The Rising of The Four Heroes

by Pretty Lazy

(AU, Arc 2) Naofumi, Ren, Itsuki, and Motoyasu were once apartment roommates, but instead becoming the heroes they they were summoned to become, they find themselves framed and incriminated. Now branded as fugitives to the country that brought them there, they need to stay together to figure out a way out of this mess or else risk dying by the hands of the true mastermind.

41. V3-C1 : The Story So Far

[This is mostly a summary chapter of the first arc disguised as a debriefing session between our characters. It's fairly long, considering how it isn't a straight-up summary, but rather added with some commentary.]

[Fair warning; it's a summary that makes sense for the characters to reveal. In other words, certain details will not be explored or be talked about in depth. It serves more as an event timeline, rather than what people were experiencing during those events. Omakes and side chapters are also not covered, due to their nature of the type of chapter.]

[More about this at the end though.]

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-/IV/-

Volume 3 / Chapter 1 / The Story So Far

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He was slightly disappointed when he opened his eyes once again to see the blue skies and the green leaves over his head. If there had been a chance that he would have woken up to a beige ceiling within a comfy bed, that would have been the most relieving thing in his life so far. To have been told by the world that everything that happened so far had been a figment of his imagination, created by the whims of his mind while he was asleep, that would have been great news for him to know.

Unfortunately, that was not how reality would sometimes work. Despite the unreal nightmare that he experienced, it was something that he could only wish for as an unreal nightmare right now. Pulling himself upwards from his sorry excuse of a sleeping bag, Naofumi told himself that what he went through during this month had been ingrained in his reality.

This was my life now.

Likely branded as a criminal and forced to be on the run, despite being summoned as a hero for the people he was told to protect, everything felt like a cruel joke. It wouldn't have been easy to keep himself calm underneath all this pressure, knowing that any sane person would have easily cracked underneath all of that foreboding weight.

However, Naofumi Iwatani didn't experience that.

It was because he knew that he wasn't alone in these hardships.

"Oh, you're already up, Naofumi? You've always been an early-riser; that's for sure.."

"I already got enough rest to feel refreshed. How about you, Motoyasu?" he glanced over to the long-haired blonde man. As he got out of his tent, he was tying his hair back into the normal ponytail Naofumi was deeply familiar with. "Are you feeling better from yesterday?"

"A bit sore," he groaned, rolling his neck. "Nothing that can keep me down though." He stuck out a thumbs-up with a wink and a grin. "Don't need to worry about me. I didn't take as much of a beating as you might have thought from yesterday!"

"That's good to hear. I would hate it if my friend was pushing himself too much."

"I could say the same about you, Naofumi. If you're feeling tired, don't hesitate to tell us. You were a part of that battle, no matter how little you believed you contributed."

Naofumi turned his head with a nervous laugh. "You're just saying that. You guys were the ones that needed to pick up on my slack."

"You can't be serious!" Motoyasu waddled over and threw his arm over his neck. He wished Motoyasu hadn't so while he was trying to make a fire for their breakfast. "Ren and Itsuki would both agree with me! Without what you did back there, we would have been toast!"

"Ugh, you're so loud, Motoyasu. This early in the morning?"

Everyone else was starting to wake up from their slumber. His friends and his companions, who were all in the same boat together, were here by his side. There wasn't any other way to go about it, but regardless if they wanted to not, they were stuck fighting alongside each other against the fate that they were unjustly given. He was thankful that this was one of those moments where the desire wasn't based on the latter; in which, they were fine in accompanying each other as teammates.

In fact, it was what they wanted to do in the first place. Just not in these terrible circumstances.

"How about you two? Ren, Itsuki? Are you guys feeling alright as well?"

Both of them stretched their arms rather weakly, but there weren't any visual signs that they were hurting themselves by doing that. They walked over after departing their tents.

"I've definitely had better days," Ren sighed, "but it's not the end of the world, so there's that."

"Still feeling tired here," Itsuki wryly laughed.

"And your hands?" Motoyasu asked.

Naofumi wasn't sure when it happened, but when he checked up on Itsuki when they were able to get some breathing space, his arms were devoured by an unusual shadow. He kept saying it was fine from yesterday night, but never once did he believe Itsuki out of genuine concern for him.

"I told everyone already. It should be fine. I'm sure it'll disappear…"

"Really?" Naofumi asked with scrutiny. "Does it feel like that inside of you though?"

"Even though I've gotten some good rest, it doesn't really feel like my energy's been replenished," Itsuki reluctantly answered, looking as if he was dragging himself as he walked. "If only this world worked on video game mechanics, where resting restores your resources stats."

"Unfortunately, this is reality," Naofumi replied, shaking his head. "It doesn't work that way, as much as it would have been convenient."

"I already know that, Naofumi. You don't need to remind me." Itsuki stumbled over to where Naofumi and Motoyasu were, taking a seat on a patch of grass. "At least we're here together. Reality might have been too much to handle if we didn't have our friends to spend the time alongside with."

"Might have appreciated something along these lines earlier in the month, but there's no taking back that time." Ren followed the dirty-blonde haired friend, plopping himself right down next to him. "I'd just wished there was something to celebrate about the reunion, but there's every reason as to not do such a thing right now."

"Like being on the run from Melromarc."

Itsuki's sullen words placed a slight dampening mood on the four friends. There was no harsher truth to swallow than what was laid out before them; in that they were seen as criminals by the people that they were supposed to save in the first place. Naofumi couldn't think of a stupider dilemma to be thrown into, but if he refused to accept it now, he would only be running away from a problem that would endlessly chase them until it was solved.

Since they were wrongly branded as criminals, Naofumi still had some hope that there would be some resolution to their situation in the future. To how far he would have to foresee, that was the only mystery Naofumi was hesitant to find out.

"Hey, let's not get all moody this early in the morning," Motoyasu groaned, moving off from Naofumi. He started rubbing the back of his neck reflexively. "It's better to relax, so that we'll be able to keep some good thinking heads to figure out what we should do. Hey, speaking of which."

"Is something up?"

"Where are Raphtalia and Eclair? They should have been up by now, right?"

"They went off together to hunt some food for us. Eclair had the last shift of the night, so she was already awake by the time the sun was rising. Raphtalia woke around the same time as I did. It's the reason why I was trying to start a fire before they returned. It's considerably more difficult than I thought it would be, especially without things like a match."

"Oh, let me handle that. Stand back."

Motoyasu pulled out his spear as Naofumi did as told. Ren and Itsuki merely sat there, watching as their friend's spear ignited itself in a flaming blaze.

"[Flame Thrust]!"

Motoyasu stabbed the woodpile with intense speed, catching most of it on fire. However, his rapid movement caused some of the burning pieces to fly out from the pile and right into one of the tents. Almost immediately after, the entire thing caught on fire, leaving the three friends to glare at Motoyasu's deed. Needless to say, none of them were impressed.

"I appreciate the help, Motoyasu," Naofumi gulped, "but I don't think we need a flame as big as that. Especially if it comes at the cost of one of our tenting supplies."

Motoyasu turned his head away, awkwardly chuckling. "Ehehe…!"

"What do you mean by 'ehehe'!? Damn it, have some urgency!"

"Okay, but how!?" Itsuki stammered with a panic settling in from Ren's yelling. "Do we have time to run to the river and back for a bucket of water? Do we even have a bucket!?"

"Wait, I got an idea." Naofumi aimed his shield over the burning tapestry and from the green gem in the middle, it started to glow. "[Air Strike Shield]!"

From above, a green transparent shield slammed down onto the flames, pushing it down to the ground. He wasn't a professional when it came to fires, but he knew that if there was a fire in the kitchen, a rag was more than enough to handle it. Smothering flames was more effective than adding water in small dosages and when the flames went out, he was relieved to know that it worked. Though, the disappearing shield left a broken tent that was burned down and crushed.

A brief silence spawned from the burnt ashes until Itsuki pointed at the culprit.

"If we're camping out before hitting a village, Motoyasu will be the one that's sleeping outside."

"Agreed," Ren nodded. "One hundred percent agreed."

"Oh, come on! It was an accident!"

"Did you really have to stab the wood pile though!?"

"I thought it would look cool."

"Well, it smells like some burnt tents instead."

Naofumi wondered if he should say that he bought extra tents when he was still at Riyute, just in case that something might have happened to the one he was using. He thought about a possible monster attack, but never did he expect that it would be used because of some collateral damage from his friend. Though, all he could really do was wryly laugh as Ren, Itsuki, and Motoyasu went between themselves in banter.

"Hopefully, it won't be too cold out. Let the whims of nature guide me to a settling temperature! My friends have already turned their backs to me because of a little mistake!"

"Oh, stop being melodramatic, Motoyasu." Ren drew his sword and started reorganizing the burning wood within the center. Due to the powerful properties of their weapons, they shouldn't have been worried about accidentally melting it. "Help me restack this."

"On it."

"And please don't stab any of it."

Motoyasu groaned as he started pushing the wood using the side of the spear's blade. Not before long, the two friends were able to stack it up to a relatively neat pile, giving Naofumi the leeway to keep kindling the fire with some branches left on the side.

"Hey, is everything alright!?"

A sudden voice was followed by running footsteps. Two people came out from the forest into the clearing, a strawberry-blonde woman and a girl with tanuki ears sticking out from the top of her head.

"There seemed to be a large fire coming from the campsite? Were you under attack?"

"False alarm, Eclair. We just had a stupid someone having a stupid idea around these parts," Ren begrudingly answered, glaring at Motoyasu. "Nothing to get on edge about."

"Let's just forget about that little mess," Motoyasu chuckled, leaving Itsuki and Ren to be unamused by how whimsically he had been brushing this aside. "You girls found anything good while hunting?"

"Miss Eclair and I managed to catch some usapils." Raphtalia held up the three rabbit-like monsters by their ears. "I believe Master Naofumi would be able to make something with this. We've also collected a few berries, but we aren't sure if they're poisonous or not. We placed a few in a bag, just in case, but the bush that has them isn't too far away."

"Motoyasu, that's on you. Go check if it's poisonous."

"W-What!? Are you asking me to taste the berries!?"

"How else are we going to check?" Ren swiped the bag of berries from Raphtalia and crept up to Motoyasu. "Now open up!"

As his friends went on between each other, Raphtalia handed over the monster meat to Naofumi, so that he could get started. He wasn't planning on doing anything special, just cutting it up into smaller pieces and cooking them up with some seasoning he bought a while ago. Having an intangible inventory was more helpful than he could ever imagine, so he was glad that his friends told him about it before he fell under the assumption that he needed to lug most of these things everywhere.

From the way that his friends acted, he could hardly believe that they were on the run. As the meat was starting to be cooked to its ideal colour, Raphtalia came over to his side.

"It's rather energetic around the Cardinal Heroes," she giggled. "If I didn't know any better, I would have never thought that they were the heroes. N-Not that I don't believe in their strength, but when I was told about the stories of the Cardinal Heroes when I was younger, there was a certain image that I would have for them."

They both glanced over, seeing how Ren was trying to force-feed Motoyasu the potentially poisonous berry while Itsuki and Eclair were trying to get him to stop.

"Something about being noble and hero-like?"

"Yeah," Raphtalia nodded. "The Cardinal Heroes were said to perform incredible feats in their lifetimes, making them feel like they were on another level compared to everyone else. They felt distant, just by their stories alone and that's why people were able to look up to them and idealize them so easily."

"Well, I guess you're seeing the truth right before your eyes," Naofumi chuckled. "Cardinal Heroes are just a title, but at the end of the day, we're just normal people like everyone else."

"I could never imagine being an ally of one Cardinal Hero when I was smaller, but upon being acquainted with all of them, it doesn't really feel like the same thing that I would have imagined. They act just like how my friends and I would act back at my village."

In the background, Ren finally managed to slip past Itsuki and Eclair and plopped a berry in Motoyasu's mouth. He had all the excuse in the world to spit it out, but once it entered, Motoyasu must have accidentally bitten it and from that, he continued to chew it.

Turns out it wasn't poisonous at all with Motoyasu making a pleasant expression of surprise and he requested for another one. Raphtalia noticed and smiled.

"I'll go get more of those berries."

"Don't take too long. Oh, and stay safe."

"Of course."

Raphtalia did as she was told and before the food finished up, Raphtalia managed to pick enough to serve as a side for everyone present. Naofumi split up the food accordingly and after putting out the campfire, everyone was able to finally sit now and have their breakfast before heading off.

Once the food was finished, a question still remained in the air.

"So what exactly are we doing after this?"

Motoyasu said to put off the decision last night, but Naofumi couldn't shake off their foggy future ahead of them. Without a clear plan, they couldn't even think about being the heroes that the citizens of Melromarc needed, especially if they're being antagonized by them.

Once Naofumi dropped the question, both Ren and Eclair glared at each other before looking away. It seemed like they still haven't come to terms about what the other side wanted to do. Motoyasu and Itsuki were both silent about what they should have done, probably having no good plans to answer him. However, it was Raphtalia that broke the silence.

"If it's difficult to decide, maybe it's a good idea to go back on what everyone knows so far."

"Oh, right. We've been mostly separated since we split up into our own parties," Motoyasu nodded. "I barely know what happened on your end and honestly speaking, I'm really curious as to the mess that you guys were in yourselves."

"A good refresher wouldn't be bad to start off with," Itsuki agreed.

"Perhaps we'll be able to see something we can do once the heroes put their perspectives together," Eclair nodded. "How should it be shared among us?"

"Let's go as chronologically as we can," Ren suggested. "That way, we'll be able to match up the possible moves that our true opponents have been trying to craft against us. Though, where should we begin? The day after Naofumi's trial or something?"

"We'll start from the very beginning," Naofumi said. "I'm sure Raphtalia and Eclair would appreciate being on the same page as us, from the moment we were summoned. Maybe we'll figure something out once we put together the pieces."

As Raphtalia and Eclair nodded, the heroes each leaned forwards in order to start their story. It was a tale of friendship, if Naofumi had to really think about it. Without it, he didn't think that they would have been in such a terrible place. If Ren, Itsuki, or Motoyasu never believed in Naofumi's innocence, one way or another, it would have been himself alone to be suffering through the weight of the world.

And yet, he was strangely happy that his friends were sticking to his side, even if that meant they would be criminals too. It was indeed a story about their friendship and how they came up to the point where they were up against the country that summoned them to save them.

"Now then, how to start…"

-/IV/-

One day, Motoyasu brought a strange package into his apartment. He called out his roommates and friends, that being Ren, Itsuki, and Naofumi, to see if any of them had ordered such a thing, mainly because there had been no name to refer to on the label. None of them remembered buying it, but as curiosity crept up on them, they opened the package to find a book.

Inside, it depicted a certain story. There was a world being threatened by a prophecy where a wave destruction would wash through the lands, destroying all that was alive. Only in summoning the Cardinal Heroes, each paired with a Holy Weapon, would they be able to survive for these heroes would fight back against this senseless destruction. However, they quickly discovered that the majority of the book was eerily blank, no matter how much Naofumi checked.

Suddenly, a loud screeching noise ripped in the air while a heavy weight pulled them down to the ground, causing the four friends to lose consciousness.

When they woke back up, they quickly found themselves inside a summoning room with the depicted holy weapons stuck to their hands. They were introduced to the country by the head captain of the Melromarcian Knights, Lothringen, and the king's retainer, Aldrecht. The former led them to the king while the latter stayed behind for unknown reasons.

They arrived at the throne room, having introduced themselves to King Aultcray Melromarc the 32nd and being debriefed on what the deal was. They were promised rewards in dealing with the waves of destruction and support in the midst of it, but—

"I felt like the king was being a bit… I don't know how to say it, but there was like some type of initial bias against Naofumi," Ren thought aloud. "He even said Naofumi's name in this weird tone, making me think that he already disliked him."

"Huh? That wouldn't make sense," Motoyasu frowned. "He just met Naofumi. Sure, I might have thought he said Naofumi's name in a weird way, but I just thought that the pronunciation was hard for the king. I brushed it off as that."

"I didn't realize you guys noticed it as well," Naofumi said.

"Oh, I guess we all noticed it," Itsuki followed, raising his hand slightly. "It was hard to bring it up because he moved the conversation along before it could really register."

"Though, I wouldn't be doubtful that there had been a one-sided animosity between the king and the Shield Hero," Eclair sighed. "Considering what happened to everyone, I wouldn't put it past him to have been starting to scheme something against the Shield Hero by that point."

After their meeting with the king, they were all guided to their room. It was there that they decided to talk about their situation, comparing it to the book that was delivered to them. According to Motoyasu, he actually noticed who had been the one to leave the package at the front door, being a mysterious white-haired girl.

They decided to simply review their status menus when there wasn't much else that they could make conjectures on. This is when they discovered Naofumi's flaws in being the Shield Hero, but his friends tried to help him out by providing each of their own strengthening methods for their weapons. They ended up figuring out that they could all share it among each other, giving a boost in their strength if they chose to work on it properly.

Being bored of waiting around for the banquet though, Motoyasu decided that it would be a good idea to look around the castle and see what places it had. Little did they know it would have been their first encounter with their true opponent, the one that was pulling at least some of the strings behind their backs.

"Wait, so he already attacked you like that so randomly?" Raphtalia exclaimed in surprise.

"Yeah, the knight named Zellus Clarent…" Naofumi shuddered while saying his name. When they arrived at a garden, they were suddenly attacked by the mysterious knight under the assumption that they had been intruders to the castle. Perhaps it was wrong for them to even assume that to begin with.

"What even was his deal anyways?" Ren grunted, being the one who went up against him at that moment. "I couldn't get a hold of that guy, like his whims are as flimsy as the wind that carries through the air."

"How strangely poetic."

"Shut up, Itsuki."

"Speaking of which, that's one thing I still can't understand," Naofumi openly pondered, glancing over to Eclair with the hopes that she had an answer. "How is someone like Zellus a knight to begin with? I know he was recruited for his strength, but surely that couldn't be it."

Itsuki nodded in agreement, remembering that it was what they were told when conversing about Zellus with a former teammate of his. Though, Naofumi had to wonder how things ended up on her side.

"My apologies, Sir Naofumi. I wouldn't know much about those circumstances either. All I knew was that I had the same curiosities as you, but I was unable to arrive at a reasonable answer to accept. It seems like his strength was our common response that we received."

"Is that so?" Itsuki sighed. "Well, we can't really do anything about that."

Thankfully, Lothringen had been around to protect the heroes from any real harm. Dismissing the enigmatic knight, he offered apologies on his behalf and allowed the heroes to continue on their day, awaiting for the banquet that they eventually enjoyed.

Later that night, Itsuki couldn't sleep much. He rose from his bed to take a walk around the castle, thinking that might help him out. However, he found himself in hiding when two people had been walking down, letting himself to accidentally listen in to what they were saying.

"They were talking about playing out some kind of plan. It was a bit ominous, but I didn't really pay much attention to it. All I remember is that the king wasn't aware of what they were doing and that one of them was a princess."

Naofumi stiffened, immediately glancing over to Motoyasu. His face was starting to become pale, but he shook his head with a stammering breath.

"W-Wait, are you sure that's what you heard? A princess coming up with a plan?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty certain. Why? Is there something wrong?"

"I… N-No, there's nothing…" His gaze dwindled, but then quickly turned to Eclair. "Hey, Eclair? How many princesses does Melromarc have?"

"There are two, but one of them is with the queen as far as I'm aware."

A quiet swear leaked out from under his breath, so dim that he wasn't sure that Ren or Itsuki could have heard it. The pair glanced at each other, not knowing what was causing this odd reaction.

But Naofumi already knew. Though, he wasn't sure what Motoyasu was trying to keep quiet about. They were going to have to talk about it later on in their recap, but perhaps he was trying to come to terms about that whole revelation. Or maybe he was trying to convince himself that there was another explanation for it. Whatever it may have been, Naofumi decided to keep quiet until Motoyasu was ready to talk about it for himself. Or whenever they came to that point of their discovery, whichever came first.

When the course was clear, Itsuki removed himself from his hiding spot to find himself in the garden. While enjoying the night's beautiful skies, he got distracted by the appearance of a white-haired girl. Apparently, Itsuki believed it might have been the same white-haired girl that they were all talking about previously.

"Wait, so you've been holding that to your heart this entire time!?" Ren frowned. "Was that why you were spacing out when I arrived?"

"Y-Yeah, well…" Itsuki nervously rubbed the back of his neck. "It wasn't like I believed myself that I actually saw her. I thought I was going crazy or I was just delusional, but with everything that happened so far, I'm more inclined to say that she really did show up to me on that night."

"Was she cute?"

"Not the time, Motoyasu," Ren growled under his breath.

"There had to be a reason why she showed up, right?" Naofumi continued, ignoring the remarks. "Did she tell you anything noteworthy?"

"Let me remember…" Itsuki crossed his arms and pondered before nodding. "She said something about being wary of the future."

"Oh. Wow. I wonder what that could have been," Ren sarcastically groaned. "You know, that would have been extremely helpful to keep in mind when everything started to collapse on us."

"Again, I didn't really know what it could have meant! And it's easy to say that in retrospect! Put yourself in my shoes for a moment, where a ghost-like girl just shows up, says something vague, then disappears without a single trace!"

"And I'm not entirely sure it would have been useful in changing anything," Naofumi sheepishly chuckled. "We would have received a warning, but without anything specific, we would have still fallen into this entire mess."

The next morning, the friends woke up to the audience of the king. As promised from the day before, he sorted out selected adventurers to journey with the heroes, as they couldn't party with each other due to the weapon's experience restriction. However, everyone was quick to notice that Naofumi hadn't received any party members, speaking up about it.

Each of the friends tried to speak on Naofumi's behalf, looking to convince their own party members to give Naofumi a chance, but only one person from Motoyasu's team moved over. It was a red-haired girl named Myne Sophia.

Everyone split off from the castle, going ahead to do their own things. Naofumi went off to figure out this whole fighting deal before coming back to the city with Myne, only to meet Ren again. Together, they entered a blacksmith in the search for better equipment which is where they met Erhart. Naofumi also learned about [Weapon Copy] here as well.

In the meanwhile, Motoyasu helped out a nun from the Church of Three Heroes who was making unauthorized speeches to the public about her faith. To be specific, it was a religion that upheld the Sword Hero, the Bow Hero, and the Spear Hero, but looked at the Shield Hero as a demon. He ended up accompanying the nun to the main cathedral where he met with the head nun, who she led him to the Dragon's Hourglass.

"Did you really have to do that?" Itsuki groaned. "You couldn't just let the nun suffer the consequences? Though, having Motoyasu ignore a lady is pretty unimaginable as well…"

"Hey, I couldn't exactly let the knights rough her up. She looked like she was in a tough spot!"

"I'm fairly sure the knights were merely following protocol," Eclair sighed. "If the nun was doing something that wasn't allowed, they'll take the appropriate measures in fixing it up. They're trained to only be violent if the person-in-question becomes hostile towards them."

"But things like that were allowed before our summoning from what I'm hearing?" Ren pondered.

"Yeah, that's the idea I got from how she was talking. It seemed like the nun didn't even realize that she needed to get proper authorization to do her work there."

"If that was the case," Raphtalia thought, "then why would they suddenly change from that?"

"It's pretty obvious," Ren replied. "They wanted to hide the fact that there was any bias against Naofumi in the first few days, at the very least. They were scheming, even from that day."

Itsuki didn't think he did anything noteworthy during that time. It was merely some training and some time to meet his party members. Though, that would change the next morning when Ren came to his room with a surprising announcement. That's why they headed off as quickly as possible.

Because Naofumi had been arrested for an attempt at sexual assault against his former party member, Myne Sophia. She ran to Motoyasu, in the hopes that he would protect her from the supposed demon.

"Was that why everyone in the city felt like they were avoiding Master Naofumi?" Raphtalia asked. "I think I tried to ask him once about that, but he avoided answering the question, so I didn't have the opportunity to know. From what people were whispering to each other, I had a vague idea, but for it to be that…"

"Do you think that Naofumi is capable of doing that?" Ren asked.

"N-Not at all! Master Naofumi is a very nice person!"

"Much better than a certain other person here."

Raphtalia widened her eyes, seeing where Ren had been looking. His glance was pointing towards Motoyasu who didn't look back. Rather, he felt disheartened in thinking back to it. It was written all over his face, but there had been a realization that caused Motoyasu to lift his head to Naofumi.

"I… never really got the chance to say it, but I'm really sorry. It just felt really difficult for me to decide at that moment that I ended up getting carried away with the flow of the trial."

"You never once believed that I was a criminal, right?" Naofumi patted his friend on the back, trying to cheer him up. "I remember how broken you looked, trying to figure everything out as they were violently dragging me out of the throne room. It's water under the bridge for me."

"Are you seriously forgiving him?" Ren frowned.

"There isn't much Motoyasu can do about it now," Itsuki said. "I'm sure he had his reasons."

"And besides, Mister Motoyasu is on our side for good, right?" Raphtalia asked, peering her head to the older hero. "I don't think we should keep any animosity between ourselves, especially if everyone was friends beforehand."

"But you said you were dragged out of the throne room?" Eclair groaned. "I suppose I should apologize on behalf of the knights. It seems like they've been acting differently in the presence of the Shield Hero than I would have thought."

"Ah, you don't really need to apologize for anything," Naofumi said, laughing it off.

Ren sighed, shaking his head. "Fine, do whatever you want. I really don't have anything against Motoyasu, but I'm just worried something like that might end up happening again."

"Don't worry about that." Motoyasu clenched his fist and finally looked at Ren in the eyes, sparking with new resolve. "I'm not going to turn my back away from you guys like that again. It… It just reminded me of something I didn't want to face at the moment."

"Good to hear, but that leaves the question. What do you think about Myne?"

Motoyasu winced in conflict, saying nothing about it. Evidently, that was all that Ren needed to hear to keep going with their stories. It felt like Ren himself had something he was holding back, only for Motoyasu to reveal something of his own.

After the trial, he met up with Myne and found out about her circumstances.

"You're kidding me? Myne's the princess!?" Itsuki widened his eyes while Ren could only shake his head in disapproval. "And even with how she antagonized Naofumi, you still allowed her to join your party afterwards!?"

"I didn't know at the time, alright? I just… thought something else was going on, like there was another answer that I couldn't see. That's what I still believe in to some degree, so to answer Ren's question, I…" Motoyasu held his own hand. "I still think there's more to this that we don't know yet."

"That's—"

"—a fair assumption," Naofumi interrupted, stopping Ren from saying anything further. "I think there's more to this than what we know as well. It could be as simple as Myne being a terrible person, but maybe there's a chance that something bigger is happening."

"Yeah, give one of our enemies the benefit of the doubt. Let's see how that plays out," Ren groaned. "It should have been clear that she was lying, but whatever. If that's your conclusion, there's no way I can budge you guys from that."

In any case, Ren and Itsuki decided to head to the castle in order to arrive at Naofumi's trial while Motoyasu had already been there, informed unlike they were. However, they were stopped by a mysterious masked assassin that genuinely tried to make away with their lives. If it weren't for Zellus' miraculous timing, they wouldn't have seen the next day.

"Though, now that I think about it…" Ren fell to thought, holding his chin. "Was it possible that Zellus was just waiting in the shadows? I had my suspicions, but…"

"It's possible," Eclair answered. "If Zellus wanted to find somebody in the capital, he would be able to quickly track them down. Though, he would never give a straight answer to where they were, only if things were about to go over some boundary he set."

The fight with the assassin and the resulting discussion they had with Zellus took up the majority of the time of Naofumi's trial. However, Ren had an idea as to where Naofumi might end up and they parted with Zellus in order to head over to Erhart's blacksmith.

There, they were able to meet up with Naofumi and talk about what happened.

"I can still remember Ren getting angry at me."

"It was only a given. You kept kicking yourself down like that, so it pissed me off. And to even refuse our help, scared that we might get involved in your mess? Ridiculous."

"That was only because you cared a lot about Master Naofumi, right?" Raphtalia chuckled, teasing him a little. It ended up with Ren being in a fluster, turning his head away from her. It looked as if Ren truly didn't like wearing his emotions on his sleeve, causing Naofumi to chuckle in tandem.

Their discussion ended with Ren storming off, leaving Itsuki in trying to comfort Naofumi in his hurt state. It was clear that none of them really wanted things to end up like that, but as to Naofumi's own wishes, he tried to make some progress by himself. Days would pass to have him realize that as the Shield Hero, there was very little he could have done in growing stronger by himself.

He met up with Itsuki after one of his party members, in which Itsuki wanted to check up on his friend. He also provided some materials for Naofumi to use for his own strengthening methods, but it was about this time that Naofumi started to doubt himself.

Through that weakness, a shady stubby man approached them.

"... The slave trader." Raphtalia whispered underneath her breath.

With Itsuki's reluctant following, Naofumi was led to where the slave trader did his business. It was a tent in the depths of the alleyways. Needless to say, both Naofumi and Itsuki were disgusted by what the Shield Hero was being offered.

"To think slavery of demi-humans was legal," Itsuki growled.

"It unfortunately is," Eclair said, "but I personally do not condone it. It was one of the given reasons why I was imprisoned in the dungeons to begin with. A few knights thought it might have been a good idea to take some demi-humans into the slave market, but I prevented them from doing so by force. I was seen as a traitor and stripped of my title."

"You were doing the right thing, opposed to the people that were protected by these stupid laws."

"Didn't you mention before that your father owned territory in Melromarc?" Naofumi asked.

"Indeed. There were demi-humans that lived on this territory, protected by the queen's decree. But the combination of the queen being at a conference and my father's death left nothing to show of it anymore. Or at least, that's what I was told. I hadn't been able to go back to see the destruction for myself. I hope that the demi-humans there were able to be alright after that."

Raphtalia remained quiet, except for what was whispered to the air.

"You probably don't want to know."

Only Naofumi was able to hear any of it, but he decided to simply continue onwards.

The slave trader showed off a few of his supposed wares, but none of it caught Naofumi's attention. The price was enough to deter him away from most of them, leaving only the slaves that were deemed with some sort of defect in the slave trader's eyes. Though, there was one cage left to the side that was covered in a tarp, pulling the attention of the two heroes. Underneath that—

"It was me," Raphtalia said.

"Hold on." Motoyasu raised his hands, trying to stop the flowing retelling. "You guys mentioned this yesterday night, but never cared to elaborate it. Are you really saying that this beautiful girl was once a slave? That's utterly terrible!"

"Truly a crime, but I don't believe we're thinking of the same line here," Itsuki muttered with a deadpanned before getting serious again. "She didn't look like that to begin with. Demi-humans apparently grow at a different rate than humans, more dependent on their levels than anything else."

"When Master Naofumi and Mister Itsuki found me in the slave market, I was merely a sick child. It was under Master Naofumi's care that I was able to grow in good health and for that, I have everything to thank him."

"If you were under Naofumi's care, that would be obvious!" Motoyasu cheered with a smile. "He's the one usually tending to everyone's illnesses back home. Whenever I'd be down for the day, Naofumi would make sure I'd be taking my medicine and would even make some porridge to soothe the illness. You could have been at the brink of death and Naofumi would still bring you back around!"

"She was on the brink of death. She was skin and bones when we first met her."

"Oh." Motoyasu bit his lips from Itsuki's matter-of-fact statement. "W-Well, I guess it's not exactly an exaggeration anymore."

"I'm simply happy Master Naofumi gave me a reason to live again," Raphtalia said with a timid smile. "I wouldn't want to imagine what would happen if I wasn't found that day."

"Oh?" Motoyasu changed his mood from nervous cover-up to curious speculation. A speculation of what, that was something Naofumi didn't know, but Motoyasu kept looking between him and Raphtalia as if coming to his own conclusions. He wasn't sure if he wanted to know what was going on in his head, but he turned to Ren and Itsuki, it seemed like they were thinking about something as well.

… Someone please fill me in. Am I missing something?

In continuation, what ended up happening at the slave market was obvious. Itsuki ended up buying Raphtalia on Naofumi's behalf and the two friends departed from one another, wishing the best for the other. Though, it wasn't before Itsuki requested for Raphtalia to help look out for her new master.

In the meanwhile, Ren had been up to his own plans. He was trying to gather information on the Church of the Three Heroes by himself, but he was getting nothing much out of it. Upon completing a request from the adventurer's guild, he came across Zellus. Apparently, he needed some help for a job he needed to do, one that would help out Naofumi's reputation in clearing his name.

"And that was a blatant lie."

"Tell me about it, Naofumi."

Alongside with a party member named Bakta, they snuck into the Church of Three Heroes late at night in order to investigate further into the accusations. Zellus, however, told Ren and Bakta that their objective had been to find a few certain books concerning the Siltvelt War, something that didn't seem like it had any relevance to Naofumi. In the meantime, Zellus was going to do his own investigations, something that he didn't provide any details on.

"Knowing Zellus," Eclair pondered aloud, "he was likely up to no good. It wouldn't be out of the question, especially considering what he's truly capable of."

"Though, we can't possibly know what he did exactly when we split off from each other," Ren said. "It's difficult to say what he did for certain."

They found out a possible clue, that Naofumi's original armour was tossed in the dungeon, but other than that, there hadn't been much substance in clearing his name. Ren and Bakta eventually made it to the library, discovering a secret entrance to a lower library. Inside there, they went to look for the books, but Ren found something else entirely different.

"I almost forgot about this, but here."

From his inventory, Ren held out a heavy book. It was very familiar to the other three heroes and they widened their eyes when they saw it. There was no doubt that it had been the same as the book that brought them into this world, [The Records of the Four Weapons].

"It has the same details Naofumi told us about back at home. However, the blank pages are replaced with things I can't read. Raphtalia, Eclair? Is this a language any of you two recognize?"

Both of them leaned forwards to see it, but they both shook their heads.

"And here I thought it was something we could have used to understand what might be happening. The prophecy seemed to be nearly on point, so I was assuming that we might have clues if we could read the rest of this."

"Why would the Church of Three Heroes have this book to begin with?" Raphtalia asked. "In that, it says that the Shield Hero was also a hero, not a demon."

"Perhaps they were planning on destroying it later?" Eclair suggested.

"If that was the case, they wouldn't store it so nicely on the shelf," Ren replied. "Too many questions, not enough answers. It's a bit frustrating to have so many loose ends that would help us out in knowing what's happening here."

"In any case, it was a good find," Naofumi said. "We should definitely keep it in our hands, just in case that we would find someone that can decipher the language."

"Opposed to what? Throwing it away?" Ren scoffed, tucking the book back into his inventory. "I think it was obvious that we were keeping the book."

"Just making sure," Naofumi smirked.

In the time he was looking at the book, he noticed that Batka's name hadn't been listed as a party member anymore. Curious as to what was happening, he went to look for him, only finding the books that were requested of them on the ground. Ren picked them up, only to find that Batka's body was hanging lifelessly above him. He was killed by the masked assassin and in trying to throw him off guard with the sudden death of his ally, the assassin made an attempt to strike Ren down.

"I already knew Batka was a knight as well, Eclair. Did you know him?"

"I didn't get to know him as well as other knights would have, but I do know of his name. It's simply depressing for me to hear that was his fate. I remember that he was filled with energy to whatever tasks he was assigned with, but I'm assuming his death isn't known by anyone else yet. I wonder if the other knights are starting to suspect anything or even worse, having them think that the Sword Hero did something to the undercover knight."

"I'm sure he'll have friends and family who won't ever get closure on his death." Ren's eyes leered towards the ground, as if he was looking at something in the distance. There was something heavy about his voice before he grunted to shake it off his shoulders. "I didn't want him to come in the first place, thinking that I would be enough, but Zellus insisted on his arrival."

"Are you hurting in remembering your party member, Mister Ren?"

Ren stayed silent, glancing up to Raphtalia. "I didn't know him well enough to understand what I felt during that time. It might have been cold of me, but all I can say for certain was that he didn't deserve to die there. Though again, I don't know who Batka was as a person, but you sometimes get to see who they really were after they're gone."

"I'm positive he was a good man," Eclair affirmed.

"Then I'll have to take your word on that and have his death be claimed as unjust. He clearly didn't cause the mess, so…" Ren clenched his hands slowly, yet suddenly. Was there something else he wanted to say? "I guess that's that. No use in thinking about it now."

Ren managed to fend himself against the assassin for a short time, only to be pinned. As he was closing in on death, a sudden surge of power came into his body in an inexplicable manner. To explain what he noticed, he saw something weird on the status screen; he was given a subclass randomly, that of the Bow Hero. He was able to fire back before Zellus came into the picture, lending a hand for Ren to defeat the assassin once and for all.

On the other end of the spectrum, Itsuki had been journeying out for an adventurer's guild request when the group decided to rest outside for the night. During his shift to watch out for stray monsters or bandits, he saw the white-haired girl once again. Knowing that this couldn't be a fluke anymore, he chased after her and was able to finally meet the girl by a cliff.

He spent time trying to understand her cryptic messages, only for her to shift gears and reveal that Ren had been in trouble. Trying to find out what he could do to help him, the girl taught Itsuki an unusual power, apparently exclusive to this particular group's summoning of heroes. It felt like power escaped out of his body and when the girl disappeared, so did his levels.

"Wait, so what happened?" Motoyasu rubbed his forehead, trying to understand. "You're telling me, if I'm getting this right, that Itsuki was able to give Ren his levels?"

"Considering how it lines up, I have to be inclined to agree with that." Ren crossed his arms, sighing. "Even I still don't understand what that whole ordeal could be, and I was the one to receive its power or mechanic, whatever it might be."

"That's unheard of!" Eclair exclaimed. "I've never heard of anyone being able to simply provide their levels to other people, much less even in the stories of the past Cardinal Heroes! If that would be the case, it would be crazy to think how the world might change with such knowledge."

"Didn't Mister Itsuki say that it was exclusive to the current Cardinal Heroes?" Raphtalia asked. "Though, I do have to wonder why that would be the case."

"Is it because we're from the same world?" Motoyasu suggested it randomly, from the dumbfounded look on his face. "I mean, the prophecy that we just reviewed from Ren's book said that the heroes came from different worlds and obviously, this isn't the case for us."

"That's only speculation for now, but it's a good place to start," Ren nodded. "Not much we can find more about though."

"But that's such a crazy power-up for us though! Being able to transfer our levels to each other sounds really helpful, especially if we're given the respective weapons skills to use! You shot an arrow right at the assassin to let Zellus take him down, right!?"

"We don't even understand this power to begin with, and it clearly comes with a disadvantage," Ren replied. "The person receiving the levels will get stronger, but the person providing it will be left without anything to defend themself with. That is to say, if there is no way to scale it so they don't hit Level 1 upon transferring it over."

"There didn't feel like any method to stop it once it starts," Itsuki mentioned. "It's an all or nothing tactic, so if we're going to keep that mechanic in mind, we have to be mindful of the people providing the power."

"Okay, but here's the important thing." Motoyasu pounded his palm with a clenched fist like a hammer. "What are we naming this? It's a new discovery that isn't on the help menus, so it's only right that we get to name it!"

"I don't think this is the—"

"[Stat Giver and Receiver]? Or something like that?"

"That's a terrible name, Naofumi," Ren scoffed. "Obviously, you'll have to name it [Ultimate Surge : Last Resort]. It's the rational way to call it."

"You're both terrible at names, one too on-point and the other too flashy," Itsuki deadpanned. "Please don't interrupt me. I was just saying how we can leave this for another time."

Motoyasu went to ignore Itsuki, turning over to Eclair and Raphtalia.

"Do you two have any good suggestions?"

"Hey, what the—?"

"Apologies, but I don't have much confidence in naming something as important as a source of strength for the Cardinal Heroes," Eclair replied.

Raphtalia, on the other hand, took it seriously. "Well, you're just transferring levels from one another, correct? Why not just call it [Level Transfer]?"

"A sensible name!" Motoyasu shot out a thumbs-up to her. "I like it!"

"Still thought mine was better," Ren pouted.

"I actually think it's great," Naofumi smiled.

"Can we please move on!?"

Ren and Zellus were able to defeat the assassin, but only after Zellus set fire to the library they were fighting in. According to him, it was to keep things lively, but it ended up being chaotic once the holy knights found out that the library had been burning down. Ren was forced to escape, leaving Zellus behind to his own suggestion, and he ran into the veil of the night, trying to lose the knights on his trail.

The next morning, Naofumi had been getting along with Raphtalia. She was becoming healthier over the past few days that he had been treating her. The discovery of his potion-making helped speed this along and they were at Erhart's place in order to get a new dagger for Raphtalia. They've been making a lot of progress, especially compared to the days Naofumi had been alone.

In the midst of the ordering, Ren staggered into the store and collapsed on the ground. Naofumi immediately brought medical attention to him using Erhart's first aide kit, moving him over to a back room. Though reluctant at first, Ren eventually told Naofumi what happened and decided that he needed to skip town in order to stay free. Naofumi decided to help out, but with their options being limited, Ren believed the best way would be through the front gate.

Ren disguised himself as a slave in heavy clothing. Naofumi was to walk by the search by the knights, but it quickly went downhill when the knights already made an assumption that Naofumi was a part of what happened. It caused Ren to be furious at how they were treating his friend, choosing to abandon the disguise and fight back.

Although he didn't want to leave, Naofumi and Raphtalia had to run away while Ren bought them the time and space to escape. It was all while Ren had to deal with an entire squadron of knights, to which he was barely keeping up against. Any chances went out the window when Lothringen and another squadron of knights showed up to deal with Ren. Through his resistance, he was unable to fight back against the reinforcements and was prone to capture.

However, Naofumi returned to help Ren while leaving Raphtalia behind to hide in the nearby forest until he came back for her. Lothringen proved to be too powerful for them though, threatening a single attack that would have been able to wipe them out.

"Captain Lothringen fought you guys?" Eclair gasped, a little surprised.

"Why? Is that a big deal?" Itsuki asked.

"Well, the Captain usually doesn't get involved in anything physical lately due to his condition. It's the reason why he typically sends out Zellus whenever he's required to fight. Zellus would be more than enough to deal with his opponents, but I suppose in that state of emergency, he couldn't contact Zellus to defeat their supposed criminals."

"His condition?" Motoyasu frowned. "Wait, what's wrong with him?"

"With his growing age, his body deteriorated. He has an illness that prevents him from working his body too much, or else his life will suffer. Despite that, he still proudly serves as the captain of the knights and would greatly lay down his life if it meant he could protect the country. It's one of the reasons why he's so greatly respected among many people, including myself."

"I… didn't know that," Naofumi said, his jaw hanging open. "He never struck me as someone with that type of weakness."

"The Captain would never worry the Cardinal Heroes of something that appears trivial in his perspective. He'll keep working for the country until his final breath. That's what his wish is."

"Suddenly, it puts a sour taste in my mouth that we're against someone like that," Motoyasu winced. "We may be up against some nasty people, but there are some people that are just trying to do their jobs. It kinda sucks if we think about it like that."

"Well, we want to live," Ren dismissed, "so we have to do what we have to do."

Before Lothringen's attack reached them, Zellus intercepted the strike from out of nowhere. It was not a blessing, however, for Zellus took up the reines to be the enemy that they would fight against. His presence was overwhelming and his combat techniques spent no quarters for losing. Naofumi and Ren did their best in matching Zellus' attacks, but they weren't able to beat him.

They were taken off their guard when Raphtalia came to appear behind Zellus with a knife brandished in her hands. Her intention was clear in attacking the knight that was hurting her master and his friend, but her shaking arms made it obvious that she was nervous about it.

"Quick question," Ren said. "Did you follow Naofumi back to the capital?"

Raphtalia hesitated for a moment, but nodded. "I know I was supposed to wait for Master Naofumi, but I was just worried about him. He didn't feel like himself when we were escaping, so I just wanted to see if he was okay. I know it was dangerous, but..."

"You couldn't help it. Figures." Ren sighed, holding his forehead. "I guess Naofumi's attitude is already rubbing off on you."

"Huh?"

"Ah, don't worry about it."

Her attack landed on Zellus, causing him to bleed, but he didn't flinch. His next attack was then turned over to his assailant, but Naofumi couldn't let that happen. Without much thought, he ran over to save Raphtalia and in doing so, Ren wanted to lend a hand. This was the second time that [Level Transfer] occurred, providing Naofumi with a sword to get a deep slash across Zellus' chest.

And yet, that wasn't enough to take him down. Zellus didn't flinch from suffering a massive injury like that, taking care of Naofumi quickly before moving on to Ren. Before Ren lost consciousness, Zellus started sprouting stuff about the Shield Demon.

"Wait, so he's a part of the Church as well?" Itsuki asked.

"That doesn't make sense." Eclair shook her head. "Zellus has openly demonstrated that he disliked the Church of Three Heroes. It doesn't make any sense for him to replicate their preachings. Even if you don't believe, consider for a moment that he was the person to burn down the precious library of the Church. Would a zealous believer have done that?"

"Wait, so what was the point of that little speech of his?" Raphtalia asked. "I remember him talking about it before he completely knocked me out after dealing with Mister Ren."

"It was to throw us off the scent," Ren grunted, slamming his fist onto the ground upon realizing he was duped. "He wanted me to believe that the Church had a bigger hand to play in this. He wanted me to believe he was a puppet, not a mastermind. Damn it!"

"Ren…"

Naofumi could feel his frustration from across their campsite. It was even worse, considering what happened to Ren afterwards. Whereas Naofumi found himself in a forest with Raphtalia after waking up, Ren was captured and sentenced to a similar result as his friend. The only difference had been that Ren's state of mind was not stable after what happened.

Ren really couldn't remember much of his experiences during that time before the final confrontation, but everyone else went their separate ways until their fates forced them to meet up once again. However, something was growing stronger within his sword, consuming his emotions ever so slowly…

-/IV/-

"Zellus came to see me during one of those days after Sir Ren was trialed by the king," Eclair continued onwards. "My days beforehand were spent in the darkness, just trying to hang on before the queen was able to return, but much of those hopes dwindled by time. I must have been there for a month or something before Zellus arrived."

"Did he have something to say?" Naofumi asked.

"Only for me to help out the Cardinal Heroes. It seemed contradictory to what he's been doing this entire time, tricking the Sword Hero in a framed crime. I didn't give him a response at the time, but he said he didn't need one. He left once I was able to regain some of my strength with the food he offered to me, but even in thinking back, I still can't begin to fathom what must have been going on in his head."

The group thought it might have been good to have tabs as to where everyone had been during this time. Motoyasu went first, talking about the guild request to a famined village. He thought about how similar it was to Emerald Online, especially when the dungeon holding the solution to the famine was where he remembered it might be.

"That's some convenience," Naofumi said.

"But what's this about a… video game? Emerald Online?" Raphtalia tried to grasp the concept, but could only shake her head at it. "It's something you play on?"

"I'm not sure I understand it either," Eclair added.

"Don't worry too much about it," Ren dismissed. "It's nothing too important."

"... I kinda wanted to understand it a bit," Raphtalia childishly pouted to the side.

The dungeon itself was slightly different. For starters, Motoyasu couldn't figure out the layout of the internal maze using what knowledge he retained. And although the supposed Miracle Seed, the item meant to save the people from the famine, was present, there was a trap sprung by the golem boss that hadn't been there. Through some work, Motoyasu and his party managed to get out of it alright. They handed off the Miracle Seed and started to return back to the capital, taking a few days to arrive.

Huh? Naofumi tilted his head as Motoyasu finished his end of the timeframe, but something didn't sit right with how Motoyasu explained it. It felt as if he was treading lightly on his words so suddenly between the point where they fell in the trap and when they managed to get out.

Did he skip out on something?

Meanwhile, Naofumi departed from the battle at the capital's gate in a depressed state, according to Raphtalia. She recalled how weak-willed her master had been, not having the energy to do much except the bare minimum. Even so, he still kept up in taking care of her properly, even if it meant that he wasn't taking care of himself just as well.

"It certainly worried me when you were acting so strangely like that, Master Naofumi."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that. I'm honestly not sure what came over me during that time, but it really did feel like I couldn't do anything at all." Naofumi held onto his shield reflexively. "It probably came from how useless I was feeling during my fight with Zellus."

"You aren't useless though. I'll keep saying it until it's stuck in your head, but you're the one that saved me. And I believe you can save more people as the Shield Hero." Her tail wagged a bit as she turned to Naofumi. "If you believe that you haven't done anything noteworthy, just remember that!"

"Y-Yeah, I got that message, loud and clear." He felt like she was a bit too close, but she realized that as well and quickly pulled away with a blush. "T-Thanks, Raphtalia."

Both Ren and Itsuki both gave blank looks to each other, while Motoyasu smiled to himself. Naofumi wondered what type of ideas they were getting, but it probably wasn't anything he wanted to know. He asked Raphtalia to continue onwards to what happened during those times.

They headed into a village called Riyute, where they were trying to scavenge some money from the potions Naofumi would make for Raphtalia. The shopkeeper suggested that if they wanted money as adventurers, a good place would have been the mineshaft. It was overrun by monsters ever since the first wave occurred, so the pair made their way over there.

They managed to get their hands on some ores, but not before they came across a two-headed dog monster. It resembled the monster that took Raphtalia's parents away from her. Naofumi told her to run, thinking to use himself as bait to let her escape, but she was paralyzed in fear. However, both of them ended up overcoming their fears of losing each other, defeating the monster once and for all.

"A two-headed dog monster?" Ren rubbed his chin. "Those types of monsters aren't naturally occurring in Melromarc, right?"

"That would be correct," Eclair answered. "Reports of their appearance were only exclusive to the first wave of destruction. There had been some remnants of their presence, but I haven't heard of one staying in Riyute. Though, it's been a month since I've seen any updates…"

"Would it be possible that the Church transferred over the two-headed dog monster there?"

"Why would you assume that?"

"I left it out because I thought it was irrelevant, but I came across some two-headed dog monsters when I was going through the Church by its basement. I had to kill one when I was trying to get Naofumi's armour back."

"So the Church was the one to release the monster there?" Raphtalia gasped.

"They probably did it, trying to have it kill Naofumi in a natural way. No one would say a thing if Naofumi died from taking on a monster, but failing to defeat it."

"Besides, you guys said that the mineshaft was supposed to be filled with monsters, right? That's what the shopkeeper said?" Motoyasu imposed. "If the dog monster was there for a while, it would have probably moved out a while ago since it seems like it killed most of the monsters for you. You know, because of food sources emptying out."

"So the Church planted the dog monster there," Itsuki grunted. "How despicable. Another reason to hate the Church of Three Heroes. Say that Naofumi wasn't able to beat it, it would have simply moved on to the nearby village at some point and ravaged them."

"Thank goodness that Master Naofumi and I were able to beat it."

Naofumi and Raphtalia returned to Riyute to sell the ores, but told the villagers that they dealt with the biggest threat in the mineshaft. They decided to stay in Riyute in order to help out with restabilizing their economy, by acting as bodyguards for the miners over a few days.

During that time, Itsuki arrived at the location of his guild request. A governor by the name of Idol Rabier was the one who commissioned them to investigate monster sightings, since the capital knights did not come to him in a timely manner. He provided a place to stay at his manor, so that they could scout out reports over the next few days, but Itsuki noticed the appearance of a familiar man outside the window.

The slave trader from the capital had shown up to Rabier's estate and despite not being able to hear what they were talking about as the slave trader departed, Itsuki knew what this meant. Despite being against the recommendation of Welst, a party member, Itsuki decided to make investigations into Rabier himself. Through Welst's reluctant help, they found the entrance to the basement which housed demi-human slaves, all suffering under terrible conditions.

"Raphtalia? You're tensing up a bit," Naofumi said, noticing her movements. "I guess it would make sense. You probably don't have any good memories of being a slave before meeting us."

She bit her tongue down, as if stopping herself from saying something.

"Oh, I won't go too much into detail," Itsuki pointed out, clenching his fist. "It makes me angry, just trying to remember what happened back then."

Itsuki went to confront Rabier, only to find out that it was a trap. Rabier sprung the holy knights of the Church onto him, only managing to escape from the help of his allies. This was when he found out that Kojeel, a spearwoman of his party, was a knight as well.

"Did they plant knights within all of our parties besides Naofumi?" Ren openly asked. "It seems like the king wanted to keep a close eye on us, for one reason or another."

"Wait, but there wasn't a knight in my party."

"Well, excuse me. Didn't you have the damn princess?"

"Yeah, but that had to be an unplanned thing, right?"

"At this point, I wouldn't be so sure."

"Despite that," Eclair interrupted, "I would not believe that the princess would be allowed to go out without a knight's supervision, especially with the overprotecting nature of the king. Who did you say was in your party again, Sir Motoyasu?"

"Let's see." Motoyasu counted them on his fingers. "There was Myne, obviously. Then Elena, Rino, and Lesty. Those were the four girls."

"Ah. Lesty. I recall that name."

"She's the knight!? She didn't seem like it!"

"I believe she's one of the princess' close friends. As such, she was a person to Myne, as Lord Aldrecht was to King Aultcray. She had a noble descent as a knight, just as I was, but her nimble figure makes her very quick on her feet against her opponents."

Motoyasu seemed dumbfounded by the revelation, needing some time to register it.

After escaping Rabier's estate, they headed off to another village to seek refuge for a few days to recollect themselves. That's when they decided on arriving in Riyute, but another one of his party members, Mald, abandoned his position and left the group once they arrived. Kojeel was to do some personal business concerning this whole ordeal, leaving Itsuki and Welst to wander around Riyute.

That's when they bumped into Naofumi and Raphtalia, caught up with each other, and eventually joined them in one of the bodyguard tasks. When they returned, Kojeel had been waiting for them and debriefed everyone, including Naofumi, on their current situation. She was planning on personally heading over to the capital for further investigation and reporting, but Itsuki wanted to come along in order to beat the Church.

He didn't get his way though and the next morning, Kojeel had already headed off. However, the timing might have been planned. The very same morning, the Church of Three Heroes came to siege Riyute in search of the Shield Demon and the Bow Demon. If it weren't for Welst's efforts, they wouldn't have managed to slip out to escape, but it wasn't without a severe cost.

Welst's life. In dying words, he gave Itsuki his staff for a keepsake and eventually succumbed to his injuries. Discovering Mald to be the person that sold them out, Itsuki's mental state crumbled.

"Not… my proudest moments."

"Everyone has their bad days, Itsuki. Don't feel too bad about it," Naofumi chuckled, trying to cheer him up. "With everything that happened, no one could really blame you."

They stopped on the road, aimlessly travelling around, so that Naofumi could check up on Itsuki's emotions. It was here that the masked assassin showed up to them, declaring that their presence was needed at the capital, concerning the fate of Motoyasu and Ren.

"What!? He was still alive!?" Ren exclaimed. "I thought Zellus killed him back at the library!"

"Well, it must not have been a fatal hit, but if Zellus was the one to last strike him, it might have been on purpose," Naofumi replied. "We eventually discovered that the masked assassin was working alongside Zellus as a part of a deal. I can only assume that the deal was met after you left Zellus in the library."

"Damn that guy! What's his deal!?"

Coming back to Motoyasu, he arrived back at the capital, only to discover what news had been being spread across the people. Needless to say, Motoyasu was shocked to hear that Ren was convicted for crimes against the Church of Three Heroes. With a push from Zellus, he was able to meet Ren once more, only to realize something was off about him. It was as if anger consumed his mind, thinking only of revenge against those that wronged them and even threatening Motoyasu if he chose to stand in the way.

Motoyasu couldn't let that happen. If Ren was deciding to kill the king and the pope, Motoyasu couldn't let Ren incriminate himself any further. With Zellus' help, he was able to pinpoint the opportunity where Ren would strike, the meeting between the pope and the king at the castle.

He convinced Aldrecht to allow him to serve as a bodyguard without telling him the truth, and when the day came along, Aldrecht was the one that showed up to bring him over to the castle. However, it was not what Motoyasu imagined. Instead, Aldrecht brought him over to his home and brewed him some tea as thanks for helping him finish up some errands.

The tea was induced with some sort of sleeping ailment that knocked Motoyasu out. Before he fell unconscious, Aldrecht revealed that he knew about what Motoyasu wanted to do and was going to deal with Ren himself. He eventually woke up, meeting the masked assassin who told him that he should be able to meet Ren if he hurried.

"Didn't it strike you that Zellus might have been stringing you along to do what he wanted you to do?" Ren asked. "You were his puppet the entire time."

"Y-Yeah, I realized that in retrospect. I didn't know Zellus was some kind of chaotic evil type of guy at the time, so I just believed in what he suggested. Though, what else was I supposed to do? I didn't feel like I had any other options than what he said."

Itsuki, Naofumi, and Raphtalia were able to arrive at the capital before the meeting took place. They encountered Zellus as they snuck in through the sewers, to which he played nice with them and brought them over to Erhart's blacksmith to debrief. Zellus revealed that Motoyasu was intending to fight Ren and the circumstances around it, but he will ultimately lose. That was why he called the assassin to bring the other Cardinal Heroes here, where he could then bring them to support Motoyasu in his fight.

With them consciously knowing it's a trap, but one they had to walk through, Zellus left them to go make final preparations and said he would return when it was the right time. However, Itsuki eventually managed to slip out from Naofumi's sight and rushed over to the Church in order to deal with the pope.

It frightened Naofumi, but Zellus showed up again to stop him, knowing that he'll return to the castle once he finds out he couldn't find what he was looking for. They were forced to accompany Zellus to a secret passage towards the castle, bringing them to the dungeon where they met Eclair. In freeing her, Zellus also freed the other prisoners and provided them with weapons to overtake the guards. It was likely this prison riot that allowed Motoyasu to sneak into the castle easily and confront Ren during this time.

"There's been something about Zellus that's been bugging me during that time," Naofumi pondered. "People in this world don't usually have an inventory like the heroes, right?"

"An inventory? Is that the magic that Sir Ren used to summon that book?"

"Yeah, we keep a lot of stuff inside of that intangible space. It's really helpful in keeping a light load on our backs, all while having everything that we need."

"If that was the case, things would certainly be easier for travellers and adventurers. Sadly, I believe only heroes have such abilities as far as I'm aware. Though, it could be linked to the weapons themselves, so perhaps…" Eclair rubbed her chin for a bit, before shaking her head. "No, that was simply a stray thought. Pay no heed to that."

"In any case, that's what was so strange about Zellus. I'm certain he has an inventory like us. He dropped more weapons for the prisoners than what he was carrying on his body. It had to come from somewhere and I think that was his inventory."

"But Eclair just said that only heroes have inventories," Itsuki pointed out. "Last time I checked, Zellus didn't have a holy weapon, not mentioning the fact that he definitely isn't a hero on any level."

"And that's what confuses me. Does he know something that we don't? Is there something about him that is different to the people of this world?"

"Well, we can start with what happened during our fight with him at the capital's front gates," Ren answered. "Don't you remember what happened? We sustained injuries, but everytime we took a hit, our health bar never went down. Those injuries were based on the attacks themselves, rather than what the Status Magic dictated. That in itself was highly unusual."

"With those skills of his, he had to be high-leveled too," Naofumi said, continuing the thought. "I can't imagine him being over the average power of a knight."

"Well, we have a former knight right here," Motoyasu declared, turning to Eclair. "Any idea what we're up against? As to what level Zellus is?"

"Unfortunately, I do not. Zellus' level is actually one of the bigger mysteries between the knights, as no one seems to know what it is. Needless to say, he refuses to tell anyone about it, never partying with any of the knights whenever we need to have a grouped squadron. He, however, has not received a class-up ritual."

"A class-up ritual? What's that?" Naofumi asked.

"A normal person cannot raise their levels higher than 40. That is how it always has been, but through a ritual using the Dragon's Hourglass, that level cap can be extended upwards. It takes materials and allows people to grow even stronger, so every class-up ritual performed must be approved and documented by the crown. As far as I know, Zellus has not received any of that."

"There's no way he's only a Level 40," Ren grunted. "I don't believe it for a second. He must have performed the ritual by himself without permission."

"There's a problem with that," Motoyasu intervened. "The Dragon's Hourglass is right in the middle of the Church of Three Heroes. There seems to always be knights to protect it, so there's no way that Zellus could sneak in there and do a whole ritual by himself, only to sneak out again."

"What about that trait of his?" Motoyasu continued his questions for Eclair. "Surely, something like that didn't go unnoticed by his peers?"

"It was confronted a few times, but everytime it was asked, he would provide the same answer. Apparently to him, it was a special trait of his to make things more exciting. None of us could understand what he meant by that, or even how he received that trait to begin with."

"Just what the hell is Zellus anyways?"

Naofumi's question was met with empty space. There wasn't a way to figure it out, but it was obvious that Zellus was more than what he claims to be. He was just frightened to find out what that could have been, especially with that power of his.

"He's an enemy," Ren blatantly announced. "That's all we need to know."

He remembered that Zellus said something along those lines when they fought him as a pair.

After Zellus left Naofumi and Raphtalia with Eclair, they tried making their way over to where the king might have been, only for them to come in the nick of time to Motoyasu's side. As Zellus predicted, Motoyasu was losing against Ren in their fight and Naofumi was prepared to subdue his friend to keep everyone safe.

Itsuki was going through his own dilemma during this time. He went to the church to find the pope, only to find the white-haired girl once again. She guided Itsuki's emotion in letting him realize what was truly important to him, causing him to switch over to coming to the castle in order to protect his friends. Itsuki came, deciding that he would be the one to fight Ren as his childhood friend, while allowing Motoyasu and the others to search for Aldrecht for answers.

They headed over to the conference room, searching for more clues to find out that some paper was left , one of the topics of discussion was on how the summoning ritual appeared to have some failure in it. Details seemed too complicated for Raphtalia and Eclair to make out, considering it was Aldrecht's notes. However, they were encountered by Myne, standing in as the princess, there.

As Motoyasu was with the supposed Shield Demon, Myne gave him a chance to return to her side, only for him to refuse. A fight ensued with the knights, leading Myne to believe that Motoyasu was brainwashed by the Shield Demon. Regardless of what Motoyasu tried to say, she escaped with that thought as her truth.

"Surprise, surprise. Motoyasu finally found out who he should have been fighting for this entire time," Ren sighed. "Only took for his title collapsing from a hero to figure that out."

"I said I was sorry, but at this point, I think you're just teasing me."

"No, I think Ren's being sarcastic," Itsuki deadpanned. "Ren doesn't do the whole teasing thing."

They did learn that the whereabouts of Aldrecht had been unknown and upon remembering what he said before he fell unconscious, Motoyasu knew they needed to get back to Ren and Itsuki as quickly as possible. The rest had been history, known between everyone present.

They fought Aldrecht and were on the verge of losing before Naofumi received a [Level Transfer] from all his hero friends to break apart Aldrecht's powerful spell and strike forwards with a spear. However, the spear couldn't penetrate Aldrecht due to the fact that he was still under the influence of the Shield Hero's act of not being able to attack.

That didn't matter though. In the middle of the retaliation from Aldrecht, Zellus showed up from nowhere and stabbed Aldrecht in the back. He revealed Aldrecht's plans. Due to the terrible reputation that the heroes had, Aldrecht thought it would be better to kill them and emable another set of heroes to be summoned. He was willing to be branded as a villain and take the fall for the king if it meant that Melromarc would be protected from the pressure of the other countries.

Unfortunately, that didn't happen. Aldrecht died from Zellus' attack and despite being in the position to do so, Zellus gave the heroes and their allies a chance to escape. They dove into the moat, being washed away by the current and ended up here. It wasn't a far assumption to believe that they were now fugitives to Melromarc, by being framed in killing the king's friend and retainer, destroying part of the castle, and reigning chaos within it.

When in reality, it was all an orchestration on Zellus' behalf. And so, here they are. If they were captured by the knights who were hunting them, it was very unlikely that the king would believe their side of the story, so being captured would likely mean death. If this kept up, it would be inevitable.

Not if they decided to do something about it.

-/IV/-

"Wait, what was going on with Ren's end?" Naofumi asked. "It didn't feel like it was him that was fighting against us. It was more like something was possessing him. He wouldn't just attack Motoyasu and Itsuki like that, even in a fit of rage."

Ren drew his sword and laid it on his lap.

"A fit of rage, huh? I think it had to do something about that. When I lost myself to that anger, I could feel my holy weapon growing stronger, yet it was wild and uncontrollable. There was something keeping me from destroying myself, only for me to end up destroying everything in my path. Or at least, that is probably what I would have done if I hadn't been stopped."

His sword started changing shape to the ominous blade that he held back at the castle. Naofumi was afraid that it might have started to affect Ren, but all he did was flinch from bringing it out. It seemed like he was still retaining his normal sense of self.

"This sword was unlocked during that time. No [Weapon Copy] or anything materials to unlock it. It just responded to my emotions and unlocked itself. There's nothing in the Status Magic System that would explain this, but all I know is that this sword is dangerous."

"What's it called?" Motoyasu asked.

"[Sword of Rage]. It apparently stems from something called a cursed series." Ren transformed his sword back to normal before there could be any possible side-effects from holding it too long. "From what I remember, it has the effect of self-curse."

His eyes glanced over to Itsuki, but in particular, the attention was drawn to his blackened arms.

"That's the reason why Itsuki is suffering through that right now. He tried stopping me and ended up being affected by the curse."

"Hey, I did that to myself," Itsuki nudged. "You don't need to feel sorry for anything. I was prepared for the worst and considering how I simply feel weaker inside my body, I think I got off with some good luck."

"Do you think there's any way to treat it?" Ren asked.

"Well, if this was Dimension Wave and if this was an effect from a curse, then it would stand to reason that all we would need is some holy water, right?" Itsuki answered. "If we really want to solve this problem, we need to find a place that sells holy water, but considering the intensity of this, I think a higher-grade would be required."

"There might be an issue with that," Eclair said. "Holy water is distributed by the Church of Three Heroes within Melromarc. We may be able to find some lower-quality ones out in the markets, but if it's high quality holy water you're looking for, you need to find a Church or an affiliated distributor.

"And both options will be difficult to go for," Motoyasu groaned. "Damn, I wish there was another way to relieve Itsuki of that curse then."

"We'll just have to keep an eye out for some holy water on the way."

"On the way to what? Not to suddenly change the conversation here, but now everyone is on the same page, we still need to decide what we're doing from here on out," Eclair announced. "We have a better perspective on the circumstances, but it wasn't as much as I would like to know. Therefore, I still believe in my original idea."

"You said that you wanted to find the queen, correct?" Raphtalia asked. "I feel like that would be a dangerous task for us. We would have to cross a border, from what I remembered from our conversation last night. And considering how tightly they were guarding the capital's gates, they're likely doing the same thing for the border gates."

"I say we take the fight to the Church once we get stronger," Itsuki proclaimed. "We can't let them get away with doing what they want and once we finish with them, we'll see what else we can do." He clenched fist before his body, but it trembled a bit in the mere thought. "One day, we're going to have to face Zellus again from the sounds of it. When that happens, we need to be strong enough to defeat him, once and for all."

"I still don't like any of this," Ren grumbled. "I'm firm on my belief that we need to figure out a way to go back home, regardless of how difficult it might be. If they want their heroes to be gone so badly, we'll just do what they say, but on our own terms. Never thought I'd be hating a world that resembles virtual reality, but virtual reality wouldn't screw over my friends like this."

"Virtual… reality?" Raphtalia tilted her head once again.

"D-Don't worry about it."

"Mister Ren, you keep dodging responsibility for any explanations."

"Raphtalia, you're starting to sound like Naofumi."

"But my voice isn't that high?"

"Not literally, Naofumi!"

He already knew what Ren meant by that, but he couldn't help but tease him a little. Raphtalia has been spending a lot of time with him, so it didn't hurt that she was starting to pick up on his habits. He was just wary if she would pick up the good ones.

"I…" Motoyasu's conflicted voice cried out during the mood. "I wanted to find out what's going on with Myne. If I can meet her once more, I'm sure I can make this better for everyone. If I can convince her that Naofumi wasn't the person to attack her that day, the king would definitely have to see that everything stemmed from a severe misunderstanding."

"I don't think there's any method that could let you reach through to that wretched bitch."

"I still believe in her! Don't call her such a thing!"

Ren sighed, turning his head. "Whatever floats your boat. You're probably never going to get any good chances to speak with her again and the longer this goes on, the harder it would be to convince her, if that's even possible in the first place."

"I don't think there's anything wrong in keeping that in mind for Motoyasu's sake," Naofumi replied. "If he thinks Myne is mistaken, let's give him a shot to talk to her whenever we get the chance. It's a non-zero chance that she was roped into this mess, just as Aldrecht was being used by Zellus."

"Is that what you guys think?" Itsuki pondered, probably thinking back to the time he overheard the princess talking to somebody in the castle. "I guess we'll leave it to Motoyasu then."

"Though, I wouldn't count on it," Eclair said. "I wouldn't doubt that she would help conduct and execute this plan out of her own free will either."

"A chance. I'm just asking for a single chance and if I can't convince Myne by that point," Motoyasu hesitated for a moment, glancing to the ground before he closed his eyes, "then I dedicate myself with the belief that… she probably has an active role in the schemes against us."

"Very well, Sir Motoyasu."

"And yet, we're mostly all split on what we want to do," Eclair said, switching back to the main topic. "Either find the queen, get stronger, or discover a way for the heroes to leave this world."

"Why can't we just try and do all of it at the same time?" Raphtalia asked. "We can focus our efforts on finding the queen, but we could also get stronger in the meantime while keeping an eye out for Mister Ren's option. Of course, we'll keep a lookout for holy water for Mister Itsuki."

"I think that's a great idea, Raphtalia," Naofumi nodded.

"That's fine and all, but there's still one problem with that."

"And that is?"

Ren slapped his knees with vigor. "We can't get stronger with any efficiency. Did you and Itsuki forget the whole reason why we weren't able to party up in the first place? Because of that whole weapon restriction rule that the Status Magic System decided to impose on us randomly!?"

"Ah, crap," Motoyasu grumbled. "I knew it couldn't be as simple as that. I remember dwelling so much on that tragedy yet I still forgot about that whole thing until now. Though, I have a follow-up question to that." Motoyasu rubbed his chin. "Have we ever tested it out before?"

"If everything else in the help menus have been correct, I think I'm right in assuming that the whole weapon experience restriction mechanic is correct as well. We're going to have to separate from each other frequently if we going to get any progress on our levels and—"

Shuffling came from behind some bushes, causing everyone to glance backwards. Out popped up a few balloon monsters, as if on cue. They probably came by due to the scent of food that Naofumi had whipped up and jumped them in order to chase its trail. However, they didn't know they chose the wrong party to ambush.

"Alright, let's test this out, like Motoyasu said." Itsuki took up his bow and with a slight wince, he pulled back an arrow. "Here goes nothing."

"Are you sure you should be the one to—"

Itsuki didn't bother listening to Naofumi's concern, firing it off almost immediately. It struck a single balloon, causing the rest to flee for their lives. He lowered his bow and checked his status menu once more, letting out a small gasp.

"So I didn't just imagine it back then."

"What's the result?"

"Looks like Motoyasu had the right idea. For some reason, despite what the status magic said, it looks like we can party together without any experience loss."

"Oh, right! Hell yeah!" Motoyasu pumped his fist up with an ecstatic reaction.

Ren, on the other hand, was glaring at Itsuki with an empty stare.

"Wait. You're telling me that we could have been able to party along with each other the entire time." He stood up in disbelief. "You're telling me this entire mess could have been avoided, if we had just gone out and tested it to see if it was right or not!?"

Now that Ren mentioned it, if they were able to come along by Naofumi's side, there wouldn't have been a need for Myne to come with him. Then he wouldn't have been able to be accused of any crimes because of their alibis. Then Naofumi wouldn't have been suffering as long as he did and Ren wouldn't have investigated the Church alongside Zellus. They wouldn't have fought their way out of the capital and Ren wouldn't have been captured, get consumed by his anger and become bait for everyone else to return to the capital, for Zellus to enact his plans for them.

"Huh." Naofumi had been openly counting these events on his fingers, though silently. "It does look like you're right, Ren. That's… really unfortunately, wow."

"Well, nothing we can do about it now," Motoyasu sang in a light-hearted tune. "But if we can party up together and go on a great adventure, I'm fine with that!"

"Really overestimating our fugitive situation as a great adventure here, Motoyasu," Itsuki deadpanned. "Don't you think that you're putting it in far too much of an optimistic light?"

"If we're together, I don't think it would be an exaggeration. We're the Cardinal Heroes that are supposed to save the world, right? If we can't deal with this mess together, how were we supposed to face the waves of destruction in the future?"

"That's one way of looking at it," Naofumi chuckled.

He was right. Even with the odds stacked against them, they didn't have much of a choice in what they needed to do. Regardless of where they ended up, they would end up there together.

Motoyasu stood up and extended his hand outwards to the center.

"C'mon! This is where it really starts for us! Who cares about what the world might think of us!? If we just try our best, it'll work out in the end! Isn't that right!?"

Naofumi couldn't resist Motoyasu's enthusiasm, standing up to put his hand in the middle with Motoyasu. "Yeah. We got each other's backs. No matter what happens, that's going to remain true."

Itsuki, Raphtalia and Eclair decided to join in, throwing their hands to the pile.

"This world still needs saving from the evil of this land. As long as we fight together, we'll beat them with our unity."

"Count me in too. The Cardinal Heroes don't deserve what's happening here. Master Naofumi gave me a life to live, so I'm going to use it to pay him back in helping everyone out as best as I can."

"The world needs to see the truth for themselves. We'll discover all of that and bring it out from the darkness and into the light. In that way, we'll expose the real criminals that are out there."

Everyone glanced over to Ren who stayed back with his arms crossed. Naofumi assumed that he was just trying to act cool and distant, but by being their friends, he's already standing at a point of no return. He seemed like he was actually feeling flustered about putting in his hand with everyone, making a fake cough before bashfully glancing back at them.

"What's wrong? Aren't you going to join us?"

"This type of thing is a bit… Uhm, how do I…"

"Ren's just being a nervous kitten," Itsuki laughed.

"W-What!? No, I'm not!"

"He's so defensive about it too! Come here, Ren!" Motoyasu called out. "There's no need to play the loner here!"

"N-No, it's not that! Doesn't this just… feel a bit lame to do this?"

"Only if you make it out to be," Naofumi smirked. "We're in this together and that means you too. Without your inclusion, we wouldn't go anywhere. All or nothing."

Everyone chuckled, and after a moment of hesitation, Ren started laughing too.

"Well, I guess you guys are going to stay there until I join, right? There's no helping it then."

His hand reached out to the center where everyone's hand was.

"We've hit rock bottom, as far as our reputation could go. The only way we can go is up, whatever way we end up doing it. Isn't that right?"

"Yeah," Naofumi smiled. "Let's do it. Let's rise back up, everyone."

---

[Author's Notes]

Back to the epilogue of Volume 2, it seems like I didn't exactly mention this underlying feeling in my heart. However, if you know me from the Shield Hero Discord Server (I don't actually go by my FFN handle there as my Discord name), you might already know what my personal opinion of [Rising of the Four Heroes] may be. I actually have a love-hate relationship with this story, in that I love its concept and appreciate the work that I've put into it myself, but I've always hated its results, causing the constant rewrites in the past. At some point, I knew that I needed to move on from the relentless cycle of endless working on the first arc, where we haven't even hit the first wave for the heroes to experience.

There are many factors as to why I hated this story so much, but it always ended up with its execution. I'm not going to go ahead and ruin this story for anyone who enjoys it, but I will say that a writer is a critic of their own work as well. I'd actually say that if a writer is not critical of their own work to a certain extent, their work can't be considered as great. I would say it would be decent or good at best. This ends up becoming a dilemma because if you are your story's critic, you will never be able to see your story as anything better than good. Sometimes, a writer's bias is their own worst enemy and writing becomes less about appealing to the audience, but rather to appeal to the writer themselves.

In this case, I'm not in this boat. I truly think this story has many flaws to it—flaws that I won't reveal here for the aforementioned reason of audience enjoyment. They're flaws that I can concisely point out, but will be unable to fix unless through a rewrite. And I don't want to experience that pain again. The only way I can do it is retroactively and it's very, very difficult to retcon the things that I see as flawed.

That's why this chapter exists. This is my solution to that first arc. It's far from perfect, but it's probably the best thing I can come up with at the moment. This is not simply a summary chapter for old readers to remind themselves as to what happened, but this is what I would consider the "skip chapter". I'm not exactly sure how effective it might be, primarily because it's very difficult to balance the two sides. I cannot convey emotions through a fixed summary of events like this. That is something that must be experienced through the narrative itself, but my hope is that those who decided to take advantage of the "skip chapter" will be able to go back with full foresight as to what will happen. All so that they can skim the parts that don't interest them or may be flawed.

And yet, I still needed to make sure that the old readers weren't too alienated by this style of chapter. That's why I added in the commentary from the current cast of present characters, for them to shed more light on what might be happening and for them to understand what the others might have been going through.

In fact, I… haven't actually started outlining the events of Volume 3 yet. Refer to my FFN handle. Instead, you can consider this as a teaser for what's to come for the future. Our four heroes are reunited as a single force, helped by only Raphtalia and Eclair (as of the moment *cough, new cover, cough*), against what seems to be the entire country. All caused by the whims of the fic-original antagonist.

Digressing aside, I'd like to thank all readers for coming to this point. You really don't need to review, but it is appreciated, regardless if you're expressing your likes or criticism. At this point, I'm writing this to spite myself. Oddly enough.

Until the continuation, I think I'm just going to be pretty lazy for a while. I'll see everyone in the next update. Thanks again.