What Matters Is an Unyielding Heart
What matters is an unyielding heart.
Lillian didn't answer my final offer of counseling.
With a look that said just you wait, she glared at me through a defeated person's sharp eyes, then hurriedly stumbled out through the door the Old Butler had left open.
Soon, silence settled over the room.
…Fifty-three, huh.
I confirmed the wondrous number: Favorability 53.
So forty-seven percent left to go?
I felt the summit gradually coming into view.
"Um, Doctor…?"
"Ah, yes?"
Elara was looking at me with a flushed face.
"Well, since Lillian's gone, could you finish the counseling session?"
"Haha, of course."
I smiled and sat in the chair across from her.
…And after about an hour, once I'd finished my work—
Counseling complete, I cheerfully opened the gallery window.
Lillian, that dumb bitch, waltzed in for a formal audience still wearing the brand on her forehead.
Tried to wreck Elara's mental state going "ugh idk it's all your fault!" and all that crap.
So I verbally destroyed her again.
Told her it wasn't revenge — it was just a loser's tantrum from someone too scared to do anything else. Hit her with pure logic right in the bones.
Result: Elara overcame her self-loathing.
At first favorability dropped −30 from Lillian's trash talk, then [the lost 30 recovered] and [+20 favorability] on top, skyrocketing to 53.
Elara, now full of confidence, hit Lillian with "you should get some psychiatric treatment" like she was posting in the gallery.
Lillian got called a loser and immediately rage-quit lmaooooooo
Total favorability hit 53/100.
Is this that "price of magic" you guys were talking about? lmao
Was the Hero Party's mage this easy? She's easy as hell…. lmaooooooo
It's been a week, yeah?
I smirked and left a reply.
He had a point. Geumbalgeoyudaisuki was right — I'd cleared it way too easily.
I smirked as I read his comment, thinking about how to reply.
Then another veteran, Gogumador, dropped a reply.
I snorted at WhiteMage's comment.
Pride exists to be broken.
Stating the obvious.
Of course — even if she was an NPC living inside this game, she had intellect and reason.
I knew that much.
Do? There wasn't anything she could do, was there?
I sighed and typed a reply.
The Hero Party main force?
I quietly thought about the Hero Party main force.
Wait. Fuck?
The smile drained from my face.
The Hero Party main force was coming? To this mansion?
I swallowed dryly without meaning to.
Lillian — mage of the Hero Party.
Her character setting……
All I could remember was: mage, primary objective is assassination. That was about it.
That was what I thought.
But the next comment left me even more rattled.
That was probably why Lillian came here in the first place. You got tangled up with her verbally, tormented her, and nearly became an assassination target — you just got lucky dodging it this way and that.
I was completely fucked, wasn't I?
If Lillian's purpose in coming to this mansion was to eliminate Elara for being in the way, then it meant I was now in the way too.
But……
I couldn't just sit back and watch.
Right.
That was the next problem.
How do I deal with her.
That was the real crux.
……Gogumador was right. I might well be in a desperate, no-way-out situation.
But……
Whether I could or not, I had to do it.
That was my role.
And given that Aris Mardia's setting was "psychiatric counselor," this adversity was something I absolutely had to overcome.
This wasn't overconfidence. I simply had no choice but to succeed.
If I failed to stop Lillian, death was a foregone conclusion.
If I failed to restore Elara, death was equally certain.
One way or another, I had to win this fight.
Yeah — those scumbags……
From what I'd heard, they talked a big game about justice while being nothing of the sort.
If you didn't pay them monthly tribute, they'd boycott demonkin hunting.
They'd walk into any shop, freeload food, and sneer that a future hero was eating so did you have a problem with that.
Or they'd beat people up on the street and scream that the righteous Hero Party was doing this so did you have a complaint —
There was no way that matched Elara's personality.
On top of that, Elara was the Hero Party's hero candidate.
A leader-class figure. If someone like that took command, it would only make life harder for them.
……Dispose of Elara. Kill her?
Over my dead body.
I would never let that happen.
Of course it could.
But killing was the simple part.
If Elara recovered mentally and fought the Hero Party to the death, that would be easy enough — but it wasn't an ending that suited her.
The purpose of this game was, above all else, a happy ending.
Given Elara's nature, simply killing them didn't feel right.
I couldn't be certain, but the way I saw it……
After subduing the Hero Party, I needed to reduce them to playthings she could toy with in the palm of her hand.
Given Elara's innate character, that might be the happier ending that truly fit her.
With that goal in mind, I closed the gallery window.
My fingertips were cold.
Until now, this had been an event about stopping one individual's — Lillian's — personal tantrum. Not anymore. The Hero Party as a collective was moving with the official purpose of murder.
"……So what? I just have to pull it off, right? Big deal."
My eyes fell on a dust-covered practice wooden sword standing in the corner of my room.
"……"
Elara. The woman once called a Hero.
Her PTSD.
What was at the core of it? The inability to grip a sword.
I picked up the wooden sword.
"The counseling starts now."
This wasn't treatment anymore. This was training.
I had to turn Elara back into a Hero.