Nurturing the Hero to Avoid Death

As I’m tumbling down the cliff, my head’s full of curses, mostly of the “damn it” variety. The feelings of relief from saving the girl and the confusion and upset from my predicament makes it hard to think.

Ahh.

What should I do?

Even though this is an important event. Even though I ran the simulation in my brain over and over already. I still made a mistake…

“Oww!”

My shoulder makes impact with the ground first. As expected, my head and back don’t escape harm as well. For a moment I feel as though my consciousness is fleeing, and my breathing pauses for a second. The farther I fall from the top, the darker my surroundings become, until my whole figure disappears in the shadows.

It’s silent, pitch-black as far as the eye can see. Even the sound of insects are absent.

Because today’s cloudy, I can’t see the shining stars or the moonlight.

My whole body aches, wracked with pain, and I struggle to rise. The back of my head feels disgusting. Wet. I wonder what is it. Maybe there is something wet on the ground.

I glance to the side.

In the middle of the darkness, I see a bunch of little glowing orbs. Glowing even when there’s no light around. Ten, twelve, maybe even more than that. Several small round lights.

Then I hear a growl.

T-those lights aren’t lights at all. Those are eyes. The eyes of countless beasts glowing in the darkness.

And what’s lurking in the middle of the darkness is a pack of demon dogs.

Ahh.

So here’s my ‘BAD END’, huh?

I think I’ve worked hard enough. I really think I’ve done well to reach this point. These past three years too. I worked my butt off and didn’t have any objections. In desperation, I strived my best to stay alive. Not only for myself, though. I also wanted Alfred, Granny Marie, the kids at the church, Loendal, Lian’s parents and brother, the friends I made in this world, and the leisurely villagers to survive. I don’t want to see anyone die. However, even though I worked so hard to avoid that day…

…Will I die here? In the end, I will die. Sooner or later.

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But do I really have to die here alone?

The distance between the glowing eyes and me gradually shortens.

To be feasted upon alive must surely hurt… I’m afraid. Even though I want to run, as expected I can’t move my body. I can’t stop trembling.

If I die in this world, what will happen to me?

Will I really die? No hopes of returning to my original world? Unlike in the game, if I, Alfred, and everyone here lose our lives, then that’s it. There’s no redo button.

Just a big, fat ‘game over.’

“Lian!”

I turn my head in the direction of the sound. I faintly make out Alfred’s figure on the cliff side. He’s descending while searching for footholds among the rocks and sturdy tree branches that happen to be along the way down.

Eh, why?

Why have you come down on your own?

Upon reaching the bottom of the cliff, Alfred notices me on the ground. His eyes widen and he rushes to my side. He’s somewhat panicked. A rare state to see him in.

“Lian! Oi!? Are you okay!?”

Since he seems like he wants to rush over and lift me up, I raise the only hand that I can move. He stops in his tracks. Now is not the time for that.

“Alfred… Be careful… The surroundings…”

“Surroundings?”

Alfred lifts his face, sweeping his gaze through the foot of the cliff and beyond.

After a while, he seems to see something dire, eyebrows furrowing and expression growing grim… He probably saw the lurking pack of demon dogs like I did.

“Demon……?”

Growling, one of the demon dogs slowly approaches from the darkness. It’ll definitely be the first to attack. Once it confirms the prey and gives the signal, the rest will charge us at once.

I wrack my brain for a solution, searching through my memories. If I remember correctly, in the game there should be a sword somewhere around here.

Next to the corpse of the priest with the magical ring, there should be the corpse of a knight who had died protecting said priest. And next to the knight’s corpse should be his sword.

Luckily, we’re close to it.

The unsheathed blade is covered in soil, rusted here and there. It looks terribly worn out. But that’s not what’s important. Upon closer inspection, the blade is smooth and continuous, lacking chips or dents. And judging by its degree of rusting, the quality of the sword should be considerably good, right?

And just like my memory of the game dictates, there are two corpses next to this sword. One of a man in full armor and another of person dressed like a priest, swathed in previously white robes with decorations adorning the body.

These corpses have probably lay here for a long time. Because they are exposed to wind and rain for so long, they are pretty much skeletons at this point. The clothes of these corpses have taken on a brownish hue.

According to the storyline, this knight and priest duo were pursued by demons while rushing to finish an errand and return to the headquarters of their religious organization. Unfortunately, the two of them fell off the cliff mid-flee. Then they were eaten alive.

I tug on the edge of Alfred’s shirt. After confirming that his eyes are clear and on me, I quickly point to the direction where the sword should be.

Alfred realizes what I want to say and reaches for the sword. Meanwhile, the demon dogs leap in with a howl.

“Alfre—”

“Stay there! Don’t move!”

His hand finally curls around the sword’s hilt and he immediately swings it, drawing a crescent in the air. But the demon dogs catch the blade with their razor-sharp teeth.

Now that the sword’s movement stops halfway, it looks like that’s the end of Alfred’s attack. However, Alfred is stronger than the demon dogs.

He’s able to lift the blade just like that, the sudden force blasting the demon dogs into the air.

For a second, the demon dogs pause. But they quickly burst into a roar once more, leaping toward Alfred in a frenzy.

Before I can make sense of things, the event’s battle has unfolded before my eyes.

With Alfred’s graceful and efficient moves, the demon dogs are defeated one by one.

I feel like I’ve seen these moves before. These are the sword techniques that I learned from the sword instructor in school. The ones which I then I taught Alfred secretly. These sword techniques aren’t the basic kind they teach in class. They’re melded with classical forms of martial arts, making them useful in actual combat.

Alfred has also mastered the wild fire magic. That’s because of me. After thinking a long time about the disaster day, I casually taught Alfred a technique, one that I had remodelled to only require a small amount of energy to use. That way, he can continue fighting for a long period without running out of magic power. It seems like they actually came to good use.

Aah, I’m glad. My effort was not useless. He can fight. That is enough.

Like this, surely, Alfred can survive.

Suddenly, my peripheral vision catches a slight glow farther away..

A ring.

I crawl to it, moving my injured right shoulder one way or another. I reach out. My hand grabs the soiled ring. Once Alfred obtains this ring, the event can be considered cleared. Grabbing the ring tightly, I glance up at Alfred’s location.

More than half of the demon dogs lie dead or unconscious on the ground.

As expected, the rest of the demon dogs lose their fighting spirit and dash off into the darkness with their tails lowered.

Did he win?

After Alfred’s last swing of the sword, he turns around and rushed toward me.

Aah, he won. I’m glad. I’m really glad.

Alfred is safe.

“Lian! Get up, get a grip! I’ll bring you to the school physician quickly……” Being lifted into his arms, I feel the pain in my left shoulder, right leg, back, and back of my head flare back in action. My whole body feels sore.

Before I forget, I hand the ring to Alfred.

”…Here.”

“What? A ring…?”

The moment his fingers brush against it, the ring takes on a faint glow. Alfred widens his eyes slightly. His movements freeze.

Perhaps he’s hearing the words of the dead priest’s spirit in his head. Something like “gentleman from the same village and with the same ancient blood as me, please deliver this ring to the bishop of the religious organization’s headquarters.” That’s if the story is progressing according to the game.

While Alfred furrows his brows and makes a difficult face, he casually places the ring into his pocket. Why are you treating it so roughly, huh? That is a key item, you know. Please take care of it.

But anyway, the ring was properly handed to Alfred. And Alfred survived.

This is enough.

At the beginning I was worried that we wouldn’t make it, but I have accomplished Lian’s duty in the end.