The Hero Who Wouldn't Seek Forgiveness
What word do those who wish for their sins to be forgiven utter the most? It is probably please forgive me. After all, the most effective way to ease the guilt one feels toward a specific person is to directly appeal to that person's mercy. Moreover, in this world a book preaching the absurd idea of loving your enemies sells like hotcakes. There even exists a bizarre culture that regards the act of forgiving someone as a kind of virtue and holds it sacred—a strange phenomenon I find almost impossible to understand. After personally wandering this world overflowing with benevolence for nearly several decades, I have reached one firm conclusion: the phrase please forgive me has become so light that it now carries less weight than a casual morning greeting.
Sniffle. “I-I was wrong… I did wrong….”
Yet the woman before my eyes did not easily speak of forgiveness. It was as if she believed she did not even deserve that much. As if the very idea were absurd. Her appearance, desiring neither forgiveness nor salvation and seemingly wishing only to be condemned for her wrongdoing, looked even more wretched than a sinner who had committed a mortal sin.
“Hero….”
I knelt so that I could at least meet her gaze, but her eyes, which had lost their light and grown dull, seemed to struggle even to recognize me sitting right in front of her.
“Hero…. It’s me….”
“I-I was wro—ugh! Wrong…. I was wrong….”
Even the words I had painstakingly strung together while steadying my turbulent heart seemed unable to reach her consciousness. It was right after that that I noticed the anomaly occurring in the Hero’s body.
“….!”
Her beautiful golden hair, which had reminded me of ripe barley stalks, was slowly being dyed an ominous white of unknown origin. It was more accurate to say that the color coating her was fading away like dye washing out of cloth rather than a new hue being overlaid. And the source of the power emanating from this abnormal phenomenon was a truly familiar concept that anyone walking the path of priesthood could not fail to recognize. The fragmented miracle that God was said to have bestowed upon humanity. It was divine power.
“Hey, you there!”
At that exact moment, the being I had momentarily pushed to the edge of my awareness suddenly called out to me. With a slightly irritated, stammering motion I turned around. There, a white mat-like figure—with her upper body bound tightly by the long skirt she wore and her lower body, clad in nothing but underwear, wriggling nonstop like a fish on land—was suddenly shouting at me.
“You’re still there, aren’t you!? You’re listening to me, right! Lower-realm human! Do you even realize what a sin deserving of heavenly punishment you are committing right now!? Of course you don’t! Obviously you don’t! If you knew who I was, you would never have dared to commit such blasphemous behavior! J-just this once! Yes, just this once I will specially and mercifully forgive that ignorance of yours! So right now! Release this vulgar restraint you have placed on me immediately!”
The arrogant attitude was hard to believe coming from such a pathetic figure, with only her lower body in panties sticking out from the tightly bound upper half. At first I had felt the tiniest twinge of guilt, thinking I might have gone too far. But after hearing that tone, it seemed my worry had been unnecessary. I did not feel in the slightest that this restraint was an unreasonable measure. Preventing a suspicious person who spoke suspicious words from committing suspicious acts by binding their limbs was simply the proper thing to do. There were no personal feelings involved whatsoever.
“Hero. It’s me. Reygis Rowbill. Don’t you recognize me?”
“Hey! I know you’re listening! Stop ignoring me and answer! Lower-realm human!”
That uniquely unpleasant voice—like a preschooler begging their parents to buy a toy—kept jabbing at the back of my head. But right now I was completely absorbed in wiping the Hero’s tears with the handkerchief I had prepared. I had no mental leeway left to pay attention to such worthless noise.
“Ha! If you are thinking of trying any tricks on my vessel, you had better give up! Right now she is in the middle of receiving my sacred power! She is in no state to listen to anyone’s voice! Therefore! Stop this nonsense at once! Release this restraint immediately and bow your head to m—.”
Crack.
“Uh… uhh…?”
After a sinister wave-like sound echoed once, the extremely grating noise finally subsided. Without moving my neck, I slid my eyes in that direction. The blade-shaped rosario that had been hanging around my neck was now embedded like a throwing star right beside her. Thanks to the hole the blade had torn through her collar on its way in, that suspicious person could once again see the outside world. Yet the moment our eyes met through the torn opening, she began to tremble like a rabbit before a wolf, and from her I no longer sensed any intention to spout more nonsense.
“Whew….”
I wanted to sternly warn her to please stay quiet for even a little while, but I could not speak harshly. I could not yell crude words in front of the Hero. Therefore, I carefully brought my index finger to my lips and subtly conveyed my intention, like a librarian cautioning a noisy patron. Shut your mouth.
“Hieek!”
Confirming from her frightened reaction that my intention had been clearly conveyed, I was about to turn my gaze back toward the Hero when—
Grab.
“H-Hero…?”
“It’s b-because of me…. Hic! B-because of m-me….”
The Hero carefully embraced my right hand—which was covered in blood and riddled with unidentified fragments—with trembling fingers, letting out a sorrowful sob. Soon the hazy somethings that had been shimmering around her like steam over hot water began to take clear shape. It was an old film lighting up in ashen tones. A musty soot that forcibly thrust an unwanted past into someone’s face. Having experienced something similar only a short while ago, I could easily guess that this was the scene the Hero was seeing. In other words, it was a past she wanted to turn away from.
Whether this phenomenon was a unique characteristic of the dungeon or a trick by that extremely talkative mat, there was no way to tell at the moment. But it was painfully clear what past the Hero was facing, what she was regretting, and what she was suffering over. A man bleeding from his hand. A young girl crying across from him. The familiar scene that forcibly dragged up a memory from the past could be seen as a kind of reenactment play that brought the original lead actors along with it.
“Hero…. This wound is not because of you….”
“N-no….! Because of me! It’s because of me….! Hic!”
Although we had finally managed to exchange words, what she was seeing was the me from the past. Not the current me. The incredibly foolish man who had stood there blankly where the Hero had swung her sword, busy chewing on guilty thoughts. He was a truly insignificant person who had no reason to make her suffer like this.
“So you knew everything after all….”
“Hic! Ugh! Ugh!”
She seemed to be using every ounce of strength to hold back the wails threatening to burst out, but her constant efforts ultimately ended in failure. Starting with a single tear rolling down, she threw herself into my arms. From the damp breaths that wet my neck, her raw emotions—impossible to express in mere language—seeped into me layer by layer.
“Ugh! Ugh, I-I w-was wro—ugh!”
It now seemed even forming complete sentences was beyond her. Her behavior, as if she could not control the emotions surging out one after another, looked like that of a child having a nightmare about their parents disappearing.
“No…. It was me…. I was the one who was wrong….”
“N-no! M-me! I’m the bad one! S-sorry! Ugh! M-mister! W-wrong! Ugh! I did wro—ugh!”
I tried hugging her back as she clung to me, patting her back, stroking her head—yet there was no sign of her tears stopping. How much time passed like that? The ominous white that had invaded her golden hair began to stir with terrifying momentum, as if it would cover her entire body. Even a rotten mullet is still a mullet, as they say. Though only half-baked, as one priest capable of handling divine power I instinctively realized it. This invasion was heavily influenced by her emotions. It would inflict severe damage on her personality.
“H-Hero. Would you listen to my story for a moment?”
“Hic! Ugh!”
I had to think. I needed to find some way to mediate, even if only for a brief moment, this intense lament of hers, these swirling emotions.
“H-Hero…! Hero! Please calm down for a moment! Abi… Abigail!”
“Hic! Uuuugh! I was wrong, I was wrong….”
But there was no way my not-particularly-brilliant head could come up with any great alternative in such a short time that could hardly even be called an instant. It was around the time I belatedly sensed that the ominous erosion was about to reach the very root of the Hero’s soul.
“Urgh!”
She had received a mental shock; I had to somehow spit out information shocking enough to freeze her thoughts even for a moment. Right after my confused brain reached that hasty conclusion—
“Hero. The truth is, I like women… a tremendous amount.”
“Hweh?”
At my absurd confession that had popped out without going through my brain, she suddenly let out a hollow breath into the air.