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Ruler Vol 3 Chapter 38

 

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Author: Anit666

Editor: Weasalopes

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【Sam’s POV】

 

Chloe and Susan finally stopped hugging and parted, thus ending their touching reunion. But they still stood close to each other, peering into each other’s eyes as if talking with them. It seemed they would start something forbidden right here and now.

“But Chloe, what are you doing here?”

Thankfully, they didn’t as Susan asked first after wiping her tears. Everyone looked in amazement at the duo, but none of them dared to interfere this reunion. Any questions they had could be entertained later.

Chloe also wiped her tears away and giggled.

“Hehe, you would be surprised to know this but just like you, I was also summoned as a Hero.”

“Eh?!”

“Yes, Susan. Chloe Evans is one of the Heroes who had been summoned to this world by Lucius to defeat the Demon King.”

Liera stepped forward and explained.

“Wait, one of the Heroes?”

“Yeah. Two men were summoned along with me.”

Chloe replied.

“Really? Who are they?”

“You have already met them. And they are.”

Chloe first pointed towards Jack, who lightly waved in greeting. Susan waved back to him. And then Chloe pointed to me.

“Also, he was the one who saved you and ended this war.”

Colour drained from Susan’s face upon listening to Chloe. She immediately bowed towards me and started speaking frantically.

“I am so sorry for punching you earlier! It’s just that you appeared so suddenly in front of me and I was in your arms and I couldn’t understand the situation so I took you for a pervert and-”

“It’s alright. Don’t worry.”

I lightly waved my hand to calm her down. I know her circumstances so I don’t mind, though I would appreciate if she could hold back on instantly assuming someone to be a pervert.

Susan then abruptly turned to Chloe as if she had just remembered something, and with a grievous look on her face, she spoke again.

“Chloe, regarding Sam, actually he-”

But before she could finish, Chloe stopped her by pushing her finger against her lips. With a mischievous smile, she then pointed at me. And as Susan turned to look at me in confusion, Chloe dropped the final bomb.

“There’s no need to worry about Sam, Susan. He’s also here.”

“WHA?!”

Susan shouted in utter disbelief.

⟦Ha! You have been had, Samuel! You’ve been really had!⟧

Maxwell ridiculed me from inside. Doesn’t he have anything better to do?

⟦Yeah, I’m aware of that more than you. So, could you shut up for a moment? I’m having the crisis of my life here.⟧

With desperation apparent on her face, Susan disappeared from her place and appeared in front of me. She gently took off my mask, and I didn’t stop her. Her expression- no, her entire body froze up as she blankly stared at my face. It was as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

“Heya. Fancy meeting you here.”

Since the silent atmosphere was too awkward for me, I started by lightly greeting her. What else was I supposed to do anyway. But in response, my mask fell from her hand and for the 4th- or maybe 5th- time today, tears started flowing from her eyes.

Alright this is really awkward. What am I supposed to do now?

“Heya my ass!”

She screamed in fury and raised her hand to hit me. What would she do now? Hit me with a world-ending magic spell? I’ll admit I kinda deserve it but I still refuse to die by her hands. Maybe I should put up a barrier which would weaken the spell so that it wouldn’t kill me? However, her expression contorted into a mix of relief and pain, and her hand stopped short of sending me into the afterlife.

Instead, she hugged me.

“Waaah! Where have you been, you bastard?! I thought! I thought that I had really lost you!”

And so came her muffled scream from my chest. Seeing no other choice, I also hugged her back and started caressing her hair. I was taught that this was the most optimal position to calm down a woman crying into your chest. But in response she only hugged me tighter and her wails also grew louder.

Wasn’t position supposed to calm them down, oi?! It worked with Chloe and Shiggurath, so why?! But well, I’m at fault for making her feel this way. I guess anyone would act like this after reuniting with a close friend they thought they had lost.

After some time, when Susan finally calmed down, she let go of me. She was blushing furiously as she fidgeted in her place, but by taking deep breaths she calmed herself down.

“W-What’s with your totally calm expression, huh? Don’t you feel anything even though we’ve met after such a long time?”

“Of course, I feel ecstatic. Or else I wouldn’t have hugged you back.”

“Ugh!” She groaned. “Anyway, just what are you doing here?”

She pointed at me with a sceptical look. I guess that after all that we’ve been through, it’s only natural that she would ask me that question.

“Can I say that I’m here to save you?”

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“Yeah, so that I become happy and excited because you care so much for me, and then I’ll ask you whether that was the truth and you’d reply with a flat no. Right?”

Oya? I was caught?

“O-of course not. I’d never do such a thing, especially not to you.”

“Hmph, I know you too well to know that you are lying. Most probably, saving me was an accident, no?”

Hmm….. I wonder how I should answer that. Well, I’ll just state the facts.

“Of course not. I came to know about your existence from Shiggurath and hence made the necessary plans to save you.”

“Shiggurath?”

“Yeah, well, a lot happened and we ended up becoming partners through the contract.”

“What? You are as sinful as ever, huh.”

Sinful? Where did that come from?

“Now wait a fucking minute here Susan! You know this bastard?”

Regina, unable to hold herself anymore, jumped in and rudely pointed at me.

“Of course. We were friends back on earth. No, actually, me, Chloe and him were best friends.”

“Haaa? Really? You were friends with this Monster?”

“Monster?”

Susan asked confusedly.

“Haaahh…” Regina let out a heavy sigh. “There’s so much I have to tell you. But I can’t do it alone, right Shiggurath, Liera?”

““Yeah.””

Both of them readily agreed. Though I personally believe that we should first get out of this place. We could discuss things while having a small tea party, right?

But it seemed that I was the only one who had this wonderful idea, so I kept my mouth shut.

“So first of all.” Liera started. “Do you know that man?”

She pointed at Jack.

“Nope.”

Susan shook her head. Well, I would be greatly troubled if she actually knew him.

“Damn it. Well, to be honest I don’t really know how Sam did what he did so you should ask the others.”

“Well, about that…….” Regina scratched her head sounding troubled. “I also don’t know anything other than this madman’s final plan. You should ask Shiggurath.”

“Hahahaha…..” Shiggurath laughed awkwardly. “I only know the initial stages of his plan, so……”

Well, that was to be expected. None of them knew about my true plans after all. All of them were given just specific instructions regarding their specific parts in my grand plan.

Everyone then turned to me with expectant eyes. And why the heck do you have those eyes, Jack?

I couldn’t stop the sigh from escaping my lips.

“Well, I guess I should start from the beginning.”

“Yeah, please do.”

Susan replied sounding interested.

“So, let’s go back to when the three of us- me, Chloe and Jack- were first summoned here. Even after all that bullshit that Alicia and Azell had spouted about saving their world from the demonkind, I didn’t really believe them. I mean, what kind of idiot would?”

Susan averted her eyes while scratching her cheek. I’ll pretend I didn’t see that.

“So, after learning magic, I asked Jack to hide his true abilities and made him follow the upper echelon of royalty, namely the king, Alicia, Azell, Olivia, Reygus and Liera.”

“Wait! Jack tailed us? When? We never felt his presence!”

Olivia interjected with a perfectly sensible question. However, Liera chided her.

“Don’t focus on the ‘how’, Olivia. Let us assure you that both him and Jack are capable of doing what they claim to be able to do. So, just listen to the story for now.”

“Thank you, Liera. Among all of you, the person who piqued my interest most was Azell. Ah, by the way Susan, Azell is the name Lucius went by during this generation. Anyway, Azell, or Lucius, was the shadiest person among the group, so I had Jack follow him closely. And on one fine day, Azell came here.”

I pointed to the ground I was standing on.

“Naturally, Jack followed him as well. Except that he didn’t follow him back when Azell went back. Jack closely examined this place, including the magic areia on the ground and the crystals Susan was encased in. He came back, and using a recording crystal, he showed me the entire place. That was the first time when I saw Susan.”

“Oh! So that’s how you knew I was here!”

Susan clapped her hands.

“No, I didn’t.”

“Eh?”

“When I first saw you trapped in that crystal, I couldn’t recognise you due to two reasons. First, you had grown so you were obviously different from the Susan I knew, and second that you weren’t supposed to be in this world.”

“Y-yeah, that’s also true. But you still should have recognised me!”

She muttered angrily.

“Well, your figure when you were trapped in the crystal did remind me of the Susan I knew, but I had dismissed that possibility due to the second reason. And so, I didn’t pay any mind to it beside making a mental note to keep an eye on Azell. Then came the time when I was finally allowed to go outside. And after going through some insane things due to that elf over there-” I pointed to Cornellia. “I ended up making a contract with Shiggurath.” And then came the time when Regina decided to attack the imperial castle because she ‘wAnTed tO GAugE tHe pOweR oF tHe HeRoeS’. And in that process Almarick there ended up hurting Chloe.”

Susan immediately turned to Regina who was now sweating bullets.

“I-I can explain-”

“And then she visited me in my room because she wanted me to join her side. What an unreasonable woman. Good grief.”

“S-Samuel, you bastard……!”

She muttered while grinding her teeth. But I guess even she won’t dare to attack me now, not after what I made her go through before killing Azell.

“Naturally, I refused Regina’s request because I am a good boy. And then came the time when Shiggurath trespassed in my room and assaulted me.”

“A-Assaulted?!”

Everyone now turned to Shiggurath, and now it was her turn to sweat bullets.

“No no no! I didn’t assault him! Tell them, Sam!”

I guess I’ll have mercy on her.

“Alright alright. I’ll amend my words. According to Shiggurath, she was there just to observe me while sleeping- I still don’t understand how that would help someone. And after some series of events in which she nearly killed me, I found out that the First Hero was in fact you, Susan. So that’s why I changed my plans.”

Well, I can’t exactly say that I broke Shiggurath and rebuilt her again, now can I? And neither can I tell them how exactly I had changed my plans. That’ll cause a huge uproar.

“So, I sent Jack to Regina and invited her to the dungeon, which, by the way, was ruled by the one and only Balgaar. Again, an unfortunate series of events which was actually started by me led us to be separated. I was with Regina, Liera was with Jack, who by the way politely brought her on our side. That was when I presented my plan to Regina. In simplified form, the plan was this: both mankind’s and demonkind’s armies would fight. I and Regina would fight the final battle in which, after many sacrifices, I would have defeated Regina, causing Azell to come out and stab me in the back. But Regina would have been alive and together we would have defeated Azell. Regina agreed to my plan. After that we encountered Balgaar and defeated him. Then-”

“Oi don’t make it sound so easy! I know just how terrific Balgaar was! How the hell did you defeat him?!”

Susan stopped me.

“Yeah, Susan! In fact, let me tell something. Balgaar and Samuel knew each other!”

And Regina supported her while also saying something completely unnecessary. Is she taking revenge?

“Haa?!”

Most of the people present in the room exclaimed at this newfound discovery.

“Sam, is it true?! Did you really know Balgaar?!”

Susan grabbed my collars and demanded while shaking me.

“Huh? Ah, yeah. You can say that we were old acquaintances, that’s why I was able to kill him. More on that later.”

An acquaintance who should have been dead. Nevertheless, I succeeded in acquiring him so I can’t really complain.

“Anyway, so after that came the war where Regina unexpectedly betrayed me. Like, what the actual fuck, Regina? But I was still able to somehow turn everything right and kill Azell.”

That ‘somehow’ was quite wild actually, and involved breaking the wills of a lot of people.
And the reason we couldn’t just attack Azell and kill him was because he was holding Susan hostage. Their souls were connected to each other by a great magic spell, so that’s why I had to make him come out and stab me, which allowed me and Maxwell to directly assess his soul and break that connection. This was the result I had been aiming for.

All of this was possible only because this was a world under the direct jurisdiction of Phiria. Well, that was the very reason we had been brought to this world.

I had been the one who wrote the plot for this really elaborate play, but the ones who prepared the stage were Phiria and Jack.

“Hey it’s over with that?! There are still many things I want to ask! How did you know Balgaar! How-”

“All of those questions can be entertained later on, Susan. For now, we should get out of this place.”

“Uuuuuuu……”

Susan groaned. Nope, I’m not going to fall for her cuteness.

“Before that, answer just one question from me, Samuel.”

“Hmm? Sure, why not.”

“Everyone here, except Susan, knows that despite your oversimplification while explaining, the methods you used and the things you did were overly-convoluted and created a lot of unnecessary sacrifices. There were a lot of things which could have been done in simpler ways. You forced the secrets out from Shiggurath’s mouth, you used Jack to invite me to that dungeon, and then you forcibly brought Liera to your side. The war that you had in your ideal scenario had a lot of sacrifices as well. And because of you, all of us present here had to go through so many horrors. Even you yourself were brought to the brink of death two times. So why? There’s no way in hell someone of your calibre didn’t have any better way of ending our chronic nightmare, right? So why did you use those twisted methods?”

Hmm, an interesting question. I wonder how I should answer that. It’s true that my methods were needlessly convoluted. There were several reasons for that, like wanting to avoid defeat, or being placed under severe restrictions due to the ideal scenario I wanted to create and clear, and many more. I don’t think I can explain any of them. Hmm…..

“Well…….. just saving Susan and ending the 5000 years old war….. would have been boring, right?”

“Hueh?”

“I wanted to enthuse some magic into it, to perfect the art of trickery, deception and war, and direct the actors to lead us to the final stage and finish the 5 millenniums long war with an end befitting of it legacy. That’s right! That is expected of me, as the Hero, as the sword of humanity forged by the Goddess herself!”

I finished grandly while spreading my arms like a magician finishing the greatest show of his life. Everyone, excluding Phiria and Jack of course, was dumbfounded due to my speech. This time, all of them looked at me as if they were truly looking at a monster. I guess even they didn’t expect such an answer.

“Or that’s what I would have liked to say. But I won’t because that would be a lie.”

I lowered my hands and said flatly.

“Huh?”

“Anyway, I think it’s time for us to leave this place. I’m sure that unlike us, our Goddess here is very busy.”

“Eh? Ah, right!”

“Goddess?”

Susan muttered.

“Ah, Goddess! Do you mean the Goddess Phiria?! Where is she?!”

Susan exclaimed while looking around.

Seriously, Susan? I mean, just look at that transcendent beauty standing over there. Who else could be a Goddess if not her?

Anyway, I pointed Phiria to her.

“Ah, so you are the Goddess of Life, Phiria, who teleported me to this world to save mankind!”

“Yes. It’s a pleasure meeting you, Susan.”

Phiria smiled benevolently.

“The pleasure is all mine, Goddess!”

And Susan abashedly replied.

“So, can we go back to the surface now?”

I chimed in on the conversation which seemed would take an eternity.

“But what about the other Heroes?”

Liera asked while looking at the other crystals still jutting out from the ground. The remaining 5 crystals encased the 5 Heroes of the generations after Susan.

“We’ll also save them, of course. Sam.”

Good grief. I once again started the selective decomposition, but this time on all the 5 crystals. After a contest of mana, they were turned to dust and the Heroes also came out.

Phiria then opened a portal to the surface and threw the still unconscious Heroes through it.

“Let’s go now, everyone.”

She called out to us. Everyone’s face lit up with happiness and relief as everything had finally ended. The Heroes had been saved, the war had ended. Many of them had been scarred for life, but they could finally go back to their usual lives and learn to live with those scars.

But there was one exception. Chloe stood at her place even though everyone started to move.

 

“Everyone, you go ahead. I’m sure there are some things Sam wants to ask me.”

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