The entire room froze for exactly one second before descending into absolute bedlam.
The nobles screamed. The guards roared. The King shouted orders that made no sense. The entire mob rushed toward the three assassins with the coordination of a headless chicken stampede.
In their blind panic they completely stepped over, ran around, and utterly ignored the "Real Hero" who was currently turning the marble floor into a slip-and-slide of his own blood.
Kaizen watched with mild amusement as the Hiya Hero frantically reached into his pocket with trembling hands.
He pulled out a glowing ruby-red vial.
It was a Legendary Grade Health Potion. It was the kind of liquid miracle that could reattach a head or cure a hangover instantly. Even the dark magic rotting his insides would have vanished in a heartbeat.
But the guy's hands were slick with his own incompetence.
Slip.
The bottle shot out of his grip like a wet bar of soap. It rolled across the cold stone floor, wobbling sadly before coming to a gentle stop right against Kaizen's hairy big toe.
The dying hero stared at the potion. It was inches away. It was salvation. If he could just reach it he would live to say "Hiya" another day.
He dragged his body forward. His eyes traveled from the potion to the ankle blocking it. Then he saw the cargo shorts around the ankles. Then he looked up. He saw the hairy shins. The knobby knees. He kept looking up and up until his eyes locked onto something twitching menacingly at eye level.
"Hiya... a monster!"
He frothed at the mouth in sheer terror. He wasn't scared of the stab wounds. He was scared of the one-eyed snake staring him down.
He looked up at Kaizen's face with desperate, pleading eyes.
"P-potion. P-p-please."
Kaizen looked left. He looked right. The guards were busy dying. The Princess was busy screaming. The King was hiding behind a pillar. Absolutely nobody was looking at them. The world had already written this guy off as a tax write-off.
Kaizen looked down at the dying man and pretended he was invisible. He pursed his lips and started whistling a tune that sounded suspiciously like a circus theme song.
He reached down.
The hero's eyes lit up with hope.
Kaizen grabbed the waistband of his shorts and yanked them up.
The hero's hope vanished.
Then Kaizen reached down again. He picked up the glowing red vial. He held it up to the light and examined the label like he was checking the sugar content on a soda can.
Good stuff.
"Y-yes...t-t-thank you, kind sir--"
He casually slipped the legendary potion into his own pocket and patted it to make sure it was secure.
"..."
Then he turned around and walked away without a backward glance.
The poor hero reached out one last trembling hand toward the retreating figure of the man who just robbed a corpse in broad daylight.
"Hiya..."
He slumped over and died just like that.
...
The boredom was starting to set in.
Kaizen leaned against a pillar and watched the chaos unfold with the critical eye of a gamer reviewing a buggy cutscene.
The three demonic priests were already getting surrounded. If these guys were actually high-level raid bosses the room would be a bloodbath by now. But they weren't.
They were clearly just level one trash mobs—corrupted insiders who probably took the job because the demons offered better dental insurance than the church.
Sigh.
It seemed he would have to actually participate. If the kingdom fell now he wouldn't be able to harvest the fruits of this new life. No kingdom meant no gold, no feasts, and most importantly, no harem.
He licked his lips and shifted his gaze to the furious Princess Seraphina.
She was rushing toward the blinded Arthur with the speed of a desperate lover. But Kaizen wasn't looking at her face. He was looking at the ballistics. The jiggle physics in this world were absolutely insane.
The developers had clearly blown the entire animation budget on her chest. As she ran every step sent a mesmerizing ripple through the silk of her dress that made Kaizen decide that being summoned to this death trap might not be so bad after all.
'Wait a minute.'
Kaizen narrowed his eyes.
The Princess wasn't just worried; she was hysterical. She was screaming Arthur's name with a little too much passion for two people who had theoretically just met five minutes ago.
That wasn't the panic of a leader losing a tactical asset. That was the panic of a girl watching her crush get deleted.
Kaizen looked at the writhing Arthur and then at the frantic Princess.
If it were Kaizen bleeding out on the floor she wouldn't even spit on him to put out a fire. She would probably step over his corpse to save the carpet.
A slow, truly evil smile spread across Kaizen's face.
The "Good Hero" was blind and broken. The Princess was desperate and emotionally compromised.
'This is going to be interesting.'
He realized with a dark thrill that he didn't need to compete with Arthur. He just needed to own the solution to Arthur's problem.
...
Kaizen decided it was time to invest in his own stock.
He couldn't just stand there while the "Good Hero" played the tragic victim.
If he wanted the gold, the glory, and the access to the royal lingerie drawer he needed to prove he was at least marginally more useful than a paperweight.
He needed brownie points and he needed them now.
He cracked his knuckles and did a little hop-step to loosen up his hamstrings. Then he bolted.
He sprinted toward the altar with the grace of a gazelle that had just chugged three energy drinks. The three priests were too busy holding off the wave of royal guards to notice the cargo-short commando flanking them.
Kaizen saw his opening. Years of getting shoved into lockers had eventually forced him into an MMA gym.
He wasn't a master but he knew how to throw a punch without breaking his own wrist which was already more combat experience than most iskai protagonists.
"Look here you evil madmen! I am the one who's going to save the world! Because I am the Hero of Light!"
He screamed it at the top of his lungs. He wanted to make sure everyone in the cheap seats heard him.
He needed the King, the Princess, and especially the treasury accountant to know exactly who was doing the heavy lifting.
The first priest glanced back over his shoulder.
He saw Kaizen. He smirked. In his mind the threat assessment was zero. The "Real Hero" was dead and the "Good Hero" was blind.
This guy was just the pervert who had flashed the Pope five minutes ago. He was a civilian with a fluctuating zipper. The priest raised his dark sword with a sneer expecting to slice the idiot in half.
Kaizen didn't slow down. He planted his foot and torqued his hips. He drew his fist back for a haymaker that had ten years of repressed anger behind it.
That was when the physics broke.
Sparks of golden energy began to crackle around Kaizen's knuckles. The ambient mana in the room seemed to realize who had the highest affinity and rushed to coat his fist in a blinding, swirling aura of pure holy violence.
"Light Magic! Impossible!"
The priest's eyes went wide. He tried to bring his sword up but he was moving in slow motion compared to the fist of justice.
CRUNCH.
The glowing knuckles connected perfectly with the priest's face. It wasn't just a punch. It was a holy smiting.
The impact carved a crater into the man's skull and sent a shockwave of light rippling through the chapel.
The priest flew backward like he had been hit by a truck. He smashed into a pillar and slid down like a cartoon character leaving a smear of holy sparkles on the stone.
The entire room gasped in unison. The King looked like his eyes were about to pop out of his skull. The guards stopped running and just stared because the man they thought was a flasher was actually a weapon of mass destruction.
Princess Seraphina was still on her knees cradling Arthur's head against her chest. She looked up through her tears and saw the golden glow fading from Kaizen's fist. She was confused and terrified but for a split second she couldn't look away from the raw power radiating off the man in cargo shorts.
Kaizen caught her staring. He didn't give her a reassuring nod or a heroic thumbs up. He flashed her a smile that was fifty percent charm and fifty percent pure filth. He slowly licked his lips while looking her up and down.
"Don't worry Princess. I am really good at finishing things off quickly. You just hold that pose for me until I'm done."
Seraphina blinked in total confusion. She didn't know if he was talking about the battle or something else entirely but the predatory heat in his eyes made her shudder.
Kaizen didn't wait for a response. The other two priests roared in anger and charged him. It was a mistake. They were fanatical cultists but physically they were just two geriatric men in bathrobes trying to fight a guy who spent his weekends practicing grapple holds on the internet.
Kaizen ducked a clumsy swing and laughed. It was pathetic. He felt invincible. He stepped inside their guard and unleashed a flurry of blows that were less about martial arts and more about disrespect. He slapped one across the face and kicked the other in the knee. The Light Magic reacted to his adrenaline and flared up with every hit turning the fight into a disco light show of pain.
The King watched in stunned silence as the perverted hero dismantled the assassins with the ease of a man taking out the trash.