Published: March 21, 2026
Time rewinds to when a wyvern attacked the front of the airship.
“Everyone brace for impact!!!!!!!”
After spotting a wyvern charging at us like a suicide attacker, I judged that Yoru and I alone couldn’t completely stop it, so I shouted into the ship. I figured Akira and the others would act without my warning, but non-combatants needed to be told.
The wyvern slammed into the hull’s underside, and my feet left the deck. The shock of the impact threw me up. I’d been so busy warning others that I’d neglected my own footing.
“Hey!! It’s coming this way!!”
No matter how much Yoru transformed into a dragon, a wyvern — a born pterosaur — is naturally superior in aerial combat to a furred monster. Even though Yoru still drew many wyverns because of his old reputation as a demon king’s retainer, some slipped past us.
One wyvern, with no warning, closed in on me in midair.
“Ugh!!”
I twisted in the air and parried the charging wyvern with a quick stroke of my sword. The impact shifted my landing point and I was flung off the ship.
“Damn!!”
Even though below me was the sea, falling from this height felt like being slammed onto concrete. The fear of death, different from facing a monster, drained the color from my face. My breath hitched and my body froze.
“Don’t freeze, idiot!! Grab onto me!!!!!”
Ignoring the wyvern he’d been luring, Yoru turned back and caught my fall with his back. He barked at me; I grabbed onto the spines there instinctively. My palms were cut by sharp scales, but it was better than dying, so I dug in.
“That saved me!”
“Hmph. If you were my master, you’d have dodged that perfectly and landed.”
Even now, Yoru was bragging about Akira at a time like this. I didn’t argue — I deserved the scolding. I’d learned, and I wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
“More importantly, what do we do now? If the ship gets hit any more, it might fall.”
No matter what, Ms. Noah would be furious. The image of Noah carrying a hannya mask that I’d seen in the former hero’s safe house flashed through my mind and cold sweat trickled down my spine. It was probably as terrifying as when I’d almost fallen into the sea.
“Hmm…alright. I’ll fly up to that wyvern’s back. You jump and chop off its neck.”
My brain refused to accept the meaning of those words for a moment.
“Huh!?”
“Come on, hero!! Show some guts!!!”
His words were meant to encourage, but the tone was completely amused. Despite our short acquaintance, I could tell.
Before I could react, Yoru left the ship and surged upward. I clung tighter to his back to withstand the wind.
“Alright, go!!!”
“Wait, wait, wait!!”
With dragon claws, Yoru deftly grabbed my torso and then — without pausing — hurled me toward the wyvern.
“Ugh—haaa!!!”
Enduring crushing air pressure, I landed on the wyvern’s back at full speed, ran up its neck without knowing where it would turn, and perfectly severed the extending neck.
The blade sliced as if cutting tofu. Even I was surprised at how well it cut. It hadn’t been this sharp before. Perhaps it was thanks to what the former Hero Ritter had told me back then.
“Believe in your own weapon! All weapons used by heroes can be called holy! The reason that sword hasn’t become your holy sword for a long time is because you don’t trust your own strength and weapon!”
His speech wandered and was a bit hot-blooded and clumsy, but Crow corrected and explained things for him. Putting it together, that was his message. Ritter probably wanted to talk with old friend Crow longer, but he still took the time to tell me this information; I couldn’t waste it.
Ms. Noah at the safe house had also said my sword wasn’t yet a holy sword. Combined with Ritter’s words, it began to make sense.
Even without actively researching, we’d overheard bits about our professions. The hero, being a coveted role, had many legends, oral traditions, and documents. So far four summoned heroes from another worlds had appeared before us; heroes kept being born across continents. If every hero used the same weapon, that would be strange — Ritter, for example, was bigger than me, so his sword would naturally be larger.