I Picked Up the Hero Who Banished Me

20 – [Just the Two of Us – 05]

“As you know, Livia, I think we should also worry about being tracked.”

“Yeah, you’re right. The Holy Sword came to me, and Alex isn’t a fool. The first thing he’d think is that I’m alive. And if you combine that with the rumors about seeing golden light in East Port, it’ll be easy for him to figure out I’m heading to Elvenheim.”

“Yes, whether Alex comes himself or sends assassins, we need to be careful.”

The hero’s condition improved after getting the Holy Sword, but it’s just an ‘improvement’. He’s definitely weaker than his prime.

Plus, we don’t know when the curse-induced seizures will suddenly hit, and there’s a chance he could become almost incapacitated in the middle of a fight.

Of course, most monsters wouldn’t last a few seconds against him, and humans even less so. But still, it wouldn’t hurt to be careful.

It’s always best to assume the worst-case scenario.

“Alex probably sees you being healed by the World Tree’s sap in Elvenheim as his defeat condition.”

“Yeah, that’s probably it. He wasn’t confident he could beat me, so he went for poison…or was it a curse? Anyway, he avoided a head-on fight.”

“You did beat even the Demon King so it makes sense, that’s a valid assessment.”

It seems like he didn’t just go for a mutual kill, it was a complete one-sided beatdown.

“No, he was strong, the Demon King. Well… He was definitely weaker than me, but I couldn’t kill him in one hit, it took a fair bit of time.”

It was an unbelievable evaluation of the king of monsters.

Many previous heroes had gone for a mutual kill, or, if they returned alive, they often suffered various physical disabilities.

At least coming back in one piece was a miracle, let alone coming back victorious. But this hero not only won, but frankly, he achieved what could be called an overwhelming solo victory.

That’s why Alex is scared of the hero.

That overwhelming power.

The power of someone truly chosen by the goddess, a true hero, was clearly innate.

She was just… inherently strong.

Honestly, I sometimes wonder if she’s even the same species as the rest of us… No, no, actually, I wonder that often.

“Ms. Livia, you’re incredibly strong.”

“I was born that way.”

“Could you at least give a hero-like answer, like, ‘I worked hard’?”

“That’s just false hope. It’s not that I didn’t work hard. I pushed myself to the absolute limit, but not everyone who works as hard as me will become as strong. Let’s be honest, talent is 80% of the world.”

It wasn’t the kind of thing you’d expect a hero, the symbol of all dreams, to say, but well, it wasn’t wrong.

Unfortunately, talent is considered quite important in this world, and without it, you can’t climb to the top.

That’s not to say that I’m denying the efforts of the talentless, but if someone without talent wants to not just survive in a certain path, but to reach its pinnacle, it’ll be an incredibly difficult journey.

“Of course, sometimes there’s the late-bloomer type of talent. Me, I’m the type that steadily rose, the type whose talent was apparent from the beginning.”

“Right.”

“But conversely, there are those who show absolutely no talent at first, but then, at some point, BOOM! They suddenly become incredibly strong. The closest example would be Velita, wouldn’t it?”

“Are you talking about the saintess, Velita?”

Honestly, calling the woman who tried to throw the hero under the bus a saintess didn’t sit right with me.

“I don’t know for sure, but she was ordinary before, and then suddenly her abilities seemed to awaken or something, and she grew exponentially stronger. I don’t know why either.”

“Is that so? Perhaps it was her awakening as a saintess.”

“Why didn’t I have an awakening as a hero?”

*You’re basically as if you were awakened at birth*, I wanted to say, but barely managed to hold it back.

It’s been two days since we boarded the ship.

If things go well, we’ll reach the Eastern Continent tomorrow.

The hero’s lifespan issue was resolved, but the pursuer problem remained, so the sooner we moved, the better.

“Anyway, it’s better to move fast.”

The hero’s hand trembled.

“Feed me.”

I stared at the mashed-up rice and gave an awkward smile.

Watching the hero stick to my side like a baby bird, opening their mouth with an “Ah,” I was speechless, feeling out of place.

“You can eat by yourself now, can’t you?”

“My arm is numb, 큿! The curse of the reaper!”

They were so obviously acting, not even trying to hide it, but I decided not to provoke them unnecessarily.

I let out a small sigh and brought the finely mashed food, easy to eat like gruel, up to their lips. The hero opened their mouth and ate it.

“I’m sure you used to hate this.”

“That was then, and this is now. …To be honest, once this heals, how many of these couple-y things will we have? I want to enjoy this now.”

“You’re too honest.”

The hero smiled.

“I don’t want to lie to you. Of course, I might want to hide things someday, but I don’t want to right now. I believe that when my blade wavers, you’ll surely catch me.”

“…….”

I’ve come to trust them quite a bit.

It seems like, for the hero, my presence has become something that makes them feel good, simply by being there.

Troubling.

I never imagined our relationship would get *this* good.

If things stay like this, even if the hero goes to Elvenheim for treatment, it feels like I won’t be able to shake him off.

Not that I *need* to shake him off, but if we keep being together and he finds out my secret, it’ll be a whole different kind of mess.

The hero might just brush it off, sure, but *I* just wouldn’t like it.

Everyone has things they dislike about themselves, and I’m no different. To the point where I hate myself, feel like I want to deny that *this* is me.

“You shouldn’t trust me *that* much, you know.”

“It’s okay, I’ll protect you if you’re in danger, instead.”

“Maybe you should worry about protecting yourself first?”

“Right. ……But before that, there’s something I need to say.”

“What is it? I’m not curious about your three sizes.”

I already knew they were violently large without looking.

They seemed way bigger than when I was exiled.

“Why aren’t you curious about *that*? No, no, that’s not it… Uhm, should I say it’s a somewhat sensitive topic?”

“What is it? Is something bothering you?”

Even so, being a man and a woman in one room, there were some lines that had to be drawn.

Fortunately, I don’t have the kind of kink that gets me aroused by patients, so I don’t really feel *that* way about the hero right now.

There were moments when I’d perceive him as a man, for a fleeting second, but then my reason would kick in: *he’s a patient,* and it would calm me down.

“That… Elvenheim has to give the sap of the World Tree, right? Isn’t that right?”

“Yes, it might be difficult, but if it’s the hero, maybe they can’t refuse? If you explain the situation well….”

“Yeah. That’s… what’s the problem, I guess.”

“Huh?”

What’s that sound?

“After banishing you, I went to Elvenheim, right?”

Went, he says, but I didn’t go, so it was hard to answer even with his plea for understanding.

“There was a little… problem there.”

“…Could you elaborate?”

“Well, a horde of monsters attacked and I… I ended up chopping down a few too many trees.”

“……”

Elves have this habit of cherishing trees.

It’s not like they’re strictly vegetarian or that they look down on civilization, but they live their lives with their own unique touch and they especially treasure the forest.

And he says he went and chopped down their trees.

“How many?”

“Everything I could see in my sight was cut down.”

“……”

Wouldn’t it have been better to say he just cleaved them all?

“And…”

“There’s more?”

“They blamed me, so I got a little mad… and called them long-eared gnats.”

At that incredibly racist remark, I almost blanked out for a moment.

“So I basically got kicked out of Elvenheim.”

“So, Elvenheim is a closed-off place, the rumors didn’t spread, and the truth just vanished like an echo in that forest, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“…….”

“Hey, I, I have something to say too! I saved their lives, you know? That forest beast was going nuts, rotting and eating the trees, if I hadn’t dealt with it immediately, things would have been dangerous!”

So, an absorption type monster.

Dealing with that kind quickly was important.

Depending on the time, the damage range would increase exponentially, and the monster itself would get stronger too.

“So, I had no choice but to cut it down to take care of it, but the elves are all yelling at me, what kind of thing is that to do?!”

“So, you got worked up?”

“Yeah. I pretty much saved Elvenheim, so even if they can’t welcome me, shouldn’t they at least not be yelling at me!?”

“Yes, you’re right. But that’s from our point of view, and Elvenheim’s point of view is what matters now.”

I understood where she was coming from.

A monster that not only rots the forest but also absorbs the trees’ power – dealing with it quickly, like the Hero did, was the best method.

It might’ve been a little extreme, but the method itself wasn’t wrong, it was her reaction afterwards that was a shame – so emotional.

The elves reacted emotionally too, so honestly, I don’t think it’s right to say who was at fault, but the problem is that we’re in a position to bow our heads and beg for the World Tree sap, while they’re in a position to give it as a kindness.

“You do know that the World Tree sap is only available to elves, except in very special cases, right?”

“…….”

“And yet, the favorability is interestingly low? I thought having the title ‘Hero’ would somehow help, but now it seems like that title might actually be backfiring.”

“In short, yeah… That’s right….”

“No, hearing the story, I don’t think Ms. Livia did that much wrong.”

“See? I knew I wasn’t wrong!”

“You didn’t exactly do well either, sit down.”

“……Yes.”

Here, right and wrong aren’t really important.

The point is that right now, we’re the “eul” and they’re the “gap.”

“Royce, I have a good idea.”

The hero said, raising his hand.

“If you say we should just take it by force, I’m seriously going to get angry.”

The hero quickly lowered his hand.

“I have no good ideas.”

“…….”

My head was throbbing.

Does this mean I need to figure out how to sweet-talk them?

Another thing added to my to-do list.