I Picked Up the Hero Who Banished Me

26 – [Two With the Hero – 11]

“That’s a wooden sword, right?”

Sylphy’s fundamental question.

Even if, I couldn’t exactly pull out a Holy Sword to fight, so the Hero was currently using the wooden sword I’d given her, ripping through the charging monsters with it.

Watching this, Sylphy couldn’t help but ask.

Was it even right for a being beyond human to wield that kind of power?

Every Hero throughout history had been a superhuman, but I thought Olivia Reinhart, the current Hero, was the strongest.

It wasn’t that other Heroes were weak, it’s just that the Hero before my eyes was ridiculously powerful.

If the conditions were right, could she even slice through the Goddess and the Death God, I even started to wonder.

Loved by every weapon, including the sword.

Loved by the fight.

Loved by battle.

Truly, she was born with every talent needed for combat.

It’s no joke, the fact that this person isn’t evil is a blessing for humanity.

The things she’s been through are enough to make anyone wicked, and it would be understandable if she resented the world and fell into darkness.

But, as if the goddess’s eyes were never wrong, she chose to walk the righteous path, never allowing herself to fall into wickedness.

She was the kind of person who would sooner take her own life than point her sword at an innocent person.

Though she might point it at someone she mistakenly thought was evil.

“Just a plain wooden sword.”

“Ugh… I had no doubt you were strong, but at this point, you’re so strong it’s suspicious. What are you? And even your physical state, it’s definitely not normal.”

“The world is wide, there are many strong people.”

“I don’t think you’re on *that* level…”

Actually, it might not be a big deal to reveal she’s a hero, but I wasn’t sure if Silphy was someone we could truly trust yet.

So, if she genuinely intended to help us after finishing things in Half Village, it might be okay to consult with the Hero and reveal her identity.

“Something…”

The wooden sword came between me and Silphy.

“Too close.”

It was such an obvious declaration of ‘this man is mine’.

For the Hero, the feeling of love must be something she’s experiencing for the very first time.

“No, no, don’t misunderstand, Ms. Livia.”

“…….”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’d prefer it if you didn’t call me that.”

“Huh? That Livia is your name…”

The Hero wore an expression that was hard to put into words.

“I’m Olivia.”

“Wait, just a minute…!”

I was surprised without even realizing it.

I never imagined she’d just blurt out her real name.

Did she forget that Olivia Reinhardt, the Hero, is famous?

In fact, Silphy’s eyes widened and she wore a surprised expression when she heard the name.

Even if she was completely oblivious, hearing that name, coupled with such immense power, there’s a hypothesis she could come to, and it would be damn close to the truth.

Silphy immediately said in an excited voice,

“Amazing! You have the same name as that Hero!”

‘Is she gonna play the “same name” card?’

Could this girl be of a similar type to the Hero?

The fact she can even use stealth techniques means she has a natural talent, which suggests a high probability she’s a “sense type.”

Maybe it’s a prejudice, but people who fight or train by instinct tend to be a bit simple-minded.

“So, um, Livia is like a nickname then?”

“Right.”

“I see… I apologize for not knowing your circumstances, Olivia-nim.”

“Knowing is enough.”

I carefully approached the hero and spoke softly.

“It’s okay to know my name, right?”

“……”

The hero looked up at me with a slightly sulky expression.

“I don’t want anyone else calling you that, but you.”

“……”

This is something.

I didn’t realize they had a tendency to be fixated on honorifics.

At this point, there was no knowing if hiding my name and calling myself Livia instead of Olivia even had a point.

“Anyway, don’t get too close.”

“You don’t need to worry about that.”

“Why?”

“Well… it’s not that I’m disregarding that, but I don’t have that kind of preference.”

The hero and I both tilted our heads at Silphy’s words.

What was that?

Was she implying that I have some kind of flaw in my appearance that would make me need a specific type?

Not to boast, but I’ve always heard I have a decent appearance, and the hero themselves even said that my looks and voice were good.

A person as honest as the Hero, who only knows how to charge straight ahead, wouldn’t bother lying to say something like that.

It felt like, if the person they were smitten with wasn’t conventionally attractive, they’d just say, ‘So their looks aren’t great? That means no other woman will want them, that’s a good thing!’

“What do you mean?”

“Huh? What do I mean… I like women normally, though.”

“Huh?”

“Yeah?”

“Huh?”

A chorus of questions filled the space at once.

The Hero just stared blankly for a moment before seemingly reaching the same conclusion as me.

“Wait… Sylphy? You’re, you’re a guy?”

“Yes.”

“That face?! And you’re a guy!?”

“It’s not like I chose to be born with this feminine face!”

“This is gender abandoning its duty!”

“……!”

Sylphy looked slightly shocked, so I placed a hand on the Hero’s shoulder and said,

“Livia.”

“Ah! …Um, sorry. That was a bit insensitive.”

“Please try to be a little more restrained.”

As I said that, I thought to myself,

It was a guy.

Didn’t know.

Thought he was a real woman.

From his shoulders down, his build was undeniably feminine. I was a bit hesitant to support the Hero’s statement, but it did make you wonder if the male gender was shirking its duties.

Elves, both male and female, tended to have slender builds, and so many of the males lacked particularly masculine features.

That was only relatively speaking, of course, but on average, it was true.

But an elf with such a lack of masculine traits was hard to come by.

Even if he was a half-elf, with only half the elven blood. Did the elven blood just work harder?

“It’s okay, I’ve been mistaken often enough to expect it.”

“Just asking for my own information, Royce.”

“What?”

“Do you have… a preference like that?”

“…….”

He had the look of someone who’d find the potion that turned him male if he said yes.

“I… I normally like women too.”

“Yay!”

He looked delighted.

*

And so, several days passed in the carriage.

We were almost to the half-elf village, but directly approaching it wasn’t the wisest choice, so we decided to leave the carriage some distance away and walk the rest of the way.

According to Sylphy, many in Half Village had already fallen into the clutches of the Death Cult, and they even prevented people from leaving. She said she barely escaped with a friend’s help.

If that were true, it was better to sneak in and assess the situation rather than risk being seen.

“There’s even a hidden passage like this.”

Half Village was entirely concealed by walls of trees, but there was a hidden passage of some sort.

“I made it a while ago.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Uh… Please think of it as a child’s prank. Sometimes there are nights I wanted to sneak out.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“Ah, is that so? It seems Olivia-nim has been diligent since her childhood.”

Diligent, she called it.

More like, she was just taught not to do anything else.

From what she’d heard, she was beaten by her father under the guise of education, so the very idea of sneaking around probably never even occurred to her.

“Come in.”

“Alright.”

As soon as they entered, she and the Hero’s eyes widened.

“Royce.”

“Yes.”

“You two, what is it?”

“The magical energy is overflowing. It’s an absurd amount of magic, no need to even investigate. This is mental magic. And a considerably advanced form of it too, right?”

“You’re absolutely right.”

Weak monsters sometimes used mind manipulation or mental erosion to survive, but this was too specialized.

High-ranking monsters.

Or, if it was the work of humans from the Death God cult, it would have to be at least a cadre-level case.

If they were spreading this throughout the whole village, it might not be a solo operation but a ritual performed by multiple people.

No, but.

“Sylphy, is there by any chance a wide-open space with a good view of the sky in this village?”

“Huh?”

“This level of mental magic isn’t something you could pull off alone. But if a lot of people were lurking around, the village would have noticed.”

“…….”

“So, if that’s the case, they’re doing a solo ritual. If they have a good view of the sky, they could perform a ritual to receive the yin and yang energies from above.”

“But I’m not sure what a ‘good view of the sky’ even means. If it’s just seeing the sky, we can do that from here, too.”

Hmm.

Explaining this to someone without the knowledge is not an easy task.

“Let me rephrase. Is there any place with a view of the sky that isn’t used much?”

If they were replenishing a lot of things through the ritual, they wouldn’t be operating far from this half-village.

Even if it’s a ritual, it’s a process of gathering magical power in a specific place, so the farther away they were from that spot, the less efficient the gathered power would become.

The best thing would be to do whatever they were planning in the same place they performed the ritual.

That way, they could do their work with the highest efficiency, and even magic with a scope that would normally be impossible alone could become possible.

“Before that… Is this really mind manipulation caused by someone’s interference, and not the villagers’ own will?”

“It’s very likely. I’d need to see the specific spell formula to know exactly what kind it is, though.”

“Seems like the most annoying option.”

“The most annoying?”

“Most mental manipulations lose effectiveness over time and develop a tolerance with repeated use. So, continuous use isn’t really recommended. It’s inefficient, although with some time in between uses, the tolerance weakens and it’s alright.”

Just as the Hero said, using this kind of mental manipulation continuously lowers its effectiveness.

And as time passes, it becomes easier for the person being manipulated to feel a sense of unease, increasing the possibility of breaking free of the manipulation the longer it lasts.

“However, there are rare exceptions where this doesn’t apply.”

“Exceptions?”

“Yeah, a mental manipulation that makes someone not believe they’re being controlled, but rather believe that their actions are their own true feelings. In this case… um, Royce?”

“In that case, it’s considered mental erosion.”

“Right, if you’re hit with this erosion, it’s hard to realize you’re being manipulated. Unlike manipulation, it’s even hard to feel any unease as time passes, and instead, you’ll think it’s your own true feelings.”

If it’s mental erosion, we have to save them quickly.

If we’re too late, even if the erosion is broken, they’ll remember everything from when they were under the erosion, and in the worst case scenario, they could have the same mindset as when they were under the erosion.

For example, if it was mental manipulation, breaking that magic would return people to normal.

But with mental erosion, if it’s too late, they’ll mistakenly believe the person they were under the erosion is their real self.

Looking at this village, even if we save the people, they could still end up believing in the Death God Cult.

“They can use mental erosion? The demon army executive I met before, he knew how to do that too. He tried to use it on me.”

The Hero whispered to me.

It seemed like he was only telling me this, conscious of Sylphy.

Humans do grow up, huh.

I felt a little moved.

“So, how exactly did you get through that monster’s mind control?”

“Huh? I just slashed it. It tried to mind control me, but I guess it didn’t work on me for some reason.”

Sometimes, people with strong mental fortitude are resistant to mind-based magic.

Plus, the hero has the Holy Sword.

It’s probably safe to say he’s practically immune to that kind of stuff.