Chapter 120

120. It Became Reality

“I made a mistake.”

“Did ya?”

Chomp, chomp.

On the way home, I had stopped by a butcher shop and bought a huge amount of meat.

Now, Modak was sitting on the floor, happily chewing through it all.

Meanwhile, I lay there with his belly as my pillow and complained.

When I saw him at the Chairman’s building, his body had been so hot that simply touching him could burn skin.

But right now, he was warm and cozy, like an electric heating mat.

It felt great.

If I kept quiet, all I could hear was the sizzling sound of meat cooking, while the tempting smell of grilled meat filled the air.

This was paradise....

“…Honestly, I never thought I could beat him from the beginning. I mean, he’s someone who survived even after the world ended.”

“So?”

“But I didn’t think the difference would be this huge.”

The Chairman hadn’t been able to injure me either.

But from the looks of it, he had only been playing around.

Meanwhile, I had fought him seriously and still couldn’t leave so much as a scratch.

The difference in strength was overwhelming.

If I had to classify him, the Chairman was probably someone on the level of a Great Hero too.

Scary.

Really scary.

“But Dad, for someone saying you made a mistake, you seemed to know an awful lot. Didn’t you already know everything?”

“Nope. I just took things I thought were ‘probably true’ and said they definitely were. Then even the things that weren’t true became true. Right?”

“Oooh! So you led him into it!”

“Hahaha. It looked cool, but really, it was basically me going there, kneeling down, and begging the Chairman.”

“Oooh...! I see?”

I mimicked myself from earlier.

“Please, I’m begging you. Send my kid back in one piece. I even created a situation you’d probably enjoy, didn’t I?! So please! I know you know how!”

“Hehe.”

It had worked pretty well.

But the fight had gone in a completely unexpected direction, and far more people had become casualties than I had expected.

Who could have predicted that the Chairman would suddenly set his own building on fire?

It looked like someone inside had been carrying the injured people out one by one....

But even if they survived the fire, could they really survive the Chairman afterward?

I had only brought up the traitor woman on the slim chance that my guess was right.

And it turned out she really wasn’t in her right mind and had been captured inside a laboratory.

The Chairman had even mentioned something about restructuring.

A lot of people were probably going to get crushed in the process.

“And in the end, only the true elites will remain. I kind of did something awful to the manga people. If possible, I’d like those guys to win.”

“Haha! ‘Manga people’? What’s that?”

“You know, the kind of person who’d scream, ‘Raaagh! I’ll never forgive you!’ if someone they fought yesterday died.”

“Hmm~ There are all kinds of weird people! If they care that much, why were they fighting in the first place? Weren’t they fighting with their lives on the line?”

“Exactly.”

“What an idiot! Okay! From now on, I’m calling that person Idiot!”

“…Son... you’re smarter than I expected. As expected of my boy!”

“Ehehe!”

I felt like my humanity had just fallen straight through the bottom of the abyss.

But whatever.

I wasn’t exactly in a position to worry about anyone else.

Beep, beep, beep.

Beeep! Beeep!

“What?! What’s that sound?!”

“Hmm. It means we have a guest.”

My body was exhausted from all the fighting, but I forced myself up and walked over to the front door.

When I opened it—

As expected, it was Pie.

I’d changed the door password and completely forgotten to tell her.

“What? Am I an outsider now?”

“I forgot.”

“You always do that.”

“…Uh... teehee!”

Flick.

One emotionally charged forehead flick from Pie, and the matter was apparently settled for today.

No, but seriously!

Did I do something wrong?!

Huh?!

Was it really that serious?!

“Hi, Pie!”

“Oh my, Modak. Why are you here? Wait... don’t tell me the thing in the middle of that castle was...”

“Yeah. It was residue.”

“…Then what about Aien? What happened to her?”

“I just finished dealing with that. We’ll probably see her again soon.”

“Ah, okay.”

Pie sat beside Modak and began playing with his fluffy fur.

Well, my kid was pretty cute.

Anyone who saw him would probably want to pet him at least once.

“We need to wash him. He smells like blood.”

“Eek! No! I hate baths! I’m not taking one!”

“Don’t worry. We won’t use water. If we sterilize you with fire once, the smell should disappear too.”

“Oh!”

“How are the others?”

I had hurriedly sent everyone to the Abandoned Area.

Since they were kids I had raised, they probably wouldn’t get seriously hurt just from suddenly being dropped there.

Still, I was worried.

Well...

At least Aien wasn’t there to look around suspiciously and start yelling questions, so that reduced my worries a little.

“Mallangi is doing great. Apparently, he’s a complete natural counter to the Void Beasts. Those things freak out just from him walking past them.”

“Ohhh, I see... So darkness-type creatures are afraid of light-type Mallangi!”

“Mallangi seems to hate them too, so I think he might evolve from this.”

“Sounds good to me. The stronger the kids get, the better.”

And thus began the creation of an adventuring party where the protagonist was the weakest member.

The protagonist constantly got beaten up, recovered, ran back out, drew aggro, and got beaten up again—

while all the party members kept getting stronger and stronger.

At this point, wouldn’t I be better off carrying a shield?

There was a limit to how long I could keep blocking everything with my body like I was doing now.

“What about you?”

“I fought the Chairman. He was way beyond what I imagined. I couldn’t compete with him at all.”

“Are you going to give up?”

“Hey! Tsk!!! No! That word is banned from now on! Banned! Don’t say it!”

“Uh... no.”

“...”

Damn it.

Damn it all....

Did I really have to find some method?

Did I have to meet everyone’s expectations?

It was hard.

Annoying.

My head hurt.

And I didn’t want to do it....

Still...

Did I have to?

“Is it okay for you to keep playing the game?”

“If the world’s residue can be affected through the game, then continuing to play the game might make dealing with the Chairman easier.”

“For example?”

“That...”

For example....

Turning everyone in my current party into real humans and attacking the Chairman all at once.

Something like that....

I know!

I know gathering a bunch of people around my level wouldn’t magically solve the problem!

But what else was I supposed to do when I couldn’t think of anything better right now?

I didn’t know anything.

I had no idea what I should do.

I just wanted to gather the kids together, show them the whole situation, let them judge it themselves, and talk it through with them.

“Who knows.”

“So you don’t really have a plan.”

“Nothing concrete... but I do have a last resort.”

“…You really are something.”

Why was she suddenly giving me such a sincere compliment?

Was the sun going to rise in the west tomorrow?

“Is lying around like this part of your plan too?”

“I’m currently strengthening my resolve to run straight over there and completely destroy the company if the Chairman doesn’t say anything by morning.”

“Sounds good. Can I help?”

“I can’t do it without you.”

I had already become exhausted from fighting the Chairman.

My body was strangely sturdy now, almost like I had undergone some kind of martial-arts transformation despite there having been no martial-arts event whatsoever.

Even so, the fight with the Chairman had taken a heavy toll.

My arms were trembling and numb.

My head throbbed.

My vision was blurry.

It was difficult even to stand up and move.

I need to become stronger.

I really didn’t want to have some cliché protagonist inner monologue like that.

But I had no choice.

It looked like the number of mouths depending on me was only going to keep growing.

I couldn’t keep thinking, Ah, I hope everything stays just like it is forever~.

That wouldn’t be enough anymore.

Should I go see Dorfin?

Could Dorfin even teach me anything more?

Had I already reached the limit of my talent when it came to Flow?

These days, I almost used it unconsciously....

Then maybe it would be better to learn Destruction from Jin instead.

No, could I even learn it?

Was I really that talented?

“Aaaah~! When is Aien coming~?!”

“It hasn’t even been that long since you came back from fighting.”

“…Two hours? It’s almost dawn! Good children should be sleeping by now!”

“Then it’s not your bedtime yet.”

“Excuse me?”

A short silence followed.

During that silence, my head became tangled up with thoughts about Aien again.

“She must be really scared, right?”

“Probably.”

“Don’t you have any advice as her senior?”

“I was fine from the beginning. I only had a brief identity crisis.”

I remembered the attack on the Chairman, where all the random nonsense I had said somehow turned out to be true.

I had started talking to Pie because I didn’t want bad thoughts filling my head.

But Pie was never much of a talker in the first place.

If anything, hearing her answer just made me even more depressed.

I didn’t think Aien would overcome that confusion as easily as Pie had.

“What should I do when Aien gets here?”

“Do whatever you want.”

“And what do I want?”

“How would I know?”

Pie’s words sounded almost irresponsibly casual.

But at the same time, I could feel that she trusted me enough to leave it in my hands.

I had absolutely no idea what part of me inspired that kind of trust.

Still....

Fine.

Let’s try.

“I just hope she doesn’t come back hurt.”

“She’s strong too.”

“She’s still a kid. A pure kid who still admires Heroes. And unlike you, she doesn’t use magic. She’s a physical fighter.”

That was why I was so worried.

Honestly, if it had been Mallangi, I probably wouldn’t have worried this much.

That kid was surprisingly shameless when he wanted to be.

If it were Levi, the Spirit would be with her, so there would be even less reason to worry.

As for the Village Chief....

Well, I’d be a little nervous, but there probably wouldn’t be any huge problem.

The problem was that it was Aien.

The first two—

or three, maybe?

They probably wouldn’t care much whether they had taken over the traitor woman’s body or were simply parasitizing it.

But Aien was different.

She would definitely feel guilty even though none of it was her fault.

“How terrifying must it be to wake up in an unfamiliar world?”

“…Was it? The scariest thing for me was you trying to kill me because you didn’t recognize me.”

“N-No! Aien is different! I’ll recognize her the moment I see her! You know that every person has a different Flow? Like fingerprints.”

“Then why didn’t you recognize me?”

“Because back during the tester days, I didn’t understand Flow, so I couldn’t tell what kind of person you were?”

“Nice excuse. So you looked at Lucy Lowell without realizing it was me and fell for her, right?”

“Huh?! N-No?! No! It was more like... um... our souls were drawn to each other?”

“How is that not falling for someone?”

Anyway.

Aien had nearly cried at the very end.

No matter how often she acted strong because she was a knight, she was still a soft-hearted kid underneath.

If she had really been strong in every sense, she would have thrown me into prison a long time ago.

Instead, she was always thinking things like—

Still...

H-He’s a good person! Sometimes....

That was the reason I was still able to move around freely.

Just look at how she complains about her parents, yet still sends them living expenses every month and immediately goes home when they call her....

Unlike me, who could simply think, The traitor woman was already as good as dead anyway, so I might as well use her body well, and forcibly ignore the issue—

Aien would face that guilt head-on.

She would probably keep tormenting herself over the fact that she was now inside the traitor woman’s body.

Amazing.

Truly amazing.

Knock.

Knock.

At that moment—

Someone weakly knocked on the door.

In an age like this, someone actually knocked.

I could immediately guess who was standing outside.

But I didn’t make a big scene.

I stood up and walked toward the door.

Modak and Pie followed behind me.

I pulled Modak right beside me.

Then I gently hid Pie behind me.

Slowly—

I opened the door.

“…M-Mister...?”

A young girl stood there.

She looked back and forth between me and Modak before cautiously speaking.

“…Oh dear....”

It was within the range of possibilities I had imagined.

The Aien standing in front of me looked almost exactly like one of the many versions I had pictured in my head.

Bandages were wrapped all around her body.

Between them, I could see traces of surgery.

Her eyes trembled with anxiety.

Her dry lips were tight with fear.

In the game, the top of her head had been around my eye level.

Now, it only reached my shoulder.

Her thin, untrained body trembled like a leaf.

Yeah.

I could roughly imagine what had happened.

“M-Mister... I....”

My appearance in the game and my appearance here might have had different atmospheres.

But my face itself was the same.

So Aien probably had no trouble recognizing me.

Her trembling hand slowly reached out and tightly grabbed the edge of my clothes.

She looked up at me with tears running down her face.

Red tears.

Mixed with blood.

At that moment, I realized all over again just how lucky Pie had been.

Rustle.

I quietly pulled Aien into a hug.

Pie, who had once wandered across the world itself, and Aien, who was only around middle-school age now, were completely different.

Pie shared all of Lucy Lowell’s memories.

So Aien probably had all of this body’s memories too.

But unlike Pie, Aien was probably confused by absolutely everything around her.

Who... am I?

Those were the kind of thoughts that must have made her cry.

And she had grabbed onto me because she needed something to confirm her own identity.

Without even asking who she was, Aien’s head was probably full of the traitor woman’s memories and her own memories—

and maybe even the truth that she had originally been a character inside a game.

Everything must have been completely tangled together.

“Aien.”

I deliberately called her name once before continuing slowly.

If I panicked too and started acting flustered or nervous, Aien would only become more confused.

“Don’t think about anything else.”

Her trembling fingers gripped my clothes even tighter.

Even though she was inside the traitor woman’s slim, delicate body, there was surprising strength in that grip.

“You might feel anxious right now. You’re probably confused about what’s happening.”

I know what situation you’re in.

There was a huge difference between saying I know and saying I don’t know.

Even if you knew nothing, saying you understood could earn trust.

Meanwhile, saying I don’t know even when you probably understood made you look pathetic.

Sure, if you messed it up, you could become a liar or a conman.

But that didn’t apply to me right now.

“Think about only one thing. Look at only one thing.”

“Think about who’s standing in front of you right now.”

Honestly, I didn’t know whether this was the right thing to say.

I had no idea whether this was something you should say to a child struggling with her identity.

Was it really right to tell her to find meaning in her existence through me?

But Aien, together with the Village Chief, had stood behind me more than almost anyone else.

She had stayed by my side for a very long time.

A sense of guilt suddenly stabbed at me.

Hadn’t she ended up like this because of me?

That made it difficult to say what came next.

But I couldn’t show that guilt to Aien while she stood there trembling and looking up at me.

Better to be shameless.

That kind of shamelessness was probably more familiar to the Aien who remembered the version of me from the game anyway.

I smiled broadly.

“Don’t worry.”

“Trust me.”

Aien slowly lowered her head.

Then she gave a tiny nod.

And finally—

she wrapped her arms around me too.

Only now did I wonder whether there had been something better I could have said.

Even so....

I couldn’t help it.

With how bad I was with words, this was probably the best I could do right now.

There was nothing else to be done.

Because of an accident she never expected, this child had encountered me.

Now she was trapped beside me, unable to move forward or backward.

So—

I had to become the place where she could rest.