Hero’s sacrifice

“...You all are done here. You can fuck off and leave now.”

With an annoyed look on my face, I spat out those words as I looked at the five heroines in front of me.

“Huh?” 

“Tch!” 

“Wha?”

“....!!?”

“....”

The five figures in front of me let out different confused or annoyed reactions to my harsh words. 

Their reactions were as I had anticipated, because five girls, whom I'd just dismissed, were the official members of the hero's party.

“Leo, the Hero. Just what kind of joke do you think you're playing?” The first girl to respond was Elena.

Elena is a high elf who has been living for almost a thousand years. She has a beautiful and elegant face that is showered with an aura of perfection. Her silky blonde hair cascaded just past her shoulders, framing eyes of captivating blue that could make any man fall instantly in love. Even her attire, pure white and immaculate, seemed to reflect her deep connection with nature, preserving her purity.

Even her white clothes gave off an aura of cleanliness, reflecting how much she was loved by nature, which kept her pure.

And right now, such a person is giving me cold looks.

“Joke? Why would I joke about something like this?”

“Then why are you saying such an incoherent thing?”

“Why? Because you all are fucking useless!”

“““““......!!!??”””””

Everyone looked at me in shock at my harsh words.

“Ghkk!! Leo, you sack of shit! Are you being serious right now?!”

The one to break the silence was my childhood friend, Rine.

Rine is a tomboyish cat-girl who has known me since her earliest memories. She is a muscle head, but despite that, she always took care of others, offering help wherever she could.

But what made her even more charming were her big breasts and unusually attractive hips as a beast woman. Even if she tried covering herself with clothes, her natural allure always shone through, revealing her as an undeniably attractive woman. 

And that girl right now — the person who was supposed to be my childhood sweetheart, looked at me with rage.

“So your tiny brain can't even tell when I'm serious or not? Typical muscle head.” I smirked in amusement.

“Aghhhh!! Leoooo!!!!!”

After pushing her to the limit, Rine lunged at me with a punch fueled by anger. However, I effortlessly dodged her attack and used my leg to trip her, sending her sprawling to the ground.

“Serves you right as the dog you are. You should’ve never attacked the hero.” 

I looked down at the red-haired cat girl as I stepped on her head. And while looking at her pitiful expression, unable to get up, I began to twist my foot, treating her head as if it were the sole of my shoe needing to be cleaned.

At that sight, a bright light flashed in my eyes, and in the next moment, Rine had disappeared from the bottom of my foot.

“I can't believe you! You treat your comrade like this just because her skills aren't living up to your standards!?”

The one who teleported Rina away from me was Cordelia.

Cordelia was another beautiful, delicate-looking flower among the party. With her long silver hair and shiny silver eyes, she always wore mithril armor. At first glance, some would think she was a swordsman due to the heavy mithril armor. But in reality, she was a mage.

“My standards are pretty low since I'm a kind hero. But even I wouldn't stoop that low to your ridiculous so-called ‘Standards’. The mage that doesn't have mana.”

“Wha…?”

The silver-haired girl looked at me in disbelief, her eyes revealing how hurt she felt by my words. 

“Master... Is it really necessary to—”

“Shut your fucking cake hole, you damn lowly slave!!”

The one who had tried to speak with a concerned expression was my slave, Katie.

Katie has a petite and childish-looking body. She had brown eyes that matched her long brown hair, which almost reached her buttocks. Her clothes were mostly tattered, and on her back, she carried a big backpack. 

She was supposed to be our party's potter.

“How many times do I have to remind you of your position as a slave? I merly took pity on you and bought you as a slave. Your small body is also disgusting so I can't really use you at night. You ought to be grateful for the opportunity to serve as the hero's baggage handler. But even at that, you're useless! Truly a disgusting slave.”

“ENOUGH!!”

A voice rang out sharply, cutting through the air. That voice belonged to Divlia.

Divlia was a short girl with big breasts, her hair styled in brown twin-tails, and her eyes a vibrant green.

At first glance, she might easily be mistaken for a child, but Divlia was actually half-dwarf. 

Her character was that of a quiet and introverted girl. So her yelling was rather unexpected.

"Just how much more pain are you going to inflict on everyone and everything?! When are you going to stop and look at the mess that you're always leaving behind?”

“....”

“How many more people are you going to hurt with that pride of yours?! We're supposed to be your comrades… yet, you're always treating us like trash! Just how long… hic… are you going to…. Hic….”

As the brown-haired half-dwarf sank to her knees, tears streaming down her face, Elena approached her while looking at me in disgust.

“Stop it, Delvia… Don’t waste your precious tears on a person like that.”

“Hic… ugh…”

“I always believed that prophecies were sacred things. Now I've come to understand that even them can be wrong…”

Sadness left Elena's eyes, and anger began to well in them.

“Let's leave everyone. We are no longer needed by him.”

With those final words from the blonde-haired elf, everyone comforted one another before turning their backs on me and leaving.

I watched their retreating figures, my jaw clenched so tightly that I could feel my teeth beginning to crack under the strain.

Behind me was the hidden fortress of the demon king.

That's right — I was supposed to defeat the Demon King alongside my party. But after pushing them away, I found myself standing alone.

I was restraining myself from turning my head to where the five girls were leaving. I didn’t want to have any last-second regrets, so I unsheathed my sword and jumped over the castle's wall.

“The hero is here!!!”

“Everyone, attack!!!”

Beyond the massive walls, hundreds of demons were already on standby, ready to ambush any potential intruders. 

And without mercy, countless attacks filled with magic and arrows were coming at me from different directions.

In an instant, I swung my holy sword and easily reflected all of the attacks back to their casters. 

“Gahn!” “Waahn!!” “Aghnnn!!” “AAAAAAAHnn!!!” “My eyes!!!”

“Don't flatter before the hero’s tricks! Keep attackin–AGhhh!!!”

With a calm composure and trembling, clenched fists, I looked at the demons in front of me who were dying from their own attacks.

As they began to regroup, I steadied myself with a deep breath and charged in one direction.

“Don't let the hero breakthrough our formation! He’s only one human!”

“Aghn!!” “SHAAA!!!”

A very formidable wall of demons had formed, trying to block my way. But I easily broke through them, piercing and destroying the path, all while the demons tried to stop me. 

A massive trail of destruction was left behind as I kept charging forward and taking everything to ruins. All of the demons were easily killed, and most of their houses were fully destroyed.

The most secure, hidden, and indestructible fortress of demons was slowly turning to ruins.

“AGHHHHH!!”

“We can't stop him!”

“He’s too strong!!” “AGHuuu!!”

“A– A- M-monster!!! AGHHH!!!”

Despite the cries of the demons filled with fear, I continued to kill them unconsciously while heading in a straight line.

I knew that I was wasting my mana and equipment on these lowly humans, so I decided to use one of my trump cards to get rid of all the demons at once.

“~Holy flash! Show me your wrath~”

I used a special magic that destroyed everything, creating a straight path in front of me.

With a clear path and many thousands of demons instantly killed, I ran towards the main castle, where the demon king was.

And in no time, I finally reached my destination. The remaining demons had fled, leaving me with only one final target.

I broke several walls of the castle and jumped straight at the main hall, where the demon king sat on his big throne.

“Quiet the big entrance, don't you think so, Hero?”

With a massive smirk on his face, the demon king spoke as he rested his chin on his wrist.

“Your punny underlings fled, so there was no need to go through each floor.”

“Kekeke! That's the attitude! I love it!”

“You seem happy to know that you’re dying here.”

“Ho? You're indeed very powerful as a hero. However, don't you think that a hero who pushed away it's party members with no mercy can handle me? You came in here all on your own and wasted your strength on my underlings when you could’ve overcome this battle as a party.”

The demon king smirked in amusement as he looked down on me. 

What the demon king was saying was true. I was supposed to fight together with my party after overcoming many challenges and growing strong together as a group.

But here I am right now, panting after destroying the fortress all on my own. 

The demon king was right to look at me like a fool because, as long as he was alive, he could revive all of his underlings at his own will.

“Even after many of my rebirths, this is a first for a hero like you to appear. Your reputation among the lowly races is something that even I, the Demon King, find envious. How about it? Why don't you join my side? I'll give you the best position for you.”

“Hahahahaha! Indeed, that is a very pleasing offer to me.”

“Right?”

“But too bad, I won't lower myself to someone weaker than me! Especially to someone who plans on absorbing my hero’s core.”

“....”

Almost caught by surprise, the demon king looked at me in disbelief before bursting out laughing.

“Hahahaha! You never cease to surprise me! Hero! That's right! Let's end this! Let our battle be legendary and….”

“--And a very formidable one that many would fear and remember for a long time. Yeah, Blah, blah, blah. Can we get this over with?”

“....”

The demon king remained silent before he got up. However, inside him, rage was beginning to well up. Not because I was being confident, but because I kept acting as if I knew everything about him.

After I had taken a deep breath, the demon king disappeared from his position and reappeared in front of me in a flash. And with a powerful blow, he tried cutting me down with his dark, sinister sword. 

But what he cut through was simply my afterimage.

“Going for an instant kill? That's typical for a Demon King.”

“....”

The demon king looked pissed as I appeared behind his back and tried stabbing him.

*Clang!*

But the demon king easily managed to block my attack without even turning around. Showing off his confidence and how angry he was with me.

“Ohhh! Look at you! Trying to act so cool all of a sudden!”

“...!!"

Both of our swords continued to clash as I continued mocking the demon king. The demon king was probably very pissed. But he could tell that I was trying to taunt him, so he would let his guard down.

He had spent thousands of years and had fought countless heroes before, so a fight like this was nothing to him. He was very calm and kept his composure as he continued fighting, each of his strikes more powerful than the other.

The battle between me and the demon king continued for a few more minutes before I fell on one knee, trying to catch my breath while the demon king looked down on me.

“Indeed, you are different from the other heroes. But in the end, there is a limit to how much you can accomplish. This is the end, hero.”

“Haaa…. Haa… haaa… Is that so? I can still keep going. So why don't you show me everything you have?”

“....Very well. I shall send you off to your death in the most painful way possible! That way, I will absorb you together with your core!”

“...”

As the demon king announced in annoyance at my unbroken spirit, he used his ultimate magic. 

Powerful and sinister mana was gathering all around the Demon King in an instant. The whole place and castle were filled with mana, to the point where someone's heart would burst.

The demon king was going to use his ultimate magic to not only kill me in an instant but also shatter my core and absorb it altogether with my soul.

But right as the demon king was about to finish gathering enough mana, I raised my hand and chanted.

“~Oh messengers of the spirit god, break my heart and take everything away~”

“What?!”

The demon king looked all confused as all of the mana he had gathered in the air suddenly were absorbed by my hero's core.

“This is your final life, Demon king.”

“No, w-wait!”

“~Atomic-Heart!~”

As I finished my chant, all of the mana that was all around the castle gathered at a small point at my core before bursting out in a very powerful explosion that erased everything in its way.

The castle, together with the demon king and his indestructible core, was erased in an instant.

And in the end, I stood in a several-kilometer radius caused by the most powerful magic.

It was powerful enough to be considered an all-erasing atomic bomb, but in the end, it cost my very own life.

“So this is how it ends… I hope you're satisfied with this… Leo.”

With a hole in my chest, I said to myself before feeling my body crumble to dust.

With this, you can finally rest…

.

..

…

As I felt my mind fall to dust, a white light overcame my eyes, and in the next moment I found myself in white room that had no end.

“Was it really okay for this to end like this?”

A voice asked behind me.

I knew who that voice belonged to. After all, this person was the reason behind all this mess.

“Yeah. That's how the story should end.”

I turned around and saw a masked young boy who was floating in the air.

This person who seemed concerned about my actions was a self-proclaimed Demi-God who forced me to transmigrate into my own novel as its main character.

Before I was transmigrated, I was an average author who somehow got a bit popular with another generic web novel.

I got a lot of backlash about the cruelty towards my main character, Leo. However, in the end, the story was still loved by many fans around the world.

And of course, that included this self-proclaimed Demi-god, who stated he was my biggest fan.

Now you may be wondering why this demi-god would force me to transmigrate to my own novel.

Well, that's because I wasn't able to finish my novel. I was under a lot of pressure from my fans, to the point where I wasn't sure how the story should finish.

Thus, this demi-god took his precious time and decided to help me by forcing me into the perilous universe I had written about.

“....”

The demi god looked at me, his expression hidden behind his blank mask.

“Now that I gave the story an ending, can I go home now?”

“...you want to go home?” The demi-god sounded surprised.

“Yes, why wouldn't I? I finished the story for you, didn't I? So why don't you send me back to earth? Or are you going to complain and say that you don't like my ending? Because I don't plan on changing it, no matter what.”

‘Rise of the Strongest Heroes’ was the name of the web novel that I was working on. Also the novel that I had transmigrated into.

Despite being generic, this novel was filled with characters that I cherished. And each of the heroines was a beautiful girl who loved Leo with all their hearts. A story of challenges, filled with conflict, romance, and, in the end, tragedy.

What made my novel special were the hidden clues that made the story feel real. 

And one of them was the fact that no matter the outcome, some of the heroines would meet their demise in a brutal way.

It would be a bittersweet ending, but with a broken hero who protected everyone but his loved ones. 

And the reason behind this stupid tragedy was the hidden curse that Leo was born with in his mana core.

The curse only activates at the peak of the hero's power, and it changes the fate of those who adore the hero. In this case, the main heroines.

I am the author of that story, so I knew almost everything about it and its secrets. But unfortunately, the hidden curse was something unavoidable that even the gods were not aware of.

That's why I decided that the best outcome was to act harshly towards everyone while saving them.

In the end, they would hate me, but Leo would be glad that all of them had survived. After all, they were the reason why he fought as a hero in the first place.

I let out a sigh as I looked at the thinking Demi-God.

“Are you sure about your decision? You don't need to rush. You can give your story a sequel if you want. I don't mind that.”

“No, it's better this way. Besides, I don't belong there.”

“....”

That world is a place created based on my web novel. And no matter how much of a dream it may be for an author, I don't think I can live my life pretending to be someone else.

That's why, no matter how tempting the demi-god’s offers were, I couldn't do it.

With a bitter smile on my face, I bowed my head to the self-proclaimed Demi-god and asked.

“And as an author, I'm happy with this much. So please, send me back.”

“....fine.”

After thinking to himself for a bit, the masked boy finally gave up. I could see that he was struggling to convince me, but in the end — I had already made up my mind.

“Thank you very much.”

“It's a pity to let you go like this. But I'll respect your wish. May you find inspiration within that world to grant your fans a satisfying conclusion to the story.”

“I will.”

“Well then… farewell, Leo.”

With a wave of his hand, the demi-god vanished, and the space around me shimmered, sending me back to where I belong.

In the next moment, I found myself sitting in front of my own laptop, the screen displaying  an empty Word document.

My fingers happily reached for the keyboard, but as I began typing, I felt tears rolling down my cheeks.

Perhaps it was because I wasn't used to having glasses after spending a long time in my novel — but something inside me felt empty.

♦