Hero Esmeralda (4)

And so, following Jim's scheme to the letter, Hero Esmeralda found herself setting out on a journey with Jim, just the two of them. This was Jim, after all — a man already dogged by unsavory rumors inside the party and out.

No one in their right mind would look kindly on a trip to his supposed hometown.

Honestly, if the Hero had any backing organization or powerful family behind her, she would have refused the matter with a single stroke of her sword.

But the image she had built up as the Hero over all this time made that impossible.

She was someone who acted out of good faith.

And because of that, she couldn't bring herself to turn down a comrade's tearful plea.

Of course, this would send Jim's reputation — already scraping the bottom — plummeting in a straight vertical line. But if Jim's escape went according to plan, that, too, would end up meaning nothing in the end.

Ugh, this is so annoying.

Esmeralda kept a pleasant smile on her face while quietly studying Jim, who was trailing behind her with a small pack slung over his back. For a man who had spent years working as a porter, he was still sweating buckets over a load this light.

Well, he had always been a mage-type, so perhaps it wasn't surprising.

Still, his stamina was abysmal.

Is that trait even worth anything?

Jim was always the first of the party to run ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠out of steam. Granted, he probably had a bit more endurance than Milia the mage or Irina the priestess.

But because he was, by default, the one hauling everyone's luggage, his stamina drained faster than either of theirs.

Somehow or other, his days of scraping by as a porter had granted him exactly two traits.

And even those were low-level.

Just how marginal his growth was could be summed up simply: his overall estimated level hadn't budged at all. Jim's physical and mental development might as well have been nonexistent.

Of course, a high overall estimate wasn't simply a matter of stacking high trait levels.

That figure measured only the skill one could display in combat. A person could have traits lined up one after another and still have a low estimated level.

Naturally, the higher a trait's level, the greater the odds of genuine strength.

But Jim's overall estimate was, in a word, strangely high.

Combat-related traits? Jim had precisely two: common magic and black magic. Even those were a drop in the bucket compared to Milia's.

And that was exactly what made it odd.

Compare him to Milia at their first meeting: her common magic had been at a higher level than Jim's from the very start.

Their black magic had been roughly on par.

And yet Milia was weaker than Jim. There was magic on top of that, but her overall estimate hovered near 200.

I need to check that one of these days.

Probably because of a single trait.

She had never seen it, never heard of it. Which was precisely why she couldn't figure it out.

She'd spent all this time mapping out what Jim's abilities were actually worth, and yet this one trait's capabilities remained beyond confirmation.

An unidentified trait that, despite being a mere level 1, had granted Jim an utterly absurd overall estimated level.

Granted, she had recently learned that the black magic Jim used felt different from the demons' — but even so…

It never felt like enough of a difference to register as a threat.

Power appropriate to the level of his black magic. That was why Esmeralda couldn't take her eyes off Jim's one and only trait.

So she had thrown him out as bait.

Firing off a blind arrow here, shoving him aside when a dragon breathed there.

Most of the reasons Jim listed for wanting to quit had been supplied by Esmeralda herself.

Not that she had any intention of killing him — she'd only ever pushed him right up to that razor-thin line.

Wait. Is ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it possible that little punk doesn't even know what his own trait is?

Esmeralda cast a sidelong, unreadable glance at Jim trailing behind her. His legs were visibly wobbling; he'd hit his limit before long.

"Shall we make camp here for today, then?"

"……S-su, yes, let's do that."

Under the punishment march Esmeralda had subjected him to, Jim was too exhausted to string together a proper sentence anymore.

This, too, was her intent.

A man this worn out wouldn't have the energy to think about sneaking off in the dead of night.

Whenever the two of them ended up traveling alone together, she always ran him into the ground like this.

"Go ahead and rest. I'll ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠set up the tent and handle dinner."

"I-I-I'll, I'll help…"

"Haha, I told you to rest, didn't I?"

Esmeralda gave a wry smile and all but forced Jim down onto a boulder nearby.

And so forcibly seated, Jim found he could not get back up. He'd reached his limit, exactly as Esmeralda had planned.

Jim was a demon spy. He had been selling their information all along.

And yet his porter act had always been thoroughly sincere. The principle that the most useless member should handle the most menial tasks held firm even now, with escape on his mind.

Maybe that very sincerity was why he'd never been caught.

Yes — maybe that was why Esmeralda had never killed him.

Oh, now that I think of it…

While tidying up the campsite, Esmeralda suddenly glanced back at Jim, as though something had just struck her.

Not once, in all this time, has Jim ever tried to kill us.

Not when he was stronger than her.

Not when he wasn't, either.

Mealtimes, sleeping hours — there had been plenty of openings ripe for the taking.

Esmeralda was confident she could handle whatever he dished out, but from Jim's perspective, things would have looked very different.

"Honestly."

Watching him, Esmeralda muttered in a cold voice.

"What a cowardly man you are."

Their modest little camp. Esmeralda pitched the tent, warmed up some rations for dinner, and then took the night watch.

With two people, they should have alternated shifts, but Esmeralda did not trust Jim completely. What's more, he'd already pushed his body past its limits and was half-unconscious.

Alone, back against a tree, she gazed up at the moon.

This solitary time was the most precious thing she had. The only hours when she could simply be herself.

"Haah…"

The country girl Esmeralda had died the moment she grasped the Holy Sword.

From now on, she had to live as the Hero. Putting on a dopey expression, swinging her sword for the sake of others.

After a while of moon-gazing and sighing pathetically to herself, Esmeralda quietly lowered her head.

"That was sooner than I expected."

Before her eyes, an old man had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠drawn near without her noticing.

They were getting close to the region where Jim's fake hometown supposedly lay. She had anticipated that any demon contact would come around that point, so Esmeralda wasn't flustered in the slightest as she drew her sword.

"Come alone, I see. Well, I suppose that's how confident you are."

"They say the Hero is a fool. Meeting you face to face, it seems that isn't entirely true."

The two stood facing each other across the campfire.

Jim, despite the situation, remained holed up inside the tent, fast asleep.

Esmeralda forced down the crawling sensation on her skin and glared at her opponent. He stood with his back straight and hands clasped behind him, as if to say he didn't care what she did.

Then one of her authorities — the Emerald Tablet — fed her a rough profile of the man.

If she pared it down to the most crucial parts…

Only then did Esmeralda notice the rank insignia pinned to the man's collar.

Three stars. An officer undeniably of the General Officer Grade — a Lieutenant General.

The worst crisis of her life.

"Ugh, seriously. Life is such a bitch."

Going by overall estimate alone, the old man was at least twice as strong as she was.

Of course, those numbers couldn't be compared one-to-one; in practical terms, the gap could be three or four times over and no one would blink.

There was a reason for his composure.

An elderly demon was, in itself, a rare sight.

Old age meant survival.

For demons, that truth burned clearer than any other.

"If you run, I won't give chase. My assigned task is not to subdue you. When you reach my age, you see, overtime becomes something you come to absolutely loathe."

"Wow. Really?"

"However. You'll leave that friend of yours behind."

"Ah, that's a shame. Well then, take care of yourself, Jim. It's been fun."

Esmeralda promptly sheathed the Holy Sword and backed away.

"You don't think I would lie, do you?"

"What else can I do but believe you? Gotta have faith, right?"

Of course, Esmeralda was no fool who blindly trusted demons.

She simply had a means of being certain.

So be it. I have to let him go. If a Corps Commander has gotten personally involved just to hold onto that little punk Jim, this was never going to end easily.

Fighting a Corps Commander to stop one demon spy from defecting was, no matter how you sliced it, a losing trade.

Frankly, Esmeralda couldn't fathom whether Jim was worth that much to her — but agonizing over it now wouldn't change what she could do, which was nothing.

And so Esmeralda slipped out of the Corps Commander Eleven's sight.

Eleven, Commander of the Demon King Army's 11th Corps, stepped slowly into the tent.

There lay Jim, still dead to the world.

"…"

No matter how he turned it over, Eleven could not understand.

What could possibly be special about a green whelp who couldn't even sense his killing intent?

Why had one single question earned him a forced retirement?

He had sworn to devote his life to the Demon King Army. That conviction had held unshaken, no matter how many times the Demon King changed hands.

But now, for the first time, he wavered — was it truly the right thing?

Rank and power within the army flowed from strength alone.

What reason could there be to grant special treatment to a nameless soldier with no power whatsoever?

Demons, by nature, cut down even their own blood-kin without mercy if they were weak. Most of them did exactly that — and the nobles who bore proper names were no exception.

And so Eleven had assumed there must be something he didn't know.

That he himself had been lacking. That there was something his eyes simply couldn't see.

And Lilith, the Demon King's aide, had all but cemented that belief in him.

"I don't understand. Truly, I don't."

Lilith had said, with utter confidence, that meeting the boy would make everything clear. Yet here he was, holding a blade to the man's throat, and Jim showed not the slightest sign of waking.

Dead asleep, oblivious to the world.

So whose problem was this?

His own — the one who couldn't see Jim for what he was?

Or the other fools, pouring manpower and resources into a weak, useless boy on the delusion that he might be the Demon King's bastard?

Either way, there was one way to find out.

"If you are truly a special existence, then surely you can block this much. And if you cannot — then for the sake of the Demon King Army itself, you ought to vanish as you are."

Eleven raised his sword and brought it straight down toward Jim's neck.

CLANG!

The shriek of metal striking metal.

Eleven looked down at Jim, then slowly lifted his gaze to the girl who had parried his blade.

"I gave you every chance. And yet you choose to throw your life away like this?"

"…Believe me, I tried my best to take that chance."

"But no matter what, I had no intention of leaving a comrade to die."

As she always did, Esmeralda hurled herself into a fight stacked against her.

If Jim returned to the Demon King's army, so be it — that was out of her hands.

But if Esmeralda's own choice put Jim's life on the line, then she would protect him with everything she had.

No — even if it wasn't her choice at all, even if Jim found himself under an unreasonable threat, she would draw her sword.

"Because I am the Hero."

A Hero is the one who saves the innocent. That was why, in this moment alone, the sword had to be raised.

She was not on humanity's side.

She was not on the demons' side, either.

She stood on the side of the innocent.

"If the one who set out to save the world can't even protect her own comrade, wouldn't the title of Hero weep for shame?"

Here and now, Jim was, without question, an innocent man.

Even if it was by the Demon King Army's standard, not her own.

Because she was the Hero who could not stomach injustice.