The Hero’s Brother Is Bound To Be Depressed

467 – Exit

As my chest was pierced and I vomited blood, I was barely able to keep my balance and not fall. The voice coming from behind sounded like a gurgling sound. What reached my ears through the muffled sound was Aria’s cry.

“Why, why… !”

Without realizing it, I looked over my shoulder at Aria, who was crying. She tried to kill me, but when she ended up bleeding out with her own magic, she was tormented by her guilt. Getting revenge for killing her parents and hurting me who was her friend. In the meantime, it was Aria who felt pain and confusion.

“What the hell are you going to do with me?” .”

I smiled bitterly at the sight of Aria collapsing on the floor, as if she had lost all of her strength. It suddenly occurs to her that Aria, who has always shown only her tearful side, is not befitting her tears either. Like before, she wants to comfort him by taking out sweet treats from the storage room, but she knows that she shouldn’t.

“Manager… First, let’s start with treatment!”

Does Rakar still call me manager? It must have been quite a while since I left the Messiah Club. When I looked at Rakar’s face as I got closer, I saw many wounds and scars that I had never seen before. There are even ugly burn marks on the nape of his neck, making you wonder how he was doing during this time.

However, the situation and environment are not conducive to talking to each other. Because the fight against the cult leader, the final dark force that will destroy the world, is not over.

After checking my wounds, Rakar took out a potion from his pocket and poured it on my pierced chest. Along with the pain of burning flesh, I felt the goosebumps of new skin growing in the hole. Isn’t it an ordinary potion? Like a potion containing the power of a saint, its regenerative power was extremely excellent.

Lakar solved that question.

“It’s a potion made by Kane. The fourth piece of the scattered Emerald Tablet was obtained on the third floor of the labyrinth. As the director said, Kane eventually found a way for Aria to continue living.”

It shouldn’t have been like that… At Rakar’s words, I smiled brightly without realizing it. Was the reason you entered the labyrinth to obtain a piece of the Emerald Tablet? Anyway, I knew Kane would do it. Because Kane is a person who will endure any hardship for the person he loves like me.

I didn’t want to ask, but now I had no choice but to ask.

“Is Aria okay now?”

Rakar moistened his dry lips with his tongue and hesitated for a moment before answering.

“huh. In fact, Kane used his knowledge of alchemy to share half of his life with Arya. “He laughed and said that it would be a blessing if he died at the same time as his loved one.”

I see. If it was possible to save Luna, I would have chosen the same method. There is nothing better than being able to be with the person you love until the end of your life.

“Chief, Aria… .”

Kwaaa!

As Rakar was about to continue speaking, the roar made by the Lycan and the cult leader woke us up. This is not a situation for leisurely conversation. I said, pushing Rakar’s shoulder.

“Lakar, please protect Aria and Kane.”

“… okay.”

With an expression full of regret over not being able to fight together, Rakar headed to Kane’s side, who was comforting Aria.

Kwaaang―――!

Lycan, who pushed the cult leader to the other side in the air, landed next to me and said.

“Are you okay? I didn’t expect Aria to attack you from behind… .”

“it’s okay.”

Lycan, who did not know the details of the situation, nodded to my answer without asking any more questions.

“Hehe, are you being abandoned because you can’t be trusted by a dummy who isn’t even an extra?”

The leader, whose entire body was filled with the energy of chaos, smiled mockingly at me.

“It’s truly pitiful.”

“This is the first time I’ve had the same thought. “I felt sorry for you too.”

「… what?”

The religious leader glared at me with a fierce look in his eyes, but I truly felt sorry for the religious leader. I never for a moment thought of Aria as simply a dummy that existed to fill in the gaps in the novel. The same goes for Luna, Lakar, and Kane, who do not appear in the novel.

Meeting Luna and the members of the Messiah club was the luckiest and happiest thing in my life. I learned true love and true friendship from them. So, I can’t help but feel sorry for the religious leader in front of me. Jin Xian, who did not meet them, can clearly see without thinking too much how unhappy her life was.

“Luna, a dummy who had no role in the novel… “You could never love.”

The leader snorted at my words.

“What does that mean? “Do you really think I’m jealous of you for falling in love with a dummy?”

“No, I won’t be jealous. “Because you haven’t experienced it, you can’t be jealous.”

It’s a feeling I wouldn’t have known if I hadn’t experienced it through Luna. The Jin Xian inside me said it was a weakness, but for me, she was the pillar in my heart that helped me endure until now and the driving force that allowed me to live.

“The feeling that can be felt when two people who sincerely want each other’s happiness make eye contact… “Because there is no way you would know what only Luna can give.”

「… .」

“So I truly feel sorry for you. What kind of person I was before I met Luna… Because I, as her party, know better than anyone else.”

As if I was looking into a mirror and talking to my past self, I spoke to the religious leader with a wry smile.

“We have never been sincere with anyone. Because I was born from a lie, I don’t understand what pure good intentions are, and I touch my emotions to reveal the ugly intentions that are hidden somewhere in my heart… “It was a very unhappy life.”

A strength went into the head’s shoulders. He also knows that he is Jinsian. That I truly feel pity and pity myself. The cult leader clenched his fists and exhaled an even more intense aura of chaos.

I thought he would attack me at any moment, but the leader chose to find a contradiction in my words.

“so? What has your valuable experience with Dummy given you? In the end, it wasn’t me who was pitiful and had a hole in her heart, but you who pitied me without knowing your own situation.”

“… I’m prepared to have a hole or two in my chest. Because, without any excuse, I killed Aria’s parents. It’s okay though. “Aria is still a precious friend to me.”

I looked straight into the leader’s eyes. So that my clear emotions can be conveyed through my eyes.

And laughed.

“You will never understand. If it’s a really precious person… “You can accept both resentment and anger with a smile.”

If it were me in the past, I would have been disappointed and angry that Aria, who I was trying to protect, attacked me. She may have pushed Aria to the edge with her sharp words, thinking that this was not enough to pay for killing her trashy parents. It was a time when there were boundaries to protect herself.

But now I am different. Try to understand the other person’s feelings, and do not pursue complete sincerity. It may be described as vague, but I decided to ‘believe’ in the moments we had together. Even if Aria hurts me more and leaves her with an indelible scar, that will never change the fact that she is my precious friend.

“That’s why I won’t give up to protect or get my precious people back. “Doing your best until the end is what I learned from Luna.”

「… “You’re saying stupid things for a long time.”

The leader spread his arms as if he would not say any more, scattering chaotic energy like ink around him.

Kwaaa!

“Let’s spread out and attack on both sides!”

Lycan shouted and moved, hitting the flying dark red sphere with his gauntlet. As he followed it to the other side, he bounced the sphere launched by the cult leader into the window of the World Tree.

“No matter how hard I struggle, nothing like an inferiority complex consumable extra can kill me, the leader of the Chaos Cult!”

Quad deud deuk―――!

The chaotic energy released by the cult leader literally tore the surrounding space apart. The space torn apart by the turbulent chaos and magic condensed everything around it, as if it were a black hole.

“No need for any tricks!”

Lycan clashed his gauntlets together, creating a powerful shockwave, destroying the ‘phenomenon’ created by the cult leader. When I and Lycan began attacking the cult leader from both sides, the cult leader’s voice rang in my head.

[Do you know that? Readers really dislike it when villains respond to protagonists.]

“… ?”

[It feels exhilarating to see the devil or a huge force come up with a big plan and be helplessly defeated by the main character who interferes with it, and one expects the villain to be severely defeated by the main character as he tries to proceed with his plan again without any learning effect. If the villain blocks the protagonist’s activities by preparing Plan B and Plan C in case something goes wrong with the plan, it won’t satisfy the reader’s expectations.]

I ignored the voice ringing in my head and waited for an opportunity to drive the World Tree’s spear into the cult leader’s heart.

[But I am not just a villain in a novel. If I want Roel to make the same mistake again, I have to get you kicked out of here. So, of course, I prepared a lot of things while waiting for you to come.]

The cult leader, who released a huge shock wave at me while attacking the Lycan, gathered the chaotic energy scattered like particles into one place and began to push the Lycan.

[You know what, so many of you repeat the same mistake. I am saying that I am the only one who can use the contents of the novel. It’s the dilemma of the returner or the possessed. So I can take you down in a very easy way. If you dig a trap by touching just a little bit of the information you know in the novel, you will not be able to respond to variables that are different from the prediction at all.]

The head of the cult leader who was pushing the Lycans turned towards me with a sinister smile.

[The misconception that Confsion is numbered 1 to 9 is… Is it still continuing?]

“what… ?”

[Even if the discarded setting is a resurrected world, you should have been careful about accepting strangers who did not appear in the novel as colleagues.]

At that moment, the chakram on the cult leader’s back emitted a chaotic light. The golden eyes located in the center of the chakram are staring at someone. I noticed that Mormot’s body, which was blocking Confsion with Ellie, suddenly swelled like a balloon.

“… !”

[I will ask you.]

The cult leader’s sinister voice rang in my head.

[Is Eli also precious to you?]

Even before those words were finished, I had already used everything I could to get closer to Ellie, who had not noticed Mormot’s change while confronting the vice pontiff.

Tuk-

“uh?”

Ellie, who was suddenly pushed back by me, lost her balance and fell forward. Ellie, who must have thought she was ambushed, turned her body and aimed her wand as she fell, and her big eyes opened even wider when she realized that it was me who had pushed her.

“as-“

[Exit, extra. This is the end of your story.]

As soon as Mormot’s huge, swollen arms wrapped around me from behind, my consciousness completely disappeared.