Chapter 1
"Please eat."
I filled a bowl with the stew made from the meat of some unknown magical beast and handed it to the Hero sitting across from me.
"Ah, right."
The Hero carelessly responded, taking the bowl without even glancing at me.
His eyes were always fixed on his lover.
Even in this living hell where the desire to sleep fades, it seems his lust cannot be overcome.
...How nice to have such energy.
Swallowing my sarcasm, I picked up my own bowl.
I finished it in an instant, secretly marveling at how surprisingly good it tasted.
In truth, I didn't want to put this unknown magical beast meat in my mouth, but I had no choice.
Tomorrow is our party's last day.
The day we defeat the Demon King and put an end to our three-year-long journey.
How did I end up here...
Elang Meister.
There's no grand reason why I, a disciple of the Five Tower Masters, joined the Hero's party.
Like most foolish decisions in the world, my deployment was entangled in politics.
As I went to bed earlier than the others, I recalled that day’s events one last time.
******
"The engagement is off."
Perhaps because I had an inexplicable premonition, I was able to calmly react to her matter-of-fact voice announcing the end of our engagement, without surprise or anger.
"...So it's come to this after all."
A few days ago, when the Hero came to inspect the academy, I saw Karin, my fiancée, with him.
She said she was just showing him around campus but, from that moment on, I sensed a strange atmosphere between them.
Not wanting to appear possessive, I suppressed my desire to question her and chose to trust her.
Because I loved her...
Regardless of it being a political marriage, I had loved her from the moment I first saw her.
But to Karin, I was merely a link to connect our families.
In her eyes, as she calmly announced the end of our engagement, I could see no sadness, no anger, no regret - nothing at all.
"...I assume you're telling me this because the families have already discussed it?"
"That's right. The Viscount surprisingly stepped down without a fuss."
"May I assume that the Count also agreed to this matter?"
"Yes. It's an opportunity to make connections with both the Temple and the Royal Family. He said he could accept breaking off the engagement if the other party is the Hero."
"...I see."
"You're taking this surprisingly calmly?"
Inwardly, I tore the Hero's body to pieces over and over again.
The reason this didn't show was because my mind had stopped functioning due to extreme anger.
"...Getting angry won't change anything."
"You sound like some ascetic. Have you achieved enlightenment or something?"
"Even if I were to attack the Hero here, it wouldn't change the situation. It would only make things worse."
The Hero is a figure sent by God.
We don't know his real name or what kind of person he originally was, but God’s mark is engraved on his hand.
What would happen to me and my family if I were to kill or assassinate such a figure?
It wouldn't end with just excommunication.
We'd be thoroughly persecuted as enemies of humanity, second only to the demon race, until the last one of us died.
Of course, I don't think that's even possible.
"Actually, our engagement was problematic from the start."
"......"
"A Viscount's family and a Count's family. The ranks don't really match, you know. Father might have had expectations for your future potential, but you haven't shown any real achievements lately."
A week ago, I succeeded in mastering all spirit magic that only tower master-level magicians could learn.
I informed her of this fact and even received a congratulatory reply...
"Did you perhaps have someone else write the letters you sent me?"
"...Huh?"
Seeing her face, struck by how I had hit the nail on the head, I felt as if I'd been hit on the back of my head.
What was that moment of joy I felt upon receiving her reply?
The determination to become a man worthy of her, the very reason I became a Magician - I couldn't understand any of it now.
"...I'll take my leave first."
As I stood up and turned my back, tears that I could no longer hold back burst forth.
I didn't want to be a pathetic man who would cry here.
Stifling my sobs and feigning composure, I hurried my steps. Then I heard Karin's voice from behind.
"Don't tell the Hero about our engagement!! He can be quite jealous, you know."
"......"
Faced with Karin worrying about her own well-being even in this moment, my sense of disillusionment deepened.
I couldn't answer.
If I spoke now, she would hear the tremor in my breath, the tears in my voice.
I briefly nodded and quickened my pace.
When I returned to my room, my legs gave out and the tears I had been holding back flowed like a flood.
I cried.
I cried, and cried, and kept on crying.
I shed so many tears that day, I thought if I collected them all, it might equal all the tears I had shed in my entire life up to that point.
After shutting myself in my room for three days without food or drink, what finally brought me out, ridiculously enough, was hunger.
I was so hungry.
As I shoved anything I could find into my mouth, I found my situation so absurd that this time, laughter burst forth.
Perhaps due to the childish psychology of wanting to make her regret abandoning me, I devoted myself even more to training.
If my research drive until now had been fueled by my love for Karin, what moved me now was jealousy and hatred towards the Hero.
As I researched, proved and mastered, I found myself becoming a magician surpassing even my masters.
At that time, the Hero was leading various battlefronts to victory, further solidifying his position as a symbol of hope.
I became a great magician recognized by all, but from that day, the gap hadn't narrowed at all.
If anything, it had only widened.
Should I give up now?
Just as such thoughts filled my mind, the country - or more precisely, the magic tower - requested my deployment.
Too many magicians had died in recent battles, so they wanted me to go as support.
I had no practical experience, and above all, I had no loyalty or justification to participate in such a war.
However, due to pressure from the state and the checks from my masters who saw my growth as a threat, I ended up going to the battlefield.
Leading volunteer student soldiers, I arrived at the battlefield and reunited with the Hero and Karin.
It had been about two years since we last met.
With my participation and that of the student soldiers, the frontline situation improved considerably, allowing us to catch our breath.
The Hero was initially pleased with my participation.
However, upon hearing from somewhere that Karin and I had been engaged, he began to treat me with blatant disrespect.
He would subtly flaunt his physical intimacy with Karin in front of me.
Claiming that even magicians should train their bodies, he suddenly challenged me to a duel with wooden swords.
Naturally, I was beaten so badly that day that I couldn't even lift a spoon and had to recuperate for days.
Needless to say, the frontline suffered greatly in my absence.
Somehow managing to re-establish the frontline, we realized that this couldn't go on.
If we continued to deplete our supplies like this, eventually the demon race would break through our lines and push in.
The demon race was said to be so numerous that they could harvest soldiers from fields.
This was because many of their races were highly fertile.
Feeling the limits of maintaining the frontline, we decided to devise a plan to break this situation rather than maintain it.
That plan was the Demon King’ assassination.
We would invade the demon territory and assassinate the Demon King, who could be said to be the root of all our troubles.
Since drawing attention to such an operation would do no good, a small suicide squad was formed.
People called it the Hero's Party.
It was an effort to create a somewhat hopeful atmosphere, though some mocked it, asking if we were going on a picnic.
The first party members were the Hero and myself.
In addition, there was Princess Meria of the duke's family, who had even less combat experience than I did.
Alencia, the Holy Saint of Healing from the Holy Kingdom, who had never been to the frontlines for safety reasons.
And Karin, who insisted on coming along under the pretext of maintaining the Hero's mental and physical well-being.
When I first heard the list of members, I thought it was a glorious sarcasm meant to mock the Hero's womanizing.
But it was serious.
I was so dumbfounded that I asked for the reason, and the answer I got was quite a spectacle.
"They're women."
"Excuse me?"
"You know he goes crazy if he can't do it for even a day. That's why we're sending women along."
"...Then who's going to defeat the Demon King?"
"We only need to send the Hero anyway, right? He's incredibly strong."
I had no words to refute because it wasn't wrong.
While he was a deeply flawed individual in terms of character, even I had to acknowledge his strength.
In fact, if he weren't so strong, he would have long since lost his head for harassing women.
And so our journey began.
My role was to be the party's magician, as well as bodyguard, local negotiator, cook, maid and guide.
Until we set out on this journey, I had never even touched water for chores, so I never imagined I'd become such a homemaker.
Now I can even cook unfamiliar magical beasts in my own way, negotiate with locals, and
Surprisingly, the demon realm was also a place where people lived.
They didn't automatically reject humans, so we were even able to use large towns as bases of operation.
There, I achieved some accomplishments by learning a new system of magic different from human magic.
Yet, the gap between the Hero and myself hardly narrowed.
Just as there are vast distances between stars that we can't see with our naked eyes, there was clearly an invisible gap between us.
Still, strangely, I didn't want to give up.
And so, three years passed.
We've arrived right at the doorstep of the Demon King's castle.
Tomorrow, it will all end.
Thinking of the freedom I would finally grasp after this world-changing battle, I closed my eyes.
I've even learned to smoke and drink, which I'd never done before.