Do Heroes Need Welfare Too? - Chapter 81

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 81

A self-deprecating voice.

I couldn’t hold back any longer and approached him.

I called out to him again, but Adam didn’t move at all.

“Adam. You didn’t fail to protect me! I’m right here.”

Adam’s head lifted slightly.

Then he lowered his head again and spoke vacantly.

“You must be a hallucination.”

Your Iberis is right here in front of you, perfectly fine.

I spoke to Adam in frustration, but he didn’t seem to hear me.

Those things blocking Adam’s sight and hearing were the problem.

I wasn’t certain what they were.

But it was clear they were having a negative effect on Adam.

My arm stung from touching the black smoke, whether from the Sacred Relic’s repulsion.

I had felt this sensation in the not-so-distant past.

When was it.

When I touched Abracxas after bringing the Sacred Relic.

He had rolled around on the floor of the Demon King’s Castle afterward, acting as if he was in pain. He had whined like that, forgetting even his title as one of the Three Great Demon Clans.

And then…

‘Was it Aphene?’

Anyway, that wasn’t what was important right now.

The reason the Sacred Relic was repelling was that Adam wasn’t in a normal state.

I grabbed Adam’s cheeks as he couldn’t come to his senses and struck his forehead hard with my head.

It was such an impact that my own head felt numb.

I gripped Adam’s cheeks tightly as he panicked and shouted.

“Look clearly! I’m perfectly alive! Why did you think I was dead?!”

Slowly, his focus returned.

Finally, my image entered his usual golden eyes.

Even so, I couldn’t relax my tension and continued to look at him in that state.

“Iberis?”

At the name that came vacantly from his lips, I nodded in relief.

Adam, whose strength left his legs, collapsed in place.

My clothes were already dirty anyway.

I also plopped down in front of him.

“What on earth was that earlier?”

There had been strange black smoke surrounding Adam that I absolutely couldn’t dismiss as trivial.

Something I had seen on Adam’s body several times.

The Sacred Relic had been trembling frighteningly.

Unlike usual, this time it couldn’t shake it off immediately.

As if it was gradually growing larger.

To the point where even the sacred object couldn’t handle it.

I carefully reached out and grasped the tip of Adam’s finger.

It was a little cold, but warmth was definitely being transmitted, and it didn’t reject him with sparks flying like before.

I opened my mouth and spoke to Adam.

“You looked as if you weren’t the Hero at all.”

“…That is.”

Adam moved his lips, trying to say something.

But seeing him frown as if in pain, I felt like I had touched a sensitive spot that shouldn’t be probed further.

“If it’s something I shouldn’t know, you don’t have to tell me.”

I could ask through messages anyway, and even if not, Adam’s expression looked too exhausted right now.

It was the face of someone who wanted to give up everything.

I quietly withdrew the hand that had been holding his finger.

“No, you have the right to know…”

Adam grasped my hand with urgent movements.

Adam still didn’t give up.

Adam’s eyes, filled with different emotions, looked directly at me.

“This is the Demon King’s trace, or you could call it a curse.”

“…”

I drew in a breath.

The Demon King hadn’t died meaninglessly.

He had left a curse on Adam before dying.

“After killing the Demon King, I realized something had gone wrong.”

“If you kill me, you’ll regret it, Hero. You’ll be killed by those you tried to protect without gaining honor, power, or anything!”

“Kill all those you love and destroy yourself.”

“The Demon King has appeared many times so far, but each time the Hero of that era killed him. What happened to the Hero afterward?”

Well. The only initial setting I knew was that he was the 7th Hero, which meant there had been six Heroes before Adam.

And about them… I knew nothing.

They too must have killed the Demon King and brought peace to the Empire, just like Adam.

‘And…’

And what happened to them.

As if to solve my curiosity, Adam continued.

“All the Heroes go mad and die.”

“…”

“The Demon King’s power, close to a curse, seeps into the Hero, making their mind go berserk at the slightest stimulus, leading to their execution. That’s why the Demon King wasn’t afraid of me at all.”

There’s no fool who would fear someone destined to self-destruct.

So the Demon King had always confidently welcomed the Hero.

The Demon King in the game had a face that seemed transcendent beyond arrogance.

Black hair and bright red eyes.

The Demon King, adorned entirely in black and red, personally welcomed the Hero who entered the Demon King’s Castle.

“I tried to maintain a peaceful state by meeting as few people as possible, but it ended up like this anyway. It seems the Demon King’s curse truly cannot be avoided.”

“Still, we should think about finding a way to break it!”

“Perhaps because all Heroes succumbed helplessly to the curse, there’s no content about it in any literature.”

Only then did I remember the books Adam had been reading at the Demon King’s Castle and the Temple.

Recalling him absorbed day and night, I realized Adam had made great efforts too.

But when did he stop trying to destroy the curse?

However, now Adam seemed to simply accept his fate.

“I don’t want to be alone anymore.”

“Then…”

Just when I was thinking I should find Adam’s other friends.

“Don’t go.”

Adam spoke in a voice so thin it seemed ready to break.

His words asking me not to go made my throat tight.

Adam had seemed detached about others’ deaths.

Why was that.

I didn’t know the proper reason.

But I was certain that Adam was suffering.

Adam reached out and covered the back of my hand.

Slight trembling vibrations were transmitted through the skin.

I couldn’t even imagine how much he had suffered when he mistakenly thought I was dead.

“I didn’t want to see even you leave me. But if it’s going to be the same no matter how much I let you go, as you said, couldn’t you stay by my side.”

He leaned his head against me just like that. As if his head had gotten wet from the sudden downpour, water droplets fell along his short hair.

And soon after, the shoulder where Adam was leaning became damp.

It wasn’t cold like raindrops, but hot.

Was he crying?

“It’s all my fault.”

I had been secretly curious about when this man, who wouldn’t cry even when stabbed by a sword or betrayed by comrades, would shed tears.

To think it would be now.

At his sudden tears, I stopped breathing, forgetting even to breathe.

“So please….”

At Adam’s earnestly pleading voice, I couldn’t move at all.

I remained still for a long while, unable to push him away coldly or approach him.

“I won’t leave.”

…For now.

I swallowed the rest of my words and reassured Adam.

I couldn’t leave Adam right away when he had no one else to rely on.

It would have to be after I carefully prepared a foundation for him to live happily even without me.

‘Right now he only has me by his side, so he must be mistaken….’

Finishing my brief thoughts, I smiled and faced him.

I didn’t say that I was staying by his side in order to leave.

‘But I have to return when the Quest ends….’

I don’t understand my own heart either.

When I see Adam’s smiling face, I waver endlessly, yet I’m also consistent in being unable to leave his side.

* * *

What broke the situation was an unwelcome visitor who came afterward.

“Gasp….”

He seemed to recognize Adam at first glance.

It was the person I had met earlier.

Also, he would be the most troublesome person in this village.

‘It’s that nobleman from earlier.’

Everything the nobles had said when they saw Adam was nothing good.

It would be better not to let them meet.

Lindel seemed to think similarly as he stopped his approaching steps.

His hand gripping the crutch was trembling aimlessly.

The haughty nobleman I had seen earlier was nowhere to be found, and his eyes shook like a sailboat before a storm.

He covered his mouth as if afraid a shrill scream might escape, yet kept his gaze fixed on Adam.

“Former Emperor Your Majesty…?”

…Huh?

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————