A hero who wants to help others wants to live a normal life - Chapter 27

Chapter 27   A Phone Call from a Senior

“Oh, you got a phone call.”

When I got out of the bath and headed to the living room, Inori, who was lounging on the sofa, pointed at the smartphone left on the table to let me know.

“Alright, alright. Who’s calling at this hour?”

“Isn’t it super rare for someone to call you, bro?”

“That’s rude. I get calls sometimes too, you know.”

It’s true that I hardly ever get phone calls, and honestly, there aren’t many people who would even call me in the first place. But hearing it said so bluntly still stings a little.

“Uh… it’s from Senpai?”

Looking at the screen, it seemed the call was from “Senpai.” That would be Amamiya Touka.

Even though I call her Senpai, she’s not from my school or from middle school either. In fact, we might not even have a traditional senior-junior relationship. Still, to me, she’s definitely a “Senpai.”

“Hello?”

I wasn’t sure what this was about, but for her to call herself, it must be something important.

Whether it was good or bad news, I didn’t know, but I figured it was best to brace myself. After taking a deep breath, I called her back.

“Huh…? Who is this~?”

The voice on the other end was a young woman’s, but it lacked the usual brightness you’d expect from someone her age. Instead, it sounded lazy and listless, like she couldn’t be bothered.

“Who? It’s me. You just called, didn’t you?”

“Oh…? Ah, right, right. Is this Seiji-chan?”

As soon as I said “It’s me,” I realized I sounded like one of those scam calls. She’s probably the type to fall for it easily… Or maybe not. Maybe she’d see through it after all.

Well, at least she recognized me without me having to say my name, so that’s something.

Still, even though she remembered me, that nickname…

“Yeah, it’s me, but don’t you think it’s about time to stop calling me that? It makes me sound like an old man.”

When she says “Seiji-chan,” it sounds way too much like “Seiji-grandpa,” and I’d really prefer if she stopped.

“Oh, really~? But you do have a bit of an old-soul vibe for your age, so it’s not entirely wrong, right?”

“Well, when you get blessed as a kid, it’s only natural you end up with a twisted personality.”

The blessing may be convenient, but it also locks a person’s heart into the state it was in when they received it. While it doesn’t freeze your entire mindset, having to keep the wish you made as a child at the core of your heart forever—there’s no way that lets you grow up normally.

“In your case, Seiji-chan, isn’t it more that you think your blessing was useless rather than the fact that you got one at all?”

This person… seriously.

She knows all about my past and my blessing. The government probably briefed her, and I’ve told her myself before. But when she brings it up so casually, I can’t help but regret sharing.

It’s not that I expect her to never mention it, but it’d be nice if she thought a bit more before bringing it up… Though, that’s probably asking too much. She’s not the type to care about others’ feelings. She’s more focused on using her brainpower to achieve her own wishes rather than empathizing with others.

But that’s just how it is. That’s her wish as a “blessed one.”

The reason I even call her “Senpai” is because she became a blessed one before me, and she was part of the organization I’m in now before I joined.

“…Anyway, why’d you call today?”

“Oh, right, that. So, you kinda caused some trouble recently, didn’t you~?”

“Recently… you mean the attack in Kyoto?”

If she’s talking about trouble I caused recently, that’s the only thing that comes to mind. A little while back, Inori got into a fight with a blessed classmate at school, but if that were the reason, she would’ve called sooner.

“Yeah, probably that~. I don’t know all the details, but didn’t you go a little wild? Was it fun?”

“It wasn’t fun at all, and wasn’t that whole thing not even my fault? I was more dragged into it than anything.”

It sounds like she’s implying I went on a rampage for fun, but I was the one being attacked. I just fought back in the moment.

“Come on, you don’t have to pretend~. Didn’t it feel good to fight for someone else? I know you too well~.”

I can’t see her, but her voice has this teasing tone, like she’s grinning from ear to ear. Her usual laid-back way of speaking is the same, but there’s this unnecessary energy in her voice now.

“It’s not like you were using clairvoyance to watch or anything. You just heard about it later, right?”

Although, if she really wanted to, she probably could’ve seen it. But I doubt she was actually watching the whole scene unfold at that time.

“Well, yeah, that’s true~. Oh, right~. So, what I wanted to say… or rather, it’s part of what I wanted to say, is that I thought I should share some things we learned about that incident. Actually, no—it’s not me who thought that, it’s from above~.”

“I figured. You’re not the type to care about stuff like that.”

She would never bother with something as tedious as sharing intel. I trust her abilities, but this kind of thing is definitely not her style.

“Oh my, you understand me so well… Could it be… you loooove me~?”

“Stop talking nonsense and get back to the point, you drunk.”

Her ridiculous comment made me drop the formal tone without thinking, but I’m definitely not the one at fault here.

This is the annoying part about her. She’s always talking in that laid-back, sluggish voice, but her energy levels keep fluctuating subtly, making it a hassle to deal with.

“Kufufu, that’s so mean~. I’m not drunk, I’m totally sober~.”

Seriously, this person is a pain.

“You’ve probably got a head that’s permanently floating in the clouds like you’re drunk all the time.”

“Eh? Maybe~. Oh, but actually, now that you mention it, I guess you could say I’m drunk on the beauty of the world~.”

That’s such a typical response from her, but it’s not what I wanted to hear.

“So, uh… right, right. Back to the point~. It looks like the group that attacked you was a subordinate organization of the demon faction, ‘Qliphoth.'”

She delivered this news in the same whimsical tone, but the content was deadly serious. Although for her, it was probably just another topic, no different from the random chatter we’d been having.

“Qliphoth? That anti-human group, right?”

“Yup yup~. They’re the ones who believe that useless and harmful humans should be managed by them, the chosen ones who’ve received divine blessings~. And this time it seems like the attackers were from one of their sub-groups—a bunch of idiots who don’t have blessings but still agree with their ideology~.”

Qliphoth—a criminal group that goes by a name meaning “evil force.” Why they’d choose to outright call themselves evil is beyond me, but considering their actions, it fits.

“They don’t have any blessings, which means they should be the ones being controlled by Qliphoth. I really don’t understand why they’d go along with them.”

“Well, isn’t it kinda like animal rights groups~? You know, the whole ‘humans are destroying the Earth, so it’s better to manage and restrict them’ thing. ‘We’ll take care of everything the right way~!’ Something like that~?”

I see. If that’s their mindset, I guess it’s not completely incomprehensible.

“In the end, it’s just about doing whatever they want, not really considering other people’s needs in any meaningful way.”

“If they understood that, they probably wouldn’t be helping Qliphoth in the first place~.”

That’s true. A truly decent person wouldn’t be involved in such strange behavior—they’d just live an ordinary life.

“So~ the ones stirring up trouble were from Qliphoth, but it looks like the reason they targeted you and your group was because a bunch of important people had gathered~. ‘Karat’ is part of Japan and operates within Japanese territory, but people from all over the world come here, right~? And right now, there’s even a foreign princess around~. Their plan was that if they managed to take out someone like her, relations between Japan and foreign countries would deteriorate~! The global ‘hero’ training institutions would crumble~! Oh no, how terrible~! That was their script, it seems~.”

Her words seemed a bit less drawn out since the topic was serious, but her tone was still as relaxed as ever.

At least now we knew the enemy’s objective. I didn’t understand their reasoning, but their actions were more or less what I had expected.

That said, there were still some unanswered questions.