Chapter 2: Escape from Melgen
‘I'm leaving Melgen now!’
A bright-faced Roan.
A declaration that was anything but.
All 10 members of the community dropped their jaws.
Among them, Melberick's reaction was slightly different.
‘He's escaping?’
He hadn't said escape, but that was how it felt to him.
‘How dare he… I fed him, gave him a roof, even turned a blind eye to all that doomsday talk… and this is how he stabs me in the back?’
He must have understood it as an escape because something struck a nerve.
In reality, Melberick had never once fed or housed him—but that seemed to have been completely forgotten, and he seethed with nothing but a sense of betrayal.
Still, he didn't let that show.
‘Cheeky as he is… I can't let him go. There's no one with strength like his.’
Because he couldn't afford to lose his finest worker—one who did the labor of 10 people all by himself.
Melberick put on a smile and approached Roan.
"Del Roan. I suppose you've come of age and gotten a lot of ideas in your head. But you'd do well to think carefully. The outside is a far colder place than you'd imagine."
"Yes! I'll be fine! I'm prepared for it!"
"You have no money, and you haven't learned much, have you? Life among us can be a happy one too."
"Even without money, even without learning, there are things I can do! That's what I've been working so hard for all this time!"
He doesn't back down.
He fires back a rebuttal to every single word.
After repeating himself more than 10 times, the corner of Melberick's mouth twisted upward.
It meant he was annoyed.
"Del Roan. Why are you suddenly trying to leave when things have been going fine? After everything we've done for you."
"That—!"
Roan's smiling face vanished in an instant.
"That's not right. Mr. Melberick."
"…Huh?"
The air turned cold in an instant.
When a person who usually smiles stops smiling, the gravity of the moment is amplified.
It was something Roan had discovered unintentionally in his previous life, and Del Roan was now putting it to good use.
"You didn't make any improvements because you were relying on my strength. If you had just researched how to use mana, you could have built a Melgen that ran perfectly fine without me."
"That's… because I was certain you wouldn't leave—"
"That's no excuse, Mr. Melberick. If you worked someone with grain-mixed meals and creek water, pushed them to keep going without pay even after all the work was done, and had them hunt down monsters outside to make up for the food that wasn't enough on its own—"
‘—You should have anticipated that the arrow would come back around eventually.’
"Wh-what. Where is this coming from. You weren't like this. Just yesterday you were all smiles, so why…"
"Because I've tasted all the bitterness the world has to offer. Right here in Melgen."
Actually, Melgen wasn’t the only place where I tasted bitterness.
"Even so! We’ve lived together all this time — there’s still some bond between us, right? And I also feel sorry for the man who treated me well."
Roan shifted his expression again and smiled as he looked toward someone.
It was a member of the community who had treated him warmly.
"So let me do one last thing for you."
"A last… thing? You mean you'll lend a hand one last time?"
"No? If I say I'll lend a hand, you'll work me for a few more months. I need to get moving soon, so that won't do."
Having cut it off cleanly, Roan pointed toward the entrance of the village.
The entrance to Melgen, a dirt path with stones scattered unevenly across it.
On a shabby, crooked sign were the words: "Welcome to Melgen!"
"In 30 minutes, a monster will come to this place."
"A… a monster?"
"Not just any monster—an enormous monster that could smash a place like Melgen to pieces in an instant."
"What… what are you talking about. Are you cursing us because you're unhappy with me?"
"No!"
Roan remembered it exactly.
That monster that had come back then.
Dealing with it through sheer force by chance had been the starting point of his journey—so even as all other things remained as blurry memories, this alone was vivid and clear.
Leaving Melberick behind as he continued to shout things like doomsday cultist and whatnot, Roan took up his position to wait.
Flicking the wooden sword at his hip as he did.
And then 20 minutes passed.
The moment exactly 20 minutes were up, a rumbling vibration began to be felt.
"Wh-what."
"It's searching."
"For… what?"
"I wouldn't know! How am I supposed to know what a monster is thinking?"
He stood up and patted the dirt off his rear.
Del Roan was the only one calm while everyone else had shrunk back.
Then, 29 minutes.
In the distance, at the far end of the road, the silhouette of a monster began to faintly appear.
30 minutes.
―ROOOOAAAR!!!!
"Huh, h-huwaaah!!"
"Kyaaah!!"
"R-run!!"
Having closed the gap in a mere 1 minute, the monster revealed its full form.
The hot breath it blew set the surrounding plants smoldering.
Each stomp it took carried enough force to gouge the dirt and shatter stone.
The eyes that glinted from between tufts of fur rolled wildly as they fixed on 1 spot.
The entrance to Melgen.
Those were the eyes of a creature that saw the 10 humans, Del Roan included, as prey.
"It's a…"
A villager who had interacted with a few other towns at least murmured.
"A Magma Boar…"
A beast-type monster that radiated its boiling body heat outward as ambient warmth.
Perhaps seeing it up close made the oppressive pressure something else entirely—at the monster's appearance, everyone's feet were frozen to the spot.
But.
The one person who had foreseen it was calm.
Close enough to feel the heat.
Only then did he finally raise the wooden sword and wooden shield.
"W-wait… you, the wooden sword—"
Someone cried out.
There was no time to say more.
Because Roan swung it without hesitation.
―CRACK!!
The sound of something bursting.
Grrnnngh…
The sound of being pushed back.
―Squeal!
The sound of the monster pouring in more force.
Roan was at the center of all of it.
The man who had first spoken the name stood frozen.
A beast that even a decent mercenary band or group of adventurers would have to break a sweat just to engage.
Its stomps and charges killed the courage of knights, and its dense hide and radiating heat withered the arrogance of mages.
And right now, that monster was being pushed back by nothing more than a wooden sword.
And not just any wooden sword—a crude one whittled from a tree out front, at that!
"This… can't be…"
The one standing with his jaw hanging open, trembling, was none other than Melberick.
The very man who, just a moment ago, hadn't believed Roan and had been about to flee.
‘It's being blocked by a wooden sword? No… he's actually pushing it back…?’
His legs gave out beneath him.
An unbelievable sight.
Roan's words—let me do 1 last thing for you—felt like a slap across the face.
And during all of it, not a single one of them—Melberick included—took any damage.
The shockwave of the charge and the heat.
None of it was managing to break through the young man standing before them.
Grnnnd…
Roan, who had been pushing back with just a little more force, raised his free hand.
And then—
KABOOM!!!!
He brought that fist crashing down and silenced the Magma Boar in an instant.
The force and the wind pressure startled every tree nearby into dropping its leaves.
The Magma Boar had been silenced in an instant.
In the hush that settled over the entrance of Melgen—
"Tsk, I really am lacking in killing power. I need to find my friends soon."
Roan, who had been muttering to himself, turned his gaze toward the people.
"Well, I'll be off then!"
"Uh… uhh…"
"Don't cry just because I'm gone! Make use of mana and live well!"
"Uh… uhh…"
Leaving a completely deflated Melberick behind, Roan departed from Melgen.
And then, Melberick—who had been staring dumbly at his retreating figure—came back to his senses belatedly.
"…Damn it all. I took him in and raised him, and this is the betrayal I get? Fine, let's see how well you do out there. No money, no information, and whatever training you did, you only did it here. Drop dead in a ditch somewhere."
Ptoo.
He spat once into the overgrown tangle of weeds, then turned his gaze.
It was the house where Roan had lived alone.
‘Tch, let me see if there's anything worth selling inside.’
With the thought of squeezing out one last use, he opened the door to Roan's room.
―BANG!!
He took out his frustration on the door that swung open loosely, just like his personality.
And then—
FWHOOOOSH!!
"Uwaaah!!"
Something inside the room that had been rattled by the gust came toppling down and buried Melberick.
Once he managed to collect himself, Melberick checked what it was.
"…Newspapers?"
Newspapers that had been stacked almost to the ceiling.
Looking closely, several lines in them had circles drawn around them.
[Debbie Jane Raises the Level of Fire Magic Once Again…]
[The Appearance of Heretics?]
[The Order Gathers Clergy for Volunteer Work…]
[Investigating What is Known About Swordsmanship]
"…What in the world is this."
It was there—continent-wide information gathered on a scale that was almost obsessive.
***
The moment the villagers disappeared from sight, Roan dropped his smile and reviewed the battle he had just fought.
‘Back then, I ended it vaguely with punches too. It played out exactly the same way.’
He had faced the same monster and finished it even more cleanly than that time.
And yet what filled his head wasn't pride—it was disappointment.
Why?
Truthfully, he already knew the reason.
‘I have no killing power. After fighting dragons and demons back to back, I faced something like that and still couldn't finish it cleanly.’
Roan assessed the reason coldly—but what mattered most wasn't quite there.
‘I'm lonely…!’
This was the biggest reason, as far as he was concerned.
The 6 comrades he had shared hardship with under that ashen sky.
Without the ones he had grown close to through fighting and making up, nothing he did had any flavor to it.
‘Guarding in itself still feels awkward too…’
After weighing all those reasons, his next destination settled itself naturally.
‘Let's go to the Mage Tower.’
To find Debbie Jane—the first expedition member to reveal herself.
‘It was near Bebelhon. Accounting for carriage fare and the Mage Tower entrance fee…’
At least 30 silver leaves.
And what came out of Roan's pocket?
Clink.
2 silver leaves.
He then looked over his own attire.
The worn-out clothes he had worn in Melgen and the wooden sword crudely whittled from a tree.
Even at a glance, an appearance that would invite contempt.
‘If Jane still has the same personality as she did back then…’
He imagined what would happen when he met Debbie Jane dressed like this.
‘Ew, you're filthy.’
‘What! Jane! You don't remember me? It's me! Me!’
‘That kind of con doesn't work on me. There's a strange person here, throw him out.’
…The sequence wasn't hard to deduce.
‘First, let's get some equipment.’
Change of plans.
Roan's footsteps began treading the road without hesitation.
‘Piolo was nearby. I can earn some money there and get equipment sorted.’
It couldn't compare to what his comrade the blacksmith had made for him, but what mattered was an appearance that wouldn't put him at a disadvantage.
Having finished his thoughts, Roan urged his steps forward.
A dirt path stretching straight ahead on one road.
No risk of losing his way.
***
Roan, having quickened his pace and nearly arrived at Piolo.
The scenery of Piolo already coming into view stirred his memories.
‘It looks the same. Buildings lined up along the main road.’
One single large road.
Buildings lined on either side of it.
A village with a structure so simple it bordered on monotonous—and for that very reason, its collapse had come all the faster.
‘Let me stop thinking about the past. The more I do, the more my mood sinks.’
Look straight ahead and move forward.
Roan, resolved with firm determination, lifted his foot—
Thud!
"Hold on, halt right there. We're collecting a road toll. It is a procedure for the prosperity of the kingdom, so please comply."
…Just as he was about to take that step, he was blocked by a guard.