I Picked Up the Abandoned Hero

6 – 6. Shame

“Grandma, Mom doesn’t move.”

As a child, I did not understand the concept of death.

I didn’t even know what death was in the first place.

Now, I only question the fact that my mother, who used to be strong and strong like a mountain, doesn’t answer when I call, and her warm arms are now as cold as ice.

“Is this what death is? Even when my father became like this, she said, ’cause my mother said it was death.”

“…”

“It’s amazing, my mother was stronger than anyone else, but she couldn’t beat death.”

“…”

She said her mother was the strongest in the world.

But he died.

I can never come back like my father.

The only thing I feared in the world was her mother, and even she couldn’t overcome death.

How terrifying is death really?

I didn’t know how to react to the concept of death, which I felt for the first time.

“…Grandma.”

Then, her grandmother hugged me like that and she didn’t say anything.

“Why do you keep watering from your eyes since earlier?”

I didn’t know it at the time, but her grandmother was definitely crying at the time.

She was there and she kept apologizing to me and she held me for a while and wouldn’t let go.

Why did you cry so much?

What made you so sad?

What made it so sad?

I still couldn’t understand why.

Grandma, why was she so sad?

†††

My mother was nicknamed the Witch of Embers.

The fire her mother made was usually white, and it was nicknamed because it did not go out until it completely reduced the burning object to ashes.

There are also stories big and small here and there. To get to the point, my mother was a pretty amazing wizard.

So, of course, she had a lot of knowledge in her head, and she feared that the knowledge would disappear forever when she died.

For this reason, her mother tried to ask me about magic, but her father objected because it was too dangerous, so she only learned a small part of magic.

Reluctantly, my mother separately organized the knowledge in her head into books and left them in her records, and the place I am heading to now is the library full of those books.

I don’t know where this place is.

It is a place that can only be reached using the teleportation magic circle that my mother told me about, and it is a place where there is only a white space with nothing except for the small forest where the study is located.

In a vast white space, in a handful of forest.

There is a study that my mother left for me there.

It looks like a small cabin from the outside, but when you go inside, you see an incomparably wider space.

‘Fortunately, he seems to be out for a while.’

There was no one in the study like that.

Originally, the librarian here should be guarding the books, but there were times when he was away.

Perhaps the timing was good.

Thanks to that, I don’t have to go through unnecessary trouble.

‘Still nothing seems to have changed.’

Maybe it’s been a long time since I’ve been here, I feel a little friendly.

Even now, when I quietly close my eyes here, I can hear my mother’s voice.

I learned magic from her mother here.

Those were good times.

‘I’ll stop recalling memories like this.’

Look around the bookshelves.

There must be books related to curses somewhere here.

Originally, when making a curse, it is a rule to make a way to heal it, so if it’s not extremely terrible, I’ll be able to follow it without difficulty.

“This should be enough.”

I picked out the right books.

Aside from the books written by my mother, there are many books made by famous wizards in curse magic, so it will be helpful.

Of course, as the size of the study is large, there are other spaces besides here, but it is locked with the lock my mother made, so even I cannot enter at will.

That’s why I’ve never been inside.

Only the manager of this library can open that place.

Actually, that librarian doesn’t seem to be here right now.

‘I’ll have to go soon, I’ll have to give you a simple first aid.’

Concerned about Arcel’s condition, she hurried back.

Originally, we should check the curse placed on Arcel here and figure out exactly what the curse was, but it took too long…

Even if you don’t die right away, let’s alleviate the pain as soon as possible.

†††

“…Mmm.”

The reason I opened my eyes was because I could feel the presence.

Arsel slowly opened his eyes, feeling as if someone was by his side, and regained his locked vision.

This is the room he prepared.

A room that I felt was too much for myself.

But he said he was happy to be here, and that he was never too much.

To be honest, I couldn’t understand.

It’s ironic that people who were once enemies were treated like this, those who risked their lives to protect them didn’t believe what they said at all.

‘…A book?’

But suddenly, a book came into view.

That book is nothing special.

However, if it is unusual for a book to float in the sky, would it be unusual?

Looking at it now, there were not just one or two books like that.

“These are…”

“Ah, are you awake?”

And in the middle of the book was him.

Former Demon King’s army officer.

Half-man, half-horse Alfred, nicknamed Satan.

For some reason, a strange scene was created in which he, along with books, was floating in the air.

“What are all these… all?”

“Books related to curses, I’m looking for something like a curse in your body here. There are similarities, but they do not look the same.”

He wonders how much he fell asleep after he collapsed, and before he knew it, the moon was shining softly outside the window.

I must have been asleep for more than half a day.

“Aren’t you hungry? I brought some fruits that are good for relieving fatigue over there.”

As Alfred beckoned, a plate of fruit flew slowly.

There were also quite a few familiar fruits.

They were fruits that I paid a lot of money to soothe my tired body from the arduous journey.

Very precious things that you might only see once every three or four months.

I was surprised to find a plate full of those things.

Some were so rare that even royalty and occasional ones were eaten.

Pick a bite of a delicious fruit and feel good with the sweet scent.

Even if it’s a fruit, it’s enough to soothe an empty stomach.

As a bonus, it feels like the accumulated fatigue is melting away.

“I want to cook properly, but I’ve never cooked before. It’s been quite a while since I’ve had proper food in the first place.”

“…So you’re saying you’ve been starving all this time?”

“Yes, but it doesn’t really matter. I don’t need to eat like humans.”

The more I heard about him, the more surprising it was.

Surely, the first time I met him was when my eyes crossed each other in the burning ruins.

He sensed that even then he was unusual, but this was simply beyond that level.

“No matter how strong the demons are, they still need nutrients…”

“I’m fine, it’s nice to be able to save money on food. How is your body?”

“The body, if it is.”

Come to think of it, before I knew it, the feeling of pressure on my body had alleviated.

“Eh…?”

It’s not completely gone, but it’s incomparably better than before.

“Are you feeling better? I couldn’t do it, but I could somehow alleviate the pain.”

After being imprisoned with a curse engraved on it, it was not easy to even breathe.

He continued to writhe in pain until the day of his execution came.

When I breathed, it felt like small blades were tearing my lungs apart, and when I used magic, I couldn’t even use recovery magic because of the pain that made my blood boil.

Until I got used to it, I felt it was better to kill myself.

Of course, they didn’t let the sinner go away so easily.

“It is nonsense. There was no record that he had successfully weakened it, let alone lifted this curse. How can you do that overnight-“

I couldn’t believe it.

As much as this curse is only used on the most heinous villains, its notoriety is well deserved.

As there is no way to do it, even if the guilty person turns out to be innocent, it was to the point of begging him to kill himself, so there is no need for words.

“I am a first-class wizard. He’s often called a genius. Placing another curse on top of one another is easy for me.”

“What does it mean to put a curse on a curse…?”

Arsel looked down at his chest.

There was a curse with a new white pattern on top of the existing ominous black pattern curse.

The white pattern formed to cover the black curse prevents the magic of the curse from leaking out.

It seems to be thanks to this that the pain has decreased.

“In the end, the fact that any curse works with magical power remains the same.”

Alfred came over and said, sitting in the air.

“Of course, it is maintained using your body’s mana as fuel, so it will not disappear unless you die. So I just prevented your magic from flowing into the curse.”

“Is that possible? Your words are no different from cutting water with a sword. In particular, how can the curse dwelling in the heart where magic is created, not anywhere else…”

The place where magic is generated in the human body is the heart.

The magic created in the heart travels through the blood and spreads throughout the body.

If the heart is the pump, the blood vessels are the path of magic.

For this reason, when dealing with a mage, it is better to aim for the heart first, and if you put a curse that blocks magic on the chest where the heart is, you will not be able to use magic.

The curse that blocks magic isn’t particularly difficult.

It’s just adding another curse on top of an already engraved one.

In order to operate it without any problems, it required precise control that humans could not follow.

Precision equivalent to a machine that operates without an inch of error.

Because of this, there were many cases in which magic power control failed, and only the power of the curse was increased for no reason.

“From there, I have to compete with my skills and experience, because I also suffered quite a bit. Still, your breasts are big and soft, so I didn’t have much trouble carving the curse into them.”

“I can’t believe that means-“

Arsel checked the clothes he was wearing this time.

Somehow, there were traces of it that seemed to have been loosened a little.

He probably finished his work while he was sleeping.

The work of injecting mana into the body of another person and carving a magic circle.

His face flushed red from his shame, for he was sleeping peacefully despite being subjected to such a thing.

There was a certain degree of insensitivity.

Belatedly, I lowered my head and bit my lip, but I imagined Alfred working on it for no reason, and it only made me feel embarrassed, which had the opposite effect.

“Oh, are you not angry? I thought you would be angry.”

“…No, I have no right to be angry with you. Because I got help from you again. Right now, I just resent my own immaturity.”

Alfred smiled contentedly at the shy Arcel.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but it seems to have worked, so it’s good. Then I’ll go to rest soon. I’ve been doing this for 12 hours and I think I’ll get motion sickness.”

“Thank you. I don’t know how to repay the favor I received from you.”

Arcel answered in a whisper, covering her body with her blanket.

“It’s a reward. Think about it later, and it’s okay to use magic now, but shouldn’t you use it too quickly? Right now, it’s a simple makeshift solution, so if you overdo it, it will break down quickly.”

“Lord, be careful.”

So Alfred went out, and Arcel was left alone in the room again.

“Ugh, what the hell was I doing…?”

Since I was left alone, I started to care more about what happened while I was sleeping.

I was also worried that he might be talking strangely in his sleep or looking ugly in his sleep.

Originally, I always reacted sensitively so that I could respond to enemy attacks even when I was sleeping, but I was so tired and tired and this place was so comfortable that I couldn’t do that.

In a word, I was sleeping very deeply and comfortably.

Covering my face with my hands did not cover all of these shames.

Of course there were no rat holes as it was a neatly maintained room.

“There is nothing wrong with the baby. It’s just that the kid’s skills are too good.”

“Ugh…?!”

However, a voice is heard and someone secretly appears behind Arcel.

Without any sound or sign, he covered his mouth in an instant.

“Apart from that, I have a question for you, so why don’t you answer it?”

A quiet voice that sounds like a whisper.

“Aga must be the hero who brutally murdered his fellow travelers and ran away?”

That voice seemed to reach deep into Arcel’s heart.