46. A True Hero

“Nina… Could it be that you can’t distinguish colors? … Nina?”

Her lips trembled a bit, then she nodded silently. Crap. Did I just hit a sore spot? It seems so. For some reason, she had been trying to hide her problem all along. I recalled what I told her this morning. About the bucolic painting. And about the red ribbon… Did she even know she had given me the only red ribbon we had? Probably not.

In the awkward silence, I put my hands on my knees and cleared my throat.

“Er… Somehow, I feel like I should say sorry, but I don’t know exactly why. Was it some kind of secret?”

Nina shook her head. Did a tear just sparkle in her eyes?

“It’s not,” she said. “You don’t have to be sorry. Actually, I should be the one to be sorry. I lied to you and said I wanted you to forgive me, but in fact, I was frustrated because I gave you the red ribbon without knowing it was the red one. I was selfish. And I was feeling guilty. That’s why we had bad luck and came across the boar, the snake, and the mantis.”

“… I see.”

“I was blaming you on the bus, but I ended up being a bigger liar. That’s what frustrates me the most.”

Tears shone in her eyes as she sniffed. She really hated to lie, huh. I relaxed. I was starting to understand Nina Clover a bit more.

“It’s okay. The jury has just made another big blunder assuming that everyone could distinguish the ribbons.” I said that in a loud voice, just in case the badge was recording it, then took out the red ribbon and put it in Nina’s hand. “Take it.”

To my stupefaction, she took it and blew her nose with it. I couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

“Hahahahaha! Sorry, hahaha, but the thing you just used wasn’t a handkerchief, it was the red ribbon.”

“What?”

“Well, heh, don’t worry about trifles.”

“No, I mean, you should keep it!”

“No, thanks, it’s too humid.”

“It can be washed.”

“No, really,” I said, standing up. “You did say you’re lucky, didn’t you? Well, just think you’ve met a good guy who’s just too stupid to compete with a pretty girl.” As I was walking away, I turned to grin at her. “You should get going.”

“… Are you pitying me?”

“…! Why should I?”

“Well… I may be born with luck, but I can’t see colors. My world is white, gray, and black.” She hesitated. “I barely know you but… can I ask you a question? … Do you think being lucky is worth all the colors?”

Her face had recovered her calm expression, but I knew she was still anxious. Her question made me a bit nervous myself. What was I supposed to answer? Some kind of philosophic reply? A consolation? Or…

“Dunno,” I said. “I really don’t know. But since you were born like this, it’s worth it, I think? Wait, that doesn’t make any sense, right? Sorry.”

She smiled. It was an open smile. She stood up.

“Follow me. Now I’m sure we’ll find a red ribbon in no time.”

She still wanted to help me, huh? I grinned.

“Okay.”

* * *

‘I’m sure we’ll find a red ribbon in no time.’

That was what Nina had said about ten minutes ago. Now we were running from a cheetah with antlers and a heavy tail ended with a kind of flail. Well, that was a monster.

“Nina!” I shouted as I ran. “What’s that thing?!”

Nina was breathing hard.

“It’s a… cheebou. Where I live, there are packs of them, but… they normally don’t attack people. They are scavengers.”

“Then why…?!” I stopped dead.

I knew why. Cheebous ate dead things. That monster was after me, not after Nina.

But wasn’t my smell supposed to be fine? I wasn’t rotting, right? Did that cheebou have an overdeveloped sense of smell?

Anyway…

“Nina, let’s part ways!”

We didn’t have the time to argue. Soon, I was running alone among bushes, followed by a drooling cheebou. I stopped and turned around. Unlike cheetahs, the monster wasn’t a fast runner, mainly because of its tail dragging behind. I pulled myself up on a tree branch, then narrowed my eyes… and widened them as I suddenly noticed a detail. A big detail.

On the cheebou’s left antler, there was something red. It wasn’t blood. It was a ribbon.

I laughed. At last! Then my lips twisted into a grimace. What kind of idiot would wrap a ribbon around that beast? … And what kind of stupid prey would try to fetch a ribbon from its predator?

Anyway, I tried.

I gave a chance to my telekinesis, but the ribbon was well tied and couldn’t slide along the antler. When the cheebou was just under the branch, I grabbed its antler. It shook violently, and I fell from the branch. However, I didn’t loosen my grip and landed on the cheebou’s back. The beast was about one meter tall, but my sudden weight made him collapse. As I attempted to untie the ribbon, it kept moving its head and hitting me with its antlers. It was only when I finally grabbed my ribbon, all victorious, when I realized one of its antlers had jabbed my chest. I pulled backwards and was ejected by its brusque movement. As the beast managed to get up on its feet, I sat up, looked at my ribbon, then at my pierced chest. The wound wasn’t deep, but it was bad: my lifeforce had started to leak out.

A growl reminded me of the cheebou. It loomed over me, its chops drooling like I was some kind of luxurious plate. Its teeth were as sharp as Louise’s and bigger. In such a situation, I smiled.

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“Hey. Don’t eat me, I’m not tasty.”

The cheebou frowned and sniffed me, as if wondering how a corpse was able to make sounds. Then it approached its head.

“GET LOST!” I screamed.

The cheebou jerked up, whined, then flew. I gaped at the rustling bushes it left behind. I couldn’t believe it. Did it really get scared by my scream?

I breathed out in relief, shoved my red ribbon in my pocket, and took out a small box of adhesive bandages. I had anticipated that I could end up injured, but the bandages were quite small. I had to put three of them on my wound. The lifeforce was still leaking from my body, but well… I had my three ribbons!

I stood up and scanned my surroundings. Bushes, branches, giant flowers, trees, trees, and more trees. The sky, through the canopies, was now covered with gray clouds, and it was growing dark inside the jungle. The only thing left for me to do was to get out of that place. But…

Which way?

The red base where Gilda the Bloody Cook was waiting for us… I had no idea where it was.

Anyway, as the saying goes, all roads lead to Singapore. I started running in one direction, hoping that Nina, Arkifa, Noah, and Leon were all doing fine.

I was running for a while now and was wondering how big was that Nyomin reserve when a sudden voice said on my chest:

« Candida…! Only one … left! Please start … to your bases. I repeat: only one hour left! … to your bases. »

The voice was coming out from my badge. I had feared the cheebou had broken it with its antler, but it seemed that the device was still working, though the voice was intermittent.

But that wasn’t my bigger concern. I was more worried about the fact that I had heard the same voice coming from my right. As I kept running, a bald, skinny guy appeared from the other side of a row of bushes. It was the martial artist that had run away from Noah’s crimson fire. He cut my path. I stopped in my tracks.

It had started raining. I could hear the raindrops on the high branches of the forest, but few of them reached the ground. Down there, it was almost as dark as night.

“What do you want?” I asked.

“You were running quite fast,” the baldy said. “That must mean you have three ribbons.”

Crap.

“Which color do you need?”

“… The yellow one, why? You give up so soon? You don’t wanna fight?”

“I’m a pacifist.”

A raindrop splashed on a nearby leaf. The baldy confessed:

“Me too.”

There was a silence. Then I chuckled.

“Then let’s do this. I know a friend that has three extra yellow ribbons. Let’s find her and settle this without any bloodshed, okay?”

“How about you give me your yellow ribbon, then you ask that friend of yours for help?”

“… What’s your name?”

“Huh? Jing. Why?”

“My name’s Armen.”

“I know, you’re the one who got first place in the quiz. What of it?”

I gave a slow nod.

“I’ll be honest-e. I’m-e an orphan from Bird Island, I have five younger siblings, and my little sister is very sick-e. I made a bet-e with the local mafia that I would pass this examination. If I pass, I’ll get five-e thousand Corns, and I’ll be able to pay for my lil sis’ medical treatment. If I fail… I don’t know-e what will happen to her.”

I covered my face with my hands and looked at Jing between my fingers. I overacted. I was well aware of that. There was no way Jing would fall for…

I heard a sob.

“S-Sorry. I didn’t know,” he said. “Five thousand Corns… It’s not a big amount of money either. Some families have it hard, huh? I’m so sorry, I—”

“It’s all right-e,” I said in my dad’s accent. Foreigner accent always sounded cooler. “You couldn’t know.”

I was amazed. Jing was falling for it so easily.

“I’ll lend it to you,” Jing suddenly said. “Those five thousand Corns. Let me win, and I’ll lend you the money. You can repay me later whenever you can.”

I was moved. Jing… He was really willing to help me. Was he from a rich family? Five thousand Corns was not a small amount… I shook my head.

“N-No way… I can’t get you involved in my business. Besides, I promised that, if I didn’t win the bet, I’d work for the mafia for ten years. Ah, I’m embarrassed, I don’t know why I’m telling you this, I’m sorry!” I said in a painful tone as I broke into a run.

I passed by him. The border of the forest shouldn’t be much far away by now. If I could just fool him a bit longer…

“Armen!”

Jing was calling out to me, following me. I tried to accelerate, but I was feeling weak. I hadn’t eaten lifeforce since yesterday afternoon, and I had lost a lot of energy running, then getting injured… and I think Noah’s fire had numbed my core as well. I wasn’t in a good condition. That was why, this time, Jing soon caught up with me. I was breathing hard. Crap. As things were, Jing would be able to knock me down with a single punch…

“Armen, you can’t keep on like that!” Jing cut my path again. “If some thugs are abusing you, you have to tell the police! Tell me who are these guys and I’ll become a Hero for you!”

I stared at him in astonishment. I was feeling increasingly guilty. Why did he have to believe such an obvious lie?

Suddenly, my knees buckled, and I fell to the ground. That wasn’t an act. Though I wasn’t injured as much as when I had fought with my killer, my core was still in shock. Noah’s fire. It must be the effects of his fire.

“Armen? Are you injured? Hey, let’s get out of this forest first.”

Jing seemed to have forgotten about the test. How could that be? I swallowed as Jing was trying to help me up to my feet, even though I was at the end of my rope. That was one of the most worrying things about undead people, or at least about undead newbies like me: they didn’t realize they were running out of energy until they didn’t have enough deathforce to move their bodies.

I had no options but to absorb Jing’s lifeforce and cling to him. Seeing I could barely move my body, he finally decided to carry me on his back. Despite being skinny, he was strong. We made it to the border of the forest, which was quite close in fact. Out there, the rain was pouring down.

In the growing darkness, we reached the muddy road.

“Armen… do you know in which direction the red base is?!” he screamed over the rain.

“I… don’t know,” I huffed.

“… Okay, don’t worry, we’ll make it!”

Was he thinking I was dying or something? Quite the contrary: Jing’s lifeforce was refreshing, and I was starting to breathe more normally.

I felt bad. First, I had told Jing a lie, then I had him carry me to the red base…

“Jing.”

“What is it?”

“Why do you want to become a Hero?”

A lightning lit the dark clouds on the road. Then a thunder filled the whole reserve.

“Why, you ask? To tell you the truth,” Jing said as he kept walking forward, “I am an orphan too, but I have the chance to have an aunt and an uncle that I see as my parents. They taught me it is important to be at peace with oneself. When I see people suffering, I suffer too, and I want to help them. Being a hero is not a title, you know. You become a hero when you do the things you want. And what I want is…” Another thunder muffled his words. He ended the sentence with: “Probably just like everyone.”

‘You become a hero when you do the things you want’, he said… I stopped absorbing his lifeforce.

There are people in the world that want to help others because they think they are doing something good. Those are kind but arrogant people. I had the impression that Jing wasn’t one of those. He was just doing what he wanted from the bottom of his heart. Victims were his priority. They were above his own interests. And… that’s why I knew he probably wouldn’t ask me for my yellow ribbon anymore. Jing wasn’t even thinking about that, just too concentrated on carrying me to the red base, believing I was but a poor and abused victim that was working hard to save his little sis…

Crap. What was I supposed to do? Let that guy fail the exam for my sake? Oh, that’s why I hated exams…

Soon we saw the lights of the red base appear. I had no idea how much time was left.

“Jing. I can walk now. I was just feeling a bit weak, but I’m better now.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah.”

I slid to the ground and I broke into a run, yelling:

“Jing! Sorry, I lied to you!”

I stormed into the base with an angry martial artist at my heels. The room was something like a large cafeteria, and the candidates turned to us, their mouths full—almost everyone was already there, including Nina. Gilda the Bloody Cook raised an eyebrow as I brandished my ribbons.

“Here, ma’am! I pass, I guess?”

The Independent Hero looked at my ribbons.

“Where is your yellow ribbon?”

Right. I had only two of them now… I saw a bunch of muddy yellow ribbons on a desk, drew one with my power, then took it with a grin.

“Here it is. No one said I couldn’t return to the red base as many times as I wanted, right? So as long as I go back to the forest and come back with the three ribbons—”

“Quiet,” the Bloody Cook interrupted me sharply. “I did say that the exam is over for you once you’re out of the forest, didn’t I?”

Aw, did she? Some candidates laughed quietly, and I heard someone say:

“That guy’s a crack up. To behave like that in front of the Bloody Cook…”

As I noticed Noah’s frowning expression, someone breathed out loudly behind me.

“Why?” Jing was holding three ribbons, a red one, a blue one, and a yellow one. He looked up at me in shock, as if to ask, “Is that your yellow ribbon?!”.

It was. And the worst thing was that I was already beginning to regret my rash decision. Why on earth did I give my ribbon to that guy I barely knew? Did I just condemn myself to a definitive death? No, but I had placed first in the previous test, and I had returned with two ribbons. I took a deep breath, inhaling the sweet flow of lifeforce floating in the air, then I grinned at Jing with confidence. There was no way I could fail to pass, right?

Right?