Not All Heroes From Earth Are Bad-Chapter 272

Joy and jubilation can be felt.

The end of a long, long war.

Some cheered for victory.

Some were relieved to have survived.

There were those who shed tears of protecting their loved ones.

Emotions stirring across the entire continent.

Choi Hyun-seok felt it all so vividly as if he could grasp it in his hands.

‘This must be reality?’

Contrary to the vivid emotions he felt, this situation seemed unreal.

It feels like a dream, not reality.

That’s why Choi Hyun-seok stood there with a composed expression.

“It’s warm.”

When he opened his palm, white crystals settled on it.

Though clearly resembling snow, they were infinitely warm crystals.

Too beautiful and warm to be the power that drove the continent to death.

‘Warm snow…’

Perhaps these contradictory crystals represent the current reality.

Such a trivial thought occurred to him.

“Rachel. Are you there?”

“I’m here!”

Rachel appeared at Choi Hyun-seok’s call.

She sat down, perching her bottom on his shoulder.

Lifting her chin high, she gazed at the crystals sparkling across the sky.

“I have a question.”

“Yes.”

“Did I succeed?”

“Of course! Hero, you saved the world!”

Rachel flew up toward the falling crystals, reaching out her hands.

She looked just like an innocent child excited by falling snow.

“Yap! Yap!”

Being quite clumsy, she couldn’t catch any, but she kept reaching out.

After flying around for a while, she eventually sighed and returned to Choi Hyun-seok’s embrace.

“Hero.”

“What.”

“Can’t you remain a hero forever?”

“What nonsense are you suddenly talking about.”

Asking a hero to remain a hero.

Thinking she might be joking, he looked at her, but Rachel’s expression was completely serious.

For some reason, her face seemed to be deeply shadowed.

After hesitating for a moment, she spoke.

“A hero should go on adventures! You’re not thinking of retiring to the countryside after defeating the Demon King, are you!?”

Choi Hyun-seok smiled bitterly.

“Well. I don’t think I’m qualified to be a hero anymore.”

Too much blood has been on his hands.

No matter how many lives he saved.

Could he wash away this deeply ingrained smell of blood?

“What do you mean you’re not qualified to be a hero!?”

Rachel jumped up.

She placed her hands on her hips and shouted.

“Hero! Repeat after me! There are no bad heroes in the world!”

“…”

“I said repeat after me!”

“Forget it.”

“Eih!”

Suddenly Rachel threw a punch.

Choi Hyun-seok, who suddenly got hit in the eye, cursed and backed away.

“Shit! What are you doing!?”

“Repeat after me! There are no bad heroes in the world!”

“I said forget it.”

“Aaaaah! I said repeat after me!”

Looking at her cheeks puffed full of air, it seemed she would whine until he repeated it.

Choi Hyun-seok reluctantly said in a small voice.

“… There are no bad heroes in the world.”

“Louder! And more confidently!”

“Sigh… There are no bad heroes in the world!”

“That’s good!”

Rachel said with a bright smile.

“Repeat this too!”

“What now?”

“The sacrifice of the few for the many is natural!”

“Hey! Are you really a fairy saying things like that!”

He flicked the dedicated fairy’s forehead for spouting lines fitting for a final villain.

“Ack! Don’t hit me and think about it rationally! You saved a world that was about to perish, what more do you want!? The people you saved far outnumber those who died!”

“How foolish! This isn’t as simple as addition and subtraction!”

In the pure white world, the hero and dedicated fairy grabbed each other’s collars.

After fighting back and forth about who was right, Choi Hyun-seok suddenly felt empty and sat down heavily.

“Right. What meaning does this have.”

Originally, Choi Hyun-seok didn’t particularly dwell on past events.

The past is the past.

He lived thinking that the present and future were what mattered.

However, this incident was too big to simply dismiss as the past.

But what of it?

He killed people to save people.

As a result, he saved more people.

He just suffered from the fact that he couldn’t save even more people.

Even if he went back, his decisions and actions wouldn’t be much different.

“Fine. Let’s say you’re right this time, Rachel.”

“It’s not ‘let’s say’ – I am right.”

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s say that’s true.”

“No, Hero! It’s not ‘let’s say’ – it’s really…”

Choi Hyun-seok flopped down on the ground.

Rachel kept chattering beside him, but being used to it, he ignored her.

It was then that the system message appeared.

[Hero Goal Achieved!]

[Transferring consciousness for reward!]

“Huh?”

Before he could even react.

Choi Hyun-seok’s consciousness cut off.

***

“This place is…”

Choi Hyun-seok looked around.

A familiar space.

Deep blue sky and dazzlingly bright sun.

The white clouds spread across the floor were softer than any bed.

“It’s been a while.”

A small laugh escaped without him realizing.

Though it was a very brief moment, perhaps because it was so intense.

This space was still vivid in his memory.

The place he arrived at right after dying on Earth.

Everything started here.

When he fell for Rachel’s sweet talk and dropped into the Demon King’s Army’s fortress.

-Welcome, Hero Choi Hyun-seok.

A voice echoed throughout the space.

Choi Hyun-seok realized the voice belonged to the one called God.

And the being who brought him to this other world.

“This is our first time actually talking. Ah, is it okay to speak casually?”

-Of course.

Choi Hyun-seok had been looking forward to this conversation for quite a long time.

He had so many things he wanted to ask.

“Do we have enough time to talk?”

-This is a space of souls and consciousness. Since it flows differently from real-time, we have plenty of time to talk.

Fortunately, it seemed they wouldn’t need to rush the conversation.

Choi Hyun-seok crossed his arms and closed his eyes.

“What should I ask first? Now that the stage is set, I can’t think of anything.”

The words didn’t come easily.

Many questions floated through his head but scattered.

As Choi Hyun-seok’s contemplation grew longer, the other spoke first.

-If it’s alright, I’d like to express my gratitude first.

“Gratitude?” 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

-Thanks to you defeating the Pope, my stolen power was restored and my consciousness returned. Along with saving the world, I thank you once again.

“Ah, so that’s what happened.”

He had wondered how the Pope had summoned such immense holy power, but it seems he had used this being’s power.

Choi Hyun-seok naturally asked a question that came to mind related to this.

“What exactly are you? Are you really a god?”

-I am not something as grand as a god.

“Then?”

-A mental entity created by human wishes reacting with mana. That’s how I would summarize it. If that’s difficult to understand, you can think of me as a tool for human happiness.

Choi Hyun-seok slowly nodded.

It wasn’t impossible.

Since mana could become anything.

It could have created such a god-like being.

“What’s your name?”

-I don’t have a name. If you need to call me something… X would be fine.

“Alright.”

X.

He wasn’t sure what meaning it held, but he decided to call it that for now.

“X. What was the Pope? He said he was also a hero. How did he take your power?”

-Pope Orban IV. His real name Thomas Jacobson. He was a hero who came here about 134 years ago.

At this point, Choi Hyun-seok received quite a fresh shock.

To think Orban IV wasn’t his real name.

-Except for you, he was the most talented hero. He had a very strong sense of justice.

“Then why did he end up like that?”

-That’s…

The following explanation went like this.

X had recognized the Pope’s talent early on and invested in him generously.

Thanks to his outstanding talent and X’s full support, the Pope grew at a terrifying speed.

To the point of surpassing all previous heroes.

However, at some point, he suddenly changed.

He became a completely different person from before.

“He changed without any warning?”

-That’s how I felt.

“Hmm, I think differently.”

Why did the Pope change?

Choi Hyun-seok felt like he somehow knew the reason.

“True salvation. Eternal peace. These are all illusions.”

“Even if I die, and Gatren and the Deusis faith fall. Do you think peace will come to this continent?”

“Saving the world? It’s just an empty cause. No different from propaganda that only demands the hero’s sacrifice.”

As he continued his life as a hero, the Pope must have realized.

About the world’s unfairness and human ugliness.

This world, unlike modern Earth, is a class-based society.

Because of this, human nature is revealed more raw and stark.

If you ask ‘Does salvation exist?’ after seeing this reality…

Nine out of ten would say this.

‘There is no salvation.’

Even if all demons are killed, as long as nobles who squeeze the blood from commoners remain, there is no salvation for the common people.

It would be the same even if all nobles were killed and the class was eliminated from the world.

Because the inherent nature of human beings will never change.

Then why should one sacrifice themselves?

For a world that can’t be saved anyway, what reason does a hero have to fight?

Choi Hyun-seok once had similar concerns.

That’s why he could deduce the Pope’s underlying thoughts even from their brief conversation.

“Well, let’s drop this topic.”

Choi Hyun-seok had already sorted out his thoughts on this.

It was also over now.

He’d rather not get a headache by raising questions again unnecessarily.

“Anyway, you poured everything into supporting the Pope, but he betrayed you and you got screwed.”

-That’s correct.

“So that’s why you kept watching and testing me?”

-That’s also true.

From X’s perspective, he must have been reluctant to provide full support.

Because there was already the failed precedent of the Pope.

Sometimes testing Choi Hyun-seok, sometimes helping him, watching his growth.

-And one more confession: having Rachel handle your transfer and sending you to the Demon King Army was also intentional.

“Hah… So that was it.”

At this point.

Choi Hyun-seok could deduce one more fact.

Why the final reward of this adventure was hidden?

“By any chance, the reward mentioned in the hero quest for saving the world. Were you hiding it for the same reason?”

-… That’s correct.

“The reward must have been pretty worthless.”

What would happen if after saving the world, the reward turned out to be pitiful?

There was no guarantee an angry hero wouldn’t change like the Pope did.

That’s why X probably didn’t reveal the final reward until the end.

Choi Hyun-seok smiled wryly, feeling somewhat empty.

“So. What’s the reward? I think you mentioned something about giving me choices.”

-Specifically, it’s about your future residence.

“Residence…”

-The first option is to send you back to Earth.

The first choice was obvious.

Return to Earth.

Having expected this, Choi Hyun-seok calmly nodded.

-Using all my power, I can send you back to the moment just before your death.

“I don’t really have any thoughts about that. What’s the next option?”

Choi Hyun-seok didn’t want to return to Earth anymore.

It’s not like he had a family he missed.

Even if he went back, he didn’t think he could adapt well.

-Before mentioning the next option… I need to tell you about your current state, Choi Hyun-seok.

“My state?”

-You have entered the ranks of transcendents.

“Ah, so there was a specific term for this.”

Transcendent.

He thought it was an appropriate name.

Actually, he felt like he had transcended everything.

Though far from godlike omnipotence, he was at least no longer something that could be called human.

“So. What about becoming a transcendent?”

-A transcendent cannot exist in the same dimension as humans. The immense power causes dimensional cracks.

“I see…”

-The longer you stay, the greater the danger becomes. After this conversation ends, you’ll need to leave this plane within a week at the latest.

“Not much time left.”

Having to leave the continent within a week.

Choi Hyun-seok felt his chest grow heavy somehow.

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