If You Wish to Save Them
Before we went to rescue the Hero, I told Raeli one thing.
That I knew how to use magic.
There would be plenty of fighting ahead, and claiming I'd crushed every enemy with nothing but the necklace's power left too many contradictions. Better to clear up the misunderstanding before it piled any higher.
"I'm not fighting on the necklace's power alone. I actually know how to use magic — the necklace just supplies the mana. Raeli."
"W-what?"
Raeli nearly jumped out of her skin. Franc, on the other hand, looked like she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"Wait. You didn't know that this whole time?"
"I-I thought it was the necklace doing everything."
Even the Sword Saint, who'd received a B-rank in mana, had made the same mistake. Raeli misunderstanding wasn't strange at all. The most basic requirement of a mage — possessing mana of your own — simply didn't apply to me.
Raeli seemed to accept it, more or less, but she still tilted her head. Magic was a discipline you couldn't teach yourself unless you had extraordinary talent, and she knew I'd never set foot in a Magic Tower, never studied the craft in any formal sense. She was curious where mine had come from.
"Then who taught you?"
"...Someone did. A professor. Used to be a teacher, a long time ago."
The person who'd taught me magic was none other than the Archmage of the Hero's party.
We'd fought, yes — but we'd also talked. A great deal. The Archmage was a wise woman. What was the point of exhausting yourself against an enemy who couldn't die? An Immortal. So eventually, we simply started having ordinary conversations. Magical theory passed between us, and stories of the past.
She'd been a professor at the Academy, she told me. She'd researched the pinnacle of magic there and failed, again and again, until she joined the Hero's party and finally grasped it.
She had been my conversation partner. And my teacher.
The moment I mentioned a mentor, Franc's eyes went from sparkling to practically glowing — but I didn't say anything more. I just thought a little longer about the Archmage.
If she was an Academy professor... is she working here now?
And if we met again, what would I even say to her?
While I was lost in that thought, Raeli pieced the story together in her own way.
"Uh... so you've known magic this whole time, but you didn't have the talent for mana, so you couldn't actually use it. Then you got this artifact, and now it supplies the mana, so you can. Is that right?"
"That's one way to look at it."
I had to admire her. She'd interpreted everything in exactly the direction I wanted.
Beside us, Franc had gone quiet, lost in thought. Did she think Raeli's version didn't add up? She gave a small, silent shake of her head, but she didn't ask. She'd figured I had my reasons for keeping quiet, and she was being considerate about it.
The Sword Saint, walking at the head of the group, spoke.
"We're almost there."
"Aaaagh!"
"Help me!"
"Over here — he's not breathing!"
It wasn't long before the slaughterhouse came into view.
Demons had fallen on the examinees, and the Hero who should have been stopping them was locked in place by a mid-rank demon. A few bodies already lay still. The air was thick with despair.
If this was left alone, a great many people were going to die. I understood why. They simply didn't have the skill to take demons down. The Hero was supposed to handle that — but could they survive until she finished the mid-rank demon and came for them? They had no such conviction, no such hope. That was why they were breaking.
One figure caught my eye. A swordsman, still holding his ground even as the formation collapsed around him. He was at his limit — a demon's blow split his blade, and death was a heartbeat away — but the Origin of the Star I'd already warmed up smashed that demon's skull faster.
A wet, brutal crack.
The swordsman took every drop of blood that sprayed from the flying head. Then he just stared at me, dazed.
...I kind of feel bad about that.
Maybe I should have used the magic a little more elegantly.
I left the blood-soaked man where he stood and turned away. Franc took one look at the examinees dying in front of her and muttered, quiet and furious.
"Shall I just wipe them all out?"
What I heard was this: Can I go all out?
The calculations a mage performed were so immense they naturally strained the brain, so you normally set a limit when you cast. Without that limit, you felt a nauseating heat as if your brain were burning, and in severe cases the aftereffects could be lasting. She was asking if she could drop the limiter and calculate freely.
Of course she could. I trusted her skill more than enough.
"Wipe them out."
Enormous magic circles bloomed around Franc in a matter of seconds — a completely different speed from when she'd hunted monsters. She had accelerated her calculations to a degree that would scorch the brain. I did that every time myself, since I couldn't die anyway, so it made no difference to me. For her, it still required extremely precise control.
As the magic came together, I turned to the Sword Saint.
"Reinhardt. You're in command of the examinees."
"...Very well."
He looked faintly surprised by the order, then took a few steps forward and spoke in a voice that was heavy, solemn, and absolute.
"As of this moment, I am taking control of this situation."
A voice laced with mana rolled over every examinee on the field. He was an elite, educated from childhood in every discipline that mattered. Even before the regression, I'd watched the Sword Saint command troops more times than I could count. That was why I'd put him in charge.
He finished reading the battlefield and began issuing orders, one after another.
"All examinees, hold your positions and endure. Protecting the formation is what matters. Do not simply flee. The wounded fall back. The front holds."
And the most important thing of all was raising morale that had already hit the floor.
Steel whispered from a scabbard. The Sword Saint drew his blade and plunged into the field.
Like the Spear Saint's single-point thrust, he unleashed the one-strike technique that was his own.
A sharp, tearing rush of air — and the Sword Saint took a demon's head in a single cut. Head-on, it might have been a different story, but he'd struck from behind. Even a demon that powerful died cleanly.
The examinees, who had seen nothing but despair, watched that head fall. And hope found them.
"Hold the line!"
"We can win this!"
While the Sword Saint rallied the examinees, I turned and left a word with each of the others — the Spear Saint, Franc, and Raeli.
"Franc, take the right. The formation there is still in decent order, so the risk of hitting our own is low. Just rain magic as you please."
"Asel, you're on the rear. That's where the line is most broken — it's practically a melee. Just hold the center, even for a moment. Show them what you can do."
"Raeli, you go to the rear as well. Get the examinees formed up. That's the most basic of basics. That's how a battle starts."
"Got it!"
Franc, already sunk into her magic, gave a silent nod. Raeli answered with real energy and charged for the rear.
Asel just stared at me, blank.
"What are you doing? Get going."
"A-are you insane?"
The Spear Saint jabbed a finger behind her. More than five demons. If she dove into the rear, she would have to hold against all five of them. I could see how asking that of her made me look completely unhinged.
"So? You're not going?"
I lifted my dagger. Asel clutched her head and protested, the picture of injustice.
"I'll die if I go back there!"
"You won't die. And you only have to hold for a little while."
I could say that with certainty because the Spear Saint was the strongest there was at chaotic melee and holding out. Her specialty wasn't lasting a few minutes in the heart of an enemy line — it was diving into the middle of the Demon King's army and tearing it apart for hours. She'd reached the point of suppressing a war by herself. Later she'd become the kind of maniac who threw herself into the heart of a battlefield just because she liked it there.
If she was going to lose it anyway, she might as well start now.
"Ugh — uuuugh — if I get hurt, it's your fault!"
Bullied into it at last, the Spear Saint headed for the rear. The composed act was gone. All that remained was a whining child, and I let out a hollow laugh.
Had she always been like this?
I shook my head, not sure, and started walking.
The reason I'd stayed until last was simple. The finest meal is best eaten alone, isn't it?
This was a chance to earn the Hero's trust. I intended to help her take down that mid-rank demon.
I amplified the mana held by the Origin of the Star, and the star set in the necklace began to spin with real force.
The Hero had always felt the weight of duty.
She had received the blessing of the gods and grown stronger than other people. She was a commoner by birth, yet treated better than any noble. She was respected by all as the Hero. And still, only enormous obligation and responsibility had ever pressed down on her.
Her sword was far too heavy.
The clash with the mid-rank demon was not as difficult as she had expected. The problem lay elsewhere.
"H-Hero, save m—!"
A sickening crunch.
Low-rank demons had come pouring in with the mid-rank one. Another examinee had just died.
The Hero clenched her teeth. She simply did not have the strength to save them all. Matching the mid-rank demon in front of her was already her limit.
"H-human... strong. But with that... you, you cannot kill me."
The Hero prayed to God. Grant me greater strength. Guide me to a way through this hardship.
Nothing changed.
Even a Hero could not always receive an answer from God. In the end, she had to overcome it herself — this desperate struggle, this ordeal in which so many could die — if she was going to save them.
Far too many burdens crushed her. Every time a thought crossed her mind, every time her sword failed to pierce the demon and bounced away in vain, someone was hurt. Or someone died.
Even without seeing it directly, she could tell the line was collapsing. Morale was plunging to the bottom. Examinees fleeing in panic were visible too.
Is everyone going to die?
Just as even the Hero was about to fall into despair, an unexpected miracle arrived.
A wet, brutal crack — and the head of a demon that had been pressing them suddenly burst apart. The magic was powerful, and it was fast.
Even in the middle of the fight, the Hero had to turn her gaze. On the hill across the way stood faces she knew. She could not have failed to know them. Of the mere five S-rank examinees, four were standing there.
Reinhardt. Asel. Franc.
And... Argal.
She recalled what she had seen in her dream. Argal, who had burned the Capital and sought to fight the Hero. And she compared it to what she was seeing now.
The Argal of the present had come to save her.
She could not understand it. And that was why the shock hit even harder. Had the dream simply been a lie? Some demonic spell that had painted one man as a vile villain?
While she reeled in confusion, the battle began to stabilize. The moment four powerhouses entered the field, the atmosphere flipped at once.
Every time Reinhardt swung his sword, a demon's head came off. Franc's magic burned the demons to ash. At the most collapsed stretch of the rear, Asel was holding out alone against no fewer than five opponents.
And Argal...
"...What?"
He was right beside her, aiding the Hero.
Their combination unfolded as if it had been painted. Magic supported the path of her sword, and the dagger that occasionally lashed out was lethally precise. The instant he joined her, the mid-rank demon could do nothing but take the hits.
Each piece of it was astonishing. But what she found hardest to believe of all was this: her coordination with Argal was as natural and perfect as that of comrades who had spent decades fighting side by side.
As if the two of them had once fought a desperate battle against an enemy they could never have defeated alone.