Price Of A Hero

“Hey, Arja, just tell me already! How do I change back!”

“Yeah, Arja, how about explaining all of this as well?”

“Hey now, that’s Crown Prince for ya, Hava. We’re not in the arena.”

“Then what about him?”

The two continued to bicker as we rocked back and forth. The conversation had been going on for a while now, but everything was at a standstill. After the ruckus at the market, we were quickly escorted via carriage — just that there were no horses to drag us around, but camels. Donkeys were apparently too “peasant-y” for someone of our status, whatever that might be.

Well, it would be true with Arja, obviously. But not me and this man in green.

From Arja’s introduction back then, his name was Hava. He had also dropped his armor form to return to looking like a regular human. Contrary to the armor’s appearance, Hava was a bulky man. He was not only taller than Arja, perhaps over two meters, even, but he was also incredibly muscular, with his shoulders and pecs being easily twice the size of my fists. His dark skin was a tone darker than Arja’s as well, and unlike the latter’s shining appearance, his complexion looked like he had weathered the storm for as long as he could remember. Having just undone his transform, the man was topless, but that was soon fixed by a set of “clothes from fine silk” that Arja bought from the store in trouble. “It’s helping the people,” he said.

But all of that didn’t change the fact that the man in question had been avoiding both of our questions the moment we stepped on the carriage. And yes, I was still stuck in my armored form the whole time. Now that I had no choice but to use it, I had realized how incredibly annoying it was. Everything was tiny-sized, and I nearly broke the door just trying to get in.

But as always, Arja was still putting on that jokey face of his. “And as for Ren… easy now, buddy, relax,” he chuckled, throwing me another purple fruit. “Here, have a mangosteen.”

“I can’t even eat with this thing.”

“Oh, right… my bad.”

“Just tell me how to get out of it already!”

“And explain his problem!” Hava added in frustration.

“Okay, okay, fine, one at a time,” Arja snapped a finger. “First of all, uh…”

“Get me out of this thing first!” I shouted.

“M…kay, Hava, yer up first.”

“Hey!”

Ignoring my frustration, Arja continued. “Y’see, my good friend, my sworn brother from a different mother…”

“You sound like we’re related,” huff Hava. Despite being the one to get answers first, he was still clearly sulking.

“But we are. On a… very far-away branch, but still.”

Feigning a cough, he continued. “In any case, our friend here is Ren. He’s from another world.”

“Another world… Arja, you bastard!” Hava almost jumped up from the carriage, but as our ride rocked to the point of almost falling, he remembered our disposition and managed to sit back down just in time.

Now it was his turn to feign a cough, Hava continued. “Arja, you bastard. You’re using those now too?”

It didn’t take a detective to know that this man before he had some obvious grudge against the monsters. It made sense, of course, seeing that they were, quoted by Arja, “summoned familiar by Drizzle, from another world”. And if these two had been fighting these monsters for a while now, they must have gotten to witness just how dangerous they were… as well as how many casualties there had been.

“Hey, hey, don’t blame me,” Arja raised his hand to answer. “It was our other friend that brought him here.”

“Other friend… Indra?”

If Hava’s reaction towards the fact that I was from another world was just simple anger, then his seething rage when the name Indra was mentioned, by himself even, was nothing short of pure hatred. I could feel myself being pricked by those words already.

On the other hand, Arja stopped smiling for the first time since I’d met him. “Kana, Hava. Her name is Kana.”

“Arja, stop. She’s gone. The Kana you know… the Kana we know is no more.”

“One more word and we’ll feast with yer charred body.”

It wasn’t a joke. Arja’s eyes were sharp and cold like a razor.

“... Fine, I won’t comment on that matter any further,” Hava let out a sigh, before turning to me. “So? What does In… Kana’s summoning of this guy has anything to do with his current circumstances? Normally they just summon a monster straight up, right?”

“He’s a special case,” finally, Arja’s eyebrows loosened. “I’m gonna guess it’s because it’s Kana that summoned him. Her link with Indra finally awakened Vritra in our land… and it chose him as the host.”

“Strange. Then why him in particular? He’s an otherworlder, right? Kana shouldn’t have any relations with him.”

“About that…” It was my cue to explain. However, in the moment, I finally realized the biggest problem.

My clothes were gone. Or rather, it should be inside this stupid armor that I couldn’t turn off.

“Arja!”

“Kay, kay, I guess yer turn is next, Ren,” finally, he commented on my matter. “The thing is… I don’t know.”

“Finally, thank you… wait, what?”

“I don’t know,” the young prince shrugged.

“But you can transform! What do you mean you don’t know?”

“Ya see, Ren,” he snapped his fingers. “Once we’ve gotten this Stigma, transforming and de-transforming is like breathing to us. We might need a trigger phrase to ease our process of getting the armor to appear, but to make it disappear, well…”

Snapping another time, he concluded. “Literally just a snap of the finger, and we’re back to normal.”

“So… I just need to snap my fingers?”

“No, no, figuratively speaking. I mean that it’s an unconditional action. If yer not used to it, I’d say just focus on yer tattoo on yer arm, and think about yer old body. That’s about it, but… I’m thinking ya should just wear that always.”

“... Excuse me? What about eating? Sleeping? Personal hygiene?”

“No water, remember? Unless ya wanna roll yerself in sand like us.”

“... Fine, I’ll give you that last one. Still!”

“Once yer in that form, the armor will naturally absorb natural energy — sunlight, for instance. As long as yer desire is still kickin’, ya aint gotta worry about things like basic energy. And as for sleeping, well, just sleep like normal. It’s not like this thing forces ya to stay awake.”

“Still! Why can’t I just…”

Arja, for the first time since our ride, moved from his seat to mine. Patting his hand on my shoulder, he continued:

“I’m serious, Ren. Stay in this form. This land needs a hero.”

“... What?”

“Let me explain. Yer regular form right now is half-merged with Vritra. It gave ya some snake-like features. That’s a no-go, for reasons I think ya know better than anyone else.”

Naturally. Who would ever approach a monster?

“But this,” knocking on the armor’s chestplate, he continued. “This is a real hero. Big, strong, a bearer of miracle, like everyone had just witnessed. Ya feel me?”

“You mean… media exposure?”

“Not sure what that means, but yer vibe is similar, so yeah, basically that,” Arja snapped his fingers. “If yer image as a hero is strengthened, then not only will the nation’s wellbeing be improved, but yer own quest would be easier, right? After all, assisting a hero is everyone’s biggest dream.”

“Well…”

He was right. I had to admit, Arja was much more of a shrewd tactician than I had expected. Hidden beneath his flamboyant and unserious nature was a mind well-versed in politics. He wasn’t the Crown Prince of the nation for nothing.

But that wasn’t my main concern.

“No, I need to de-transform now. I have the picture, you know, to prove my circumstances.”

“Oh… that one. Gotcha.” Arja nodded in understanding as he turned away for a second, rummaging through some of the sacs in the carriage. Soon enough the man had taken out another picture — an exact copy of mine with Reiko.

“I asked some of our painters to make a copy, just in case. Anyway, Hava, Ren’s connection to Kana… is probably this.”

“This is…!” The other man couldn’t believe his eyes.

“Surprising, right? But yeah, no matter how much ya slice it, she looks just like Kana. Now, whether she’s a doppelganger, or there was something else amidst all of this, we don’t know. But all we can conclude is that I don’t think Kana bringing Ren here was a mere coincidence.”

“It’s not,” I shook my head. “Back when I met her on Earth, she was calling out my name… as if she’d known me from a long time ago.”

“And there we have it,” Arja raised his hands to conclude the story. “We have Kana summoning Ren from another world, Ren here wants to find his sister through Kana, we are in need of a hero through Ren, and we are the only clue Ren has towards Kana. Sounds simple enough, right?”

“I… guess,” Hava rubbed his temples as if suffering from a chronic headache. If I didn’t have this stupid armor on me, I’d probably do the same right now.

“In any case, the solution is simple: Ren will continue to pose as Drought’s hero, and in exchange, we’ll get ya all the info ya need for Kana, as much as possible. Deal?”

“Well, yeah, of course,” I nodded. “But can you please figure out how to at least change me back when I’m in private?”

“Yeah, sure. But we’re not in private right now, right?”

“That reminds me… where are we going, actually?”

“Where else?” Arja let out a wry grin. “To our palace.”