Translator: mii
Editors: sleepchaser, ASplashofMusic, Brighton
I had a childhood friend.
He was small and cute with a face anyone would find “pretty” in just a glance.
His soft golden hair was more beautiful than the nectar honey bees collected, and his big round eyes shone vibrant, a clear red similar to pomegranate. Coupled with his snow-white skin, everyone often referred to him as an angel.
Although he was a boy, he was much cuter than the girls in our village. We were the same age but he grew slower, leading to him getting teased often.
“Don’t cry so much. You’ll just get teased again, you know.”
“I’m not crying.”
I clearly remembered that while no tears spilled from his eyes, they would grow misty as he bit his lips in frustration.
He healed my scratch with such a face, and only after making sure my body was free of wounds did he finally sigh in relief.
As I saw that, warmth filled my chest, and well, I once again remembered how soft he was.
That’s why I had been astonished to discover he was the hero.
This had occurred when we were around ten years old.
At that time, we were playing under the big tree beside the orphanage as usual. Then people in incredibly imposing attire arrived at the orphanage.
In their words, God’s oracle had decreed that a hero resided here, and they came to test whether someone could unsheathe the Holy Sword. They called my childhood friend and I into a separate room.
The moment he yanked the sword out, worry hit me before surprise.
After all, he was someone who would burst into tears just by looking at my wounds. Since we lived in the countryside, he could kill some insects, but demons? The Demon King? I didn’t think he had it in him.
They told him that due to his young age, he would need to undergo special physical and combat training. However, he was the type of person who would endure things in silence until losing consciousness.
If such a tender kid fought against demons, he would definitely get hurt.
So I thought it was only natural for me to say, “I’ll go together with him.”
After all, he was my precious childhood friend. We had been together in this orphanage before we were even aware of our surroundings. In fact, we were practically always together.
We shared a bedroom and slept together on a bed. If I left him alone, strange men would approach him, so I made sure to stay with him even while bathing. It was to the point where there were only a few instances when we were apart.
There was no way I could leave such a guy alone.
The special training was quite harsh, but it was necessary to guarantee our lives in future battles. I didn’t have any magic power, but I was nimble, and the instructors praised that I would have a bright future ahead of me.
Despite how amazing his magic and skill in the sword were, he wasn’t willing to fight. Hesitance plagued his movements, and he never attacked with all of his might.
I had long since expected this. Therefore, I pushed through the special training even with blisters covering my hands. As long as I could fight the demons in his stead, it would be all right.
Even so, those fun days only lasted until we were twelve years old.
Because a demon would grow aware of the hero’s existence and attack the village.
✢
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
The demon first set fire to the houses.
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He hated fighting, but he wasn’t a coward.
Even when surrounded by men twice as big as him, he never blanched.
The panic within his eyes must be because we were currently no match for the demon.
“Hey, lend me your sword. Let’s go to our hideout.”
“Eh?”
“The demons won’t be able to find it easily. Plus, there’s food there. Come on, give me your sword. It’ll just become a burden for you once we start running, right?”
I grabbed his hand and casually wrenched the unsheathed Holy Sword away from his grip. When he finally met my gaze, I shot a grin at him and started dashing to the hideout.
The so-called hideout resided in the chapel at the back of the orphanage. Behind the cross hid a trapdoor leading to the basement. After previously chancing upon it, we had turned the small room into our hideout.
Inside were many snacks we had sneaked in, as well as beautiful stones we had gathered. Along with a little pocket money.
This small room only had a table and a bed, but it was better than trembling in fear with everyone outside.
Although the room was stuffy with our scents, I felt that these scents were telling us things would be all right.
God would definitely protect us here.
Even if he were to stay here on his own, he would still be fine.
“I’m sorry.”
I pushed him toward the back of the room and closed the door. As I did so, I could hear loud noises coming from upstairs. The screams of everyone in the orphanage.
Before he could rush to the door and open it, I moved a heavy wooden box to block the door. Through the thin wood separating us, I could hear his screams. It shocked me. He hadn’t even panicked when the demon first struck. Even in such dire straits, I couldn’t hold back the small laugh that escaped me.
I climbed the stairs without a sound, and blocked the hidden trapdoor by pushing a heavy desk on top of it.
With this, he wouldn’t be able to get out. However, someone would eventually find him.
…Probably.
At that moment, I caught sight of the demon stalking toward the others, a sword in its hand. It appeared to be wreathed in darkness. Tightening my grip on the Holy Sword, I shouted from the bottom of my lungs, “Hey, you damned demon! The hero is here!”
The demon stopped in its tracks and turned to me. Then I charged at it. However, after one clash of our swords, I was sent flying in an instant. Pain seared my body as I landed on my back. But in the blink of an eye, I rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding the demon’s strike. Damn, it hurt.
A resounding boom.
At close range, the demon twisted its mouth into a grin.
We exchanged strike after strike, but it was evident the demon was merely playing with me like a cat would with a mouse.
Despite the fact that I wielded the Holy Sword with two hands, whereas the demon only relied on one hand, my power and speed were still inferior to its. I could not properly defend against its attacks.
In stark contrast to the demon’s uninjured state, blood soon soaked parts of my clothes.
There was already this large of a gap between us, even when solely comparing our skills in the sword. If my childhood friend were to stand in my place, were to fight against such an enemy, he would definitely be paralyzed by fear.
All of a sudden, as the demon was in the midst of one-handedly beating me up, it shot a blazing fireball at the orphanage. The screams grew louder.
“Damn it!” I fiercely swung the Holy Sword at it.
Yet the demon avoided my sword with ease, grinning once again.
It waited for me to regain my balance before rapidly thrusting its sword at my vital points. With each stab of pain that ran through my body, more and more blood gushed out of me. Soon, my entire body was stained red.
For every painful grimace I made, more joy appeared on its face, a face beautiful to the point of inhuman. Then it continued to toy with me. To torment me.
Eventually, the fight came to an end.
“Just this? How boring. He’s just swinging the sword around like a fool. Is this thing really going to be a threat?”
The demon had discarded its sword mid-battle and stopped the Holy Sword’s strike with its bare hand. Its flesh was slightly charred, but again, just slightly.
It was only natural. When it’s all said and done, I wasn’t the hero. I had no way of bringing out the full power of the Holy Sword.
And it was impossible for me to defeat the demon just by wielding it.
Appearing utterly bored at this point, the demon thrust out its left hand in one quick motion.
The area around my heart burned, and then chilled. The edges of my vision darkened, and I could faintly hear the sound of the Holy Sword falling to the ground.
Watching through a blurry gaze as the demon vanished, I grew a little relieved.
This was the last moment before my death.
✢
It seemed the sole survivor of that tragedy had been the hero.
The fireball the demon had released back then likely killed everyone in the orphanage.
Had he been safe because he stayed in the basement? Or did God protect him?
After that, the hero swore his revenge. In a magnificent manner, he crushed that demon, who turned out to be the Demon King’s close aide, the Demon King, who ordered the destruction of that village, and all of his soldiers. Then everyone lived happily ever after.
Watching such a play with eyes half lid, I looked at the actor portraying the hero. He was in the process of bowing to the audience.
Similarly stunning golden hair and red eyes, and clad in the hero’s preferred colors. Moreover, his cold expression proved identical to that of the so-called icy hero.
Hmm, no matter how I thought about it, I couldn’t be sure.
I had low expectations from the start, but I couldn’t be sure even after finishing this drama titled “All About the Hero.”
What wasn’t I sure of, you might ask? Well, about whether my memory as the hero’s childhood friend was real.
I was twelve years old when I realized that those memories were from my previous life. At that time, I had seen the headline “Icy Hero Allen, Stepping into the Headquarters of the Demon King” in a newspaper, along with a picture below it.
I might have remembered some events even before that, but I hadn’t recognized them back then. Or rather, I couldn’t confirm their authenticity. I had many dreams involving that angelic child, but in my mind, he was akin to an imaginary friend whom I could only meet in such dreams.
My confusion at that time was overwhelming.
Riley no longer looks like an angel! That was the first thing that struck me. His cold expression and how he had become the hero surprised and perplexed me. Not to mention, why the heck was he called “Hero Allen?”
Allen had been my name in my previous life. I had brown eyes and hair, as well as an ordinary face incomparable to Riley’s angelic own. Well, I basically looked the same now as I had in my past life.
Since I hadn’t seen him for a long time, Riley’s cold appearance had shocked me, so much so that I started investigating what had happened to him.
There were many stories written about the hero Allen’s hometown village. All so detailed that I could even recite them from A to Z.
“The village was a gruesome sight at that time. In the wake of the demon’s rampage and masacre, the smell of blood and smoke hung thick in the air. No one came to help the villagers no matter how hard they had screamed. We could see that they desperately tried to survive, yet it was futile. Deciding to at least pray for their well-being in the afterlife, we headed to the cross in the chapel, the only thing that had survived the fire. But to our surprise, there we found the hero silently cowering, holding a familiar young boy’s corpse in his arms.”
Mister Kenneth had written the most detailed of the stories. He had been our sword instructor. The familiar young boy was probably me. However, as I thought about how I had probably died around then, I slightly tilted my head in confusion.
Mister Kenneth naturally knew that my childhood friend was Riley and I was Allen, but he never mentioned our names even once in that story.
He also didn’t mention why Riley became the hero, or why Riley now called himself Allen.
Gloom shrouded my entire being as I pondered the reason for this. But I gave up soon after.
The only way to learn what had occurred after my death was to ask Riley. But he was currently beyond my reach.
Even if I wanted to ask Mister Kenneth, I should confirm whether these were truly memories from my previous life first. If I just strolled into the headquarters of the Knights Order asking them that, it wouldn’t be strange if they were to detain me.
Riley’s cold personality also worried me. He must have fought through many tough battles for him to undergo such a radical change. I purchased all the newspapers that featured Riley. And as I read about the battles he had participated in, my heart clenched.
The moment I saw the breaking news of him defeating the Demon King, I was almost brought to tears from how much he impressed me. Riley had worked this hard… He was amazing. Well, that was a matter of course.
✢
Four years passed since then.
Were those really the memories from my previous life? To this day, I still did not know. But nowadays, I lived as Ilya, the son of a tavern’s owner.
Or should I say, Allen and Ilya were like the two sides of a coin. Both were me.
Although I might be Ilya now, I still looked forward to the marking Riley’s return, where I could catch a glimpse of him. I also wanted to visit the graves of the villagers at a later date.
And for that, I had to make sure I was well prepared.
Once I returned home, I did some chores. Lifted the chair, swept the floor, and wiped the desk. I also checked our stock of change.
Ah, I had to write the menu on the blackboard as well. One that could convey the deliciousness of Father and Brother’s cooking.
Maybe I should write something related to the hero? Something like, “Feel like the hero! Have a taste of his hometown’s cooking blah blah?”
After the return parade, how nice would it be to make that dish with the vegetable scraps? The one I used to eat at the orphanage?
I was fine with eating any kind of vegetable. It didn’t matter how old or near rotten they were. After removing the damaged parts, I just needed to sprinkle some Kieri seeds and they’d taste better.
Adding crushed Kieri seeds to any recipe could bring out its secret flavors, giving the dish a unique palatable taste.
Because everyone thought of Kieri seeds as just weeds, they let me pick as much as I liked. But back at the orphanage, they were priceless treasures.
Back then, I had caught sight of some birds eating those seeds. I came to the conclusion that they were edible and tried cooking with them. Even I myself had felt embarrassed at my destituteness at the time. However, to say that I didn’t want to praise my previous self for this discovery would be a lie.
Yep, it’s been a long time since I had that dish. That’s why I had the urge to taste it once more.
I know I have my hands full with some other more important things right now, but I just couldn’t help myself…
With chapter one filled with a slightly sad tone, don’t we all just want to give Riley a pat in the head now? When I first read this novel, I imagined what if Lian (the MC from my other translation project, “Nurturing the Hero to Avoid Death“. Please give it a try, it’s a very cute story. (｡･ω･｡)ﾉ♡) couldn’t survive the demon attacks… Would Alfred turn cold like what happened to Riley now?
This novel is a little shorter in terms of chapter amount, but each chapter is actually pretty long. I decided not to split this novel into parts since I love the story too much to do that, but I’ll have to update one of my projects three times a week to follow CG’s rules. That’s why, I’m going to (try to) release three chapters a week for this novel. Please follow me on this journey! (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*.✧
Support the author! Here’s the tutorial made by “Shido Within” on how to buy digital books at CMOA. The tutorial specifies on how to buy digital manga, but I think it should work for novels too. After registering, you can click here to go to Icy’s CMOA page. Apparently, you can also buy this book at Bookwalker Japan! You’ll need to create a Bookwalker Global account first, then connect to VPN before clicking here to go to Icy’s Bookwalker page (or you can go there from the RAW Page on Icy’s ToC!). Here’s the guide on how to purchase books on Bookwalker JP Store! After the purchase, you can turn off the VPN and download to read the book on any device! (Thank you Shadow-san for telling me about this! ˭̡̞(◞⁎˃ᆺ˂)◞*✰) The difference is that if you’re using CMOA, you need to pay using your credit card, but with Bookwalker, you can pay using PayPal! Very efficient!
Support the translator! How about buying this translator a cup of bubble tea to give her a pat in the back? o(*>ω<*)o
What is the requirements to be an editor…I’m only good at English so I can’t be a translator but I do want to help😖
You can try their test if pass you can go ahead and if fail nothing wrong la
deep breath I’ll try to pass then. UwU
Hello, Lurker-san! You can try taking the editor test! I personally prefer editors who can help me reword my awkward phrasing, fix my typos, and consider if the character’s actions are logical or not. 🙂
It a good story
Thank you for reading! 😀
I have dragon quest flashbacks
Thank you so much for the chapter!!😍😍
Thank you for reading too, mnj-san~ ^^
you’re the real mvp, taking on so many projects! this one sounds super interesting so im looking forward to more! just dont overwork yourself!
Yay! I was thinking of not taking any projects anymore, but I liked this story so much so I happily jumped to the pit… ^^” But worry not! I’ve been planning to translate this since December last year, so I have some stockpiles… kind of… I’m happy enough if you guys like it as much as I did, though! 😀
Ohhhh, I’m oficially intrigued.
Poor Allen died protecting his dear friend and then the hero become an icy person… I’m Wondering how old is the hero now? Would he recognize him at fist sight?!
Thanks for the new novel!
Hello again, Navleu-san!
The hero is 28 years old, while Allen is 16 years old! (I think!!!) The hero is going to meet Ilya next chapter, so we’ll find out soon about that! 😀
Thank you for reading too! 🙂
i bet after allan/ilya’s death the soft lil hero cried all his tears out and then swore never to let anyone else into his heart… his most beloved person is already dead…. QAQ
the ice was probably bc his cold thirst for vengeance. anyways i hope they meet while ilya gathers ingredients for that dish…thank you for this new story mii, also congrats on completing sig and minoru’s journey!!! you really love heroes, huh? XD
Ahaha, you figured me out! 😋
Make sure the stress of translating all these stories isn’t too much Mii 😭 but the start seems interesting~
Knowing that people enjoyed reading the story is the biggest motivation for me~ But I’ll make sure not to overwork myself, thank you Malthendia-san! owo
Thanks for the chapter! Poor little hero & his friend…
Thank you for reading, Ethereal Rainbow Canvas-san!
Ooh, looking forward to this new project! 😀
(by the way, there’s a mistake somewhere in which sword is spelld dword)
Thank you so much for the correction, lurkess-san! ⁽⁽◝(๑꒪່౪̮꒪່๑)◜⁾⁾≡₍₍◞(๑꒪່౪̮꒪່๑)◟₎₎
Fixed the typo.
Another blonde hero Mii? 😏😏😏 I’m sticking my eyes onto this story though I’m super interested!! but honestly I too think Al would be icy, he would go on a one track revenge rampage until everything that killed Lian burned!
Also can we just give Allen a head pat?! Allen!! What a good boy! (๑˃̥̩̥̥̥̥̆ಐ˂̩̩̥̥̩̥̆৭) he stayed with Riley, protected him, even trained to help him face down demons! Allen!!!!!
It’s… another coincidence… ₍₍ (ง ˙ω˙)ว ⁾⁾ Yori-san, please don’t expose me here!!
Yeah! Imagine what’ll happen after Al finished his revenge, he’ll feel so… empty… ( ´_ゝ｀) One more reason why I have to adopt my cute kitten Lian! I’m still not giving up, ahhhh!!!
Both of these cuties deserve a pat~ What a pair of good boys~ ( ´∀` )
… I’m going to apply 🙃
Thank you for the interest! (#ﾟ ﾛﾟ#) Good luck!
Thanks for the chapter 😊😍 Wuwuwu. He’s sad because you’re not with him, you silly dum dum!!
Thank you for reading too, Katie! They’re so silly, really~ (๑•́ ₃ •̀๑)
Hello, I’m looking for experience. Could I apply for the editor position? I do have a lot of free time right now.
Please do! (●///▽///●) You can take the test to apply for the editor position in CG’s discord server! I’ll be waiting!
hi, mii may I re-translate your translation, The Icy Hero is Yearnning for love into indonesian? I found your translation and interested with it. Of cource I will The link to reach your translation ^^
Sure, please make sure to credit me back 🙂
thankyou XD
Hello, thank you very much for the update really. 👍😘
A nd for sharing this really interesting story and although the chapters are long as you say… I really loved your work is appreciated.❤️❤️
Hello, thank you very much for the update really. 👍😘
And for sharing this really interesting story and although the chapters are long as you say … I really loved your work is appreciated.❤️❤️
I don’t have time to be an editor. However, if I see anything, I’ll point it out in the comments for you to correct.
Thank you for translating this.
I feel bad for the children. Hope they reunite soon. Just found this from surfing randomly. Thank you for translation. <3
Thank you for the chapter ❤❤❤❤❤
Thanks for the chapter ❤️(๑′ᴗ‵ ๑)
Thank you 🙏
I don’t get why japanese novels always emphasize their MC to be ordinary looking while the ML is drop-dead gorgeous? It’s like the two extreme ends of the spectrum! I get that they want to emphasize that it isn’t just about the looks but come on! It’s always about looks! Like, people’s first impression usually comes from how good or sophisticated or clean you looked. Adding a little bit of beauty points for our MC can’t hurt in the long run, after all!!!. 😕😕😕
Sorry but that’s wild! I also imagined Lian – which is hilarious
Interesting. Decided to read this one next. Looking forward to it thanks for translation
thank you for the translate!!!
Rereading this again( ╹▽╹ )