The Hero’s Disciple Has Returned

For example,

If a person finds a fallen man and helps him. Then it turns out that the man had information that could save the country from crisis, and by returning to the royal palace and reporting on that information, he saved the country from crisis. In this case, couldn’t we say that the person who helped the fallen man saved the country? If that person hadn’t been there, the man would have died, and the country would have likely fallen into crisis and been ruined, right? Then it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that person achieved the great deed of saving the country.

Therefore,

The person who rekindled the will to save the world in a hero who had completely lost the desire to save the world due to despair?

That person too

Could be seen as having achieved the great deed of saving the world, couldn’t they?

Therefore,

How would Jade appear in the eyes of Riel, who sees a completely different world as the ‘Elf of Blessing’?

‘He’s light itself.’

Although Riel had been forced to see many diverse things, even she had never seen anything like this in her long life. She had never seen this in the saints and holy women that humans consider so great, nor in the elders that elves respect and follow so much.

Never before.

Such a beautiful light

Such a beautiful sight

No matter how much longer she might live

The only one who could show such a thing

Was the human man before her eyes

Riel couldn’t help but be certain of this.

It was that special and that beautiful.

The karma that the man named Jade possessed was that special.

‘To think there would come a day when I’d be glad to have this ‘curse’…’

It’s amazing.

At this moment, Riel is sincerely thinking that she’s glad to be the ‘Elf of Blessing’. Riel couldn’t help but be bewildered by the fact that she was sincerely feeling grateful for being able to see this sight thanks to being the ‘Elf of Blessing’, even though it was happening inside herself.

For a lifetime

For a long time

She had lived cursing the fact that she was the ‘Elf of Blessing’.

She had lived resenting the World Tree, her parent, for giving her this unwanted power as a special blessing.

And now

At this moment

She was feeling joy.

About the fact that she was the ‘Elf of Blessing’

How absurd is this?

But that’s how beautiful Jade’s specialness was.

To the point of cowardice, to the point of thinking it’s too much, to the point of shaking one’s head saying it’s unreasonable, but one has to accept it. Because it was too beautiful to deny. Jade’s specialness, the light of his soul, was too precious to waste time denying…

It was too sacred.

To the point that she, the ‘Elf of Blessing’, felt blessed at this moment.

♧♧♧

Self-proclaimed ‘Lucky Elf’ Riel

Sera knew that her true identity was the ‘Elf of Blessing’.

Of course she knew, having accepted her as a companion many times in her long life. But that fact wasn’t particularly good for Riel. It couldn’t be good. Because Sera had never given Riel a satisfactory result.

The reason Riel became a companion of Sera, the hero, was simple. It was because of the expectation that she might give meaning to the ‘curse’ she had. But Sera had never properly answered that expectation.

Riel’s ‘curse’

The ‘special eyes’ she gained from becoming the ‘Elf of Blessing’ were the true nature of the curse. To bestow the necessary blessing on someone, you need to know that person. But the World Tree gave Riel too strong a power. As a result, she no longer needed to do that. She became able to bestow the necessary blessing on someone just by looking at them. The problem was that as a result, the world she saw became too special.

No matter how excellent a brain is, if it lacks the function of forgetting and can’t apply brakes, it can never be considered good. It’s just ‘hell’s torment’ and a ‘curse’. And it was the same for Riel. Because it was too special, it was ‘hell’s torment’ and a ‘curse’ for her. Because of this, she was in pain even among elves, and in pain even when she left the elves.

No matter how long a life she lived

No matter how much she wandered

No matter how many special souls she met

She couldn’t escape that ‘hell’s torment’.

So she had no choice but to place her final hope in the hero.

And Sera, the hero, could only give her disappointment and despair each time. Yet Riel always stood by Sera’s side with her bow. Saying that she didn’t like leaving everything to a young human girl.

‘Maybe if it’s Master… No, that won’t do. Maybe Master’s soul could save Riel, but no matter what, it’s not right.’

She thought that the Riel she knew wouldn’t particularly have ‘any feelings’ for a human man, but that’s unknown. She might develop ‘some feelings’. Isn’t Sera herself the very proof of that? She had been certain that she would never accept anyone else into her heart again, that no one would be able to have any influence on her.

Until she met Jade.

But after meeting Jade, everything changed.

Literally, the world changed.

She accepted one person into her heart more than anyone else, and was always full of thoughts and feelings about that person. She had completely changed. Because of one man named Jade. He changed a person who had despaired of everything and given up on everything. And ‘there’s no guarantee or certainty that this will only happen to me.’

In other words, this person named Jade can cause what happened to Sera to happen to someone else. That possibility, that special ability (or should it be called talent) cannot be considered to only happen to Sera.

Because Jade is an amazing person.

That amazing person can accomplish anything.

He might be able to create such a miracle even for an elf who has wandered and despaired for a long life.

No, he will be able to.

Because Jade is an amazing person!

‘…Yeah, I definitely shouldn’t let them meet.’

Sera decided that.

But

No matter if she’s a hero

As long as she’s human, things in the world don’t go as planned.

♤♤♤

What is this elf saying?

“I’ll specially bestow luck on you. Because I’m the ‘Lucky Elf’!”
“…No, I’m fine.”
“I’m doing it specially because you’re my life-saving benefactor!”
“…I said I’m fine. Just go.”

I don’t want to receive luck from someone who doesn’t look like a ‘Lucky Elf’ at all.

I said I’m fine, so go

I don’t want to get involved with an elf and suffer for my entire life!

Even if things in the world don’t go as planned, why does it have to be involvement with an elf…

♧♧♧

“So you’re saying you’re not the ‘Lucky Elf’, but the ‘Elf of Blessing’?”
“…Yes.”

In the end, Riel revealed the truth to Jade.

Because it seemed like this stubbornly stuck situation wouldn’t resolve at all otherwise.

“Do elves lie too?”
“…Everyone just tries not to, but it’s not that we can’t.”

Riel wanted to insist to the end somehow because she felt bad about breaking the fixed idea that ‘elves don’t lie’, but Jade wasn’t an easy man. The instinct of Riel, who had lived a long life, was screaming that to change this man’s mind, she had to pay an appropriate price, so Riel followed that.

The fixed idea that ‘elves don’t lie’ was useful in many ways, so Riel didn’t want to lose it, but unfortunately, it was Riel who was in a hurry to give a blessing, not the other side. Therefore, Riel had no choice but to give up a very useful means herself.

“So if I receive your blessing, it will be good for me?”
“Yes! Of course! Very good!”
“It’s not something like you’re the ‘Unlucky Elf’ and you gain luck by giving misfortune to others?”
“……”

For a moment, Riel couldn’t help but sincerely think, ‘Should I just not do it?’

“You lied once, so you could lie twice, right?”
“Have you been deceived a lot?”
“Yeah, I’ve been deceived a lot, you know?”

How harsh is mercenary work… Literally, it was an industry of deceiving and being deceived. Since Jade wasn’t an excellent mercenary from the start, he had to be deceived a lot. Of course, after becoming a veteran, he became the one who deceived others diligently. Therefore, for Jade, suspicion was a daily occurrence and no different from a survival skill. If it had been Sera, it wouldn’t have been like this, but since the one in front of him wasn’t Sera, it was inevitable that his suspicion disease would activate.

“……”

Riel looked at Jade with a truly sour expression.