“But Tommy, you’re the hero! Don’t listen to him,” said Xerica as she wrapped her arm around Tommy’s shoulders.

  “Yeah,” said Daisy, plopping her chin on top of his head. “What would that brat know about the goddess’ will?”

  “You follow it excellently,” added Lensa. “I can assure you of that.”

  Ecole just gave him a thumbs up, and Neitra stood towards the back, either unsure of what to say or whether to approach.

  “That’s not the point!” Tommy shouted as he shook them all off and stood up. “It’s not about the goddess’ will, it’s about actually doing something!”

  Xerica shook her head. “And we are, our quest is more important than-”

  “Than what, saving lives? We’re on this quest to do that, but people are still dying. People I’m supposed to protect!”

  Before any of them could say anything more, Tommy began to run.

  “Wait!”

  “Don’t follow me, I want to be alone!”

  They obliged and didn’t pursue.

  “Give him time,” said Lensa. “I know the goddess will have him see reason once he calms down.”

  “Let’s continue searching for the armor piece in the meantime,” said Daisy. “He might cheer up if we start moving faster.”

  Artyom just shook his head as he approached them. He looked at Neitra, who didn’t quite meet his eyes, and kept walking.

  He didn’t follow Tommy, at least not to catch up with him, and instead activated Detect Life and traced his outline as it ran further into town.

  Artyom walked along the same path at a leisurely pace. He stopped by one of the food stalls selling some kind of fried dough and spent a handful of copper coins on two servings. He didn’t have much money left, especially after buying that suit needed to sneak into the party, and Artyom would need to find a way to get more. Maybe he’d ask the party for a cut of their rewards, or have some sent over from headquarters?

  But that wasn’t important now.

  Artyom continued towards the grasslands on the other side of town near the church. The cliff face at its edge was precarious, but the actual ground leading up to it felt incredibly sturdy as he lowered himself to sit down.

  “I told you all to leave me alone,” said Tommy. His face was set in a numb frown while his eyes and cheeks looked red and puffy. Dried tears streaked his face, leaving the thinnest channels of salt along it.

  “I wasn’t around for that conversation,” said Artyom with a shrug. “And I’m just sitting here, I am leaving you alone.”

  A flash of anger welled up in Tommy, but exhaustion was catching up to him, so he sat in place. Rather than focusing on the man beside him, the hero looked out to the ocean below.

  It was a perfect shade of blue, only accentuated by the prismatic colors shining from the sky; an impressionist piece painted through the lens of a perfectly cut diamond. The slow crashing of lazy waves matched the pace of his heavy breaths.

  “Only thing that could make this view any better is some food,” said Artyom, holding out one of his bowls. “Take it.”

  It was already lunch time and Tommy’s frustration couldn’t outweigh his growing appetite. He took the food and bit into the fried dough. As he chewed and swallowed, his posture began to relax somewhat.

  The two sat there in silence for a minute longer, just enjoying their food and the scenery; it did well to ease their turbulent hearts.

  “Is-is he right?” Tommy eventually asked. “Am I a bad hero?”

  “I’m not familiar with how you were chosen, I’m guessing it was some kind of prophecy?”

  Tommy nodded. “Some really important priests found me when I turned eighteen and told me I was destined to stop the Dark Lord.”

  “Then it doesn’t really matter if you’re a ‘bad’ hero, you’re the only hero they’ve got.”

  “But the hero’s supposed to protect everyone! And I… I haven’t.”

  Artyom let the conversation settle down for a moment as he put his thoughts into words. “That’s the nature of an evil as widespread as the one you’re fighting. They’re everywhere, and you can’t be everywhere yourself. Believe me I’ve tried.”

  Stolen story; please report.

  “So what are you supposed to do?”

  “Be where you can that has the most impact. For me, that’s right here. For you, according to the others, that would be collecting those armor pieces so you can stop the Dark Lord.”

  “But people… people died! I need to do something about that too!”

  Artyom cocked an eyebrow and looked at Tommy. “Did you even know about the warbands until now?”

  Tommy slowly shook his head.

  Artyom looked at the hero with a bewilderment that slowly morphed into realization. That explained why he was so happy-go-lucky about his adventure and dismissed Artyom’s warnings of how dangerous this place was when they first met. This entire time, Artyom thought the reality of the situation just didn’t register for him.

  “Wait, did you know about the war bands?”

  “That’s why I seeked you out in the first place,” said Artyom with a nod. “There’s a village near Brimhaven, the place we first met, called Freeacres. It was also attacked.”

  “So you think I’m not doing anything either,” replied Tommy, putting his head into his hands. “I couldn’t even stop them.”

  “Hey, I couldn’t stop them the first time around, and I was right there!”

  “But you know where they are then, we can go and-”

  “I killed them all soon after.”

  “Oh… do you want to be the hero instead? You’ve already done more than me.”

  Silence hung in the air between them as the two looked at each other, and then it was broken by-

  “Hahaha!” Artyom laughed, unable to hold it in.

  Tommy just stared at the man in a confused indignation, not sure what to say or even feel.

  “Ha, sorry about that,” said the man from Earth as he calmed down. “It’s been a long time since anyone’s asked that of me, and I’m a bit disillusioned by that role.”

  “Wait, you were a chosen hero?” asked Tommy, his eyes suddenly lighting up like a kid meeting his idol.

  “I was called that, and it was a long time ago in a land far away. It ended up not being as glamorous as I thought it would be, but that’s pretty much what I was.”

  “So you fought your own Dark Lord and saved your kingdom?”

  “Eh… not really. Turned out the ‘Dark Lords’ I was up against were just another six kingdoms, and ones that weren’t any worse than the one I was fighting for. I ended up making friends with their chosen heroes and leaving.”

  “Woah, and then you came here?”

  “After a long while, at least.”

  “Hold on, the Dark Lord I’m fighting is definitely evil. And there are the warbands too…”

  “I’m not saying anything about your Dark Lord, he definitely seems pretty evil, and deities don’t usually get involved in a conflict unless it’s a legitimate good versus evil thing. So relax, your quest is probably the real deal.”

  The mention of his quest made the light in Tommy’s eyes dim. “But people are still dying, and I can’t save them. There has to be something I can do.” He turned towards Artyom with an expecting look.

  An idea came to Artyom’s mind. It was a great idea, a perfect one that would make his life a lot easier, but… it might not have been optimal. Optimal for the kingdom, at least.

  “You know, I’ve seen how strong the rest of the party members are, stronger than me in fact. Maybe have one or more of them patrol the villages to scare the warbands away?”

  It would have been better to have Tommy convince one of the nobles to deploy their personal armies, since everyone might be needed here to collect all the armor pieces as fast as possible. But Artyom had his own mission; his own ordained quest.

  “Hey, that’s a good idea!” Tommy exclaimed, suddenly struck with a newfound energy.

  And speaking of his mission…

  “By the way, how did you get here from Cali-”

  “Tommy, there you are!” exclaimed Xerica as she ran up with the rest of the group behind her.

  Artyom frowned at their approach. He wouldn’t be able to dig into Tommy’s past with them around in case they learned of his intentions and reacted poorly to it. Not that they weren’t already reacting poorly to his presence, but they might upgrade their stealthy approach to killing him out in the open.

  “We can tell each other about our history later,” he said, patting Tommy on the back and quickly standing up.

  And speaking of poorly reacting, the ladies looked at Artyom with even deeper frowns.

  “You’d better not have done anything to hurt his feelings any more,” said Daisy. “Or else I’m going to throw you off this cliff!”

  “Actually, he made me feel a lot better,” said Tommy, slowly standing up. “I’m more committed to my quest now, I want to finish it as fast as possible so nobody else has to die.”

  The four reflexively smiled, so much so it looked truly sincere, but then turned to Artyom with confusion.

  “But in the meantime, one of you should patrol where the warbands are and fight them back!”

  That confusion quickly turned into bitter rage.

  “Was he filling your head with those ideas?” asked Xerica.

  “The quest the goddess gave you is more important than anything else, much greater good can be done by following that.”

  “I know, but why can’t we have both? It’s not an entire army, it’s just a few warbands, and if Artyom can take one on alone then one of you is more than enough to keep them away!”

  “It’s going to slow us down a ton though,” mumbled Ecole.

  “But there’ll be less killing, and fewer orphans,” said Tommy, stamping his foot. “I’ve made my decision, you four are the strongest here, even Artyom said that. One of you has to keep the warbands away!”

  If their looks of anger were previously skin deep, they now could pierce Artyom’s heart. The man from Earth didn’t react however, and just looked at them innocently.

  The three groups stood off for what felt like a minute, but eventually, one of them acceded.

  “Alright, fine,” said Xerica. “We’ll figure out who should keep the warbands away.”

  Artyom couldn’t help but let loose a thin smile. But who was to say they wouldn’t try even harder to kill him now?