“Deek, is it? You have the feel of a Hero about you as well. What are you the Hero of?” We were just finishing with our meals when Calypso spoke up.
“Ah? You’re a Hero? I didn’t think you were that strong,” Roxford said, and then waved his hands. “Not that I’m saying you’re weak or anything!”
“I’m the hero of a city called Chalm. Nothing special.” I responded simply.
“Chalm… chalm… I’ve never heard of it!” Roxford shrugged.
“Most towns usually elect a Hero of the town. They’re not so amazing when you think of it.” I responded.
Although I had never officially met any other heroes, there had to be at least a few hundred in Aberis alone. The Prince had once mentioned that there was a yearly gathering of heroes, which was coincidently where a lot of heroes gained their more unique names, but I didn’t know when that was and I didn’t have much interest in going to it anyway. As a lord, my status already exceeded a Hero anyway.
“Don’t try to be modest.” Her red lips moved up in a smirk once again. “You have to be quite powerful to make it this far. It is a warzone out there, after all, and you’re a human.”
“I am!” Roxford declared. “Although, my bandits are a mixture of humans and demons.”
“What about you?” I asked Calypso.
“Don’t you know not to ask a girl such personal questions?” She gasped mockingly. “I’ll just say I’m not a demon.”
Well, they both looked human, and without using God-eye on them, there was no surefire way to find out. I decided to take them at their word for it, but I was curious about what they had said.
“Demons and humans? How do the demons feel about you going after their Demon Lord?”
“Demons aren’t much different than humans.” He shrugged. “Some are bad, some are good. Some resent the oppression of an overbearing lord and are willing to break the rules to upheave them. Our troop has always taken from the wealthy and given to the poor. Demons, humans, it doesn’t matter to us. This particular Demon Lord has exploited his people, and thus we must destroy him. To accomplish that, we need a weapon.”
I had already thought such thoughts. After all, how could I have Shao next to me without thinking that perhaps demons weren’t as evil as we let on? That didn’t mean they weren’t the enemy, and this so-called demon lands to the north is supposedly a blight where they allow the curses of dungeons to run wild. I couldn’t allow the dungeons to continue to sprout up. We had to destroy them. Looking around the bandits here, another product of the dungeon, I just had to harden my heart. They didn’t make the choice easy, but if I didn’t fight, then our world would be destroyed. I was certain of that, at least.