Nurturing the Hero to Avoid Death

When I enter the church, I notice the weak orange sunlight penetrating the vertical lattice windows on the left and right.

In the middle of the church are ten rows of wooden benches, each row containing multiple benches placed side by side.

No worshippers are currently inside the church. Just one old, petite nun with a candlestick in hand, lighting the other candles around the altar.

Noticing us enter, the nun—Marie— looks back at us.

When her gaze falls on me, her small eyes widen. “Oh my. Lian-sama…” Then grow even wider upon shifting toward Alfred beside me. “…and Al?”

Although Marie looks confused as she tilts her head to the side, she still flashes us a smile, cheeks rosy, wrinkles forming in the corners of her eyes.

Following that, Marie starts walking toward us. “What made the both of you visit the church this late… Huh…?” She stops right before Al. Frowns and looks at him, worry in her eyes. “What happened to you, Al? Why are you this muddy…”

Alfred simply glances down at the white bundle in his arms, not answering Marie’s question. He then takes a small, quiet breath and closes his eyes. After several seconds, he reopens them and turns to Marie. “…Marie.”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry, but can I ask for…a burial and a funeral prayer?” Alfred gently lifts the small white bundle so that Marie can see it better.

Marie stares at the white bundle before looking back up at Alfred with a questioning expression.

Marie’s confusion is no surprise.

The bundle looks too small to possibly contain a corpse. Implying that it does will only make people think they heard wrong.

Alfred heaves a small sigh, face tired. “This is all that’s left of the corpse. It’s been left exposed for too long, so… only the bones remain.”

“…So that’s it.” Marie nods, not questioning him any further. She then puts her hands together and prays for the white bundle.

After a while, Marie slowly opens her eyes again and shoots Alfred a gentle smile. “I understand, Al. I’ll fulfill your request and bury them. Can you tell me the name of this person who has passed away?”

Alfred lowers his head. Purses his mouth, looking like he’s suppressing something inside. But after a while, he stares at Marie, eyes reddened and pupils dark like the dusk and night, and slowly starts to say. “…Sunny Fram.”

Marie once again widens her small eyes after hearing that.

“Fram” is a rare surname.

In this village, only Alfred possesses that surname.

For the deceased person to have the same surname as Alfred can mean…

Before Marie can ask about it, Alfred continues, “…My father. I tried my best to search and gather all his bones, but… it’s possible that I might’ve missed some. Is that okay?”

Marie closes her mouth and silently nods. Her eyes have grown moist.

Afterward, she flashes Alfred a gentle, reassuring smile. “That won’t be a problem. The body is the vessel of the soul, the medium in which the soul is able to pass through this world. It’s only natural to send the soul off with a prayer of gratitude for finishing their role here in this world.”

Then Marie tells us to bury the remains while the sun is still up, before walking out the church ahead of us to lead the way.

We climb the gentle slope of a hill behind the church, reaching the peak.

Overlooking the village is the panoramic cemetery, where the villagers who have passed are laid to rest for eternity.

Alfred chooses to bury his father’s remains at the top of the green hill, which has the best view of the village. He climbs up the hill between the cemeteries.

Alfred sets the large shovel on the ground, which he took from the church and carried on his shoulder the entire trip up, and starts digging. I offer my help to Alfred, but he turns me down.

He tells me he wants to do it by himself.

And so, Marie and I wait by the side for him to finish digging. In the meantime, we pick some flowers to offer to his father.

Alfred places the white bundle and the flowers Marie and I collected inside the hole before covering the hole with the upturned soil he dug out. As he flattens the ground with the shovel, he begins to speak, “I found him deep inside the western forest.”

“Granny Herba’s two goats, a mother and her child, ran away, so I chased after them into the forest. Then… I found the bones by a small river and a big tree…”

I close my eyes, the memorable scene Alfred is describing popping into my mind.

Because this world is the same as the “Arcadia” I knew in the game, I’m already familiar with that place.

That’s right, I’ve already known about this event for a long time. Since I first arrived in this world, even.

All this time, I’ve known that Alfred’s father previously waited and waited, hoping for someone to find him in the depths of that forest where people rarely visit.

I know that… but I continue to pretend I don’t.

Up until now.

I thought I shouldn’t change the flow of the story.

If I change the main storyline so drastically, then the scenarios from the game will no longer happen.

If the storyline changes, I won’t know how the future’s going to turn out anymore. I may not be able to make an effective defense plan.

Without a long-term plan, I won’t know what to do. By then, who knows whether the village and I will be able to survive past the day of disaster?

I’m only an ordinary person and a mob character.

I’m not blessed with anything special. After all, Lian is only a small rival in the storyline. He has never experienced any lucky supernatural events. He doesn’t have any special power either.

So if I want to change the outcome of the day of disaster, I have to remain steady in building my plans. I carefully consider my every step.

Another thing: if I change the storyline and Alfred learns about some things earlier than in the original storyline, what if he finishes the events earlier than before?

Worst case scenario… the day when the demons attack this village will be brought forward too.

Thinking of this, I grow terribly anxious.

What if that really happens?

Many people will lose their lives. How horrible.

I know these are just baseless worries.

Maybe my fears are over-exaggerated. Maybe saving Alfred’s dad won’t really cause that big of a change in the story.

But there’s also no concrete proof that the storyline won’t change. I don’t know what will happen. If there’s a possibility that saving Alfred’s dad would create a butterfly effect and end up bringing the disaster forward to an earlier date, then… I’ll just leave things as they are. And so, I decided to keep this matter to myself. Follow the original plotline in the game until the day of the event arrives.

Until Alfred finds the corpse himself.

I turn a blind eye to the predicament of Alfred’s father, who waited for help for a very long, long time.

I turn a blind eye to Alfred’s suffering over the years as he longs for his father who will never return.

Just like that, I continue ‘lying’ to him all these years.

I constantly tell myself that this deception is necessary to prevent the story from changing.

So even though I know a lot of things, I’ve kept them to myself. I’ve never even tried to tell anyone.

I’m really a coward. A weak-minded, big liar. A horrible person.

That’s why, from the very start… I’m not qualified to have Alfred like me.

“He was lying down at the base of a big tree deep inside the forest when I found him. Half of his body was covered in soil.”

“Ah…”

Kneeling before the flattened grave, Marie puts her hands together in front of her chest and closes her eyes.

Alfred says, “He still has the remains of his jacket on him… as well as a lot of sword cuts. My father works as a courier, delivering things to various places. A robber probably attacked him or something on his way to deliver some items.”

“I see…”

That’s right.

Alfred’s father was heading far east for a delivery when a few bandits began to pursue him. As such, he fled into the wide expanse of forest land ahead of him.

It’s very profitable to deliver items to places outside the country, but accepting such deliveries also means that the courier will have to walk alongside danger and death every time he sets out.

The more unstable the situation is in the area, the greater the chance for the courier to experience bad luck.

To his misfortune, Alfred’s father had been one of the unlucky ones.

“On the other side of the small river, deeper still into the forest… I found some of my father’s travelling tools scattered around. They were pretty filled with scratches. I think he fled as far as he could from the bandits, but in the end… he exhausted all his strength and collapsed,” Alfred continues, sticking a cross made of white wood into the flattened soil, in the upper part of the grave he dug. Afterward, he straightens it.

His tone is awfully light.

I don’t know what Alfred’s feeling or thinking at all. He’s expressionless. Just like how he used to be.

I don’t know whether he feels sad or angry.

“I thought that maybe, he’s not my father. Maybe he’s some other courier. But… when I checked the corpse, he really is my father. I saw the amulet my mother and I made for him sewn inside his jacket. There’s also a ring on his ring finger, and it’s the same as my mother’s.”

“…I see.”

I place the autumn wildflowers that I picked onto the grave and rise to my feet next to Alfred.

“…My father’s just there all along, in a place so near me. And yet, I never noticed at all,” he says in a quiet voice. It’s as though he’s telling a confession.

I have no idea what to say to that.

Alfred sets aside the incense burner Marie brought and lights it up. He then also puts together his hands in front of his chest and closes his eyes, chanting the prayer for the dead in a gentle tone.

Alfred keeps his eyes closed until Marie has also finished her prayer.