Crash!

The thugs were hurled in all directions, slamming into walls and rolling across the tavern floor. Startled patrons jumped from their seats and backed toward the walls.

“W-Wait…!”

One of the brutes reached out a hand as if begging for mercy, only for Clay to grab his wrist and twist it in a direction it was never meant to go.

“Gyaaaaaaa!”

“Painful, is it?”

Clay looked down at him with cold pity.

“You must’ve known this would happen eventually. So why cause such a scene?”

“I-I didn’t know! I didn’t knooooow!”

“What?”

Clay’s grip on his wrist tightened.

“Gyaaaaaaaagh!”

“There’s a limit to arrogance.”

There had been those in the past who overestimated their strength. But the man in Clay’s grip now didn’t even possess the strength to justify his swagger.

“Just another idiot who only knows how to shout and bully.”

Clay’s face twisted in distaste.

“And you’ll pay the price for it.”

“W-Wait, please wai— GRAAAAH!”

Without hesitation, Clay snapped the man's arm entirely. As the brute let out a scream bordering on death, Clay released him and turned his gaze to the remaining thugs.

“How many others like you are out there?”

“W-What?”

“If you know anyone else, spill everything.”

Now was the perfect time to clean house.

At his words, the thugs gulped. Terrified, they clearly had no loyalty to those who weren’t present.

“I-I’ll tell you everything!”

“There aren’t that many we know of, but…”

After hearing their names and locations, Clay gave a nod.

“Good. You can go now.”

“R-Really?”

“Yes.”

The brutes supported each other and stumbled out of the inn. As the other customers, who had been frozen in shock, witnessed the scene, they slowly began to speak up.

“W-What the hell, it’s over?”

“Those bastard punks acted all tough and got wrecked! Serves ’em right!”

“Damn, that was satisfying!”

Crude as it was, most people were supportive of Clay’s actions. But Clay himself showed no response to their praise.

“…Caused a scene, didn’t I?”

He paid the innkeeper for the broken furniture. Though the man vehemently tried to refuse, Clay didn’t take the money back.

Stepping outside with his group, he turned his gaze toward something.

“Over there.”

Clay began to walk.

Syltanaro realized immediately that he was headed toward the place the thugs had run off to.

“Let’s follow him.”

Naiad, peeking from Syltanaro’s arms, spoke quietly.

“Clay seems… different right now.”

Syltanaro nodded and quickly went after him.

♧

Foothills on the outskirts of Yaphenon.

In a hideout nestled in the mountains, a group of bandits were drinking and laughing.

“Man~ we’re raking in cash like crazy!”

“At this rate, we could live easy for a whole year!”

“Hah! Even if the country goes down twice more, we’ll be fine!”

Piles of treasure filled wooden boxes around them—all extorted from nearby villages under the guise of ‘protection fees.’

Yaphenon was currently undergoing a national reconstruction project. But only a month had passed since it began.

There were still places untouched by Neville’s reach, and public safety in those areas was fragile. These men had taken advantage of the chaos to line their own pockets.

“Keheh, wars won’t stop anytime soon. Plenty of work ahead for us.”

The one seated at the head of the table—the boss—grinned as he spoke.

“Back then, we had to be careful because of that Hero. He was scary.”

The Hero had never tolerated injustice. He had fought not only against the Demon King but also cleaned up scum like them across the land. If he’d seen this scene…

“They killed their own Hero and started a war? What a joke. But hey, works out great for us.”

With no one to stop them, they could run wild.

“But boss, didn’t the Hero become the Demon King? I don’t know if he was resurrected or what.”

“People say he’s not even a corpse.”

“Everyone who saw him swears he’s alive and kicking.”

As the Hero’s name came up, some of the underlings began to show unease. The boss barked back loudly.

“Hey! So what if he came back or became the Demon King?! Who cares?! Maybe back then we’d have worried, but now? He ain’t got nothing to do with us! If anything, he’s helping us! That makes him an ally, an ally!”

With that, he raised a bottle of liquor.

“So shut up and enjoy yourselves! The world’s working in our favor now! Let’s drink, eat, and have fun all we want—”

BANG!

The door to the hideout burst open.

“…Huh?”

Their party was interrupted, and the boss’s face twisted in irritation as he raised an eyebrow.

“B-Boss!”

It was the injured thugs who had returned. Each of them bore serious wounds, and one of them had already collapsed, unconscious, with a limp, mangled arm.

“What the hell is this?”

Sensing that something had gone terribly wrong, the boss demanded an explanation, irritation flaring in his voice.

“I-It was the Atana Faith!”

“Atana—what?”

“We mean the Atana Faith! Some follower of theirs attacked us and did this!”

The Atana Faith.

A religion that worshiped the ancient god Athanasia. It had been all but extinct until recently, yet somehow, its influence was rapidly growing in Yaphenon.

“You dumb shits got wrecked by some third-rate cultist?”

Faith only granted real power to nations like Krata. The idea that cowards from a barely revived religion had done this to them was beyond belief.

“Fuck that! Where are those bastards?! I’ll go show them what happens when you mess wi—”

“No need.”

A heavy voice cut through the room. Every bandit, including the boss, turned to face the sound.

A man stood there. Clad in a white robe, he could easily have been mistaken for a follower of Atana.

“…You?”

The boss muttered blankly, then quickly scowled and raised an eyebrow.

“So it’s you?”

He might not have known exactly who the man was, but it was clear this was the one who had destroyed his subordinates. The boss immediately grabbed the iron club beside him.

“You’re the Atana cultist? The one who did this to my men?”

“That’s right.”

“Hah!”

The boss let out a derisive laugh.

“You’ve got balls, asshole. You think you can just stroll in here like this?! Do you have any idea where you are?”

“Didn’t know I’d find this place so easily either,” the man in the robe said quietly, “But your men kindly guided me straight here. Didn’t even know I was following them.”

“You—!”

Furious that his men hadn’t looked back even once, the boss raised his club high.

“Fine! Beating the hell out of you will at least make me feel better! Let’s see how well that god of yours protects you!”

CLANG!

The iron club struck the robed figure’s shoulder head-on. It was a blow strong enough to make any normal man collapse in agony.

“……”

But strangely, the robed man didn’t move an inch.

“…?”

The boss stepped back, stunned.

“W-What the…?! What the hell are you wearing under that thing?!”

Unwilling to believe what just happened, the boss bared his teeth and yelled again.

“Quit messing around and DIE!”

He swung the club once more—

Clack.

The robed figure caught the weapon with one hand.

“Wh—?! Urgh! What the hell!”

The boss tried to wrench the club free, but it wouldn’t budge. It was as if the man’s grip had turned to steel.

“Let go, you bastard!”

The boss kicked upward, slamming his knee into the figure’s gut—

Thunk!

A dull thud. The sensation was wrong. Feeling something strange against his leg, the boss finally looked up into the hooded man’s face.

“…Done yet?”

Within the shadows of the hood, he saw red eyes. They didn’t seem human. But the boss recognized the face and turned pale.

“Y-You’re the Hero—Clay?!”

“Using that title now? That’s a bit outdated, don’t you think?”

The robe fell away as Clay crushed the iron club in his hand like paper.

“You must’ve made some money, but your weapons are garbage. This can’t even be called iron.”

“W-What are you?!”

The boss stumbled backward, shouting in panic.

“Why are you here?! What do you want?!”

“What I want?”

Clay smiled—and it was a broken smile, accompanied by a twisted, deranged laugh.

“Would’ve been nice if I did want something.”

“W-What?!”

“Maybe then people wouldn’t have taken me so lightly and left me like this.”

The smile vanished from Clay’s face.

“Yeah… I guess I’ve been too rational.”

“W-What the hell are you talking about, you crazy bastard?!”

“I think I understand now. Why the former Demon King acted like such a beast. Must’ve been easier that way. Maybe I should live a little easier too—use my head just enough to function.”

Clay stepped forward and grabbed the boss by the head.

“GAAH!”

The man flailed as Clay lifted him like a sack of potatoes. Then, after calmly observing his struggling form, Clay flung him sideways.

CRASH!

The boss smashed into a pile of treasure chests. Gold and jewels scattered across his body—the very loot he had hoarded.

“Y-You…!”

“Boss!”

The bandits recoiled in horror as their leader groaned, unable to rise.

Clay slowly walked toward him.

“How do you feel right now?”

“Ugh… guh…”

“I’d like to hear your answer.”

Clay crouched down and looked him in the eyes.

“How does it feel?”

“AAAAAAAH!”

The boss let out a scream and shouted at his men.

“What the hell are you doing?! Kill him already! Move your asses! You want to lose all this money?!”

The underlings had hesitated—but at the mention of money, their eyes turned red with rage. They had only followed the boss for wealth.

And now, they couldn’t afford to lose it.

They sprang to their feet, grabbed their weapons, and rushed at Clay.

“Umbra.”

Clay whispered.

“Pecus.”

A combination spell.

The shadows of the bandits began to rise, twisting and forming into the shapes of beasts.

“W-What the hell?!”

“What is this?!”

“GAAAAAH!”

The shadow beasts pounced and began devouring the very people they were connected to. Because they were made from their own shadows, the bandits couldn’t run away—they could only scream.

Clay watched in silence.

“Guh—gah…”

The boss, too, had his flesh torn by a shadow beast. As he looked up at Clay, it finally hit him.

This wasn’t the Hero he had once seen.

Clay had become something else entirely—a monster consumed by pain, surviving only by using power as a drug.

“A-A curse on you…”

He remembered the people of Donon, who had once said Clay had returned to save them.

He let out a dry laugh.

That thing wasn’t salvation. It was a catastrophe. A disaster buried deep in the abyss, wings torn off and fallen underground.

Squelch.

At that moment, the boss’s head was torn off by a shadow beast.

(End of Chapter)

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