* * *
‘This is insane.’
A new Trait…….
Madness?
‘I only just got rid of Pacifism, and now she’s about to gain Madness?’
Fortunately, it had not manifested yet.
It was not too late!
I quickly reached out and blocked Aileen’s view.
“……Setanta?”
“Killing that Imperial citizen here isn’t going to solve anything.”
“…….”
“We’re being pursued right now.”
We were in the middle of the Imperial capital, where security was already extremely tight.
Keeping our heads down and staying quiet was the best course of action.
“So, Aileen, take your hand off your weapon right now.”
“……?”
Aileen tilted her head at my words.
Then, seemingly only just realizing that her hand was resting on her Ironwood Sword, her eyes widened.
“Ah…….”
“Lower your hand slowly. Take a deep breath too.”
I spoke to her gently and carefully, as though calming a rabid dog, and finally managed to settle her down.
Her eyes still looked somewhat unhinged, but fortunately, the Madness Trait did not manifest.
‘I can’t let her get Madness. That Trait is difficult to remove…….’
Memories surfaced of countless ruined characters who had fallen into insanity after I failed to manage their mental state.
I could not allow one of the Heroes from my first three-pull to become a mental wreck like that…….
“I know all of you have been through something terrible, but we need to leave the capital as quietly as possible.”
“…….”
“There are too many people here. Let’s head toward the outskirts first.”
With that, I led the group another ten paces or so.
DING!
[Your infamy is spreading far and wide!]
“Is that really true? Someone carried out a bombing at the execution grounds?”
“That’s right. A wanted order has already been issued. Apparently, the man’s face is so terrifying that he looks like a monster that crawled straight out of hell.”
Two knights were walking toward us from the direction I had intended to take.
Worse still, they were Imperial Knights wearing blue cloaks.
‘Damn it……!’
I quickly spun Rian and Aileen around and pushed them toward the corner, pretending that we were browsing the merchandise at a nearby shop.
I could not afford to trigger their trauma again.
And more importantly…….
‘There might be someone among them who recognizes me because of inherited Trust.’
Avoiding eye contact altogether was the safest option.
Keep walking.
Please, just keep walking…….
I repeated those words over and over in my head.
“Lord Setanta, I’ll cast Recognition Suppression Magic on you again……!”
Rian called out with a hollow expression.
Now that I looked closely, dark circles covered the area beneath his eyes.
He looked as though he might collapse and die at any moment.
“If it’s just one more time…… I think my body can endure it.”
……Are you really all right?
Sure enough—
[Rian has failed to cast the spell.]
“COUGH……!”
Perhaps his mana had flowed backward.
Rian coughed up blood and collapsed where he stood.
His complexion, which had already been poor, had now turned almost bluish.
[The Hero’s stats temporarily decrease due to Mana Backlash!]
“L-Lord Setanta, I’m sorry…….”
“……Hold on tight.”
He staggered and began to fall, so I hurriedly caught him and helped him stand.
‘What about those knights who were passing by?’
I glanced sideways.
Fortunately, despite the small disturbance, they seemed to have passed us without paying any attention.
However, the owner of the fruit shop directly in front of us turned out to be an unexpected obstacle.
“Damn it, what’s with this half-dead sick man? Has he got some fatal disease or something? Don’t drip your filthy blood on my apples. Get out of here!”
He glared at Rian as though looking at something disgusting, then—
“Hmm? Wait. Hold on! You aren’t in the middle of mutating into a monster, are you? Hey, take off that hood and show me your face!”
He stopped Rian with a suspicious expression.
“N-No……! I’m simply somewhat frail……!”
“……Hmm? That’s an Ailant accent, isn’t it? You’re an Ailant bastard, aren’t you?!”
Apparently, in that brief exchange, he had even picked up on Rian’s Ailant accent and immediately started picking a fight.
“You bastards! I bet you were the ones who released that red vapor over the capital too!”
“……!”
“I heard your base was wiped out, so how did you survive?! Guards! Someone call the guards right now……!”
‘This is bad……!’
What was the safest route out of here?
Where were the guards positioned?
Just as I hurriedly tried to calculate an escape route—
BOOM!
“Shopkeeper! The fruit you sold me earlier was rotten inside!”
“……!”
A booming male voice erupted right beside me.
I turned my head and saw a blond man angrily confronting the shopkeeper, veins bulging on his forehead.
‘Wait. That face is……?’
“One of the fruits I bought here just now was rotten! Return my money immediately!”
“W-What are you suddenly talking about? There’s no way……!”
“I demand a refund! Give me my money back at once!”
Blond hair and sharply defined features.
A powerful physique that looked as though a Greek statue had stepped straight into the flesh.
It was a familiar silhouette I had seen countless times.
‘……Achilles?’
A Hero of the neutral Rom Federation.
An SSR trap character.
And the glorious king of all useless characters, who had taken first place in the poll for …….
[……A portion of the Hero’s Trust is carried over.]
Achilles.
He suddenly turned his head toward me.
“Hmm?”
“…….”
“……I feel like I’ve seen that face somewhere before…….”
Yet despite the Trust carryover message, Achilles merely stared blankly at me for a moment.
Then, as though he had lost interest, he turned back to the shopkeeper and resumed pressing him for a refund.
‘……Just as I expected, he isn’t particularly interested in me.’
That was right.
Inherited Trust did not always translate into hatred toward Setanta.
‘More importantly, in the previous run, that bastard never witnessed Setanta’s betrayal.’
There was no reason for him to hate me to the point of wanting me dead like the Hero did.
Why?
Because by the time the Final Chapter arrived…….
That bastard was already dead.
* * *
-How do I keep Achilles alive? I raised him carefully, but every single time he gets hit in the heel by a poisoned arrow and diesㅠㅠㅠ
└Why are you trying to save a useless character?
└No, even if I give him top-tier shoes, his foot keeps getting destroyed and he diesㅠㅠ Please tell me how to save him. (OP)
└He always dies. You absolutely cannot save him.
└You aren’t supposed to raise useless characters lol
Achilles was a Hero who invariably died young before making it past the middle-to-late stages of the game.
His cause of death was always the same.
Sudden death caused by an injury to the heel.
‘That’s why I did put him in the same party as Setanta during my previous run, but he died soon afterward.’
A Hero fated to have his heel destroyed and die no matter what anyone did.
And because of that, he was also a character who had never lived long enough to become Setanta’s enemy in my previous life.
That was the true identity of the man arguing in front of the fruit shop.
‘……But he isn’t alone? He has someone with him.’
For a while now, a black-haired woman had been standing beside Achilles with a crooked posture.
Beside her stood a small white horse.
PRRRR-!
It shook out its platinum-colored mane.
‘Who is she? I’ve never seen her before. Is she another new character exclusive to the Hidden Route, like Finley?’
She had a mischievous-looking face, and her unruly, wavy hair fell below her collarbones.
With two people who looked as though they had stepped out of Greek sculptures standing side by side, they certainly drew attention.
“I told you, the apple was rotten! Return my money at once.”
“No, that isn’t what’s important right now! These Ailant bastards are right here!”
“What does that have to do with anything? Why should I care?!”
“J-Just look at them! They’re obviously suspicious! I was just about to call the guards when you came over and……!”
Anyway, a new character was a new character.
Right now, I needed to escape.
‘Fortunately, Achilles has drawn everyone’s attention away from us.’
Should we leave immediately?
No.
If I did that and the shopkeeper shouted after us, it could become troublesome.
It would be better to watch the situation a little longer and find the right moment.
As I searched for the perfect opening to escape—
‘Hmm?’
For a moment, I felt a strange gaze on me.
“……Hey, Achilles. Apparently some madman threw a bomb into the execution grounds and ran away.”
The black-haired woman beside Achilles narrowed her eyes as she stared at me.
She was speaking to Achilles beside her, yet for some reason, her gaze remained strangely fixed on me.
“They say he looks terrifying. Apparently, his face is like a demon’s! He even tore the Imperial flag to pieces.”
“What? Why are you suddenly talking about something so completely unrelated, Hecate?”
“…….”
Ah, so her name was Hecate?
She was a new SSR character from Greek mythology.
‘If it’s Hecate…….’
The Goddess of the Moon and Night.
And the Goddess of life and death, boundaries, and crossroads.
‘There’s a good chance she belongs to a Rogue-type Class.’
……DING!
[Information on a new Hero acquired!]
[Hecate suspects you.]
‘Huh?’
A somewhat strange system message appeared before my eyes.
‘What is this?’
The new character…….
Suspects me?
“They say that terrorists are still on the run. You don’t think he might come this way, do you?”
The woman called Hecate kept glancing toward me while lightly nudging Achilles beside her.
At the same time, her right hand moved toward where her dagger would be.
She was clearly on guard against me.
“Whoever he is, he sounds completely insane, doesn’t he? Probably the sort of person we should never get involved with, right? Oh, and apparently he’s muscular. They say his strength is absurd.”
“I’ve already heard all of that! But why are you saying it while staring directly at that man’s face?!”
“Hmm…….”
“And look at him. Far from looking like a demon, he’s obviously a perfectly presentable, handsome man. He doesn’t even match the terrorist’s description.”
“Oh, come on. He could’ve stolen someone else’s clothes and changed…….”
[TIP - Some Heroes possess exceptional intuition.]
Still looking unconvinced, she was now openly staring at my chest.
‘What?’
‘Why is she staring at my chest?’
Was something wrong?
I lowered my head to check.
“……!”
A button strained against my bulging pectoral muscles as though begging for death, barely managing to hold together the fabric being pulled taut in both directions.
‘……I even buttoned the top row wrong?’
Damn it.
I must have fastened it incorrectly because I had been in such a hurry earlier.
Was that why she suspected me?
‘I should fix it quickly.’
I hurriedly tried to fasten the button over my chest, which had already been stretched to its absolute limit.
PING-!
‘Huh?’
The button shot away.
And struck the fruit shop owner squarely in the forehead.
“You…… You……!”
The shopkeeper scrubbed furiously at his forehead as though something filthy had touched him.
Then—
JUMP!
He sprang to his feet, his face flushed bright red.
“I knew it! We need to seize these suspicious Ailant bastards and interrogate them immediately!”
* * *