With the help of the village head, we were able to rent a room at an inn, which was the only one in the village. After being introduced to some of the village representatives and having a brief explanation of the rules and regulations of the village and where not to go, I returned to the inn for the night …. and found a defenseless Tia in my room.
“Ah, it’s been ages!”
“Hey, hey, aren’t you a little too relaxed?”
I couldn’t help but giggle at Tia as she rolled around on my bed. But even as I pointed this out, Tia didn’t even get up, keeping her face buried in the pillow.
“It’s nice, It’s like coming home, it’s so calming. You see, the elven village I went to with Reil in the previous world was like. ……”
“Ah, well, We were busy back then.”
In the previous world, we had saved an elf village. But at that time, we were in the middle of running around the world to get assistance in defeating the Demon King, so we could not stay in the elf village for a long time.
In contrast, this time they have said they will investigate the cause, so there was no need to leave here in a hurry or get kicked out. Then there’s certainly no reason to stop Tia from enjoying …… the atmosphere…… of her hometown that she hadn’t experienced in a long time, even if it’s not strictly true.
“Hey Ed. Speaking of which, why did you say that?”
“That?”
“The Demon King. If it’s you, you would have known where the Demon King is right away, right? Then why didn’t you just go and defeat him?”
Tia looked up from her pillow and asked me curiously. But that question was exactly why I couldn’t help but smile again.
“Hey Tia, aren’t you forgetting the original guideline of action now that we’re able to defeat the Demon King? The condition for us to leave this world is not to defeat the Demon King, but to be exiled after joining the Hero’s party. If we easily defeat the Demon King by ourselves, how are we going to join the Hero’s party after that?”
“Oh, I see. Then what about the Demon King? Don’t tell me we’re not going to defeat him?”
“The plan for now is to casually meet with the Hero in this village under the guise of investigating the spirit tree, and then negotiate with the village head to have them accompany us on our journey to defeat the Demon King.”
“Heh. The opposite of the usual, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Up until now, we had always been a part of the Hero’s party. However, in this world, the Hero has not yet formed a party with anyone, nor are they aware that they are the Hero in the first place, nor did they engage in any activities that would be typical of the Hero.
Therefore, we need a plausible reason to ask them to accompany us on our journey.
“…… Are? But that’s something we can do in this timeline, right? What did you do before?”
“Hmmm? In the first round, it took me two months just to enter this village in the first place. I finally gained their trust and entered the village, but I had no idea why the spirit tree was like that, so I just stayed here for half a year and then got kicked out.”
“What? I don’t feel like there’s a single good thing about it.”
“I can’t help it! Looking back on it now, it’s not like I was able to do anything back then.”
This is the 62nd world. In other words, it was much earlier than the world of Reil. At that time, I had become reasonably strong, but of course I had no knowledge of pollution magic or the power of the Demon King, so there was really nothing I could do against the spirit tree that was wrapped in black ivy.
“I had a feeling that the Hero was here, so I tried to get into the village, but from the elves’ point of view, I was a suspicious person who persistently tried to enter the village without knowing why at a time when the spirit tree was in trouble. And when I did get into the village after a lot of effort, I couldn’t do anything about it because the Hero was just a child, and then even after desperately trying to get into the village, I did nothing but play around…. I had to deal with a lot of confusion and trouble. Well, I did get kicked out after six months, so I was able to return to the white world safely. …… Well, looking back, I can’t think of another world where I was forced to waste as much time aimlessly as here.”
“Hmmm. Isn’t that strange, A Demon King who hasn’t even been confirmed to exist, and a child Hero ……? From the way things have been going, shouldn’t the timing of our coming here be more like when the Demon King started rampaging and the child grew up to become a Warrior?”
“I don’t doubt that, but there’s a lot we don’t know about world travel, and more importantly, we don’t know how to find out.”
“Sure, we can guess from the trends we’ve seen so far, but there’s no way to know for sure. …”
I shrugged my shoulders and replied, and Tia buried her face in the pillow and muttered. I can’t help it, there’s nothing I can do. It was tempting to abandon my thoughts with words like that,…, but now that I’ve regained my memory as the Demon King, there’s something that’s stuck with me.
(I had accepted it carelessly so far, but now I look back and see that every time we had jumped, it was definitely a turning point in history. If so, is there something we should be interfering with at this time? Remember, remember …. what’s the difference between the first round and the second round now?)
I clawed desperately at my not-so-pleasant memories. I tried to recall not only the first round, but even the crappy memories before that, but there was only a margin of error difference there.
“Hah,, I don’t get it!”
When I scratched my head in frustration, Tia finally got up from the bed, took my hand, and patted my head lightly.
“Look, you shouldn’t be so rough with yourself, okay. We’ve only just arrived, so it’s fine. Tomorrow, when we go around the village, you will probably notice or remember something. Well, first, let’s go see this Baby Hero, shall we?”
“…… Hah, that’s right.”
I should have thought there was no need to be in a hurry, but unbeknownst to me, I was in a hurry myself. I was grateful to Tia for reminding me of this, and as I turned around, I slid my hand under Tia’s armpit and pulled her out of the bed.
“H-Hey!?”
“I’m just going to go to bed now that we’ve decided on tomorrow’s schedule of activities. So, Tia, go back to your room.”
“What? It’s already kind of a hassle. Can’t we sleep here together?”
“Of course not. They took the trouble to get us two rooms, so you should sleep in your own room.”
“Yes. Che, Ed, you are stingy.”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing? Good night.”
I laid down on my bed again as Tia, with her tongue sticking out, left the room, closing the door behind her. The comfortable warmth that remained there had me sound asleep in no time at all. …. And the next morning, after finishing breakfast, we started investigating the elven village as planned.
“This way?”
“Yes.”
The destination was a residential area. Because We were heading towards the place where outsiders are least likely to set foot and where people wouldn’t want me to go, we were looked at with suspicion many times. However, as we continued to walk, what I found there was just an ordinary house.
“I’m off!”
A boy of about 12 years old burst cheerfully out of the door of the house. He had reddish-bronze hair, which was unusual for an elf, and he was the Hero of this world ……..?
“Huh?”
“? What’s wrong Ed?”
“No. …… eh?”
Tia’s words drifted from right to left in my ears and disappeared. I continued to stare at the boy with that much concentration, but I could no longer hide my astonishment at his back as he moved away from me.
“No way, why ….!?”
The boy who was supposed to have been the Hero all this time. But I couldn’t feel the slightest sign of him being a Hero at all.