The Incompetent Hero's Revenge Plan
"Leon!"
Tiris's urgent cry rang out across the battlefield.
A portion of the monsters she'd been holding back had broken free and were charging straight at me. She was a hero herself, and I was Leon — the absolute bottom of this party's combat rankings — so I could understand why she sounded so frantic.
Under normal circumstances, the script would have called for me to take a nasty hit without managing any real response.
But the me of right now was different.
"Hoo..."
I shed every scrap of unnecessary tension from my body and swung my sword along the path my muscles already knew, meeting the oncoming monster head-on. The edge of the blade aura, forged through pure technical mastery, was sharp beyond all reason — and the beast's body split cleanly along the arc of my cut.
"Ah."
Damn it.
I'd only meant to wound it enough to break its charge. I never imagined I'd cleave the thing clean in half.
It was a movement the original Leon could never have pulled off. Not even close.
Had I stood out too much? I glanced sideways at Tiris and found her staring at me with her eyes gone round as saucers, the monster she'd been tanking completely forgotten.
Was it really okay to zone out that hard in the middle of a fight? And she was supposed to be the tank, no less?
"Tiris! In front of you!!"
"Ah!—"
BOOM!!
"Whoa..."
Just as I'd feared, the monster she'd been holding off slammed into her the moment her attention slipped. Watching a human body go flying like a baseball knocked clean out of the park, I couldn't help the little noise of genuine wonder that escaped me.
Of course, Marie's magic managed to pull the situation back together after that, and we finished the commission somehow.
A world inside a game.
About a week had passed since I'd possessed the protagonist of The Success Story of the Incompetent Hero.
Life here wasn't nearly as bad as I'd expected. Setting aside the total lack of internet and other modern diversions a guy like me would normally kill for, day-to-day living was actually pretty comfortable. Everyday household goods existed under the name of practical magic tools, and a decent inn even had something resembling a proper shower.
So what exactly did a person do for fun in a place with no entertainment?
Leon party's daily routine was brutally simple.
Wander the continent. Hunt monsters. Stack power and experience.
Of course, that wasn't unique to Leon's party — the other two hero parties were doing the exact same thing.
"Um, Leon. Have you been doing some kind of training on your own?"
"No, nothing like that."
"Is that so...? It's just that you haven't been joining me for morning or evening drills lately, and yet your movements have improved so noticeably..."
After a week of clearing monsters in the area as a party, Tiris — who, as the tank, got the closest look at my fighting of anyone — had finally sensed something off and come to ask about it.
"Come to think of it... Leon has been getting hurt a lot less often lately."
"Less often? It's basically stopped entirely..."
"Mm. It's like he's gained composure... or maybe a kind of ease..."
But Tiris wasn't the only one who'd noticed the change over the past week. Noren, Marie, and Philia each added a comment of their own, all of them looking at me.
Don't look at me like that. You'll make me get attached.
"Maybe the things Tiris taught me are finally starting to sink in."
I let a small smile slip and deflected the remarks of these unnervingly sharp-eyed women. Keep talking about me here and I'd be in real trouble. I needed to change the subject — fast.
And there was only one topic that suited this bunch perfectly.
"More importantly, when was the exchange conference again? We should probably start moving soon."
"Ah... r-right. We've got about two weeks, so a leisurely pace should be fine. This conference is scheduled to be held in the Roman Kingdom."
"The Roman Kingdom..."
"...Hero Ragna's homeland."
Tiris carefully checked Marie's expression. The reason she was watching Marie's face was obvious enough. Marie was going to jump ship to Ragna Roman's party.
She was probably fretting over whether it would look like she was tipping me off on purpose. Tiris was a traitor too, same as Marie.
And just as she feared, Marie's face tightened for a fraction of a second.
It was such a fleeting shift that anyone without serious technique would never have caught it.
Yeah. The original Leon never would have noticed in a million years.
"Let's rest today and start moving tomorrow. What's the distance from here to the Roman Kingdom?"
"We should arrive in about a week without any trouble."
"Then we'll get there early and take a week to rest. I'm pretty wiped — mind if I head up first?"
"Of course. Get some good rest, Leon."
After Leon went upstairs under Noren's send-off, the four women sat looking at one another in silence.
Leon himself had denied it, but they all knew. Something about him had changed.
"It's hard to put my finger on exactly what..."
"He's definitely different."
"A hero's growth is something we ought to celebrate."
"That's true, but..."
At Noren's words, Tiris let her sentence trail off.
A hero's growth. That was absolutely something to be glad about. A stronger hero meant more power to stand against the Demon King.
But for her, right now, it was anything but good news.
Because they were planning to betray him.
Because they were telling themselves they couldn't keep operating as a party under an incompetent hero — lying to themselves with that excuse while they prepared to switch parties.
"Everyone... let's just get some rest for now. As the Hero said... we need to prepare for the exchange conference."
The overall flow of this game went like this:
Growth Arc → Exchange Conference Arc → (repeat) → Ending
The growth arcs were straight-up turn-based RPG. Sure, there were H-scenes, but most of them were defeat scenes. The real focus was character progression.
The exchange conference arcs were a hybrid of deduction and puzzle-solving. As far as the eroge side of things went, this was the main event — the stretch where the heroines' corruption and the H-scenes that came with it piled up the thickest. It was also where the various ending routes branched, and where the protagonist's growth path got locked in.
RPG plus mystery puzzles. Mix those two elements properly and the game design itself was honestly top-tier.
If you ignored the fact that NTR was the main course, anyway.
Either way, after a few exchange conferences, a final conference event unlocked. That was when every starting heroine abandoned the protagonist and he had to push forward alone. Judging by the current situation, this looked like that final conference timing.
"Works out fine for me. Once this conference is over, I'll be free to move however I want — perfect timing to go meet the Sword King."
Grinning at the thought of unleashing the Sword King Secret Arts, I pulled up my status window.
Over the past week of living here, I'd figured out a few things.
First: I couldn't level up.
I still didn't know why. Maybe loading the cheat file had broken the level-up system somehow. Or maybe this save file's real level was in the 93 range, so even though the display said 33, the actual level and experience were tracking at 93. No way to tell.
"Shame. I was counting on the full HP and MP restore that comes with a level-up. Can't do that now."
The reason I was so hung up on recovering my HP was simple.
Second thing I'd realized here: the HP on my status wasn't just a remaining life bar.
I was pretty sure it represented the overall condition of my body. Put simply — if 100% HP meant peak physical condition, then the lower my HP dropped, the lower the ceiling on the power I could actually output. In other words, my practical stats were lower than the numbers on the screen. Without a proper control group it was hard to be precise, but I was certain of one thing: the force I could currently produce was nowhere near the stat cap of 999.
"On top of that, not being able to fully restore my HP was another surprise..."
Whether Priestess Noren's abilities just weren't enough, or whether my max HP was simply too high, the most she could raise it was by about sixteen thousand.
Spreading the healing over multiple sessions would technically work, but that would draw way too much unwanted attention.
Even in this state I was incomparably stronger than the original Leon, so hanging around like this for now wasn't a problem...
Still, thinking ahead, I needed to secure some kind of recovery method.
We were only mid-chapter, so full-restore potions like elixirs were a pipe dream — and unlike in the game, means of recovering MP in this world seemed to be genuinely scarce.
"Next thing I need to think about is the party."
Leon's current party.
Tiris, Marie, Philia, Noren. What was I going to do with these four, and how was I going to handle them?
At the start, my combat ability had been zero, so I'd needed to keep them from being stolen by the other heroes just to survive. Things were different now.
Thanks to the cheat file working out even better than expected, I had more than enough fighting power to survive in this world on my own. I didn't need them anymore. Whether they ditched me for the other heroes or not was none of my business.
That said, just letting them walk away like nothing had happened...
Didn't sit right with me. Not even a little.
"The reason I ended up here is because Leon died. And Leon died because of his party's betrayal. If these girls hadn't stabbed him in the back, I never would have had to go through any of this crap."
Sure, getting isekai'd as a protagonist was the kind of seat you'd get down on your knees and beg for in a web novel. The problem was that this particular other world was an NTR playground.
Even the game's title was a joke — The Success Story of the Incompetent Hero...
"All right. Decision made."
They left him because he was the Incompetent Hero. So if I succeeded without them — as the Incompetent Hero — and stood proudly in front of them afterward, that would make for a damn fine revenge.
I'd make the game's title real. I'd write the actual success story.
"Thinking about it again, the game is called The Success Story of the Incompetent Hero, and yet not a single ending has him properly succeeding."
Knock knock knock.
I'd been wondering whether the developers had named it that way just to mess with the players when a knock came at the door.
The only people who'd come looking for me were party members, and I was pretty sure I'd told them all to go rest on their own.
"Who is it?"
"Leon, it's me."
"Philia? What's up?"
"I-it's nothing important, really... It's just that we haven't talked just the two of us in a while... Could I come in and catch up a little?"
Her voice sounded terribly cautious. I could guess why, and the decision was easy.
"Sorry. Ever since I got so sick, my body's been wiped out... Mind if I just rest?"
"O-oh, right?! ...Sorry. Get some good sleep..."
A disappointed voice drifted through the door, and that was all. The presence lingering outside soon faded with the sound of retreating footsteps.
"Philia, huh..."
Hero Leon's childhood friend, and the ranger of the party. According to the story, the moment Leon was chosen as a hero, she couldn't bear to be separated from him — so she grabbed a plain hunting bow and ran out of the village. Your classic single-minded, high-initiative heroine type.
If this game's core hadn't been a fresh little love story between hero and heroine, she probably would have locked down the main heroine slot. Of course, like every NTR-route heroine, she was also Heroine A — the type who stewed alone trying to handle everything without a word to the protagonist, then eventually caved to pleasure and fell.
Her H-scenes were pretty hot, and my little buddy had owed her a lot of good times — but to me, currently plotting Leon's revenge, she wasn't an NPC I looked on fondly.
"Don't worry, Leon. This body of mine is going to get you a spectacular revenge. Just trust me and wait up there in heaven."
The continent of Philgorea was broadly divided into four regions: West, Central, North, and East.
The main stage of the Incompetent Hero's story was the Central region.
Central itself held five major nations, and one of them was the Roman Kingdom — the host of this exchange conference.
"We got here earlier than I expected. I was sure Marie was going to make us camp rough for another three days."
"Indeed. This must all be the Goddess's guidance."
If the Roman Kingdom had a defining trait, it was ordinariness. No exceptional military strength, no special resources or unique features — a thoroughly average country. And because of that, a quiet precariousness slept beneath the surface: the constant risk of being swallowed by its neighbors. Knowing this place was about to become a turning point in my life left me feeling oddly sentimental.
"Leon, still not used to the capital?"
"Hm?"
"Oh...? You're not? Every time we come to a capital you look around like everything's a marvel, so I assumed you still found it unfamiliar... Forgive me if I presumed too much."
"No, nothing to apologize for..."
I waved off Tiris as she bowed her head in apology. She wasn't exactly wrong. I really was seeing this place for the first time.
Marie stretched with a long, lazy arch of her back. I glanced at Noren offering a brief prayer, then clapped my hands lightly to gather the party's attention.
"We've arrived at the capital of the Roman Kingdom, so let's rest as planned. We got here way earlier than scheduled, so handle whatever personal business you need to take care of, then meet back at the inn. Anyone planning to be out late tonight?"
"Well... Hero. Would it be all right if I stayed at the church for a few days?"
"Fine by me. So we'll see each other again at the conference, right?"
Once she had my permission, Noren bowed in thanks and vanished into the crowd.
Watching her go, Marie raised a hand as well.
"Then I'd like to go off on my own for a bit too."
"Yeah? All right."
I nodded without fuss, and Marie looked at me with a flicker of confusion.
"What is it?"
"It's just... you're not going to ask why?"
"It's personal business, isn't it?"
"...You're not wrong. Anyway, okay."
Looking vaguely unsettled, Marie tilted her head and walked off as well.
I didn't need to hear her reason. It was obvious.
She was peeling off from the party to meet the other hero who'd already arrived here — Ragna Roman.
And Noren, heading to the church, probably wasn't much different from Marie.
So that leaves...
Just Tiris and Philia. The two of them.
"What about you two? Since things turned out this way, I think it's fine if everyone handles their own business and we meet up later. It's the royal capital — nothing's going to happen."
"I-I..."
"If that is what you wish, Hero, then I believe that would be perfectly fine."
Tiris spoke up before Philia could get a word out. Philia swallowed whatever she'd been about to say and looked at me.
Tiris had probably spoken out of loyalty, trying to secure me some personal time — but Philia clearly didn't see it that way.
Not that it was anything I needed to worry about.
"Then let's split up and regroup later. The inn right up ahead should work, yeah?"
"Understood."
"Ah!—"
I left before Philia could say another word.
"Then let's split up and regroup later. The inn right up ahead should work, yeah?"
"Understood."
"Ah!—"
Philia reached out a hand, but he was already walking away.
In the end, her hand only drifted through empty air. She said nothing, and lowered her head.
Tiris watched her for a moment, then scratched the back of her neck with an awkward look.
"Perhaps I shouldn't have said that."
"..."
"If you, too, Philia... if you have no choice but to follow him in the end... then I thought this might be better."
At Tiris's words, Philia's body trembled on its own.
That probably wasn't what Tiris had meant — but to Philia, it sounded like this:
You're a traitor just like the rest of us. What exactly do you think you're trying to do?
"Then I'll... be going as well."
"..."
Tiris's figure receded into the distance, and Philia was left alone in front of the inn, staring blankly in the direction Leon had gone.
"...N-no. I... I didn't betray Leon..."
Hollowly, trembling, as if forcing the words into herself, she spoke in a voice that curled in on itself.
"I... that's right... I did it to protect Leon... Yes... to protect Leon... to protect him from that savage Abel..."