The Bird That Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (8)

“Lady Ashuria. Lady Ashuria, are you there?”

After calming the hero down sufficiently, I wrapped her in a blanket and escaped from the establishment before she woke up again. The shop owner seemed to have a lot to say about the tragedy that had occurred in the room, but after confirming that the person in my arms was the hero, he begged me with a pale face not to spread any rumors.

With loose pants and the hero in my arms, I arrived at the inn after passing through the bustling streets and pleasure district. Ashuria was sitting and chatting with Mille. She stood up abruptly like a soldier called to attention at the low voice urgently calling her name and looked at me.

Then she scanned my appearance and made a very disgusted expression.

“…What have you been doing?”

“Wow, the porter looks just like a man chased out while having an affair.”

Pants that kept slipping down and disheveled top. I was sweating profusely, and in my arms was a blonde head wrapped in a blanket. I denied all the sinister imaginings that Ashuria and Mille might have had, nodded, and said:

“…I’ll explain once we go upstairs.”

Ashuria, who was about to say something more, nodded and covered Mille’s mouth after seeing my desperate expression and the hero’s face wrapped in the blanket.

“Huh? Her…! Mmph! Mmph!”

Thanks to Ashuria’s quick response, the people in the inn glanced at us briefly before returning to their own business.

---

“The drug’s effect itself has worn off since she’s so robust, but there are some signs of slight dehydration. I think she must have sweated a lot…”

Mille was watching the hero while stamping her feet anxiously. Ashuria had her hand on the hero’s forehead, checking for fever, and I was sitting in the corner catching my breath. I felt a bit guilty at the mention of ‘dehydration symptoms’, but what I had done was strictly a medical procedure.

“Is the hero going to die? Huh? Is she going to die like this?”

Grabbing Mille who was circling around the bed, Ashuria said:

“No. She won’t die. Because the porter here brought her back admirably. So, Mille. Sit down next to him and praise the porter.”

“Wow! Hooray for the porter! The best!”

Mille, hearing Ashuria’s words, erased her teary expression and ran towards me. Then she clung to my side and started cheering three times. I smiled awkwardly and tried to dissuade her from praising me.

“Now, now, Miss Mille. We’re in front of a patient, aren’t we? This is a bit much.”

Mille looked at my hand that had come close to her nose while she was cheering. Then she sniffed and stared at me, saying:

“Why does your hand smell so strongly of the hero?”

“Uh…”

Ashuria looked at me with an incredulous expression, then looked at the hero and me once more. That expression was about to change into one of contempt as she shook her head.

“It’s a misunderstanding! It’s a misunderstanding! Nothing like that happened! P-please, listen to my explanation first!”

Ashuria asked in a very low and calm tone that contrasted with her expression:

“…You didn’t lay a hand on her at all. Is that what you’re saying?”

“…No, I did touch her, but that…”

Ashuria stood up abruptly. If there hadn’t been the excellent shield of the hero and the cumbersome obstacle of the bed between her and me, I would have died the moment she stood up. I closed my eyes tightly and shouted just as she was about to turn and come towards me:

“It, it was unavoidable! Okay? I was almost taken advantage of! Logically, how could I overpower the hero? So, I, I had no choice but to calm her down with my hands! I didn’t do what you’re thinking!”

The world was quiet. When I opened my eyes again, Ashuria’s brass knuckles were gleaming right in front of my nose. Seeing it up close for the first time, I noticed the word ‘Love’ engraved on the knuckles.

“…I’ll believe you. Although you’re dissolute, I don’t think you’re that kind of person.”

Ashuria put her knuckles away and sat down beside the bed. Her expression, which seemed to embody an indescribable feeling, and her turbid exhalation perfectly expressed her emotions.

“By the way, I’m a bit shocked that the hero was a woman.”

“Isn’t it good if she’s a woman? We can go to the bathhouse together! We can play together! We can share lodgings!”

At Mille’s unexpectedly positive words, Ashuria shook her head and said:

“I don’t like being hit by women. It doesn’t feel authoritative or overwhelming.”

“If the hero was a man, would he hit Ashuria?”

Ashuria shook her head again at Mille’s follow-up question.

“…I was thinking of trying to work something out through conversation, but lately, unpleasant things have been increasing.”

Ashuria covered her face and bowed her head deeply. The hero was not to blame for her disappointment. The hero was sleeping obliviously, and only Ashuria’s mistake of expecting something stern from the hero was lingering in this room.

“It feels like my dream has crumbled.”

“Lady Ashuria, your dreams are more modest than I thought. I assumed you’d have dreams like saving humanity.”

“Aren’t there many good people praying for such dreams? Because I believe there are still such people left in the world, I decided to make a slightly more worldly wish.”

Is her statement a correct view of the world? I didn’t have the confidence to provide an answer to this question, so I thought about it and then erased it from my mind. So instead of continuing the conversation with Ashuria, I asked Mille:

“Miss Mille, you seem less shocked than I expected. Even though it’s been revealed that the hero is a woman.”

“Hmm… It’s curious, but not surprising. I think it’s rather good! If the hero is a woman, we can do more diverse things together. We can hug and sleep together. We can play together. We can understand each other better!”

“I see you’re thinking from that perspective. They say it’s better to accept things quickly rather than slowly. So, what will you do from now on?”

The hero is a woman.

A secret that we had been hiding from each other without much thought had been revealed. Ashuria was in despair due to her sexual desires, and Mille didn’t mind, but we couldn’t know how this fact would affect our party going forward.

Ashuria ran her hand through her hair and said:

“What would change? Even if she’s a woman, the hero is still the hero. She’s still someone who strives to destroy evil demons and save the world, and I, as a religious person, have a duty to support her path. Public matters are public, and private matters are private. I still intend to stay with the hero. After all, there might be some circumstances we don’t know about. I think it’s better to just cover up the fact that we found out.”

Even if she seemed a bit off, Ashuria was still a religious person after all. Her sound argument made both Mille and me nod, and Mille asked:

“By the way, where did Lena go? It’s such an important time.”

“Didn’t we run into her on the street earlier? She was heading towards the pleasure district.”

“The pleasure district, you say?”

Ashuria nodded at my words and started a different conversation. It was a criticism of the hero’s carelessness.

“Anyway, the hero was really careless this time. It’s fortunate there was only one evil assassin, but if there had been several, the hero might have been seriously injured, right?”

I tried to dissuade her as she seemed to be getting increasingly angry while speaking:

“Now, now. The hero will probably reflect a lot on this incident. I think it’s better not to scold her too much. The hero will reflect on it herself.”

“…Still, I’ll say a word when she wakes up.”

Ashuria said that, crossing her legs and looking at the hero. Then, staring at the hero’s face, she said:

“It’s not new, but looking at her like this, it’s unmistakably a woman’s face.”

I nodded and looked out the window. Lena.

Where could she be and what could she be doing?

---

Red walls with red lighting. Lena walked into the bloody-smelling lodging. Banyan’s corpse was wrapped and discarded in a corner. The floor was still soaked with bloodstains that hadn’t been cleaned yet. She nodded, sensing the faint smell of aphrodisiac in the room.

“Banyan. Yes. It’s Banyan.”

Her gaze turned to a small bag. It was the unwritten rule of the pleasure district to incinerate the belongings of the deceased, so it had been left untouched. She knew about the items inside that bag too.

A necklace containing a portrait of the noble lady Banyan liked.

Aphrodisiacs.

Secret weapons.

The necklace was a truly unique item. Despite the fact that having a distinguishing feature could leave room for being tracked, which was dangerous for a disguise assassin, she insisted on carrying that item.

“You know, Lena. I’m going to escape this dirty place. Later, I’ll gather wealth and live as a respectable noble lady no matter what anyone says.”

Banyan and Lena’s relationship wasn’t that good. Lena criticized Banyan for being vulgar, prostituting herself and assassinating, while Banyan cursed Lena for being ignorant, jumping in among enemies to kill.

Lena took out a cigarette from her pocket. It was a cigarette she had bought at a store on the way.

“You always told me I had no class. Honestly, I didn’t dislike those words that much.”

Lena didn’t actually know whether Banyan was a smoker or not. Sometimes she wouldn’t smoke, saying she had to pretend to be a non-smoker, and other times she would smoke, saying she had to pretend to be a smoker.

Her real face, her real name, her real personality, everything was a mystery to Lena.

The only things she could know about her were her honest desire for success and her arrogance.

“I… I’ve always thought you and I were alike. You knew too, didn’t you? That if you keep rolling around in this place, you can’t become the noble lady you want. That even if you act, you’re not a real noble lady, and in the end, you’ll end up living a bottom-feeder life too.”

Lena lit the cigarette for her. Then, throwing the cigarette into the pool of blood, she said:

“But still, you shouldn’t side with the demons. Right?”

Lena dusted off her hands and stood up. Somehow her mouth tasted bitter, so she thought she should drink some alcohol at the inn today. In the place where she had stretched and disappeared, the extinguished cigarette floated in the blood.

---

“Waaaaaaaaaaaah!”

Bang! Bang!

The sound of blankets being thrown violently echoed. The first thing the hero did upon regaining consciousness was to recall her memories.

“What do I do!! H-how can I face them!”

Remembering the shameful behavior she had exhibited while intoxicated by the aphrodisiac, she simply couldn’t bear it. While the unfortunate blanket endured the hero’s rampage, the porter’s voice, who had come up from downstairs, was heard from beyond the door.

“Hero, are you alright?”

“I-I’m fine, so don’t come in!”

“Th-then should I get someone else…”

“It’s fine!”

The image of the porter awkwardly turning away was vivid in her mind. As the porter’s straight nose, deep eyes, and kind smile came to mind, the hero felt her face turning red again.

[L-let’s…! Take a bath… together?]

[…With you, old man… It’s okay…]

“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”

The innocent blanket flew high into the air with a bang.

It seemed the hero’s screams would continue for a while.