To Save My Favourite Character, I Decided To Destroy the Game’s Plot

There was a good number of people lined up at the food stand that I headed to with Schneizel.

It was a lunch break after an exhaustive training session, and the mere fact that they were selling food was probably enough to satisfy the need.

Our objective was to talk to the owner, who used to be an O'Brien official. Hence, we decided to wait until the customers stopped coming in.

'Is that man a former official of O'Brien's?"

'As far as I know."

I looked at the store from a distance and observed the owner serving the customers. He seemed to be in the middle of a conversation with a customer.

"Welcome, sir. What can I get for you?"

"Uh, is there any difference between the white bread and the black bread over here?"

"The ingredients are different. The black bread is harder, so if you want to eat it, you should dip it in soup or something. There is a store over there that sells soup with some kind of waste product, right?"

"So the white bread is softer?"

"Yes, the white one is softer. Yes, it depends on the person's sense of taste. If I had to choose, I would say the white one is softer and more refreshing."

"I'll take this one then."

'Thank you."

. The old man who was the owner of the place talked in a manner somewhat similar to O'Brien's.

Or, for that matter.

"The old man is not a baker at all. He's as strong as a bat."

Schneizel muttered as if he was trying to speak for me.

. The owner of the store is still clad in an atmosphere that cannot be hidden even though he has retired from active service.

　He himself is a slender old man, but his physique is not as impotent as that of O'Brien.

　If I were to use an analogy, it would be a Japanese sword sharpened to the utmost degree of fineness.

　At first glance, it looks slender, but depending on the user, it can become a great sword, a sword that makes one's skin tingle.

We had been observing such a man serving customers with a gentle smile for a while, but...

"Oh?'

I'm pretty sure he's ------."

When an old man who appeared to be a close aide of O'Brien's stopped by the establishment, the atmosphere around him changed dramatically.

The soldiers who had been standing in line up until then broke up like spiders scattering, and the two people who remained were the owner and his aide.

"I think you are obstructing my business."

'I'm sorry about that."

The owner, a slender man, and his aide, a muscular man of great stature who still looks up to his old age.

　The two contrasting figures exchange words with a sense of urgency.

"What do you want, Mr. Bax, Captain of the Thousand?"

"Don't use that annoying honorific. You would have been a captain of a thousand if you had stayed in the service."

"I'm just a commoner now."

"About that, however.".

"I don't want to. No matter how many times you ask me, no matter how many words I use to convince you, I will never go back to the military".

"The situation is different for this time. Can't you see that I need your help now more than ever?"

The aide, who is said to be Bax, approaches half pleading with the owner.

The next words he uttered were a strong rejection, without even the honorific.

"I entrusted my sword to O'Brien, who was a true great general, not the fallen . I told him when I resigned that I would return the sword to him. I told him that I would return the sword he entrusted to me. I am no longer his sword."

The way he intimidates Bax with one sharp, single word is truly befitting of O'Brien's former officer. Perhaps the owner of the establishment was one of the more irreplaceable of the officers.

　That is why the current executives appear to persuade him even just before the war.

"I see. Then there is nothing I can do. But if you change your mind, come to me anytime. Your place is still vacant".

"It will never happen again."

"Hmph."

　Bucks leaves with an atmosphere of friction. The owner watches his back, clenching his fists tightly for some reason.

"Okay, it seems fine now, so let's go."

"What? Now?"

How can you be so determined to stick your head in under these circumstances?

No, well, we don't have much time, and maybe this is the best timing.

　I ran after Schneizel, who had quickly started walking away, in a hurry.

️

The owner of the place, who had been staring at the direction Bax left, notices us and turns around.

"Are you eavesdropping?"

"I'm sorry. I know it's in bad shape, but things are what they are".

'Huh,------ I've been feeling like I've been getting peeks into your personal life lately, but it seems it was you. Schneizel, Commander-in-Chief."

　The owner squeezes out the words with a sigh. If one only looks at that part of his life in isolation, he does not look like a tired old man.

"Well,I'm here today to talk to you. I came here today to talk to you."

"About O'Brien?"

"I'm glad you're so quick. I don't want to leave the war unsettled. I want to get as much information as I can from you because you were close to him. especially about what drove this once upright man crazy."

------

　A long, long silence. The owner's face showed a terrible struggle.

I wondered if the story about O'Brien and him would contain that much of the truth.

After a few moments of silence, the owner finally speaks up.

'That's fine,' he said. "But this is not the right place. We'll have to move a little.

So we moved to an empty place.

　But this was still a plain, and the scenery was not particularly different from the place we had just been.

"I'm a little tired. May I sit down?"

"Sure, I don't mind."

"I'll take my seat now."

　The owner sat down on the grassy field and took a breath before looking up at us. He seemed to be asking us to sit down as well.

We had no choice but to sit down, and we made eye contact with the owner.

"You must be Norwin, right?"

"What? Ah, yes. Yes, I am. Nice to meet you."

Suddenly he speaks to me, and although I am confused, I answer.

"Hmmm. Commander Schneizel. Why did you bring this boy with you?"

"You still don't like the kid?"

'No, just curious as to the reason."

"Because he's brilliant. You've heard the rumors, haven't you?"

"Well, yes, I have."

"This guy is a hundred times better than the rumors say he is. He will be a general after me, or at the latest, later."

"I see. ------"

The owner, whose eyes widened at Schneizel's bullish statement, stares at me and shuts down.

　He stares at me and shuts his eyes.

"If this child's path leads to the general, then he must listen to what I have to say".

". I'm sorry, but I'm counting on you."

"Well, it may not be that easy for you yet..."

After saying so and smiling bitterly, the owner suddenly disappeared his expression.

　It was not a straight face. This is darker than that, what is it, a sense of emptiness? A sense of loss?

Anyway, there was an uncanny feeling that chilled my heart to the core.

With this expression on his face, the owner spoke up.

"Commander Schneizel. I'm sorry to interrupt, but is there anything that is so important to you that you can't stay calm without it and will go crazy if you lose it?"

"What? Does that have anything to do with the subject?"

"Yes. It can be anything that is important to you. Family, friends, position, honor, money. What came to mind first?"

"Family. If I lost them, I would be insane".

"I see. Do you have one, Norwin?"

"Yes."

Saraswati, Lucy, Misha. Many faces come and go, and one last smile, Crescencia's, is etched in my mind.

　The girl I swore to protect in this world. The girl who is still held in the grip of death.

　If I truly lose her, I may go mad. Everything up to now has been an effort to prevent that.

"I see. 'I see, Legionnaire Schneizel, Norwin. The old O'Brien had it, too. Something so important that it would be hard for him to lose his sanity if he lost it."

"------, General, perhaps?"

"You know exactly what I mean. Yes, I do. He longed for the title of general more than anyone else, and he wanted it more than anything else."

　The general is important. If he lost it, he would go mad. I don't really understand the feeling, but it's probably not impossible when you consider what Gardias and Schneizel put into it.

'I've known him since I was very young, even younger than Norwin is now, and he always nagged me that O'Brien was going to be a great general."

The owner squints nostalgically, looking up at the clear blue sky as he spins his story.

"I guess the image of a general, a hero, and such a glorious figure resonated in his childhood. It's amazing that he actually made it to the top of the ranks to become a candidate for general. But the result was as you both know. He was lost in the struggle and was exiled to this land. I'll never forget the despair I felt at that moment. He is not the only one. Those of us who put our dreams on his back could not remain unperturbed either."

---Just as I put my all into Crescencia, O'Brien put his all into the most prestigious position of a general.

He was younger than I am now, less than eight years old. I wonder what it must have been like for him to almost reach the position he had dreamed of since that time, and then to feel the despair of being pushed down.

"Well, if I put it into words, I can talk about it in a few dozen seconds like this. Only those who have actually experienced it can understand how it felt at that time. But I want you to imagine it. Truly, at that time, using everything he had, he was aiming to become a great general. Givin up every minute, every pastime, even the women he loved, to keep supporting O'Brien. That was the only thing he dreamed of doing."

The owner would not be lying when he says so. The loyalty that I witnessed in the joint training session earlier was indeed real.

　O'Brien had the unique charisma of a man who, more than anyone else, had aspirations of becoming a general.

"But the only and greatest misfortune for him was that we had a monster in the generation below us, Ghardias. A superb man who combined military prowess and wisdom. That was the perfect general. O'Brien, who crossed over to that one with only his wits, would be a monster enough. But he could not match the real thing, which has everything. Can you understand this despair?"

The owner, who had been looking up at the sky, turns around and asks us.

　The sense of loss and emptiness that again floats on his face. Ah, this is the look of a defeated dream that one has staked one's life on.

If I lose this, I will not be able to keep my cool. The owner must have lost something important because of O'Brien's loss.

"O'Brien's efforts were genuine from the end. It was out of the ordinary. Even when the ordinary people around him were compromised, giving up, playing, laughing, and so on, he never failed to study! But God did not give him two things. Inevitably, no matter how he trained, O'Brien's strength was limited by his body. You two saw it, didn't you? That thin, poor body of his."

"Yeah, right."

　Schneizel muttered awkwardly.

"I guess we all went crazy when Ghardias took the position of the general. O'Brien lost hope, and we, who had put our dreams on the back of such a great leader, lost something, too. When we were swept away to this land, we were as good as dead. So, so--"

"Easily, we could have gone crazy."

　The owner continued.

　What did he mean by "go crazy"? While Schneizel and I were astonished, the owner went on further.

The past that I just told you is the cause of O'Brien's madness. And after that, the reason why this city came to its present structure is what we are going to talk about. Let me begin by saying that O'Brien's current autocracy is not a form of dictatorship that he produced. It is almost entirely the work of his men.

"Are you saying that you wanted Lord O'Brien to be at the top, in any way, shape, or form?"

　The words escaped my lips.

'Yes, Mr Norwin. Because we entrusted him with our dreams, we felt he had to be at the top. Even in a remote place like this."

The pain of the past has only just been revealed by the owner's own talk.

The hidden truth that will now come out is far more shocking than we had expected.