Audience with the Hero Queen (2)

No one in the room was too surprised to hear that Neo was Uria's Champion because they all knew about it and a few of them in the room had even been present when he descended.

Neo nodded at Merlina's words and confirmed what everyone in the room already knew about.

"Yes, that's me."

He didn't act like he was familiar with Merlina because the Merlina of this time was different from the Merlina of his past lives. What he learned from his regressions was the lesson that he should never inform the people of his current life anything about his past lives.

Neo wanted to avoid any unwanted scrutiny or pandemonium that may be caused from him informing others about his ability to regress back into time and the future events that may or may not even occur in his current life.

The last time he acted like a prophet and told everyone about the future events that happened to him in his previous life, things didn't work out so well for him.

Neo learned the lesson the hard way in his second and third life as everyone relied too heavily on his information and when things didn't unfold as he said they would, the people who took his word for gospel began to show a lot of mistrust in him and the Goddess which ultimately made those 2 regressions a failure.

From then on, Neo made sure to keep his regression ability and information about any future events to himself starting from his fourth life moving forward because when he regressed, the flow of events that happened in that regression didn't always move forward the same way they did in his previous regressions.

Sometimes, the information he obtained from his previous lives would even become irrelevant as the choices he would make would affect the flow of events in his current life. With the events changing, the future of that life would become unpredictable so relying on his past lives' knowledge was no good.

After confirming his identity, Merlina continued to stare at Neo with a scrutinizing gaze before saying, "You've been asleep for the past 2 decades but it seems you aren't as powerless as I thought you'd be."

"..."

"You were able to take care of a demon gate by yourself and prevent any damage from happening to the city. For that, I should reward you."

"Reward me? I did it because it was my duty. I do not need a reward," Neo replied.

Merlina gave Neo a smirk and said, "You are every bit the Goddess said you would be. Selfless, logical…and unemotional."

"...What?"

"Even when my guards took you away like a criminal, you didn't care or show any negative reaction despite being treated unfairly. That's not something a normal person would do."

"They didn't mean to do me any harm and…I'm not a 'normal' person," Neo said in reply before continuing, "Why are we having this conversation?"

Neo was a bit confused by this life's Merlina. The Merlina he knew from his previous lives was more of an 'act-now-talk-later' type of person. Usually by now, the Archmage would've fired one or two magic spells at him to test out his skills, but this life's Merlina didn't have any notion of doing that it seems.

'...How come there's so many things that changed in this regression?' Neo inwardly said to himself. 'It doesn't matter. Even if I find out what changed, it won't affect my mission to destroy the Demon King. It's better now in this life since he's been sealed away and all I have to do is destroy his fragmented parts.'

Merlina didn't answer Neo's question and moved onto a more important subject.

"I'm sure you've heard the gist of things from the acting Guildmaster of the Adventurer Guild, yes?" Merlina asked.

"Yes. I heard that the war against the Demon King was over and the various nations of Edels'herah were able to emerge victorious and split the Demon King's body into fragments and seal them away."

"Good, then that's all you need to know for now."

"..."

"Since you're awake, it seems that Goddess Uria has finally decided to take things into her own hands though it certainly is about time we dealt with those fragments."

'Taking things into her own hands, huh?' After thinking that, Neo quickly voiced his concern, "I still haven't been able to connect with the Goddess…"

Merlina sighed when she heard that and said, "I figured as much. Uria has been asleep for a long time now. The only instance that she's been awake was during your coming onto this plane and even then, it was only brief. She only said a few words and went silent."

"So she's been asleep all this time?"

"Yes. At least, that's what we believe. For all we know, Uria might have her hands full handling her brother, Nyxlvain, in the Divine Realm."

Neo frowned when he heard Merlina's assumption and thought to himself, 'That's impossible. The Gods in the Divine Realm aren't allowed to fight against one another, so it's definitely something else.'

He tried to rouse his divine energy but noticed that it was moving through his body much slower than usual.

'I did notice that my Goddess's powers were waning every time I regressed…Is she asleep now because she's lost too much of her power regressing me into the past numerous times already?'

Neo wasn't oblivious to it and he knew for sure that with every regression, the Goddess was weakening. The logic-defying power of turning back time definitely had a large toll to pay and this resulted in Uria losing her powers.

Since the Goddess was weakening, so did he who was connected with her. It was because of this that his previous regressions were always failing. While he was weakening, his enemy, the Demon King, remained as strong as he was before.

Since he failed in his first life and was weakened in his subsequent lives, it was only logical that things would go downhill from there. It was why Neo prioritized recruiting powerful allies to his side to aid him in his battle but unfortunately, everything still came down to him defeating the Demon King.

It was because of this that in his 6th regression, he began learning how to use Mana from Merlina, the Archmage, and Fighting Energy or Aura from Sun Go Kong, the Martial King, in order to compensate for his waning powers.

Even then it was still not enough. He thought that this life would be his last because on top of him being weakened so severely without Goddess Uria's Divine Energy, the Goddess herself had fallen into slumber so it was highly likely that she wouldn't be able to turn back time again.

'Things would end in this life'–that's what Neo thought when he first woke up in his chambers inside of the adventurer guild, at least until he heard that the people of the world had already defeated the Demon King by themselves.

'The Demon King's already been defeated and all I need to do is completely eliminate his existence. I guess my long road really will end in this life…'

"Anyway, since you're now awake. The quest to completely vanquish the Demon King will now fall to you," Merlina said, snapping Neo out of his reverie.

Neo nodded at her words and replied, "Yes. I'd like to know the location of the Demon King Fragments that has been sealed so that I can go and destroy them right away."

"We'll provide you the support you need to complete your quest. However, there might be some complications down the road."

"...Complications? Like what?"

"We recently lost contact with our allies in the Moria Forest."

"Moria Forest…the elves and fairies?"

Merlina nodded and continued, "I'm not sure if it's a coincidence or not, but a few days ago before you woke up, the forest was besieged by numerous Demon Gates and now, we've lost all contact with them."

"Then shouldn't we go see what's wrong?" Neo voiced with a slight tinge of concern in his tone.

This somewhat surprised Merlina because from what she knew, Neo was supposed to be an emotionless vessel that served to only fulfill the Goddess's wishes. To see him show any emotions was rather…strange, to say the least.

Merlina shook her head and replied to Neo's question, "That's something that you, Uria's Champion, have no need to concern yourself with. We'll be the ones to go help our allies while you should focus on your important quest!"

Neo felt a bit conflicted after hearing what Merlina said. He didn't know how to respond because his quest to destroy the Demon King Fragments were indeed of utmost importance. Once he dealt with all of the fragments, the evil energy of Twilight God Nyxlvain should disappear from the world so demon gates wouldn't even be able to manifest anymore.

"..."

Merlina took Neo's silence as affirmation and said, "First, we'll deal with the Demon King Fragment that our nation was tasked to oversee. I've requested assistance from an old friend of mine so please wait here in the castle for a few days until he arrives."

"...Yes."

Hearing Neo's curt response, Merlina smiled at him before saying, "You're not one for formalities. Haha, I rather like that."

"..."

"Cecilia, please escort our young hero here to his quarters within the castle–"

Before she could finish her words, Merlina was interrupted by the High Priest who politely spoke up and said, "Your Highness, before we continue, may I have a bit of time with the Champion?"

"Hm?"

"It's regarding the holy relics that my chapel is currently safekeeping."

"Oh yes. I nearly forgot about that. Do as you wish. Once your business with him is over, Cecilia, I want you to show Neo to his quarters and if he wants, give him a tour around the castle," Merlina said before standing up and walking out of the hall through the side door.

Her advisor, Lawrence, followed after her while Master Henry–the true Guildmaster of the adventurer guild that Neo was familiar with–stayed behind for a moment before shaking his head and moved to walk out of the hall.

When he passed by Neo, Henry leaned in and whispered, "Please meet me in the castle's training hall once you're finished here."

Neo gave Henry a glance before nodding. He didn't know what this was all about but he didn't see any reason to deny Henry's request to meet with him later.

Once Henry left, the High Priest approached Neo and bowed his head to him, "Oh Goddess, you truly haven't forsaken us!"

"..." Neo didn't know how to respond so he remained silent.

"Uria's Champion, it truly is great to see that you have awoken. Now, we can completely vanquish those vile demons!"

"...Yes…"

"On behalf of the Luminance Faith, I apologize for the mistreatment that we have caused you," High Priest Illyan said.

"Mistreatment?" Neo asked with a confused look. He didn't know what Illyan was talking about since he had just woken up and didn't know about anyone from the Luminance Faith mistreating him.

Even in his past life, the Luminance Faith had always been supportive of him and mistreating him was the last thing they would ever even consider doing.

Seeing that Neo was confused, Illyan clasped his hands together and like a person seeking forgiveness, he confessed, "We unfortunately couldn't maintain your dwelling inside of our church and had to hand you over to the Adventurer Guild after that incident."

"Incident?"

"Ah, it's nothing," Illyan said before redirecting the topic to Neo's belongings. "Please come with me to the Chapel. The Holy Relics that descended with you should be returned to you as you are their rightful owner."

"...Okay."

Illyan and Neo left the hall while Cecilia, the deadpanned girl who was tasked with escorting Neo, followed closely behind them.