'BURN THE NEW HERO!'
'WE HEARD YOU NOBLES SUMMONED YET ANOTHER ONE!'
'KILL HIM! WE DON'T NEED MORE CORRUPTED HEROES!!'
The voices rose from outside, echoing through the castle walls like a curse clawing its way into his skull.
He opened his eyes.
The world came back in fragments the scent of polished oak, the weight of thick sheets over his body, the sting in his chest that pulsed in time with his heartbeat. His limbs were heavy, his breath uneven. The training… it hadn't been a dream. The pain of the lance still lingered, not in flesh but deep within, where no wound should exist.
He sat up slowly, every muscle protesting. The room was dim, lit only by the pale light filtering through the curtains. The air trembled with distant rage. Outside the window, he could hear the mob again hundreds of voices unified in their hatred.
'STOP SUMMONING HEROES!'
'THEY'RE NOTHING BUT CURSES IN HUMAN SKIN!'
His hand clenched over his chest. He forced himself out of bed, swaying as fatigue dragged him down. His feet touched the cold marble floor.
He staggered toward the window.
Below, the courtyard was a sea of bodies, commoners with torches, farmers with rusted pitchforks, mothers clutching their children while shouting through tears. The hatred wasn't empty it was born of loss, of fear, of too many broken promises.
Their faces blurred in the morning haze, but the emotion was clear.
They didn't see him as salvation.
They saw him as another disaster waiting to happen.
The door creaked open behind him.
Lucien entered first, his usual calm weighed down by exhaustion. His eyes were shadowed by regret. Following him was King Ragnvald the ruler of Valdheim, the man who had first stood before Seiji at the summoning circle. His presence filled the room before he even spoke. Broad, commanding, yet burdened his very steps felt like judgment.
Lucien bowed his head slightly. "You should be resting still."
Seiji didn't turn. "Kind of hard to rest when half the city wants me dead."
Lucien's silence was heavy.
Then came another voice colder, deeper.
"Your kind isn't welcome in this world." said Ragnvald, each word deliberate. "You're well aware of that, right?"
Seiji froze. The king's tone carried no anger, just finality. A statement carved in stone.
Lucien's gaze flicked to Ragnvald. "Your Majesty, as I said before, he could be the prophec—"
"Quit it, Lucien." the king snapped, though his tone never rose. "Heroism is a past now."
Lucien's jaw tightened, but he said nothing. His silence felt like surrender.
Ragnvald's boots echoed as he approached, stopping just a few feet away from Seiji. The young man turned from the window to face him. The king's eyes were sharp, old as war.
For a long moment, he said nothing. Then, quietly, he began to speak.
"Listen up, because I'm only saying this once."
His voice carried the weight of decades, of battles lost and victories that left nothing behind.
"You think you're special, don't you? Dropped into our world, handed a destiny, expected to play the hero. But let me shatter that illusion for you."
Each word fell like a hammer blow.
"Your kind people from Earth, summoned or reincarnated have been flooding into our world for ages. And most of you are a curse, not a blessing. You've torn both worlds apart, leaving chaos in your wake, and we're still picking up the pieces."
He took a step forward. The firelight caught the scar running down his right cheek, the reminder of wars fought long before Seiji's arrival.
"Do you want the truth? Every single day, more of you show up. Summoned by desperate rituals or reincarnated by some cosmic whim, it doesn't matter. The result's the same. A flood of so-called heroes who are anything but a hero."
He turned away, his cloak dragging against the floor.
"You're not the first, Seiji. And you won't be the last."
Lucien looked away. He had heard these words before. He'd watched Ragnvald give this speech to countless others heroes who came and went, each one fading faster than the last.
"Overpowered?" the king continued. "Sure. Abilities that could topple kingdoms or reshape the world? Absolutely. But what do most of you do with that power? Nothing. You're lazy, self-absorbed, or worse perverted cowards who'd rather chase fleeting lust, pleasures than face the darkness threatening us all."
Ragnvald's tone hardened, eyes narrowing.
"You think you can just walk away, find some quiet corner of this world to hide in? There's no peace here, Seiji. None. Not while the chaos keeps swallowing everything we've fought for."
The word chaos lingered, heavy and cold. But seiji understood it immediately, it sounded like something more than monsters or war. Something deeper. Something alive.
"We summoned your kind because we had no choice." Ragnvald went on. "Our world's crumbling. Monsters, corruption, wars that never end. We thought Earth's people would bring hope, courage, a spark of something better. But instead, we got arrogance. Betrayal. Heroes who abandon their titles the moment things get hard."
Lucien's hands tightened around his staff. "Not all of them were like that." he murmured.
Ragnvald's gaze flicked toward him sharp as a blade. "Name one, other than the first generation of heroes."
Lucien's lips parted… then closed. He couldn't.
The silence that followed was unbearable.
"I've seen it all, Seiji." Ragnvald said, his voice quieter now but not softer. "I've watched your kind turn their backs on us, on their own potential, on the very idea of heroism. They'd rather build harems or play god than save anyone. And I'm sick of it. I'm done believing in heroes."
Lucien lowered his head. He didn't interrupt again.
Ragnvald's voice deepened, each syllable ringing like an oath.
"I gave up on heroism a long time ago. The world's been waiting for a real hero, someone who'll actually stand up and fight, not just for themselves but for everyone. Not another 'overpowered otaku.' who'll ditch us when the going gets tough."
He stopped in front of Seiji again.
Their eyes met hopelessness against hope.
"So tell me, Seiji." he said, each word deliberate. "what are you going to do? Are you just another disappointment, or are you actually going to prove me wrong?"
...
For a moment, the only sound was the faint roar of the mob outside, their chants bleeding through the stone.
Seiji said nothing. His throat was dry, his pulse heavy. He could feel the exhaustion in his limbs, the ache of Lucien's lance still lingering. The world's hatred pressed in from all sidestheir hatred. Not of him, but of what he represented.
And yet… he understood it.
He didn't know these people. But he understood them.
Because back on Earth, he had seen the same faces people crushed by systems, betrayed by those who promised salvation.
Lucien took a step forward. "Your Majesty—"
But Seiji raised a hand, stopping him. His voice was hoarse when he finally spoke.
"No, Lucien. Let him talk."
The priest hesitated. Ragnvald's expression didn't change.
"He's right." Seiji said quietly. "You're absolutely right, Your Majesty. If I were in their shoes, I'd probably hate me too. Some outsider summoned here while people are dying. Another supposed 'hero.' I get it."
He exhaled slowly, the fatigue etched deep in his tone.
"But I told you. I didn't ask to be here. I didn't ask to be a hero. Yet… if I'm stuck in this world, I'll damn well make it mean something."
Ragnvald remains unfazed. Lucien's eyes widened faintly.
"I'm not here to play god. I'm not here to chase power or women or glory. Heck i don't even know how long I'll survive. But if I'm going to die here, then it's not going to be as some 'curse' from another world. I'll die trying to change something, anything. Even if no one remembers."
The words hung there, raw and imperfect but real.
Ragnvald studied him in silence for a long time. Then, slowly, his gaze softened just enough to be human.
"Then prove it."
He turned away, the heavy cape trailing behind him as he walked to the door.
"You'll have your chance soon enough, 'hero.' The world's already breaking again."
The door closed behind him, his footsteps fading into the echo of the castle's corridors.
Lucien exhaled, shoulders sagging. He turned to Seiji, placing a hand on the young man's shoulder.
"You spoke well." he said softly. "But words alone won't heal this world."
Seiji looked at him. "Fine. I'll use more than just words."
Lucien smiled faintly the kind of smile that carried both sorrow and hope.
Outside, the mob's fury began to die down, the crowd scattering like smoke after rain. But their anger didn't fade it merely slept, waiting.
He turned back toward the window. The torches below flickered out one by one. The morning swallowed the city whole.
Seiji stepped into the quiet courtyard, still burdened with the lingering ache of yesterday's ordeal. His ribs felt tender, his back stiff, his breath slightly unstable as though fragments of the tenfold gravity still clung to his lungs. But he walked. Not with confidence, but with duty a fragile, trembling thread tying him to a new path.
Lucien was already waiting at the far side of the courtyard.
No priestly robes adorned him this morn, no ceremonial posture elevated his form. He stood as merely a man lean, unadorned, wrapped in the courtyard's morning silence. In one hand, he cradled that same plain wooden staff, its surface worn smooth by epochs of unseen trials, gripping it lightly as if it were an extension of his weary soul rather than a weapon of war.
The staff looked worn, even weaker than yesterday. But Seiji already knew better than to judge it by appearance.
Lucien turned as Seiji approached. His expression was unreadable calm on the surface, but shadowed beneath. Something like guilt lingered in his eyes, brief and quickly concealed.
"You're walking." Lucien observed, his voice a low murmur that blended with the breeze. "Good. I was… concerned."
Seiji halted a few paces away, managing a tired exhale that misted in the chill air. "I'm still alive. I guess that's progress. Though every step feels like dragging chains from some forgotten dungeon."
Lucien's lips twitched in what might have been the ghost of a smile. But his eyes stayed serious.
"Today.." he said softly. "we do not push your body. We shape your mind."
Seiji blinked. "My mind?"
Lucien nodded, his gaze distant, as if peering into veiled sequences of fate.
"To be a hero is not strength. It is restraint. Self-control. Patience. Mercy. You cannot protect the weak if you cannot protect yourself from your own impulses."
He stepped back, lifting the wooden staff horizontally.
"Today, you learn the discipline that keeps a hero from becoming a tyrant."
A breeze passed between them, carrying the faint scent of grass and cold metal. Seiji felt the weight of those words deeper than he expected. After everything King Ragnvald had said earlier the hatred, the disappointment, the condemnation it resonated.
Lucien continued, his voice a steady cadence amid the morning's hush.
"If your heart is unstable, your resolve collapses the moment blood is spilled. A hero must survive not only the battlefield but his own nature."
He tapped the staff lightly against the ground, a subtle vibration humming through the stones.
"We begin."
Lucien moved not with the brutal velocity of yesterday's assault, but with a precision honed by eras of contemplation. A gentle swing of the staff arced through the air, deliberate and unhurried. A small step forward followed, weight shifting like a tide ebbing before the surge. Subtle, controlled, each motion a riddle veiled in simplicity.
Seiji reacted instinctively at first, his training sword rising to meet the staff's path. But Lucien's intent wasn't to overwhelm. It was to illuminate. The strikes slowed deliberately at their apex, granting Seiji fragments of time to discern the angle, to unravel the intention woven into the movement. The staff wasn't a harbinger of harm it was a tutor, imparting rhythm, timing, perception in silent strokes.
"Don't recoil." Lucien murmured as Seiji blocked too widely, the staff tapping his wrist with feather-light rebuke. "Narrow your movements. Conserve your strength."
Again.
The staff swept low, forcing Seiji to pivot, his boots scraping against the flagstones.
Again.
A thrust aimed at his shoulder, he sidestepped, feeling the air whisper past.
Again.
The wooden staff blurred into circular motions, weaving shapes in the air like a dancing script. Seiji blocked, stepped back, shifted his stance but he felt the fatigue pull at him faster than expected. Not physical exhaustion mental constraint.
Lucien did not stop.
"Patience." he say, voice threading through the clashes. "You do not lash out blindly. You respond with clarity."
A blow slid past Seiji's shoulder, gentle yet firm.
"You do not destroy recklessly. You redirect, guiding force as one guides a wayward soul."
The next strike he parried, though clumsily, the impact vibrating up his arm like a ripple in destiny's web.
Lucien's tone sharpened. "You do not crush your enemy's will. You understand it."
Another thrust targeted Seiji's center. He intercepted it, barely, the clash echoing faintly across the courtyard. From a distant window, King Ragvnald watched, his eyes still cold, before turning and walking away.
"Good." Lucien said quietly. "But your eyes wander."
Seiji realized he was glancing at Lucien's face, searching for intention.
"Watch my shoulders, hips, and feet." Lucien instructed, his movements a living lecture. "The body speaks long before the attack does."
Seiji refocused, his vision narrowing to the subtle cues. the faint pivot of a heel, the tightening coil of shoulder sinew, the prelude to motion scripted in flesh.
And... he saw it.
The heel shifted imperceptibly.
Shoulders tensed in prelude.
He dodged not by raw reflex, but by insight's guiding hand, the staff whistling harmlessly through empty space.
Lucien nodded, a spark of approval in his eyes. "That is the mind of a hero."
And then he moved faster.
Not brutal. Not overwhelming. But a step above a sharper rhythm, more refined patterns. Seiji strained, sweat beading at his temples despite the morning's chill, his mind a forge hammered by concentration's relentless blows.
His muscles trembled, not from pain but from intense concentration. Lucien's attacks were like riddles disguised as blows. Questions. Tests. Lessons.
Every block taught balance.
Every dodge taught humility.
Every failed parry taught patience.
Lucien's voice came again.
"A hero must be able to kill."
He struck downward. Seiji barely blocked, the jolt reverberating through his frame.
"But a hero must choose not to."
The staff stopped just short of Seiji's throat.
Lucien held it there, hovering, unwavering.
"And self-control." Lucien whispered, his breath steady. "Is the difference between justice and tragedy."
He withdrew, stepping back with fluid grace.
Seiji exhaled shakily, his sword lowering as the tension uncoiled. "Lucien… how do you stay calm like that?
A brief silence. Something heavy passed through Lucien's eyes.
"…Discipline." he answered at last. "And the memory of what happens when I am not."
Seiji didn't push further.
He didn't need to.
The training slowed again. Lucien's motions softened, shifting from combat patterns to something more meditative.
"Seiji." Lucien intoned, his staff tracing languid arcs in the air. "a hero must never kill out of anger."
He tapped Seiji's chest gently, right where yesterday's lance had etched its phantom scar, a point of vulnerability in the soul's armor.
"Hatred makes you weak. It clouds judgment, invites ruin. If you seek vengeance, you will lose everything."
Seiji lowered his gaze. "And mercy? Doesn't that expose weakness, leave you open to the enemies strike?"
Lucien shook his head, a subtle of denial.
"Mercy." he said, "is strength so absolute that it does not need destruction to prove itself."
He raised the staff once more, its tip gleaming faintly in the rising sun. "Stance."
Seiji braced, centering his breath amid the courtyard's hush.
This time, the staff movements were slower, almost ceremonial. Lucien's strikes were gentle tests barely touching, probing, urging Seiji to loosen the stiffness in his limbs.
"Flow with me." he said. "Not against."
Seiji inhaled deeply, drawing the crisp air into his core, steadying the inner tempests.
Centered.
Moved.
Their forms synchronized, not flawlessly, but in burgeoning accord. Lucien struck high.Seiji shifted low, evading with newfound grace. Lucien swept the air in wide arcs; Seiji rotated, countering with measured poise. The exchange felt like a silent colloquy, words unspoken yet profound, woven in motion's tapestry.
Lucien broke it with a question.
"Tell me, seiji… what do you think a monster is?"
"…Something dangerous?" Seiji ventured quietly, parrying a light thrust. "A being that instills fear, that preys on the vulnerable?"
Lucien faltered not gradually, but abruptly, as if struck by an unseen malediction. The air grew colder, charged with unspoken dread. Shock widened his eyes, mingled with disgust, denial, a torrent of emotions flashing like lightning in a storm-shrouded sky. The staff trembled in his grip, the wood creaking under the strain of suppressed memories, reminders of something or "someone...?"
"Monsters." Lucien repeated, voice hollow. "Is that what you think?"
Seiji swallowed, unease coiling in his gut. "…Lucien?"
Lucien closed his eyes briefly, his breath uneven for a moment. His fingers tightened around the staff.
"There is no such thing.." he said finally soft, brittle. "Not a single one in this world."
He opened his eyes again. And they were filled with a grief so deep it frightened Seiji.
"Every being you call a monster.." Lucien continued slowly. "comes from pain. From loss. From a brokenness so profound it shapes their soul. Trauma births cruelty. Fear births violence. Despair births chaos."
His hands trembled faintly.
"No one is born a monster."
Seiji felt the heaviness behind those words, like Lucien wasn't explaining a philosophy, but confessing a scar.
"I see.." Seiji murmured careful, gentle. "I won't pressure you further."
Lucien inhaled deeply, steadying the inner maelstrom, his expression reclaiming a fragile calm like mists settling after turmoil.
"Thank you." he replied, gratitude threading through the quiet.
He stepped back, elevating the staff anew. "Let us continue."
They resumed training, but something had changed subtly. Lucien's motions had softened again not weakened, but more introspective. He wasn't pushing Seiji to the brink. He wasn't testing limits today. He no longer pressed to the brink, this was guidance, shaping with care, teaching with nuance.
"Focus on your breathing." Lucien advised, his staff tracing deliberate paths. "Slow. Controlled. Every movement originates in the heart's core, not the limbs' haste."
Seiji complied.
Inhale, the world sharpened, details emerging from haze. The ivy's subtle rustle, the stone's unyielding chill.
Exhale, clarity bloomed, tensions easing like curses dispelled.
Lucien circled him slowly, the staff tapping sporadically against the ground, awakening faint echoes.
The cold felt clearer.
The stone beneath his feet solid.
The morning air crisp with quiet tension.
Lucien circled him slowly, tapping the ground occasionally with his staff.
"Stillness." he said. "Is not the absence of motion. It is the readiness to act the moment action is needed. A hero must be calm even when the world burns."
Seiji exhaled, anchoring himself amid the courtyard's serenity.
"Again."
Lucien struck lightly.Seiji blocked with smoother precision, the clash a harmonious note.
"Again."
A sweep unfurled. Seiji dodged gracefully, boots gliding over stone.
"Better."
Lucien escalated subtly, Seiji adapted, his form flowing like sequences aligning.
"Good."
A faint smile touched Lucien's lips. Not triumph, relief.
"You're learning."
They paused at last, both breathing softly, not heavily, but deeply.
Seiji wiped sweat from his brow, the morning sun now cresting the walls.
"Lucien… earlier, when I asked about monsters… you looked—"
"Do not.."Lucien cut in gently. "finish that sentence."
Seiji closed his mouth, respecting the boundary.
Lucien lowered his staff, eyes softening with sorrow's tint. "One day, perhaps… I will reveal why that query wounds so deeply."
A pause lingered, heavy with unspoken pacts.
"But not today."
Seiji nodded. "I understand."
Lucien straightened his posture slightly, reclaiming his composed air.
"As always you learn quickly." he said. "Not perfectly. But earnestly. And that… is far more important."
His staff tapped the ground once.
"Training concludes here. Rest your mind, Seiji, as we pause our sessions for a while. Recover until you are prepared to embody heroism."
Seiji released a breath, exhaustion mingling with calm, a clarity grounding him, unprecedented and profound.
Lucien turned to depart, but hesitated mid-stride, glancing back over his shoulder.
"And Seiji." he said softly. "You asked what I think of monsters."
He looked back, his eyes meeting the youths gaze.
"For what it's worth… I hope you never become one."