The Rising of the Shield Hero Vol 06 Read online

  Armor had a crappy attitude. He was the sort of guy who always acted like he’d been put in charge.

  He wanted power and respect, and I think he was mostly just hanging with Itsuki to make sure that he got what he wanted.

  I didn’t know how powerful he was. I didn’t see him doing anything very impressive, or really helping anyone at all, during the last wave.

  L’Arc might have been the enemy, but I shared his assessment of Armor: he looked like a criminal of some kind.

  “What do I want? I want to know how you live with yourselves!”

  I was shouting and I felt like the whole room had become chaotic.

  I must have really looked unstable, because Armor and the rest of the group looked suddenly intimidated.

  Itsuki was the first to come to his senses. He was very angry now. He shouted back at me.

  “What are you talking about?!”

  “Still playing dumb?”

  Damn, I was getting so angry that I felt like I could switch to the Shield of Wrath right then and there. Hate billowed up inside me like smoke.

  If Ren showed up, I’d probably go crazy. The Shield of Wrath contained the core of a dragon that Ren had killed, so the shield itself responded dramatically to Ren’s presence.

  “You’re trying to seed doubt about our master, aren’t you Shield Hero?!”

  Armor took a step in my direction, so I reached out, grabbed his arm, and tried to use a judo hold on him.

  “In violation of the legendary weapon rules, you have touched a weapon besides the weapon with which you specialize.”

  There was a crackle and hiss, and pain shot up through my arm. It wasn’t that bad though.

  I was surprised that the legendary weapon rules applied to things like judo holds. I’d been able to hit things in the past though. What was the difference?

  “Ouch!”

  “I came here to speak with Itsuki. Don’t get in my way, underling!”

  I shoved Armor back and glared at Itsuki.

  I hadn’t felt this angry in a long time. Raphtalia had done so much to help keep my rage under control.

  But I didn’t want to keep it under control right then.

  “You . . . You’re always going on about justice and honesty, but you don’t understand anything at all!”

  “What are you. . .”

  I was really shouting at this point, and apparently Rishia had come to the door to see what all the fuss was about. When Itsuki saw her there he finally understood what I was upset about.

  “You mean to tell me that you are upset over THAT?”

  “Now you’re talking sense.”

  “She’s in the wrong here.”

  “Are you out of your mind?!”

  Here’s what I heard from Motoyasu:

  Here’s why Rishia was so upset.

  Yesterday, Rishia finished her shopping and was heading back to the party’s room.

  This happened right after I’d parted ways with her.

  “Rishia? Was it you?”

  “Hm? What do you mean?”

  Right after she got back to the room, Itsuki approached her looking very upset. But she didn’t know what he was upset about.

  “There’s no point in pretending you don’t know. I know that you’re the one who broke my accessory.”

  She looked around and saw that Itsuki’s favorite bangle was broken into little pieces.

  “Me? No! I, I don’t know anything about it. What happened?”

  “I can’t believe you would lie to me. We have proof that you did it.”

  Itsuki turned to his other party members.

  “That’s right. I saw it. I saw Rishia break Master Itsuki’s prized bangle and then hide it.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I saw it too.”

  “What?! I did no such thing! I . . . I really don’t know what you’re talking about!”

  Rishia emphatically denied the charge. But Itsuki wouldn’t believe her.

  “Look at all the witnesses that claim they saw you. I guess there’s no avoiding it. Shame, had you repented I would have forgiven you. Rishia, you are no longer a member of this party.”

  “But! But I really didn’t do it!”

  Just then, Rishia saw Armor smile.

  But she didn’t have time to try and figure out what had happened; she simply wanted to keep her place in the party. So she fell to her knees in front of Itsuki and begged him to reconsider.

  “Please! Please! I want to be by your side, Master Itsuki!”

  Itsuki wavered, perhaps feeling guilty. His eyes filled with tears.

  “You mustn’t forgive her now, Master Itsuki!”

  Armor and the other party members shouted to him.

  “I’m sorry. We must part ways.”

  “Master Itsuki?! I’m telling the truth! Please believe me! Please reconsider! I’ll do anything!”

  She was crying at his feet, but Itsuki turned his back on her.

  “How long will you beg for his emotions?! You’re a liar! Why should we allow someone like you to get close to our master?!”

  Itsuki’s remaining party members chased her out of the room.

  She still tried to get back to Itsuki, but her efforts proved futile.

  And that is pretty much everything that Rishia told Motoyasu.

  “You’re not going to forgive Rishia after all she did for us during the battle with L’Arc?”

  “That’s not it at all!”

  Itsuki snapped, suddenly fierce.

  It sounded to me like I’d stumbled on the truth.

  The queen had praised Rishia for her help, and that was something that he simply couldn’t stand. He couldn’t let that happen because his party and he had spent so long condescending to her.

  So he was jealous that the weakest member of his party was getting praise from the queen, and the only way he could deal with it was to frame her and get rid of her.

  From what I’d heard, Rishia hadn’t done anything wrong. Someone else had broken the bangle, and they were clearly trying to frame Rishia for it.

  I hate cowards that frame people for crimes they didn’t commit!

  That was why I was so upset with Itsuki, because it was a personal issue for me.

  “So you didn’t get what you wanted by begging, so you’d get another hero to come beg me on your behalf? Do you really think I’m going to let you back into my party?”

  “Rishia didn’t tell me anything. Our womanizing friend, Motoyasu, used his ‘charm’ to pry the story out of her!”

  Speaking of which, Motoyasu had come to this world because he’d been killed in an emotional fit back in his own world.

  He was probably nervous around girls that seemed to have an unhealthy obsession with guys.

  I guess it was like a yandere character from a gyaryge .

  There were gyaruge like that back in my world too. It was infamous for the bad ending.

  If Motoyasu had experienced something similar in his past, then hearing about Rishia and her relationship with Itsuki would have prompted memories of his own personal traumas.

  But that wasn’t the issue here!

  “What I’ve already said about it is the truth and needs no elaboration. Rishia lied about her actions. She forgot about her debt to me and was only using me for her own ambitions. Removing her from my party is only natural.”

  “And you don’t think that any of your other party members are just lying about it?”

  “Seriously? You would accuse my trusted teammates of lying to me? I don’t think that is likely. Rishia has been with us for the shortest amount of time. Therefore, I have reason to trust their word over hers.”

  The idiot. He wasn’t even trying to make sense!

  Obviously, I’d taken the time to look into the issue before I came breaking into his room.

  I knew that I couldn’t just run in there without proof and use my emotions to change his mind. Luckily, reason hadn’t completely abandoned me at that point.
r />   Rishia was not the real culprit. Furthermore, I’d already figured out who the real criminal was.

  It was actually pretty simple. I just asked a shadow.

  Shadows were secret agents under the command of the queen.

  They were a lot like ninjas. They snuck around in secret, gathering information on people.

  I knew that they had been watching all of the heroes since we’d arrived in Cal Mira. So I assumed, correctly, that they might have insight into what had really happened to Itsuki’s bangle.

  Rishia didn’t break the bangle. One of Itsuki’s other party members did.

  Apparently the shadow had even anticipated this turn of events and had therefore met with Itsuki and explained the situation to him. But Itsuki chose to believe his party over the shadow.

  When I heard that Itsuki had already been informed of the truth, there was nothing left for me to do but barge in and demand answers.

  “But there is a witness! And it’s a disinterested third party who watched with objectivity! Think about it! Are you really going to believe that your party members watched her break the bangle without stopping her?”

  “So you’ve already investigated... Well, I suppose there’s no getting around it. It was all for her, you see? They weren’t just giving her the opportunity to confess. By setting her up, they were really giving Rishia a way to avoid conflict.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  I didn’t know about this “setting up” business . . . but it all sounded very coercive.

  “It was a way to get Rishia to leave the party. My teammates here, by taking these actions on their own, were giving Rishia a way to avoid battle. Don’t you see? They did it out of concern for her.”

  “. . . ?”

  What was he saying? I couldn’t make heads or tails of it.

  They did all of this on purpose? They made it all up to get her to leave the group?

  “Rishia doesn’t belong on the battlefield. Everyone talked about it, and we decided that it would be better for her to live out her life, happily, back in her village.”

  “Yes, exactly. We did all of this for Rishia.”

  Other party members were jumping in and agreeing with Itsuki’s story. They were trying to make it look like this was all done out of concern for her.

  I guess they thought it made it okay to falsely accuse her of a crime?

  Did they think about what life in her village would be like after that? Did they think of how people would treat her?

  Was that really their best idea?

  Rishia understood perfectly well that she wasn’t the most powerful fighter around.

  If they wanted to protect her from the danger of battle, why didn’t they just sit her down and talk about it sincerely?

  Granted, Rishia was very passionate about wanting to help them, so she probably wouldn’t have immediately agreed to leave. But if Itsuki had sat her down and sincerely explained his feelings, wouldn’t she have choked back her tears and nodded?

  Whatever. I knew one thing for sure.

  Itsuki wanted to get Rishia out of his party. But Rishia was insistent about helping, and he didn’t know what to do.

  So his party members decided to commit a crime and frame her for it?

  Did that make any sense? No. The truth was that he was upset that she’d proven herself useful in the last battle.

  So they all framed her—out of jealousy.

  They did it out of concern for her? Ha! Give me a break!

  It seemed more likely to me that he knew he wasn’t in any risk from the plan, so he thought it up and asked his party members to carry it out.

  He could have made a sincere request of her, but instead he tricked her and ended up hurting her in the process. And all because he was jealous of her success in the last battle!

  When was he going to understand that we weren’t playing a game?

  Besides, had this been a game, a party member probably would have just left the party if he’d asked her too.

  But that’s right. Itsuki had been used to playing console games . If those were single player, then he would be accustomed to his party members being NPCs.

  I was really at the end of my rope with this guy. Exhausted, I turned to Rishia.

  She looked like she was on the verge of tears. She was shaking as she looked at Itsuki, clearly using what energy she had to stay composed.

  As for myself, well, this was really the last straw. There’s no way I could respect Itsuki at all after this.

  Motoyasu was an idiot who believed everything Bitch said, sure. But he wasn’t the sort of person that would cast off one of his teammates and leave them to rot.

  As for Itsuki, if he were facing an enemy he couldn’t defeat, would he run away and leave his party to die?

  “The truth is that Rishia never really quite fit in with the rest of the party. I don’t want to force her into unnecessarily dangerous situations, so I think it would be better for her to live in a peaceful place. I think she would be happier that way.”

  “Did you stop to think about how Rishia might feel about it?!”

  “That’s easy to say, but a battle for the fate of the world isn’t the sort of thing that we can risk on someone’s emotions.”

  “Then why didn’t you just tell her that in the beginning?”

  “I will say it now. She simply isn’t powerful enough to be of use in battle. I thought that if we gave her time to level and power-up, things might change. But nothing changed. Therefore, I think it’s best that she goes back to her village.”

  That was what I expected him to say.

  Basically, he was just trying to make himself look better.

  “Then why didn’t you tell her that honestly? Were you afraid of being the bad guy?”

  “Not at all! Why are you so simple-minded?”

  “If you think being thoughtful means framing someone for a crime so that you can get what you want, then yeah, I’m fine with being simple-minded.”

  “She won’t be able to keep up as the battles get harder. We had to be tough to protect her!”

  “But you’re the one that ignored her real potential and forced her to be a fighter! Why won’t you let other people control their own lives?”

  Hasn’t she said that she was better with magic than a sword?

  He must have known that, but he told her to focus on melee when she went through the class up ceremony. He should have known that she’d end up useless!

  And then when he realized she couldn’t keep up, he decided to do away with her. That’s the Itsuki I know.

  What a jerk!

  If he’d just been honest with her, she would have understood!

  In the end, he came up with this elaborate scheme just so he wouldn’t have to look like a mean person.

  And that’s basically what he had done to me too.

  They’d had a specific goal in mind and they had schemed to get what they wanted. And Itsuki had been in on it the whole time.

  “Then this is a good opportunity to be clear about it. My party is not going to be able to continue working with you, Rishia. To be frank, you are too weak to keep up.”

  Which meant that he would only say what he really meant if his back was up against a wall—which it only was because I’d stormed in.

  On top of it all, he must have felt like he was being blamed for his behavior, so he reasoned that it was because of Rishia, and therefore Rishia must be in the wrong.

  How hypocritical and self-righteous can he be?

  Compared to him, I preferred the company of slave traders and con men. At least they knew that they were evil.

  They didn’t pretend to be something that they weren’t, and their intentions were clear. That alone made them way better than someone like Itsuki.

  “...”

  Rishia tried to reply to Itsuki but couldn’t find the words. She turned and ran out of the room.

  “Rishia?!”

  “She’s just trying to get
your sympathy. Now please get out of my room!”

  “You . . . You want to make innocent people suffer—again!”

  “When did I ever do that?!”

  “Oh, I guess you’ve forgotten? About Bitch? About your little disguised hero antics?”

  “I don’t believe I have anything to do with the Bitch incident.”

  Nothing to do with it, eh? He was standing with her, blaming me for everything. But I’d yet to hear an apology for it.

  He really thought that he was the center of the universe. He didn’t care a lick about the thoughts and feelings of others.

  I didn’t have enough energy to be angry anymore. I was just tired. The boiling rage I’d felt was starting to cool off.

  I thought that this made me feel the way that Bitch had made me feel when she betrayed me. But I was wrong. This was different.

  “Oh well. I thought you had a sense of justice. I thought that you had some issues but that you could at least be a decent hero. And now this. I suppose I’m surprised. Surprised and disappointed in you.”

  I shot him a nasty look.

  I’d heard that the opposite of affection wasn’t hate—it was indifference.

  So that meant that the opposite of hate was also indifference.

  I couldn’t bring myself to care about Itsuki anymore. I couldn’t get mad at someone I didn’t care about.

  “We don’t have the sort of relationship that permits you to say things like that! Please keep your distance from me in the future!”

  Itsuki was furious. He was shouting at me.

  I was starting to understand. Itsuki thought very highly of himself, so there was nothing worse for him than knowing his estimation had fallen in someone’s eyes. He must have found it traumatic.

  “I don’t care. Why should I spend time with a self-righteous brat like you? Just keep doing your best to keep your nasty, true nature hidden from everyone.”

  “I told you to get out of here!”

  Itsuki looked like he was about to reach for his bow, but I just glared at him with cold indifference.

  “Go ahead . . . do it. Take that beloved bow of yours and shoot me. You coward!”

  “You asked for it!”

  Itsuki pulled the sting back on his bow and fired an arrow.