The Porter Has No Interest in the Hero’s Party

Upon arriving at the village, we each moved to do what we wanted without anyone saying who should go first. Lena took out her sleeping bag from her bag and ran upstairs to her room, and Ashuria rummaged through her luggage, taking out and kneading a small bag. Her satisfied smile seemed more gloomy than usual, so I avoided her gaze and looked at Mille.

Mille pointed to a salad on the inn’s menu and said:

“I’ll eat here!”

Ashuria, grinning widely, grabbed the hero’s arm and dragged him outside. I sat across from Mille and ordered the same salad, saying:

“You worked hard this time too, Miss Mille.”

“Huh? No! Killing demons is a good thing. I think it’s something elves should naturally do.”

“Still, isn’t the journey too hard or tiring for you? I heard that elves can’t travel long distances.”

Mille widened her eyes at my words, then smiled and shook her head. When she wasn’t killing people or hunting prey, Mille was a really nice woman. I hoped that the man who would take her would also be a good person.

“Huh? Why can’t we? That’s a misunderstanding. It’s not that elves can’t travel long distances. It’s that people around them can’t tolerate elves long enough for long-distance travel.”

“I’ve never met any elves other than you, Miss Mille, so I don’t know. Are other elves a bit different from you?”

Hearing my question, Mille nodded. She still had a smiling face, and bowls of salad pushed between us like the tide. There were a few pieces of dry meat on leaves that had just been roughly turned over in soil, but Mille took a bite of the leaves and said:

“Haven’t you heard that all elves are crazy?”

I was chewing on bland leaves and couldn’t respond to the suddenly incoming question, so I let out a fake cough. I gulped down the water in my cup and looked at Mille again, and she was slightly narrowing her brow, looking at her salad bowl.

“It would be a lie to say I haven’t heard it. I’ve heard it many times.”

“That’s right.”

Mille said this in a calm tone. I was a bit taken aback by her statement and carefully said:

“It’s not good to disparage yourself too much.”

“Huh? I’m not disparaging myself. It’s true. Elves congenitally can’t empathize with others. Being a long-lived species, if we shared too many emotions with others, it would become difficult to live, so it seems we’re born with our emotions suppressed. That’s why elves usually live together with just elves.”

Mille was a very good elf, but she seemed unable to forgive this salad. She poked the salad with her fork, glanced at the kitchen, then turned her head back.

“But Miss Mille, you’re so emotionally rich, aren’t you?”

“Yes. I was an oddity even among elves. During cultural hours when we read human literature, I was the only one who cried because the content was too sad.”

“Making Miss Mille cry, it must have been a very sad story.”

“Yes. That’s right. It was a very sad story. I still remember it. It was a story about a man and a girl who promised to bring her flowers, but the man gets killed by a thief while carrying the flowers, and the girl turns to stone while waiting for him.”

It was a tragic story. Just talking about it seemed to tear at her heart, as Mille sniffled and breathed heavily. I said:

“How’s the current journey for you? There must be basic cultural differences between elves and humans, isn’t it uncomfortable?”

She wiped her tears with her sleeve, then shook her head at me and said:

“Huh? It’s fine. Our party members all seem to have similar tendencies to me, so I actually like it. I hope we can continue traveling together!”

The mention of having a similar tendency to Mille made me chuckle involuntarily. I laughed and nodded.

“I also want to continue traveling. It’s touching that Miss Mille had the same thought.”

Mille nodded with a bright smile.

“Hehe. This is the first time I’ve opened up like this. Actually, this is my first journey.”

“Is that so? Your performance so far has been that of a veteran among veterans.”

“It could be called experience and maturity. I was the number one hunter in the elven forest. Was I that cool?”

“You were more excellent than any archer I’ve seen in the empire.”

“Right?”

“Yes.”

We smiled brightly like an old couple with the skinny, tasteless salad between us, then without saying who first, we both looked at the kitchen.

The aging chef, who was yawning, saw us throwing glances and nodded, saying:

“What are you looking at?”

Before I could say anything, the salad bowl flew past my shoulder towards the kitchen. It passed between the armpits of the chef who was leaning vacantly against the kitchen shelf and crashed into the kitchen wall with a heavy bursting sound.

The chef turned his head inadvertently, then realized he had almost died and his face turned pale. I burst into laughter again looking at Mille, and Mille responded to my smile with a broad smile, saying:

“The salad doesn’t taste good.”

Ashuria.

As a member of the church, she was always a woman who followed God’s will, judging the wicked and praying.

“Hero. Let me tell you a story passed down in the scriptures.”

“Um, okay.”

The hero and Ashuria were now alone in a dark room. Sunlight from the hole in the roof was shining on Ashuria like a spotlight, and the hero was awkwardly standing in the round room with nowhere to sit.

The hero thought this room looked like a bell.

“Once upon a time. A man died and went to the afterlife. In the afterlife, there was a very tall ladder, and an angel was guarding it. The man asked, ‘What is this ladder?’ Then the angel answered, ‘It’s the ladder to heaven. Please proceed by writing your sins on each rung of the ladder with the chalk here. The less sins you have, the shorter the ladder becomes.'”

Ashuria continued speaking and took out the pouch she had brought. It seemed a bit heavier than what she had bought in the market, but she thought her sins made even this weight feel heavy.

“So the man climbed up the ladder. Although he thought he had lived without committing sins, he found that his sins were endless as he climbed. After climbing for some time, the man discovered a saint coming down the ladder from the opposite side. The man exclaimed with excitement, ‘Oh Saint! Are you coming down from heaven to save people?'”

Ashuria took out a rope from the pouch. It was much rougher and heavier than what she had bought, and there were no handcuffs. Ashuria tilted her head, but she couldn’t back down now. She hung the rope on a ring hanging in the air and skillfully tied the rope to make a handcuff shape.

Then she put her wrist through the gap and pulled the end with her mouth, tightening it.

“Ashuria?”

The hero didn’t understand what meaning there was in Ashuria tying herself. Ashuria didn’t answer the hero’s question but asked back:

“Hero. Do you know what the saint answered?”

The hero was naive, but not stupid. He knew that the current situation was going somewhat strangely. The hero awkwardly shook his head and said:

“W-well?”

Ashuria smiled and said:

“He said he ran out of chalk and was going to get more.”

“Haha… Huh?”

The hero laughed, gauging Ashuria’s reaction to her joke. He didn’t know if this was meant to be laughed at. Ashuria confirmed that her arms were firmly tied, then used her feet to push the pouch towards the hero.

“From this story, we can see that everyone commits sins while living, and those sins accumulate without us noticing. Even the ancient saints, great people, lived repenting of their sins. It’s only natural that I, who am inferior to them, need a harsh path of atonement that they couldn’t walk.”

“Ashuria. You don’t need to lower yourself like that. So…”

Ashuria shook her head. The hero glanced at the pouch, and Ashuria seductively revealed her thighs between the folds of her skirt and said:

“Hero. It’s because it’s you, not someone else, that I can ask this. As a religious person, I cannot tolerate people with dark and evil desires harming my body. But penance is an act that a religious person must go through. Hero. If you, the faithful and righteous hero, help me with my penance, I could ask for nothing more.”

“P-penance…?”

Ashuria, her face turned bright red, panted. She was barely restraining herself, but the very fact of atoning with the hero was exciting her.

Warm sunlight was embracing her as if God was bestowing a blessing. In the bright light, Ashuria said:

“Hero. Please take out the items there and use them on me.”

Scented candles and a specially purchased beginner’s whip. A healthy gag to block screams.

These were products she had prepared with great care for the hero who was not yet accustomed to such play.

Pain is love. Love is a form of atonement, a faith.

Therefore, the hero’s act of inflicting pain on her was love and faith.

Ashuria trembled, anticipating the violent love that would come to her.

“Ashuria. I, I don’t want to hurt my party member. This kind of thing…”

The hero said hesitantly. Each time the hero showed reluctance, Ashuria spoke with a stronger tone:

“Hero. Please give me a chance for atonement. Didn’t you say you would do anything for a comrade? For me, that time is now.”

The hero had no response to her logic.

“B-but…”

Moisture grazed his hesitant eyes. Even that sight was lovely to Ashuria.

“It’s okay, Hero. I have prepared something for beginners, so please open the bag quickly.”

The hero was weak to requests. He couldn’t refuse when a comrade said they wanted something.

“Ah, alright, Ashuria. I’ll… I’ll try.”

The hero reluctantly stretched his hand to the floor, and Ashuria looked at him with a face full of anticipation.

The sound of heavy breathing echoed blatantly, and the hero carefully opened the pouch, then looked back at Ashuria.

“D-do I use this?”

“It’s okay. That’s something to be used lit.”

The hero carefully opened the bag and took out the contents.

Needles.

Countless needles were shining, reflecting the sunlight.

They looked like sewing needles at first glance, but upon closer inspection, they had grooves in a reverse hook shape, meaning that once they pierced flesh, they would tear out pieces of flesh. Seeing the form optimized for pain, Ashuria shook her head and muttered:

“This isn’t what I bought…”

The hero was surprised to check the detailed form of the needles, and he was so shocked by the hardcore atonement method of having to stab Ashuria with those needles that he dropped the entire bag. Needles rolled on the floor, and Ashuria hung in the air like a saint’s shroud.

The hero shook his head and said:

“S-sorry, Ashuria. I-I can’t do it after all. Hurting a comrade. I, I can’t do such a thing.”

“H-hero! I-it’s not about hurting! And I didn’t prepare those items! I think there’s a misunderstanding! I, I don’t need needles like those, and if you just whip me with a whip…”

“N-no, it’s okay! I’m sorry, Ashuria! I-I think it’s too early for me!”

The hero screamed and ran out of the room.

The sound of the door closing was heard, and only Ashuria remained in the room.

Ironically, a cloud that had just come by covered the sunshine, and a heavy darkness filled the room.

Ashuria, who was hanging in the air all alone, sighed deeply, untied the rope herself, and came down.

Not knowing why the bag had been swapped, she scratched her head and clicked her tongue.