with Naofumi, she only wants Consevatie alive to prevent him from becoming a Dead Man's Switch, or because she wants Consevatie to experience a Cruel And Usual Death in the hands of Siltvelt.
• Big Sister Instinct:
  • Initially, she viewed Raphtalia as nothing but a demi-human slave that stops her from getting near Naofumi, yet in the times they are alone together, Mein had chosen the decisions to save Raphtalia or to bond with her. Eventually in chapter 58, while Mein hates herself's increasing sentimentalism towards Raphtalia, Mein nevertheless wishes to keep her safe from going on an infiltration to save Naofumi.
  • Downplayed. Under normal circumstances, Malty would actively try to find ways to beat Melty in political games, but if Melty's life is at risk of physical harm or death, Malty takes off her political guard down for her safety.
    • To a Raleigh Consevatie, Malty had warned Melty to not go near the man out of the potential he might do something horrible to her.
    • For the third wave in chapter 91, Malty insists for Melty to stay in the backlines healing soldiers to save her from combating the deadly monster. Another reason stems from if Malty were to become queen, she would want to do it in a way where her hard work in assisting the Shield Hero is a payoff and not because Melty's death just made her the sole competitor.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: She puts on a façade of a cheerful, nice, and supportive girl to hide her ulterior motives to become the Queen of Melromarc. Towards her father, she appears to agree with his plans of framing Naofumi of rape while looking as though she is under pressure from her father's plan to ruin the Shield Hero's reputation. However, Malty's inner thoughts reveal that she hates her father for coming up with a stupid plan to summoning the Shield Hero to Melromarc with the purpose of ruining the Shield Hero's reputation.
• Blemished Beauty: In the aftermath of the encounter against the wave hound in chapter 19, she loses a piece of her ear and a permanent scar on face. Despite its reputation of being a shame to noble women in communities, she remains just as beautiful as before and Naofumi treats her no different because of it.
• Blinded by Rage: From her great anger to kill Kazuya for his annoying statements that Graile's rebels are the bad guys and Satellizer is a hero, Mein loses her more tactical side to make plans in chapter 110, and once her rage calms down, she can only lament on how petty she became for attempting to hurt a child.
• Blood from the Mouth: Mein as she throws up her stomach contents over pushing her body to its limits in chapter 110, she gets a mixture of blood to be vomited out as an extra addition.
• Bodyguarding a Badass: Downplayed. Naofumi on his own is limited to only using his Legendary Shield to protect himself, and despite losing it in later chapters, he still has miracles as a substitute for support. In the end, Mein insists on protecting Naofumi with her better proficiency at attacking, so that his weakness of not having a way to deal damage is covered.
• Book Dumb: Academically, she never went to school and was tutored at home by her uncle Aldrecht. Despite having an abundance of resources to learn from, she struggled to keep herself focus to learn her subjects from Aldrecht and her other teachers. Additionally, she easily loses focus on studying from books, unlike her sister, Melty. However, while unremarkable at her studies, she excels at being The Social Expert Manipulative Bitch at predicting other people's wants, needs, and the political structures of the world.
• Bratty Food Demand: Back as a princess from Anne's P.O.V in chapter 89's omake, Malty had the ability to rudely demand food for her at anytime, but hides that fact to make herself look sympathetic in getting onto Katarina's goodwill.
• Breakout Character: Downplayed. Qinlongfei writing Malty for the early parts for the story, she was meant to act as a Pinball Protagonist that does not contribute much to the plot, and instead narrates the actions of what Naofumi takes to progress the storyline. However, after Qinlongfei wrote chapter 3 and portrayed Malty's past in a sympathetic angle, Malty was given a more integral role to be a protagonist.
• Break the Haughty: While her body was intact in her beginning adventures with Naofumi, Malty secretly hated Raphtalia, because of her Fantastic Racism. Viewing Raphtalia as a problem taking away Naofumi's attention, Malty attempted to leave Raphtalia to fight a Hell Hound by herself. When the scheme ended up backfiring on Malty receiving the brunt of the injuries, and her face getting permanently scarred, she slips out on her more pragmatic side to apologize to Raphtalia. From then on, though Malty still keeps her racist views, she Took a Level in Kindness to slowly grow closer to Raphtalia as a child to watch over, and sees value in wanting Naofumi to view her as a companion he can trust.
• Broken Tears: After she finishes kicking the Bitch Lord and giving her a "Reason You Suck" Speech, Malty has an emotional breakdown over their similarities and herself being as bad as the Bitch Lord. The breakdown is the culmination of both her remorse and the stress it could cause her heart condition if she breaks down for too long.
• Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: Inverted. On surface, Mein looks to be the one that comforts Naofumi of his worries and Heroic Self-Deprecation to believe in himself, but on a personal level, Mein has a much more brooding outlook to be a Pragmatic Hero that is cautious of everyone. Naofumi himself is on a more gentle, as he acts as her Morality Pet to keep her in line from planning up schemes that could endanger others' lives and cares for her wellbeing.
• Byronic Hero: Beneath the Mask of the enthusiastic and kind Mein of Samphor persona see shows in public, Malty is secretly brooding inside of her mind to look at the many possibilities other people are hiding behind their well-intentions. A worry that recurs behind her mind is that while she may assist and be heroic for her party, her main priorities is to be queen and the possibility of Naofumi learning her princess identity is something she fears will cause him to reject her.
• Call-Back:
  • She remembers the illusion of her mother way back in chapter 48 telling her that she can't change herself, and the statement of Mirellia's is brought back again in chapter 108, as to remind herself that her own selfishness and manipulative actions will never leave her.
  • To get Naofumi to stop sulking out of himself as an unworthy hero in chapter 113, Mein brings up her moment of cowardice back in chapter 19 at the Lute Village mine incident. That way, they could relate to each others failures and not keep bringing themselves down from who they used to be from the past.
  • Getting stunk by the back and the feeling poison seep inside her body in chapter 117 reminds her of her previous experience with the Siltvelt Ravens knocking her out with a poisonous arrow back in chapter 56.
  • Naofumi suggesting on using the sewers to escape from the Melromarc capital in chapter 120, Malty is reminder of the experience she had to deal with the Siltvelt Agents way back in her early adventures with Naofumi. Looking back at the old times, Malty can only recall the steps the Siltvelt Agents took to get inside of Melromarc, instead of their names and attempts to transport Naofumi away.
  • To calm down Naofumi's burst of anger at Rudopholus and Bellatrix possibly endangering her life by tampering with her slave seal, Mein recalls back into the event of the Life Root rampaging throughout Balafon, so to assure Naofumi that getting her slave seal tampered is a risk worth taking in chapter 124.
  • Seeing Yukari be screaming with a panicked look behind her back in chapter 125, Mein is reminded of her previous encounter with the wargs, so she uses her previous experience with the surprise monster attack to prepare a ball of fire in her hand to prepare for the chance Yukari just saw a threatening figure behind her back.
  • To guide Raphtalia in healing the Balafon Elder of his injuries in chapter 131, Mein recalls Raphtalia performing a Mouth To Mouth Force Feeding technique the latter did a while back in chapter 57, so that Raphtalia is both assured of Mein's presence and have on what she can do to help others.
• Calling the Old Woman Out: In chapter 48, though her mother is not present and is instead an apparition created by the dungeon boss, Malty vents out her frustrations on why she hates Mirellia as a poor mother. Though Malty got to live a mostly comfortable life as a princess, Mirellia never did anything for her life and most of the care she received came from her princess privileges, father, and her nanny.
• Cannot Spit It Out: Deep down, she wants to tell Naofumi her identity as a princess, so that their relationship isn't masked with lies, but isn't able to find the confidence within herself to do it. By telling Naofumi, the consequences could result in him hating her, leaving his party, or due to their goals not aligning, they might not be able to keep each other satisfied.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You:
  • Downplayed. She doesn't kill Naofumi, but she is given the option to go through with her father's plan to frame Naofumi of rape and instead side with another hero more suitable for her needs. Instead of going with the action that both nobles and her father had expected of her, Malty chooses to save Naofumi from his trial, believing him to be the most efficient out of all the heroes and that his prestige as the Shield Hero will be most useful for helping her be queen.
  • Discussed. She very much wants Consevatie the Younger to suffer or die inside of the collapsed pit in chapter 120, but her thoughts on Consevatie possibly dying are put to question when thinking if the slave seal attached on her chest, and by extension Raphtalia and Firo would all be indirectly killed if their connection with Consevatie is cut short. Thinking those thoughts, Malty brushes the idea of Consevatie dying in hope of herself, Firo, and Raphtalia are at least kept alive by his presence surviving.
• Card-Carrying Jerkass: Downplayed. Her Crocodile Tears and ability to pull off being a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing is something she proudly enjoys having as a useful skill that can manipulate her benefactors into supporting her. Although in the end, she doesn't act as a blatant Jerkass and Spoiled Brat all the time, as she needs to keep up with appearances and not ruin her own reputation through her own blunders.
• Cassandra Truth:
  • Malty considers revealing herself to everyone in chapter 95 that she is the first princess of Melromarc to establish authority on the Three Heroes Church, but decides against it, since hostile members of the church can just claim she is an imposter of the real Princess Malty.
  • Malty is denounced as a pretender of the first princess by Captain Felix in chapter 109, since he believes the real Princess Malty would have stayed in the capital of Melromarc and would not be carrying around a burnt scar. To prove Captain Felix wrong, Malty casts a [Fiendfyre] to show her magical capabilities as a princess and ownership of Aultcray's Vassal Wand.
• Chainmail Bikini: Defied. Malty attempts to buy the same armor that her canon version had wore, but doesn't do so under the request of Elhart. Justified by the fact that the revealing armor is used to accompany knights in courts. Rather than buy the revealing, good-looking armor, Malty instead buys Boring, but Practical leather armor for protection and to create the disguise that she is an adventurer.
• Character Check: She has at times relapsed into her manipulative side or will stoop to victimizing her self at others if it means gaining more advantages.
  • For the earlier chapters in her time as Mein of Samphor, Malty has spent most of the time pretending to be nice around everyone and hasn't been dubious in a relaxed environment. Around Eclair in chapter 38, Malty returns to her more manipulative side to sour Mirellia's image, so the Eclair will turn against the queen.
  • If she can convince unsuspecting strangers to fall for her lies or manipulations, Malty is likely to pull up being a Smug Smiler to cherish the minor achievements she can make, no matter how much nicer she can get with her party members.
• Character Development:
  • By the start of the story, Malty's attitude towards everyone she comes across with is to view them as gullible pawns that can be manipulated as long as she finds the spot that can get around their moment of weakness. She spent most of her time wearing masks and seeing words of politics being laced with lies that by the time she becomes an adventurer, she has to really put in the effort on learning to live on stable relationships with Naofumi and all his party members. Though at first, she treats them as a nuisance that are getting in her way to start a more intimate relationship with Naofumi, Malty eventually grows closer and is more tolerant in keeping around her allies.
  • Her initial adventurers with Naofumi had Malty's mind be always on guard and be scheming for future events on how she could manipulate Naofumi into her perfect king. During later chapters, Malty acts less of a schemer and more of a pessimist that has a paranoid outlook on people that could potentially become a problem for her party.
  • At first, Malty got through her life by using her feminine charms to either seduce or tease others into becoming submissive towards her orders. However, as an adventurer, seduction is an unreliable tool for survival, so Malty slowly resorts and adapts to the life of a real adventurer to become strong enough to fight the battles her party members participate in.
  • Her Fantastic Racism against demi-humans and the beastmen meant that Malty has a sense of pride in refusing to work with any of them. By later chapters, Malty is eventually willing to follow the commands of Farkas, as the latter is her best chance at handling situations of combat for a desperate measure.
  • Whenever she is put into dangerous situations or is in the possibility of being endangered, Malty is quick to rely on either running away or thinks secretly into her thoughts to use someone as a Human Shield. As with Raphtalia, Malty immediately ditched her in chapter 19 to have her act as bait for a Hell Hound, so that she herself would survive. Come to chapter 91, Malty doesn't think about much for her own survival and immediately heads towards the frontline of the battle against the third wave to assist Raphtalia and Naofumi.
  • Back in chapter 44, Mein preferred to have Naofumi put her wellbeing above all else, so that her safety is ensured. By chapter 92, when Mein and Naofumi are falling towards their potential deaths, Mein is willing to separate herself from Naofumi to ensure his safety.
  • She used to be paranoid at the thought of death claiming her life in the past and when adventuring with Naofumi during her early days, Malty saw the adventure as something she could compare to her romance novels. However, in chapter 105 where she reflects everything she has gone through with Naofumi and her party members, Malty doesn't feel as much stress about dying like before and feels comforted over the fact Naofumi views her as a trustworthy companion, instead of traitor keeping secrets from him.
• Character Tic: Anytime an advantageous situation occurs or an enemy she absolutely despises gets their Laser-Guided Karma, expect Malty to have thoughts about becoming a Smug Smiler, in which she will suppress her excitement.
• Child Hater: Downplayed. Her low opinion on children stems from her interactions with Melty and Raphtalia. From what Malty can conclude on their interactions is that children can't be easily negotiated and their impulsivity can cause them to interfere her personal enjoyment. At the same time, as much as Malty dislikes them, she doesn't take actions to openly hate them and instead tolerates their attitude until they leave her.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Since choosing Naofumi as her chosen hero, she does her best to make sure that no other girls besides herself is near him at all times.
  • During her initial days with him, she tried to find an effort to get Raphtalia away from him but couldn't, due to Raphtalia's constant need for a parental figure. Eventually, while she does form bonds with Raphtalia, Mein doesn't want her to be constantly coddled by Naofumi.
  • Part of the reason she doesn't want to stay with Motoyasu is that she doesn't want to deal with the competition of three girls, something which further gives Mein a reason to stay with Naofumi.
  • When Melty tries to stay with her and Naofumi, Malty in her inner monologue panics in distress, since if she isn't willing to share a cardinal hero with her friends, then its clear Melty won't be getting anywhere near Naofumi.
  • Bellatrix getting close and touchy near Naofumi's body, all from the latter taking his time understand Bellatrix and Rudopholus' past, Mein feels a sense of outrage at Bellatrix being a woman attempting to take away Naofumi's attention in chapter 123.
• Combat Pragmatist: She is willing to do whatever it takes to take out whatever enemy that is threatening her life. She will focus on their eyes and quickly find a way to set them on fire.
• Comically Missing the Point:
  • For a time in chapter 118, Mein not understanding the word of what "lava" is, she assumes the terminology as Naofumi exaggerating the difficulties to travel to Peninsula as comparable to insects. After thinking for a bit, Mein is able to connect lava with Dragon Blood as the closest association to a fiery liquid to understand what Naofumi is saying.
  • Communicating with Naofumi about what Bed-Chan is doing to their navigators in chapter 126, Mein assumes Naofumi is asking her to bring help their navigators by burning Bed-Chan alive to be saved from being brainwashed till decay. However, Naofumi instead clears up Mein's misconception that he can understand Bed-Chan in the Japanese language, and the latter is the one calling for help to be protected from the Three Heroes Church.
  Naofumi: What are you doing, Mein? She's asking for our help.
  Mein/Malty: Yeah, I think they are telling me they'd rather die than being controlled by this slender ... thing.
  Naofumi: What? NO! She's definitely not asking for death! She's trapped, and asking us to help her escape.
  Mein/Malty: Yes, Master Naofumi. I don't know if you are talking about Yukari, or Nora. But I can see they are both trapped. And no. I can't help them escape. Sir Oersted already tried and failed, and now he's hanging alongside them.
  Naofumi: I'm not talking about Yukari and Nora! Now look at what you just did. You hurt Bed-Chan's' feelings.
• Commonality Connection: Learning from Ken's snark that Minami is an enjoyer of reading romance novels to slack off of her education, Malty thinks that she will get along with Minami for their shared love for romance novels in chapter 105. Hopefully if the waves and the situation calms down, Malty wishes to have an opportunity to bring about a discussion of their favorite interests.
• Composite Character: While she may lack the sadism, idiocy, and repulsive nature of her original counterpart, a majority of the negative traits Malty possesses in the story is similar of Canon!Naofumi's personality. Specifically, Malty has the pessimistic and paranoid viewpoint Canon!Naofumi has, alongside the additional benefits of being more charismatic than the latter and being better at hiding her self-serving motives.
• Compulsive Liar: Deconstruction. She has a tendency to lie about matters regarding her real motives to stay with Naofumi or taking desperate measures to not let anyone know of her identity as a princess. Malty's reasoning for this is her fear of being hated by Naofumi learning who she really is, but the truth will inevitably have to be revealed and she wishes to be the one that reveals it, as to not completely ruin Naofumi's image of her.
• Conflicting Loyalty: Deep down inside of her, she desperately desires to become the queen of Melromarc but at the same time, doing so would mean having to reveal her identity to Naofumi's group as a princess, leading to the people that care for her to lose faith in her.
  • It's further explored in chapter 63, where Malty could either reveal herself as a princess to Naofumi but risk losing his support in her goals to be queen or continue to lie with him and strain their relationship in the future once the truth of her identity is eventually exposed.
• Continuity Nod:
  • In chapter 18, Malty confuses the word "lava" for insect larva, as both have a similar sounding to each other. Fast-forward to chapter 114, the joke is repeated again by her not understanding Naofumi's snark answer to comparing travelling to Peninsula by water or lava.
  • Thinking that the word, "static", refers to glowing mushrooms, Mein is reminded of those same mushrooms she found in the Lute Village Mine back at chapter 19.
• Cool Big Sis: By playing into her compassionate "Mein of Samphor" persona so well, Malty ends up being known as "Big Sister Mein" to Raphtalia and is relied by the latter for emotional support or for protection.
• Cooldown Hug:
  • Downplayed. To calm down Naofumi's worries in chapter 106 of her decision to go out to Graile with the risk of exposing herself, Mein hugs him to signal her confidence and safety of her choice.
  • She runs to give Naofumi a hug in chapter 129 to persuade him off his worries that their actions to kill the many soldiers of House Consevatie and the Three Heroes Church was a necessary act to save Balafon's people, and that they can't bring themselves down with guilt.
• Corporal Punishment: Her suggestion to punishing and teaching Firo to become a good girl for Naofumi is by suggesting for the latter to use a familiar seal on Firo. By using the familiar seal, Naofumi can shock Firo to punish the latter for misbehaving. In the end, it fails to convince Naofumi to use slavery as a harsh punishment to Firo, since Naofumi views Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil.
• "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot:
  • She is left lamenting inside her thoughts in chapter 116, as her plans to immediately go into the Melromarc capital to meet up Vicar Vittorio with Naofumi, Uranus, and Oersted blinded her from the possibility that the monastery members could have known were the other Three Heroes are, and instead have them for support against the Three Heroes Church.
  • Thinking back on everything that had happened that led up to chapter 126, Malty wonders how different her life would have been in a curious case had she gone with her father's plan to frame Naofumi. Though not regretful to stay by Naofumi's side, she thinks on the many possibilities her life could have become if the problems she had to deal were different from the current ones.
  Malty: (And she has a lot of built up anger ever since Cromwell's betrayal... or since she committed her plan to stick with Naofumi. Not that she regretted her decisions and would have taken it back. Even if she's now morbidly curious on how things would have gone if she went with father's scheme and framed Naofumi.)
• Cowardly Lion:
  • Having started off as a Dirty Coward willing to use her own party members as a Human Shield and leaving Raphtalia behind in a cave, Mein grows to be able to face off the third wave in the frontlines. Though fearful of her life, Mein is not willing to let her allies do the fighting, while she just watches from behind, so she joins them no matter the injuries she sustained from the exploding fishes.
  • Her fears are further explored in chapter 105, as while she is very much afraid of dying and would not risk her life for her country, she would be willing to do so for Naofumi, as the thought of being valued by him feels comforting, even if it means dying.
• Crocodile Tears: She uses her tears to make herself look sympathetic, to have her benefactors believe her stories, and look pressured at situations.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Discussed. In how she wants Consevatie to suffer, Malty likes to hope his end to be gruesome as a form of payback to everything he had done to her and her party members. As such, anytime Consevatie is brought up in a discussion or implied to be responsible for something, Malty will curse him to die horribly in someway.
  • Played for Laughs. Venting out her frustrations in wanting Consevatie's death to be done by Siltvelt, Mein accidentally gets her group members to be creeped out by her overly detailed rant on how she wishes the death to be orchestrated.
• Cutting Corners: Downplayed. To squeeze in a slightly smaller price from a shopkeeper in chapter 100, Mein uses a made up sob story on how she got her burnt scar to exploit the shopkeeper's sympathies.

D-G

• Damsel in Distress: She gets one of her thighs clawed by Lugo's gloves and it drains her magic. Lacking the magic to fight back, Mein is kept as a hostage of Lugo and is intended to be used as a ransom against the Shield Hero's party and the Three Heroes Church expedition.
• Dark Secret: Her main secret being that she is the first princess of Melromarc is something she actively hides from Naofumi, and her party to an extent, as she believes the reveal of her real identity would either imply she is the cause of Naofumi's suffering or no one will trust her for her more selfish motives.
• Dating What Daddy Hates: Double Subverted. At the start, Malty is ordered by Aultcray to only pretend being Naofumi's partner, so that he would be able to set up a trial to frame him as a rapist. However, once Malty chooses to save Naofumi of his trial and continue staying by the latter's side, Aultcray begins to hate Naofumi even further either because he believes him to be too incompetent to protect his daughter or is secretly brainwashing her to his side.
• Dead Guy Junior: She names her adventurer identity as "Mein", and its also the same name her pet filorial, Mein, is called.
• Death Glare:
  • Fed up with Naofumi's Chronic Hero Syndrome to save the people of Graile from the Three Heroes Church, at the cost of exposing his identity as the Shield Hero, Malty glares at his face to stop him from going forward with the plan he is coming up in chapter 105.
  • Being near Jackson, Malty's distrust towards him pushes her to be glaring at most of his words, due to thinking him as a traitor that only sides with people to further his goals.
    • She gives off a Death Glare in giving Jackson a What the Hell, Hero? for his Bystander Syndrome to do nothing all while Father Caleb and the rest of the Three Heroes Church members enslaved the Lute Village women.
    • Not trusting Jackson to be a Fake Defector that could easily have a Chronic Backstabbing Disorder to genuinely betray her group for the Three Heroes Church, Mein glares at him participating in Naofumi's plan to be the most important component or setback in chapter 129.
• Declaration of Protection: Being partners with Naofumi, she promises to be his sword to always protect him, and being seen by him as more than the tool she proclaims herself as, Naofumi also promises to keep her safe at all costs.
• Deer in the Headlights:
  • When she and Naofumi are about to be shallowed whole by a leviathan monster in chapter 92, Mein is filled with so much fear in her body that she can't control herself from moving to do something the increase the chances of survival.
  • She spends her time in chapter 94 doing nothing but to look in horror as to the goddess that Lautrec had summoned is beating down the fighters dealing the third wave. It takes Mein to get reminded by Raphtalia to run, just so she can focus on her own safety and not look like an idiot in a battlefield. Even then, Mein's Heroic RRoD catches up to her and she lacks the energy to push herself into doing anything.
• Defeated and Trophified: Defied. She likes the thought of having Sister Amelia's head as a personal trophy in chapter 109 to get payback for the latter's refusal to give her holy water way earlier and for participating in framing her as a fugitive. Though an interesting suggestion by Alderic to tropify Sister Amelia, Malty would much rather prioritize in military strategies to protect herself and Naofumi.
• Delayed Reaction: Just as she learns the concept of video games and NPC being comparable to artificial life forms like controlled golems in chapter 128, Mein eventually bursts in anger from the full understanding Consevatie is a reincarnate that sees Medea to be world of playthings meant for him to joyride.
• Dented Iron: After unleashing her Supernova spell, she blacks out and is treated by Zylden. However, unleashing the spell had caused her heart to be damaged and is highly advised by Zylden to not overexert herself again or she will die.
• Desecrating the Dead: From being unable to hold her stomach contents at how gruesome Ken killed Kazuya, Mein unintentionally lets her vomit onto Kazuya's shredded corpse in chapter 110.
• Despair Event Horizon: Reaching chapter 118, Malty is put through a big wringer that both physically and emotionally wears her down. She is knocked on her knees to witness Consevatie come before her and Naofumi, just so they could be told of themselves falling into a trap. Afterwards, Malty's own way of thinking is crushed by Consevatie labelling out the part of her own selfishness to not give up becoming queen, and is turned into a slave to be humiliated for life, all while she sees herself as a failure who only dragged the people she cared for in the worst situation.
• Did I Just Say That Out Loud?:
  • In chapter 7, she accidentally screams out her thoughts to Naofumi on how stupid he was for making her worry over his loud screaming and that it would have potentially attracted some unwanted guests. In Naofumi's response, he gives a dejected and saddened look for disappointing her, and it causes Mein to realize her uncontrolled outburst had hurt his feelings.
  • In chapter 73, Mein calls out Eclair for the latter's foolishness to fight Uther without support and believing that dying honorably is a good idea. Quickly after warning Eclair's decision to fight Uther on her own, Mein realizes that her own words have genuine weight and she is actually starting to care for Eclair, despite the latter being in a lower rank of position.
• Didn't Think This Through: As smart as Malty may be in the game of thrones or in manipulating people, a major flaw of hers is that she fails to consider are the unintentional consequences that follow the actions she makes.
  • In chapter 7, Mein successfully blackmails a merchant into giving her tons of silver coins to support herself and Naofumi in their adventure. However, by robbing the merchant, Naofumi is able to deduce and suspect that Mein isn't who she says she is, since the money obtained is to much to be traded with balloon skins.
  • In chapter 77, Mein chooses to shoot the ceiling of Boletaria Castle to let air in to allow everyone to breath and to empower her fire magic. Unfortunately, Mein forgets to consider that she is underground of the castle and by attacking the ceiling, she caused the environment to crumble and endanger everyone. For the worst case scenario, she had accidentally got Aldrecht killed, all from recklessly using her newfound power.
  • She puts on a sister clothing of the Three Heroes Church in chapter 106 to blend in with the crowd, so that no suspects her with anything, but fails to consider that Dressing as the Enemy would mean she looks like an enemy to her allies. As a result, Ken almost kills her, until he identifies her as Sophia of Totela.
  • When making her plan in chapter 115 to go into the Melromarc capital alone, Naofumi reacts to worry for her life, and despite her insistence to go through with the plan, he always tries to bring up reasons to just stay with him for safety. Thinking Naofumi as just being paranoid, she tries to find ways to calm him down and dismisses all of his fears for her life, until he brings up a good point as to how she go to Melromarc, if there were unknown variables that got in her way. Mein tries to find a way to rebuke that question of his worries, but the longer she thinks on it, she realizes her miscalculation and the risk she may have posed for herself.
  • In the middle of her No-Holds-Barred Beatdown of Jackson in chapter 128, Mein is put to a stop from her outburst by Naofumi warning her that the noise she is creating has the possibility of attracting unwanted intruders. Mein, understanding Naofumi's words, she backs away from Jackson and relents on the built up shame for her impulsive actions and her personality in general.
• Dirty Coward: After making decisions from time and time again to save Raphtalia in situations where she could have easily been left behind to die. the last straw that convinces Malty to ditch her is when they get cornered by a hound. With Raphtalia still alive, Malty quickly views her in her thoughts as a Human Shield that can act as bait for the hound while she runs, but the hound ends up chasing Malty for not looking at its eyes.
• Disabled in the Adaptation: Canon!Malty lacks any sort of any long-lasting physical injuries, because she lets her minions do most of the fighting for her and she mostly stands behind from any close danger. In this fanfic, Malty gets a cursed scar on her face and a bitten in chapter 19, and it remains on her face permanently from the encounter.
• Disposing of a Body: As an indirect result to disinfect herself from contracting any poison from a dead pilgrim man in chapter 99, Mein burns his corpse to kill any remaining bacteria.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Deconstructed. Hearing Kazuya's annoying screeches that Satellizer is the hero and the people hurting her are the bad guys, Mein is easily infuriated in chapter 110 to make two attempts to have Kazuya killed. After calming down once the rebellion is finished, Mein making a Long Last Look at the events that transpired causes her to solemnly regret having made attempts to kill a child that was not bringing much harm to her.
• Disqualification-Induced Victory: Defied. A variation of the trope is part of the reason Malty doesn't want Melty to have herself be endangered by the monsters of the third wave, since becoming queen through Melty's death would make Malty's adventuring with Naofumi feel like a wasted effort for her.
• Ditzy Genius: For all her intellect on planning and precautions on dangerous situations or approach on surviving the game of thrones, Malty can look past on surface-level details, thereby limiting on what options she perceives is possible.
• Don't You Dare Pity Me!: In chapter 67, she at first mistakenly believes that Kyubey is blackmailing her for suspecting her true identity as a high-ranking noble. It turns out, Kyubey was actually trying to comfort her lack of confidence to tell Naofumi her true identity. In Malty's eyes she would have preferred Kyubey blackmailing her, as it means it's a situation that can be eventually sorted out. However, by being pitied by Kyubey, Malty feels as though she had sunk as low as a demi-human slave.
• Does Not Know How to Say "Thanks": Though she eventually comes to terms in chapter 119 that she cared for Baldy, Blue Eyes, and Mala as her three closest associates that have helped her life as a princess, Malty feels ashamed of her past self for never having acknowledged or expressed glimpses of her own gratitude towards them.
• Dramatically Missing the Point:
  • She assumes that Naofumi is a Tragic Hero who went into a hero academy and got betrayed by his peers, which resulted in him landing in Medea. Despite sympathizing and telling him about how sad and tragic his life must have been, it only brings Naofumi down even more, because he is unknowingly making Mein believe he is a great hero, but is actually a normal Otaku that wasted his high school life. Even when Naofumi is aware of Mein hiding her true identity, he can't bring himself to call her out, since he would look like a hypocrite for hiding who he really is.
  • Not understanding why she has no relevance in Naofumi's world, with the exception of characters he can reference through his own Pop-Cultural Osmosis, Malty questions Naofumi if her family has relevance to the Portal Book that transported him into Medea. Hearing from Naofumi's mouth that he saw a princess of the royal family that did not appear as a nice person to him, Malty concludes that her life has no real importance, and that Naofumi's hesitancy to give her an accurate answer could imply she is Marked to Die.
• Dramatic Ellipsis:
  • She takes a dramatic pause on what she has to say in her thoughts when having to let out the real source of what frustrates her about the Bitch Lord being just like herself in chapter 63.
    Malty's Thoughts: (She was angry at this... creature so much, because she sees her exact reflection within the Bitch Lord. And she HATES It!)
  • To give her own personal piece of ambitious advice, so that Naofumi does not give into his Heroic BSoD in chapter 95 from the Three Heroes Church, Malty takes a brief pause in her talking to motivate Naofumi that they need to work together to claim what belongs to themselves.
    Malty: We have to grow stronger... and take what's rightfully ours by force.
  • Having to release her pent up anger in chapter 126, Malty at first believes it all came from Cromwell turning the Three Heroes Church into enemies that ruined her life, until she dramatically takes a pause to question if it came from her decision to be committed as Naofumi's partner. Though thankful that she and Naofumi both trust each other even in the present, she thinks in curiosity on what difference her life could have been had she went with her father's plan to frame Naofumi of rape.
    Malty's Thoughts: (And she has a lot of built up anger ever since Cromwell's betrayal... or since she committed her plan to stick with Naofumi. Not that she regretted her decisions and would have taken it back. Even if she's now morbidly curious on how things would have gone if she went with father's scheme and framed Naofumi.)
  • Though feeling uneasy to trust Jackson of his reformation in chapter 128, believing that if he is capable of changing into a person, Malty hopes to apply the same statement to the betterment of herself.
    Malty's Thoughts: (But if this lowly commoner can change... maybe she can too.)
• Dressing as the Enemy:
  • Mein puts on a lays of sister clothes in chapter 106 to make herself look like a church member of either the Three Heroes or Four Heroes Church, so that nobody would suspect her as someone that is noticeable within the crowd.
  • Again, by Robbing the Dead knights of House Consevatie of their armory, she provides herself, Ren, and Oersted outfits that can allow them to blend in as fake knights that can infiltrate inside of Balafon without getting spotted by Consevatie the Younger.
• Drunk on the Dark Side: Right after absorbing the mana contained in the Orb of Power in chapter 77, Malty feels an intense feeling of euphoria over the power that surges through her body. With the power, she can easily defeat all of the Free Fighters and go face-to-face against Aldrecht. The downside is that by being fueled by so much excitement, Malty gets reckless on how she uses her powers, resulting in the endangerment of everyone and ruining her persona as Mein of Samphor.
• Enemies Equals Greatness: Being hated by someone of great importance would imply that she herself is an important person, but angering the wrath of an outer god out for her blood in chapter 94, Mein is unable to feel herself being smug at an enemy hating her for reasons she can't understand.
• Enemy Mine: She is unable to tolerate Streibough's demeaning insults towards her and his overblown ego downplaying the feats she is capable of. In chapter 102, Mein leaves his rudeness for once as an exception in teaming up together to freeze the cultists that are endangering her life and Naofumi.
• Energy Donation: Once she reunites with Naofumi and Raphtalia in chapter 91, Mein casts an [Invigoration] spell on them, alongside with the members of House Dozel, Claus, and Yngvi to boost their stamina recovery.
• Enlightened self-interest:
  • In a personal scale for her ambition to become queen, she actively supports Naofumi in his adventurers out of hope that by the end, all the glory and credits they had done for the commoners repay her ultimate goals.
  • Put in a cynical note, Malty will consciously refuse to help random strangers that serve little to no link for her survival or goals, as she believes such a actions to be a waste of time to progress her more desperate times with Naofumi.
• Enraged by Idiocy:
  • She hates her father for coming up with a plan to summon the Shield Hero to Melromarc with the sole purpose of ruining the Shield Hero's reputation. By sending the Shield Hero and all the other three Legendary Heroes to Melromarc, Aultcray is only endangering the other countries with the chance of starting a war. Malty even begins to think that her father is going senile.
    • Malty sides with Naofumi as he proves himself to be the most cautious and stable compared to the other three Legendary Heroes, as they prefer to work in their own methods making them to be unusable in her plans to become Queen.
    • Motoyasu Kitamura's stupidity during Naofumi's trial, manages to leave Malty baffled by how he refuses to apologize to Naofumi despite antagonizing the latter.
  • At Eclair, Malty has a distaste for her Honor Before Reason as part of the primary traits that make up the Seatto family. As good as Eclair wishes to be, Malty can see how her honorable rules can result her creating unnecessary problems that could have been avoided had Eclair chose to be more pragmatic.
  • She secretly shows her annoyance at Sir Antonio for having No Sense of Direction, despite being an elite knight with the title of Chevalier.
  • Malty is left surprised at how a commoner from the past had the audacity to call her a witch since birth, and better yet, the commoner managed to start a rebellion at Defiant Bay.
  • Witnessing the stabbing of Father Gordon from Sister Amelia in chapter 104, Malty couldn't believe the sheer stupidity Sister Amelia sunk herself into. Even worse, Malty goes from being left in shock from the stupid act to panicking from Sister Amelia's madness to unleash her knights into enslaving everyone in Graile.
  • Anytime she has to deal with situations related to Consevatie, Malty is likely to be triggered in someway from Consevatie's poor thought process to achieve goals, and to make matters worse, him succeeding over her, despite a lack of intelligence is what makes him one of the worst people she can't stand.
• Entertainingly Wrong: Each time Naofumi mentions his experiences from Japan, Mein is likely to come into the wrong conclusion as to what Naofumi's life was like before.
  • She hears of the terminology "video games" in chapter 3, but while she may understand what a game is, Mein lacks any understanding as to what the word "video" means.
  • Hearing Naofumi learn his information from Google, Mein refers to the person as "Sir Google", despite it being a website in reality.
  • Naofumi saying the word, "lava", Mein associates the word as something related to insect larva in chapter 18, before Naofumi explains the terminology as hot, molten rock.
    • By chapter 114, Naofumi brings up the term "lava" again as part of his statement to jokingly question if escaping to Peninsula by sea is a good idea, since the place is unlikely to have lava. At first, Mein thinks up of insect larva again, but is then able to associate lava with fiery liquid comparable to Dragon Blood.
  • In chapter 88, Ren brings up his reasons as to why he is the most qualified to talk to King Aultcray and he uses his video game experiences to enforce himself. To Mein, she can only deduce video games as a competitive sport event, due to not knowing what the concept it.
  • Played for Drama. She receives facts from Naofumi that the princess he saw from the Portal Book not looking like a nice person, Mein suspects that the only reason he does not have a fully negative opinion of her princess self is because is possibly destined to die.
  • Naofumi explaining the term, "static", to her, Mein imagines the concept to be flashes of thunder blocking the vision of people, instead of Naofumi being unable to find the proper words to explain the real meaning of "static".
  • Not understanding how video games and NPCs work, Mein interprets Naofumi's explanation of them in chapter 128 as illusion magic casted to create an imaginary world, alongside NPC being artificial lifeforms that can only act on command like golems.
  • With the facts Naofumi provides of "plot armor" in chapter 130 being something that convinced Consevatie into believing he is invincible to all forms of damage in Medea, Mein thinks of plot armor as a sort of mythical armor designed to protect its wearer, but misses the point of plot armor as a story device meant to protect certain alive for the sake of plot progression.
• Escapism: Her enjoyment to read romance novels comes from wanting to escape the dreary politics of the real world.
• Establishing Character Moment: Entering the story for the first time, Malty displays herself as an arrogant, envious, and ultimately ambitious woman that seeks to surpass her mother in any way possible. She looks up onto her mother's room and notes privately when possible to further fuel herself knowledge on becoming an effective player on the Game of Thrones. Publicly or interacting with others, Malty hides either as The Tease or a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing to gain favors that can progress on her personal interests.
• Et Tu, Brute?:
  • Defied. When given the option to betray Naofumi by falsely accusing him of rape, she decides against it, as Naofumi proved himself to be a more reliable ally of achieving her goals compared to the three Legendary Heroes.
  • Subverted. Seeing Baldy and Blue Eyes again in chapter 119, she assumes them to have sided with Consevatie the Younger to betray her after all the time they had spend together with her as personal knights. However, Malty's expectations are proven wrong once Baldy and Blue Eyes reveal themselves to be taking a Big Damn Heroes move to save her in a rescue mission.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Understanding that if Naofumi can translate both her language and Bed-Chan's language into Japanese that only he can relate to in chapter 126, Mein is able to give a positive conclusion that Naofumi's shield was never really stolen if he can still translate the language of creatures that are possible.
  Naofumi: Not 'it'. Bed-Chan thinks she's a girl. And why wouldn't I understand her? She's speaking perfect Japanese.
  Mein/Malty: NO! But that's not the important thing. Don't you realize it? Master Naofumi? You can still understand what I'm telling you, and I can still understand what you are saying to me too.
  Naofumi: Well, yes. Because-
  Mein/Malty: The translation ability given to you by your shield. It's still active even after your shield got 'stolen' by Lautrec's goddess. Same like your legendary weapon restriction!
  Naofumi: You... you are right! I guess it's like that time Haru lost his wings. That makes so much more sense. Maybe Lautrec's goddess didn't steal my shield away after all! Although I'd be nice if I know how to get it back.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Slowly over the course of the series, Malty starts to care for Naofumi as an equal or partner, despite having initially viewed his prestige as a legendary hero for a tool. If she were to succeed in her goal to become queen, she would want him to be a king to rule by her side either to be grateful for his support or for genuinely caring towards him. Even while Drunk on the Dark Side over absorbing the mana of the Seatto heirloom, she refuses to abandon him for her goals.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • The first time she shows her standards is when she mistakes Naofumi's comment to sleep on the floor as an implication he was abused by his parents. Responding to his potentially horrible past life, she shows her sympathies to him and even ignores she almost chose to go with her father's plan to frame him.
  • Malty begins to feel sorry and a sense of empathy towards Raphtalia's Survivor's Guilt as an abused slave, but she squashes her own feelings of empathy, believing she shouldn't be experiencing them as a royal princess and for reminding her of what had happened to Mein.
  • She gets concerned at Raphtalia's broken mindset of believing that slavery with the Shield Hero is a sign of their trust when slavery in history is a form of an execution punishment.
  • She doesn't exactly love Melty for their Sibling Rivalry at claiming being queen, but Malty doesn't want her to suffer any grievous injuries or even death.
    • As shown with Viscount Raleigh, Malty warns Melty to be careful of the man's reputation, though it would have been easier to eliminate Melty to become the sole heir for the throne.
    • Another case shown with Melty is in chapter 91, as Malty worries for Melty's safety during the third wave and if she were to die, winning the game of thrones through the death of a personal competitor would feel disgusting.
• Everybody Knew Already: Downplayed. Though a majority only know her a Mein of Samphor, there are a few individuals aware of her deception without her knowledge.
  • By chapter 66, Ren and Itsuki have figured out that she isn't Mein of Samphor, while she herself is unaware of their discovery.
  • At Naofumi, he also knows that she isn't who she says she is, but doesn't pursue confronting her out of fear he might come off as a Hypocrite for not being the hero she views him as.
  • For Malty to at least have awareness that Naofumi knows of her deception, Kyubey confronts her to just tell the truth, so that she won't have to feel burdened at constantly lying for the secret.
  • Outside of Naofumi not knowing her identity as a princess, everyone with the Three Heroes become fully aware of her identity as Malty S Melromarc in chapter 111 by Iris revealing who she really is under Mein of Samphor.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • As much of a Spoiled Brat she can be, she won't waste any medicine that is given to her, no matter how distasteful it can be. As such, Mein's reaction to Raphtalia wasting the medicine that Naofumi is giving to the former is what annoys her.
  • Though she can engage in being morally questionable at being manipulative and distrustful towards people, she is quick to get disgusted at the possibility that Iris may have sold Motoyasu's additional party members into slavery in chapter 30.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Downplayed. Not exactly evil but due to her selfishness, she struggles to understand being around people who are genuinely kind to a fault and can mistake their kindness as either being dumb or an act.
  • Even though Naofumi told her personally that he deduced her cowardly act of leaving Raphtalia to fight the Hound all alone, Naofumi understands why Mein did what she did and holds no grudges towards her. Seeing Naofumi's empathy, it confuses Mein's expectations that he would be angry at her and starts suspecting that his strong empathy is the result of his traumatic past life.
  • After surviving the Hell Hound in a cave with Raphtalia, even though Malty had left her for dead, Malty assumes Raphtalia to be angry at what had happened. When it turns out that Raphtalia is too dimwitted to understand why Malty had left her and is instead blaming herself over Mein's face getting ruined, Malty gets an unknown feeling that keeps pushing her to apologize to Raphtalia.
  • To allies that do good for her party such as the Shieltfreeden Shive, Malty suspects their team up to be a way to get a reward from the Shield Hero or to kidnap him once they are done fighting a Godzilla threat. When Tanya and the Shieltfreeden Shive just leave after the team up, Malty is left confused over their seemingly selfless heroism.
  • In chapter 86, she gets lost in thought from criticizing Lord Seliph to be an idiot for turning down his arranged marriage for a successor and instead choosing to marry a commoner at the cost of sacrificing his nobility. This is without Malty considering that Lord Seliph was never interested in playing political games and just wanted to experience true love in his life.
• Evil Parents Want Good Kids: In Chapter 64, Raphtalia wishes to become a human like Mein or Naofumi to avoid associating herself with the filthiness of demi-humans, but the way Raphtalia behaves, Mein is reminded of her mental breakdown and Raphtalia being her would be a bad idea, since she is not the type of person Raphtalia believes herself to be.
• The Evil Prince: Defied. She wants to do her best in assisting Naofumi in exchange to become the queen of Melromarc, but crosses the line at taking opportunities to eliminate her sister, Melty, from the succession line. For Malty, it would be cruel for her to allow her own family members to die and her efforts to become queen would be pale if it came from herself being the sole heir.
• Exactly What I Aimed At: Inverted. Whenever Malty uses [Unstoppable Force] she would usually perform the magical spell on Naofumi as a creative way to give him an edge on an enemy. However, in chapter 120, Malty blasts [Unstoppable Force] at Roger of Ajax as a offensive attack, instead of support like what Naofumi would expect from her.
• Existential Horror: Confused by all the times Naofumi has a Pop-Cultural Osmosis on a lot of people he recognizes, despite many of the people being beneath her status as a princess, Malty starts wondering to herself in chapter 115 if she is someone unimportant. When learning of Naofumi's negative opinion of her princess identity having been tainted by seeing her in a cover page of the Portal Book that brought him into Medea, Malty concludes that the only reason he does not fully hate her princess self is because she is Marked to Die.
• Experienced Protagonist: Downplayed. Malty has a genuine experience in how the game of thrones as concepts work, as it is designed for nobles to backstab each other as the norm for more political power. On top of knowing the game of thrones, Malty has a basic understanding of Medea's noble houses, history, and landscape. For all her advantages as an Experienced Protagonist at the start of the story, Malty is held back for being a Sheltered Aristocrat underestimating the struggles of an adventurer, is Book Dumb that slacked off her school studies, and can be a Smug Snake too overconfident of her abilities turning against her.
• Experience Points: By killing monsters, she can extract the experience points inside them to buff up her levels to make herself stronger. On the downside, however, Malty can also get experience points from the deaths of living beings such as humans, demi-humans, and Beastmen, which can make leveling up feel like having to carry on murders she got herself involved in.
• Eyelash Fluttering: She bats her eyelashes while pointing at the beautiful armor in chapter 3 to present herself as a cute lady to Naofumi.
• Eye Pop: Played for Laughs. Looking at the fresh produce Bed-Chan is able to make for Naofumi to feast on in chapter 127, Mein's eyes almost fall out of her sockets from the reveal of Bed-Chan's ability she had not known.
• Eye Take:
  • Starting chapter 124, Mein instinctively blinks her eyes to respond at Naofumi's suggestion in which she switches her slave seal to have him as her owner, so that Consevatie's grasp on her is taken.
  • She blinks her eyes in chapter 126 as her way of comprehending Naofumi's description of the Slender Man, and the understanding that the monster they are encountering is a sentient being known as the Bed of Chaos.
  • She starts blinking her eyes to understand the concept of video games, until realizing that Consevatie views everyone and demeans them because of thinking Medea to be a video game in chapter 128.
• Face Death with Dignity: In her last thoughts near the end of chapter 94, Malty goes under a Heroic Self-Deprecation believing she is responsible for the deaths and pain everyone is experiencing from the lies she has told. As the goddess begins to strike her sword into her body, Malty begins to welcome death, until Naofumi saves her.
• Facepalm:
  • Played for Laughs. Mein puts her hands on her head to calm down a growing headache in chapter 106 from witnessing Naofumi's balloons shapeshift themselves into giving Naofumi the appearance as the Shield Hero in his shield-less state.
    • Played for Laughs. Another facepalm for Malty occurs once again in the same chapter, as she wants to scream in rage on Streibough randomly deducing herself as Princess Malty and her companion being the Shield Hero as the ones running away from the Three Heroes Church.
  • The moment Naofumi takes an interest in helping the family Yukari mentioned in being held hostage by the Three Heroes Church in chapter 124, Malty feels an urge to slap a hand onto her head in frustration for Naofumi potentially risking his self-preservation over the lives of a few people in Balafon.
  • Receiving an Armor-Piercing Question from Naofumi that the possibility Consevatie is not following her group in chapter 125 was because of a Trick-and-Follow Ploy where her slave seal is a Tracking Chip, Malty gets an urge to slap her head for Naofumi's clue warning her that Consevatie has a chance of having an advantage over her.
• Fake First Kiss: Of all the times she was courted and attempts to take Naofumi into an intimate relationship with a kiss, Malty receives her first kill while unconscious by Raphtalia giving her a mouth-to-mouth medicine feeding in chapter 58.
• Faking the Dead:
  • As a second option if the Gallian knights succeed in overpowering the cultists in chapter 102, Malty plans for herself and Naofumi to fake their deaths as Fearless Fools to leave the knights undetected.
  • Lampshaded. For the slave fighters tripping before they could properly engage in combat against Uranus at chapter 109, Malty suspects that the slaves may be Willfully Weak to fake their deaths, so that their Three Heroes Church commanders or slave seals won't harm them.
• Fallen Princess:
  • She doesn't lose her princess privileges, but she does abandon them in pursuit of becoming queen, with the help of Naofumi's title as the Shield Hero. Without Malty's status as a princess to back her up in her adventures with Naofumi, she's forced to change the ways she used to live her life to learn surviving the lifestyle of the commoners. Throughout her time as Mein of Samphor, Malty begins to act less spoiled, learns to connect with her party members, and becomes a more genuine hero. Although in the end, while she still seeks to become queen, she also doesn't want to break the trust of her friends.
  • She does lose her princess privileges as of chapter 95, due to the church betraying all of her companions, and wishing to have her and Naofumi be arrested. Though she could challenge the church's authority with her princess status, it wouldn't mean much if people can just claim she is an imposter of Princess Malty. Afterwards, Malty has to live her life as a fugitive with Naofumi in her own kingdom to avoid being arrested by the church.
• False Friend:
  • To her childhood friends being Katarina, Bertia, and Iris, despite spending time and discussing their personal interests with each other, Malty is paranoid over them being potential competition for her goals to claim the throne.
    • As a result, Malty has Katarina become a farmer, as a way to stop the latter from improving her Earth magic at a magical academy.
    • To Iris, Malty secretly hates her for being a superior Shadow Archetype of herself and is suspicious at the possibility on how Iris could outwit her in the game of thrones.
  • Zig Zagged. At Eclair, Malty at times acts courageous toward her to further strengthen their bond, so as a way to have another noble in support of her side at the game of thrones. On the other hand, Malty slowly starts to care for Eclair from having spent so much time with the Shield Hero and the other members that she begins to worry for Eclair's safety.
• False Rape Accusation:
  • Defied. Before becoming the companion of Naofumi, Malty is urged by Aultcray to accuses him of rape, so that he would be able to freely punish the Shield Hero without having to face repercussions of the latter's potential supporters. On the other hand, Malty chooses to not go with her father's wishes and instead clears up Naofumi's name, believing the latter to be her best chance at becoming queen.
  • Invoked. Dealing with an arrogant merchant in chapter 7, Malty makes herself look like a rape victim of the merchant as part of her Wounded Gazelle Gambit to force the merchant into giving her and her Naofumi as cheaper price when they meet each other again.
• Fantastic Racism: Justified. She holds prejudiced views on most demi-humans as murderers, bandits, and rapists, and her racist beliefs stem from Siltvelt's known history of using their own demi-human slaves as Cannon Fodder to force them into fighting in wars.
• "Fawlty Towers" Plot:
  • When she made her secret identity as Mein of Samphor, Malty assumed that her new name and village origins wouldn't bother her future with Naofumi, because they come from unknown locations. However, Malty it put into many situations in later chapters where she has to expand the past of her identity as Mein and has been met with decisions that suggest that she or her party members go to Samphor.
    • Exploited. In chapter 56, she stands out in her group by lacking a history with her identity as Mein of Samphor, so she improvises her blank past by claiming that she has a mother that worked as a scribe. With the claim that her mother is a scribe, Malty is able to provide more complex knowledge to Naofumi that a normal commoner would otherwise lack.
  • In her second secret identity she crafted for herself and Naofumi as of chapter 100, Malty's lying is put to even more pressure to create a fake past for Sophia of Totela, so as to prevent anyone from knowing her fugitive identity as either Mein of Samphor or Princess Malty S Melromarc.
• Faux Horrific: Malty is filled with dread upon finding out that Naofumi is becoming a filorial fetish just like Melty, all from encountering a garden breed filorial.
• Fearless Fool: Invoked. She thinks up of a scheme in portraying herself and Naofumi as foolish zealots that recklessly endangered their lives against a fight of the cultists in chapter 102, so as to trick the Gallian knights into leaving them.
• Femme Fatale: She acts flirtatious to gain the favors of her benefactors. Towards Naofumi, she plans on acting as a seductive lover towards him to use his title of the Shield and power to become a successor as a Queen.
• First Friend: Malty had Iris, Katarina, and Bertia as her childhood playmates but even then, they are only friends because of Aultcray arranging them to play with each other. The first real friend Malty has that lacks romantic interest, but instead with care is towards Eclair. Initially, Malty's friendship with Eclair was to be courteous as a way to have the latter become her loyal pawn for the game of thrones. Through time, Malty begins to worry for Eclair's safety on a more personal level, leading to the latter making a declaration to become Malty's friend.
  Eclair: If you'll have me, I'll be proud to call you my friend, my princess.
  Malty's thoughts: (Friend... not a childhood playmate father arranged for her, who she planned to sabotaged from the start because they can easily turn into her rivals. Or a tentative ally she needs to constantly keep an eye on. But someone she can actually trust.)
  Malty's thoughts: (It may not be so bad at all.)
  Malty: I will be honored.
• First Girl Wins: Being the first companion of Naofumi and recognized as the one that never gave up on him in his most difficult times, Malty is the main Love Interest for him, as the most interactions she has in their party with other members lack any romantic tensions. Anyone else in the party, Malty behaves either as their team leader, close friend, or a family member. To Naofumi's case, he interacts with other other female members, those being Raphtalia and Firo, as surrogate daughters, and Eclair being associate, all while Malty is treated as a partner.
• Fist of Rage: Reacting to the Bitch Lord's Hannibal Lecture on her party and her Evil Laugh from having broken their spirits while bound in ropes, Mein curls both her hands in frustration. Eventually, Mein releases her anger by kicking the Bitch Lord to shut her mouth.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: Witnessing Consevatie approach her dungeon room again in chapter 119, Malty quickly notices that the way he is acting lacks the smug undertones nor the straight posture she can recognize. Soon afterwards, those small clues bring way to the reveal that Yomi had been impersonating Consevatie to bring in a path for Blue Eyes and Baldy to come in for Malty's rescue.
• Foil:
  • Getting fed up of Firo's spoiled behavior in her human form, Mein realizes that the way Firo behaves is almost exactly like her own spoiled behavior as a princess. With Firo and Raphtalia as the youngest of the Shield Hero's party, Naofumi loves Raphtalia more because of the latter's king-hearted attitude, similarly to Mirellia being a Doting Parent to Melty and not Malty. For Firo's attempts to be a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing, she lacks the experience to pull off being a hidden bitch, while Malty herself has the years of experience that can give off the façade she is a proper princess.
  • Being Naofumi's first companion, they both contrasts their ways on how they deal with problems, the way they act, and interact with others around them.
    • Whereas Naofumi can at times be a Wide-Eyed Idealist where his Chronic Hero Syndrome pushes him to come up with solutions that won't work realistically, Malty is The Cynic that struggles to trust anyone besides herself and expects the worst in everyone turning on their party.
    • To each other, they both can't spit out on who they really are beneath their identities as a commoner or Shield Hero. For Naofumi, he is afraid to tell Mein his identity as The Everyman that can be found in Japan, while Mein on the other hand is afraid to reveal herself as the princess of the nation that hates him. Both their reasons in the end all stem from not wanting to destroy their relationship from letting each other down.
    • They enjoy indulging in hobbies to escape the realities of their world. To Malty, she reads her romance novels, while Naofumi reads Isekai novels or binge watches anime.
    • Malty and Naofumi were given an education, but both did poorly in what they needed to learn. For Malty, she was homeschooled, but was too lazy to give focus on her studies, although she does vaguely remember some of her lessons. Naofumi, meanwhile, had support from Yuugo to be given motivation in getting through high school but failed, which resulted in him falling Off the Wagon to return back into being an Otaku. Despite Naofumi and Malty having limited school knowledge, they end up being Book Dumb in the end of what basic knowledge they have.
    • Malty's Book Dumb intellect comes from her as The Social Expert in being perceptive as to what hidden intentions other people might have behind the surface. On the long-term, Malty doesn't think far ahead and her plans are likely to backfire for their shortsightedness. At Naofumi's case, his understanding comes from his caution to be wary of others' surface behavior, the future consequences of what his action, and the safety measures taken for his party to be safe.
    • Both of them have younger siblings that are more successful in life and are favored more by their parents. To Melty, while Malty has a Sibling Rivalry with her for the Game of Thrones, Melty only wishes to spend time with her sister. With Takeru and Naofumi, the former doesn't have any respect towards him and is looked down upon as an Otaku.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Zig Zagged. Malty is partly the responsible sibling, as while she may have slacked off on her academic studies and spent her time as a princess reading romance novels, she also has the knowledge necessary to be cautious at political games. Melty on the other hand is responsible for being the obedient child that excels in her studies, but is too naïve to survive the Decadent Court, and is more interested in playing with her sister rather than participate in any politics.
• Forged Message: Using the [Aural Mimic Wand] feature of Aultcray's Star Wand, Mein crafts a false message of her father's fake last words, so that she can help assist the demi-humans and everyone else on Graile to pull off a convincing act that she is the first princess of Melromarc, even if she has to continue pretending to be a commoner.
• Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: Though initially adamant in refusing to allow Jackson to team up with Naofumi, believing the former to be only interested in exploiting Naofumi to get revenge on the Three Heroes Church and Consevatie, Malty ultimately allows Jackson to join if he can prove himself to be redeemable, but she nevertheless has never forgotten Jackson's betrayal of Lute Village.
• Foul Medicine: Receiving Healing Herbs from Lana and being requested to take it every few hours, Mein hates the routine to consistently drink her medicine for her heart problems, because the medicine itself tastes disgusting.
• Freudian Threat: Mein thinks up of cutting the manhood of Consevatie as a means to threaten him in chapter 130, once her group is able to defeat him. However, to her group, they all have a Universal Group Reaction from being weirded out by Mein's way of punishing Consevatie one they all confront him.
  Mein: On the threat we completely end his manhood if he does.
• The Gadfly: Downplayed. Malty doesn't annoy others, unless given a reason to do so, but for all the times Streibough has attempted to expose her and Naofumi's identities, she wants to find times or moments where she can order Streibough around to make a fool of himself in hopes of annoying him.
  • Played for Laughs. As such in chapter 109, she takes a quick time to look around in battle for Streibough as to make sure he doesn't pull on a traitor move on the rebellion. Once she spots him attempting to sneak away, Malty makes an order to have him be captured, and once the latter is captured by Biggo, all Streibough could do is admit his Heroic BSoD tiring him from continuing his fight.
• Genki Girl: Invoked. As part of her façade to get Naofumi fall for her as a partner he can always rely on, thereby giving herself a better chance to dictate his actions in a way that can grant her the title of queen, Malty acts with enthusiasm and determination to look forward brightly in their adventure together. However, as the chapters goes by where her Character Development settles in, her Genki Girl personality is averted where she lets out more of her personal opinions, or questionable suggestions in what she believes is the best choice she can guide Naofumi in the game of thrones.
• Gentle Touch vs. Firm Hand: Discussed. In chapter 80, she and Naofumi get into an argument with each other on how they should deal with Firo's violent and bratty behavior. In Mein's case, she sides with going onto a firm hand approach via using a familiar seal on Firo to ensure a consistent punishment is delivered out. To Naofumi, he wants to continue treating Firo with decency as a way to not degrade her individuality and will only sell her to Motoyasu as the ultimate punishment.
• Genuine Imposter:
  • Under her identity as Sophia of Totela, she offers to play her real self as Princess Malty in chapter 105 to denounce the Three Heroes Church off of Graile, while everyone is unaware of who she really is.
  • As of chapter 108, Malty enacts the plan with the demi-humans to play herself as the first princess of Melromarc to turn the Graile knights, and mostly Captain Alderic into siding with the revolution against the Three Heroes Church.
• Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Listening to Naofumi complain about himself being a failure of a hero and his companions paying the price of his mistakes, Mein slaps Naofumi to clear up the negativity inside his mind. Once Naofumi focuses on her, Mein explains that the world isn't fair and that the real enemies that should be blamed are Lautrec, Consevatie, and Cromwell. To regain what they have lost, she requests for herself and Naofumi to become stronger, and makes it clear that she will not abandon him like how he never abandoned her.
• Giggling Villain: Right as she is temporarily empowered by the Orb of Power in chapter 77, she lets out a tiny chuckle to celebrate her unlimited power.
• A God Am I: When asked by Bertia on what steed she would want her chosen hero to ride on, Malty answers that the steed of the hero isn't what satisfies her, but rather being worshipped by others as a goddess.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: Discussed. Explaining the unreliability of the God Crafting rituals in chapter 126, Mein brings up a historical event of a righteous man who became driven to insanity with the power imbued to him that almost all of Faubley was destroyed.
• Gone Horribly Right: In chapter 57, she reveals more of Melromarc's history to give Naofumi a better understanding of Medea and does so by explaining Princess Mirellia's failures from the past. Although Malty succeeded souring Mirellia's image in Naofumi's eyes, it also causes him to have a greater distrust on Mirellia's older daughter, making the moment she reveals her true identity to him being more problematic in the future.
• Good Girl Gone Bad: With Mein, Malty once mostly acted as a sweet Nice Girl that does her best to keep her pet filorial taken care of and well fed. After Mein's death, Malty's initial kindheartedness slowly started to fade away and she became more manipulative in the pursuit to become queen, as she believes it's the only thing in life that will satisfy her.
• Good Princess, Evil Queen: Downplayed. Malty is the first princess of Melromarc and although manipulative to ensure she becomes queen, is ultimately heroic in assisting Naofumi and his party. Queen Mirellia, despite being a great mother for Melty and wanting to do what's best for the nation of Melromarc, she fails horribly at being a mother for Malty and actively hinders the latter's goals at the cost of further endangering her nation.
• Groin Attack: Wishing for Consevatie to suffer, after witnessing him give Raphtalia a Trainining From Hell, and placing the blame to herself being the failure as the Parental Substitute and Cool Big Sis, Mein takes notes inside of her mind to have Consevatie be kicked in the crotch, similarly like what Firo does to the people the latter hates.
• Growling Gut: Her stomach rumbles from the growing starvation in chapter 119 where no one is left to give her any food inside her dungeon cell.
• Guilt Complex: Concocting schemes or to have people she personally knows and cares for to follow in the plans she made up, Malty is prone to have guilt be built up inside of herself, when her own plans ends up harming the people that supported her ideas, instead of herself being the one that started everything for them to participate in.
• Guilt-Induced Nightmare: She goes through a recollection of memories from her past with Mein in chapter 48 from the illusions of the Balafon Dungeon. The memories remind Malty of what led to Mein's death and the hidden feelings behind her mind blaming herself for what had happened.
• Guilty Pleasures: Her hobby of reading romance novels is something that is frowned upon in high society, yet is still a set of books that help bring her enjoyment to pass on time. Even if she considers some books to be trashy in someway, she can't help herself but enjoy the content stored for her own fulfillment.

H-K

• Had to Be Sharp: As soon as she declare Naofumi innocent from the False Rape Accusation, Malty loses the chance to rely on her father and the Three Heroes Church to give her additional resources to help her forward. In order to improve, Malty takes up her identity as Mein of Samphor and to rise alongside Naofumi to have a chance at becoming Queen. On the bright side, Mein is able to freely level up as an adventurer and no longer has to stay stagnant as a level 3 princess.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: Before starting her journey with Naofumi, Malty believed her title as a princess made her special enough to not require any forms of training and leveling up for life, which resulted in her being Ambitious, but Lazy to achieve her goals. After working Naofumi she slowly gives up believing hard work to be futile, since she has to train up her own strength and bloodline abilities to not strain her body too much in performing taxing spells.
• Hate at First Sight: Noticing Consevatie as one of the spectators who will watch Naofumi fight Motoyasu in chapter 26, Malty is filled with dread and rage for having to potentially interrupt with the worst man that Aultcray once arranged in the past to court her.
• Hates Their Parent:
  • Downplayed. With Aultcray, Malty still has fond memories of how he had taken great care of her. In spite of what Aultcray had done for her in the past, Malty loses her respect towards him by the start of the story, due to his senile mind causing him to make decisions that are detrimental to her goal in becoming queen of Melromarc.
    • Downplayed. Though grateful her father gave her his Star Wand to be given protection against the Three Heroes Church, Malty having to deal with its broken functions is something she blames her father from having caused by his own recklessness to summon all of the Four Legendary Heroes into Melromarc.
  • Malty's hatred for her mother stems from the fact the latter never much spent time nor was ever proud with any achievements she made. Even with the privileges of a princess, Malty was nothing more than a political bargaining chip for Mirellia and was not valued as much as the faceless commoners Mirellia tries so poorly to watch over.
• Headache of Doom: Due to the Star Wand failing to properly translate Ben-Chan's words, Malty is left with a headache in which she has to throw a tantrum on the ground to cool herself off from the stress in chapter 125.
• Heal It With Fire: As a last resort to find a way to hide her cursed scar to avoid being discovered as a fugitive of the Three Heroes Church, Mein uses her fire magic to burn her cursed flesh away in chapter 95.
• Heartfelt Apology: Downplayed. She does not get to have the chance to apologize to Raki in their much earlier interactions, but still wishes to give him an apology in chapter 117 as a thank you for having taught Raphtalia a Mouth To Mouth Force Feeding technique that saved her life.
• Heel Realization: While berating the Bitch Lord, Abby, for being such a horrible demi-human, Malty herself realizes just how similar their desire for power really are, and she herself is just as bad as the Bitch Lord, resulting in Malty crying.
• Heroic BSoD: She undergoes through a mental breakdown in chapter 63 from having come to the conclusion that the way the Bitch Lord had acted towards her allies is a resemblance to her own lies as Naofumi's group, and to an extent, her own father.
• Heroic RRoD:
  • As soon as she unleashes her Supernova at the Life Root, the mana thirst causes her to black out and while she is given medical care by Zylden, she is warned to not overexert herself again.
  • Having used most of her magic to protect herself from a long fall in chapter 92, and beforehand, expending most of her energy to get back with her party members, Mein becomes too tired to do anything in dealing the goddess in chapter 94.
  • Using [Fiendfyre], even though she used an Amplifier Artifact of her Star Wand to boost her own fire magic in chapter 109, her heart starts acting up that almost causes her to lose her consciousness in chapter 109.
  • Further performing more spells such as [Rising Heat] and [Hydro Sphere] in a short succession to kill Kazuya, Mein's body is left disoriented from having expended so much mana.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: Inside her mind, she doesn't believe herself to be nearly as heroic as she displayed herself to the public and her own party members. For what heroism she does, she assures herself that they are primarily to boost her reputation to have a shot at becoming queen and dismisses the selfless actions she performed that weren't necessary to her end goal.
  • Chapter 44 has Naofumi call her a nice person who although having a drilled prejudice to hate demi-humans, is a good person that saves them in spite of her prejudice. Rather than be comforted of Naofumi's good words, Mein feels as though she isn't nearly as good as Naofumi believes herself to be, despite having grown and changed to be a genuine hero.
  • In chapter 53, Malty believes herself to be only but a pampered princess using Naofumi and revealing her real identity would only shatter their relationship. Zylden, however, while understanding that Mein is spoiled, she also saved Balafon from the Life Tree from her own abilities as a princess.
  • In chapter 79, Mein admits to Naofumi and Raphtalia to feeling unworthy to act as their party member for becoming uncontrolled and violent back at the catacomb. As much as Mein presents herself as a sword for Naofumi, the latter has so many other people to rely on that she feels obsolete to them. It's only when Naofumi and Raphtalia remind Mein of the good she did for them is what convinces her to continue staying with the party.
  • Believing that so many people got hurt of her actions that led up in chapter 94, Malty believes death is what she deserves, but forgets that she always stayed with the sides of her party and gained their trust to care for each other.
  • Getting captured and enslaved by Consevatie the Younger, Mein thinks to herself as a failure that can't help anyone, except drag them down in a futile attempt to fulfill her ambitions to surpass her sister in becoming queen.
  • In the aftermath of her outburst towards Jackson's begging to join Naofumi in chapter 128, Mein reflects to herself being too selfish of an opportunist to better herself for her companions, as she thinks that if she can't have faith in Jackson changing, then the same statement applies to herself.
  • Eavesdropping on Consevatie's insults about herself in chapter 131, Malty is left ashamed of herself, as the lies she made around the people she cares for had only hurt them in the end, and whatever benefits she wanted for herself will only frame her as an unfaithful partner to Naofumi.
• Hidden Disdain Reveal: Despite being friends with Iris since their time as children, Malty gets to admit how much she actually hates her friend in chapter 48. While part of the hatred stems from Iris being a competitor in political affairs, the main reason is that Iris embodies herself as the perfect lady that Malty herself can never be.
• History Repeats: The first time in which Malty loses herself in an outburst to beat up the Bitch Lord in chapter 63 was out of frustration that to herself being just as selfish and irredeemable like the Bitch Lord. Going into chapter 128, Malty undergoes a similar breakdown, in which she beats up Jackson to the ground, all while spouting that the latter can never find true redemption. Believing Jackson to be an opportunist that whines for powerful figures to side with him, Malty believes herself to also lack the ability to change, as her own selfishness looks to be the cause of why the people she loves have their lives ruined.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Throughout the chapters of Ambition of the Red Princess, the lies she has made with her party members and other allies have complicated her goals to become queen in the future and her relationship with them.
  • At chapter 56 where she has a private discussion with Aldrecht, she is advised to reconcile her strained relationship with her father, Aultcray, but doing so would result the latter hating Naofumi even more under the assumption that Naofumi had brainwashed Mein. It causes Mein to realize the irony of her treachery and willingness to play all the sides being the causes of her downfall.
  • Chapter 57 has Mein give Naofumi a history lesson on Melromarc and focuses on explaining to him the failures Princess Mirellia had made in the past, so that Mirellia's image is soured in the eyes of Naofumi. However, it also resulted in Naofumi concluding that Mirellia's elder daughter is an untrustworthy person, causing Mein to have a harder to decide on revealing her true identity in the future.
• Honey Trap: She makes an attempt to seduce Naofumi into sleeping with her in chapter 7 as a way to better manipulate him into her pawn for her goals to become queen. Unfortunately for Malty, Naofumi's hidden balloon monster ends up biting her hand and she never gets to have another chance to enact a plan like this again.
• Horrifying the Horror: Lampshaded. Knowing Yukari to be a necromancer, a type of profession specialized in the undead, if Yukari is showing fear towards a Humanoid Abomination in chapter 125, then it is a clear sign for Mein herself to be terrified at the possible threat lurking within the mountain.
• Hostage Situation: She puts inside Kazuya inside of her [Hydro Sphere] to punish him for his claims that Satellizer was innocent, and to be turned into a hostage that distracts the latter from properly participating in battle at chapter 110.
• Hot Wings: She activates the spell, [Icarian Flight], from Aultcray's Magic Staff and it grants her flaming wings in which she uses to take flight with Naofumi and Kyubei to escape the Three Heroes Church from arresting them.
• Hour of Power: In chapter 77, she absorbs the power stored within the Seatto artifact and it gives her the boost needed to take down the Free Fighters to end the conflict. Quickly after obtaining dominance, Mein quickly gets Drunk on the Dark Side, resulting in the endangerment of everyone and once stopped by Aldrecht, she loses too much air to continue using her newfound powers.
• Human Shield: When she and Raphtalia are cornered by a Hound in chapter 19, Malty's instincts for survival is to use Raphtalia as a bait for the dog while she herself makes a run for it. Unfortunately, Malty not staring right into the eyes of the Hound convinces it to maul Malty instead of Raphtalia as expected.
• Hypocrite: Played for Laughs. Inside her thoughts on how she views Lord Seliph's marriage with Miss Maurne in chapter 86, Mein sees the act as foolish for a high-ranking prince like Lord Seliph to reject the opportunities of life to live with a commoner. This is without Mein herself seeing that Naofumi's end goal after the waves is to leave the political side of the nobles and to live with her in Samphor as commoners.
• Hypocrite Has a Point: In chapter 91, she gives an order for Melty to focus on healing soldiers that are fighting the third wave, because they both have their own duties to fulfill in their own way. For Malty's end, she feels hypocritical at saying such a statement, since she doesn't like performing her duties as a responsible princess, but at a time of war, they both need to really be responsible.
• I Am a Monster:
  • She declares herself as exactly like the Bitch Lord in chapter 63, due to the latter embodying many of her negative aspects of her personality, and Malty feels as though she can never change from how desperately she seeks to be queen of Melromarc.
  • For how she knew that Satellizer cared for Kazuya's life, yet she still chose in the end to make attempts to kill the latter's life, Mein sees her actions to be monstrously petty move to hurt a child who only annoyed her and posed no real threat on his own.
• I Am What I Am: Knowing her only motives to join the demi-humans' revolution against the Three Heroes Church is to escape with her Naofumi in chapter 108, Mein remarks in her head that her mother is probably right in the fact she can't ever change her own selfishness and manipulative nature to achieve a goal.
  Malty/Mein: (Perhaps her mother's illusion had a point: She can't change who she is after all.)
• Ignorant of Their Own Ignorance: Downplayed. Playing the game of thrones or the backgrounds of the Three Heroes Church, Malty likes to think she knows how everything operates, due to watching her parents participate in political affairs in their courts. While she may know the dangers of the game of thrones, Malty can get manipulated by tempting offers that she fails to think the consequences about, or her own plans having flaws that are only noticed when others point them out.
• Ignored Epiphany: Reconstructed. Malty knows full well how her lies have the impact to hurt the people she cares for, and has been called out at times for her selfishness. Despite Malty's refusal to fully admit responsibility for her actions, choosing to ignore the criticisms pointed to hurt her mind by focusing into something else helps clear herself up from being drowned in her self-loathing.
  Malty/Mein's Thoughts: (So Mein does what she does best in this situation: goes into self denial by distracting herself with something else.)
• I Hate Past Me:
  • The longer she goes on in her adventures with Naofumi and his party, Malty occasionally regrets how she wasted her life as a princess doing tea parties and remaining ignorant from whatever knowledge she could have gained from either her training or tutoring.
  • By chapter 92, she and Naofumi are freefalling from having been nearly eaten alive by a void serpent. An excellent move that could slow down and break of her and Naofumi's fall would have been learning the simplest spells of wind magic. However, because of Malty's own laziness and lack of perception to learn from Mein's death, she curses herself for having wasted her own learning experiences she could have gained.
  • Doing her Call-Back in chapter 113 to reminisce of her cowardice back at the Lute Village mine incident where she abandoned Raphtalia to get eaten by a hound, Malty wonders to herself if she feels ashamed by her past action as a Dirty Coward or if her weakened state is bringing down her mood.
  • Feeling glad that Baldy, Blue Eyes, and Mala have all come to rescue her in her aid inside of a dungeon cell in chapter 119, Malty is filled with gratitude for their help. However, because Baldy and Blue Eyes have no witness of Malty's Character Development, they only stare in confusion as to why she acts so differently. When Malty begins to look back to her past interactions with them, she only feels a sense of shame and embarrassment, because for all the times Baldy, Blue Eyes, and Mala had always been by her side, she failed to properly acknowledge them as people to care for.
• I'm Crying, but I Don't Know Why: After getting slapped in the face by Aldrecht and getting berated for her ungratefulness towards her father's unconditional love, a tear dribbles down Malty's eyes and she covers it up to avoid showing weakness.
• I'm Standing Right Here:
  • As Katarina talks about Malty potentially loving Motoyasu of his kindness towards his ladies, Malty in her disguised identity is near Katarina and actually views Motoyasu to be too stupid to be worth needing his love.
  • Her princess identity gets accidentally soured by her tarnishing the failures of Princess Mirellia to Naofumi in chapter 57. By revealing Mirellia's incompetency to Naofumi, Mein had caused him to assume that Mirellia's elder daughter would be worse than the latter. At the same time, Malty is the one explaining everything the Naofumi and all it did to her is further complicate her chance to reveal her true identity.
  • Ken makes a declaration that if a royal member of Melromarc were to be near him as of chapter 105, he would threaten them with violence for their laziness in being unable to protect his family. This is while Malty is right beside him in the disguise of Sophia. Seeing Ken's bloodlust for revenge against her and her family, Malty is spooked.
  • Streibough wishes for Princess Malty to be in Grail, as her appearance would be of great help in defeating the Three Heroes Church. This is all while being unaware that Sophia is Malty, and he has been insulting her as a commoner and has been making attempts to expose her real identity.
    • When Malty pretends to act has her real self to execute a plan on denouncing the Three Heroes Church out of Graile, Streibough acts as a Jerkass to her by commenting that there is no way the real Princess Malty would be carrying a burn wound. At the same time, Malty is right beside him and is insulted by his comment.
• Informed Attribute: Downplayed. She has stated a recurring number of times about herself not being a pious person, which is true to an extent, since she only knows the basic steps of faith about the Three Heroes Church. To knowledge relating about Saint Brimir, however, Malty had a lot of intellect on that subject, and has at times treated Prayer Is a Last Resort to beg any gods she knows of to have divine intervention.
• Innocently Insensitive:
  • She tries to calm down Naofumi's worries for her in chapter 115 by reaffirming that he needs to realize his importance as the Shield Hero to honor Farkas and Kyubey's death. However, saying such words ends up with Naofumi interpreting it as a jab to his Survivor's Guilt, leading him to believe that Medea would be better off without him.
  • Mein calling Bed-Chan as "It" or "Thing", she gets reprimanded by Naofumi to call Bed-Chan in a more proper name, since the monster has sentience and is categorized as female. By calling Bed-Chan in neutral terms at chapter 126, Mein is unknowingly hurting Bed-Chan's identity as a living being.
• Insecure Love Interest: Being Naofumi's companion and putting on a facade that she is just a simple country girl, Mein thinks a lot about how and what would happen if she were to reveal her identity to him as Princess Malty S Melromarc. Part of the reason is that she needs his status as a hero to help her be queen, and another being she doesn't want to hurt and betray the genuine trust he has shown her.
• Insistent Terminology: After getting spooked by Itsuki's outburst for justice in chapter 3, Mein declares she is going to run away, but changes her words to making a tactical retreat to not look like she got easily scared by Itsuki.
• Insult of Endearment: Since surviving the Lute Village mine incident, Mein's racist nicknames she gives to mention to Raphtalia are less of hatred and more of a neutral term that shows she is beginning to care for Raphtalia's being, even if her subconscious calls Raphtalia in demeaning terms.
• Instantly Proven Wrong:
  • Mein believes that Motoyasu using his video game knowledge of finding a dungeon with a valuable seed is stupid way to help Balafon, since nobody has proven that a dungeon exists near the village. However, Motoyasu's proposal to find a dungeon is proven to be correct, as the village's elder confirms the existence of one holding a seed. With the confirmation of the dungeon actually existing, Mein feels as though her own words have slapped her face.
  • When King Ariona leads her companions to gifts that will become very valuable for them, Mein assumes the gifts to be either a joke or a trap to her party members. When the gifts are found by her party members, they examine it and realize the potential they hold, despite being old, causing Mein to realize how she almost passed something useful for collectibles.
• Instant Sedation: She is knocked out immediately by a stinging touch In the Back at the end of chapter 117, and the only thoughts that she can recall out of her mind is a similar experience that happened to her with the Siltvelt Ravens poisoning her back in chapter 56.
• Internal Reveal:
  • Since chapter 13, Henrietta was known for being the first born daughter of Aultcray. It isn't until chapter 55 where Malty learns that she is the second daughter of her father and despite being the second, she is loved just as much as Henrietta.
  • For most of her life, she had thought of Consevatie to be nothing more than an idiot noble that got too pampered to understand political warfare and with an ego too big for his own survival. However, in reality, Consevatie is a reincarnate of Earth that was born again in Medea. For some time, his origins were kept a secret, until The Reveal in chapter 112, and eventually in chapter 128 where Malty learns of Consevatie's true nature.
• Intertwined Fingers: Laying on a tree in chapter 113 to get rest from exhausting her heart back from the Graile War, Naofumi sits besides her shoulders for support. Being relaxed, Mein slips her fingers with Naofumi's, as so they can be in touch with each other. Though Naofumi was at first shy at the act, he feels his moment of comfort after a few seconds to settle with Mein.
• In the Back: While attempting to stop Oersted from performing a Senseless Sacrifice to go alone into Vicar Vittorio's camp in chapter 117, Mein is suddenly stung from behind her back that causes her to get knocked out.
• Ironic Echo: Back in chapter 26, Sieg insults Mein by warning her choice to join up with Naofumi will only result in her being The Load in his party and will just drag him down. At first, Mein is able to rebuff Sieg's statement by proclaiming herself as Naofumi's hero, but the case couldn't be said the same in chapter 78. After accidentally getting Aldrecht killed all because of her own foolishness to control her unlimited power, Mein isn't able to feel the pleasure of Consevatie's punishment and is only reminded of her own manipulations harming the people she cares about.
• Irony:
  • Mein can see lots of ironic moments in chapter 105, as individuals are asking for the presence of Princess Malty to help them in their cause to denounce the Three Heroes Church in Graile, but those same individuals are unaware of her real identity as the princess they seek.
  • Mein personally sees Cromwell as the person that ruined her and Naofumi's life by being framed a fugitives, yet she ends up being the one that defends Cromwell's innocence that the latter is not the type of person to recklessly enslave everyone in Graile.
  • Naofumi worries for her life in chapter 106 of her plan to impersonate the first princess of Melromarc, all while not knowing that she is the actual first princess of Melromarc under the disguise of Mein of Samphor.
  • Streibough for once is able to start using his head in wanting Princess Malty to join the cause to save the demi-humans in Graile, but he is unable to notice that Sophia is Malty, and he has been insulting her in all of their interactions.
  • Played for Laughs. Malty finds a funny irony at Naofumi calling her Princess Malty, her real name correctly in chapter 109. For her identity as Sophia of Totela, Naofumi has an Accidental Misnaming to call her Mein, her adventurer identity, but he ends up effortlessly calling her Princess Malty with no slip-ups.
  • She notices a set of ironic situations in chapter 120 where her whole group taking the sewers to escape the Melromarc capital is the same tactic the Siltvelt Agents used to get inside of the capital and meet up privately with Naofumi. Similarly with the mention of Beloukas, Malty finds a fact ironic on how the slave traders who is morally questionable in smuggling slaves into Melromarc will have to be a potential person to rely on for herself to escape her city.
• It Only Works Once: When asked by the Lute Villager boys in chapter 117 to help them liberate the Three Heroes Church out of their village, similarly to a case that happened in Graile, Malty becomes hesitant to fulfill their request because Graile only succeeded from the assistance of elite forces she found within the Okami Clan.
• It's All My Fault:
  • Watching Captain Lotheringan do his best to save her and Naofumi from their free falling in chapter 92, one of Mein's chaotic thoughts is to blame herself, believing that by being near them, she is only going to cause their deaths like with Aldrecht. This is despite having come back to assist Naofumi and Raphtalia, since she doesn't want to leave them behind.
  • Once she and Naofumi escape the Church of the Three Heroes in chapter 95, Malty secretly blames herself for everything that happened, and believes all the consequences that happened stems from the lies she crafted to become Naofumi's companion.
  • Watching everyone in Lute Village get captured by the Three Heroes Church in chapter 118 and Consevatie being present to smugly taunt all that have failed to oppose him, Mein blames herself inside of her mind, as she believes her own recklessness to find Vicar Vittorio was what led her and Naofumi down to defeat.
  • The capture of Naofumi and all their allies at the hands of Consevatie in the latter's Vicar Vittorio trap leads to Malty blaming herself for everyone's detriment to beat the Three Heroes Church, since she was the first one to have been hooked to the trapped, and had also dragged around her other allies to fall with her.
  • She believes Uranus' death was the cause of her own planning and ambitious goals to reclaim Melromarc for herself, as those reasons to desperately come back to the capital led to her getting enslaved by Consevatie, and the escape then caused Uranus to be killed in a Escort Distraction to save the lives of everyone.
• It's Quiet… Too Quiet: Analyzing the forest of the mountain in chapter 126, Mein is led to a realization that everything in the environment is too quiet to be normal, as there are no natural sounds of animal life to be present.
  Malty: (Of course, nothing answers her back except the shuffling sound of branches against the wind. How did they miss it? There's no sound of birds, or bugs in the forest. It's too quiet to be natural!)
• I've Come Too Far: Since starting the game of thrones, lying to her father in betraying Naofumi, and pretending to be a commoner as Naofumi's companion, Malty left with a conflicted option of what will happen to her by the end of the political games. She tells herself that once she is a player, she has to play till the end as the next queen of Melromarc. However, it will come at an eventual cost where her deception will ruin everyone for nothing if she decides to quit, which is why she wants to keep going until the end.
• Jacob Marley Warning: To fend off her sister, Melty from adventuring with the Shield Hero, Malty shows off the scar and ripped ear on her face to warn Melty of the dangers that the Waves of Calamity causes. If Melty were to join the Shield Hero like a sort of game, it would be likely she'd be scarred or suffer serious injuries.
• Jaw Drop:
  • In her plan to return to the Melromarc capital by herself to deliver a message to Vicar Vittorio, she is hit by Naofumi's insistence to not go through with the plan in chapter 115, out of his own fears that it will endanger her life. When Naofumi asks how she can meet up with Vicar Vittorio, just incase an unexpected event blocks her way and she is all alone, Mein attempts to think up a response, but is not able to come up with one, due to Naofumi making a good point in exposing the flaws of her plan.
  • From the belated realization that the "Bed-Chan" Naofumi is talking to has genuine sentience, Mein's jaw opens up to comprehend the knowledge in chapter 126.
• Jerkass to One: Even if she is being a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing or Beneath the Mask to pretend in being nicer than she really is, Malty's usual behavior has her be relaxed, though with a sprinkle of pessimism. If put to people she holds a strong level of hatred for, such as Consevatie the Young and Streibough, they are enough to trigger Malty into being a Lady Swears-a-Lot to curse their and find someway to deliver a Laser-Guided Karma onto them.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Zig Zagged. At times, her niceness towards her party and others is a façade to maintain her good graces with them, but she does drop her attitude to play the Game of Thrones in exchange to bond closer with her party members.
• Keeping the Enemy Close: For all the times Streibough acted as a bitter jerk around everyone, and specifically to her blurting out his attempts to discover her real identity, Malty plans on keeping a close eye on him to ensure he does not sell out anyone to the Three Heroes Church in the revolution for Graile.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: While the Bitch Lord is tied up in chapter 63 and the latter is spouting out her misguided moral superiority at her party, Mein loses her composure to give her several kicks and "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
• Kill It with Fire:
  • Mein burns a pilgrim man's corpse in chapter 99 as a precaution to kill all the bacteria that may potentially infect her body with the man's clothes.
  • To fight off the wild skeleton warriors in chapter 122, Malty goes for creating a serpent made of fire as a means to have them be killed.
  • She tosses a fireball at a mountain of corpses in chapter 130 to kill off the possibility that their rotting smell produces unsavory diseases.
• Kill the Ones You Love: To Jaune, Malty's love for him is mainly for his respectful attitude to start a genuine relationship with her in the past and when he learns of Eclair being still alive, Malty is secretly left with no choice in her thoughts to kill him to ensure Eclair's identity getting exposed doesn't endanger the Shield Hero's party. Despite needing to kill him in case of the worst scenario, she takes a pause to give herself the intent and reassurance to do the dirty deed.
• Kissing the Ground: Once she finally lands onto the ground after falling for half of chapter 92, Mein wishes to kiss the ground out of gratitude that she is safe. Unfortunately, Mein isn't able to perform a kiss, due to her body being too exhausted to move.
• Kiss of Life: While unconscious, she receives a kiss from Raphtalia, as a way for the latter to perform a mouth-to-mouth feeding to give her antidote for her poison in chapter 58.
• Knockout Ambush: While stopping Oersted from going out on his own to confront Vicar Vittorio in chapter 117, Mein is suddenly ambushed by someone delivering a stink In the Back that knocks her out.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: Mein initially considers the option to fight the goddess of the third wave, since the goddess only wants her, but because the goddess managed to easily dispatch of the strongest warriors fight, Mein realizes it would only be foolish to fight. Even Raphtalia warns Mein to run while the chance is available, since they don't stand a chance, nor have the energy to fight.
• Know Your Vines: As an unfortunate consequence for not taking in Gaston's lessons about wildlife and plants, Malty is left blind picking out which plants are edible for her, Naofumi, and Oersted to eat in chapter 121. Luckily, Naofumi's precaution to take learning opportunities seriously makes him the only one capable of picking out the correct berries, leading to her being grateful for his basic skills.

L-O

• Lady and Knight: Naofumi gives off the look as a knight with his attire and Legendary Shield, and she is the lady he promised to protect for being the companion that believed in him in the beginning, all while hiding herself to be the first princess of Melromarc.
• Lady Macbeth: Downplayed. She lies to Naofumi at times and gives him specific information about Medea as a way to mold him into a hero that can help her become queen, but doesn't engage in suggesting he go commit villainous acts.
• Lady Swears-a-Lot: As composed she may make herself look in front of others and to her allies, any encounter with someone that has an unbearable Jerkass personality will be enough to flare Malty into letting out swears to show the insignificance of the jerks she has to deal with. If she were to mention the names of the people she can't stand, Malty is likely to call them a "little shit" inside of her mind.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Her decision to treat Raphtalia as a Human Shield and attempting to leave the latter behind to fight the Hell Hound results in Mein immediately getting her karma by the Hell Hound instead mauling her. Mein could have easily avoided the situation had she chosen to keep herself calm and worked with Raphtalia in staring down the Hound, but leaving only irritated the Hound.
• Laughably Evil: Through her antics to manipulate Naofumi into becoming her minion in early chapters, her manipulations occasionally backfire on her, which results in either Slapstick humor or her noting how her own lies keep making her life worse.
• Like Mother, Like Daughter: To each time she has to discipline, personally teach, or have a better understanding on Raphtalia and Firo, Malty is reminded of her own self acting like her mother, Mirellia.
  • Just like Mirellia disliking Malty for being a Spoiled Brat in disguise of a princess, Malty herself hates having to deal with Firo's bratty behavior.
  • Similarly like Mirellia loving Melty more for being the academically smart and nice sister, Malty prefers to care for Raphtalia for the latter's obedience to care for everyone in the Shield Hero's party.
  • In chapter 80, when explaining in detail the behavioral problems Firo displays to everyone, Malty is forced to admit in her thoughts that she sounds like her mother wanting to discipline the reasons of a misbehaving child.
• Likes Clark Kent, Hates Superman: As Mein of Samphor, Naofumi gives great trust towards her and tries his best to protect her, but with her true identity as a princess, Malty fears at Naofumi abandoning her for her pampered life as a princess. It takes Zylden to remind her of her bravery against fighting an Outsider God that while she may be "Mein of Samphor", she unleashed Supernova as a princess to save a village.
• Literal-Minded:
  • She takes Naofumi's word, "lava", in chapter 118 as him making a sudden comparison to insect eggs when it comes to travelling by water to Peninsula, before being able to associate lava with Dragon Blood, so that she could understand Naofumi's unknown terminology.
  • Learning "plot armor" from Naofumi's short summary of it in chapter 130, Mein connects the word into a literal piece of armor designed to protect Consevatie, instead of a story device that is meant to keep certain characters alive for the sake of progressing its intended plot.
• Living Lie Detector:
  • Played for Laughs. Declaring herself a professional liar, she easily finds out that Firo is the culprit that trashed the library from hearing the latter hum away.
    • She again manages to easily see through Firo's fake kindness in Chapter 54, as the latter is grooming Raphtalia's hair only to hide her malice against Motoyasu.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Lord Noches and her uncle Aldrecht are aware of who Henrietta is as the first child of Aultcray, but Malty has no idea of who Henrietta is, despite being a member of royalty. It's until chapter 55 where Malty learns who Henrietta really is.
• Long Last Look: Before finally going through her goal to leave Graile with Naofumi in chapter 110, she temporarily stays behind to take a Long Last Look at the recent events.
  • First, starting off with Streibough's noble Heroic Sacrifice, she wonders to herself if she Was Too Hard on Him for his surprisingly heroic moment to kill off Sister Amelia and the Three Heroes Church army.
  • Secondly towards the death of Kazuya, Mein finds herself to be disgusting for how she allowed her own blind anger to attempt murder on a child, all from Kazuya's mere annoyance and still attempted to do so, even when Satellizer made it clear she cares for his wellbeing.
• Love Epiphany:
  • Platonic example. In chapter 73, she calls out Eclair for attempting to fight her own father without any support and warns the latter of how foolish of a move it will be for Eclair to die a meaningless death. Right after Mein finishes warning Eclair, Mein reevaluates what she just said and realizes she is starting to care for Eclair's safety.
  • Platonic example. In the past as a princess, Malty never showed much love towards Baldy, Blue Eyes, and Mala as the main people that always stuck by her side to have support for her needs. By the time of chapter 119, Malty realizes just how much they mean to her once Blue Eyes and Baldy show their Undying Loyalty to free her from her dungeon cell, and Mala going out of her way to rebel the Three Heroes Church.
• Loves the Sound of Screaming:
  • Fueled by the power of the Seatto heirloom, Mein takes the pleasure in hearing the screams of the three Free Fighters she set on fire in chapter 77 as music for her ears.
  • Watching Consevatie barf and his jaw cracking from getting smacked by Elhard's warhammer in chapter 119, Mein is comforted by the sounds, as she is able to receive an indirect form of revenge at Consevatie enslaving her and Naofumi.
• Luminescent Blush:
  • In chapter 110, her face heats up in embarrassment from Uranus willingly rewarding Naofumi his armor, as a way to show thanks to him and his companion, Mein, for being a major help in breaking Graile's gate open. Though Mein was a major component in making sure Graile's rebellion succeeds, she was Not in This for Your Revolution and only wanted to find opportunities to escape with Naofumi.
  • Her face heats up from the children looking up to her as a great heroine, because of Naofumi in chapter 117 telling them of how she "pretended" to be Princess Malty in the Graile war.
  • She feels her face going red in chapter 123 from seeing Bellatrix and Rudopholus being attractive-looking necromancers, despite them being in their forties in age range.
  • Out of gratitude in chapter 123, Malty's face gets warm from Bellatrix being able to praise her achievements, and being somewhat of a tease at the scar in her face being the sign of a great warrior.
• Made a Slave: A hot rod is placed on her chest in chapter 118 for a slave seal to be implanted and have her be labeled as Consevatie's major victim to humiliate for life in front of crowds.
• Magic Compass: Mein has a [Clairyoyance] spell dedicated to locating targets she visualizes and it provides her a trail of white smoke to follow to the desired destination.
• Magic Staff: By chapter 94, Aultcray's Heroic Sacrifice and Diving Save is to give Malty his Magic Staff that made him the Staff Hero. Once Malty attains the staff in her hand, she gets a brand new HUD and she changes the staff into a piece of wood to avoid compromising her identity as a princess.
• Making a Splash: In chapter 54, she tries out low level water magic and is proud of herself by being able to do the same magic her sister, Melty, does and become even better through combining water with fire for a more advanced element to be created.
• Marked to Die: Learning from Naofumi in chapter 115 that the only relevance her royal family has from his world was through his Portal Book, Malty urges him for information about a princess he saw, which she assumes to be a prophetic description of herself. When given the answer that the princess didn't look to be nice, the way Naofumi delivers his answer gives her the implication she was destined to die eventually, or on the Third Wave.
• The Masquerade Will Kill Your Dating Life: A problem she has to deal with in escalating and gaining more of Naofumi's trust in their relationship is her identity as a princess. Knowing that Naofumi has a distaste for nobility and specifically her family, Malty left to take a gamble on what the aftermath will be if she were to reveal her true identity. Either Naofumi will leave her for being a spoiled princess that initially saved him to use him as a pawn or that the façade that she was Mein of Samphor, a country girl, was all a lie.
• Master Actress: To be an excellent political player, Malty had dedicated her learning into being able to wear many different types of masks to either deceive or convince others into taking her side.
• Malicious Slander: She sours Mirellia's image as a queen and princess to Naofumi by revealing the Queen's war crime of murdering several beastmen children out of paranoia that they will become threats to Melromarc. Furthermore, Mein goes into depth that despite everything Mirellia did in the Faubley Secret War, the latter ended up ascending as a queen and was never punished for her actions. To Naofumi, believing that Mirellia was a horrible person, he is led to believe that the elder daughter of Mirellia will be even worst, as newer generations of monarch families are spoiled with their lifestyle.
• Meaningful Look: Mein uses her facial expressions to nod as a means to silently communicate to Raphtalia in chapter 131 of her advice to apply the Mouth To Mouth Force Feeding for the Balafon Elder to drink a healing potion.
• Meaningful Rename: Since declaring her new identity as an adventurer called "Mein of Samphor", she is rarely ever referred to as "Malty", and is instead called by the narration as "Mein".
• Mercy Kill: Afraid that Bed-Chan is possibly a hostile monster that can brainwash people into submission in chapter 126, comparable to the Slender Man, like Naofumi had described, Mein opts to use her fire magic to burn Yukari and Nora to death, as so the two are saved from having their bodies mind-controlled to the point of decay.
• A Million Is a Statistic: Invoked. Her Tough Leader Façade trained into her is to treat casualties and the people of Melromarc as a means to gain leverage to her opponents, so that she would be able to think rationally and not be led astray by emotions.
• Minor Injury Overreaction:
  • Played for Laughs. Balloon monsters, who are viewed as the weakest monsters in Medea are so harmless that children can easily kill them and the balloons themselves hardly bring damage. However, when Mein is unexpected bitten by one in chapter 6, she loudly screams before descending into quiet sobs. Balloon monsters afterwards have become the monsters that terrifies her the most, despite being one of the weaker ones.
  • Discussed. To deconstruct and expose Consevatie's weaknesses in chapter 130 when she and the others eventually confront him, Mein reinforces her beliefs that it will be easy to coerce Consevatie into giving up the moment they inflict a sort of physical pain onto him.
    Malty: Consevatie is a gutless brat who whines at the slightest bit of pain. I doubt it would take much to 'coerce' him not to activate the kill switch on the slave seal if we have him at our mercy. On the threat we completely end his manhood if he does.
• Mirthless Laughter: Naofumi jokingly wondering in chapter 128 of Consevatie having the possibility to work himself up enslaving a royal princess, Malty laughs out nervously besides Naofumi to avoid the fact that she herself is a royal princess that actually got enslaved by Consevatie.
• Mistaken Ethnicity: For all the times Mala served her as a personal maid, Malty assumes her to be a commoner of Melromarc dedicated to watching over her. That assumption turns out to not be the case with Roger's Wham Line reveal that Mala is a demi-human of Siltvelt that defected her country to show loyalty to Aultcray in the way of a servant.
• Mistaken Identity: When getting healed in chapter 91, after from getting knocked out by a fish explosion, Malty assumes the person healing her to be Raphtalia. However, as Malty feels refreshing water on her skin, it turns out to be Melty doing the healing.
• The Immodest Orgasm: Played for Laughs. Coming in contact with a cushioned chair in chapter 123, Malty lets out an audible moan to signal her longing to experience her former luxurious life as a princess, even if the only comfort she can find is with a well-made chair for her body to rest on.
• Moment Killer:
  • Her attempt to seduce Naofumi into sleeping with her in the same bed together as a way to gain more of his trust, it all goes wrong with Naofumi's hidden monster balloon biting her hand. In the end, all Malty had to deal with in the night is to quietly sob from the pain of the bite.
  • Malty thinks in her head and believes she'll finally have a chance to initiate a kiss with Naofumi in chapter 11, but Raphtalia's rumbling stomach ruins the romantic moment for her.
  • Malty almost gets the chance to reveal her real identity to Naofumi in chapter 44 during their moment together watching the red moon. However, when Naofumi casually mentions Lautrec and eventually remembers how the latter escaped him, Malty fails to capture the romantic moment to reveal herself.
  • As Streibough's accusation that directly jabs at her real identity being Princess Malty and Siesta being the Shield Hero in chapter 107, Malty attempts to make a move to reveal her real identity as a princess to calm down any potential infighting with the demi-humans. Before she reveals herself, Naofumi beats her to the act by claiming himself to be the Shield Hero.
  • Mein losing her mind in her happy thoughts and her moment of an intimate hands-holding with Naofumi in chapter 113, once Uranus makes his sudden appearance to announce to them on where they plan to take their destination onwards from the monastery they rest.
• More Expendable Than You: Whether it's to garner sympathy points, portray herself as a sword to be used in battle or genuinely wants Naofumi's life to be the main priority to be protected, Malty sees her value as a person to be inferior to the Shield Hero.
• Mouth To Mouth Force Feeding: Invoked. To give Raphtalia advice on how she can save the Balafon Elder's life from his injuries, Mein reminds Raphtalia to feed him potion with a kiss to the mouth in chapter 131, just like what Raphtalia had done to her way back in chapter 57.
• Mundane Object Amazement: Usually in her life as a princess, luxurious objects and servitude was something that was always available for her. However, since becoming an adventurer, Malty will always feel a sense of amazement and comfort when coming across rewards or chances to relax that can temporarily bring back her princess life quality.
  • Played for Laughs. Just from placing her body in contact with a cushioned chair found inside of Jarl Balgruuf's mansion in chapter 123, it was enough for Malty to have an audible moan, just to have a brief glimpse of comfort resembling her princess lifestyle.
  • Coming in contact with a simple bed made out of feathers and silk, Malty gushes in praise for the wonderful comfort it brings for her body in chapter 124, as her time being an adventurer had only allowed her to sleep onto the ground or improvised beds made of straw.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Played for Laughs. Whether it's Zylden or Kyubey explaining to her that she isn't actually a country girl named Mein of Samphor, Malty's first immediate response to their reveal is to find a way to dispose of them from the Shield Hero's party. Afterwards once Malty has calmed herself down, she will try to negotiate with them or ask how they learned who she is.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • After the power of the Seatto artifact leaves her body and she sees that the destruction she caused inside the underground cave in chapter 77 had killed her Uncle Aldrecht, Mein blames herself for allowing the surge of power to cloud her judgement.
  • In chapter 110, seeing Kazuya's mutilated corpse at the hands of Ken and with the defeat of Satellizer, Malty is left disgusted of herself for having attempted to kill Kazuya, a demi-human who is just a child, all for being an annoyance rather than someone that is a threat, all from a fit of rage.
  • After being stopped by Naofumi from continuing her No-Holds-Barred Beatdown of Jackson, Malty feels shame in herself at chapter 128 for her lost of control possibly exposing her group to the Three Heroes Church, and herself feeling like she is a person incapable of changing.
    Malty's Thoughts: (No, just like the self proclaimed Bitch Lord, Jackson reminded the princess of herself despite their vastly different birth and upbringing. And it hammers into her head how right a pompous fop like Consevatie the Younger is about her. That people like her can not change. Even when she wants to help, all she does is lead people to ruin like she did to Naofumi and his companions.)
• Mythology Gag:
  • Her early behavior with Naofumi if she were to let out her secret thoughts and personal opinions is to whisper her words near his ears. This behavior of Malty is reminiscent of how she would manipulate Motoyasu into doing her bidding if there were situations being unpleasant to her in the canon story.
  • In chapter 8, Malty's inner thoughts have her snark that she is secretly a goddess disguised as a princess during the confrontation with the Siltvelt agents. From the web novel of the original shield hero story, Malty is actually a god in disguise, since she was created by a fragment of the goddess, Medea.
  • At chapter 30, hearing Iris talk about giving the party members of Motoyasu's group an offer they cannot refuse, Malty blurts out in shock that her friend, Iris, just sold innocent people in slavery. While the truth was that Iris bribed the party members into leaving Motoyasu, Malty's accusation is a reference to her canon counterpart selling Motoyasu's party members into slavery.
  • Played for Drama. In chapter 95, Malty and all of her party members are betrayed by the Three Heroes Church in chapter 95. Everyone of the party members are treated as fugitives and the Church of the Three Heroes are rising at their power with no one of high authority to stop them. At this point, Malty has essentially lost her rank as a princess, since people of the Church would only call her an imposter and being forced to hide under her adventurer identity, she is always called "Slut" by Consevatie. As a cruel twist of irony, the suffering Malty is going through are the exact same punishments Canon!Malty went through by having her name be changed into something demeaning and losing her royal status.
  • When she named herself as Mein of Samphor, the name itself referenced both the name of her pet, Mein, and her canon counterpart's adventurer disguise. Later in chapter 100, Mein second secret identity is named Sophia of Totela, which serves as a reminder of her favorite romance novel character and an allusion to her canon counterpart's surname of the adventurer name as Myne Sophia.
  • Malty starts up a forest fire just like what her canon self did in The Rising of the Shield Hero, but the difference being is that Ambition!Malty did so in self-defense to ensure the survival of herself and Naofumi from a horde of monsters at chapter 100. Canon!Malty, meanwhile, started a forest fire For the Evulz, and to flush out Naofumi and his party for escaping her.
  • Played for Laughs. By the Graile arc and in chapter 108, Malty gets to play the role as a major member of a coup to overthrow the Three Heroes Church as the government she wants to get rid off, similarly to Canon!Malty's role to have the Three Heroes Church and Tact to burn Melromarc in The Rising of the Shield Hero.
  • Played for Drama. When Naofumi first saw her at the Portal Book that brought him into Medea, both his counterpart in The Rising of the Shield Hero, and him in here are implied to have called her "bitchy" for looking like someone that would betray them. While the statement of being a bitch could be an accurate description of Canon!Malty, Ambition!Malty having Naofumi describing her as "not a nice type" of girl triggers her in chapter 115 as someone unimportant for Naofumi to effectively learn who she is.
  • Played for Drama. In the canon series, Malty's first major punishment that got her into a Karma Houdini Warranty was that when she got a slave crest placed upon her body to disable all of her lies and force her to tell the full truth of her crimes. In Ambition of the Red Princess, Malty experiences the same humiliating faith on a more tragic note where is given a Slave Brand to live out the rest of her life in chapter 118 as a glorified trophy for Consevatie to lord her over.
  • Played for Drama. To listen in on Consevatie unknowingly insulting her by describing her possible future actions after Naofumi's death will be hooking herself up with other Legendary Heroes, Malty sulks to herself at the thought of how low she is capable of sinking with her selfishness. Similarly to the canon series of The Rising of the Shield Hero, Canon!Malty does the exact same things Consevatie had described by siding with every Legendary Hero, and bleeding them out of their resources for her own benefits.
  • She gets insulted by Consevatie accusing her for siding with the Spear Hero and selling the latter's party members in slavery as a means to hog up her hero's attention. However, while those actions apply to Canon!Malty from The Rising of the Shield Hero, Ambition!Malty never attempted to sell anyone into slavery, nevertheless had an interest to be with Motoyasu.
• Named Like My Name: Lampshaded. The name of Captain Alderic has a similar sounding to her Uncle Aldrecht. To Malty in chapter 108, she wonders how Aldrecht would be able to tolerate and command the rash attitude of Captain Alderic.
• The Needs of the Many: Invoked. She suggests for Naofumi to not focus on Wyndia since the latter is only a single demi-human and that they should instead be looking for Eclair's artifact. However, by blurting out the lack of Wyndia's importance, Malty had accidentally soured her kind façade from Gaelion calling her out. To compensate for her rude comment, Malty gives Naofumi a scenario to focus on saving the Seatto artifact over herself, despite secretly wanting her life to be valued more.
• Never My Fault: Played for Drama. Deep down inside her heart, Malty is aware that it is her own fault that she got Aldrecht killed all because of her power-hungry state. To lessen the sorrow of what she feels about his death, Malty blames Jaune Arc for choosing to go against Aldrecht in keeping the Seatto heirloom. Even though Malty knows this treatment is unfair to Jaune, since the latter once used to court her, she also wants to move on from whatever past romance they had with each other.
• Never Speak Ill of the Dead: While Streibough was still alive, her interactions with him was nothing but to exchange blows on who could humiliate each other first. Coming into chapter 110 and witnessing Streibough perform a Heroic Sacrifice to kill an entire army of the Three Heroes Church by himself, Mein can't bring herself to use her previous interactions before to continue hating him. All she could think of is wonder if she Was Too Hard on Him to realize his potential heroism.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Reconstructed. When cornered by a hound in chapter 19, her instincts warn her to abandon Raphtalia by using her as a decoy for the hound to get busy with, all while she makes her escape. In the end, however, the hound focuses its attention on Mein instead and feasts on eating her face. Afterwards the event, Mein believes herself to have angered Raphtalia for abandoning her, but it turns out her actions ended up looking as though she was protecting Raphtalia from the hound. Though Mein was an Accidental Hero beforehand and had no intentions to spend time with Raphtalia, Mein having unintentionally saved Raphtalia, slowly pushes her to care for the latter as a child and to grow attachment with.
• The Nicknamer:
  • To remember Elhard as the person who gave her stinky leather armor instead of the fancy but revealing armor in chapter 3, Malty often refers to him in the back of her mind as the Smith Demon for providing her top-quality goods that match her demands at the cost of her own comfort.
  • Not knowing the real name of Dida at the time of chapter 25, Mein opts to calling him Henchman Number 2 as the second bodyguard for Iris.
  • The rude insults and frequent accusations Streibough makes towards trying to uncover her real identity is what pushes her to refer to him as the "little shit" inside of her head.
• Noble Bigot: For all the time she has spent growing closer to Raphtalia and the latter slowly coming to view her as a mother than just a Cool Big Sis, Mein sometimes from her Fantastic Racism refers to Raphtalia as a "raccoon dog", even if she has come to value Raphtalia as a child to care for.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Upset of Jackson playing up his misery as a victim of Consevatie, when all Jackson made himself look is a traitor that bows down to powerful people for help in chapter 128, Malty rages in her fury to punch, kick, and slap Jackson to the floor, until being stopped by Naofumi to not alert any outsiders of her outburst, and to listen in on what Jackson has to say for himself.
• No Listening Skills: Deconstructed. Since being a homeschooled student and beginning her early adventures with Naofumi, Malty rarely paid attention to important teachings or notes, since she finds having to learn to be boring for her mind. By the later parts of the story, Malty starts feeling shame for her past self's arrogance in not being a dignified learner, as her lack of basic skills mean she is unprepared to survive on her own without an ally having the expertise to assist her.
• Nominal Hero: Before her Character Development kicks in and her siding with Naofumi is done for pragmatic reasons to gain his trust, as to become queen, Malty's early heroism such as debunking his trial, saving slaves, and fighting the Waves of Catastrophe lacked any heroic motivation. Her main motivation to commit such heroic acts was done in a way that she could exploit benefits for protection and glory for her credibility. By the time of her Character Development where she grows close to her party members, Malty becomes more like an Unscrupulous Hero, as even if she has no interest in saving the world, she doesn't want to make herself out as The Load of the party.
• Non-Indicative Name:
  • Raphtalia always calls her as Big Sister Mein, but Raphtalia deep down sees Malty as more of a surrogate mother than just a Cool Big Sis to look up to.
  • Discussed. Explaining the concept of God Crafting to Naofumi in chapter 126 to stop him from incorrectly using the term, Mein explains it's title to be about extracting the power of god-related sources to empower living beings, instead of summoning actual gods into Medea.
• No One Gets Left Behind: Being in imminent danger from the Three Heroes Church wanting to capture her and Naofumi, Mein does her best to keep Naofumi safe from their attempts to capture them both. She uses her new staff from Aultcray to grant herself Hot Wings to fly away and once safe from the danger, Mein announces that after everything they went through, she won't ever abandon him in any way.
• Not Afraid to Die: Downplayed. She is very much scared of dying ever since being confronted with the death of Mein, but after having survived so many deadly events as Mein of Samphor without having to rely on the castle walls or knights, Malty's fear of death is numbed as part of her adaptation into an adventurer.
• Not Helping Your Case: Lampshaded. In chapter 108, a Three Heroes Church priest attempts to denounce her and Naofumi as fakes by calling them demons, but the priest's words only solidify that she and Naofumi are the real deal, and their names are only getting badmouthed. To respond for the priest's idiocy, Malty feels like giving him a silent thanks.
• Nothing Is Scarier: Walking inside the dungeon cave of Balafon village and being separated from her allies causes her anxiousness to slowly grow from encountering nothing. She would have preferred battling monster, instead of dealing with silence and the growing mist.
• Not in This for Your Revolution: She assists the demi-humans to take back Graile in a rebellion against the Three Heroes Church. But in the end, Malty only does it out of being a Punch-Clock Hero for Naofumi, and because she wants to find a way to leave the Gallian knights, so hers and Naofumi's identity are not exposed in their goal to escape to Zeltoble from the Three Heroes Church.
• Not Me This Time: At chapter 105 in a sense of Irony towards Cromwell being the one that ruined the reputation of her life and Naofumi as criminals, Malty of all people ends up being the one that debunks Cromwell to be responsible for enslaving everyone in Graile. As horrible as Cromwell is, Malty doubts that even his own twisted faith would lead him into committing senseless destruction at Graile.
• Not Now, Kiddo: Her instinctive reaction to stop Raphtalia from being the one to take on an infiltration mission to save Naofumi from the Siltvelt Agents is under the belief that Raphtalia is too weak to be put in such a dangerous situation. It takes Raphtalia using her gentle words to express her gratitude that allows Mein to let Raphtalia take on the mission in the latter's small raccoon form.
• "Not So Different" Remark:
  • Hating on the Bitch Lord for the latter's cruelty and selfishness to further her own bloodlust for power, Malty thinks of herself to be exactly the same as the Bitch Lord, because she herself can't get over being a manipulator that exploits situations for her own gain, which results in her crying in the perception she can't change for the people she cares for.
    Malty's Thoughts: (She was angry at this... creature so much, because she sees her exact reflection within the Bitch Lord. And she HATES It!)
  • Feeling the smell of jealousy coming off of Streibough from having his quest to be with Princess Alethia being led astray in needing to first help Mein and Naofumi get to Faubley, Malty realizes that those same feelings of jealousy are the same emotions she feels at having a Sibling Rivalry with Melty to become queen.
  • After being stopped of her beatdown on Jackson in chapter 128, Mein recollection of herself and actions have her remark as a person incapable of change, since if Jackson looks to be a someone that is seeking Naofumi's help for the sake of revenge, and suspecting Jackson to be the type that bows to powerful people to fulfill his own vendetta, them the same negativity should apply to herself that can't change out of her selfishness. Later on in the chapter, Mein's similarities with Jackson are reconstructed, since if the latter is willing to prove to everyone of his change, then the same fact can apply to herself improving as a person.
    Malty's Thoughts: (But if this lowly commoner can change... maybe she can too.)
• Obfuscating Stupidity: As Mein of Samphor, the amount of information Malty can let out to her party members is limited by how her disguise as a commoner isn't suppose to have access to knowledge exclusive to nobles.
• O.C. Stand-in: From the original work, The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty's personality was primarily her being a huge liar, Royal Brat, and compulsive manipulator. Her past with her family isn't heavily explored and she mainly antagonized the Shield Hero's party for her own benefits. In here, while she still stays a liar and a manipulator, Malty gains redeeming and sympathetic qualities to expand her goals to become queen, preventing her from being a Hate Sink like her canon counterpart.
• Offscreen Villain Dark Matter: Towards the well-made equipment Mark Consevatie can replace for himself and his men in chapter 129, Malty wonders how House Consevatie is able to afford everything, as there has to be a limit on a noble house's spending before eventually running low on money. To theorize on House Consevatie's budget, Malty sources the her answer to illegal slave trading as a means of profit.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • While Drunk on the Dark Side from having absorbed the power of the Seatto heirloom into her body, she believes herself to be acting sane in only wanting to incapacitate, but not kill Aldrecht. However, she fails to consider that using fire attacks inside a crumbling cave will drown out the oxygen. As a way to get around the oxygen problem, Malty results to puncturing the surface of the cave to let air in, but only causes rocks to crumble and endanger everyone's lives.
  • Played for Laughs. Mein sweats profusely from the terrifying realization in chapter 86 that she may have been indirectly responsible for Firo's hostility towards everyone, all from having flicked the latter's head way back in chapter 31 over an argument as to the given name Firo should get.
  • When Streibough brings up facts as to how her origin as a pilgrim known as Sophia of Totela is put to question by her unusually strong water magic that surpasses experienced nobles, Malty is left sweating and dreading from being unable to come up with a lie to ward off his suspicions in chapter 102.
  • Streibough finally managing to get into a conclusion that she is Princess Malty and Siesta is the Shield Hero causes the fear inside her to spike up at what would happen if their true identities were revealed at the demi-humans in chapter 107.
• Oh, No... Not Again!:
  • Getting tired of Streibough's Entertainingly Wrong conclusions as to what he believes her real identity to be, Malty admits her burning frustration into having to deal with him going in his wacky, but Accidental Truth conclusion in chapter 106 where Streibough unknowingly claims her to be Princess Malty and her assistant being the Shield Hero.
  • Played for Drama. Receiving a sting on her back that causes her to pass out by the end of chapter 117, she recalls her last thoughts on the event being comparable to the time she was poisoned by the Siltvelt Ravens.
• One-Steve Limit: Her name as Mein of Samphor comes from naming herself based on her pet filorial, Mein. For the name of the read Myne of Samphor, her name starts off with "Y", instead of an "EI", as a way to be a separate person to Malty.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Not knowing or being able to properly address her personal knights by their real name, she calls them as Baldy and Blue Eyes. Though Malty knows Baldy's real name as Baldwin Winchester, she prefers to use a nickname for his bald head being a prominent feature she recognizes. As for Blue Eyes, she never bothered to learn his real name, so she focuses on nicknaming him based on his blue eyes.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
  • In chapter 63, she loses her cool towards the Bitch Lord and kicks the latter to shut her smugness. As Mein of Samphor, she usually acts friendly and compassionate to everyone as part of her façade, but to the Bitch Lord, the anger being displayed at the latter is an unusual display of emotions for Malty's secret identity.
  • Usually when Mein gets angry, she usually vents out her frustrations similarly with the cases of tearing Itsuki, Aultcray's sacred duel, and lashing out at the Bitch Lord. With Aldrecht's death, however, Mein doesn't get angry but is instead silent. The behavior of Mein signals Naofumi and Raphtalia that Aldrecht was a person that was close to Mein's life.
  • After she Took a Level in Kindness in many points of the story, the gratitude she displays for for Baldy and Blue Eyes rescuing her in chapter 119 comes across as an out-of-place behavior they don't expect from her, due to having watched over her needs during her time in the past as a pampered princess.
• Opportunistic Bitch: Malty will always have a feeling of smugness to herself if she can see a gullible person she believes she can manipulate for her own benefits, or to take items that will benefit her into the long run. Problem is, Malty underestimates the difficulty of how manipulating someone can lead them into taking actions she isn't able to approve, and she can be put into tempting deals that she isn't able to plan on what it will do to the future of her life.
• Out-Gambitted: In chapter 103, Against Streibough threatening to expose her identity as Mein or Malty from the Sophia of Totela persona that she created, Malty reveals her status as Aldrecht's student to shut Streibough's mouth from exposing her, since she already outranks him in terms of magical capabilities, although she doesn't bother revealing her princess status in the end.
• Overly Long Scream: Falling down a pit inside of the Melromarc capital, Malty screams at the top of her lungs, and stops once she realizes in chapter 120 that the fall she supposedly thought was long had already stopped.
• Overly-Nervous Flop Sweat: Whenever someone gets close to discovering an embarrassing or important lie, Malty is likely to sweat beneath her clothes as a response to what results may occur.
  • She sweats nervously when Naofumi starts questioning why Malty (doesn't know Mein and Malty are the same) had suggested Katarina to go farming to hone her Earth magic instead of a magic school.
  • Mein begins sweating inside her cloak again in chapter 86, upon learning that filorials transform into aggressive creatures if exposed to violent actions. Learning that fact from Filorial Bill, Mein thinks back from the past and realizes that the flick she made on the newborn Firo's head in chapter 31 is what led to the latter developing such a violent attitude.
  • Malty is left sweating inside of her cloak in chapter 101 out of the risk that the knights of Gallia are asking questions of her past as Sophia of Totela. As Malty and Naofumi are credited for being an indirect help in stopping the warg monsters from harming any refugees, both don't wish to draw any attention out of risk of being exposed and having the come up with obscure lies to put up an alibi for their Secret Identities.
  • A feeling of cold sweat drips beneath Malty's cloak as Streibough points out her unusually strong magical powers as a strange connection that surpasses the power of several nobles, despite making herself look like a pilgrim.
• Out-of-Context Eavesdropping: For a long time, she thought her mother, Mirellia, sold her to a death sentence with King Egbert out of malicious intent or out of callousness that she herself could be replaced with Melty, because of having eavesdropped Mirellia's private conversation with Aultcray. Until chapter 56, Malty learns the full context of her sellout with King Egbert was the result of the latter exploiting Aultcray's desperation to force the Melromarc family into giving herself up.

P-S

• Patriotic Fervor: Most of the time she mentions her kingdom, Melromarc, she frequently labels it to be glorious and above the perceived hypocrisy with Siltvelt.
• Pet the Dog:
  • Her interaction with the seamstress of Goddess and Heroes in chapter 82 have Mein act completely polite and thankful for the tailor's hard work with no signs that it was faked or a manipulation tactic.
  • As revealed in chapter 91, despite Malty's rivalry to beat Melty in the game of thrones, Malty shows her worrying side in wanting her to be safe. Reasons stem from wanting her effort with the Shield Hero to be what grants her the claim to be queen and not because Melty's death means she herself is the sole heir for the title.
• Platonic Declaration of Love: By chapter 105, Naofumi asks for Mein if she is willing to stay as a partner to him, even after he has lost his Shield to Lautrec's Goddess. Naofumi giving reasons that partners are to be seen as equals in helping each other out, Mein accepts his declaration to be seen as his partner by his side.
• Playful Cat Smile: When she realizes that Naofumi's sentimentality means he won't easily throw her away, Mein takes the opportunity to smile mischievously to convince him into sleeping with her in a single bed.
• Playing with Fire: She uses fire magic to fight her enemies, but it is rather weak due to rarely training herself to become stronger. However, once she goes on adventures and trains with Naofumi, Malty becomes more adept in using her fire magic.
• Please, Don't Leave Me: Mala suggesting to have herself be the one to perform an Escort Distraction to buy the rest of the group in chapter 120 to have the time to flee from the Three Heroes Church, Malty is adamant in not wanting her to be left behind to die fighting, since she now realizes just how important Mala means to her life.
• Point of Divergence: In canon, Malty betrays Naofumi by accusing him of rape, which causes him to have a strong distrust on females and be hated by the entire world. In this story, Malty instead clears Naofumi's name and becomes his ally for the rest of the story. Rather than engage in petty sadism, Malty focuses her goals on becoming a Queen and to prove Mirellia wrong about her capabilities.
• Poking Dead Things with a Stick: She sees a man lying on the floor in chapter 95, and her response to the man laying down face flat is to poke him with her Star Wand. By flipping over the man, Mein concludes his death was that he succumbed to a poison from seeing his greenish skin.
• Politically-Active Princess: To take part in playing the game of thrones in becoming the queen of Melromarc, Malty gets herself involved with political games under the guise of Mein. As Mein, she exploits her identity as an adventurer coming from Samphor to work with Naofumi Iwatani, the Shield Hero, and use the credibility he obtains to increase her chances to claim the throne.
• Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure: Each time Naofumi recognizes a person, despite only seeing or meeting them for the first time, he just so happens to know their identity, because of recognizing them in his world, all while Mein lacks an understanding how he associates them.
  • By chapter 115, Mein's Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure is played for drama, since because Naofumi can recognize certain people, she questions why she herself is someone Naofumi does not know from his world. When given an answer by him that he once saw a princess in the cover page of the Portal Book that brought him into Medea, Mein is led believing she has no importance, because she is destined to die for something.
  • Meeting Bellatrix and Rudopholus for the first time in chapter 123, along with Naofumi, Malty is left wondering what how Naofumi has a level of awareness of who Bellatrix and Rudopholus are. Even more, when hearing the word, "Death Eater", from Naofumi, Malty thinks of the word as something overly edgy, until Bellatrix and Rudopholus explain their associate with the name as an organization dedicated in smuggling people away from Faubley.
  • Hearing about Naofumi's plan being comparable to a guy named Lelouch, Mein thinks of the person to be a great military strategist that inspired Naofumi to think up excellent plans for her group against the Three Heroes Church. But now knowing who Lelouch is, Mein assumes him to be a real person, rather than someone found in a fictional anime series.
• Power Floats: The power absorbed from the Seatto heirloom into her body gives her the ability to rise and float into the air to attack three of the Free Fighters that are getting close to Naofumi.
• Power High: Deconstructed. Absorbing the power inside of the Seatto Heirloom has given her a feeling of euphoria and the dominance to defeat all of the Free Fighters seeking to harm her party members. As great of a feeling the power is giving her, Malty has a lack of focus on how she uses her spells, so they end up being wasted and easily countered by Aldrecht.
• Practically Different Generations: Downplayed. Malty herself is two decades old and the age gap between her sister, Melty, is approximately half a decade.
• Pragmatic Hero: In supporting or protecting the lives of her party, Malty occasionally has thoughts in her head that the best way to help is to perform some morally questionable deeds to ensure their survival or to progress on their goals.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Rather than frame Naofumi of raping her, Mein instead relies on Pragmatic Villainy to not betray him. Mein relies heavily on pragmatic villainy to make sure that she is able to have a chance in becoming the Queen of Melromarc. She stays with Naofumi to become stronger alongside him and because the other three heroes are not as reliable when dealing with problems compared to Naofumi.
• Prayer Is a Last Resort: At the worst times in her life being in perilous danger or at unfortunate situations, Malty goes into the depths of her mind to send prayers to any divine beings she knows of, so as to hope a lucky intervention comes to save her or her allies.
• Princess Incognito: Pretends to be an adventurer named Mein of Samphor to support Naofumi in his goals of defeating the Waves and to become a hero.
• Princess Protagonist: She is the daughter of Queen Mirelia and King Aultcray, making Malty as the First Princess of Melromarc. She's the protagonist for having sided with Naofumi to use his reputation as a legendary hero to gain the reputation and credibility to become queen.
• Promoted to Love Interest: Exaggerated. At the original canon, Malty would break Naofumi's heart by betraying him via False Rape Accusation and would become Motoyasu's main party members. Although a part of Motoyasu's party, Malty doesn't care for him and would use him only to repeatedly humiliate Naofumi in every encounter. Here, Malty never goes through with accusing Naofumi of rape and teams up with him in the beginning of the story. Initially and although Malty views him as a stepping stone to become queen, she does eventually grow to bond with Naofumi and his party members.
• Promotion to Parent: After spending so much time being a Cool Big Sis to Raphtalia and the latter always calling her a big sister, Malty is viewed as a secondary mother for Raphtalia. Her interactions with Raphtalia frequently involve the latter seeking for comfort, personal approval, and quality time, that Malty fits more as a mother than just a big sister.
• Protagonist Title: The fanfic being named as Ambition of the Red Princess refers to Malty's status as the Princess Protagonist of the work and the word "red" to place her as a Significant Green-Eyed Redhead. The ambition part of title is used to illustrate her main goal spanning throughout the fanfic as wanting to become the queen of Melromarc.
• Psychological Projection:
  • Towards interactions with strangers outside of her party, she strongly assumes anyone else to have ulterior motives beneath what they portray themselves. Similarly, those traits she claims others have is what she possesses within herself by hiding her true identity from her own allies, and to anyone that has genuine virtues they value over their own lives, Mein either views it as a weakness, foolishness, or a chance to get exploited.
  • In situations where she has hurt others or is needed to act on forgiveness, Malty expects others to hate her for her actions, because she herself isn't that forgiving of a person. When proven wrong by Eclair in chapter 79, as the latter chooses to forgive and thank her for having destroyed the Boletaria Castle, Malty is taken aback and is confused with Eclair's thankfulness.
  • Reconstructed. Part of the reason she can't accept Jackson's siding with Naofumi as a genuine Heel–Face Turn, is that he looks to be an opportunist that will look for powerful people to fulfill his goals. Similarly to herself, she can't see herself possibly outgrowing her selfish impulses to become queen, since Jackson's seemingly slimy actions resemble her motives to an extent. However, once Jackson delves deeper of his motives to be more of a real hero that can help the common folks from the Three Heroes Church, Malty begins to be more accepting towards him, because if he can truly change, then the same fact can apply to the betterment of herself.
• Psycho Sidekick: Downplayed. Naofumi being the the Legendary Small Steps Hero, he always goes around saving people and is highly reluctant to or is against Mein's plans to Shoot the Dog or willingly leave others in danger. Contrast to Naofumi being more morally upright, Mein's questionable morality and pessimism can push her to think up of plans that Naofumi wouldn't normally think on doing, or pull of acts, though dirty, are necessary for their survival.
• Psychotic Smirk: She lets out psychotic smirks whenever her benefactors fall for her Crocodile Tears and when things are going in her favor.
  • In chapter 77, she first has a silent smirk upon absorbing the mana in the Seatto artifact, before her smirk becomes a small chuckle from the power gained.
• Punch-Clock Hero: Malty won't actively commit herself into a being a hero since it is either too much work for her to bear, or the heroism she has to perform will backfire into putting herself in danger. To have a motivation to save others beyond her party, Malty goes through with following Naofumi's orders, hoping nothing goes wrong for her or the plans she has in mind.
• Punctuated Pounding: To end her "Reason You Suck" Speech to the Bitch Lord, Mein persistently kicks her while calling her a vain, selfish, sadistic, worthless piece of trash that only cares for herself.
• Puppet King: Discussed. Putting the facts that Melty is under the custody of the Three Heroes Church and of Naofumi' Armor-Piercing Response in chapter 108, Malty begins to fear in her head as to what might be happening to Melty. Melty being in the church could mean the organize could mold her into a ruler they can control for his lack of experiences in manipulations, while she herself is assassinated by the organization.
• Quivering Lip: Invoked. To perform a possible case of Crocodile Tears on Naofumi to convince him to sleep with her in chapter 6, Mein makes her lips tremble as the first sign of her false tears.
• Ready for Lovemaking: When Naofumi starts requesting for two rooms in his tired state, Mein takes advantage of his exhaustion to hire only one room and having the room be filled with a large heart-shaped bed. That way, she can be ready to easily seduce Naofumi into sleeping with her, but everything all goes wrong once Naofumi's hidden balloon monster bites her hand.
• Rage Breaking Point:
  • At chapter 63, Mein hearing the Bitch Lord act so smug of herself being supposedly better than the moral righteousness of Naofumi and Raphtalia, she looses her cool to kick the Bitch Lord and deliver "The Reason You Suck" Speech to her.
  • Having had enough of Streibough's accusation that Naofumi looked himself to be a coward that ran away from an outer goddess, Mein lets out the truth that Naofumi did not desert anyone, as so she could retaliate against Streibough's offensive comments in chapter 107.
  • Paranoid at the thought of Jackson only joining Naofumi as a chance to gain power to take revenge on the Three Heroes Church, and the chances shown to Jackson, despite the latter having betrayed her in the past, Mein goes berserk in giving Jackson a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown and "The Reason You Suck" Speech, as she can't trust him to ever change his selfish ways.
• Real Dreams are Weirder: She experiences a strange dream in chapter 106 where knights are exploding into ashes, Motoyasu is protecting Raphtalia, an exploration is happening in a dungeon for the Four Cardinal Heroes, and her mother of all people is beside her.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
  • In chapter 63, the Bitch Lord's Hannibal Lecture on how the Shield Hero's party perceived hypocrisy towards slavery gets on Mein's nerves so much that she kicks the Bitch Lord to shut her mouth. Mein then explains that the Shield Hero and his party did a better job in helping slaves and that the Bitch Lord herself is behaving exactly the same as the nobles the latter hates. Mein goes into depth that the Shield Hero's party is not pampered but is instead comprised of loyalty and love to fight the threats in Medea.
  • Not trusting Jackson to be a person capable of reforming into a better person, Mein goes into beating him down onto the ground in chapter 128, coupled with deconstructing him as a person that whines only about his suffering and never about others.
    Mein: STOP IT! You think I don't know what you are trying to do here? You are pretending to be pathetic, and playing up the tragedy of Consevatie and the church's victims to make us feel sorry about yourself. So we'll help you topple your enemies in the church. But what happens after? The moment we help you beat Consevatie, you'll run to the next powerful guy who'll throw you a bone like a starving bonedog! Like Cromwell, or maybe the Pope! Sell us out another time for you own gain! Because I know selfish people like you! You! You only like to whine about how bad you have it in life, never think about how others could have it way worse! Always want more than what you deserve, not caring about who gets hurt because of your actions! And people like you can never. EVER. Change!''
• Rebellious Princess: Downplayed. She likes her status as a princess, but wishes to get more in life by becoming queen, a royal status even higher than a princess. Malty throws off her pampered princess life in exchange to live out as a vagabond with Naofumi, just to have a chance to surpass Melty and become queen.
• Reduced Mana Cost: The Star Wand she got from Aultcray is great at enhancing the potency of her fire magic, and have her magic be more controlled for better efficiency.
• Replacement Goldfish: Played for Drama. Once she finds out that she is actually the second daughter of Aultcray and the Henrietta was the first, Malty begins to question if her father's love was the result of viewing her as a replacement for Henrietta. It takes Aldretch to do an Indignant Slap on her face to remind her that her father truly her and Melty.
• Reformed, but Not Tamed: Malty is slowly becoming more trustworthy for Naofumi and his parties, since she is learning to adjust to the life of an adventurer that assists their party during their difficult times. Though better than when she was at the start of the story for being an Ambitious, but Lazy Schemer that looks for opportunities to elevate herself, Malty will at times act manipulative to latch onto potential opportunities or have thoughts to Shoot the Dog if it looks to be the best option to help her party.
• Rich Sibling, Poor Sibling: Downplayed. She is the poor sibling in comparison to Melty but only because Malty lacks the Queen's favor and birthright to be able to claim becoming the next queen of Melromarc. Melty on the other hand has Mirellia's favor and is given the best tutors to have the best chances at becoming queen.
• Right in Front of Me:
  • Played for Laughs. Chapter 105 contains a bit of a humorous discussion regarding the demi-humans needing Princess Malty's help to assist their plan in overthrowing the Three Heroes Church off of Graile, but are unable to realize that Malty is right with them under the guise of Sophia.
    • Uranus discusses needing Princess Malty's help, as her title as the first princess of Melromarc would mean she is likely to be elected as a regent over Princess Melty to deal with the crisis of the Three Heroes Church. This is while Malty herself is under the disguise of Sophia, is with Uranus as of currently, and is somewhat bitter of being unable to fulfill her royal duties.
  • Played for Laughs. Uranus worries for her safety as Mein of Samphor in chapter 108, because impersonating Princess Malty could potentially result in an execution by the capital, all will not knowing she is Malty playing herself to lead the rebellion against the Three Heroes Church.
    • Ken trash talks the Royal Family of Melromarc for being unable to protect his family, because the royals appear to be lazy in doing nothing towards the Three Heroes Church's influence. Ken promises that if he were to confront any of the royals, he would inflict violence upon them. As Malty listens to Ken, her heart is brought with fear as to what he might do to her.
    • The moment Streibough puts aside his pride to question how they can bring Princess Malty into their cause to overthrow the Three Heroes Church in Graile, Malty personally finds a lot of Irony in his statement, since Streibough had unknowingly insulting her in all of their interactions.
  • She is mentioned of her role being a Genuine Imposter as herself in Graile's war by Rhapsodos delivering news to Mother Sylvie of the events the occurred, all while he is not aware Malty is listening to him under the guise of Sophia of Totela.
• Robbing the Dead:
  • Seeing a man that succumbed to poison in chapter 98, Mein takes the opportunity to steal the man's clothing to disguise herself as a pilgrim, and work together with Naofumi to gather back their remaining allies and escape to Zeltoble.
  • After the deaths of the House Consevatie knights in chapter 130, Mein steals the clothing of the corpses, and has both Oersted and Ren do to same to give themselves disguises, providing them a way to infiltrate into Balafon without getting exposed by anyone.
• Rude Hero, Nice Sidekick: Inverted. She may present herself as a nice girl to everyone, but her mask can crack at times she has to stand near a Jerkass. If not the case, Malty in her inner monologues show her highly pessimistic mind being unable to comprehend simple acts of kindness as a weakness to the political games she is playing. To Naofumi being the main hero, he has a more genuine nice side in which Malty appreciates for, and the former actively looks for solutions to help everyone, even if they are unrealistic in the end.
• Sadist:
  • Downplayed. The one time Malty acts sadistic is during her empowered state from the Orb of Power giving her the sense of dominance that the Free Fighters have no chance in harming her or her Naofumi.
  • Downplayed. If a person she personally hates receives a Laser-Guided Karma for the poor behavior she displayed towards her, Malty will feel slightly satisfied for the downfall they caused themselves.
    • At watching Streibough's humiliation at all the weapons pointed at him in chapter 105 for attempting to expose her identity, Malty is pleasured for having made a fool of himself in front of everyone.
    • Lacking the energy within herself in chapter 109 to take herself and Naofumi to escape Graile, she chooses to be The Gadfly near Streibough to annoy him with petty commands as a way to get payback for all his rude interactions.
    • Every time she a discussion, view, or interaction with Consevatie happens, she'll try to find a way to have him be harmed in someway, as bringing defeat or pain onto him would be an affective way to sooth away her burning hatred off him.
• Saying Too Much: While she compares the difficulty of the current Third Wave and the previous wave difficulties that the past Legendary Heroes have faced, Malty accidentally says, "Father", instead of King Aultcray when referring to him into her explanation in chapter 115, which could easily expose her identity as a princess right in front of Naofumui.
  Mein/Malty: And we might be already facing a Wave than previously recorded ones. Father and Pope Balmus brought actual elite forces with them back in the Third Wave.
• Scars Are Forever: After surviving an attack from a Hell Hound, Malty gets a cursed scar in her face, and despite the treatment she received, it always stays on her face forever. As of chapter 95, the cursed scar becomes a problem in identifying herself to strangers, so she chooses to burn it away with her fire as a substitute to better hide her identity.
• Schemer: Played for Laughs. Malty has a tendency to overthink situations from either believing everyone else is secretly a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing or if someone is getting close at learning her identity as a princess and it can cause her to come up with overly complicated plans that aren't necessary to be performed.
  • Malty thinks up of a plan for herself and Naofumi to ditch the Gallian knights in their fight against the Cultists in chapter 102, but fails to consider the danger she herself would have to be in. As a result of her shortsightedness, Malty is instead focused on working together with the Gallian knights, as they end up being the best option to protect Naofumi and herself.
• The Schlub Pub Seduction Deduction: She flirts and attempts to seduce an arrogant, slobby merchant in chapter 7 into giving her and her Naofumi a bonus sale on the balloon skin. When the merchant ends up being too prideful to accept her charms, Malty resorts to a Wounded Gazelle Gambit to blackmail the merchant into giving her his money or else she would enact a False Rape Accusation on him.
• Screw Destiny: Played for Laughs. Commander Cloud makes a vague foreseer announcement in chapter 101 that her destiny as Sophia will be that of fighting with the Four Legendary Heroes against the Wave of Catastrophy. On paper, the future sounds like a great destiny for a commoner, but Malty sees it as a nightmare for her real goal to become queen and be safe behind the castle walls with Naofumi.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: Lampshaded. Thinking on Nora's understandable whining in chapter 125 of the Schnee family not receiving proper retribution on their crimes, Mein concludes the unfairness of the world being that powerful families have the connection to bypass laws limiting their rule.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Mein's sympathies to Nora being unable to give the Schnee family their deserved punishment in chapter 125 is to sigh inside her thoughts that people who are rich have the money to pay off escaping the laws.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Beautiful!: She whispers into the ears of an arrogant merchant that an advantage she has over him is that she is a pretty girl that can convince the Melromarc guards into believing she is a rape victim while he is nothing but a hideous man who can't get away scamming her.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: While the Gallian knights get busy in preparing for their fight against the Cultists in chapter 102, Mein thinks up of ways on how she could get away from the knights to ensure both her and Naofumi's identity are not exposed.
• Secret Identity: She hides behind an identity of commoners to disguise her princess status from people she needs to gain trust from without worries or to blend in with crowds.
  • Her first Secret Identity is known in the form of Mein of Samphor, and Malty uses the identity to act as a humble commoner that acts as the first companion for Naofumi.
  • The second being Sophia of Totelia, Malty uses the second identity as a backup for Mein of Samphor, since she needs to have herself and Naofumi to avoid being detected as fugitives by the public.
• Secretly Selfish:
  • Secretly in her mind, she only stayed with Naofumi and saved him from his trial out of a pragmatic reason to have his status as a legendary hero help her be queen of Melromarc. When assisting him to fight the waves and taking care of their companions, Malty partly uses them as tools and to occasionally bond with them.
  • Played for Laughs. To hog in on most the food rations offered to her by the Lute Villagers in chapter 117, she distracts Raki by having him explain his situation with Lute Village to avoid having to share her own rations with others.
• Secret Message Wink: Whenever she is trying to seduce someone or tease them, her starting tactic into beginning it is to wink at their eyes to signal them as to what's she is going to do.
• Self-Applied Nickname: To have an easier time manipulating Raphtalia's trust, so she would be able to get rid of the raccoon when the time eventually comes, Malty declares herself as "Big Sister Mein" for Raphtalia to call her in all their interactions. Initially, the act as a big sister for Raphtalia started off as an act for Malty, the latter begins to see Raphtalia as a child to care for and is no longer willing to take the option to leave her behind in danger, resulting in Raphtalia seeing her as another mother.
• Self-Proclaimed Liar: Inside her thoughts, she views her ability to lie excellently, be able to be a Living Lie Detector, and usage of Crocodile Tears as a type of skill that makes her an excellent liar.
• Sentimental Shabbiness: Ever since Mein got her cloak for the banquet celebration of the second wave, she has been subconsciously getting attached to the clothing. For the cloak being with her on so many of her adventures, the clothing feels like her own skin. Meeting the same seamstress of the Goddess and Heroes tailor shop, Mein opts for restoring her cloak to its original quality in chapter 82.
• Shadow Archetype:
  • Towards the Bitch Lord. The Bitch Lord is a Smug Snake, self-centered bandit leader that is under the delusion that she is saving demi-human slaves from the evil nobles. In reality, the Bitch Lord only cares about herself and sees her followers as nothing more than tools to fuel her life of luxury. Similarly, their strong desire for power, willingness to manipulate their own allies causes Mein to hate her, due to the Bitch Lord embodying every negative aspect of her self. To further twist their unusual similarities, the Bitch Lord's behavior is a mirrored version of Canon!Malty's portrayal.
  • Inverted. To Iris Amelia, lots of Malty's envy towards her is that Iris seems to embody every aspect that surpasses her. Iris lacks the impulsivity of Malty, is patient with her interactions, is highly intellectual, and is more charismatic. As nice as Iris may act to Malty, the latter is always suspicious on what's on the back of Iris' mind and that her own friend could betray her at anytime in the Game of Thrones.
• Shame If Something Happened: With the merchant in chapter 7 using his family as a excuse to escape Mein's threat, Mein uses the merchant's family against him by claiming it would be horrible if they were to find out he looked as a rapist attempting to molest the Shield Hero's companion.
• Sheep in Sheep's Clothing: Downplayed. Beneath the kind mask she formed under her Mein of Samphor façade, she has shades of selfishness and a cynical aspect in perceiving things, but when voices grow in Raphtalia's mind that Mein might have never cared for her, upon learning the latter's identity as a princess in chapter 112, Raphtalia puts the voices into silence from reminding herself of Mein having eventually grown attached to love her as a child.
• Sheltered Aristocrat: For most of her life, she has spent her days as a princess living safely away from the dangers of what's beyond her home. Once she chooses to take Naofumi as her hero, Malty assumes their adventure together can be easily handled. However, when faced with the first wave, Malty is shaken by fear from having been mauled by a Hell Hound monster and takes a more cautious approach in more potentially dangerous situations.
  • At first, she viewed the commoners to be ungrateful villagers that are lazy with the way they live, but after experiencing the kindness of the people from Lute Village, Malty starts viewing the common villagers as reliable good people and has a better liking towards them.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: As Abby berates all her companions for supposedly being horrible heroes and for "exploiting" slavery as a way to get stronger, Malty loses her cool to kick Abby's smug attitude. Malty then gives Abby a "Reason You Suck" Speech on the latter herself being no better than the nobles she fights against.
• Shout-Out:
  • If she were to mention her role as a political player to claim Melromarc's throne, she is likely going to call politics as the Game of Thrones for maneuvering around other political players.
  • In chapter 77, once the mana of the Orb of Power is absorbed inside her body and her own powers exponentially increased, Mein declares herself as having unlimited power. The declaration of Mein's unlimited power is similar to Palpatine from Star Wars declaring his unlimited power against Mace Windu.
• Significant Green-Eyed Redhead: On top of her possessing red hair and green eyes, her significance in the story lies on her being the Princess Protagonist, and though another redhead exists being the real Myne of Samphor, Malty coincidentally took her identity to become an adventurer for Naofumi.
• Silence of Sadness: Shortly after the death of Aldrecht in chapter 77, Malty talks a lot less and remains a more silent party member, until Raphtalia and Naofumi call out on her silence in chapter 79 as an indication Malty cared for Aldrecht, despite being on a Power High that led to his Accidental Murder.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: She has courted many men in the past in courtesy of her father, Aultcray, but almost all of them only followed her because of her father's request and for political reasons. For the people that stood out to her the most, it's Jaune Arc and Naofumi who genuinely cared about starting a relationship and building it with her.
• Slave Brand: Malty reaches a low point in chapter 118 where she is left groveling on the ground with Naofumi and a hot iron rod is placed on her chest to label her as a humiliated trophy for Consevatie to lord over.
• Slave Liberation:
  • Exploited. She persuades Naofumi to buy three slaves from Beloukas in order to save and use them to expand their party in better fighting off the Waves of Catastrophe. To herself, Mein wishes to see the slaves as bodyguards for her protection, and as Human Shields at the worst case scenario if her life were in danger.
  • Even if she is Not in This for Your Revolution at Graile fighting against the Three Heroes Church, Malty makes an order in the princess demeanor she presents to the public by requesting them to apply holy water on the enslaved people, so as to regroup for future conflicts.
• Smug Smiler: At a general sense, Malty will feel like releasing a smile of arrogance if she can get her plans or succeed in manipulating unsuspecting into becoming her pawns for a goal.
  • In chapter 99, she succeeds in fooling the guards of Gallia into letting her through the place by tricking them into thinking she is a devoted pilgrim. Having succeeded in her deception, Mein secretly wants to smile to express her superiority, but doesn't to avoid exposing herself.
  • At Streibough making a fool of himself in chapter 105 and getting weapons pointed at him for attempting to expose her and Naofumi's identity, Malty wants to pull out a smug smile to celebrate the downfall he caused himself.
  • For how much was digging himself deeper in his embarrassment by accidentally calling her out to be a student of Sheffield in chapter 107, Mein wants to show a gratified smirk at the humiliation he is facing for having almost exposed her princess identity.
  • By successfully getting Biggo to catch Streibough from running away at the rebellion against the Three Heroes Church, Malty wears a smirk for the humiliation Strebough is receiving for attempting to leave everyone.
  • In a more playful manner with Naofumi, she gives him a smirk as reaffirmation that they should be grateful for having each others backs to chapter 113 and onwards.
• Smug Snake: When it comes to playing the game of thrones to become queen, Malty overestimates her abilities as a cunning player and believes herself to know all the tricks that other political players might throw at her. However, due to her arrogance and desire for more power as queen, she can fall onto tempting offers that are sugarcoated to hide the flaws that might potentially lead to her downfall.
• The Social Expert: Downplayed. From the amount of time she spend observing and taking notes of how people act in court, malty has the perceptive knowledge to use their behavior as an inference on how they truly act on the inside. However, minor tics and understanding the full personality of a person are out of her grasp, as either her own ignorance and arrogance can block her from analyzing more information out of a person's behaviors.
• The Sociopath: Subverted. At first glance, she appears as though to be The Sociopath for her constant lying to Naofumi and viewing her father's senile behavior as a chance to exploit to be a step closer to becoming queen. Although manipulative and caring mostly about her goals as what she believes is her main priority, she shows too much empathy, a care for others, a lack of impulsive actions, and too much remorse to truly qualify as a sociopath as shown in later chapters for Ambition of the Red Princess.
• Sore Loser:
  • Watching Eclair fight Weiss, Mein notes that the way Weiss cheats in the sword fight by using magic, Mein admits to doing the same for the sake of wanting to have a chance at winning.
  • Deconstructed. Against Aldrecht in chapter 77, Malty has a clear advantage fighting him, because being empowered by the Seatto heirloom. When Malty finds out she still can't beat him with her fire attacks and that the air inside the underground of Boletaria Castle is running out, Malty chooses to blast the ceiling to let air in, rather than concede defeat. In a sudden twist of events, instead of letting air in, Malty's clouded judgement in the fight causes an Earthquake that endangers the lives of everyone and accidentally gets Aldrecht killed in stalling for time to allow everyone to escape the danger.
• Speak in Unison: She and Naofumi asks each other a question as to what they are thinking but realizing that they said at the same time, Mein allows Naofumi to state his question first and herself's after.
• Spiteful Spit: She spits onto an image of Iris in chapter 48 to expose her fake kindness in comparison to Naofumi's genuine loving nature.
• Spit Take: Played for Laughs. Right as she finishes shallowing her Healing Herb medicine in chapter 114, learning from Commander Rhapsodos and Lieutenant Hewley that Mother Sylvia is the wife of the late Duke Claud Edda, acknowledges she would have spitted out or choked on her medicine had she received the fact earlier.
• Spoiled Brat: As princess, she has a strong taste for spending the time of her life on luxuries and playing tea parties with her three friends. Even when playing with Katarina, Bertia, and Iris, Malty secretly suspects them as opponents that could get in her way to have the throne. Despite having her teacher, Aldrecht, and knight trainer, Zellus, Malty doesn't enjoy the useful knowledge she might gain and is more interested at living out her pampered life. If disrupted, she can yell out like a banshee at her servants, regardless of whatever proper manners she displays to hide her selfishness.
• Spotting the Thread: Watching Baldy and Blue Eyes approach her dungeon cell with Consevatie in chapter 119, she first assumes them all to be out for her blood or to extract information out her. However, judging from Consevatie's behavior, Malty is able to tell something is wrong with how he presents himself, until quickly leading to the reveal it was Yomi being an Identity Impersonator, and Baldy and Blue Eyes going on a rescue mission for her sake.
  • In chapter 87, she manages to catch on a weird thing on Sir Crepe for the latter being aware of the gossips high society spews out, despite being a knight who isn't suppose to be aware of such matters.
  • Looking at Consevatie the Younger up close in chapter 119, Malty notices that the way he displays himself is not filled with the usual arrogance shown, which eventually clues her in from the immediate reveal that Yomi had been impersonating Consevatie the Younger to infiltrate inside the Melromarc castle.
• Spy Speak: To discuss her plans for the future of her and Naofumi's destination to Uranus in chapter 113, Mein speaks to Uranus of her intended destination in a different context. As a security measure by having her words be let out in a different context where she is completing her pilgrimage as Sophia of Totela, Mein and Uranus are the only ones who understand with each other on where they are to go.
• Stock Light-Novel Calamity Princess: Played Straight. She exhibits many of the associated traits with these tropes that make up her personality, past, and goals for life.
  • Although wearing a optimistic façade as an adventurer known as Mein of Samphor, she wishes to prove to her mother of being the worthy heir to becoming the queen of Melromarc and a competent partner her Naofumi can trust, despite being a pampered princess in disguise.
  • Her main magical powers is by Playing with Fire and it is the most volatile magical element a person can have. Out of control, her fiery spells can harm someone like her nanny dying in the past and the event still impacting her to the present. With experience by acting as Naofumi's companion and putting in the effort to become stronger, Mein can use more versatile fire attacks and be no longer stagnant as a low-level princess.
  • She is the main Love Interest for Naofumi and is his first companion for having saved him from his False Rape Accusation trial. Although Malty's real motives was Naofumi's usefulness in helping her become queen, saving him meant that he developed an Undying Loyalty to protect her at all cost. While Mein's initial motives for Naofumi was to view him as a reliable political tool, she slowly changes to become accustomed to the life as an adventurer, and starts to question how Naofumi will view her if he ever finds out she only helped him for his heroic prestige and pampered life as princess.
• Stress Vomit:
  • As part of her Heroic RRoD in using [Rising Heat] and [Hydro Sphere] to deal with both Satellizer and Kazuya, Mein barfs up a mixture of her stomach fluids and blood in chapter 110.
  • Her stomach feels churned from witnessing the bloody mess of Nora's Lodged Blade Removal in chapter 127.
• Stunned Silence: The reveal of her status as the current user of King Aultcray's Vassal Wand shocks the Gallian knights and demi-humans in chapter 106, as Mein gets them to raise several questions on how she got the wand.
• Successful Sibling Syndrome: To Melty, Malty believes the former to be better in almost every imaginable skill possible, which causes a strong rivalry between them. Melty is given praises from many nobles over her kindness and grace into eventually becoming queen, while Malty rarely ever receives them and it comes off as Damned by Faint Praise. Additionally, Melty has the rights and was born to become queen, while Malty is left in the shadows to marry King Egbert as her final fate.
• Suddenly Shouting:
  • For all the pent up aggression that's been building up inside her in chapter 105 to Naofumi risking his real identity exposed by playing himself as the Shield Hero, Malty lashes out at him to not endanger himself by being a hero when he needs to be protected.
  • Trying to understand the function of video games by comparing it to golems being made functional with illusion magic, Malty loses her initial calm behavior and burst into anger in chapter 128, as the reason Consevatie has been condescending to everyone was because he believes all inhabitants in Medea are all fictional characters meant to bow before him.
  Malty: OH! That absolute little shit! Just because our world is very similar to, apparently, one of these 'games'. Make-believes from your world. He started to think all of us are these glorified illusion golems from said make beliefs, who can't think for ourselves?! I don't know how old he was before he reincarnated. But he probably didn't live long in his previous life if he's this stupid!
  • Getting her Berserk Button pushed too many times of Naofumi being so desperate to be by her side at all times in chapter 130, Mein lashes out screaming to stop him from being so stubborn for her own safety, when what they need is to be independent of each other to save Balafon.
• Super-Hearing: [Aural Amplification] of the Vassal Wand heightens nearby noises in her environment to be alerted of any strangers wanting to jump on her.
• Suppressed Rage: Played for Laughs. In an offering to allow Anne to become a maid for Katarina at a chapter 89 omake, the latter shows her gratitude by rushing in to hug her. As Katarina hugs and rubs her face at her cheeks, Malty secretly detested the act, and only showed it through a brief annoyance.
• Survivor Guilt:
  • Remembering how Mein died to save her life from a pack of bone dogs, Malty blames herself in her thoughts that had she done something differently, Mein would still be alive as her filorial friend.
  • Aultcray's sacrifices and efforts to keep her safe from both getting nearly eaten alive by a leviathan and killed by Goddess Raphtalia counts as this. Knowing her father would do anything to keep his family safe, Malty feels guilty that he would have not injured himself as much if she didn't keep lying to him about Naofumi and focused her ambitions to become queen.
  • Surviving and escaping the pursuers of the Three Heroes Church down under the sewers in chapter 120, Malty is left feeling guilty at Uranus having to leave his life in danger for her own safety. Believing her own ambitions and planning to take back Melromarc is the reason people that follow her are killed, Uranus' caused of death ends up serving as a reminder of how Aldrecht died for her and everyone's safety back at Boletaria Castle.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial: She loves Filolial birds for their fluffy feathers and cuteness, but she denies her love towards them.

T-Z

• Tactical Withdrawal: Thinking up of potential military strategies she slept from, she makes up a plan for the rebel army in Graile to restore and free everyone of their slave crest, so they can better plan forward against the the Three Heroes Church after chapter 109.
• Take That!:
  • Upon gaining unlimited power in chapter 79, her inner monologue denouncing herself as a one-note villainess whose only role is to be a wicked schemer behind her chosen hero is a way that somewhat attacks her canon self for having no real character traits, beyond being a Hate Sink that always loses with no real achievements to be proud of.
  • In chapter 105, Malty comments on King Egbert having rumors to have raped 9,999 noblewomen to death. While Malty agrees with the fact that King Egbert is a horrible man, there is no way he would have raped that many nobles, since that number would have depopulated all of the noblewomen living in Medea.. In a way, this in Qinlongfei debunking that logical problems The Rising of the Shield Hero's portrayal for the King of Faubley being an out-of-place character designed to exist only to give Malty a Karmic Rape.
  • Mein in chapter 113 commends Naofumi for choosing to stick up with everyone to be their hero, proceeding afterwards the False Rape Accusation from the early chapters. Just by choosing to stay with him in the trial back then, Mein lifts his spirit stop him from lowering himself from despair. In a way, Mein referring the other path Ambition!Naofumi could have chosen is reminiscent of him possibly becoming his canon self where he could have just being a Nominal Hero only doing heroism for the money.
• Take Up My Sword: Chapter 94 has Aultcray renounce his ownership of his wand to give it to Malty, as he slowly starts to pass out from blood loss. Once Malty receives the wand, her class changes from sorcerer to Vassal Hero of the Wand.
• The Talk: Played for Laughs and Lampshaded. As a response to Raphtalia doing a Mouth To Mouth Force Feeding for her to receive an antidote for her poison in chapter 58, Mein thinks of giving Raphtalia a talk about intimate relationships and kisses, if Raphtalia were to have used her tongue as part of the procedure.
• Talk to the Fist: From listening to the Bitch Lord laugh at her perceived moral superiority and smug belittling towards the Shield Hero's party, Mein kicks the Bitch Lord's face to shut her mouth.
• Tantrum Throwing: To clear off the headaches being caused by the Star Wand's failure to properly translate Bed-Chan's language, Mein bashes her Star Wand onto the ground to calm down her rage, before she can properly present herself to Naofumi in chapter 126.
• Targeted to Hurt the Hero: Though Satellizer cares for Kazuya and wants him safe at all costs, Mein focuses her attention on killing him out of revenge that his whiny claims are annoying in how Satellizer is always praised as a hero. By attempting to kill Kazuya, Satellizer's attention is focused on saving him in chapter 110, and later doing whatever she can to get revenge on Mein. By the aftermath of Satellizer's defeat and Kazuya's death, the trope is deconstructed in Mein seeing herself as a monster for having attempted to kill, Kazuya, a child, simply for being a blabber mouth in her face.
• Tarnishing Their Own Beauty: Downplayed. Her face was already ruined by a cursed flesh she had gotten in chapter 17 and a missing ear, but she burns the scarred part of her face with fire magic in chapter 95 to avoid getting detected by the public as a fugitive.
• Taught by Experience: From looking at Yukari's eyes widening in shock from behind her back in chapter 125, Mein quickly deduces a chance that a monster is behind herself, since the experience for Mein's quick preparation is a reminder of what had happened with the wargs chasing her and Naofumi down back in chapter 101.
• Team Member in the Adaptation: At The Rising of the Shield Hero, Malty had a Chronic Backstabbing Disorder that made her a dangerously unstable person to any hero that allowed her to join their party. Within the Shield Hero, Spear Hero, Sword Hero, and Bow Hero's party, Malty betrayed all of them and framed them as wanted criminals For the Evulz. In Ambition of the Red Princess, she chooses to permanently stay with Naofumi as his first companion and sticks beside him, unlike what her canon counterpart did to him.
• Tears of Fear: Played for Laughs. For most of her life as a princess, she has mostly used her Crocodile Tears to have others give her what she wants. In an attempt to seduce Naofumi in chapter 6, Mein uses her fake tears to show his more vulnerable side. Suddenly, she is attacked by Naofumi's balloon monster in the seduction attempt, causing Mein to scream and cry out. After the balloon is removed, Mein quiets down to silent sobs over its terror.
• Tears of Remorse: As she persistently kicks the Bitch Lord for how vile she is, Malty breaks down in remorse from herself being almost like the Bitch Lord in terms of their desire to get more power and their willingness to view their own allies as pawns.
• The Tease: She flirts with Naofumi in chapter 15 by claiming herself to be a girl amongst the other party members who are male. Mein gets Naofumi to tense up and feel a sense of awkwardness, before admitting to be teasing him.
• That Came Out Wrong:
  • In chapter 80, Mein comments that she and Naofumi only had Firo for a short amount of time, but the way she phrased her sentence to Naofumi, Mein accidentally sounded as though she made a suggestive sentence.
  Malty/Mein: Okay, I admit we hadn't had Firo for that long.
  (The princess has to take another pause thinking over her own words, it came out more suggestive than she meant.)
  • Played for Drama. Claiming that Naofumi's survival as a Legendary Hero keeps the Waves of Catastrophe's difficulty from escalating, she meant her words in chapter 115 to give him confidence and to not be worked up for her own personal safety. Instead, her words end up temporarily turning Naofumi into a Death Seeker, as he believes that Medea can still continue on without his existence.
  • Expressing her rage to her group about wanting Consevatie to die horribly in the hands of Siltvelt in chapter 130, she accidentally misleads her group into thinking she was going to take her plans in a literal form. In actuality, Mein only wants to keep Consevatie alive under the fear of a Dead Man's Switch threatening Raphtalia and Firo's life, before then taking the chance to have Consevatie killed.
• Theme Twin Naming: Her name as Malty is the first vowel, "a", making her the first daughter of the royal family, while Melty's name is the second vowel, "e", as the second daughter and the younger sister Malty deals with.
• These Hands Have Killed:
  • Once the dust in chapters 110 of Graile's rebellion and Satellizer's defeat, Mein's subsided anger brings her to reflect at herself for being so horrible of a person that she tried to kill Kazuya twice, all from his outlandish words that Satellizer was innocent and not because he was just a harmless child who was only annoying her. Looking over at Kazuya's body from Ken slashing him to death, Mein tries putting back Kazuya's body, as if to wipe away the guilt her rage nearly caused her to kill a child.
  • Downplayed. She bares no regret participating in the deaths of the Three Heroes Church and House Consevatie's men in chapter 129, but the senseless deaths she had to cause to save Balafon's people, along it being a reason that got her to level up is what sours her from experiencing any joy of a complete victory.
• They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: Wearing the sister clothes of found in the burnt chapel in chapter 106 allows her to look like an average church member that doesn't stand out in anyway to be spotted by any of the Three Heroes Church.
• Think Happy Thoughts: Having her moment to have an intimate share of hands-holding with Naofumi in chapter 113, Malty's head drifts into a state of calmness free from any scheming thoughts and stress. As her mind slowly relaxes, she remembers how her own relaxed mind as a child had killed Mein, which then interrupts Malty's lightened mood. To bring back her peace, Malty recalls having walked with her little sister, Melty, in their early years and the quiet times she courted Jaune.
• Thinks Like a Romance Novel: As revealed inside of her thoughts in chapter 105, Malty's initial perception to travel with the Shield Hero was that she expected the adventure to be endearing as a way to get closer to Naofumi, but after the scar she received from the abandoned mine and the several brushes with death, Malty starts to see the grittier side of the adventure.
• This Is for Emphasis, Bitch!: She calls the Bitch Lord a genuine bitch by kicking her face to shut up her arrogant behavior for attempting to break the morals of her friends. To finish berating Abby, Mein's last words to her is by loudly calling her a bitch.
• Tired of Running: While she may have helped House Okami in starting off Graile's rebellion by being the Voice of the Resistance, she is Not in This for Your Revolution, as her main goal is to flee the place with Naofumi to eventually reunite with Eclair and Yatsuhashi in Zeltoble. Yet because every enemy trying to hunker down the rebellion keeps interrupting all her plans to escape, Mein chooses to stay in Graile to make sure all the potential threats holding her down are finished.
• Title Drop: In chapter 66: ULTIMATE POWER, Malty says the title word for word after absorbing the mana stored inside the Seatto heirloom and feeling its mana surge inside her body.
• Token Evil Teammate: Compared to all of Naofumi's party members, she is secretly the most selfish out of them, since her main motive to stay in the group is to use the Shield Hero's credibility to grant herself a chance to be queen. Malty as the Token Evil Teammate is eventually downplayed in later chapters, as while still selfish, she learns to at least be more connected with them.
• Too Clever by Half: Pushing her inner knowledge on how she believes the game of thrones operates in her perspective, Malty's own arrogance believing she knows how to plan ahead is what causes her to miss clues on her allies' behavioral patterns and hidden wordplay unsuspecting strangers prey on her ambitions. As a result of her own flaws in thinking, Malty needs the Naofumi, or someone trustworthy to give her more options and an expanded perception for her own plans.
• Too Desperate to Be Picky: She eats off the peasant food of Lute Village in chapter 32 and if she were to compare to what her past self would have reacted, she would have never in her life try out the food of commoners. However, after leaving the princess life to join Naofumi as his companion, Mein has to take and enjoy the pleasure of eating common folks food instead of the meals nobles usually eat.
• Too Important to Remember You:
  • Being the first princess of Melromarc, Malty is shown to have struggled recalling Anne's name in a chapter 89 omake at an agreement to let Katarina have Anne as her servant.
  • Even to her personal knights Baldy and Blue Eyes, and personal maid Mala, Malty rarely ever address them by their real names, instead opting to bark at them to fulfill their demands, or rely on the physical features most noticeable for her to call.
  • Lampshaded. She thinks to herself in chapter 115 of for her having such a high-ranking status as a princess, she has little to no knowledge of houses and organizations that she doesn't bother to learn about, because they initially had minor relevance to her life.
• Took a Level in Badass: By the start of the story, she was a measly level 3 princess from rarely being put to work against fighting monsters to gain more levels. After joining Naofumi, Malty stops remaining in her stagnant level 3 and has grown strong enough to cast more efficient fire spells. Furthermore, she learns to perform water related spells, something she once lacked an affinity to do.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Initially at the early chapters and for most of her life as a princess, whatever "kindness" she displays is likely to be an act to keep up the reputation as a diligent princess or the simple commoner known as Mein of Samphor. Slowly, even though she hides her identity as a princess to Naofumi and most of her party members, she does get to bond with them and doesn't want to break their trust.
  • During her initial interactions with Raphtalia, Malty viewed her as a filthy, demi-human slave that serves no usage in battle and that time spent on her is a waste for heroes like Naofumi. Eventually, in the times Raphtalia has saved her and relied on her for support, Malty started to see her as less of a demi-human and rather a raccoon child needing support from her new parents.
  • Compared to the past, Malty believed that all the decisions she made would have resulted in the best outcome for herself, but during her time as an adventurer, she has come to terms to let go a bit of her pride in chapter 79 to accept that she is flawed in making mistakes.
  • The first time Malty had to interact with Raphtalia, she always viewed her as a filthy demi-human slave that is only getting in her way of Naofumi's relationship. By chapter 91, Malty sees Raphtalia as a child that needs her and requires protection to be kept safe. While at first, Malty was willing to ditch Raphtalia with a hound in chapter 19, chapter 91 has Malty be genuinely desperate to reunite with Naofumi and Raphtalia to assist them in the third wave.
  • Finding out Raphtalia had a helping hand to lure herself and Naofumi into Consevatie's trap in chapter 118, Malty believes she would have hated Raphtalia in the past for such a traitorous deed done against her. However, after spending much time and learning how kind of a girl Raphtalia is, Malty can only feel sympathy for the abuse Consevatie had done on her.
  • To her personal maid Mala, and knights Blue Eyes and Baldy, she never bothered to properly express her gratefulness for all they had done to bring comfort to her princess life in the past. In the current events of chapter 119, Malty learns how to express her thankfulness at Baldy and Blue Eyes for rescuing her, and experience an Anger Born of Worry to make sure Mala is safe in Melromarc's rebellion. Although at the perception of Baldy and Blue Eyes not understanding her changed behavior, Malty is left feeling ashamed for her past actions where she never got to value them as close people.
• Tough Leader Façade: Invoked. As part of her training to become an effective member of the royal family, she was taught to treat the tragedies in her country as something to be dismissed, and instead be used as a leverage to make rational decisions.
• Trauma Button:
  • The sense of empathy she felt from understanding Raphtalia's survivor's guilt as an abused slave reminds Malty of what had happened to Mein in her childhood and it causes her to stop empathizing to not think about the horrible moment.
  • Watching Raphtalia be put into a situation where she needs to be Gaining the Will to Kill via murdering a rabbit pill by courtesy of Lautrec's training in chapter 14, Malty is reminded of how her own training from Mirellia had caused her to accidentally murder her innocent nanny.
  • Just as her mind calms down into a moment of peace at chapter 113 where she interlocks her fingers with Naofumi, her peaceful state is interrupted by how her current mindset is reminiscent of what got Mein killed when she was a young child. To subside her painful memory, Malty resorts to Think Happy Thoughts to subside that moment in her life.
  • Learning that Mala is right outside of the Melromarc capital fighting the Three Heroes Church's army, Malty's head is flown with panic reminder her of Mein and her original nanny's death. To prevent another situation of a loved one dying, Malty angrily demands Baldy and Blue Eyes to get Mala off the battlefield.
  • Escaping the sewers, all while having to witness Uranus sacrifice his life to provide her and all of her companions the necessary time to escape their pursuers in chapter 120, Malty is reminded of Aldrecht's death back in chapter 77, leading to her to feel like she is to blame for their deaths.
• Troubled Fetal Position: To deal with Mein's death in the past, Malty curled her arms around her legs to hug herself in bed. Later in Mein's illusionary form in chapter 48, Malty, again, pulls her legs to her chest from having been reminded of her traumatic memory.
• Unable to Cry: Seeing Melty in chapter 95 look for her and mourn the injuries their father sustained from Web!Raphtalia, Malty wishes to have a chance to mourn for her father, but isn't able to do so without exposing her identity as a princess.
• Undying Loyalty: Slowly to Naofumi, Malty makes a clear and sincere declaration in chapter 95 that after everything Naofumi did to protect her and everyone else, she won't give up on him in his weakest point, and will support him by the end of their adventure.
• Unexpected Virgin: Although a Femme Fatale who is great at swaying men by her side through her charms, chapter 58 reveals that she never actually kissed anyone in her life. The first kiss Malty got was with Raphtalia, and it happened while she was unconscious.
• Ungrateful Bitch:
  • Lampshaded. Secretly in her thoughts, she thinks of Raphatalia's reaction to not drink Naofumi's life-saving medicine to be ungrateful for his efforts to save her, as even Malty herself would never waste medicine that is given out of generosity.
  • In chapter 103, Malty ends up being an Ungrateful Bitch herself, as once she reveals her Uriah Gambit to Naofumi at how she plans on ditching the Gallian knights in their fight with the Cultists, Naofumi scolds her for abandoning the people that are helping them, even if they help is unwanted.
  • Thinking back towards her original interactions with Baldy, Blue Eyes, and Mala in her time as a royal princess in the past, Malty feels ashamed for being ignorant of their existence, all while she expected them to continue serving her Spoiled Brat attitude.
• Unknown Rival: Not being the crowned princess, Malt's main goal for her ambition is to ensure she is better than Melty in everyway and by becoming queen. As Mein, she enjoys being able to lord over the fact that she got to increase her strength and levels through a genuine effort, instead of killing weakened monsters like what Melty did. Despite all of Malty's efforts to get ahead of Melty, the latter is oblivious to the idea of the game of thrones and only wants to view Malty as a big sister.
• Unscrupulous Hero: She is better than when she was a Nominal Hero that geared all of her heroism towards the sole purpose to uplift herself in political games, though her heroism is mostly limited to caring for the safety of the party members that trust her as a companion. To saving the world from the Waves of Catastrophe, she would much rather stay behind the castle walls safe, than to fight on never being able to achieve her dream as the next queen of Melromarc.
• Unstable Powered Child: When she was a ten years old child, she developed an affinity for fire magic, but lacked any training to properly utilize it. Once Malty was given training by her mother, Mirellia, the latter trained her right after Mein's death. By training Malty as soon as Mein's death, Malty lost control of her fire magic to kill a monster rabbit, and instead got her nanny killed.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Back in chapter 31, Mein flicked Firo's head, because the latter was trying to kick her finger. The one small action of flicking Firo's baby head ended up causing Firo to develop the personality of a Spoiled Brat and an unhinged party member that needs to be kept at a constant watch.
• Uptown Girl: Zig Zagged. Malty is the princess of Melromarc and she disguises herself as a commoner adventurer known as Mein of Samphor to have Naofumi trust her. Naofumi on the other hand is the Shield Hero and while he technically up-ranks Malty in terms of the social hierarchy in Medea, he is actually The Everyman Otaku of Japan who just so happened to stumble upon an Isekai book.
• Uriah Gambit:
  • Played for Laughs. In chapter 90, she thinks to herself on pairing up Firo and Keel together in the fight against the third wave monsters. That way, Mein can get payback for Keel being condescending toward her and Naofumi, since Keel insulting Naofumi would most likely result in Firo wanting to kill Keel. If Firo were to kill Keel, Mein would have the leverage in convincing Naofumi that Firo requires strict punishments to behave.
  • To escape the Gallian knights in chapter 102 and stop them from ever potentially learning both her and Naofumi's identities as fugitives of the Three Heroes Church, Malty schemes in her mind that the best way to get the knights are to leave them in a fight against the cultists. That way, the death of the knights can prove herself and Naofumi and escape, or if the knights overpower the cultists, then she and Naofumi can just fake their own deaths.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Back as a young child, she used to be much kinder and playful, due to her lack of interest in playing the game for the throne and she spends most of her time playing with Mein. However, while playing with Mein, Malty was ambushed by a pack of stray dogs and Mein was forced to make a Heroic Sacrifice to save Malty's life. Ever since Mein's death, Malty had lost interest in maintaining her relationships with anyone and dedicated herself into playing the game for the throne. To play, she had to view her close friends and allies as tools for her own gain.
• Utility Magic: In chapter 64, she uses her newly learned water magic to wash away the bloodstains from her party's armor after their battle against Mouse and the remaining bandits.
• Villainesses Want Heroes: She wants Naofumi to keep her as a companion and to stay with him at all times to have both his protection and his prestige as a legendary hero to have a chance at becoming the queen of Melromarc.
• Villain Respect:
  • To each time Naofumi makes a reasonable deduction with his intelligence, Malty praises him for being an excellent partner who can help her, while also being great at taking care of himself through caution.
  • She is impressed by her Aultcray's excellent charisma to lie at Kael'thas about Naofumi's trials in chapter 82, which help her realize that she needs more experience to be a better player in the game of thrones.
  • Even if she hates Firo for being such a Spoiled Brat inside of their party at the Shield Hero, Mein somewhat finds it admirable at Firo's willingness to show her selfishness to everyone.
  • To Chevalier in chapter 102, Mein is usually disappointed by his No Sense of Direction, but on the occasion he shows his historical knowledge of Defiant Bay, Mein appreciates the knowledge he possesses and is grateful for having learned it, even though she does plan to leave him and all the Gallian knights for herself and Naofumi's escape.
• Villain Protagonist: Downplayed. Unlike her canon self where she is portrayed as the Big Bad Wannabe antagonist, Malty is instead a Villain Protagonist. Her role as a protagonist explores her inner thoughts and goals. While she does manipulate her allies and thinks of them as her pawns, she does not betray them and helps them to become great heroes.
• Villains Never Lie: She provides advice for herself in chapter 6 that the best way to tell a lie or to manipulate someone is to tell them a complete truth that can either lead them to be Right for the Wrong Reasons or be Entertainingly Wrong.
• Virtue Is Weakness: The virtues she has disdain for the most is compassion, justice, and loyalty. She treats these traits to people who follow them as gullible pawns that can be easily exploited by a manipulative person. To loyalty in particular, Malty struggles to fully put her faith into someone and in the back of her mind, always believes of the possibility of getting backstabbed.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: She has always stated to herself that she won't ever sympathize or feel bad if Firo were to ever be in trouble, but watching the latter be unable to resist the slave seal placed upon her by the Three Heroes Church in chapter 118, Mein feels a moment of sorrow for Firo, even if they never had a good time interacting with each other.
• Voice Changeling: Creating a Forged Message out of the Vassal Wand in chapter 106, Malty can use her thoughts to create an imitation of her father's voice, in which she plans on giving herself the reputation of her princess status, despite preferring to keep up her incognito identity as Mein of Samphor.
• Voice of the Resistance: She and the demi-humans within Nagumo's dojo spend their time planning their resistance, and the plan hinges on herself playing as her princess identity, and Naofumi playing as the Shield Hero. Once the plan is enacted in chapter 108, Malty plays the role of her princess self, while under the guise of Mein to voice her opinions for Graile's public to turn against the Three Heroes Church in a rebellion.
• Wants a Prize for Basic Decency: In chapter 8, when called out for her racist statement against the two Siltvelt agents, she is left confused over Naofumi's anger and believes herself to be the innocent victim worthy of being rewarded for saving him in back in the trial.
• Was Too Hard on Him: For all the times she has been The Gadfly near Streibough to irritate him at all the times he acted smug to expose her and Naofumi's real identities, she is left shocked of his Heroes' Frontier Step in chapter 110. Witnessing Streibough pull off a Heroic Sacrifice in the form of Taking You with Me, Malty wonders to herself if she was too harsh on his interactions with her and underestimated his willingness to be a hero in the hardest of times for her pride.
• Wax On, Wax Off: Invoked. During her childhood years with Katarina, Malty suggested for her to take on the job of a farmer so she could learn at perfecting her earth magic. Unbeknownst to Katarina, Malty's suggestion was meant to stop her from ever learning how to properly use her earth magic. That way, Katarina would never become a potential competitor for Malty to deal with later in life.
• We Can Rule Together: Her end goal if she were to succeed at becoming queen of Melromarc wouldn't just be for herself, but for Naofumi also. For Naofumi's support and love for her, Malty sees him as more of a genuine partner than just a political tool to be used and would want him to at least be rewarded by the end of their adventure.
• "Well Done, Daughter!" Girl: In chapter 72, she sympathizes with Raphtalia's Sibling Rivalry with Firo in being the best child in Naofumi's party, since in the past for Malty, she once craved for Mirellia's approval before moving on to prove that she is a better heir at being the queen instead of Melty.
• What Are Records?: Inverted and Played for Laughs. Whenever Naofumi or the rest of the Legendary Heroes mention devices or events originating from their world, Malty would be unable to comprehend what they are talking about, since what Legendary Heroes talk about are concepts that have never existed in her world.
  • Mein, who belongs to the technologically less advanced Medea tries to learn the concept of, "static", by Naofumi in chapter 126. But because advanced technology for static to be applied does not exist, Mein can only understand the term as lightning bolts clouding up vision.
  • Not understanding the word NPC and Isekai, Naofumi explains the terms of the words in chapter 128, so they both get a grasp on how Consevatie thinks, and learn the latter to be an overconfident reincarnate who believes himself to be the main protagonist of Medea.
  • Naofumi saying the word, "plot armor", Mein is left confused as to what the word means, due to not understanding plot devices that happens in stories. When Naofumi gives short description to what plot armor means, Mein ends up being Entertainingly Wrong in thinking plot armor is a literal piece of armor Consevatie is wearing.
  Malty/Mein's Thoughts: (That's very strong armor indeed, if Consevatie the Younger truly believes he is beyond hurt. Even mythically strong material, like mythril or titanite can't truly protect a wearer from all incoming damage.)
• What Is This Feeling?: In chapter 23, Mein takes the chance to discuss with Raphtalia on the event of they had to go through against the Hell Hound. Mein's intentions are to calm down whatever disappointment Raphtalia might have towards her abandonment, but Raphtalia ends up lacking any hidden disdain towards her, much to Mein's confusion. Despite Raphtalia knowing that Mein had left her, Malty gets a regretful impulse that pushes her to continue discussing about the Hell Hound, even though Mein views it to be idiotic in the goal for the throne.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • For Naofumi's plan to pretend in being the Shield Hero in chapter 105, despite his shield and risking his real identity getting exposed, Malty calls him out for endangering himself for people that she believes are not worth saving.
  • To argue that Jackson in chapter 117 is just as bad as the rest of the Three Heroes Church and he is not the hero he thinks himself as, she claims that he should have done something to stop Father Caleb from enslaving the women of Lute Village, instead getting caught up in a Bystander Syndrome.
  • Played for Laughs. To herself, Mein's venting about the morbid ways about how she wants Consevatie to die in chapter 130, she accidentally scares off her group by her vindictive hatred being contradictory to her well manners.
• What Were You Thinking?: To Naofumi potentially exposing his real identity as the Shield Hero by pretending to be his heroic self, despite needing to keep his identity low as Siesta of Totela, Mein lashes out on him in chapter 105 for being reckless with the idea he spouted out.
• Whispered Threat: As part of her tactic to both seduce and intimidate a merchant into giving money and a bonus sale, Malty whispers in his ears on the consequences that will occur if he chooses to report her to the guards.
• Who Would Be Stupid Enough?: Her reaction to watching Sister Amelia stabbing Father Gordon in chapter 104 causes Malty to blurt out how reckless and stupid of a move Sister Amelia has made. To make matters worse, Malty is further left bewildered from Sister Amelia making a declaration to enslave the populace of Graile with her knights, resulting in Malty commenting that everything is pure madness.
• Willfully Weak: Lampshaded. Malty thinks in her head that the slave fighters in chapter 109 are making themselves easy opponents for Uranus either because the slaves are afraid of their slave crests or to receive a Curb-Stomp Battle against their opponent.
• Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: Defied. She refuses taking an option where she lets Ken randomly rages on about acting as The Bait in chapter 105 to distract the Three Heroes Church, so that the faction won't capture their group in Graile. However, by doing nothing, Malty feels as though she is denying her family's responsibility for all the troubles the House Okami has had to go through.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Discussed. Explained by Mein of an instance about the God Crafting ritual had Gone Horribly Wrong in the past, she uses the example of a righteous man driven mad by the power given to him, which led to most of Faubley getting destroyed.
• Worthless Treasure Twist: The first time she learns of the Seatto heirloom that is said to grant great power or bonuses to leveling up, Mein assumes the heirloom to be a very unusual and unique artifact that must be chased after. However, in chapter 73, it's revealed by Eclair that the heirloom is actually a crystal ball, which disappoints a bit of Mein's expectations, since the reputation of crystal balls is for storing mana. Regardless, Mein still wants her party to obtain it out of the chance the crystal ball is unique to the rest.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit:
  • She pretends to be a victim that is being molested by an arrogant merchant in chapter 7, as a way to blackmail said merchant into not reporting her to the Melromarc guards, and to instead give her and her Naofumi a bonus sale.
  • A way she can play into her Princess Malty persona and convince everyone to rebel against the Three Heroes Church as herself being the real deal is that if she were to be attacked by someone, she can claim an assassination attempt was made towards the Royal Family of Melromarc.
• Would Hurt a Child: Being irritated by Kazuya's annoying claims that Graile's rebels are the bad guys and that Satellizer is innocent in his eyes, Malty quickly loses her cool in chapter 110 and makes attempts to kill the demi-human child. Her attempts to kill Kazuya first start off with [RISING HEAT] out of frustration the latter is attempting to hold back Naofumi from restraining Satellizer, and eventually holding Kazuya inside of a [Hydro Sphere]. Afterwards the child's death in the hands of Ken, Malty's subsided rage brings her into the realization that she just tried to kill a child out of annoyance, and perhaps she can never change her own selfish pettiness.
• Wrong Assumption: She believes that the trope of being Marked to Die applies to her, since receiving an answer from Naofumi in chapter 115 that a certain princess he saw from his Portal Book did not seem "nice" to him, it looks to be from her perspective that she is destined to die in an avent.
• Xanatos Gambit: Subverted. In her head, Malty believes she has the perfect escape plan for herself and Naofumi to leave the Gallian undetected with their real identities never exposed. The plan involves pulling a Uriah Gambit in leaving the knights to fight for themselves against a group of cultists, while her and Naofumi make a run. While a good plan on paper, Malty underestimates the danger she would be in, as clouded from her arrogance, and attempts to enact her plan in chapter 102 end up forcing herself to fight with the Gallian knights for herself and Naofumi's survival.
• Yandere: In her usual state, she wants to keep Naofumi for herself either as a political tool for becoming queen or for someone she cares for. However, while in her superpowered state from absorbing the mana inside of the Seatto artifact, Mein acts possessive in not wanting anyone touch Naofumi, because only the latter belongs to her.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are:
  • She assures Raphtalia that her goodness is far above the savagery of the Bitch Lord's demi-humans and that Raphatalia to an extent is even better than herself, due to Raphtalia being Mein's hero during their encounter with the Hell Hound in chapter 19.
  • In chapter 79, she believes herself to be The Load of Naofumi's party, due to possessing an uncontrollable fire magic that caused her to kill Aldrecht during her empowered state. Rather than be given up, Naofumi and Raphtalia remind her of the times she didn't give up on them to convince Mein to stay in the party. Convinced to stay, Mein feels grateful for having such accepting companions, despite only supporting her Secret Identity.
  • Observing Naofumi to be sulking beneath his silent demeanor, Mein confronts him about it in chapter 113 to warn off his worries that he is not the one to blame for all the destruction that happened in Graile. When it appears that Naofumi is still bringing himself down as someone that Mein shouldn't look up to, she reminds him again that he does not have to know everything that goes on in Medea. In the end, Mein advises him to be glad that his quick thinking and experienced has made him an effective hero in Medea, despite having only been around for almost two months.
  • Mein tries to find ways to appeal to Naofumi's lack of confidence and sense of overprotectiveness towards her in chapter 115 to calm down his thoughts believing himself to be unworthy of her partner and as a hero.
• You Did Everything You Could: To assure Naofumi in chapter 123 that he was not at fault for causing the undead Thunder Lizard to resurrect itself in a fight against the Three Heroes in chapter 98, Mein comforts him by providing him with the insight that their selves and party members all agreed to not dispose of the Thunder Lizard's corpse, because they were all too tired from fighting the Raven Lords.

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