Chapter 31
Chapter 31
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 31
Chapter Title: Failure-1
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He lay there as if dead, a faint smile playing on his lips.
He looked happy.
As far as Pashier could remember, it wasn't that he had never smiled once during their journey. She couldn't recall just how pure and beautiful that smile of his had been.
She hadn't seen him as a person.
When he was just the porter, he had been little more than a pack mule. It was only natural that the party members resented him for forcing his way into their group without offering any explanation. And yet, he had meekly followed their every order.
She had thought she treated him well enough in her own way. But it wasn't respect or consideration for him as a human being.
It was the fondness one feels for a well-behaved pet that knows where to do its business, or the attachment to a tool that functions perfectly. It wasn't affection for another person.
Even when he had acknowledged her dream—unlike the others—happy about what she "should" be happy about. She had seen him as a tool that hadn't broken yet. Pashier had never treated him like a human.
If she had, she never would have viewed his actions as betrayal and lashed out in anger.
His smile slowly faded. His body began to twitch faintly.
A smile still lingered on his lips. It looked so terribly fleeting that Pashier sank even deeper into gloom.
His eyes opened. He quietly scanned his surroundings, his expression gradually hardening.
"Why am I still here?"
"It failed."
"Why?"
Staring at Pashier with hollow, emotionless eyes, he writhed like a bomb on the verge of detonation.
"Me. I failed."
Emotions tied to the Hero's Return Ritual.
Anxiety and fear? Of course she felt them. When a true Hero flew into a rage, unspeakable horrors from the records would come to pass.
But even in that moment, Pashier hadn't seen him as a person.
Enel had risen from a mere tool meant to obey her will into something terrifying and immense—but he still wasn't human.
He was nothing more or less than a colossal wildfire too vast for any human to contain, or a natural disaster too overwhelming to resist.
"I... never got to thank you."
She had glimpsed hope in his promise to return, felt triumph seating him upon the magic circle. Emotions fully within her grasp.
But gratitude? That she couldn't muster. It was the sort of feeling one person has for another's deeds.
"I... I never truly saw you, not until the very end!"
When had things turned out like this?
There were plenty who slandered Pashier. Like some witch from a grim fairy tale, she had countless detractors who reviled and despised her.
Normally, she would have brushed it off as petty jealousy from lesser minds. But now, she had no choice but to concede the point.
Disgust at herself welled up, and Pashier wept endlessly.
She had never once considered what he might have felt. Even revisiting memories alone, she relied on rote formulas like, "That much humiliation would make anyone angry."
"Hah..."
He let out a hollow laugh. It quickly shattered his breathing, tears mingling with the ragged gasps.
"Hah, heh, haha, heh, sob..."
He was crumbling. The last thread of hope he clung to had snapped.
He wailed like a beast. Laughter, tears, blank stares—every breath brimmed with sorrow.
"Yeah... right. From the start, it was never going to work."
"No, it could have worked. If I hadn't stuck my nose in where it didn't belong, if I'd just thanked you even a little!"
These mages and priests—they knew who the real Hero was.
Not everyone looked kindly on Enel, but at the very least, they believed he deserved gratitude.
Had they performed the ritual without her, it wouldn't have failed.
"No way I could've pulled it off... no way I could've gone back..."
As if deaf to the world, he muttered ceaselessly to himself.
"I'm sorry. So sorry..."
Enel advanced toward Pashier, step by frozen step.
His brutal fist sank into the soft belly of the young mage, eyes squeezed shut.
"Guhhhk!"
She knew it was coming, yet the mage didn't dodge.
Her breath exploded from her lungs, innards twisting in agony—but she endured. No, she simply accepted it.
"Why... why'd you do it?"
Enel wore a look of agony, as if he were the one taking the blows.
"Just once. If it'd worked just once."
But his fists never stopped, pounding away at Pashier heedless of his grief-stricken face.
Abdomen, shoulder, chest. Nowhere left unscathed.
One spell now, and Pashier could end the pain. His grip held no power in that moment.
Yet she took his fury in silence.
"Then I could've—at the very least, at the end—left this world with one good memory of you!"
Blood dribbled from the mage's lips. Fighting the Demon King had brought worse perils, sharper pains—but no time to dwell then.
Always scheming: how to escape the crisis, how to seize victory.
Not now. No guiltless monster promising bliss upon triumph.
The only monsters here were her—who never once understood him—and the man shattered by the same failure.
"Why... why'd you have to..."
His words rang hollow too. By now, no good feelings left for the mage.
But in time, with much forgotten, pains and emotions distant, only joys and pretty pictures lingering...
Then perhaps he'd recall her final "kindness"—not kindness at all.
A pointless what-if now.
Crude, unrefined fists hammered her cheeks and jaw. Weight behind every blow, relentlessly.
Each impact drew a soundless scream from Pashier. Too weak to seal her bleeding mouth; air whistled through the gaps.
Mages and priests shuddered, witnessing the madness. Their powers spent entirely on the ritual.
Even at full strength, none dared face his wrath head-on.
"Stop."
But the Princess approached with icy calm. Light from the Hero's sword faintly illuminated the dim basement.
Through the wavering glow, Enel glimpsed Elenor's face; Elenor, his.
"Come back, Elenor! You can't do that!"
The Emperor cried out desperately, but Elenor neither sheathed her blade nor halted.
"I saw this as half-betrayal, was disappointed in her... but Pashier is still my friend."
Enel paused.
"Heh, heuh..."
A smile crept across his tear-streaked face.
"Haha, hahaha, hahahaha..."
Laughter too ragged, heaving his breaths. Even laughing strained him now, endlessly accelerating.
"This changes nothing for you. I swear everything His Majesty can offer. No blame falls on you, as you desire."
Elenor leveled her sword ahead.
"A friend, huh. Friend... friend..."
He released Pashier limply. The bleeding little mage crumpled to the floor.
"Can't gather those materials again anytime soon. My feelings aside, the Empire—His Majesty—did everything possible."
"..."
"Unavoidable, isn't it? Give it up. The Leodrín Barony comes with lands. Go live your life. Do as you please there; we won't interfere."
Powerless as any commoner now, yet all but the Princess quailed before Enel.
"Embrace women. Savor fine foods, rest easy. As an Imperial subject, I'll guard you with my life."
"...Give up?"
Pashier stirred, forcing open her blood-choked throat.
"Immortal... forbidden arts... I can use them... somehow, given time... send you back..."
Enel crushed her wrist beneath his foot; her desperate rasp died instantly.
"Enough."
Enel gave a curt laugh.
"Going back changes nothing. Family, friends—gone long ago."
"...What?"
"It's not about wanting to go back."
Princess, Pashier, Emperor—all hung on his words in stunned confusion.
No desire to return? Nothing explained his endurance, his hopes, his deeds.
"Not wanting to go back—not wanting to live! In this world, with you here, I never wanted to live a single instant!"
At last, an emotion they grasped: hatred blazing in his eyes.
"Need to cool off for a bit. I won't take your life."
The Hero's keen blade edged toward him.
"No... no..."
Rage from moments ago vanished like a dream; shoulders slumped, head bowed.
"When I wake, I'll apologize properly. Insult me, beat me—like you did to Pashier."
Elenor swung for his shoulder. Blue light erupted from the Hero's sword, rending flesh.
"...Huh?"
The hand of the 'once-Hero' was marred with horrific wounds and blood.