Atalanta watched. She saw the moment Iskios, who had left an opening and had his legs sealed, drew two swords from his waist.
And the instant he drew them, white flames burst from both blades and burned everything around them to ash. Unable to withstand the heat and blinding light, Atalanta growled and stepped back.
The area around Iskios had turned into a sea of fire. The reason the forest had suddenly caught fire was the flames pouring from the swords in both of Iskios's hands. Now, Iskios was using the power he had wanted least of all, and the blaze was devouring everything around him. The heat made Melanion release the hand that had been holding Iskios.
Hot, dazzling flames like the sun itself erupted outward, and Iskios swung the two burning swords at the white lycanthrope in front of him. The moment Iskios's blade moved and touched the white lycan's body, Atalanta felt the world around her fall into a deathly silence for an instant. And then...
"Grrr... What is this...!?"
At the moment Iskios collapsed to the ground and Melanion let his guard down, an explosion erupted centered on the place where the white lycan had stood. A violent gust of wind swept out from there and blew away everything around it, including Atalanta.
Atalanta had thought the entire forest would become a sea of fire, but she saw with her own eyes what had happened. There was no doubt that, just moments ago, a sea of flames had ravaged the forest and burned everything in its path.
The white flames had definitely been burning this forest until just now. But as if the fire had already been extinguished, the place where flames had exploded around Iskios was now filled only with the smell of burning. And then... Atalanta saw it.
"Grr...?!(That is...!?)"
There, in front of Iskios, who had dropped to one knee and crossed the two swords he held while sending flames out through the blades, stood the white lycanthrope. At first glance, it looked as though its entire body had burned to death, but then it transformed into a human form as if nothing had happened.
No, it wasn't a transformation. That may have been its true form. As Atalanta thought that, something came to mind when she looked at the human who had lost half his face to burns.
She had seen that person before, and Iskios had as well. His body looked frail, but Atalanta's instincts as a hunter made her vaguely remember who the man was.
"Grrr...(You are, surely...)"
Atalanta remembered the identity of that white lycan, who that person was. His name was Melanion, the man who had once tried to challenge Atalanta, only to be frightened off by Iskios and driven away.
While Atalanta had not been looking, he had changed. But what in the world had happened to make a person change like that? To transform into a lycanthrope... Even now that he had become a beast, Atalanta still could not understand.
Melanion's face... half of it burned away, turned into a hideous, searing ruin. Iskios looked at him without expression. Melanion's whole body had been charred black by the sword Iskios had used, but tears streamed from his eyes. He glared at Iskios and wailed.
"You... You had something like that as a trump card...!?"
"....."
To Melanion's question, Iskios said nothing. This was not a trump card. To Iskios, this was not a trump card, but a forbidden card. A sword he had received from Apollo, the one he hated and feared most. He had known what it was, but Iskios had used it to bring Melanion down.
Iskios's face remained expressionless, but his thoughts were complicated as he looked down at Melanion. And Melanion, without hiding his hatred, slammed it straight into Iskios. With a body that could barely even breathe anymore, Melanion shouted.
"Aaaaaaaaah! Cough, cough...! I...! I...! Am I... not enough...? In the realm where you heroes stand... are ordinary people not allowed to set foot there...!?"
What stood there was no longer the image of a weak coward who had once held a great dream. Now he was glaring at Iskios with fierce eyes, growling like a beast.
His body was weaker than that of ordinary people, he had no exceptional talent, and no divine blood flowed through him. Even if someone like that worked hard, realistically he could never set foot in the realm where heroes stood. He could never stand shoulder to shoulder with the woman he loved.
For someone like Melanion, there had been no choice but to pray to a god.
But that was already a story of the past. Now, even if he heard Iskios's sharp gaze or his words, Melanion was no longer the kind of man who would cower in fear and run away with his back turned, crushed by the smallest fear Iskios planted in him. His eyes were fixed on Iskios, filled with hatred as he glared at him.
"I... couldn't... beat... you. But... someday... I will... definitely... definitely... I will, for su..."
Melanion kept muttering the hatred he held in his heart while glaring at Iskios and repeatedly throwing himself against him. As he did, the focus in Melanion's eyes grew increasingly blurred, and his voice began to lose strength.
Before long, the hatred in Melanion's eyes and the words he used to curse Iskios vanished. Melanion was dead. He was nothing more than a burned corpse with no soul left in it. Iskios and Atalanta stared silently at the dead man for a while.
-Hatred is inherited across generations.-
After the emergency treatment for both ankles and feet was finished, I couldn't use my legs for a while, so I had to rely on Atalanta for movement. Come to think of it, this might be the first time I've depended directly on Atalanta.
Before we left, Atalanta and I cremated Melanion's body and buried him on a flat stretch of ground near where we had fought. After I buried Melanion in the earth and made his grave, I continued the journey with Atalanta to meet my mother.
During this life, I had almost never looked back on my previous life. But then, why had it come back to me in the middle of a fight... why at that exact moment... The pain from it was brutal.
Still, now that I thought about it, I felt like I understood why.
In my previous life, I had a friend similar to Melanion. A frail guy, full of dreams, timid, and only half-decent at scheming. A friend I used to drink with back in the day.
We were busy as working adults, but whenever we had free time, we forced out time to drink together, talk about what had happened, and sometimes listen to each other's dreams. He was working part-time, but he often said his dream was to become a teacher.
Well, in the end, it never came true... Still, unlike Melanion, he found work in a different field and kept looking for another chance. I don't know what happened after that. I died and was reincarnated in this end-of-the-world Greece, after all. Not knowing what came next was, for me, a real regret.
Facing one's limits, fighting against them, and gaining the fruit of growth. I... in my previous life, the scale was small, but I thought I had faced myself in my own way back then too. If I had been a little calmer then, would the result have been different...?
"We've finally arrived, Atalanta...!"
"Grr..."
After meeting Melanion, who had turned from a coward into a lycanthrope, and being made to remember my previous life, Atalanta and I finally began to see the destination of our journey: the temple of my mother, the goddess Selene.
As the temple came into view, I remembered the road that had brought us here, and the moment this journey had begun. And then... at last, after crossing the final ridge, Atalanta and I set foot in the destination of our journey, and in a place that, for me now, was like my father's home. Just looking at the huge temple adorned with a full moon made that clear.
—We've finally arrived. At my mother's... the temple of the goddess Selene...!!!