I Became the Hero While Paving a Flower Path for My Niece - Chapter 13

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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The Heroine’s Flower Garden Paver Became a Hero — Episode 13
“What?”
At Yi Baek’s words, Alex couldn’t help but let the sound escape his lips.
“I beg your pardon?”
The knight Loren turned to look at Alex.
“No, it’s nothing….”
Alex started to deny it, then changed course. He needed to warn them about the monsters beforehand.
“When I used Mana Detection, I sensed what appears to be a fairly powerful individual. It seems to be capable of using magic… I think it would be wise to be cautious.”
“…Understood.”
Loren nodded while thinking to himself, ‘Mages really are incomprehensible.’
There was no reason for a powerful magical monster to appear in a Lowest-Tier Dungeon like this.
‘He seemed polite enough, but he’s strange all the same.’
With that thought, Loren turned back toward where the soldiers, So Yeong-ju, and the others were gathered.
“What do you mean, your mana?”
Yi Baek answered Alex, who was speaking in hushed tones.
[Literally that. I felt it when I used Mana Detection just now.]
[Why?]
Alex whispered as he followed behind the soldiers.
“Maybe you’re mistaken? Similar mana or something.”
[That almost never happens unless they’re blood relatives.]
[Hmm.]
[But since this is another world, I can’t be certain.]
—!
Just then, a commotion erupted from ahead.
Loren and the soldiers, recognizing the sounds of people and monsters, held their breath and moved with greater caution.
“First, let’s save the people.”
Since a Contaminated Dungeon doesn’t disappear, the mana Yi Baek sensed would still be there.
Saving the people first, growing stronger, and then investigating the dungeon seemed like the right approach.
[Right.]
Knight Loren and the soldiers concealed themselves behind brush and trees, taking in the situation.
First, they spotted the people who had been pulled into the dungeon. About twenty in number. The count matched what had been surveyed, suggesting no deaths yet.
But many bore grievous wounds and looked ready to breathe their last at any moment. Several had collapsed entirely.
Standing before them, weapons raised despite obvious injury and exhaustion, were five soldiers who had been guarding the Castle Gate and a single nobleman.
“Are you all right, So Yeong-ju?”
Kain, holding a broken spear, and
“I’m fine. We just need to hold on until the rescue team arrives.”
So Yeong-ju, holding a sword.
And on the opposite side.
There were Goblins with weapons, and they looked far fresher.
“Sir Loren… something seems wrong.”
One of the soldiers spoke.
“Goblins of this caliber shouldn’t be able to inflict this much damage.”
A Lowest-Tier Dungeon was not such a dangerous place. It was where new soldiers and mercenaries went for training.
The numbers might pose a challenge, but not enough to leave people covered in blood like this.
Loren had already spotted something amiss.
“Their skin is purple. Poison damage.”
Indeed, most of the people’s skin and faces had taken on a purplish hue.
“But how could so many be affected?”
The poison used by Goblins in a Lowest-Tier Dungeon was Paralysis Poison. Even then, it typically came in the form of venomous stings that could only strike one person.
Yet here was widespread, devastating poisoning.
Something was wrong.
The mage’s words suddenly came to mind.
A powerful monster capable of using magic.
‘Then there’s no time to hesitate.’
Knight Loren made a swift judgment faced with a more dire situation than anticipated.
“Mage. Use magic to draw the Goblins’ attention.”
In the meantime, Loren planned to split the soldiers into two teams — one to rescue the people and the other to hold back the Goblins while they secured time to escape.
“Understood.”
Alex agreed with Loren’s plan.
With the monster still out of sight, now was their chance.
Just as they were about to cast magic.
Bang!
A violet streak flashed before their eyes, striking the ground near Kain and scorching it away in an instant. And they watched in horror as the earth itself melted.
Poison.
!!!
The soldiers’ faces went white. Loren spun around to see where the spell had come from.
“A Goblin Shaman!”
There it stood—a Goblin Shaman gripping a Staff.
And behind the Goblin Shaman, lodged in the bark of a tree, was a Dungeon Core radiating the dungeon’s energy.
“How is there a Goblin Shaman in a Lowest-Tier Dungeon?!”
But something was wrong with the creature’s appearance.
The right side of its head was covered in swollen black growths, as if diseased—lumps of rotten flesh clinging to its skull.
“What on earth is that?”
The grotesque sight made Loren recoil in horror.
[The monsters in this place have a nasty look to them.]
But Alex, accustomed to such creatures, spoke quickly instead.
“Now is not the time to panic. We must move—fast.”
Just as he said.
The Goblin Shaman’s Poison Ball landed right in front of Kain. It didn’t hit him directly, but the poison’s touch sent him staggering backward.
“We rescue him immediately and get out.”
At Alex’s words, Loren’s wits snapped back into focus.
‘Damn it.’
A knight dubbed barely a week ago had no business facing a Goblin Shaman while protecting civilians. But running—that, he could manage.
“Everyone, move! Mage!”
Alex spun his 1st Circle ring rapidly.
[Will. Focus.]
“Fireball!”
Two Fireballs materialized in the empty air.
‘Down!’
And in the next breath, they shot toward the goblins.
Bang! Boom!
1st Circle magic, but its power was tremendous. The wounded goblins began to burn.
At the same moment, Loren and the soldiers bolted to their positions.
“Magic?! How?! Loren!!”
So Yeong-ju, startled by the Fireballs that had bloomed from nowhere, spotted Loren and the soldiers and called out with relief.
“They’re alive!”
“The rescue party came!”
The civilians and soldiers echoed the same.
“We must flee quickly!”
“Understood! Anyone able to move, help the wounded!”
At that, the people began lifting or supporting the injured, moving in the direction the soldiers indicated.
Having confirmed So Yeong-ju was alive, Loren joined the soldiers forming a barrier against the goblins.
“Kain! Are you all right?”
Meanwhile, keeping watch on the goblins, Alex approached Kain, who was being supported by another soldier.
“Alex?”
Kain started at the sudden appearance of the mercenary recruit. Where were the others?
“How did you get here?”
“Questions later. Run, now.”
With those words, Alex cast magic, summoning a Fireball.
Bang! Boom!
The Fireball collided with the Poison Ball streaking through the air, and both erupted.
[Direct hit! Perfect!]
Seeing this, Kain wondered if the poison was making him hallucinate. How could a mercenary recruit cast spells?
As Kain stumbled forward in confusion.
So Yeong-ju, still relatively unharmed, joined the fray and shouted a warning.
“Loren! Mage! Be careful! It uses both poison and magic that weakens the body!”
At the same moment, the Goblin Shaman raised its Staff high.
-Kiieeeeek!
With that cry, Loren, So Yeong-ju, and the soldiers standing against the goblins felt their bodies grow heavy and numb. It felt as though invisible weights had settled upon them.
But there was one among them unaffected.
[…Why are we okay?]
It was Alex.
His outstretched arm flickered briefly as he cast the spell, but his body showed no signs of damage.
Alex was bewildered for a moment, but quickly assessed the situation.
“We need to run.”
There was no objection.
The soldiers, So Yeong-ju, the knight Loren, and Alex retreated slowly, keeping watch on the Goblin.
Bang!
An uninjured Alex cast magic to block the Goblin Shaman’s attack.
Once word came that the villagers and wounded had drawn near the Dungeon’s entrance, the plan was to unleash Fireballs and run without looking back.
Yes.
That was the plan.
—Shriek!
If only the Goblin Shaman hadn’t gathered mana to launch a powerful spell.
“….”
If only Alex hadn’t witnessed it.
It probably would’ve gone as planned.
[Alex? What’s wrong?]
[We need to run!]
When Alex suddenly stopped, Yi Baek questioned him.
“Mage, what’s the matter?”
Even as a 1st Circle knight, Loren endured the weakening magic and continued to shield the mage Alex, now stopping with a puzzled expression as he turned to look at what had transfixed him.
He saw what Alex was staring blankly at.
It was nothing special.
Just the Goblin Shaman gathering mana to cast a spell.
But Alex saw it clearly.
A pure white Bone Fragment lodged in the Goblin Shaman’s chest, glowing with a sickly teal light.
Yes.
Teal.
That damned teal light.
[Wait, that?]
[Hold on. Something’s wrong with this creature’s state.]
[Hey, Alex?]
That skull he wanted to crush.
That magic he wanted to destroy.
And… the Demon King.
“Ha… haha….”
Though the scale of power, the victim, and the circumstances were all different, the sight before him pressed Alex’s trauma button with surgical precision.
[Hey… Alex?]
[Are you laughing right now?]
“Mage…?”
Everyone held their breath at Alex’s unsettling demeanor.
—!
Then the Goblin Shaman, having gathered all its mana, unleashed the spell. Multiple powerful Poison Arrows shot forth like projectiles toward Alex and his companions.
Much like the Demon King’s attack that Alex had been unable to stop.
“Shield.”
Boom!
But this time was different.
Now Alex could hold Leo, could speak with him, could share a meal with him.
Slash!
And he could wield a sword.
“M…Mage?”
Whoosh!
And he could cast magic.
[Wait, did he just cast Fireball without an incantation?]
[Silent Casting?!]
The voices of others, even Yi Baek’s voice, didn’t reach Alex.
The only thing in Alex’s vision was that Goblin Shaman. Or perhaps the Demon King looming beyond it.
“…The Demon King must die.”
[His eyes have gone mad!!]
With gleaming eyes, Alex spun the 1st Circle ring like a madman, conjuring Fireballs into the empty air.
‘More….’
That wasn’t enough. He drew in mana endlessly, sensing it through Yi Baek’s perception. To create more Fireballs.
‘Stronger…!’
But he didn’t stop there.
Just as he had compressed Fire and reshaped it into Fireballs, he now modified those Fireballs themselves.
To increase their destructive force, he made them long and sharp like arrows, and set them spinning in a vortex.
The rapidly rotating flaming arrows filled the sky.
[What the….]
[I never taught you anything like this.]
[! Hey! Keep this up and you’ll destroy yourself!]
Unaware that blood had surged into his mouth and was trickling from his lips, Alex was trying to unleash all the resentment and anguish, desolation and rage of the ‘future’ as his entire body burned with fury.
‘Uncle!’
If Leo hadn’t crossed his mind, he surely would have.
“Ugh!”
Alex instinctively sensed his body’s limits and stopped.
But he didn’t cease the attack.
The flaming arrows already formed hurtled all at once toward the Goblin Shaman.
“Die!!”
Boom!!
An explosion far greater than any before thundered through the Dungeon.
[…Wow.]
[Not even bones left.]
The shockwave, dust, and searing heat rolled toward Alex. From exerting so much strength, his breathing grew ragged and his body heaved involuntarily.
“Haah….”
[Are you alright?]
As if unable to hear Yi Baek’s words, Alex kept his eyes fixed on where the Goblin Shaman had been, concentrating on recovering his mana.
He had witnessed too many monsters and demons reviving repeatedly to let his guard down.
Soon.
The dust and smoke settled.
The revealed landscape was gruesome. The ground was pocked with deep craters, littered with the corpses of dead goblins.
The Goblin Shaman who had borne the brunt of the attack lay sprawled on the ground, its body charred black.
[That one’s definitely dead.]
With the Goblin Shaman dead, Alex’s reason returned.
No matter how filled with rage, he’d just unleashed this fury on a mere Goblin Shaman, not even a Demon King. Rather embarrassing….
‘Hell with it.’
His heart felt completely refreshed!
The Dungeon Core behind the Goblin Shaman had shattered and vanished, but Alex paid it no mind. The Contaminated Dungeon wouldn’t disappear anyway.
Alex walked forward with a satisfied expression. Then he thrust the blade in his hand deep into the head of a fallen goblin with a sickening crunch.
-Squeak!
A goblin that had still been alive let out a final death cry.
From his time with the hero’s party, Alex had learned the hard way that finishing blows were essential — those things kept coming back.
So he went through every goblin whose body looked intact, stabbing them one after another with his blade.
-Shriek!!
Sometimes a living one was caught in the sweep.
[Oh….]
[Are you really just an ordinary farmer?]
“Not anymore.”
After finishing the killing blows so thoroughly.
Alex arrived at the Goblin Shaman’s corpse.
Though it seemed dead, he made sure by driving his blade through its head. The body crumbled to ash and collapsed.
In the spot where the clothes, staff, and flesh had all burned away, only one thing remained embedded in the chest — a pristine white Bone Fragment unmarred by even a scratch.
‘It was shining the same dark green as the Demon King’s skull.’
Thinking there might be a connection, Alex pocketed the Bone Fragment to examine it later.

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