The Last Hero (2)
I should probably get some sleep.
I had no idea what Aji thought about any of this, but personally, I wanted to wrap up her training as fast as possible and get back to the village. Come to think of it, hadn't it been almost a month since I'd last been there? I'd told the village chief I'd be back soon, and yet my return kept getting pushed further and further out. Best to sleep, finish training Aji quickly, and head home. And to do that, I needed to get to sleep first.
"Sleep in that room."
"That room?"
"Yeah."
I handed Aji one of the two keys the innkeeper had given me. I was about to head into my own room and finally rest when Aji quietly caught hold of my clothes.
What's this about?
I turned around to find her clutching the key, wearing an expression of pure incomprehension.
"What?"
"We're not sleeping together?"
Hold on... what was she even saying?
I fell silent for a solid three seconds, completely at a loss for how to answer. But I managed to pull myself together quickly enough. I kept forgetting — Aji wasn't human. She was a beastman, a race whose common sense and instincts diverged from humanity's in every possible way. She might look roughly human on the outside, but on the inside she was far closer to an animal. Of course her culture and way of thinking would be wildly different from a human's.
"Well. Humans don't sleep together."
"Why?"
"Because... we're human."
It wasn't that I couldn't understand where she was coming from. For animals, sleeping together was a survival advantage — better odds of handling a crisis, a safer night's rest. From that perspective, what I was doing must have seemed completely pointless. She simply couldn't grasp why companions would sleep apart.
I had no choice but to explain it to her. I didn't bother with some long-winded lecture, though. There was no way a beastman would truly understand human common sense — and even if she did, she'd never be able to relate to it. Better to just gloss over it and move on.
Having said my piece, I turned to go into my room again.
"But there were people who slept together."
"..."
Huh...
Aji was still looking at me with genuine curiosity, pointing out that humans slept together too. Well... she wasn't exactly wrong.
"No... what I mean is, you don't sleep with someone you've barely known for any time at all."
I had no choice but to tack on a further explanation — that you didn't share a bed with a complete stranger. Hoping that would finally be enough, I was just about to step into my room for real this time.
"But there were people who slept together."
"..."
And once again, Aji pushed back. I was forced to pile on yet another layer of clarification.
"Look... Aji. What I'm saying is, humans don't sleep with little kids like you who they've only just met."
That should do it, right?
I felt like I'd explained the whole thing perfectly well. Honestly, Aji had a point — it wasn't as if humans never shared a bed with someone they'd just met. Grown adults could certainly end up doing that. But nobody normally slept with a little kid like Aji. My explanation felt airtight. She couldn't possibly argue with this one.
"But there were people who slept together."
You've got to be kidding me...
Aji contradicted me yet again. There were people like that? What kind of absolute freak—
"Aji. Those people aren't human."
I clicked my tongue. Who in their right mind would even think about sleeping next to a little kid like this? If I ever caught someone like that, I'd cut their head off on the spot without a second thought.
"Oh. I see."
Maybe it was the murderous look on my face, but Aji finally wore an expression that suggested she'd accepted it.
"Good. You understand now? Get some rest, and I'll see you tomorrow."
"Okay."
The Q&A session was over. Leaving Aji behind, I finally stepped into my room.
"Hah. I'm wiped."
I collapsed straight onto the bed. Finally, some rest. I was just about to drift off when—
Creeeak...
"...?"
Not long after, I was forced awake again. I'd barely started trying to rest — who the hell was bothering me now? I sat up with a faintly irritated look on my face. Whoever it was, they were dead. Truly. Just in case the person who'd entered my room turned out to be a thief or a robber, I opened my eyes ready to offer a silent prayer for their soul.
What I found instead left me genuinely surprised. It wasn't a thief or a robber at all.
"What? Aji? Is something wrong?"
The one who'd come into my room was Aji. Why on earth was she barging into my room in the middle of the night?
"Hah... hah...♡"
And she looked... more than a little off.
"I'm sorry — what did you just say, Hero Jacks?"
Until moments ago, the party members had been relieved to have found a hero in Jacks. They'd felt genuine gratitude toward him for taking them back on as a hero's companions. But what was happening now? Jacks was saying something completely insane. He'd brought them to an inn and announced he wanted to check their physical chemistry? What kind of situation even was this?
"You want to... check our physical chemistry?"
"A hero and his party members aren't that kind of relationship."
The party members recoiled in pure disgust. What did he think they were? Granted, a hero and his companions were all grown adults, and under the right circumstances such things could happen. But that was a purely personal matter — not something that came with the roles of hero and party member. Surely he hadn't become a hero just so he could do those kinds of things with his companions?
The light in the party members' eyes, as they looked at Jacks, was steadily dying.
"Hmm... is that so? Haha. I must have misunderstood."
Jacks apologized at once, laughing it off as if it were nothing, trying to smooth the whole thing over. Just a joke, he insisted — no need to take it so seriously.
"Mm..."
"Right?"
It really was just a joke... right?
Of course, they couldn't simply take him at his word. Whether he'd genuinely been joking or was simply saying whatever was convenient — honestly, it was hard to tell. The looks they gave Jacks remained less than warm. Still, they forced themselves to believe him. Come on... he'd said it was a joke. Common sense said it couldn't be anything else. Jacks had volunteered to become a hero, after all. He couldn't possibly have taken that on lightly. It had to have been nothing more than a joke.
The party members tried to reassure themselves.
Don't... think too badly of him.
No — they had to reassure themselves. The truth was, they weren't really in a position to get angry with Jacks. Under normal circumstances they would have recoiled in open disgust, but they did their best not to show it. They knew better than anyone how little room they had to maneuver.
They had already been through three heroes before being recruited into Jacks's party. After three failures, their standing with the Empire had plummeted about as far as it could go. At this rate, even if they managed to defeat the Demon King, there was a real chance the Empire wouldn't honor its promises. Their situation was already precarious enough — a fourth failure was simply not an option. And even if they succeeded, souring their relationship with the hero was something that absolutely could not be allowed to happen. This time, they had to make sure Jacks succeeded in slaying the Demon King. If anything, they were the ones who desperately needed to stay on his good side.
So think positive. This whole thing was just their own baseless worry.
"Understood. Shall we get going, then?"
Jacks left the inn again and took the lead. Fortunately, the direction he headed was toward the Demon Realm. So they were going straight there after all. The party members followed after him.
Still better than Alex, at least.
Jacks's first impression had been truly awful, but Karne — the elf of the hero's party — still considered it a relief. Yes, a man like this was hundreds, thousands of times better than a hero plotting a rebellion. So what if he had a few strange ideas?
She was in the middle of settling her thoughts that way when—
"Kyaah...!"
Apparently, she wouldn't be able to settle them after all. Karne couldn't stop herself from crying out.
"Huh...? Karne, what's wrong?"
"Karne. Is something the matter?"
Why had she screamed? The other party members asked her what was going on. Instead of answering directly, Karne replied with a face flushed deep red.
"W-what do you think you're doing?"
Looking half furious and half mortified, she glared at Jacks with eyes that were nearly brimming with tears.
This man just grabbed my butt...!
The reason she was glaring at him was simple: Jacks had casually groped her rear. It was no mistake. His hand had definitely touched her. He'd done it while the others weren't looking. She'd been trying so hard to give him the benefit of the doubt — and he'd pulled something like this already? This, she had no choice but to call out properly.
"Is something the matter, Lady Karne?"
But Jacks spoke as if he had absolutely no idea what she was talking about, wearing an expression of complete bafflement at why she was reacting this way.
"Excuse me?"
He's playing dumb? Is this guy insane?
Karne could scarcely believe what she was dealing with.