The Hero’s Disciple Has Returned

“…It’s night.”

Perhaps I’ve gotten used to it from repeatedly fainting

My mental recovery speed seems to be getting a bit faster, even if just a little.

…Is that a good thing?

“I suppose it’s positive that I can achieve even a small meaningful result.”

The ‘natural mana’ has also increased slightly, though very little. Doesn’t it have meaning that the fainting show hasn’t been meaningless? At least compared to when I had just lost my Aura Heart and felt utterly lost, the situation has clearly improved, so I decided to think positively that good is good.

“I wonder how strong that kid has become?”

Considering the identity of Mr. Ras, who might be an upper-class magician or even a Great Magician, and thinking about how such a person showed such a humble attitude… It must be no ordinary strength. Maybe she’s already surpassed the realm of masters? Am I overestimating too much just because she’s my disciple? I’m estimating so highly that such worries arise, but considering the tremendous talent my disciple showed me, I thought it was entirely possible.

Perhaps I couldn’t ignore the possibility that she might be racing beyond that level, perfectly handling my Aura Heart.

Well, even I thought that was too much of a disciple-fool thought… Handling someone else’s Aura Heart isn’t that easy. If the compatibility is surprisingly good, things might be different, but since the probability of that happening is low in the first place, doesn’t ‘good compatibility’ have a good meaning?

Or if my Aura Heart obeys like a well-behaved loyal dog, panting and listening well, that would be a different story…

Considering my personality during my mercenary days, it’s probably too much to hope that my Aura Heart would be such an affectionate thing.

“I just hope she’s doing well and staying healthy…”

As a master, it’s inevitable to earnestly hope and wish that the disciple is doing well.

♧♧♧

The Emperor thought it was a crisis.

So he forcibly selected hero candidates and had them assigned masters above the level of masters. But a problem arose here. It’s important to create many hero candidates. The strategy of increasing the number of excellent warriors under the pretext of hero candidates wasn’t bad either.

But what about the real hero?

How to select the real hero here?

In other words, it’s like this.

A situation has occurred, so it feels like something needs to be done somehow

But you can’t do nothing

In many ways, it seems like it would be a problem if you don’t create and implement some kind of project

And as a result

Just starting something big and seeing what happens

It was the kind of tremendous waste of administrative power that can often occur when trying to do something in an emergency crisis situation within a massive national system. It was like “Start something big and leave the future to my future self or colleagues!”

Anyway, the important thing is to make it look plausible at this moment

But this kind of immediate cover-up approach inevitably leads to problems.

In this case, it’s

‘Hero selection’.

It was good to select many hero candidates and assign them to excellent masters or above, with the idea that ‘Whether a hero emerges from among the hero candidates or not, it’s good if high-quality forces to fight against the Demon King’s army in the future increase as a result.’

The problem was the method of selecting the hero.

They want to leave it to the temple, but…

The problem is that they’ve also assigned disciples to the masters of the temple side. To the holy knights and battle priests.

In other words, even the temple has become a stakeholder this time.

Even if the temple selects a hero candidate from their side as the hero, no one would believe it. In a situation where they should unite around the hero after selecting one, debates about ‘Is this the hero or not?’ would break out. This could have been avoided if they had calculated this far and not sent hero candidates to the temple side from the beginning, but it was impossible because they had selected too many hero candidates in the first place and couldn’t help but send some to the temple side. To begin with, considering the temple’s vast network, even distinguishing whether someone is a temple-side hero candidate or not would be an extremely difficult issue.

Anyway, what the national system is likely to do in this situation is obvious.

Create a title called ‘Hero Selector’, attach it to suitable people, and declare “This is confidential and cannot be disclosed to anyone.” If there are impressive-sounding titles and capable people who have been entrusted with this top-secret task, it makes people mistakenly think, “Oh, the country has thought everything through and is doing things properly.” The truth is that it’s nothing more than a hasty cover-up patch project.

Moreover, state secrets are not that reliable. It’s not an exaggeration to say that it’s nothing more than capable people secretly knowing everything. To begin with, if it was a country that handled things well, they wouldn’t have dealt with things in a way that generates so much behind-the-scenes talk.

In other words

If you know who the ‘Hero Selectors’ are and take action in advance

It’s not an exaggeration to say that it’s determined who will become the hero.

What does that mean?

It’s not an exaggeration to say that what a regressor who has decided to become a hero should do is determined from the start.

♧♧♧

The Mercenary King Balik could be seen as being in an unfair position in many ways.

While all the other master-level and above individuals received hero candidates as disciples, this didn’t apply to him. But in a way, this could be seen as the imperial officials having at least a minimal conscience. Because the Mercenary King was famously the worst as a master.

Originally, the position of Mercenary King required not only strength but also the intelligence to control mercenaries and regulate the industry without causing too much trouble. But in times of chaos, can you afford to consider such things? In the end, the current Mercenary King position was filled based solely on strength, excluding intelligence. That was the current Mercenary King Balik.

As you might guess from this…

Mercenary King Balik wasn’t smart.

If there was any consolation, it was that his intuition and sense weren’t rock bottom.

Therefore, in these chaotic times, he somehow managed the noisiest mercenary industry with his strength, and made up for his lack of intelligence with intuition and sense, running things fairly well. That point certainly deserves high marks, but… Raising a disciple was a different matter.

The mercenary industry is naturally full of people who prefer physical confrontation. Of course, it was natural for many of these guys to eagerly approach the current strongest mercenary, the Mercenary King, saying they wanted to learn from him.

But…

But you see…

…Not a single one of those many guys had survived.

Not one had endured the position of disciple under the Mercenary King…

It was such a famous story…

That’s why even though the officials had sent a hero candidate to a secluded A-rank mercenary, they couldn’t send a hero candidate under the Mercenary King. It was partly due to having a minimal conscience, but no small part was due to the fear that they might send someone who could be the real hero under their own hands to the Mercenary King and meet the outcome of ‘died before becoming a hero’. To begin with, considering the temple’s vast network, even distinguishing whether someone is a temple-side hero candidate or not would be an extremely difficult issue.

That’s why the Mercenary King had many complaints.

They didn’t send him a single disciple

And only saddled him with the annoying position of ‘Hero Selector’.

‘It’s not my fault. It’s the fault of those guys who can’t even learn such a simple thing.’

The Mercenary King felt wronged.

It’s not like he taught something difficult like magicians do

Or taught complicated swordsmanship full of superficial flair like swordsmen.

It was extremely simple

Extremely straightforward

Extremely easy

And yet, a method that could definitely make them strong.

Where else could you find such a good master? A master who even guarantees free time if you just complete the daily quota?! What a new-age master figure this is! That’s why the Mercenary King praised himself as an extremely good master.

And

In this world

Whether master or professor

Among those who say “I am a good master (professor)!”

There were no truly good masters (professors).

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call this a ‘truth’.

To begin with, the Mercenary King’s method had problems.

It’s not that he was barking nonsense.

He taught

Leaving out all the complicated content

With only really simple methods

How to become strong.

If there was a problem, it was that unless you had the body of a giant race, it was impossible to achieve.

If you have overwhelming physical strength, what need is there for magic? Why would you need deep swordsmanship?

That’s right.

Mercenary King Balik was a genius when it came to physical strength and combat. And it’s natural for geniuses not to understand the reality and psychology of ordinary people at all. Who would have thought that the situation where the dumb Balik couldn’t understand ‘ordinary people’ because he was a ‘genius’ would be created? But the world was originally full of such ironies.

Anyway, Mercenary King Balik was very displeased with the position of ‘Hero Selector’.

In this situation,

Another reason to be displeased was added.

“Cough. Cough. Cough.”

Some crazy woman had suddenly barged in and left him in a half-dead state.

Mercenary King Balik

A man who occupied the Mercenary King position with just his strength, a position that normally would require intelligence as well as being the strongest in terms of force. Such a man was now in a half-dead state.

“Well. The world is indeed wide.”

The Mercenary King’s body was screaming, but he stood up. The great sword specially made so that only the Mercenary King could wield it was cut. It was cut even though he had seriously imbued it with aura. Balik wasn’t a transcendent being, but he was a monster who could draw even against transcendent beings with his tremendous strength, toughness, sense, and mental fortitude. Yet now his whole body was screaming in pain and even his great sword was broken. This great sword was the only one of its kind in this world, made of special metal to not break even against a transcendent being’s Aura Blade.

In other words, it showed just how insanely strong the attacker, the crazy woman, was.

But

Mercenary King Balik stood up.

He knew he couldn’t win.

He might be dumb, but he wasn’t so stupid that he couldn’t recognize reality. Rather, being a genius in combat sense, he could gauge the opponent’s capabilities more accurately than anyone else.

“Let me select the hero. Then I’ll just leave.”
“No!!!!!!!”

It wasn’t because of a sense of duty that he should decide fairly since he was sitting in the position of ‘Hero Selector’. He had absolutely no sense of responsibility for the position of ‘Hero Selector’ to consider such things. He could tell just from the reactions of the officials who entrusted him with this task that this position of ‘Hero Selector’ was created by the empire in a hurry to clean things up. He might be dumb, but he wasn’t an idiot when it came to intuition.

Therefore

The reason he’s saying no

At this moment

Wasn’t for any grand reason.

“You crazy bitch. Do you know what I hate most in this world?”
“I don’t know.”
“Right, you wouldn’t know. I’ll tell you specially. It’s people like you with arrogant eyes thinking the world revolves around you because you’re strong. That’s why I’m in a very good mood right now. I might be weaker than you, but at this moment, I can ruin your mood more than anyone else, can’t I?”
“Even if you die for it?”
“Kuk kuk. If you’ve become a man, you should know how to stubbornly stick to your guns till the end.”
“…Are you crazy?”
“Kuk kuk kuk kuk. To say that to me so openly. It’s the first time since Brother ‘Jade’.”
“What…?”
“……?”
“……?”
“……?”

For a while, an awkward silence that was hard to explain began to dominate the space.