●○ ｔｅａｓｅｒ ｏｎｅ ○●

The weight of a gold medal shouldn’t feel this heavy.

It’s the only thought that rises from his mind, and he stands before the people with a smile as pretentious as the heavy medal hanging around his neck. Hero — that’s what they call him now, a title that leaves nothing but a bitter aftertaste on his tongue. It’s a title that immediately translates to martyrdom to him, carrying with it the ambitions and desires of those who don’t want to die trying to achieve.

It’s definitely not a name that he would use to describe himself, him of all people.

Hero, they call him, but that’s only that — a meaningless title, especially on him.

And the people watching him seem to agree. There are murmurs that travel around, words he can’t hear but can predict all the same anyway. It almost makes him laugh, mockery and venom brimming at the tip of his tongue, threatening to hurt the moment he opens his lips. Him, a hero? It’s such a laughable thought. He doesn’t have a heart big enough to become a martyr like his best friend, and he certainly doesn’t care enough to try and ruin himself for this ty society.

What he wants is the opposite.

He is not and will never be a hero, no matter how much this ty society wants to force the title into his throat. He doesn’t want to help people, whose faces he knows nothing about.

There is only one thing he wants in this world: to save the soul that society will once again forsake, like it has done so, so many others. And he will get it, no matter what he has to sacrifice.

If he has to sacrifice the world for that one soul, then so be it.