The moment he registered that Seraphia had launched an attack, Shu instinctively drew his own sword as well.
Only now did Shu realize that if not for Seraphia's attack just then, that red-haired girl would have been about to kill a person.
The atmosphere a moment ago had been smooth enough, admittedly.
Comforting a patient who was already beyond all saving, and in accordance with her wishes delivering the final blow, so that she could at least die in a human state.
But...
Out of the corner of his eye Shu studied Seraphia, whose whole body was trembling with the swell of her emotions.
【And here I thought I was the extreme one... turns out Miss Seraphia is the more extreme of us?】
A person ought to have a correct death.
That was a principle of life Shu had received from a certain elder a long time ago.
The only correct death that could be accepted was to die when one's lifespan was spent, mourned and remembered by the people around one.
At present there existed no means whatsoever of reversing the Corruption Sickness, and for the infected, ending them while they could still hold onto human thought was perhaps also a correct death.
Shu gripped the sword in his hand a little harder.
Miss Seraphia looked somewhat angry.
Perhaps she felt that even so, that person could still have been saved?
"Miss Seraphia, are we going to save that person?"
To keep from misreading her intent, Shu asked.
"No... it isn't... I only..."
Seraphia was breathing deeply, the expression beneath her hood shifting several times over.
The situation seemed to differ somewhat from what Shu had imagined.
"That expression looks exactly like a cat whose tail has been stepped on. Have I done something that made you very angry?"
The red-haired girl glanced briefly at the woman, who had been frightened by the sudden turn of events.
"Don't tell me a Holy Wing of the church forbids any act that takes another's life? That killing is absolute evil? Or is it that, having seen me in that sort of place a few days ago, you hold some prejudice against me?"
【A few days ago...?】
Shu caught that phrase sharply.
The recent business that had left him lying in a sickbed for several days surfaced in his mind at once.
"You're the person from the fire..."
Shu's sword was gripped steady and levelled at the red-haired girl.
He had not had time to observe the scene closely then, being occupied with saving people, but the sight of Seraphia fighting this person at the time had still left no small impression.
"Calm down, calm down. We have no particular reason to fight. You're a Hero Candidate and a Holy Wing of the church, aren't you? If I raised a hand against you, I rather feel I'd become a criminal against humanity."
"...What exactly is it that you do?"
Miss Seraphia had, for reasons unknown, fallen into an abnormal turmoil of emotion, and while he could not work out what she was really thinking, the person in front of them was dangerous, and Shu decided he had better sound her out.
"I'm employed by an organization devoted to the 'liberation' of this country, and I'm responsible for running errands and doing odd jobs for them. Ah, my name is Akane. I hope we can get along amicably."
What a suspicious way of putting it.
Just as Shu was about to press further, the middle-aged woman slumped on the ground let out a high, bestial cry.
She had become a monster.
From the feel of her mana just now Shu had sensed she was already in her final moments, but he had not expected this final stage of transformation to come so quickly.
"What a headache... and after I'd promised her, too."
Shu heard a distinct sigh.
The red-haired girl who called herself Akane nimbly dodged the lunge of the monsterized woman, and then that blade drove straight into the latter's heart.
As the woman's altered body slowly went limp, Akane pulled her blade free and flicked the purple-black bloodstain from the edge onto the wall.
"So. Is this what the two of you wanted?"
That flippant manner was put away, and Akane stared at them coldly.
Shu stared blankly at the Corruption Sickness patient lying on the ground, purple-black blood beginning to spread out from the place where she had fallen.
A death like this was not correct.
But there was nothing whatsoever he could do.
'So long as you are alive, there is always a way.'
That saying was an exception for these Corruption Sickness patients alone.
"A word of advice for you. Concentrate on growing as adventurers, and don't get involved in matters on this soil that you don't understand yourselves. You do rather look like people who would deliberately drag themselves into dangerous business out of impulse. Well then. I hope we never meet again."
Akane returned her blade to its sheath, lifted the woman's body from the ground, and turned to leave without further ado.
"Wait!"
Shu was about to call her back and ask about some of the things still puzzling him, but he saw her lower her body and then spring up, and among the tangled architecture of the lower city district her figure was quickly gone, leaving only the two of them and the purple-black blood remaining in the alley.
【She's strong.】
Those nimble movements and that consummate way of fighting left Shu looking up at her somewhat.
In the countryside of a small kingdom, the strength for which Shu had been praised by everyone, the strength to kill bears and wild boars with a sword, had looked less and less impressive since he left the village.
Still, among the knowledge he had received from the Church was the fact that the special items dungeons produce include items capable of markedly raising innate physical quality and mana aptitude.
These things were also a large part of the reason driving countless people to become adventurers.
But when that hope for the future met the intensely jarring purple-black bloodstain on the wall, Shu's feelings were pulled back out of that anticipation and into reality.
Even if he became a strong one like that red-haired girl, he would still have no way to protect people like this, no way to let them obtain a correct death.
At exactly which step had things gone wrong?
Shu returned his sword to its sheath, spread his fingers, and gazed at the calluses on his hand.
The Hero, the one who defeats the Demon King and saves the world.
That is how it is written in stories of that kind.
The Demon King is the 【problem】 itself, and defeating the Demon King saves the world.
【Is that really how it is?】
Shu held some slight doubt about this road.
He wanted to ask Seraphia how she viewed the matter.
But when he turned to look at Miss Angel, he found her staring hard at the purple-black blood spreading across the ground, her body trembling faintly.
"...Miss Seraphia?"
"...What?"
What he had meant to ask a moment ago was swallowed back in an instant at the sight of her reaction.
Belatedly, Shu felt that Seraphia's reaction was somewhat abnormal.
As though she had been struck by some particular event, and had lost control of her emotions.
Shu turned over the elements of the scene just now, considering which parts might be responsible.
Into his mind, in an instant, came the deformed angel he and Seraphia had encountered when they first met.
That was right. At the very beginning, he had nearly mistaken that deformed angel for a Corruption Sickness patient.
Shu knitted his brows slightly.
"What were you thinking about just now, Miss Seraphia?"
"..."
A long silence.
Then she opened her mouth slightly, and closed it again.
The pale gold eyes trembled, and after briefly losing focus, settled their gaze back on him.
"I..."
"You thought of that monster from before, the one that looked so much like an angel?"
"...Yes."