Thirteen Days Until the Hero Arrives
Thirteen days until the hero arrives.
How long had she sat crumpled on the floor, tears streaming without end? Her sense of time had grown faint, dissolving into nothing, when the sound of someone walking—no, running—echoed from outside.
Thud—thud. The footsteps quickened and grew louder as they neared. Clack—clack. The shortened strides finally halted right before the door.
Without warning, the bathroom door where she sat swung open. It flew wide with a sharp clack, nearly slamming into the wall.
He stood there, breathing hard as if he had sprinted the whole way, chest heaving. The moment their eyes met, relief washed over his face.
What would a Saintess do in this situation?
She shaped a smile for him, as if nothing at all had happened.
His pupils trembled violently, a faint guilt flickering within them. The act had been the right choice after all. He seemed to feel responsible for her ending up like this.
Suddenly the whole scene struck her as absurd, everything so trivial that she nearly laughed out loud—a mistake she barely caught in time.
A Saintess does not mock others.
She must not let her guard down.
Keeping the smiling expression fixed, she crafted the mask: the eternally foolish, gentle smile of a Saintess who hid her own pain and always put others first.
She was not someone this man should worry about. She was not a good enough person to deserve worry. The one who ought to feel guilt was herself—yet watching this Holy Knight shoulder the blame made a deep, rising disgust well up from the core of her heart.
To be seen not as herself, but as something else, as someone else—how thoroughly unpleasant it was.
If he ever learned she was not the real Saintess, that the person he had fretted over so desperately was already dead and she had simply taken the place… what would he do?
The thought terrified her.
Dying cleanly by a single sword thrust might almost be a blessing.
She could see now how completely Theas the Saintess had lived for others, how thoroughly she had buried her own suffering. That others cared for her this deeply… she could no longer even remember when the last person who had worried about her had vanished.
Was it because the Erosion Rate had climbed, or had no such person ever existed for her in the first place?
And she knew she could never live the way the Saintess had. A life spent for others was the last thing she wanted.
She drew a firm line inside her heart between herself and Theas. Do not cross here, she warned herself again and again. To keep the Erosion Rate from rising, nothing mattered more than maintaining a clear boundary between herself and Theas. She had to separate and quarantine every thought that was not her own—those foreign feelings that seeped in as if the two personalities were already blending.
That was the only way she would survive. With that resolve, she lifted her head again and looked at the Holy Knight with the same expression as before.
Yes. She was still smiling.
When someone sees a person with sorrowful eyes who had been weeping endlessly, only to force a brave face the instant they entered—someone more selfless than anyone—how do they look at her?
He still could not hide the tremor in his gaze. Truly unskilled at concealing his own feelings, she thought, and slowly pushed herself upright.
Had she collapsed without realizing it, swept away by emotion? She found herself sitting on the floor. Placing her pale hands carefully against the tiles, she used them for support and rose.
The Holy Knight hesitated a moment, then stepped closer and offered her a hand that looked almost rough. She had not noticed when they first met, or while he held her hand earlier—how calloused it was.
Again. Erase the useless thought. What does it matter about someone else?
The way foreign emotions and thoughts kept mixing in was more unpleasant than anything.
Act as she always had. She was a selfish person, after all.
She took his heavily calloused hand and finished standing.
She meant to convey Thank you, but the Saintess could not speak.
“Ah…”
What left her mouth was too pathetic to even call language; a flicker of embarrassment touched her. Seeing her lips part briefly then close again, the Holy Knight seemed to understand.
“It’s all right.”
Honestly, she was surprised. How selfless had the Saintess been, that even an ordinary Holy Knight could anticipate she would try to express gratitude in a moment like this? Had he attended her for a long time?
Perhaps not so long after all. Because she did not know him.
She kept herself and the Saintess strictly separate and continued the thought. Whatever the case, for someone forced to play the perfect Saintess, the greatest threat besides the hero himself was the extras she did not know—the nameless, useless people who never even appeared in the game. Here they lived with real roles of their own.
She knew the Saintess lived with attendants, but she knew nothing of who this attendant was, what his name was, how long he had served, what he liked, or what kind of personality he had.
That was why she always had to wear the mask: the foolish, selfless, pure, fragile girl who silently endured her own pain. She never poured her soul into the performance. If she did, the character she was acting would become herself.
The long chain of thoughts finally ended, and the Holy Knight spoke again.
“If anything is inconvenient, please call for me.”
She listened while half-sitting on the edge of the bed, watching him continue in that stiff manner of speech.
“Given what happened during morning prayers, there is no need for you to come out for prayer.”
“Meals will be delivered at the proper times.”
Oh, that’s good.
The thought slipped out unbidden.
“I’ve already reported this to my superiors.”
A faint tremor colored his voice when he mentioned the report. Is there some hidden backstory involving the upper ranks and the Saintess? It did not feel like an immediate problem for her, so she decided not to care.
He turned, closed the door, and left her room. Only a lonely silence remained, circling the chamber.
Alone at last, she began to consider what she could still do. With the Erosion Rate already at twenty-five percent, it felt a little late—yet Four Seasons was still a game. That meant, system-wise, methods to slow the Erosion Rate or reverse it even with penalties were not completely nonexistent.
Madman’s Notebook, Threads of Tuning, Drawing the Line, Rosario…
At this point in time, none of those items were obtainable. While she could still remain herself, she had to find some way to hold on.
Right now the Erosion Rate was still low enough that body and mind stayed clearly separated; she could not feel the body’s pain, and her senses were dull. If she ever reached the state of constant, horrific agony while also taking on the Saintess’s personality, the odds of being able to use any of her game knowledge would plummet. That would mean the world simply flowed along its predetermined path.
To survive, she had to twist the fixed outcome.
First… maybe I should sleep a little.
Everything that had happened since morning was more than enough to pile exhaustion onto a young girl’s body. Her eyelids had been heavy for a while, her limbs limp and trembling. Even if she forced her mind to stay sharp, no easy solution would surface through this fatigue. She finished climbing onto the bed, slowly lay back, savored the faintly soft feel of the blanket, closed her eyes, and drifted into sleep.
She woke not long afterward. A short double knock—tap-tap—made her frown and open her eyes.
Mealtime already?
She rose and walked slowly toward the door. Perhaps he heard her approaching footsteps; a familiar voice came from outside. It was the same Holy Knight who had held her hand so tightly.
“I’ve brought your meal.”
She opened the door just a crack and accepted the tray—ugh, heavier than expected. She had tried to take it with one hand and staggered; he watched with worried eyes. She gave him a faint smile that said she was fine, then closed the door.
Receiving that kind of look from a man was neither familiar nor something she wanted to grow used to. She clicked her tongue inwardly and set the tray on the small table.
Aside from a few cherry tomatoes and the dressing sprinkled over them, the plate was nothing but green—an aggressively healthy meal. Without meaning to, she grimaced.