"W-wah... Thank you... Thank you, big brother."
Seeing the sharp little knife right in front of her get shattered by an invisible "current of air," the terrified little girl, who had already collapsed limply onto the ground, naturally realized that she had encountered a true savior. While the thugs stood wide-eyed in stunned disbelief, the girl, having finally broken free with all her strength, almost instinctively shouted her thanks as she hurried behind Ganatica.
Although the youth had seemingly just climbed out of a garbage heap, with filthy stench clinging to every inch of this dejected "vagrant," the terrified little girl had no mind to care about such things. In order to seize this only life-saving straw that had fallen from the sky, she nearly wanted to cling tightly to the vagrant who had stepped forward just in time.
"...Thanks? What is there to thank me for? How could someone like me be worth thanking?"
Receiving the gratitude of a beautiful girl, an ordinary brave young man might have seized this opportunity to show off his heroic side. But ignoring the terrified gazes of the thugs, Ganatica turned to look at the little girl's delicate face wet with tears. All the savior felt upon being thanked was a helpless, sorrowful confusion.
Thinking back, when he had decided alongside that girl Pandora to lead the slum-dwellers in resisting the nobles' exploitation, had he ever hesitated in the slightest? Thinking back, when hatred had driven him to slaughter those so-called "indifferent bystanders," had he ever felt even a trace of pity?
But now... the long years had passed in silence, and demon blood had stained layer after layer of leather armor. What had Ganatica, the one called the "avenger," become? Where, exactly, did his so-called "true self" exist?
That former "hero" had