The Hero’s Disciple Has Returned

Sera also had a time as an ordinary(?) hero candidate. She had a fresh period when she walked the righteous path, thinking that not doing so would be corruption, and never walked the dark path. This was during the early stages of infinite regression, when the number of regressions hadn’t yet exceeded three digits, when she hadn’t given up on steadily counting the numbers.

But when she was defeated and died without even properly fighting the Demon King due to all sorts of interferences, and regressed…

Even the fresh Sera had to admit.

That to save the world, one shouldn’t insist on the righteous path. That’s how she started to step into darkness.

For Sera, who only knew the righteous path, adapting to the dark path wasn’t easy. There were times when she got involved half-heartedly and had to die from surprise attacks. It was natural from the start. Because it didn’t make sense to slowly adapt in the underworld stained with blood. If it had been when she was experienced, it might have been different… But at that time, except for being able to regress, she didn’t have anything special to boast about, so there was no answer except struggling.

Then one day, she received help from the underworld for the first time.

It was a strange enigmatic person whose gender could barely be recognized as female through her build, hiding herself entirely in black from head to toe.

She appeared in front of Sera, who was being unilaterally beaten, knocked down all the ruffians, gave her food, and then disappeared. She was famous among the beggar kids living in the underworld. A mysterious enigmatic person who never revealed her name or identity, always hiding her existence with a black cloak and black mask, but occasionally extending a helping hand to beggar kids who were being unilaterally victimized… To put it grandly, she was known as a sort of saint of the underworld.

Sera thought that if she owed a debt, she should repay the favor, so she thought she would repay it someday when she had the chance.

Little did she know…

That she would find that enigmatic person in a nearly dying state.

Sera secretly brought her to her hideout, treated her, and saved her. As she had gained some experience, she could at least provide first aid. But since it wasn’t yet a time when she had accumulated a lot of know-how as an infinitely regressing hero, all she could do at that time was first aid. But she couldn’t let her benefactor die, so Sera did everything she could.

And fortunately, she regained consciousness and gradually recovered.

At first, she was reluctant to open her mouth, but slowly she began to speak and started teaching various things.

She introduced herself, saying that she was called Number 5 in an assassin group called 【Medusa】 and that she had long forgotten her name, so she could just be called Number 5. She explained her situation, saying that she had been forcibly made an assassin against her will, and had to kill people through assassinations, but she couldn’t kill anymore, so she tried to escape and got seriously injured, and that’s how Sera ended up saving her.

And that evening, taking advantage of the moment when Sera disappeared briefly to find food, Number 5 disappeared

The next day, Sera could find Number 5’s corpse.

The reason was simple.

If 【Medusa】 found out that Sera had helped Number 5, it was clear that they would try to kill Sera too. So Number 5 had cleanly erased her traces and deliberately revealed herself to be killed by 【Medusa】.

Sera cried. But at the same time, looking at Number 5’s corpse with a bright smile, she realized.

That Number 5 had wanted a ‘meaningful death’. That for her, a meaningful death was happiness. For her, who was in hell whether she lived or died, dying while protecting someone was the most satisfying happiness.

Number 5 from another iteration proved this.

There was a time when she eliminated 【Medusa】 as quickly as possible and freed Number 5. Number 5 became a wreck and died miserably like that. Even freedom couldn’t be salvation for Number 5. Number 5’s soul had already been broken long before the point where Sera regressed. No matter what Sera did, Number 5 craved death and considered a meaningful death as happiness. Therefore, Sera couldn’t choose the path of forcibly saving Number 5. If Number 5 wanted such a meaningful death so much… She decided to go along with it.

Sera decided to repay the favor by giving Number 5 a meaningful death. It was to learn all the skills that Number 5 had. Number 5 wanted to die leaving even a little meaning, and Sera thought learning Number 5’s excellent skills would be helpful. So they made a contract that Sera would kill her when she had perfectly mastered Number 5’s skills. Number 5 accepted this. Because teaching a hero candidate and dying was something she could see as a sufficiently meaningful death.

In other words, for Sera, Number 5 was both a benefactor and a former teacher. Even though she eventually had to kill her with her own hands.

But seeing Number 5 die with a smile as if she was truly happy, she couldn’t think it was wrong. If that was happiness for her, there was nothing she could do about it. Sera just accepted it like that.

And when she fell into the hell of infinite regression and couldn’t die even though she wanted to, Sera ended up envying Number 5 like that. Because she could die when she wanted to die. That’s why she had never doubted. ‘Whether her way of repaying the favor was wrong.’

This was also one of the changes that came about because of Jade.

What would Jade have done? When she thought about it, the master she knew wasn’t someone who would kill and say ‘I repaid the favor’. Jade couldn’t be wrong. Therefore, she was wrong. Her method was wrong. Sera had come to adjust herself from an omniscient master’s perspective. It wasn’t just the level of resembling someone you love, but reaching the level of striving with all her might to resemble because she loved.

As a result, Sera thought her way was wrong. Meaningful death is happiness? If she said such things to Jade, Jade would say this without any hesitation.

-That’s bullshit.

…That’s what he would say.

So Jade would never leave such a theory of meaningful death happiness alone. He would try to change it somehow. It was clear that he would do so because that’s the kind of person Jade was. And it was Sera herself who had received salvation from such a Jade. Therefore, Sera concluded that she should do for Number 5 in Jade’s way to truly repay the favor.

If the theory of meaningful death happiness is bullshit

Then what should be done?

First, she had to save her.

That’s why at this moment, Sera had to walk a path she had never taken before.

“Number 5”
“……”
“I’m going to eliminate 【Medusa】.”
“……”
“What do you think? Don’t you think I can do it sufficiently?”
“…You could do it.”
“Yes, I could do it.”

Eliminating 【Medusa】 was too familiar for Sera. Until she gave up on saving the world, she had eliminated 【Medusa】 every time before starting, so there was no one who knew better how to eliminate 【Medusa】 well than her. It wouldn’t be wrong to call her a 【Medusa】 extermination specialist.

“I’m going to eliminate 【Medusa】, but what are you going to do?”
“…Are you telling me to help eliminate 【Medusa】?”
“Yes.”
“It’s impossible. I have the things they put on me…”

Whoosh!

As Sera swung her aura blade, all the curses placed on Number 5 were completely dismantled and vanished due to the anti-aura. Since they were also composed of magical power, they simply vanished in an instant before the anti-aura. If 【Medusa】 had known about the existence of anti-aura, they would have prepared other devices, but since the existence of anti-aura was not yet known to the world, it was natural that there were no such devices at all.

Therefore, at this moment, Number 5 became completely free.

“What do you mean it’s not possible? It’s not because of those things that just disappeared, is it?”
“…It’s a lie.”

From Number 5’s perspective, who had to live a hellish life due to those terrible things they had put on her for her entire life, it was unbelievable that they all vanished so easily just by swinging a sword once. But she also knew, being at the level of a master. That all those filthy, dirty somethings inside her had completely disappeared.

“Well then, what will you do?”
“…Can’t you leave eliminating 【Medusa】 to me?”

The moment she saw those eyes, Sera could immediately understand.

‘She’s thinking of dying together…’

Sera, who had worked harder than anyone to fulfill Number 5’s wish, could read it at once.

“You’re thinking of dying together, right? No, you can’t. You have to keep living.”
“…Why? I… don’t want to live… I’m a sinner…”
“You’re a victim. You’re just a poor victim who was inevitably swept up, entangled, and engulfed in the madness of those crazy bastards.”
“But I killed because I didn’t want to suffer! Because I didn’t want to be in pain! Because it was better for others to be in pain than for me to be in pain! That’s why I killed! You don’t know how much blood is on these hands! If you knew, you couldn’t say such things!”
“Hmm. At this stage, you’ve killed about 30 people on request, right? If we include the training period, it would be about 40 people.”
“……”

Number 5 looked at Sera with a blank face. Actually, if you calculate the number she killed on request and the number she had to kill during training due to 【Medusa】’s ‘fratricidal plan’, it was exactly that much. It was 【Medusa】’s crazy plan that the last survivor who lived after being locked up and made to kill each other would become an excellent assassin, and Number 5, who was caught up in it, had no choice but to kill victims like herself. Therefore, the number she had killed so far… did not deviate from what Sera said.

“So what?”
“…What?”
“Yes, you’ve killed quite a few people. So what?”
“……”
“You think you should die because you killed people? What changes if you take your own life here? Do the dead come back to life? If that’s the logic, shouldn’t all mercenaries who kill people for money be sent to the guillotine? Right?”

Number 5 didn’t yield. To begin with, a decision to kill oneself that could be broken by someone else’s words couldn’t be something that could be easily parted with. After all, one couldn’t easily decide to kill oneself in the first place. Therefore, Number 5’s determination wasn’t shaken by someone else’s words.

“…A sinner doesn’t have the right to decide that.”
“But there’s also no one else who can decide it.”
“Even so…! It doesn’t mean a sinner can shamelessly live!”
“Yes, as you say, a sinner can’t decide, and since the victims don’t exist, they can’t decide either. Then don’t you think it’s right to leave the judgment to a rational person who can make such a judgment?”
“…What do you mean?”
“When nobles have legal problems, they have trials, right? And those who decide that are people qualified by the Emperor. It’s the same thing. When the answer isn’t clear, you leave it to someone qualified to give that answer. Yes, for example, someone up there.”

Sera pointed to the sky with her finger.

Meaning God.

“But as you know, the one up there in the high heavens is famous for not answering well no matter how much you talk about such questions. So you can ask someone who has the qualification to be that person’s representative.”

And Sera pointed to herself with her finger.

“A being who saves the world from crisis on behalf of God, that’s a hero. If it’s a hero, it’s enough to be God’s representative, right? So don’t you think it’s rational for me to take on the judgment of your sin?”
“…That’s forced. To begin with, you’re a hero candidate, not a hero…”
“Don’t you think so?”
“……”

Number 5 couldn’t find words to say.

She, who was at the level of a master, was defeated so easily, even though she had clashed in the most advantageous situation for herself. And such an opponent is not a hero? Even she thought it wasn’t something she should say.

“I’ll make a judgment as God’s representative. You become my comrade.”
“……”
“I have countless things I need to do as a hero. And each of them is necessary to save the world. So helping me is essentially saving the world and will be a way to save hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, an unimaginable number of lives. So live and help me by my side. That is the judgment I give you as a hero with the qualification of God’s representative.”
“Such… a one-sidedly convenient story can’t possibly…”
“If you die and all the people you killed pop up and say something to you, tell them this: ‘The hero forgave me. If you want to argue, go argue with the hero.'”
“……”
“I’ll shoulder your sin along with the fate of the world that I’m shouldering.”

It was by no means a fair judgment that came down from heaven, but rather close to a demon’s secret whisper. It was truly the demon’s meticulous temptation itself.

But it couldn’t be ignored. She couldn’t pretend not to hear that voice.

Because according to those words, it means she has the right to live.

Because it means she has the right to see tomorrow while living.

She had thrown away, thrown away, thrown away, saying she had no such right.

To be told she doesn’t have to do that.

How sweet those words are?

She wants to follow those words right away.

But a sinner like her doesn’t have the right to decide that…

‘But will there be anyone else who would shoulder my sins besides her?’

If it had been a different voice, she could have ignored it. If it had been something like ‘You have no sin’ or ‘You’re just a victim too, so don’t feel guilty’, she could have ignored it as much as she wanted. But the words Sera chose were, of all things, that she would shoulder the sin. It was as good as saying that even if she shouldered her sin instead, she wanted her to live.

She doesn’t know the reason.

Why she wants her to live so much

Why she’s doing this much for her

But

One thing for sure is

That this hero candidate is the first to truly wish for her to live.

The word ‘first’ has a strange power.

That strange power shook Number 5.

In the end, she knelt down. She had knelt many times to the 【Medusa】 executives, but it was always forced by torture spells. But at this moment, she had no pain. It was all pure sincerity.

“This life is for the hero, this body is for the hero, this sword is for the hero… Until the moment I die, for you who shouldered my sin… I swear.”

At those words, Sera smiled awkwardly. It wasn’t the ending she wanted, but since Number 5 had decided to live, she could avoid the worst ending, so it was a somewhat satisfactory result.

She missed Master’s touch.

She craved Jade’s praise.

‘I’ll do it secretly.’

Sera was adding something she wanted to do while going to apply holy water to the dragon egg next to the sleeping Jade tonight. The dragon egg was an obedient child, so a perfect crime was a sure thing.