I Picked Up the Abandoned Hero

42 – 42. Observing starlight

“This almost died… I think it would have died 5 or 6 more times if it wasn’t for me.”

Alfred said, fixing the broken bone.

The action that continued while the auction was coming to an end was more than enough to fill the VIP room with heavy breathing and moaning.

While the auction was in progress, a thumping sound was heard a few times, but the demons dismissed it as construction noise.

“…How the one who hits gets tired first. But is it the first time in my life that I have felt such exhilaration?”

Arsel, who was fixing his clothes, responded that he was refreshed.

“So good? Then would you like me to make a punching bag that looks like me?”

“No, it did.”

If possible, the real thing was better.

Arcel cools her down by slightly loosening her clothes to see if her body temperature has risen from using her body.

It’s as if she did anaerobic exercise for 3 hours in a suit. It’s no wonder that even Arcel is tired.

Anyway, it was not a bad time to unwind the accumulated things.

However, the only bad thing was bad timing.

“Are you here?! How long have you been looking for it! When I opened my eyes, I couldn’t see those demons, and you too-“

Stella hurriedly ran to the VIP room.

It is clear that he fell asleep after being poisoned by Clen, and then woke up and immediately found it from Arcel.

Thanks to the end of the auction, it seems that the security passed easily.

“…What, what did you guys do here?”

“Stella? Why?”

However, the figure of Arcel finally found is not unusual.

Arcel is breathing heavily and sweating with her clothes slightly loose, and Alfred is doing some simple stretching after fixing some broken bones.

It seems like it happened after an action that I only saw in books.

She was greatly perplexed as it seemed to be something she had never encountered in over 100 years.

Of course, Arcel doesn’t understand Stella’s reaction and answers in question.

“It’s not a big deal, we’ve been together often since the old days.”

“What did you often do?”

But unlike Arcel, Alfred seemed to notice what Stella was thinking.

She doesn’t understand exactly what it is, but she thinks it’ll get a funny reaction if you touch it.

“It was hard, but it was a good time, right?”

“It was a good time, but why are you doing it again?”

So I deliberately stick close to Arcel, wipe her sweat with a handkerchief, and put my hand on her shoulder.

Arsel felt strange about Alfred’s sudden change of attitude.

When I was hit, I tried to scream and run away, but now it’s not like that at all.

It was really messy.

“Uh…”

Looking at the scene, Stella was speechless, her pupils quivering wildly, and she began to hiccup.

I want to firmly believe that it is not, but when I looked at the situation, it seemed that the action was in my head no matter how I looked at it.

“If you like it, let’s do it next time. Then, just the two of us in the bedroom so that we can relax.”

“Yes… If you say so, I will not decline, but really why?”

There, Alfred decisively approaches Stella and whispers something in her ear.

It was such a small voice that Arsel couldn’t hear it.

Instead, Stella heard it clearly.

“It was pretty fun, right?”

“Ah-“

Puff!

“Stella?!”

In the end, Stella’s eyes went loose and she fell back to the floor.

“Oops, did Grandma Clen’s poison remain? It will take some time to wake up.”

I was so shocked that my mind couldn’t stand it and my consciousness was blocked.

I thought of the possibility in my heart, but I couldn’t stand it when I faced it in reality.

It was as if Alfred, who seemed to be showing off secretly from the side, was hammering a nail into Stella’s spirit.

Fortunately, it wasn’t to the point of inability to recover.

“Alfred, what do we do with this?”

“Well? I don’t know, but why don’t you ask Grandma Clen?”

Alfred was satisfied that it was worth sacrificing himself for that alone.

†††

Arsel was worried about the collapsed Stella and went to ask Clen about this.

Because earlier, Clen had said that Stella would only sleep for half a day and then she would wake up again.

“I don’t use poison enough to knock me down twice… But maybe it’s poison that can’t wake me up again.”

Clen was puzzled by Arcel’s words.

It is said that there are several types of poison in Dokdo, but it is because I have never heard of a sleeping poison that wakes up once and falls asleep twice.

“Maybe I stayed half awake and then went back to sleep. But don’t worry. After all, it wasn’t a lethal dose of poison.”

“Then it’s fortunate…”

Anyway, I’m relieved to hear that Stella won’t have a big problem.

It is nothing when you think of Stella, who would have been busy taking care of her hometown after not sleeping for days.

“So, how was it?”

“What are you talking about?”

Then Clen asked Arcel.

“What can I ask, of course, the feeling of beating that cunning and creepy bastard.”

“Oh, that is…”

A story about beating Alfred with both fists.

At the time, when I hit him, I felt a sense of pleasure and comfort that was incomparable to any other time, but now that I think about it again, I felt like a child, so I felt a little embarrassed.

Not even a child. Dani knocked down people and beat them with his fists.

For a moment, it seemed like the habit of a country girl came out.

“I was satisfied.”

“It is worth helping.”

Nevertheless, one thing is certain: I am satisfied.

If Alfred were here, he would have shook his head, saying it was too cruel.

Currently, Alfred was warming up in warm water because he was beaten so badly by Arcel.

“Certainly, without your help, Alfred would have run away in no time.”

“It’s nothing. On the contrary, if you can see him in pain and begging to be saved, he can cooperate as much as he wants.”

Alfred didn’t seem to be the only one who had accumulated a lot of things.

Clen says Arcel’s beating Alfred is more exciting than anything he’s ever seen.

Certainly, considering what Alfred has said to Clen so far, this is more than enough.

“By the way… How did you know Alfred? Plus, you seem to know about his mother…”

Arcel asked her maid over her cup of tea.

Looking at the circumstances, it seems that Clen and Alfred met while he was in the Demon King’s Army.

As Alfred himself said, the reason he officially visited Clen’s land was because of the order of the Demon King.

Of course, that was close to the Demon King’s anti-force threat to support the war.

“The two of you weren’t very friendly. His mother’s side was like a living disaster. In particular, the flame of the mother was so dangerous that even the demon king was wary of it.”

“A mother is…”

“You seem to already know about that witch.”

The mother meant the witch of ash.

According to the written book, the witch of ash is said to be an evil witch who wants to burn the world itself.

In fact, the magic created by the Witch of Embers has more than its majesty.

Alfred said that even the red flames that swallowed the entire forest in an instant were discarded because they were the lowest level of magic created by his mother and considered defective.

“I’ve never seen the Witch of Embers myself, after all, it was before I was even born.”

Of course, anyone has no choice but to be vigilant.

“It is relatively recent that the mother died. It is surely surprising that a human being has spent that much time, even though the body is terribly afflicted with all sorts of curses and diseases.”

It hasn’t been that long since Alfred showed up in the demon army.

It is estimated that he has lived for quite a long time.

“I don’t even want to talk about that witch. When she recalls her memories of that time, she dreams of her being burned at the stake. She doesn’t even die, she burns forever…”

Clen shook her head in disgust.

It must have been pretty dreary.

After hearing that Alfred’s mother was the Witch of Embers, Arcel could understand why he preferred burning at the stake.

If it is genetic, it must be genetic.

“And the son of a b*tch… sh*t, I should have helped. When I think about it again, I get angry. Then somehow he should have let him go for good!”

But when it came to Alfred’s story, Clen started shaking her fists so much that her last name shook.

While the Witch of Embers seemed to be dealing with a dangerous beast, Alfred treated them strangely like enemies.

“Did something happen to him by any chance? Certainly, if you’re close, you’re a person who… Accumulates a lot, but it seems there are things I don’t know about.”

Come to think of it, Alfred often looked like he was teasing Clen in a strange way.

It is clear that something must have happened between the two of them.

And of course I can’t help but wonder about that.

“…Are you curious about what I did with him?”

Klen said as she gulped down her wine.

“You don’t have to tell me, but it’s not that I’m not curious…”

Arsel was worried that there might be something Clen didn’t want to think about, or that there was something else that made him treat Alfred like an enemy.

I’m curious, but I didn’t want to force myself to find out.

“Anyway, one day he’ll laugh bitterly and say something, and I’d rather speak with my own mouth than that.”

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But it seemed that Clen was intending to tell her after all.

“What happened?”

“It’s nothing special, it’s just that I unknowingly tried to make him my companion.”

“Ugh…! What?!”

Arsel almost spit out the tea he was drinking at the words that came in without any warning.

It was because she said that Clen was trying to get Alfred as her partner, her husband.

Arcel became suspicious that he had heard them wrong.

But judging from Clen’s reaction, it seems to be true.

“I was intrigued because he was the child of that witch… Anyway, because of her face, he’s a pretty decent guy.”

Clen said, blushing slightly.

However, the flushed face soon became serious and cold.

“So when you dared to reject me, you should have killed me. If what I couldn’t deal with at that time is my grudge, it’s my grudge.”

I don’t seem to have that feeling anymore.

She was likable, but she couldn’t figure out what happened afterward or how her Alfred rejected her.

“To be honest, I think it would be fine if I still had my mouth sewn up and my limbs restrained so I couldn’t move.”

It didn’t seem like he had any regrets at all.

“Are you serious…?”

“Wasn’t that the reason the warrior saved him? I thought that’s why he’s staying with me now.”

“Oh no! I never-“

Arcel also raised his voice in embarrassment.

“No…”

But I couldn’t bear to deny it.

To be honest, it wasn’t that there wasn’t such an element.

In the past, when Alfred kidnapped princesses according to the devil’s order, most princesses followed him without even resisting, as if possessed by him.

Some even cooperated in abducting them.

What a headache it was every time.

It’s a joke, but it’s said that some princesses wanted to be kidnapped by Alfred.

The only princesses that Alfred kidnapped were beautiful and rumored to be beautiful.

The fact that he came to kidnap was tantamount to verifying his words.

“Eh…”

Arsel wants to drink at least some cool ice water.

At Clen’s beckoning, her maid came in and handed her a glass of ice.

Thanks to that, I could barely cool myself down.

“…I can’t deny it.”

“As expected, was it the story that no matter how proud a hero is, it is inevitable that they fall for their looks? If that bastard was the demon king, he would be worth seeing what the future would be like.”

“But that’s not necessarily the case. Alfred…because something felt different from what I had heard.”

The public even called him Satan, calling him an evil demon.

But Arcel didn’t always feel that way when he saw Alfred.

Of course, it can’t be denied that he was a wicked person because he followed the devil’s orders and caused countless casualties, but it didn’t seem like he was born as a wicked person.

Besides, I’ve had his help on several occasions along the way.

When there was a dangerous crisis that he couldn’t get through alone, he certainly came to Alfred’s help several times.

But the other colleagues just couldn’t accept it.

It was Alfred who finally opened the way to defeat the demon lord, and he was able to face the demon lord optimally without any special wear and tear.

If not…

I don’t know what happened after that.

Even if he defeated Alfred and went to the Demon King, he would have met the same fate as the other warriors before him.

“Certainly that is true. He’s different from normal demons. No matter how much he is a half-demon mixed with a human, there’s no way he’s the same demon as me. Even that demon king couldn’t do that.”

Klen said looking up at the moon in the night sky.

“…But I will tell you this much. Anyway, the hero can be seen as a benefactor who took care of the troublesome demon lord, so I will tell you his fate in particular.”

“What are you talking about?”

But Clen’s face didn’t look particularly good.

Even though he got angry when he talked about Alfred, he didn’t look like that, and he felt strangely uneasy.

“If you truly want to remain a hero, the demon Alfred is a threat you will have to deal with yourself someday. Perhaps it was because of her mother’s influence that she suffered the same fate.”

“What the hell is that…”

“What kind of joke is that, he has a fate that is darker than that of his mother. If there was only a reverberation on the mother side, that is the source of fate itself.”

Clen is silent for a moment, as if deep in thought. She opened her mouth as if she didn’t really want this.

“I received the education of my ancestors, so I can see the fate of existence, albeit a little. Does the light from the moon and stars give meaning to me and I interpret the light?”

It seemed to be some kind of astrology.

Klen speaks while observing things behind the night sky, not the moon or stars.

Something outside the sky, something unknown that surrounds the space that contains this world.

It’s like Alfred, she said.

“It is the last thing to appear in this world. Regardless of his will, he was born to bring about the end of the world.”

The fact that Alfred appeared soon meant that the end was coming to this world.

In other words, it meant the end.

Clen said that Alfred was a harbinger of the end.

“…”

Arsel didn’t react at all when he heard that.

There was no response.

I couldn’t respond.