63. A Malice More Serious Than Hatred
63. A Malice More Serious Than Hatred
Heroes, as a rule, were trainwrecks of personality.
That perception was so widespread that adventurers generally viewed Heroes in a negative light, and the adventurers in this party were no doubt looking at this situation as some kind of opportunity.
Here was someone with the power to annihilate enemies the whole party would struggle against combined, yet she not only split the profits equally, but actually volunteered for night watch duty.
What could be more perfect than a pushover like that—not just easy to exploit, but ideal for using as a punching bag to blow off steam?
"Haha~ When I first heard 'Failed Hero,' I figured she'd be some bottom-tier wreck who couldn't even use her power properly. But I guess a Hero's still a Hero, even after they've rotted, huh?"
"...The barricade I can understand, but making her handle the dishes too feels a bit excessive."
The vanguard wore an uneasy expression as he spoke, gauging the mage's reaction.
But even that seemed less about worrying over Ga-ram and more about whether the Hero might borrow her power to retaliate.
Sure, she'd been branded a washout and they thought of her as beneath them, but considering what she'd shown them so far, they figured reducing them all to bloody paste would take nothing more than a flick of her wrist...
"Oh, come on~ What's there to be scared of? If the world were ruled by whoever's strongest, humanity would've been handed over to the Heroes long ago instead of the Empire."
The mage, on the other hand, felt zero hesitation about his actions even after witnessing that power firsthand.
The way he shrugged and sneered made it clear he felt not a shred of guilt or reluctance about what he was doing.
"In the first place, Heroes are stuck simpering up to their sponsors to maintain what authority they have. So there's nothing weird about us throwing our weight around a little with a Hero who's so desperate she can't even get a single adventurer. Don't you agree, Mr. Ascetic?"
"Well, yes... Considering certain Heroes who squander the donations meant for my monastery, I can't say I hold a favorable opinion of them, not even in empty words."
"See~ Even the chaste Ascetic here says so. So go ahead and grow a thicker skin. If that Hero actually snaps and kills us all, that's when she'll really have zero adventurers left to party with anyway."
The mage snickered, glancing toward where Ga-ram had gone to do the dishes.
As the mage's unrestrained badmouthing gradually drew the ascetic and the vanguard into agreement, the sniper, who had been watching from the sidelines, shook his head with a bitter smile.
"What a mess. The ones who did wrong are one thing, and the victim's another..."
"What's with you? You were sneering along just fine before. Why are you suddenly sitting this one out?"
"I'm of the opinion that you only work as much as you're paid. Joking around to someone's face is one thing, but this behind-the-back stuff doesn't sit right with me. I'll go do some recon while I'm up. You all rest a bit more."
With that, the sniper left the area.
The mage, who'd been doing all the trash-talking moments before, glared at his retreating figure with a sour look.
In that case, if there was no need to talk behind anyone's back, then I had no reason to stick around here either.
"What's with that guy. He got cold feet all of a sudden... Oh? Where are you going?"
"I'm worried about the Hero. I'll go check on her and be right back."
"Haha~ What's there to worry about? She's sealed the perimeter tight with barricades, and that delinquent over there confirmed there aren't any traps~"
"...Because you never know."
Even if the Hero was in a position where she couldn't oppress the party, if something went wrong with her, we'd have to directly face monsters like that gargoyle we ran into first.
Using that excuse to get away from the badmouthing session, the vanguard muttered in a bitter voice.
"That guy... I've felt it since the first time I saw him. He's really not very sociable."
"Come to think of it, there are a lot of suspicious things about him. He hides his face, and he even hid his name as a condition for joining the party..."
"If he had any sense, he wouldn't have chosen a spear-wielding class. Pfft-hehe, what kind of class name is Spearman, anyway?"
...That damn mage woman.
She's making me remember things I'd rather forget.
"Well, whatever. It's his life, so let's not mind it. Anyway, about what the Hero did earlier..."
Even after I withdrew, the mage kept right on with the trash talk.
Part of me wanted to step in and mediate, but at the moment, I was saddled with the title of Hero Killer, which made me just as notorious among adventurers as a Failed Hero.
If things escalated, I risked being forced to reveal my identity, and even that wouldn't change their perception of the Hero. So I resolved to stay as calm as possible.
If things crossed the line, I'd have to stop it—but now was not the time.
"...It's okay."
A faint voice reached me just as I stopped at the entrance to the room where Ga-ram was.
The sound of clattering dishes came from a fountain in the center of the room, and through it, I could dimly make out the sight of Ga-ram washing dishes, her hand raised to the corner of her eye.
"It's okay. I can do this well."
A murmur to stave off the loneliness of washing dishes...
But even to me, just eavesdropping, the tremor in that voice was unmistakable.
"Because I'm used to this sort of thing. They all... said we have to keep the party together, even like this..."
Clatter, clatter. The scraping sound of dishes clinking together as they were washed beneath the fountain.
And as droplets from her face fell onto a dish not yet drained dry, the girl's gaze naturally drifted toward its surface.
To wipe away the water spots on it with a dishcloth.
"Because this is all I have. So if I just endure a little longer, everything will be okay..."
She kept washing the dishes, strong-willed and determined, but maybe she just couldn't ignore her own reflection in the plate?
The girl locked eyes with her own faintly visible self and froze on the spot, staring blankly at her own face for a long moment.
No matter how much she tried to reason with herself, she couldn't look away from her true feelings, staring them straight in the face.
"Huu..."
She bit her lip, trying to suppress the sound that was leaking out, but with a heart this fragile, there was no way that was possible.
Whether sooner or later, the dam bursting was a foregone conclusion.
"Uuu, huu..."
The hand that had wiped her eyes with wet fingers a few times went limp and dropped to the floor.
And only then, having reached the limits of her endurance, the girl began to release the emotions she had been holding back all alone.
"Uwaaaaaaah..."
A sorrowful, weeping cry.
Even that sound she tried to kill as much as possible, terrified it might carry to the room where her party members were. A Failed Hero... no, a little girl, not even yet an adult.
But even looking at that pitiful sight, I couldn't bring myself to step forward and offer a single word of comfort.
The confusion of falling into a strange world with an already timid heart, and the fear for her future.
Before she could even build up the self-esteem of a Hero that might neutralize those negative feelings, I had inadvertently barged in and shattered it in vain.
"Huuu, uwaaaaaah..."
In this miserable reality, with no one to depend on, how wretched must it feel to be relegated to cleaning up after others, despite her innate destiny?
Even that, if repeated, becomes something you get used to—but getting used to something comes not from resolve, but from resignation to an unchanging reality.
No matter how miserable your situation, it's the result of surrendering to the pitiable, heartbreaking lot that is your own fate.
"...Why is it that Heroes are all one extreme or the other?"
Either their personalities implode, or they end up as cowards even more pathetic than a Foreign Worker.
Sure, in the latter case, if you're aware of the danger, you won't die from letting your guard down. But this world is a brutal dark fantasy where simply being alive is agony for those who have nothing.
In a world like that, having natural ability yet being used by others, living in constant terror, never knowing when you might die—that's not a life a young girl can be expected to endure.
"...If only she had some hope."
Right. If only that child had some hope that she could live a slightly better future.
A slip of paper, drawn out by a gesture born of that guilt, quietly began to unfold before my eyes.
[Open after the first camp inside the dungeon.]
The third note Airi had given me.
A note I was only allowed to open at the decisive moment, to minimize the variables if I knew the future. The time had finally come to open it.
Of course, this note was ultimately only meant to resolve the worries I carried.
It would only help my own stability and growth; there was no guarantee it would affect that child's safety.
But if, by any chance, she had prophesied that my future self would have these exact worries...
"...What the hell is this?"
What was written on the note I unfolded while dreaming of such an impossible ideal far exceeded my expectations.
I'd thought, on the off chance, that I might have to put that child in danger to preserve my own life. But what the note actually said was that such a thing wasn't even worth worrying about in the first place.
"Damn it. I was worrying about the wrong thing."
I'd expected a newly excavated dungeon to be crawling with Murderers, but I never imagined something even worse was waiting.
If I don't find a way to stop this, something really terrible might happen.
****
The day after we made camp.
The dungeon exploration, which resumed once more, proceeded just as smoothly as the day before.
After all, there was a competent Scout to handle the traps, and whenever we ran into monsters like gargoyles, the Hero's power could clean them up in an instant.
The party members, who had been somewhat wary at first, relaxed as the journey went on so smoothly, and began to focus solely on investigating the structures.
"Miss Hero! We're going to rest here for a bit. Could you set up the barricade?"
"O-oh, yes. Leave it to me..."
"Fufu~ The expedition's gotten so much easier, all thanks to our Miss Hero~"
She looked exhausted, likely short on sleep after standing night watch all last night.
I saw the mage giggling as she watched the Hero drag obstacles to block the passageway in that state, and the vanguard and ascetic exchange glances before forcing awkward smiles.
Watching the mage treat the Hero like a servant was clearly eroding their self-restraint bit by bit.
There was a risk that this would soon escalate to an extreme, but ironically, now was not the time to be worrying about that.
"Well, geez. A young lady who isn't even the Hero they tormented, and they're about to lose their cool like that... You don't seem too pleased about it either, right, pal?"
The sniper watched the party members with distaste, but ultimately clicked his tongue from a distance without interfering.
The moment he approached me, as if looking for agreement, I inclined my head toward an as-yet un-barricaded passage and spoke to him.
"More importantly, I'd like to scout that area for a moment. Would you come with me?"
"That way? Didn't we already confirm there was nothing there when we passed through earlier?"
"Something's bothering me. Please."
"Ah, well. If that's all. Miss Hero~ We're heading out to do a little recon, so please seal up the way we came!"
The Scout followed me away, leaving the Hero to secure the room they'd use as a rest stop.
After walking down the corridor for a while, I stopped only when I'd led him into a room that served as a library, cluttered with obstacles.
"Speaking of which, we seem to have come pretty far from the party. Is there some kind of problem..."
-Shwik!
The moment the spear in my hand sliced fiercely.
The sharpened edge, refined from Mithril, tore through the bookshelf and the ancient tomes inside it—but the target's legs had long since left that spot behind.
"...Buddy, what the hell is this?"
Dammit, missed.
Guess a guy who's survived a long time in dungeons has sharp instincts, even against a surprise attack.
"I hate to even ask this, but are you the same type of scumbag as the bastard who stabbed the Hero in the back the moment we got in here? Figures. I had a bad feeling since the moment you hid your face and name..."
"Pol Denian. Member of the contract-killing specialist Clan, Red Cross."
No, whatever else, this guy needed to be dealt with right here.
Firm in that conviction, I smoothly pulled away the mask that hid my face and recited the contents of Airi's prophecy.
"You're here to assassinate the Hero, under orders from your clan. Aren't you?"
Just in case—on the off, off chance that Airi's prophecy might be wrong.
To confirm it, I revealed my identity and simultaneously invoked his affiliation. The moment I did, the guy, seeming to recognize my face, let out a scoffing laugh.
"...Haha, well now."
As if to signify that his disguise as an adventurer had, from this very accusation, just been confirmed as fact.
"As expected of a man who's killed dozens of Heroes, huh? Guess you do have the eye to recognize people in the business~"
Right. This was no time to be worrying about trash talk.
Because if I don't eliminate this bastard right here, starting with him killing that child, the Murderers who receive the signal will start slaughtering every adventurer in this dungeon indiscriminately.