The Lowest-Ranked Hero Has Returned
"You..."
Maurice trailed off, his face contorted in anger.
He glared fiercely at the blazing embers.
Step. Step.
Soft footsteps echoed through the air.
"...le, Dale."
A branch pierced through Yurina's abdomen.
Blood flowed profusely.
Suddenly, a faded memory flashed through his mind.
— I'm sorry... Dale. For leaving you all alone...
Words Yurina—no, Yuren—had said as she died in her previous life.
"......"
He placed his hand on Yurina’s shoulder.
He channeled the energy of the Blessing of Revival into her.
Fwoosh.
The flickering embers wrapped around her wound.
It was his first time attempting this in the thousands of years spanning even his previous lives, but for some reason, he felt certain—he could do it.
“Ah...”
A faint sigh escaped Yurina's lips.
The branch that had pierced her abdomen slipped out, and the wound began to heal rapidly.
It resembled the way old heroes' wounds had regenerated through Maurice’s power, but—
“What is this...?”
Yurina gently brushed the gray ash that had fallen around her now fully healed wound.
That ash hadn’t appeared when Maurice’s power was used.
But it had appeared when Dale had returned from death.
“Dale... You could do something like this?”
“This is my first time too.”
He gave a faint smile as he examined her completely healed wound.
‘Even if the result is the same, it feels different from Maurice's blessing.’
It was like the difference between regeneration and revival.
A fitting comparison might be:
Maurice's healing was like patching up torn clay—rejoining the old parts.
Whereas his own healing felt like discarding the torn clay entirely and overlaying it with something completely new.
‘Regeneration versus revival.’
In the end, though, both had the same result: healing the wound.
“Alright! I’m healed, so let’s—”
“No, Yurina. You stay here.”
“Stay here...?”
“I’ll handle him.”
He turned toward Maurice, summoning the embers once more.
Unlike the gentle warmth from when he healed Yurina, this time they radiated a fierce heat that threatened to engulf the world.
“...Hah.”
Maurice shook his head with a tired, exasperated look.
“So you're really going to keep getting in our way until the very end?”
Sigh.
A deep breath.
“Well, it can’t be helped.”
He let out a crooked smile.
“Remember what I said? That I’d help you want to end this world.”
Maurice turned to the Apostles of Eternity and gave a quiet command.
“Kill them. All of them.”
The Apostles of Eternity nodded mechanically—
Whoosh!
And dashed toward the fallen Iris.
Dale quickly raised his hand, preparing to unleash his embers at them—
“It’s okay, Dale.”
Yurina stepped forward, holding only the hilt of a broken sword.
From her stigma, a silver aura flowed, forming a beautiful blade of moonlight atop the hilt.
“I’ll protect Iris, no matter what.”
“...Yurina.”
“Remember what you said before? That because I existed, you were able to exist.”
She smiled softly as she cut down the approaching Apostle of Eternity.
Slash!
As she cut down the enemies charging toward Iris, she continued,
“It’s the same for me. Because you were there, I—no, we—are here now.”
She glanced back at Professor Elisha and Lanes, who were running toward them, and smiled again.
“So please—believe in me, Dale.”
“......”
Speechless, Dale stared blankly at Yurina.
“Whew—! Bro! I’m here too!”
“Quiet, Berald. I told you to keep your voice down.”
“Ah, Iris! Are—are you okay?!”
Berald, along with Senior Sofia and Camilla, arrived late but at last.
“...Hah.”
Dale chuckled quietly and gave a small nod.
“Then I’m counting on you, Yurina.”
“Mm!”
Leaving Yurina behind, he stepped forward toward Maurice.
Maurice twisted his mouth into a grin and gripped his wooden sword tightly.
“You’ve got some reliable party members, huh?”
“What, jealous?”
“Not really. I’ve got some dependable comrades too. And besides...”
Fwoooosh!
White petals scattered in the air.
“The more precious something is, the greater the despair when it’s lost.”
Boom!
Maurice stomped the ground hard.
His wooden sword, wrapped in petals, swung with terrifying speed, while tree roots burst up from all directions.
Boom! Fwoooosh!
Embers clashed violently with the petals.
The powerful shockwaves tore through the floor of the auditorium, cracking it wide open.
“Hah.”
Dale exhaled, embers mixed in his breath, and swung his sword.
Gray flames flared wildly around his body.
A chilling sense of omnipotence surged down his spine.
Rumble...!
Massive roots burst from the shattered floor.
Dozens of meters long, and thick enough that a grown man couldn’t wrap his arms around them.
Roots infused with the power of the Tree of Creation—strong enough to knock even master-level heroes out with a single blow.
But—
“Bloom.”
Fwoosh!
As the wild flames engulfed the roots, they instantly crumbled to ash.
“Ugh...!”
Maurice quickly retreated—but Dale stepped forward with ease.
In a blink, he closed the distance.
With a fist wrapped in embers, he launched a savage punch.
No special technique, no fancy moves were needed.
A punch imbued with magic so vast it was almost unfathomable—power strong enough to literally crush a mountain.
KWA-GWAGWAGWANG!!!
The earth split apart.
Maurice’s body, struck by the punch, crashed through the wall of the auditorium and was flung hundreds of meters away.
“Ka... hack!”
A hole the size of a human head had been blasted into his solar plexus.
Blood and entrails gushed out from the torn flesh.
“...Impressive, really...”
Rumble...
The torn flesh around the wound began to writhe and squirm, then fused back together, regenerating in moments.
“Alright, then. Let’s go ahead and kill each other for real!”
With a twisted grin, Maurice charged forward.
BOOM! THUD! RRRRUMBLE!
Their clash continued.
The entire Hero Academy grounds—vast enough to rival a mid-sized city—were reduced to rubble in the wake of their battle.
Squelch!
A body pierced by dozens of tree roots regenerated instantly.
Whooosh!
A body shredded by burning embers healed in the blink of an eye.
“Hahahaha! I can’t remember the last time I experienced death like this!”
Laughing maniacally, Maurice swung his wooden sword.
Chwarararak!
White petals scattered through the air.
As if standing in the middle of a snowstorm on a frozen plain, the surroundings became blanketed in white petals.
“How is it? Still holding up?”
“More than fine.”
With a nod, he incinerated the falling petals with embers.
“Heh. I wonder how long that confidence will last.”
With a smirk, Maurice glanced back at the now-distant auditorium.
“Hm... looks like I don’t have the luxury to divide my strength anymore.”
He reached out toward the auditorium, and green light radiated from within, flowing into his body.
Wooooong!
The green aura surrounding Maurice grew darker and denser.
“You retracted the power you gave to the Apostles?”
“Yeah. They’re not going to be of much help in this situation anyway.”
“Then they won’t last long—they’ll die soon.”
Without the blessing of regeneration, the Apostles of Eternity wouldn’t stand a chance against Yurina, Professor Elisha, and Lanez.
“Who cares if those guys die or not?”
Maurice shook his head with a completely indifferent expression.
“......”
That strange, creeping sense of wrongness returned.
A deeply unsettling feeling crawled up the spine, like watching misaligned gears trying to turn.
“Well then, shall we start going all out?”
Spreading the dark green aura, Maurice grasped a tree branch.
Chwararararak!
White petals bloomed from the branch.
“...Before that.”
“Hm?”
“There’s something I want to ask.”
“Haha. What, are you trying to stall until your party members arrive?”
Maurice chuckled and playfully twirled the branch in his hand.
“Go ahead and ask.”
“You...”
He looked directly at Maurice and continued softly.
“Why do you keep saying ‘we’?”
At first, he assumed Maurice was referring to the Apostles of Eternity.
But even now—when the Apostles were no longer present—he kept using the word we.
Yes.
As if... someone else were still with him.
“What are you...?”
Stop.
Maurice froze in place.
“There’s no one there but you.”
“...Ha.”
Maurice let out a hollow laugh.
“Hey, did you hear that?”
He turned to empty space and shook with laughter.
“He says I’m alone here.”
“Haha! That’s what I’m saying! We’ve been fighting together all this time, and he acts like you don’t even exist.”
“Ugh, I told you to train harder, didn’t I? You guys are always slacking off—now this guy’s acting like you’re invisible.”
“Yeah, yeah, got it. Don’t be so cranky. Can’t even joke around anymore.”
Ah.
“...You.”
That faint sense of wrongness was growing sharper now.
When Maurice had said he wanted to go home—that’s when the doubt first emerged.
Why did he want to go back home?
Logically, after falling into this strange world 500 years ago, it would make sense to want to return.
But—
‘Too much time has passed.’
Five hundred years.
Yes, five hundred.
No matter how attached he might’ve been to his old world, it wouldn't be the same place anymore.
He had to know that.
And yet Maurice still said he wanted to go back.
Even if he had to turn this world to ash.
Whoosh.
A single white petal fluttered past his eyes in the breeze.
‘Chrysanthemum.’
He remembered hearing something as a child:
In the old republic, chrysanthemums were used to honor the dead.
“I know.”
Maurice gripped the flowered branch tightly.
“Yeonghoon, Jaeyoung, Jinho, Yeonju...”
He murmured names no one else could recognize.
“We’re all going home—together.”
Petals swirled through the air like a blizzard.
“...Ah.”
Now he understood.
Now it all made sense.
“Yeah... I see.”
Just like he was...
Him too...
...was living in that place.
A never-ending,
Unyielding,
Bitterly cold and sorrowful garden.

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