Tale of the Fake Hero - Chapter 0

Chapter 0 – Prologue 一 Fake

Trigger Warning: This chapter contains descriptions of a child’s death.

“Once upon a time, my grandma told me a story…” A child’s voice faintly reached me.

Sheathing the Great Holy Sword, Aradamantel, I kneeled down beside him.

The child struggled to say, “When the abyss runs rampant in the world… the gods… send a hero…”

It was an uruk’s doing. It looked like a mace had crushed the boy’s spine. Even if he miraculously survived, he would never be able to walk again.

“You are that hero, right…?” the boy asked.

‘A hero, huh…?’ I bitterly shook my head. It was a forgotten term that could not exist in that land of tears that even the gods had abandoned.

“But… how did you…” The child looked over my shoulder to where the hundred or so corpses of the uruk’s advanced forces I had cut down were strewn about like trash.

“I did kill them,” I said, “but I’m a fake.”

“Fake…?”

The Warrior was supposed to be a being who could seal the abyss and bring forth the Age of Light during the Mythical Age. Unfortunately, I was unworthy of being chosen by the gods. Above all, the world was neither kind nor gentle enough for such beings to be born in every era.

“In the Church of the Light Dragon, fakes like me are called ‘Fake Warriors’,” I explained. As the name suggested, it literally meant I was a fake—an artificially-created hero and the crystallization of humankind’s desperate attempt to resist the cruelty of fate.

“It means I don’t have the power to give you what you want.” I couldn’t revive the dead. I couldn’t even split the sea with a single slash. All those feats were stories from the Mythical Age一stories of real heroes. I was a fake, after all.

“Then… then… they’ll continue to live as they please… without any punishment…?” the boy struggled to ask.

Killing, stealing, robbing… such actions were the norm for the abyss and its servants, taking precious lives from humanity. It was as if they despised the efforts of those who tried to live each day to the fullest.

“My mom, dad, grandma, brother, and everyone in the village are dead… still…” The child quietly began to cry.

He would soon be unable to breathe, so where could such sorrowful and desperate cries come from?

“I’m angry… in the end… there’s nothing I can do but cry…” he lamented.

I could see myself as a crying child over the boy’s sobbing form. Just like him, there was a time when the heavens took everything from me, and I could do nothing but cry as they cackled.

“If… if I also had some strength like you…”

What did he want? Did he want to live, or did he want to be comforted in his last moments? I couldn’t figure it out. Since I didn’t know, there was only one thing I could do for him…

“Whatever it is you wish… I probably won’t be able to perform unrealistic miracles.” I held the trembling hand he reached out to me as death approached. “I can promise you one thing, though…”

“…?”

“I will pay them back in kind for everything they did to you and your family.”

Very faintly and quietly, the boy’s rapid pulse I felt through our clasped hands faded and stopped.

“ …” I carefully put the child’s hand on the ground and let out a short sigh.

It was summer, the season when volcanic ash turned the world black. In that season, crows landed on the dead and feasted on their flesh.

That was when voices sounding like scraping metal rang out.

“Kisayka o tto shiem?”

“Olbera shi ge meruk.”

When I looked back, as I expected, I saw more uruks. Their armor clanged as they poured into the village, and the look in their eyes was different—anger at the one who killed their comrades and interest in such a strong opponent.

There was absolutely no sense of guilt for the people they had looted and killed.

Yes. They had always been like that.

Shhhhk—

The Great Holy Sword, Aradamantel, almost exploded out of its sheath as it leaked out a fierce red sword aura.

“Kishiro mao karedan da?!” one of them asked, warily wanting to know who I was.

I answered, “I am Kaisen Alter Aradamantel.”

Aradamantel was the name of my holy sword. My middle name, ‘Alter’, was an ancient word given to a Fake Warrior, meaning a proxy.

As such, my name was ‘Kaisen, the proxy wielder of Aradamantel’.

“I will kill you.”

My crude name and desperate cry were the destiny I created for myself on the day the sun and moon hid in fear while only the stars looked down at my tear-filled eyes in cruel laughter.

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