The Lazy King-Volume 2, Chapter 7: Fortis’ Courage, Part 4: Until We Meet Again

The Demon Lord was there.

Atop the boorish pitch-black throne. The chamber without a sound.

His hair a deeper shade than black, and those slovenly eyes. A jet-black coat draped over his entire bocy. With shadows stuck to his face, and an irritating look to his eyes, a delicate-looking man.

Compared to any other Demon Lord I had chanced upon before, his appearance was lacking in majesty, and on that, my memories of the past played back. Nothing had changed in his figure since the last we locked blades.

There wasn’t another Demon to be found. Even when he was supposed to be a Lord, he had no one to follow him.

There was only one point that differed from my last memory of him. Simply the fact that the man was not asleep.

It seems he truly was waiting for me.

Without saying a word, without any preparations for attack, only his eyes followed me, and those pupils of his were stagnated with an unfamiliar darkness. They didn’t even take in the glint of the Holy Sword gripped in my right hand, and all they met with were my own eyes.

… I’m scared.

I took a step forward.

The gap between this pressure pushing down on my entire body, and that dignity that equated close to nothing.

The fact that I felt no fear from looking at him was all the more scary. If it was my first meeting, then I would likely have been caught off guard.

As if I were walking through a bog, my feet were heavy.

The moment I thought to let out my voice, the Demon Lord opened his mouth.

Befitting his appearance, it was a depressing and dark voice. A voice I was hearing for the first time.

What was he to say to me? I tensed up my shoulders, and waited, but his words made me forget my very situation.

“Back hip circle.”

“… Eh?”

Back hip… circle?

What is he talking about…? I sought out meaning from his expression, but the Demon Lord’s face didn’t change at all.

The man before me continued to look in my direction, with eyes that didn’t seem to be focused on me, as he talked on.

“In the past, I couldn’t do a back hip circle. Do you know of it? Back hip circle? You use a metal horizontal bar, and you do this sort of spinning motion around it.”

“W-what are… you even…”

“I think it was around elementary school… they tried to make us do it in gym class, but I just couldn’t do it. I never even thought of trying to be able to do it. Because I never thought myself capable, I didn’t even put in the effort. In the end, up to the very last moment, I couldn’t do it. In the first place, I was never the best at physical activity.”

I couldn’t understand any of the words he was letting out at length.

No, besides a small portion of it, I could comprehend the vocabulary. However, I cannot understand the reason of such a talk unfolding here.

I can’t read his intent.

Leaving me to the wayside, the Demon Lord went one.

He was full of openings, but I didn’t even have the will to attack him.

The only thing I could understand was that this meaningless banter wasn’t the sort of thing to occur before the world’s decisive battle.

“And so, naturally, even when I went graduated to middle school and graduated to high school, and even after I entered college, I could never do it. Well, I’ve never seen anyone in college doing a back hip circle on a horizontal bar, but… I guess that doesn’t really matter. What I’m trying to say is that, in the end, even when I went out and became a working adult, I never became able to do a back hip circle. Even when most of my past memory’s faded away, I wonder why that’s the only thing I can remember.”

Fuuuh. The Demon Lord let out what was clearly a sigh, before his lips curved.

“… But it seems that right now, I can do pretty much anything.”

I had never even imagined this Lord as one to laugh, but what had dimly grazed his face was surely… a smile. It wasn’t one of ridicule like Gloria’s, and it wasn’t anything like an honest smile of joy. I’m sure it was his self derision.

The Demon Lord’s words didn’t stop. It was as if he was a completely different person from the one I met before.

His words came out disinterestedly, but I could feel an emotion I couldn’t understand behind them.

The topic changed quite suddenly.

“Then have you ever heard of the Magic Lamp?”

“Magic… Lamp?”

Listening to his words is a waste of time. I should initiate an attack. But my hands won’t move.

These words without meaning, without intent, were binding my movement. It wasn’t something like a Skill.

I knew. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to move. I wanted to listen.

I had the feeling that the reason for both of my defeats lay somewhere in there.

“Yeah. It’s in the One Thousand and One Stores… A fairy tale from the Arabian Nights. A tale of a genie that came out from rubbing a musty oil lamp.”

“I don’t… know it.”

Fairy tale.

It’s a story I’ve never heard of before, and I’m not sure what he’s trying to say. Perhaps there nothing I should say here.

I couldn’t see an atrocious nature in him, and yet my shoulders trembled.

In this case, having him direct killing intent at me would be… much easier.

I had forgotten about it. The cold feeling running up from my navel. Fear.

The Demon Lord raised his voice into a laugh. It was a dry chuckle.

Looking upon the scene, I doubt there’s a single one who’d call this man a Demon Lord.

I finally noticed the reason. He was much to lacking in anything one could see as desire.

“Just by brushing up against a lamp, all sorts of wishes could be granted. That sort of story. Having lost any and all restrictions, a magic tool to grant any prayer. I sometimes thing. Of lucky Aladdin whose hands it happened to fall into… just what sort of thoughts went through his mind.”

I don’t know. I don’t know anything.

With an aloof attitude, he avoided my wary eyes. And the Demon Lord’s face changed.

A sigh, and a sinking voice.

“Hero…”

『Hero』

It was a word I hadn’t heard from another in a long time.

There’s barely anyone left in this world to call me by that name. It had truly been a long time since anyone named me as such, that it took a moment for me to realize he was calling out to me.

Perhaps this man is all that’s left to call me by that name. The final enemy I failed to kill. The final enemy to know me as a Hero.

“Hero… I’m… surely a 『Cheat』.”

“Ch… eat?”

He folded over his legs, sent those abyssal eyes at me, and sighed.

I couldn’t tell the motives behind that word. But it had been the one with the single most emotion packed into it.

A voice that sounded as if it was tired of everything. Back when I was a human, when I had lived as a Hero, the voice used by those with things they should have protected. A child who’d lost his parents, a young man who’d lost their lover, a soldier who’d gone up against the forces of evil, and survived their own defeat.

“Even without doing anything, I’ve become able to accomplish anything. Without any of the effort, I’ve become able to do anything. I’m sure there’s no worth left in any of it. That’s why, to me, you’re the only lingering attachment I have to this world.”

I couldn’t possibly understand the words from this Demon Lord.

But it’s not like I didn’t have anything left to think.

Still, more than that, I understood that the die had been cast. That the formalities had been gone and done with.

Demon Lord and Hero. What we had to do had been determined long ago. I was already resolved. I wasn’t negligent.

That was something my opponent was well aware of.

“Now, it sure has been a while, Hero. You, who may be the one to kill me. You, who may be the one to be killed by me. My arch nemesis. The only one I’ve ever recognized as an enemy of my own volition. Have you trained yourself enough? Do you remember our last battle?”

Our last battle. The blows from my Holy Sword that were unable to leave a single scratch on him flashed back in my mind.

The Demon Lord who barely moved.

After tens of hundreds of thousands of years, just what has changed in this man? His face held a gentle spot of delight.

The fact that I was to meet him the first I stepped foot into the Demon World was just a coincidence.

The second time, I sought him out, and demanded a battle.

And surely, this third confrontation is fate.

That’s why, no matter the numbers that Demon Lords exist in, thie man is the one that must be killed by me.

As a Hero.

I put more light, more soul into the Holy Sword.

My past retreat. Where even in his normal state, he boasted immense defensive power to render any blade inept. The Demon Lord who broke my blade.

And I didn’t know his name. The man introduced himself for the first time.

“… Right, my name is Leigie. The Lazy King governing the sin of 『Sloth』, and your… enemy. I’ve already taken care of anyone to interfere. Now, Hero, come and…”

The Demon Lord’s fingers mover ever so slightly. My senses were honed to a level higher than ever before.

I immediately jumped to the side to evade. The door behind me was blown off its hinges.

『I’ve already taken care of anyone to interfere.』

As I thought the one who launched an attack on Gloria was this man!

The Lazy King who named himself as Leigie muttered in a slovenly tone without any intonation.

I kicked the ground, and used my wings to accelerate.

Leigie’s gaze intersected with the killing intent in my eyes.

Without letting out any words, the Demon Lord’s lips moved to themselves.

『… try to kill me.』

＊＊＊＊＊

What I was given as a Hero, and honed as an Angel were all directed towards battle.

The shaking of my hands, and the shaking of my body had ceased.

I stepped in. The floor shattered before my feet. The strongest concentration. The strongest condition. There wasn’t any space left in my soul for me to feel fear against this Demon Lord. The greatest, and most powerful enemy of all was before me, and the all the experience I had ever gotten over my life was whispering for me to defeat him.

My awareness was suddenly delayed. I could clearly see the bags that had formed under his eyes.

Leigie. Leigie the Depraved.

The name rolled around my tongue.

Without his name, there was never a way to look into him.

Even if I may have been a human, I wielded the foremost power of the Surface World, and his ability to block that without anything to guard himself meant there was no way he wasn’t a long lived Demon.

But I think I was just running away. With that power before me, I had broken. I was running from his existence. Because if I was to learn of him again, I would have no choice but to fight him.

But at times, I did wonder whether I would see him again. Even if I didn’t as one on the vanguard of heaven, most information about Demons naturally entered my ears. As natural as it may be, I did have knowledge of that name.

Leigie. Leigie the Depraved.

One who pulled their bowstring against the Heavens, one of oldest Demon of them all. Leigie Slaughterdolls.

I already knew his characteristics. The characteristics of an Acedia Demon.

It was an absolute defense. That was all.

That enhancement was separate from his base specs, but there’s no way his offensive power or speed is anything too high. At the very least, he should be less than Gloria in that aspect.

The threat of his invisible attacks lay in that he sent them out from a distance impossible to detect. If Leigie and Gloria had directly confronted one another, then she would likely have been able to employ some form of tactic. 𝐟re𝐞w𝐞𝒃𝓃𝒐𝐯𝚎𝒍.c૦𝚖

What I need is a destructive power great enough to destroy his soul, and that was my… reason for defeat.

Have I trained myself? … There’s no need to ask. At the start, it was just something that had been handed to me, but I surely trained that power. As a Valkyrie, so as not to face defeat a second time. In the years since I was reborn, there’s no way I was just playing around.

Regret, regret, regret.

There was no way I could fill it in with my human body… the sheer difference between us.

The magician’s words of pity repeated within my head.

I don’t need to think of defense. The power I have now, what I never had before. The Fortis Authority. My heart will never break.

“The truth is… I did feel a little sorry for it.”

The moment my sword was about to reach him, before my eyes, Leigie, who should have been but a step away, grew farther.

My sense of distance was upturned. My suppositions, and the disparity of truth. I used the momentum that was causing me to topple over, and took another step. With all my power, I gripped the sword in both hands, and aimed for his heart.

… And at that moment, he became farther again.

It’s not my imagination. It’s not an illusion.

… Farther? No, that’s wrong. Leigie was still sitting on the throne.

The one moving away was… me.

The throne was just a few meters in front of me. I put more power into my feet, and dove in. the moment before the blade reached him, my field of vision shifted.

It wasn’t my eyes playing tricks on me. It wasn’t that my body was being manipulated.

“I’m sorry for not taking you on earnestly last time. Well, I was sleepy, so there really was no helping it, but… if I had been a little more serious back then, perhaps I wouldn’t have to go through these regrets. The thought alone kept me up at ni… oh, wait, well, um…”

While talking on, Leigie’s arm gave a small movement.

An impact sent my entire body flying.

Oh shi…

By the time I noticed it, it was too late. My body crashed into the wall, and was pressed against it. By an invisible feeling of pressure.

It was a force that made my body feel it would be ripped apart. My creaking body and the wall both let out their screams.

Leigie presented out the palm of his hand. He started turning his hand in a circle. Accompanying that motion that looked like a joke, the points of pressure twisted.

While looking upon that scene carelessly, Leigie politely, as if he was trying to buy time for something, began to explain.

What foolishness is this… no, it would be strange for me to think that he only had a single power.

I’m fine, the damage is within expectations. My bones aren’t broken, and I haven’t suffered anything fatal.

And more than that, I was impressed. On the fact that Leigie initiated an attack on his own.

“『Aport』”

Turning my blade on a being without resistance, yet having it fall flat.

It was a situation as if my everything had all been meaningless, and that had been the greatest fear I held.

The Demon Lord is to attack me, and I’m to counteract. In that case, I can still be a Hero.

Even if that Lord had yet to even rise from his throne.

“『Teleportation』 and 『Psychokinesis』. Of course, here, they have different names, but… it seems that all the powers I ever wished for have come into my hands.”

While he went on about his own Skills, his face held no scorn, or anger, or sorrow.

The Demon Lord stood. Even when there was no need to stand, he rose. The past two times, he had laid sprawled out the entire battle, and yet he stood.

“Hero, I will pay respect to you as a Demon Lord, by killing you. You will kill me, and I will kill you. Even if it felt like a pain, I’m sure that’s what I should have done.”

Even when all he did was stand, even when it’s not like his power rose at all, a premonition of my entire body being swallowed up made my arms tremble.

I frantically moved my crushed body, and touched whatever was pressing down on me with the Holy Sword.

An invisible something was ripped through, and vanished. My body was released. I landed over the carpet. I had a slight hope, but it doesn’t look like Leigie took any damage.

I let out a short breath. My head hurt so much it felt it would split. I didn’t have enough oxygen. I didn’t have enough Mana.

I’m sure my heart felt fear. Before the existence who defeated me without me having any means to resist. It was a form of trauma.

But I’ll ignore that. I had confidence. I had always fought on. A majority of my enemies had been above me.

The reason I won against them was simply… because I never gave up.

First, I’ll have to land an attack. A blow with all my might.

My target is the Demon’s heart… his soul core. As long as Leigie is taking up human form, its location should be in his left chest… where a heart was supposed to bear.

I can’t release energy at him. I’ll have to slash at him directly…

I put my breathing in order. My sword was already fully loaded with power.

Teleport, Aport. It will be next to impossible to approach him, but if I fail the first time, then perhaps I can close in the second.

I wanted an opening. I chanted magic.

Leigie’s movements were slow. That psychokinesis thing was linked to the Demon Lord’s movements. I saw that clearly.

I cut away the palm shot at me. It’s difficult to dodge, but as I thought, it’s fragile. As long as I inflict an attack on it, it’ll disappear.

White light flickered on and off as it gathered in my left hand.

With depressing eyes, Leigie looked at me.

“Hah… hah…”

“… Ah. You’re really looking the part there.”

“『Crescent Thunder』!!”

Leigie’s slovenly posture was swallowed up by the white thunder I released.

It was a lightning attribute offensive magic possessed by Heroes.

The carpet caught fire, and the throne was taken in by it. Imbued with a holy element, that lightning was originally supposed to deal heavy damage to dark forces. But General Class was one thing, and I didn’t think that it would have any effect on this Lord.

The moment I fired it, I let my body dance through the sky. I took flight. The ceiling was high, and I was able to soar about.

I took a great spin, and swooped down to try and behead him from behind. At that moment, the scene before me changed.

Leigie, who was supposed to be before my eyes, disappeared, and the blade’s edge cut through the air.

I had predicted it before hand, so I didn’t stiffen up.

I carefully examined the power of my foe. Aport. There’s no forewarning of it. I can’t go against it. From before Leigie’s eyes, I had been transported to the end of the room. A wall close in up to my nose.

I was able to tell the Demon Lord’s positioning in an instant. When I’m this close, then I can tell every one of his actions, even without looking at him. I hit down the invisible hand lowered on me with my sword, and ripped through it.

I kicked the wall, and moved my wings again, as I accelerated towards him. Ours eyes met. Those eyes of his were certainly keeping up with my movements.

I put power into the sword, and simultaneously sent out an incantation-less 『Cresent Thunder』. Leigie’s befuddled expression disappeared into the light.

I continued to raise my speed even further, and dived straight into the light. The moment I entered it, I heard a voice from within.

“AS I thought, I’m not suited to killing… hah… it was something I already knew, but…”

Leigie’s presence disappeared. No, it moved.

From in front of my eyes, to behind. This time, it wasn’t that I had moved, but Leigie.

A few meters to my rear.

Mater transportation. It truly is a fearsome power. But sometimes, such fearsome power comes with restrictions.

Is it effective time? Distance? Or perhaps limited uses?

I won’t give him the time. Can he use it consecutively? Various thoughts flew through my head.

I began moving a speed that felt it would make my heart burst. It doesn’t really matter if I die. My body creaked as it displayed abilities beyond my limits.

My consciousness accelerated. I turned around, and shot lightning again. Speed and power. I want an opening. Just a small gap, a space of a single breath is enough. Without him avoiding, a small space without him using a Skill.

I shortened the few meters in an instant. I instinctively cut off the invisible power lowered on my right arm.

I kicked the ground. My step was too powerful, and my right ley let out an ominous sound. It’s likely broken. I don’t feel any pain. I don’t really care.

Having had Mana poured into it past its limit, the blade of the Holy Sword expanded. A materialization of pure energy, a sword of light.

Just one step. One more step, and I’ll reach him. Leigie turned his eyes from my blade, and directed his gaze on my hand.

At that moment, my field of vision fell.

As If I were falling, I approached the ground. My mind went blank for an instant.

I tried to move my arms, but they wouldn’t move. What I should have had held up before me, the sword that should have been in my grasp, was falling alongside me.

An impact. My chin hit against the carpet. My arms won’t move. My legs won’t move. As if I were watching a long dream, my body lacked a sense of reality.

And it was there, that I finally noticed my arms weren’t connected to my body.

A heat as if to burn through my body broke out through my torso. It was, as if to corrode away my body, moving up.

I didn’t feel any pain. The arms that casually rolled on the ground before me. Still clutched around the Holy sword, their cross section, as if finally remembering their original form, began to spurt out blood.

My conscious became distant at once. I somehow withstood that with will power, and glared at my arms.

It was a slash. My disembodied arms. It was something that I had seen time and again on the battlefield, the traces left behind by a blade.

… That can’t be… when did he…

Leigie wasn’t holding a sword. When I had just been a step away from reaching him, the Demon Lords hands were surely empty.

This is bad. It isn’t such a bad thing to die, but it’s bad for an incomprehensible attack to assail me now.

I don’t have any more time. Having lost its weilder, the Holy Sword’s power would dwindle the more time passed.

Right before my consciousness was to go out, Leigie looked down over me, and muttered.

“… Do you know of dolls? Hah…”

… Human… form…

My flickering sight. On those words, I finally realized that a power besides that of Leigie had been close.

Human… form. Leigie Slaughterdolls. The last name was one’s way of life, and his way was Slaughterdolls.

I… see…

“It was a nice match, Hero. My regrets have, more or less… died down, perhaps.”

“Don’t… screw with… me.”

Regrets have… died down?

Nice match?

Not yet. I’ve yet to lose.

I had stepped in more than enough. The distance to Leigie was already less than a single Meter.

There was still power left in the Holy Sword.

“Don’t… look down on a 『Hero』!!”

The form of the Demon Lord turning his back to me right above. A clear gap.

I wrung out my remaining power, and yelled.

A new 『Cause of Death: Blood Loss』 message came up, and I revived. Jumping up, I moved forward.

In concert with my will, the sword sparkled.

The strongest blow. With all my Mana, with all my existence backing it, that blow closed in on the Demon Lord’s back.

At around the same time, the heat ran up my chest again, but it’s too late.

The tip of the sword pierced into his left chest from behind.

“… So you were… still alive…?”

“Wha…”

This can’t be…

The sword I had wrung out all my power into. The strike that should have pierced through his flesh, and then his Soul Core, had come to a stop.

My hand felt numb. I felt a hart response all over my arm.

The heat and pain encroaching on me, bit by bit. I ignored whatever response was sent by my sense of pain, and rotated the holy sword.

It’s no good… he’s too hard. I got through his flest, but I couldn’t inflict anything on his core.

I have… no chance of winning.

Just like before. No matter how much courage I wring out of myself, no matter how much Mana I have, no matter how many Skills I learn, no matter how far I withdraw, if I can’t even damage him, my victory is… impossible.

My knees buckled, and the ground closed in on me. Power was leaving my body. What was pierced was my own left breast… the aim was my soul core. It’s a fatal wound.

It’s… alright. I’m not scared. I won’t lose. I’ll beat him. I have to beat him. If I don’t stand here… then who will?

I’m sure that my heart… has yet to break.

If Leigie’s regrets were to be me, then the final regrets left in me… the reason I, reluctantly enough, fought on half by habit, yet still chost to stand on the battlefield after death… That reason must be… none other than this Demon Lord.

A scene like a revolving lantern passed through my head.

Without being able to move a single eyelid, I died.

＊＊＊＊＊

If I wasn’t able to find any particular reason, then I’m sure that was the reason that I had no choice but to live in solitude.

My grey rat-colored hair was constantly bathed in a highly concentrated Mana of light, and at some point, it had changed to a vivid silver color.

It wasn’t just an ordinary silver, but a silver close to blue.

No matter how many times I looked at it, the silver blue hair reflected at me never truly felt like my own.

Even though, by now, I should have been accompanied by that silver a far longer time than my association with that gray.

The form reflected in the water’s surface, smoothed over lie a mirror.

All that was there was a single Hero.

An aloof hero. Having obtained the epithet of 『Silver Blue』by others before she noticed it, a lone Hero.

Serge of the Silver Blue. Serge Serenade.

Not taking about a single comrade, the one who continued to fight against the enemies of humanity. The sword of hope.

“Haha… ha…”

My laughing voice was shaking.

The Hero Class was powerful. It was to force a single human to live the life of a single sword.

It improved the human body to fight against those of evil. It enhanced physical strength, inflated one’s Mana, and granted powerful Skills. Enough that a village girl who had yet to even come of age, could fell monsters by her hand.

The only thing that one couldn’t obtain with the Class itself, was the all important 『Courage』. That alone was something one had to make do with their own efforts.

Strong. Its power was certainly strong. But even so, I was scared.

My breath was rough. My hands shook, and my heart gave a heavy beat.

I looked at the palm of my hand. Having overcome hundreds of thousands of dark forces, yet come out without a single wound, those white and elegant fingers, as if to reflect the inside of my heart, were shaking.

I clenched my fist.

It was a fear I’d tasted countless times, and nothing to me at this point.

To those cut down by me, they must have felt a fear much greater than this.

As if to encourage me on, the Holy Sword gripped in my right hand gave a small pulse.

I wonder when it was that I noticed whispering to myself would more or less calm me down. Perhaps it was in that distant time when I first started fighting against abnormal monsters. If that wasn’t the case, then surely I would have… broken long ago.

“I’m not scared. I’m not scared. I’m not scared. I’m not scared. I won’t lose. I won’t lost. I won’t lose. I won’t lose. There’s no way I can… lose.”

Even if I never had anything precious.

Even if I never had any comrades to fight alongside me.

I just looked ahead.

There was no one to listen to me. No, there never should have been.

As if to read off a line to myself alone, I whispered.

“I mean, I’m… a Hero.”

I strongly gripped the sword.

The smell of blood and iron and death. The presence of war, and the abnormal cries.

A battlefield where, if a normal man were to happen upon it, he would all but fall to madness.

Even if I was bad at talking with people, I could cut down monsters.

No matter how helpless I may be, as long as I don’t let it reach my face, no one will notice.

That’s why, no matter how far I went, I accomplished my role as a Hero.

I packed power below my navel, concentrated my attention on my heart, and excited the Mana over my entire body. Concentration great enough for it to take on tangible form, silvery blue Mana blew over as a wind, and drew spirals as it circled up around me.

The wails of the magic beasts ceased. The spirits invisible to my eyes trembled, the world stopped.

Within that noisy world, I was alone.

“See, aren’t I… strong?”

Having I gained the Hero Class, and rushed across a countless number of battlefields, there was something I came to understand.

Heroes were weapons. Even if there was no technique in their arms, and no good in their hearts, they were envoys of light that could cut down anything with their pure volume of Mana. Those needlessly powerful Skills, and the Holy Sword that inflicted enormous damage on the vassals of darkness were merely a byproduct of that.

I remember the words once imparted on me by the king of a country I stopped by long ago.

… Hero Serge, never forget that the lives of tens of thousands of civilians rest on your back. Every time you hesitate, human lives will perish. Every time you retreat, human lives will perish. If you’re to ever face defeat, then… a countless number of lives that could have been saved will be lost forever.

『… Yes…』

Back then, I had thought it a horribly selfish thing to impart such a burden on a simple little girl But it’s also a truth that I found solace in it.

A light like an aurora emitted from my sword.

That beautiful spectrum that had entranced me the first time I emitted it, after tens and hundreds of uses, was only something I had grown accustomed to.

The grotesque eyes gathered on me.

All sorts of seeds to become the enemies of humanity. Against the forms of various monsters, I smiled with my face alone, and let a light that was nothing but bright flow out from my Holy Sword.

“…”

The first time, I let out an unsightly cry. Because if I didn’t, my mind would have been paralyzed by fear.

But now, I don’t even have to raise a single word.

I inhaled in a shallow breath of air. I exhaled. With just that, I could divert my fear. I overwrote it with fighting spirit.

The point I became a Hero was the point I cast away my tears.

From a hill overlooking a vast land, I ran as if intending to tumble. No matter how steep the slope, I was never tripped up.

If it was just for a short time… I could even soar through the sky. I trampled over all the obstacles. Enhanced by my power as a Hero, my physical abilities didn’t fall short of a magic beast’s.

Every time I swung the Holy Sword, the monsters would be bisected in a flash, and the lightning would strike through them. My visual and auditory senses and all else were taken in by blood. The feel of cutting into meat, repelling the survivors.

Normal beings of the monster race held dreadful figures, but to me, they were nothing more than scraps of paper. In just one swing of the sword, the monster that would have taken hundreds of human lives was killed.

My objective was always… the ones clad in the greatest miasma. The enemies of humanity.

On the battlefield, in the center of a wasteland, I found them. Among piles of corpses.

The greatest for of Evil Spirit to appear on the Surface World. With numbers countable on a single hand, they could take down an entire country. And before those strongest Evil Spirits, I alone brandished my sword.

My own foolishness no longer produced anything from me but a quivering laugh.

Friends? Comrades? Something like that… there’s no way I could have anything like that.

A Hero’s power was something extraordinary.

Even among those that held the Hero class, the one heralded as the strongest was me… there’s no way there was anyone in humanity who could keep up.

＊＊＊＊＊

My consciousness returned.

“… So you can still stand… that’s strange… I’m sure you should be dead by now…”

By the time I realized it, I had already stood up again.

What raced through my head were the battlefields I once ran across. The lantern turn itself for but an instant.

I knew. What’s left in me is… not courage, but just my dignity as a Hero.

“I’m… not… scared.”

The Holy Sword was the same as before. As if to cheer me up, it let out a glimmer.

I followed my experience, and at the presence I sensed behind, I turned my body, and let the Holy Sword come down.

The weight I felt on my arms. The sharp sound of metal colliding.

What had appeared at some point in time, something with its entire body shrouded in black armor, locked blades with me. If it was just in physical strength, the other side had the advantage. It was a fearsome force, and a fearsome speed, but in technique, I’m… the greater.

Two strikes, three strikes, our blades met one another, but on the third time, what it should have blocked with its sword, it took with its body. Caring not for the flesh it bisected, the Holy Sword cut through that trunk of a body from left to right.

There was a tough resistance, but I was certain of my target’s destruction.

The body close to two meters in size vanished, and on top of the bloodstained carpet, what took its place was a black chess piece divided in two.

The Fortis Authority could return light to my eyes. But the rolling piece wasn’t to become my threat again.

I overcame my shaking body with fighting spirit, and confronted the Demon Lord again.

I pretended not to notice the hopeless chances of victory swirling about my head.

“… What is… with that…”

“… I won’t… lose…”

The Demon Lord quietly sat back on the throne. While furrowing his brow, there was no sign of him initiating another attack.

If I can’t pierce through his core, I’ll have to aim for his neck. If not the neck, then an arm or a leg. Anyways, I’ll have to inflict just a little damage…

I gripped the Holy Sword in both hands. I can’t hear anything. I can’t see anything. I can’t understand anything. I stepped in, and swung to take his neck. The muscles of my arms cramped up, and let off creaking sounds. I paid no mind to my own damage.

Leigie wasn’t even looking at me. He let out a sigh, and opened his right hand.

The space before my eyes turned pitch black. But the kinetic energy I had given my body did not die down. My sword was definitely coming towards Leigie’s head, and…

There was so much resistance, it felt like my heart was painted out.

Wh… y… his skin is…

“…”

I couldn’t let out my voice. I frantically tried to scream.

I was able to pierce him before. I was definitely able to pierce all the way to his soul core, and yet now my blade… won’t enter his flesh!

What!? How!? Why!?

The character string appeared again. I didn’t even give the 『Cause of Death: Destruction of Soul Core』 a second glance.

I can’t move at all. Only my field of vision turned left and right. Within my stagnant time, I thought.

Is it that I can’t rend his bones? No. I didn’t make it to the bone. It stopped on his first layer of skin.

If it was metal armor, I would have sliced through with ease, and I could just as easily cut through the barrier of any high class magic barrier, yet a hard sensation remained in the Holy Blade.

It was, strangely enough, the… same as the last thing that had been left in my hands in my final battle as a hero.

Until just now, until this moment… it definitely got through!!

My heart shuddered like never before.

Having obtained 『Fortis』, there was a great unrest I felt when I experienced death for the first time. This was an impact surpassing that.

『Brave Heart』 shook. I’m sure it was a Skill that was supposed to be peerless. The path that I never lost sight of, despite my fear and my shivers, was starting to feel unsteady.

Before the selections laid out before me, my will to stand whispered quietly to me.

The simple 『YES』 and 『NO』gained greater meaning that ever before, as they pressed down on my choice.

『Do you still have the will to fight on?』

『Before a great darkness, before an existence much greater than your own, do you have the reason to stand and face him?』

『Do you have the courage?』

The magician’s old words echoed with them.

『Serge, you have the right to choose. To live as a hero to light up the dark, or… to waste your entire life as a normal civilian…』

I would think back to that question from time to time.

If perhaps I had chosen the path of a normal person, then would it truly have been so useless?

Perhaps it was my life as a hero, and my afterlife as a Valkyrie, descended to repeat endless battles day after day after day that was the wasted one?

The answer had yet to come. That’s why, just once more…

By the phenomenon brought about by my Fortis Skill, my extracted Soul Core was brought back to life. Light blessed my eyes once more, and from the depths of my body gushed up the heat of life. It was an uplifting feeling as if to blow away my fears.I’m sure that for all this time, Fortis Angels have fought on with nothing but that courage as their weapon.

My hazy vision came into focus. At some point in time, Leigie’s gaze from his seat on the throne had quietly directed itself down on me.

“Ye s… I’ll fight…”

“Hero, could it be… you can’t die? Even if your heart is destroyed, you’ll revive?”

As I thought, unlike Gloria, this Demon Lord knowns not of my authority.

In Leigie’s right hand, that should have been empty, a transparent crystal appeared. That item that was basked in the glimmer of a finally cut diamond, was promptly crushed in his palm.

Light was extracted from my eyes again. Of course, I had never seen it in my eyes before, but I understood by instinct. That was… my heard.

『Aport』

It couldn’t be… no, there’s nothing… else I can think of. Matter transportation from within my body.

『Cause of Death: Destruction of Soul Core』. The words danced before my eyes.

A ridiculous power. A peerless… ability. Be it Angel or Demon, no matter how strong they may be, there wasn’t a single one who could live without their heart.

… Besides me.

I no longer have any hesitation. My spirit blazed up.

In order to clear away all the darkness. In order for my existence to hold meaning. That’s why I became a Hero!

Death distanced itself. The feeling of nihility assailing my body was overwritten with the reality of life.

I clenched my teeth, and stood up again. Again and again. I’ll stand as many times it takes. You’ll see.

“I won’t… lose…”

“Hero… I… see… Hero.”

The blade I put my might behind, my wishes behind, was brought to a halt by Leigie standing still.

He stopped the Holy Sword that, if he were a Demon, if he was one in cahoots with darkness, it should have burned through his entirety. It wasn’t his neck. The blade came into contact with his unhealthy-looking face, and stooped as if I was living a nightmare.

My hopes were smashed. Not a single drop of Leigie’s blood flowed. He took it head-on, and without even making preparations to defend, he took on the power of a Hero, and the light to destroy all darkness without a scratch.

I let out a piercing yell, and thrust again. Leigie didn’t dodge.

But what I aimed at his left chest was stopped without even piercing the flesh.

It’s no good… he’s hard… he’s too hard. The skin I was able to get through once, I couldn’t pierce again.

“Hey, please tell me one thing, Serge.”

Should I retreat? Should I pull back once, and face him again? Can I even face him? Is there… an existence that can triumph over this Lord?

There is. There has to be… In the heavens, there were plenty of those wielding powers greater than mine. If it’s them, then…

… Right, the Demon World… if I pull him out of the Demon World, perhaps I can win. But am I… capable of such a feat?

“Hey, Serge Serenade.”

I thrust the blade, and receiving an additional attack, Leigie didn’t direct the slightest hostility at me.

I struck my lightning into him. The world was filled with light, and the intense discharge caused an echoing sound, but the voice reverberating from within it didn’t stop.

“Can you… not die? Is your valor, your courage… a result of your lack of death?”

“…”

The lightning disappeared.

The abyss was peering into me.

The abyss was questioning me.

A black to suck in all sorts of light. Those darkness colored irises were examining me.

“Courage born of an inability to die. Could that truly… be called the work of a 『Hero』?”

I’m sure it was an honest query. There was no good or bad intent behind it.

But I cannot listen to him. I can’t deal with him head-on.

I can’t be brought in by the darkness. Rather than my heart shattering, I was much more afraid of my will falling apart.

The question lasted a few seconds. There was no answer. But I didn’t remove my eyes from him.

The Demon Lord moved. Separating from the throne, one step forward. The slash I released in desperation, Leigie received with the palm of his hand.

The Holy sword slid through and cut off half his hand frighteningly easily.

“… Ah, I see. So you were a 『Cheat』, same as me…”

I never thought an attack would get through.

For an instant, my thoughts froze. Like a separate lifeform, his fingers flew off, and rolled along the carpet.

Without paying any attention to them, Leigie’s face continued to approach me. The bags stuck under his eyes. The mediocre face of a man one couldn’t see as anyone strong.

His breath hit an area around my ear.

“It’s fine. You’ve no need to despair… if it’s me, I can issue an end to your life without death.”

Differing from before, a cold Mana started welling up.

I instinctively tried to retreat back, only to notice my legs would no longer move.

Leigie’s face had approached to a few centimeters before me. In his eyes, reflected the scene of my features freezing over.

The chill gradually rising up from my feet. I tried wringing out my power, but my lower body wouldn’t budge in the slightest.

“… Sleep for the rest of your days. I won’t forget you.”

The tips of my fingers were iced over. The area below my navel lost its power, and my face was suspended.

I didn’t feel any pain. Only my heat was being robbed away. A cold something was passing over my spine. It wasn’t just a hallucination.

Leigie raised a quiet voice like one of a parent to their child.

“I think I’ll… wait for the next Hero, whom I’m not even sure exists.”

“Ah… ah…”

The nature of Leigie’s power had changed. From one the was simply heavy, to one heavy and cold.

His finger was fixed on my chin. I didn’t look down. I can’t see what’s becoming of my body. But I know.

My time is stoping. My Soul Core is freezing.

Everythign I have in me is losing its heat. My body, my will.

Is this… death?

The ice came up to my chest. Slowly, and as if to harass me, oh so quiet. But it was certain.

Contrary to my desire, my lips began to move.

“Am I… going to… die?”

“No, you’re not going to die. You’re going to end. Thank you for staying as my enemy. You can… rest now.”

A one-sided verdict. His calm words, and his dark eyes.

My chest was frozen over, and it continued up my collar to cover my throat.

Yeah, I already knew. I’m sure… this is… the end.

The Holy Sword lost its light. My arm had frozen through long ago, and it wouldn’t move in the slightest. Even if that blade had still been clad in light, I no longer had the hands to move it.

From the core of my body, I was frozen. No, this must be just as the Demon Lord said… suspension.

Even with my breast frozen over, the selection didn’t appear to me.

It was a phenomenon I had never seen before. No, if you count the time I felt it when I lost my human body, this was my second… end.

“…”

My voice would no longer come out.

Unrest. My emotions were rocked by an incomprehensible wave.

Regrets? Hesitations? Anger? Grief? Or perhaps… Relief?

I don’t know anymore. I don’t know anything.

What I heard at the end was, differing completely from the rewards of foreign kings, and the ovations of the people I saved, and the oracles given to me by the Angels, uncalculated, and honest commendation.

“Until we meet again, my old friend.”