WETRIED TRANSLATIONS

Is It Bad That the Main Character’s a Roleplayer?

[Translator – Aren]

◈ Chapter 300 Proof (5)

"I’m dying......."

I had finally succeeded in burning Behemoth’s brain to a crisp. It had been such an arduous process that I found myself genuinely grateful there was no bone between the eyeball and the brain.

[...You goddamn pushover bastard.]

I should have seen it coming from the moment the vitreous body filling most of the eyeball turned out to be as hard as frozen pork belly. If even the vitreous body, which should normally have been like jelly, was that tough, then just how hard was its actual flesh going to be?

For a while there, I thought I had picked up a new profession as a miner. The damn thing just wouldn’t dig through.

[Damn it, at this rate, if the Hero gets here first……!]

Still, in the end, I was the one who won.

Avoiding the brain I had burned away, I stepped onto the edge of Behemoth’s eye socket. The stench of blood and rot faded somewhat, and the wide-open scenery made it feel as though I could finally breathe again.

"I used up my Arcane Power, so why do I feel like I’m completely out of stamina as well…..?”

But the sheer exhaustion of having poured every last bit of Demonic Energy into the fight made my feet stop without me even realizing it. If I had my way, I wanted to lie down somewhere suitable and just rest.

[Aren’t you going to move already?]

"...Maybe I should take a nap.”

I glared at the Demon pestering me because she didn't want to die. If not for Faust, I would have dropped right there and told her to do whatever the hell she wanted. It was a shame I couldn’t.

「I-I’m fine……」

"No. Let’s go.”

I slowly made my way down through the eye socket. Behemoth’s head was hardly a slope suited for carefully stepping down one foot at a time, but thanks to the special feature known as its tusks, it wasn’t completely impossible either.

With a groan, I stepped onto the tusk and slid down it. My slightly unsteady body nearly turned the whole thing into a comical spectacle.

"Almost landed on my face……”

I had very nearly greeted this rock-hard ground face-first. Rubbing my nose, which had narrowly escaped being smashed, I straightened myself from where I had been leaning against the tusk.

I had used up all my Arcane Power, not my stamina, so I could still stand well enough.

"...Where do I go now?”

But one problem reared its head.

I had nowhere to go.

[You can decide on a destination later, so just start moving.]

"Shut up for a second."

[Please, think while you walk!]

If I had my way, I would want to go back to that city. To see Richa, and the young lord with the dark-blue hair. Faust would probably want to see them too.

There was also the sword I had to return and the Lucky pouch necklace.

"...I wonder if I’ll be able to come back here someday.”

But the Hero was over there, my disguise had already been exposed, and most importantly, I currently had no Demonic Energy.

More precisely, I had no power left that would let me escape no matter what kind of mess I caused.

I was fine.

So going back right now was probably impossible. I scratched my head as I looked at the boy trying his best to show a calm expression.

"...Let’s come back in about 5 years.”

That was all I could say. The boy gave me a faint smile without answering.

"If I leave the sword here…I don’t know whether it’ll ever get recovered. Should I just take it with me?”

[Are you deliberately stalling for time?]

If I was going to come back someday anyway, couldn’t I return it then? I glanced at the amber-colored sword inside my inventory, then at the corpse of the beast I had killed.

I probably couldn’t take that with me either, could I? I stared wistfully at that horrifically tough, durable hide before suddenly remembering a certain incident from the past and shuddered.

"Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.”

[Please, Gretchen, just start moving while you—!]

"No, this time I’m not trying to piss you off. I’m seriously asking if there’s any way to take this with me.”

[...Why?]

"I’m worried we’ll end up with another Skyflow Tiger that ate Moby Dick.”

[.......]

The Demon glared at me. The red glow behind the goat skull mask showed no particular expression, but somehow that was still the impression I got.

[...If you just leave it here, something like that could happen. But the Hero is coming this way now, right? Leave it. She’ll purify it herself.]

"...I really can’t take any materials?”

[Goddamnit, Gretchen. Do you think this is a game? You seriously think hauling that thing away is going to let you craft some legendary item? That some god-tier loot with its name written in gold is going to pop out?]

"I know this isn’t a game, but still, if the hide is that tough, couldn’t you make clothes or something out of it……?”

[My dear, damn Gretchen. Surely you don’t actually think a needle is going to pierce a hide that even a sword can't penetrate? Or are you planning to cut and stitch the leather yourself, piece by piece?]

Oh, she was pissed. Without even meaning to, I had managed to get under the Demon's skin, and found myself convinced by her explanation.

Fair enough. Even I, overflowing with Demonic Energy, had only managed to kill it by stabbing through the comparatively soft eye. There was no way an ordinary craftsman could make anything out of that hide.

"Fine, let’s go.”

I moved Faust from where he was clinging to my forearm and set him on my shoulder so he wouldn’t fall—even though he was an illusion and it probably wouldn’t matter if he did—then headed south.

I was running horizontally with the eastern wall on my left, so it was probably south.

“...Do you think the face I’ve been using for the past few weeks is going to end up wanted?”

At the same time, I started worrying about the future. Specifically, about losing the second identity I had only just managed to establish.

[Who cares?]

「I-I’m not sure.......」

"I’d be kind of disappointed if I ended up wanted.”

If that appearance got put on a wanted notice, I probably wouldn’t be able to enter Mannafeld again either.

That really would be a shame. There was something I wanted to tell Sir Walter. That the swordsmanship he taught me had saved my life. That I was genuinely grateful.

Swallowing my deep regret, I bounced across the rocky desert. My Demonic Energy showed no sign of recovering, so I was running purely under my own power, but I was still making fairly good speed.

[... Pick up the pace.]

"Ah, you really don’t stop nagging.”

And all the while, the Demon kept tiptoeing around me without even being able to raise her voice.

Maybe it was because I had forced her into an unfair contract while I held all the leverage. Looked at one way, she was starting to seem downright pathetic.

"And you. Stop pretending to be weak.”

But did that make her look funny or pitiful? Absolutely not.

"I know people like you. I know you’re the kind of person who, instead of repenting until the bitter end, will keep watching for a chance to betray me.”

That bastard was a murderer who had slaughtered an entire family, parasitized the sole survivor’s body, and massacred numerous humans. On top of that, she was the kind of absolute scum who had forced an unfair contract on a child, continued psychologically abusing him, and had even threatened him with his hometown just moments ago.

"I’m sure you’re still racking your brain right now trying to figure out how to stab me in the back. You’re probably searching for some loophole in the contract so you can strike at me at the most critical moment. And I’m sure you’ve got some separate card tucked away that you won’t reveal until the absolute last second. People like you value your own life far too damn much.”

In other words, to sum it up, she was the absolute worst kind of criminal, utterly beyond rehabilitation. Even that pathetic behavior could simply be an act meant to make me lower my guard. She was trash that deserved neither mercy nor another chance.

"So don’t try any tricks to make me feel friendly toward you. My kindness doesn’t exist for the sake of people like you.”

[.......]

I pushed the Demon, whose expression had gone blank enough to make her earlier pleading seem like a lie, out of my field of vision.

「...Um.」

Instead, I turned my head slightly toward the softly whispering child. The boy, so tiny that it was difficult to make out his expression, murmured.

「If the Hero finds you, it may hurt a little, but at least you’ll be able to die safely.」

Perhaps because he was so close, or perhaps because he was connected to my mental world. Either way, I could hear his voice with perfect clarity.

「So…I’m really fine. Why don’t you just go back now? 9 years is far too long.」

I really didn’t want to hear that.

"You might have already noticed, but…”

Thud, thud. Without any Arcane Power, my body kicked off the ground and cleared a rock. I could have gone around it, but it was easy enough to jump over, so I did.

“If there had been even one person around you who could help you, I never would have helped you myself. Why? Because even if you didn’t mean any harm, what I went through because of you was far beyond anything I could forgive.”

But even after clearing the first rock, the path didn’t remain smooth. A second one soon appeared.

Perhaps it would be more accurate to call the terrain uneven. The fractured earth rose upward, forming a massive step.

"Honestly, even looking at you right now makes me a little uncomfortable. I’m human too. I’m someone who wants to say that I’m hurting too.”

I stared at it for a moment, then found a protruding section and stepped onto it. The small amount of Arcane Power that had recovered in the meantime helped with my jump. Immediately afterward, though, the Arcane Power bar hit rock bottom again.

"But more than that, I feel sorry for you. I hate the circumstances that made you have to say things like that. The environment that left a child with no choice but to talk that way. The tragedy of having nowhere at all to ask for help is just too awful and too pitiful."

Tap, tap, tap. My body kicked off the rocks in a zigzag and returned to the proper path.

"That’s why. That’s the only reason I’m helping you.”

「But I…I don’t deserve your pity.」

And yet, as the saying went, beyond one mountain lay another. There was still more to overcome.

New terrain appeared before me, too high and steep to climb simply by stepping onto its protrusions. It stretched too far to either side to easily go around it as well.

I stopped for a moment before the jutting wall of earth.

"What do you mean, deserve?”

「You already know, don’t you? Setting aside what I did to you… I failed to properly control that Demon and ended up creating dozens of victims. I also sacrificed thousands of people in order to bring you here.」

The voice echoing beside my ear settled atop my rising breath.

「That’s the kind of trash I am. An idiot who has no right to be saved by anyone. So no matter how much I think about it, this is the right choice. I-I…I’m not worth 9 years of your life.」

How was I supposed to get over this? [Hey, Gretchen.] Trying to ease even a little of the tightness in my chest, I hooked a hand into the collar of my shirt. [We need to go.] But my shirt was already hanging completely open. [That bastard chose to come this way instead of taking care of the beast’s corpse.] In the end, all I could do was return to sighing.

"...Let’s go over this from the beginning."

Still, if I climbed one step at a time, wouldn’t I eventually reach the top? I rolled up my sleeve—though they were so tattered that it hardly mattered—and grabbed hold of the uneven surface of the cliff.

"First, the fact that you failed to control the Demon and ended up with dozens of victims is absolutely not your fault. It wasn’t something that happened because you gave up on controlling her. You tried, and you simply weren’t strong enough to succeed, right?”

「But if I had been stronger……」

"’If I had been stronger’ is a pointless hypothetical. That wasn’t something you could control.”

Even without Arcane Power, my sturdy body wasn’t going anywhere. I couldn’t help having trouble finding a route because I had little rock-climbing experience, but at the very least, I wasn’t going to get screwed over because my grip or core strength gave out. At first anyway.

"People usually call harm caused by external factors that you neither caused nor had the power to control a disaster. And when someone suffers because of a disaster, the fault is never the victim’s. It was absolutely not your fault, understood?”

「.......」

"And sacrificing those people…Yeah. I can't defend that either. A wrong is still a wrong after all.”

But around the halfway point, I started feeling the strain. To be more accurate, I was feeling it quite a lot.

Crumble. The footholds occasionally crumbling beneath me and the ache in my muscles exhausted me more than running hundreds of meters ever had.

It was the same even when I periodically poured in the small amount of Arcane Power that had recovered.

Climbing without equipment when you were a total amateur wasn’t something anyone should be doing.

"But…you were young, and you were in a situation where there wasn’t anyone who could help you, much less anyone you could even call out to for rescue. On top of that, the environment you were abandoned in was something even an adult would have struggled to endure. I think that needs to be clearly acknowledged.”

Still, I had made it more than halfway. Yeah, more than halfway. I looked at the drop below, now awkwardly far to turn back toward, and the much shorter distance remaining above, then reached out again. Only half left.

"I'm not saying being young means everything gets forgiven. And I’m not saying the fact that the people you killed were criminals makes what you did justified. I’m only saying that, considering your age and the environment you were in, I think you deserve at least one chance.”

「Even though I killed that many people?」

"Yeah. Even so, that’s what I think.”

Could the blood debt of killing thousands ever truly be forgiven? Probably not. Regardless of whether they had been criminals or not, the dead likely wouldn’t understand the child.

"But if struggling desperately because you wanted to live is enough of a sin that you deserve to die for it, then that’s far too unreasonable."

Still, I couldn’t imagine there were many people who could’ve chosen differently in an environment where they couldn’t sleep, were in pain every moment, and might kill someone the instant they let their guard down.

So he had to be given a chance. No matter how many sins had piled up, denying him even the opportunity to become better would be far too cruel.

「But, but how could I possibly do that? What right do I have to live on top of all those people’s blood……?」

It was simply too pitiful to let a child die like this when he had never even had the chance to truly experience what living was.

"You know. Faust. The reason I spent a while throwing my body around recklessly, saying I didn’t care if I died, was because I couldn’t see any hope of things getting better from where I was. Guilt was crushing my entire body, and I never knew when or where the variable called the Demon might suddenly appear. I couldn’t find any meaning in staying alive, so I thought maybe dying would be better.”

「...Yes.」

"But not anymore. If I endure 9 years, you’ll get a chance to live. The time I endure has meaning now.”

At the very edge of the cliff I had finally managed to reach, I moved my arm one last time.

"My 9 years will become your 50. And in those 50 years, maybe you’ll be able to save more people than the number you killed. Maybe you’ll even be able to do more good than the sins you committed.”

Scrape. My fingertips reached the top of the cliff. My entire body was drenched in sweat and felt as heavy as lead.

“So, Faust, live. The sins on your shoulders are unbearably heavy, and your guilt will torment you again and again, but even so, try living. If you keep living, opportunities to atone will come. There’ll be moments when, precisely because you were never forgiven, you can become a better person. That’s life. That’s what life is.”

Still, this was the end of the climb, so I put the last of my strength into my fingertips. My body dragged itself upward, and sprawled face-down on top of the cliff. Damn it. I sure as hell was never going to do rock climbing without Arcane Power ever again.

"And frankly, after thousands of people died and one adult like me got ground down just to barely preserve your life, ending it here would be pretty damn rude, don’t you think?”

Even as I felt the presence of divine power drawing closer, I remained sprawled across the ground without any intention of moving.

The Inquisitor was wearing armor, and there was no way she could climb a cliff in that armor. That was the confidence I had gained after calculating the situation.

"Faust."

「...Yes.」

"Do you still want to die even after hearing all that?”

Apparently, my calculation wasn’t entirely wrong. The presence of divine power stopped below the cliff and didn’t move.

"Do you really want to die?”

No. It was moving.

「...I.」

U-uh. [Hey, Gretchen.] My instincts suddenly began blaring alarms. [I think you need to move right now—] My eyes flew wide open.

「I.......」

Boooooom!

An enormous surge of divine power struck the cliff, and the entire thing began collapsing.

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