Chapter 51: Ron: He’s still alive

“What?”

Isis turned around and confirmed with Ron again.

The deeds before the Hero slew Casalima had always been a secret, known only to the few who recognized Isis’s surname and made the connection.

But beyond that, no one knew about her master, or about her past as a slave.

“I said, the one who took you away from Knamening.”

“He wouldn’t want to see you like this, and he certainly wouldn’t want you to die unknown and unnoticed.”

If there was any way to make Isis change her mind, this was the only thing Ron could think of.

No matter how things ended, he wanted Isis not to give up on herself.

“You… who are you?”

Isis stood before Ron, leaning on her sword, and asked after a few silent beats.

“Someone who knows that person.”

Ron didn’t reveal his identity directly, only leaving a vague answer.

“Proof.”

Isis’s voice trembled.

“He mastered teleportation spatial magic. You should know that, Isis.

“Sometimes he’d leave behind a few words and vanish, other times he’d suddenly appear.”

Ron knew he couldn’t say anything too sensitive, so after thinking it over, he decided on this as proof.

Back then, to clear as many character routes as possible, he’d sometimes had to run two or even multiple save files simultaneously—naturally relying on teleportation spatial magic to handle things quickly.

“Do you need… any more?”

Seeing Isis staring straight at him, Ron lowered his voice and asked softly.

“No need.”

Her reply stopped there. Isis stepped forward until the distance between her and Ron was close enough to count each other’s strands of hair.

“You… who are you?”

Isis asked the same question again, and from her blood-red eyes, a string of crystal tears fell.

Ron had never imagined Isis would cry.

Even after spending so much time together, aside from the act of his own ‘death,’ he had only seen this child—who worked so hard to wrap herself in a cold, strong shell—shed a few tears in secret.

“You’re not him.”

Her white hair scattered as she shook her head. Isis quickly wiped her tears with her arm in that brief moment. When she met Ron’s eyes again, only faint tear streaks remained.

“If it were Master, he would have hugged me…”

After whispering to herself, Isis pulled back her gaze, which had almost drifted away along with her memories.

“Mr. Ron… you really are… hard to read.”

When Ron had spoken those words earlier, Isis’s first reaction had been that the person she longed for day and night was right beside her—but clearly, she denied that possibility the next moment.

On the contrary, with Ron suddenly revealing connections to various mysterious abilities and actions, Isis’s wariness toward the man before her kept rising.

“He’s still alive. Don’t you want to see him?”

Facing the Hero’s suspicion, Ron became calm instead. He had to guide Isis’s thoughts.

“Impossible—”

Isis grabbed Ron’s collar in agitation.

“I killed him with my own hands…”

Making someone speak aloud about killing their beloved was far more painful than any torture.

“He… was cursed by the demon race. Right before my eyes…”

“He scattered into dust…”

Her grip on his collar loosened. Ron saw Isis lower her head and reached out to pull her into an embrace, but he barely held back the impulse.

Casalima’s problem was imminent. Ron thought it best not to stir up extra trouble before obtaining the origin crystal and solving it.

As long as Isis didn’t give up, there would always be a chance to confess.

“He was a very mysterious person too, wasn’t he?”

If he had the same relationship with Isis as in the past, Ron felt he could easily comfort and soothe the suffering Hero before him.

But now, he could only use one lie to fill the gap left by the previous one, and from here on, he would have to maintain his connection with Isis with countless lies and deceptions.

“It’s just that due to certain circumstances, he can’t come to see you, but…”

“But as long as you can trust me and we solve Casalima’s problem, I’ll take you to meet him.”

Having grown used to being an all-knowing, all-powerful veteran player in the game, Ron now felt a surge of reluctance and powerlessness as he relied on deception.

“Hope…”

Isis repeated the brief word, then wore a complicated smile.

“Master lied to me.”

“And you, Mr. Ron, are also lying to me.”

“Isis…”

Isis raised her slender index finger and pressed it against Ron’s lips.

“I believe what you said.”

“Even if you’re really lying to me, I’ll still believe it.”

This was, after all, a chance to meet her master again. If possible, Isis didn’t want to pin that hope on a vague Heaven or Netherworld.

He had prepared many assurances and words in his mind earlier, but at this moment, Ron could only respond with that short, almost pale reply.

“It’s nothing. Now, can we go?”

***

Morning light fell on them through the dappled shadows of the trees. Isis’s weariness had faded, and her eyes now held a bit more depth and hope than before.

“Yeah, let’s go.”

Ron walked beside Isis. He knew that Isis probably still didn’t believe an ‘ordinary person’ like him could root out the Demon King’s corruption, but the bond they had forged in the past made the Hero choose hope.

“Hmm… what are Teacher and Sister Ash doing anyway…?”

Lifa sat on a bare tree stump, kicking a small stone at her feet.

“No, I should use a different title.”

“Hero? Lady Knamening? Or would calling her Sister Isis be disrespectful?”

Lifa frowned at the lake, troubled over what new name to use for Isis.

From the moment Ron suddenly changed course to Enid, Lifa had sensed something strange about her teacher. Only when the truth came out just now did she realize that the root of everything lay with Isis.

“Teacher said he knows the Hero Isis.”

With that possibility as a fulcrum, Lifa’s thoughts quickly branched out.

“But from the way Sister Isis looked when they met, she clearly didn’t recognize Teacher Ron.”

He remembered meeting her, but Isis had forgotten.

Lifa thought that possibility couldn’t be ruled out. However, combined with Ron’s repeated emphasis on secrecy and his many odd behaviors, their relationship was far beyond that of mere acquaintances.

“Between Teacher and Sister Isis…”

Lifa stood up. Her reflection in the water was especially clear under the sunlight.

They say once the seed of suspicion is planted, it grows wildly.

Although Lifa’s curiosity about the relationship between Isis and Ron was more for speculation, it didn’t stop her—who harbored feelings for Ron—from letting her imagination run wild.

Thinking back to the strange interactions with Isis a few days ago…

And not long ago, the anxious worry she’d shown when Isis was unconscious…

Lifa’s emerald-green eyes grew more and more confused, and the lake, mirror-like, was no longer calm.

“Huh?”

The golden-haired girl’s face in the reflection was disturbed by ripples. Lifa looked up and realized it wasn’t the wind’s doing—it was…

The entire ground was shaking.