Chapter 42
No, Cecilia's really shoving me outside like this..
Given what I'm wearing right now, I feel like I could die of embarrassment, and she's just shoved me outside..
In the game, Lumia had been established as having an exceptionally beautiful appearance, and in person, she really did look like a doll. Perhaps that was why, the moment I stepped outside all dressed up, I could feel the gazes of passersby.
Even though I was fully clothed, it felt as though I were standing naked on display, and my face flushed bright red.
Even the Hero, who normally would have bombarded me with questions like whether I was sick or all right, was still staring at my body and face with a dazed expression. Unlike before, his gaze was unmistakably blatant, which made me feel a little strange.
It wasn't my first time being looked at that way by a man, but I had never expected it from the Hero. Someday, the day would come when I had to love the Hero, and when it did, I would probably end up doing things like that with him too, but..
I scratched my head.
“...”
If only the Hero hadn't said he wanted to see me wearing this, none of this would have happened..
...
Sigh..
Right.. It was wrong of me to put this on because I had said I wanted to wear it, then complain about the Hero.
I knew that.. I was only acting this way because I was so embarrassed by how I looked right now.
Until recently, I had been a man, yet here I was dressed up like a woman.
Cecilia had dragged me along, dressed me up, and shoved me outside. While I was standing there in confusion, wondering what I was supposed to do now, the Hero approached me from the side and held out his hand.
I looked up at him, wondering why he was offering me his hand, and the Hero answered with a smile.
“I'll escort you.”
So, in the end, he had decided to do as Cecilia suggested.
With no other choice, I raised my hand, took the Hero's, and gave him a smile.
We had rushed out of the capital and hadn't been able to enjoy ourselves properly, so shouldn't we at least enjoy ourselves here?
Though I wasn't particularly fond of what I was wearing.
.
.
.
It wasn't a particularly large village, but this was still a festival held to welcome the Hero, and the mood in the village was excellent thanks to the head of the necromancer who had been ravaging it. Since it was a small village, word of what the Hero and I looked like had spread instantly, so we were welcomed wherever we went.
I only realized it now, but more people visited the village than I had expected.
It was also the village closest to the capital, and whenever a festival was held in Latikan, the capital, the other villages would open festivals one by one as well. Since they happened to be welcoming us, they had held one too, so the number of visitors was apparently higher than usual.
In modern terms.. yes, if we were comparing it to Korea, you could think of it as a city somewhere in Gyeonggi Province. Since Latikan, the capital, was so enormous, this village was only relatively small; it couldn't really be called a truly small village.
‘Wow..’
In the central square, water surged up from a fountain bearing a statue of a god, while many merchants had set up around it, shouting to sell their wares and attract customers. Ordinary travelers and adventurers alike walked around the square.
People who looked like couples had claimed the benches, embracing each other or showing their affection. Some couples were so absorbed in passionate displays that they seemed unable to see anything around them, despite this being such a wonderful day for a festival.
Whenever he saw couples like that, the Hero would clear his throat.
I felt sorry for the Hero, but I thought I understood why he reacted that way. The person he liked was walking beside him, all dressed up, and he had to witness something embarrassing like that. He may have been imagining doing something similar with me.
We walked side by side around the square, but we weren't exchanging any words.
It was only natural, since I couldn't speak, but it must have been very disappointing for the Hero.
What a tragic life.
The person you love is mute and deaf.
In the best sense, the Hero was a devoted lover, but in the worst, he was a hopeless fool. Being able to hear only one person's voice was romantic, but wasn't there some famous saying about life?
Life is a comedy when seen from afar, but a tragedy when seen up close.
From a distance, it might have been a romantic story in which the male lead took responsibility for a struggling heroine for life. Up close, however, it was a sad story about a woman who could hear nothing but the Hero's voice and couldn't speak, who would have to spend her life relying on someone else's help, while a man spent his life caring for her at her side.
Even so, the Hero had chosen me.
He had chosen a mute, deaf mage with no particularly outstanding qualities over the impressive heroines around him. That fact alone showed how much affection he had for me—for Lumia.
So..
I felt terribly sorry for the Hero.
The Hero was going this far for me, for Lumia, while I was deceiving him all the while.
Even if I couldn't do anything else for him, surely I could at least hold his hand, couldn't I?
I fidgeted with my hand.
Earlier, I had refrained from holding his hand because, when I was a man, I had thought it improper for a man to walk around holding another man's hand. But now, that aversion had mostly faded. For some inexplicable reason, I felt confident that I could hold the Hero's hand now.
Or did I really need to understand why?
I smiled wryly to myself.
“Huh?”
Apparently, the Hero hadn't expected me to take his hand, because he looked flustered.
For all that he was the Hero, I couldn't understand why he was so bashful.
Even though the person he liked had taken his hand first, I hadn't expected him to broadcast his embarrassment with every inch of his body. Surely, being the Hero, he at least had some experience, but he was reacting this strongly just because we were holding hands.
“Lu, Lumia?”
Come to think of it, we'd done things more intimate than holding hands, so seeing him get this flustered over something as simple as holding hands made him look rather cute.
Uh, I mean..
I didn't mean that he was cute in appearance. I meant that the way he acted was cute.
I wasn't into that sort of thing yet.
Or was I..?
Wasn't it a problem in itself that I had thought a man was cute, even if only for a moment..?
I was a little confused, but teasing the Hero was even more fun, so I shook my head inwardly. Although we'd drawn a line between us, we'd slept together, and I'd even let him use my lap as a pillow; it was strange to see him react this way just because we were holding hands.
At first, I'd wanted to hold his hand out of pity and guilt. But once I did, the Hero's reaction was so novel and amusing that I found myself enjoying it too. I could even feel my heart beating faster than usual.
This was.. abnormal.
That was how I knew.
This was my feeling, but it wasn't mine.
However, I had no intention of questioning that now.
No, there was no need to question it.
Hadn't I always thought that way?
I'd always thought we should start by erasing my aversion to the Hero—to men. The Hero must have known that too, and so did I.
Aversion wasn't something that disappeared easily.
There was a reason people divided gender into mental gender and physical gender.
People might casually say that having a hole makes you a woman and having a rod makes you a man, but gender was far deeper and more complicated than that. Why else would terms like heterosexual, homosexual, and bisexual exist? Sexual attraction was a much more complicated matter.
There was clearly something strange about me now.
I was still mentally myself, but my body and heart were leaning toward the Hero.
I assumed it was related to the fact that I had become Lumia.
It would be a lie to say I wasn't afraid, but I was even more afraid of the destruction to come; during the time I'd spent with the Hero, I could tell that the affection he showed me, and the feelings behind it, were genuine, and, finally, my body and heart were leaning toward him.
After agonizing over it for a long time, on the day the Hero saved me—the day he told me the whole truth—I decided to accept it.
In the end, if I wanted a happy ending in which no one died, I had to love the Hero.
Given my current situation, I might have had every right to feel wronged, but there was little time left to dwell on it, and the responsibility placed on me was immense.
The time I had spent with the Hero, Cecilia and Ruril—whom I had only recently met—and this world..
I hoped none of it would be destroyed.
And I didn't want to die, either.
Who in the world would want to die?
Yes, so..
‘First, let's get used to holding hands.’
Because even a thousand-mile journey begins with a single step.
Right?
I smiled at the Hero.
The hand I had clasped with the Hero was warm.