HRB 100

“I just want to live with you guys. That’s all I need.”

So he simply hoped that they could live as they had been, as usual.

Seeing the two of them look at him with surprise, wondering why Eddie was saying such things, Eddie suddenly thought of something and added, “Oh, right. There’s something I want to ask of you both.”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

Eddie smiled brightly at their obedient replies. “This is an order, get close to Ketron.”

If they were going to be by his side anyway, wouldn’t it be right for them to become friends?

He didn’t know if Ketron would want it or not, or rather, to be honest, Ketron probably wouldn’t want it and would show a rather reluctant reaction, but Eddie had a modest wish for Ketron to hang out with friends his own age(?).

…Considering the scene he saw at the end of Part 2, it seemed like the right thing to do.

Of course, the two of them, who would have nodded resolutely and said they understood even if Eddie had told them to bring back a dragon’s heart, frowned at those words.

***

That evening, Eddie spent the day as usual, acting like nothing was wrong, but he was so troubled that he kept sighing, so he went outside the inn for a while to clear his head.

As the exhilarating winter air filled his lungs, his head finally seemed to wake up, albeit forcibly.

Ah, I want a cigarette.

He wondered if it was a side effect or something.

In Irena, the capital, which was celebrating the end of the year, there was a huge snowman made of Sorcery in the central square. The faces of the people passing through the central square also reflected the happy atmosphere of the year-end.

People in the story who had overcome the crisis, no longer fearing the Demon King.

But the story was not over yet, the Demon King had been resurrected, and the world was facing a crisis again. If the news of the Demon King’s resurrection were to spread, those happy faces would disappear in an instant.

He came out because he felt suffocated, but somehow he felt even more suffocated.

He really wanted a cigarette. Eddie couldn’t understand why he was thinking about something he had briefly smoked in his early twenties when he didn’t know anything, and then quit. That’s how stuffy he felt.

The fact that he had to rely on the generosity of the story for the situation after the ending, the fact that he couldn’t fully accept Ketron’s feelings, the fact that he knew he wasn’t completely unrelated to this world and Lee Jeong-hoon, but he didn’t know how that was possible, what Arthur’s fake Holy Sword was, and what the resurrected Demon King’s next goal was, all made Eddie’s heart more complicated.

The most annoying thing was that he was just an ordinary person with no abilities, so nothing would change even if he worried about it.

No, if I was going to be possessed anyway, or be reborn, wouldn’t it be nice if I had some kind of ability, whether it’s Sorcery or swordsmanship? Of course, thank you for the convenience store.

Thinking of the convenience store, he also remembered that cigarettes were the single item with the most variety in the convenience store. If he really wanted to smoke, there were plenty of them at the convenience store, so he could go down and smoke, but he didn’t really want to.

“Why are you out here in the cold?”

After squatting for a while and thinking about such things, Ketron came out to find Eddie, as if he was worried.

It was an expected situation. Now, if Eddie wasn’t in sight, Ketron would always start looking for Eddie after a certain amount of time. This was also a familiar part of everyday life. Ketron being by Eddie’s side.

“Just… thinking.”

Looking at Ketron’s face, last night naturally came to mind. Perhaps because of the various things that had happened, he wasn’t embarrassed just by thinking about it anymore, but Eddie couldn’t stop his cheeks from feeling hot.

Eddie swallowed any words that came to mind.

“It’s almost New Year’s.”

Then it would be the second year since he came to this world, counting by years. It was still far from being a full year, but he had a vague feeling that everything would be over before it was a full year.

He was possessed in this world during a season when it was just getting cold, and now it was already the end of the year. Time was passing so quickly in this world and the other world.

“Come to think of it, when is Ket’s birthday?”

As he thought about the new year coming, he wondered when Ketron’s birthday was. It was information that had never appeared in the original story.

The main characters weren’t so emotional that they would celebrate each other’s birthdays, so there was no related information.

Besides, Ketron was the type who was a million light-years away from hinting around for people to celebrate his birthday.

Since it wasn’t a difficult question to answer, Ketron quickly replied.

“It’s January 1st.”

“I see… what?”

Eddie’s eyes widened at the date of January 1st and the fact that it was just a few days away.

“Because I’m an orphan.”

But Ketron didn’t seem to care much.

Ah, it seemed that because he was an orphan, his birthday was lumped together as January 1st. There wouldn’t be many orphans who knew the actual date they were born, and Ketron had also made January 1st his birthday as a child without a birthday.

Even so, a birthday is a birthday, and Eddie’s mind started racing.

How many days are left until January 1st? Not much time left? A little over a week left!

“No, why didn’t you say anything?”

Even as he said that, Eddie knew very well that Ketron wasn’t the type to go around telling people about his birthday.

He inwardly clicked his tongue.

“Is there anything you want for your birthday present?”

It would be nice if he could give him a surprise gift, but since there wasn’t much time to prepare, Eddie ended up having to ask him directly.

Of course, he didn’t expect Ketron to stare at him like that.

Eddie didn’t realize the meaning of that gaze for a while, but he belatedly realized what it meant.

Eddie’s face flushed red. Ketron sometimes launched surprise attacks like this.

“…You have to say something other than staying alive.”

“That’s all I want.”

He was quite skilled at saying such things now.

Eddie couldn’t say anything for a long time, just opening and closing his mouth. He hadn’t had many relationships, but he had had some, and no one had ever made his heart feel like it was going to explode like this.

Eddie, who couldn’t say anything for a long time and just breathed out, tapped his reddened cheeks and tried to calm his agitated heart.

And then he said in a determined tone.

“Okay, I understand.”

Of course, since there was no subject or anything, Ketron didn’t understand Eddie’s determined resolution.

“What do you understand?”

Eddie grinned mischievously at Ketron, who was looking at him with a puzzled expression.

He couldn’t tell him right away. Eddie’s philosophy was that gifts should be sudden and unexpected to be truly enjoyable.

He was the kind of person who was known as a weird Santa among his friends back in the day. He was so serious about surprise gifts that he always searched for ‘special’ gifts, refusing ordinary gifts, expecting his friends’ enthusiastic reactions.

Of course, Ketron didn’t know any of that.

After staring at Eddie’s face for a while, Ketron reached out his hand to Eddie, saying, “Then I’ll look forward to it.”

He’s really not looking forward to it at all.

Eddie took his hand with a sulky face, got up, and went back inside the inn.

It was a moment at the end of the year when he didn’t think he wouldn’t be able to give him a gift on his birthday.

***

Inside the Marquis Evans’ mansion, Marchioness Evans, who had come to visit her youngest daughter after a long time, asked with a stiff face.

“How long are you going to keep doing this?”

Marchioness Evans. She had fallen in love with Marquis Evans after having in-depth discussions about Sorcery when they were attending the Academy. It was a publicly known secret, but she was a more talented Magician than Marquis Evans.

She was smarter and more powerful.

She cherished her youngest daughter, who was the most like her among the children she had given birth to. Her personality and talent for Sorcery were especially similar to hers.

That’s why she couldn’t understand her daughter, who had been making foolish choices lately.

“The noble Hero chose another woman, not you. I really don’t understand what you’re thinking.”

Only a few close people knew that Boram and Arthur’s relationship was unusual. Logically, it would be hard to imagine that Arthur Fontaine, the Hero and Count Fontain, was having an affair with the daughter of Marquis Evans, who was his comrade, behind the Saintess, to whom he was engaged.

Even if Arthur visited her, it wouldn’t seem strange because they were comrades who had crossed the line of death together, even if the relationship between men and women was unusual. Besides, the Marquis Evans’ daughter, who always had a stern face, hardly showed any change in expression, so there was no sign of it.

But there was no way that Marchioness Evans, of all people, wouldn’t know that.

Wasn’t she her only daughter? She had always thought of her as the child who resembled her the most, who even had the same talent, and who would become great someday.

When she heard the news that she had become a comrade of the Hero and achieved the great feat of defeating the Demon King, she was delighted, thinking, ‘That’s my daughter!’

But when her daughter returned to her side, she had a gloomy look on her face.

With a foolish man who didn’t look like a Hero by her side.