Why Did You Do It?!
"Why—!!! Why did you do that?! Why...!!"
Arang grabbed Leon by the collar and screamed in rage.
I could understand Nen crying.
Her twin sister, someone she'd always been glued to, was gone—like losing half of herself.
But why Arang? I felt empty and sad too, but not that much...
Thud...!
"So you're saying I, the Hero, should've died instead?!"
Leon shook off Arang's arm and yelled back. She staggered backward, pushed away.
If Arang had been in her normal state, she wouldn't have been shoved by Leon like that...
Her whole body was covered in red blood from wounds everywhere, after charging close to strike the Demon King amid those pouring beams of light.
"Haa... haa..."
Arang panted roughly, then turned to look at me.
Step... step...
She stumbled toward me.
"Seraphina's the Saintess, right...? You can save Annie? Yeah?"
Her face twisted in tears, like someone who'd lost family or a lover, as she clung to me and begged.
Wait... lover?
It was weird when I thought about it. How hadn't I noticed?
At the start of our journey, Arang and Annie often shared Leon's bed with him.
But as the trip dragged on, they spent less and less time with him. Mostly just me or the twin elf sisters kept him company at night.
And after that day Leon tried to force himself on Ceria, I hardly ever saw Arang and Annie near him.
The two bathed together... always stuck side by side, so close...
I'd thought it was just because they were both frontline fighters bonding.
But if it wasn't...?
"..."
I instinctively pulled back the hand I'd reflexively raised to heal her.
If Arang and Annie really were lovers, like I suspected—what would a healed Arang do to Leon?
She'd blame him for Annie's death and try to kill him, no doubt.
An unawakened Leon couldn't survive an attack from an awakened Arang...
"Ha... haa!"
Leon raked back his hair with a hand, breathing hard like he was worked up.
"You all lost comrades and can't think straight anymore... Just hear me out."
"What...?"
He flashed that mask-like smile at everyone.
"Who could've predicted the Demon King had a power to erase our attacks? He aimed it at me and used it. What if he'd targeted someone else instead? Listen—someone had to take it anyway. It just happened to be me. Yeah, it was an accident."
There was... some logic to his words.
No one in the party had even noticed the Demon King's perfect counter ability.
But did that make it right for Leon to hide behind a comrade with no defense, letting them die to save his own skin?
"Right... Leon. You're correct. No one knew about that power. But... you can't act like this right now."
Ceria had approached unnoticed, ice sword in hand.
Her mana was depleted, judging by the remnants clinging to her body.
Leon still had most of his mana intact, so even though she couldn't strike, she spoke.
"You charged ahead, and the Demon King targeted you. That was your mistake. But instead of handling it alone, you used a comrade without any shielding ability as a meat shield."
Her purple eyes ground out the words, unleashing a tremendous pressure that overwhelmed me for a moment.
"I... I'm the Hero..."
"And what's that supposed to mean?!"
Ceria cut him off with a thunderclap yell as he tried to speak.
"The Hero is the one who defeats the Demon King and saves everyone! Leon Donaued! What have you done right as a Hero?! Even cutting off the Demon King's breath—that was my blade, with the Saintess's help!"
"Kuh...! You think that wound would've been possible without the damage my holy sword inflicted?!"
Leon screamed like a last-ditch struggle.
"Urgh... haha! Hahaha!"
"...?"
He seemed to groan at first, then burst into mad laughter.
A smirk crept across his lips.
"We beat the Demon King anyway. That's the end of it, right?"
He pulled a scroll from his pocket.
"What's that..."
Riiip—!
Before anyone could finish asking, Leon tore the scroll.
"The Order said there's only one like it. A holy relic that returns you even from a place thick with demonic energy."
Fwoosh—...!
A white gate appeared beside him. Leon stepped through and vanished.
The white light shrank rapidly. My body moved before I could think.
If we missed that gate, we'd be stuck deep in the Contaminated Land.
No food, no supplies—impossible to make it back to the kingdom...!!
Thud—!
Just before I reached it, I saw Ceria grabbing the collapsed Nen and Arang.
Fwoosh.
By the time I passed through, the gate had shrunk so small she had to duck—but I worried if they'd made it.
I glanced back at the shrinking hole of light, now barely big enough to crawl through.
Whoosh—! Thump—!
There—Ceria, hugging Ren and Arang, threw herself flat through it.
"Kuh..."
Ceria groaned from hitting the wall, Arang with her. Nen looked dazed.
Thank goodness... everyone made it...
I sighed in relief and looked around.
A return scroll would've had a set destination.
"This place..."
It was very familiar to me.
Towering marble statues of past saints everywhere.
The temple at the Holy Order Headquarters.
"Protect me, everyone—! I was wounded in the fierce battle with the Demon King!"
Leon was already yelling at the paladins rushing over.
"You Hero bastard...!!!"
Arang lunged like a feral beast, claws out.
"You piece of shit!!"
Ceria, unable to hold back this time, charged with her ice sword.
The Order's paladins blocked them.
If they'd been at full strength, even dozens of paladins couldn't have stopped Ceria and Arang.
But both had depleted their mana and untreated wounds.
"Those two fell to the Demon King's illusions! Protect me!"
Leon joined the paladins. They unleashed holy arts and shield techniques, and the two tired first.
Thud...!
"...Hah... heuk..."
"Grrr... Hero... save Annie...!"
Bound and collapsed, they ground their teeth.
"Why's everyone so heated...? We're the Hero party that beat the Demon King, right? Let's relax, yeah?"
Leon looked triumphant.
Who won was obvious at a glance.
Of course, Ceria and Arang were furious at Leon, and they'd report it to the higher-ups for sure.
"Hero Leon Donaued sacrificed comrades to survive alone?"
"Hm... But he did defeat the Demon King, didn't he?"
The Alpha Kingdom's king and nobles.
The Goddess Religion's pope and high priests.
The two ruling powers involved in the Demon King subjugation and Hero selection concluded: Demon King defeated—no issues.
Honestly... I'd expected this from the start.
With the kingdom's elite and the Order backing Leon, they'd never rule against him.
Especially since he'd achieved their goal of subjugating the Demon King.
"Hero Leon Donaued! He failed utterly in his role as Hero! Even now, post-subjugation, he hasn't awakened...! Comrades died to beat the Demon King!"
But Ceria de Valstein protested Leon's wrongs and punishment to the end.
They couldn't brush her off lightly—she was heir to the Valstein Ducal Family.
"We'll ask the Saintess. Did Hero Leon Donaued fail in his role?"
In the end, the kingdom and Order demanded my testimony—I'd witnessed everything.
Why me...? I thought.
But there was no one else.
Arang was from the Beast Kingdom, Nen from the Elf Kingdom—both nations took them back, satisfied with "Demon King slayers' comrades."
Torment stirred in my heart.
Leon's actions weren't befitting a Hero... I felt I should accuse him here.
Thump...
But the throb from my belly tipped the scales.
Pregnancy past three months—my stomach was starting to swell...
"There was an accident during the subjugation, but... the Hero undoubtedly played his part and succeeded."
My testimony silenced Ceria's claims.
If it were another crime, they'd investigate deeper.
"Just as the Hero said—they must've been under the Demon King's illusions! That beastkin and elf are still trying to kill him, right?"
"Even the Saintess, God's proxy, says so—no problem. Spread the Hero's victory news at once!"
The elite preferred proclaiming the Demon King's defeat to boost the kingdom's prestige over punishing their Hero.
Yeah... this settles it.
Demon King's gone. It's over.
"Sera. Thanks. In the end, you're the only one who stayed by my side."
Leon came to me with that bright smile from our first meeting. My anxious heart calmed.
Now's the time.
"Um, Hero... no, Leon."
"Yeah?"
"I'm pregnant with your child."
His red pupils widened.
"Huh."
For a split second, his face soured—then he forced calm.
"Th-the Order forbids impure relations for priests, doesn't it?"
What? Why say that now?
And you, Leon...?
Heat surged from my gut, something rising.
"It's not a sin if we marry..."
I bit my lip and told him.
"Right. Marriage... marriage."
Leon paused, grabbed my shoulders with both hands.
"We can't marry right now."
"What? What do you mean...?"
"I'm the Hero who beat the Demon King, right? Got a ton of stuff to handle for a while."
Stuff to handle...? More important than the woman carrying your child?
"Don't make that face, Sera. For now... live at my Donaued house. Once things settle, I'll do whatever you want."
I couldn't trust those words at all.
"...Okay."
But I had no other choice.