Inside An Ad**t Game As A Former Hero

Miracle day.

As if they couldn’t get tired of it, the citizens of Lupus talked about it every day.

How the city was entangled in thousands of black tentacles, shrouded by the Heavenly King, when the holy light shone aloft, and the Heavenly King disappeared into thin air.

‘Nonsense.’

Even if the whole church, including the pope, were to hold a holy ceremony as a group, there was no way they would harness that intensity of holy mana, let alone an individual.

‘But there was a pronouncement from the Goddess and then the Pope…’

It was clear that he had expedited the monster alone.

They just had no notion of what method was used.

Lorian let out a deep sigh.

“Is that why it’s so hard to dig into?”

“It’s not, not really. If we don’t bother trying to put him down, we can win enough people’s hearts either way.”

“That will be enough. We don’t have to overdo it and mess up our objective.”

“Understood.”

Calion nodded his head.

Lorian’s gaze darted away from him to the other nobles.

“It is important to win the hearts of the citizens, but we have a more important thing to regard. And that is the coronation of the princess.”

Tension appeared on the faces of the nobles.

The princess may not have proved her abilities, but she stood perfect as far as legitimacy went.

She was a difficult opponent to touch.

Lorian smiled at the aristocrats with hardened expressions.

“By the way, according to rumors, the former archbishop passed away during the last Heavenly King incident, and the new archbishop seat is still vacant.”

At his words, some quick-witted nobles’ eyes lit up.

“That means…”

“Yes. I think we better place our attention on the succeeding archbishop first. To someone who is as close as possible to becoming the next Archbishop.”

An archbishop was necessary to perform the coronation ceremony.

* * *

The nip scribbled–

—writing down words and syllables on the parchment. The speed was incomparably slower than before.

‘Tool that can be discarded? Don’t be ridiculous! Do you think I’m just a tool!?’

She’d made herself successful.

And she would do so more and make their stomach ache in agony. They’d regret everything they had imposed.

It would be useless to come and beg then.

With bitterness in her heart, she continued her research work.

At that moment, suddenly, a drop of water dripped, soaking the parchment, and smearing the ink across the page.

“Ah, wha…”

Realizing that the water droplets were coming from her own eyes, she wiped at the corners of her eyes with the back of her hand. She was able to wipe away her tears, but her eyes were still red.

Water droplets welled again from the corners of her reddened eyes.

Soon, she cried as the bitterness docked in her heart drained.

She was given no choice; isolated from her own family.

No matter how they had fared in years, they were related by blood. To her, as to everyone else, blood ties held a special meaning. She wondered what all the hard work she had waded through to get the recognition of her family meant.

Although she was eventually abandoned.

Again.

Her hand gripping the quill tensed. She couldn’t help but throw the quill to the corner of the room.

“I don’t need you! You don’t need me either!”

She had tried her whole life to be accepted by her family.

Still, they abandoned her.

Then she would forsake them too.

‘I… just needed someone to acknowledge my hard work.’

And she had one such person that came to mind.

He was the man who had always acknowledged and respected her.

Cloud.

He was all she had left to herself.

‘This research is also nearing its end.’

A kind of trick that slightly twisted and roiled the mana circuit so that one could temporarily use magic beyond their own circle.

Completing this alone would be of great help to Cloud.

He too would be very happy and praise her.

‘That’s enough.’

Eri nodded, picked up a new quill, and tried to continue her research.

“…”

But maybe it was because her mind was disturbed, and the research was tapering.

After blowing dozens of minutes thinking, she finally let go of the quill.

‘…I should visit Cloud. It has been quite some time.’

If she would talk to him, even this stuffy feeling would get much lighter.

Eri left the room and knocked on Cloud’s door.

Then she heard an unexpected voice.

– Who is it?

Katarina’s voice, not Cloud’s.

Eri stiffened momentarily.

“…Isn’t this Cloud’s room?”

– Is it you, Miss Eri? Yes, that’s right.

The door opened and Katarina peered out her head.

“But why are you…”

Eri started to ask why she was there, but then she stopped. Because Katarina was Cloud’s lover. It was not unusual for her to be in his room.

Although this was slightly off-handed…

It wasn’t something Eri could comment on. Rather than that, she decided to achieve her purpose of coming here.

“Is Cloud inside?”

At her question, Katarina shook her head.

“No?”

“Yes, he isn’t. Do you need him? For he only comes late at night. Even if I ask, he just skims over.”

As if she had accumulated quite some, Katarina began to express her dissatisfaction. As for Eri, she didn’t have the will to listen, so she cut her off short and left for outdoors.

Normally, she would have made sure he wasn’t there and she would have gone back to her room, but this time around she wanted to see him anyway.

She recited an incantation.

As mana took shape, huge blue eyeballs appeared in the sky above her.

[Clairvoyance]-!

The eyeballs swivelled and scanned the city.

Mana drained quickly like water into a bottomless hollow, but that was okay. Because the places he could be at were limited. She would find him before she would run out of mana.

‘Found him.’

Red hair was caught in the royal palace’s gymnasium.

There was no one other than Cloud with that hair color.

Eri slightly modified the clairvoyance spell.

The field of view quickly expanded toward the kingdom’s gymnasium.

“…uh?”

She caught sight of Cloud kissing a brown-haired woman.

And the brown-haired woman was someone she knew very well.

Lorraine.

Lorian’s younger sister.

She was someone Eri loathed beyond dislike.