Translator: RaidenTL

Chapter 73: Prona Kingdom's Capital (5)

"...And so, in the end, I married all of them and we lived happily ever after. That's the story."

"You're so proud of being a blatant cheater."

"Ah, shit. Why do you always have to nag me whenever I tell this story? It's not like I broke the law. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I married multiple women legally, so what's the big deal?"

"Try using that tiny brain of yours for a second. Do you think ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠your wives wanted a group wedding? They only accepted it because you're the world's biggest philanderer. Hey, Cloud. Don't you dare grow up to be like him."

"No matter what you say, I bet this kid's leaning toward my story. A harem is every man's dream!"

"Dream, my ass!"

The beautiful female spirit, Eredna, yelled at the handsome male spirit, Drake. She nagged him some more before turning her gaze to Cloud.

"Forget that nonsense and listen carefully to the story I'm about to tell you. It'll be much more helpful."

"Hey, hey. Don't listen to her. It's just her bragging, wrapped up in a heartwarming tale about how she faced many threats to her chastity but ultimately protected it."

"Bragging? When did I ever brag?"

As Eredna scowled, Drake clicked his tongue.

"You think this is the first time I've heard your story? You always subtly describe the lineage and abilities of the men who courted you."

"That's just to tell the story objectively..."

"Objectively, my ass. It's your roundabout way of saying, 'I'm the kind of woman who gets courted by all these amazing men, and on top of that, I'm an incredible woman who protected her purity!' So insidious."

"Insidious?! Hey, are you done talking?!"

An enraged Eredna grabbed Drake by the collar, but he just picked his ear with a bored expression.

Eredna's face soured.

"Guys, stop fighting. This isn't how you should act in front of the current Hero."

As the atmosphere worsened, a naive-looking hero spirit stepped between them to mediate, but...

"Shut up, you loser who doesn't know a thing about women!"

"Get lost, you dumbass who lost his girl to the Demon King."

Hurt by Eredna and Drake's harsh words, the hero squatted down on the floor.

The other hero spirits chuckled as if they were used to it and moved on.

Cloud let out a deep sigh.

Where did it all go wrong?

Seven spirits had appeared while he was talking to the king.

They were the souls of the heroes absorbed by the Soul Stone.

One of them, Silas, who claimed to be the first Hero, said the story about the Soul Stone was true and asked Cloud to let the king go.

Cloud was a bit bewildered by their appearance.

It was the first time he'd seen souls absorbed by the Soul Stone move about so freely.

If even Cloud was surprised, the king's reaction was a given.

He went beyond bewilderment to outright shock, making a huge fuss before sulking off at Silas's polite request for him to leave.

After that, the crumpled hero over there suggested they all introduce themselves.

And this is what it's come to.

A deep line was about to form on Cloud's forehead as he watched Eredna and Drake, who had now started what looked like a duel to the death.

"My, we keep showing the current Hero our embarrassing side."

The first Hero, Silas, approached and sat down next to Cloud.

"Are you disappointed?"

"Not at all. They're full of personality. It's nice to see."

The hero who built a harem.

The hero who starred in a pure love story.

The hero who lost his woman to the Demon King.

The hero who suffered alone in a dark fantasy, and so on.

All the heroes here were overflowing with personality.

In fact, the first Hero, Silas, was the least distinctive of them all. His adventure was the kind of story you'd only see in a fairy tale.

"Haha, that's true. They're strong enough to have maintained their sense of self inside the Soul Stone for hundreds of years, after all."

"Are there any who failed to protect their ego and collapsed?"

It was a rather rude question, but Silas smiled and shook his head.

"I know what you're worried about, but no, that never happened. In the first place, I never even made the offer to heroes who seemed likely to break."

Apparently, all the heroes gathered here had accepted Silas's offer in one way or another and were absorbed into the Soul Stone of their own free will.

There were six besides Silas, so he'd thought the offer was made to every hero, but it seemed it was only for those who met a certain standard.

"You said you were the one who first created this Soul Stone, Sir Silas."

"That's right."

"Was there a reason you had to create such a thing? Even at the cost of sacrificing yourself, and others?"

Silas was silent for a moment.

Then he spoke.

"How long do you think this peace will last? How long do you think the tradition of the Hero defeating the Demon King can be maintained?"

It was poor form to answer a question with a question, but it helped Cloud guess his intentions more easily.

"You mean you prepared for a time when the Hero would be defeated."

Silas nodded.

"I killed the Demon King with the other heroes. But strangely, the unsettling feeling the Demon King gave off remained. The Demon King was definitely dead, and yet... We felt it instinctively. That this was not the end of the conflict between humans and demons. We returned to our homelands and decided to prepare for the future in our own ways."

"And your method was the Soul Stone?"

"Back then, the Prona Kingdom was in a much worse state than it is now. Even a hero can't create something from nothing. Perhaps there was a better way, I don't know. But this was the best I could come up with."

The day the Hero is defeated by the Demon King.

An unprecedented chaos will unfold as the demon army overruns the continent.

There's no way a small, weak nation like the Prona Kingdom could withstand such chaos. Therefore, he created a way to generate powerful energy using the strong souls of heroes as a medium to protect the kingdom.

That's what Silas said.

"But it's all become meaningless. Our long-held secret has been exposed to the demons."

A secret weapon is valuable because its existence is a secret. A secret weapon that isn't secret doesn't hold much value.

"If what you say is true, that the Four Heavenly Kings are trying to use the Soul Stone as a medium to fully descend... I'd rather die than let that happen."

He had lived his entire life to protect the kingdom from the demons. He had maintained his ego inside the Soul Stone for hundreds of years for the sake of the kingdom.

But to think that very thing would now threaten it.

A bitter look crossed Silas's face.

"It might not be completely meaningless."

At that moment, the hero who had experienced a dark fantasy, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠who had been quiet until now, spoke while looking at Cloud. Realizing the meaning in his gaze, Silas's eyes widened, and he nodded.

"Yes, that could be possible."

"What are you talking about? Please don't keep it between yourselves; tell me too."

Silas turned his body completely toward Cloud.

"You. Would you be interested in learning the sword from me?"

"...The sword?"

It was a rather sudden offer, so Cloud tilted his head.

"There's more than just the sword we can teach you. Though in this state we can't demonstrate magic, we can at least teach you the theory."

"If you want, I can teach you some bedroom techniques!"

"Read the room, will you!"

Eredna smacked Drake on the back.

Drake, who had been cackling, suddenly turned serious. Not just him, but all the other heroes were looking at Cloud with an unusual intensity.

Even the hero who had been squatting on the floor after being insulted by Eredna and Drake.

Cloud also wiped the smile from his face.

"What do you want from me?"

"It's nothing grand. We just hope you won't forget what you learn from us and will pass it down to future generations in some way."

"That's not a difficult task, but... isn't that something you could have done yourselves without going through me? Like training a successor."

"Hmm... Embarrassingly, we didn't think of it when we were alive. I don't know why, but it was the same for everyone here. We left behind some of the equipment we used, but..."

"Hah..."

How could they not think of that?

There must have been a third party's intervention.

And it's obvious who that third party was.

Cloud let out a dry laugh and nodded.

Increasing the number of skills he could use in this world was a good thing.

To be honest, he was getting a little tired of using only basic skills like [Strong Blow], [Parrying], and [Wild Strike].

"How long will it take to learn?"

"A year should be more than enough."

"One week."

Cloud said as he stood up.

"At the latest, let's finish within a month."

Drake grinned at the sight.

"This new Hero is pretty arrogant. I like it. You need at least that much confidence to be worthy of my powerful sword!"

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"...Maybe I really should teach him some bedroom techniques."

Drake muttered as usual, but his voice lacked its usual energy. Eredna couldn't bring herself to scold him. The other heroes were the same.

"I never imagined he'd actually master everything in a week."

Silas let out a hollow laugh and shook his head. As he had first declared, Cloud learned all their techniques in just one week.

It was a pleasant miscalculation.

It meant the current Hero was far more exceptional than they had thought.

However, seeing the techniques they had spent their entire lives honing being replicated, if not perfectly, then at least similarly, after just one look, they couldn't help but feel a sense of emptiness.

"I didn't expect our time to part would come so quickly, but I'm glad for it, as it lessens the sorrow of farewell."

"...As I've said before, you don't need to go this far. Your teachings were more than enough."

"Now that its existence has been revealed to the demons, the Soul Stone must be destroyed anyway. You managed to stop them this time, but who knows if the next Hero will be able to do the same."

"What I mean is, you can all be freed from your duty as heroes and be at peace."

"The past several hundred years have become meaningless. Please, let our sacrifice have meaning."

"Yeah, you punk. Don't try to hog all the cool stuff for yourself. Share a little."

"We've been trapped in that tiny gem for hundreds of years. What's a few more years at this point?"

Cloud sighed at the heroes' banter. Refusing after they'd said all this would be even more disrespectful.

Stubborn old geezers.

And how did they even know about the pattern?

"Don't come blaming me later."

Cloud gripped the Soul Stone and used the pattern.

The moment he did, the heroes' souls were sucked into the Soul Stone. He felt a strong resistance from the hand holding the stone.

It wasn't because the heroes' souls were resisting absorption.

It was because Cloud's vessel was too small to contain all of them. No, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it was wrong to even blame Cloud's vessel.

Each one of them has an insane presence.

The heroes had compressed their souls as much as possible to make it easier for Cloud to accept them.

But these were the heroes who had represented the Prona Kingdom in their respective eras. The quality and size of their souls were incomparable to those of an ogre or a behemoth.

This feels like trying to pour the ocean through a funnel.

His arm, the conduit connecting the heroes' souls to his vessel, felt like it was being torn apart. Veins bulged and muscles twitched uncontrollably.

The souls that barely made it through his tormented arm tried to settle inside his vessel.

The backlash was just as severe.

Capillaries in his eyes burst, and tears of blood streamed down his face.

Blood trickled from his nose and ears, and a high-pitched ringing began.

Gack—

A fistful of blood surged up his throat.

This is bad. If I just passively accept them, my body will break down.

All that was happening was souls entering and trying to settle in his vessel. That was all, yet his body was being severely damaged.

He had wanted to avoid tampering with their souls if possible, but he had no choice now.

Cloud began to compress the heroes' souls.

However, unlike when he compressed the souls of the ogre or behemoth, he was extremely careful not to affect the original souls.

Thanks to this, it took two full days for Cloud to finally stabilize the heroes' souls.

Letting out a long breath, Cloud collapsed. His blood vessels were twisted, his organs were damaged, and his muscles were torn. He had stayed awake for two full days in that state.

It was literally a miracle he was still alive.

"...This is why I said I didn't want to do this."

Next time I see them, respect for elders be damned, I'm going to punch one of them.

Cloud spat the blood from his mouth onto the floor and used the wall to push himself up.

He staggered toward the outside.

*

<Hero's Pattern>

[Passive]

-Reduces damage taken from Demons by 20%.

-Increases damage dealt to Demons by 20%.

-Reduces damage taken from Black Magic by 20%.

-Reduces damage taken from Undead by 20%.

-Increases damage dealt to Undead by 20%.

[Active]

(Bloom)

-For a short time, draws out all latent potential. User loses consciousness when 'Bloom' ends.

(Wither)

-Can be used during 'Bloom'.

-Draws out power exceeding latent potential. When 'Wither' ends, all stats are permanently reduced by 10%.