The Last Place Hero’s Return - Chapter 20

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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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Chapter 20. So It Was You? (1)
Chirp, chirp-chirp, chirp-chirp!
Early morning.
The chirping of birds feasting on insects gathered beneath the streetlights at dawn seeped through the window cracks.
Morning sunlight filtering through the clouds and the gradually warming air—the season when the seeds of life begin to sprout.
Having opened my eyes since before dawn, I sat on the edge of my bed, gazing at the sunlight streaming through the window while lost in deep contemplation.
And that contemplation was none other than.
“How can I die quickly, efficiently, and cleanly….”
Had someone else heard this, they might have mistaken it for the rambling of a severely depressed patient, but for me, it was surprisingly a serious matter of consideration.
‘Slitting my throat with a blade every time is inefficient.’
Once I mastered the technique, I could trigger the Blessing of Resurrection without any significant effort—that was undoubtedly a strength.
However.
‘It’s far too conspicuous.’
When I was in my Dormitory room, it didn’t matter, but if I went outside like during that outdoor training and activated the Blessing of Resurrection by slitting my throat, the risk was far too great.
What would happen if someone witnessed my head separating from my body and rolling across the ground before regenerating perfectly intact?
‘Then I would no longer be able to hide the Blessing of Resurrection.’
It would mean losing one trump card I could use effectively in combat against enemies.
‘Even if the day comes when the Blessing of Resurrection is revealed, I should hide it for as long as possible.’
I wanted to avoid being discovered practicing mana cultivation like some fool.
“A method faster, more efficient, and cleaner than slitting my throat….”
One candidate immediately came to mind.
‘Poison.’
In my previous life, it was something I frequently used to rapidly trigger the Blessing of Resurrection in emergencies.
I used to carry poison in my mouth like a trained assassin.
‘The problem is I’d need to obtain a toxin potent enough to kill even a Hero in an instant.’
And I’d have to use it four times every day.
‘Poison is out of the question.’
Rather than using poison, it was better to carefully slit my throat without being discovered.
“If not poison, then….”
A sudden thought flashed through my mind as I continued contemplating.
‘Mana Bullet.’
A spell that condenses pure mana and fires it outward.
It was the most basic of basic spells—even a first-year Candidate from the Magic Department fresh to the Academy could use it.
‘If I could create a Mana Bullet inside my body, I could easily rupture my brain or heart and trigger the Blessing of Resurrection.’
Had Sophia overheard this idea, wouldn’t she have scolded me for spouting such nonsense?
No matter how basic Mana Bullet was, creating it ‘outside’ the body and creating it ‘inside’ were entirely different matters.
‘Mana fundamentally has the tendency to embed itself in the physical body.’
It was similar to how water gets absorbed when it touches paper.
The moment I created a Mana Bullet inside my body, instead of forming a projectile, the mana would simply be absorbed into my body.
‘For a Mana Bullet created inside my body to avoid being absorbed, I’d need to make it extraordinarily small.’
To prevent the mana from being absorbed into the body and dissipating, I had to create a projectile so minuscule it wouldn’t even touch the meridian channels—the “qi pathways”—through which mana flowed within the body.
‘Yet simultaneously, it needed to possess enough destructive force to rupture vital organs like the heart or brain in a single strike.’
In truth, this was a method possible only in theory, with virtually no practical feasibility.
Creating a projectile the size of a finger and creating one the size of a grain of rice were challenges of entirely different magnitudes.
And this required crafting a mana projectile far smaller than even a grain of rice.
But.
“It’s certainly worth attempting.”
This wasn’t arrogance speaking.
Nor was I blinded by hubris.
My singular strength—both in my previous life and now—lay in manipulating mana, particularly in efficiently controlling minute quantities of it.
Berald, Sophia, Iris, even Yuren.
None of them could match me in this regard.
‘Though truthfully, they had no need to.’
Just as someone with tens or hundreds of millions of gold in wealth wouldn’t meticulously calculate how much to spend on daily meals to survive as long as possible on minimal resources.
These individuals, whose mana overflowed abundantly, simply had no reason to concern themselves with efficiency and precise control the way I did.
‘Let me try once more.’
Failure or success—either way, I’d survive.
“Hah.”
I drew in a slow breath, focusing my entire consciousness on the Stigma.
I extracted the barest thread of mana from the Stigma and formed a projectile within the qi pathways that extended throughout my body.
“Ugh.”
The first attempt failed.
Before the projectile could fully form, the mana was absorbed back into my body and returned to the Stigma.
‘Smaller still.’
I envisioned a tiny dot.
So infinitesimal that the naked eye couldn’t perceive it.
‘Still not enough.’
The second attempt also failed.
The projectile formed, but it couldn’t sustain itself and dissipated.
‘A bit more, a bit more, a bit more.’
Third, fourth, fifth attempts.
With each successive try, cold sweat beaded across my forehead.
The shirt I wore grew damp and clung uncomfortably to my skin.
“Ugh.”
Perhaps I’d concentrated too intensely for too long.
A splitting headache accompanied nosebleeds that dripped steadily.
“…Just a bit more.”
Several hours passed in this manner.
‘I did it!’
At last, I succeeded in forming and maintaining a mana projectile within the qi pathway.
‘Like this….’
As if aiming a gun.
I fired a mana bullet directly at my heart.
“Krrrraaaaahhh!”
A terrible, searing pain blazed through my chest with overwhelming force, but the Blessing of Resurrection remained unactivated.
“…The power wasn’t enough.”
I’d succeeded in creating the mana bullet, but failed to generate enough force to rupture my heart in one strike.
‘Still, I’ve seen enough potential.’
If I could perfect this method, I could trigger the Blessing of Resurrection whenever I desired.
And far more swiftly, elegantly, and cleanly than before!
‘A new method of suicide using mana bullets.’
The advantage of this technique wasn’t merely that I could die without anyone discovering me.
‘It could also compensate for the Blessing of Resurrection’s limitations.’
The Blessing of Resurrection is a power that instantly regenerates any wound—no matter how severe—if it deals fatal damage.
Whether my entire body is slashed to ribbons and scattered, or burned to ash.
The moment the Blessing of Resurrection activates, my body regenerates from the stigma at its center.
‘Conversely, if the damage isn’t fatal enough to cause death, the Blessing of Resurrection won’t activate.’
In other words, to put it simply.
Vital points like my head or heart regenerate instantly the moment they’re severed, but my arms or legs don’t regenerate immediately even if they’re cut off.
‘It’s not for nothing that I carried poison in my mouth in my past life.’
If my limbs were severed and I couldn’t even bite my tongue—and from experience, the tongue rarely causes death even when severed—I’d lose any means of triggering the Blessing of Resurrection myself.
‘But if I could end my life with a mana bullet in such a situation.’
The Blessing of Resurrection would activate immediately, regenerating my severed limbs anew.
“Once I perfect this technique, I won’t need to carry poison in my mouth anymore.”
I smiled bitterly, recalling memories from my past life when I’d kept poison in my mouth as a last resort to trigger the Blessing of Resurrection in emergencies.
“I’ll call it a day here.”
My mental stamina was depleted from the nosebleed-inducing exertion, leaving me with no energy to concentrate further.
Manipulating such minuscule amounts of mana with precision was far more exhausting than I’d anticipated.
If I had to compare it, it would be like engraving letters onto a grain of rice.
Handling such infinitesimal quantities of mana only drained my mind all the more.
“Fine then. I’ll spend the remaining time training my body.”
Since I’d sharpened my mind, it was time to condition my body.
With that thought, I was heading toward the Training Ground when.
-Ding.
A clear alarm chimed, and a message appeared on my Hero Watch.
It was from Professor Jade Bastian.
[I’ve completed the prototype. Come to the laboratory when you have time.]
It would be foolish to ask what prototype he meant.
[I’ll be right there.]
Apparently.
I decided to postpone dealing with my body for now.
* * *
“You came.”
“Yes, Professor.”
Jade’s Research Laboratory.
I stepped into the room, which was as cluttered as always—so disordered it was impossible to tell whether it was a ruin or a laboratory.
“This is the prototype of the Stigma Amplifier.”
He held out a glass vial containing a blue liquid that looked like melted sapphire.
“Once you drink the potion, your Stigma will immediately begin to run wild and generate magical power.”
“How long does the effect last?”
“The effect persists for approximately five minutes. After that….”
“The aftereffects would begin.”
“Precisely.”
Professor Jade stroked his unkempt beard and continued.
“After five minutes, the vital energy throughout your entire body will begin to twist, and you’ll die instantly.”
“That’s acceptable.”
“…Are you truly certain about this?”
His voice carried genuine concern.
“If the blessing of resurrection you possess doesn’t activate in time, then you’ll simply….”
“Wasn’t what I showed you before sufficient?”
I could demonstrate it again as many times as he needed.
“Hmm, very well… I’ll trust you.”
Professor Jade exhaled deeply and continued.
“Considering the blessing of resurrection you possess, I’ve focused the effects solely on temporary magical power increase, disregarding the aftereffects entirely.”
“That’s good.”
“However.”
However?
“This prototype won’t increase your magical power by much. Theoretically, if the maximum magical power increase possible through the Stigma Amplifier is 100, this would achieve only about 30.”
“Why is that?”
Despite focusing the effects entirely on magical power increase without considering aftereffects at all, achieving only thirty percent of the theoretical maximum suggested something was amiss.
“The core material is insufficient.”
“…Is it a material you can’t even buy with a million gold?”
“Ah, I misspoke. To be precise, it’s not that the material is insufficient, but rather that the material’s quality is poor.”
As he spoke, Professor Jade retrieved a withered flower from a drawer.
“It’s called the Seven-Star Flower.”
“I’m familiar with it.”
It was the flower said to have received the blessing of the seven gods, and it was designated as the national flower of the Holy Kingdom.
“But isn’t the Seven-Star Flower commonly found everywhere?”
“Indeed.”
If you searched well enough, you could find the Seven-Star Flower among the weeds growing along roadsides.
“But finding Seven-Star Grass imbued with mana is no simple task. It’s a material so scarce that even money can’t guarantee its acquisition.”
“Hmm….”
I was contemplating whether I’d have to settle for a Stigma Amplifier with thirty percent efficacy when—
“In that regard, I’d appreciate it if you could procure some mana-imbued Seven-Star Grass for me directly.”
An unexpected proposal emerged from Professor Jade Bastian’s lips.

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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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