This Clueless Hero

The man blinked a few times.

"The amulet? I... I think it's some sort of valuable."

I nodded my head a few times, but suddenly stopped. The man in front of me was looking to the side, unable to make eye contact with me.

I brought my face closer and forced him to look me straight in the eyes.

"Why are you lying?"

Beads of sweat formed on the man's forehead.

"W-What do you mean?"

I sighed.

"If you just tell me the truth, I can make it painless."

The man grit his teeth.

"What are you talking about?"

A small smile formed on my face.

"I think you know exactly what I'm talking about. Weren't you the one that proudly said it?"

An overly pretentious expression formed on my face.

"Heh. Don't worry! We won't kill you straight away!"

The man tensed up.

"Wait, you can't kill me! At least let me live!"

A giggle seeped out from between my clenched teeth.

"Hmm? But then that would make me a liar! I already made my promise!"

The man looked desperate.

"Promise? How did you even promise that?"

I slowly pulled back the bundle of vines, curling them up in the process because of their sheer length. It was at a speed that let the man realize what was happening.

I made sure of it.

The man's face began twitching uncontrollably.

"What are you doing?"

I tilted my head to the side.

"Keeping my promise."

The man scrunched his face up.

"You can't be serious!"

Something told me that he was going to be difficult until I showed him a little pain. And so, I made him know that I was indeed serious.

By smashing the vine down on his hand.

A bang filled the air along with several cracking sounds.

The man began to cry in pain, but that was reasonable considering his hand was smushed into really chunky tomato sauce.

As the man continued to scream out in pain, I repeated myself.

"What is this thing you are talking about?"

After a few moments, the man calmed down. However, he was now panting heavily and even sweating. The man's pupils seemed to be shaking slightly, unable to take the pain.

I decided to ask once more.

"What is this thing you are talking about?"

The man blinked rapidly, as though he only now understood his situation. He clenched his teeth.

"I-It's an amulet that holds something! Apparently, there's something really precious inside, but the boss doesn't know how to open it."

I narrowed my eyes.

"And someone stole it?"

The man nodded, but with a bit of confusion.

"Y-Yes?"

I smiled.

"I see."

Then, I raised the bundle of vines up once more.

And dropped it down on his head.

The man's eyes widened.

"No!"

He tried to use his remaining hand to block the vine, finding inner strength once his life was threatening to make it. However, it was meaningless.

The vine easily pierced through the man's hand and then through his skull.

The man's arm fell lifelessly to the side.

I stopped channeling mana into the vine, letting it decay rapidly, and continued my walk. Many thoughts coursed through my head, centering around this strange amulet that the man mentioned.

It seemed like I was too late as someone had already stolen it and there was supposedly something valuable inside. I rubbed my chin with my index finger and thumb, partly entranced by the steady taps of my footsteps on the cobblestone path.

Though what was inside the amulet piqued my interest, two other things were even more intriguing to me.

How the amulet someone kept this valuable inside.

And who was the one that stole it.

From what the guard said, they didn't even catch a glimpse of the thief. Because of that and a series of other events, they assumed that I must've been the person sneaking around and taking things.

...Though I could try to investigate this now, I imagined it was better to try next time. Maybe if I got an early enough start, it would be me that stole the amulet instead.

After that episode, the rest of the journey through the village was uneventful.

I stared at the forest spread out in front of me and felt a little estranged. Instead of being covered by snow, the forest was lush and green. It was hard to see, granted it was night. However, the sight still made me feel strange.

I made my way through the trees, feeling my feet sink into the muddy ground. Although the snow wasn't the most stable, this still felt new to me because during the cold winter, the ground had hardened considerably.

It quickly became too hard to see since the trees blocked out most of the light that the full moon gave off, when it was already so little.

For a few moments, I deliberated over whether or not I should walk through the forest with my fire spell active. From the vision earlier on, there should be a chance to encounter a pack of wolves.

While I did have the teleport spell to escape, I figured it was best not to teleport around recklessly when there were so many trees I could teleport into.

That was when an idea struck me.

After gathering some mana, I held out my hand in front of me. Suddenly, a tiny flame appeared right above the palm of my hand.

This was the firebolt spell in combination with the strange diagram from the control vines spell. It started small and needed an egregious amount of mana to expand slightly. However, that wasn't bad for me in this case, because I simply wanted a small flame.

I covered the flame with both hands and found it basically got rid of all the light. This way, I wouldn't be caught so easily. After a bit of hesitation, I tried to cover the flame with only the hand that was holding it, but stopped once I felt my fingers get singed.

During the time I experimented with covering the light, I was also walking forward.

And when I was finished, I turned my head to the side and saw a blueberry bush. I blinked a few times in surprise. Almost instinctively, I reached out and plucked one of the berries and tossed it into my mouth.

It was sweet, just like in the vision.

I continued to eat a few more before leaving. There were still quite a few berries left, but frankly, it was probably a waste of time. They hardly sated my appetite given the amount of time needed to pick them.

For the majority of the time, I covered the small flame with both hands. Only occasionally, would I part them ever so slightly to get a quick glimpse of the terrain around me.

After closing my hands together, I began to walk forward. With my memory of the land ahead, I stepped around the trees and their roots. I lifted my hand for only a moment and saw a flash of something familiar.

It was a red and yellow pepper.

Although I was focusing on the place around me, I was also sifting through my memories. I set my first goal, which was to reclaim that black crown and crystal. That meant I would have to kill the lizard king once more.

Frankly, that thing was just far too huge to kill with conventional means.

Though I have learned the control vines spell, I doubted it would be able to do anything against that massive lizard. After all, it was roughly fifty meters tall.

That meant I would have to get the peppers once more.

Thankfully, after a bit of wandering, I was able to find it.

The yellow and red pepper both let out a soft glow. It was so soft, that once even the tiny bit of light from my flame shone on them, the glow disappeared.

I walked up to them and kneeled down next to them. My mind gradually formed the encase spell, but halfway through I decided to stop myself from completing it.

...I learned a derivative that let me grow plants.

So what would happen if I used it on these peppers?

The curiosity was simply too much for me. I pointed one finger towards the peppers and held the tiny flame to the side, giving off a bit of flickering light.

Thankfully, I remembered that my body was still fairly weak, thus I prepared a healing spell in advance. From there, I let loose the derivative spell onto the plants. Like the control vines spell, I could continuously channel mana into this growth spell.

At first, it seemed like nothing was happening. However, I just barely noticed that they were increasing in size.

Seeing this, I decided to continue.

The peppers continued to grow in size. My eyes were intently trained on them, watching them change in size.

But because of that, it took me a little too long to realize the peppers were falling.

Because the stalk was withering.