Calamity Upon This World

"You guys are simply too weak to have been anything other than liabilities in that fight."

The mood became awkward inside the room after Williams comment.

"Ah, I see," Jasmine said self-deprecatingly.

"Yeah, maybe you're right." Max sighed in defeat as he moved away.

[Wow, way to ruin the mood, Zephyr said in Williams mind.

'Shut up'

[Whatever you say, buddy]

'Ugh, you suck.

'I came off a bit too rude there; I should probably apologise.' William thought as he got up.

If possible, he didn't wish to sour his relationship with his party.

While he had originally only made this party for this one mission, it would leave a bad taste in his mouth to part on bad terms with these people.

**

'I'm too weak, huh?' Jasmine thought

'Yeah, he's right I'm too weak; I couldn't even help my party member when he needed me.

'Not only that, I even made the whole situation worse by panicking at the worst possible moment'

While it was true that she originally became an adventurer just for money, that didn't mean that she didn't care about anything other than money.

Ever since Jasmine was a child, she never had many friends due to the absence of her father and her mother being sick constantly. As the oldest in the family, the responsibility of raising her little brother and buying medicine for her mother fell on her.

Ever since she was a child, she had heard the stories about adventurers of the past and how, through many tribulations and multiple life-threatening situations, they forged bonds of friendship that stood tall even against the sands of time.

She had also read about how, in many stories after surviving near death, the flower of love blossoms between two people.

Jasmine had always dreamed about a future husband who was strong, would help support her family, and would hopefully spoil her with love.

But today she just witnessed her first crush almost 'die' and even got called weak by him.

At this point, her hopes of a love story with a prince who would take care of her whole life were ruined before they even began.

But on the bright side, she had at least earned enough money for her mother's treatment.

So she was still somewhat content with the results of her first ever A-rank mission.

And while she likely won't ever find another man as handsome or talented as John in the future, she can probably find someone half decent with her charm and talent.

"Jasmine, do you have a minute?" William asked as he approached Jasmine, who was standing in a corner with a gloomy look.

William felt bad for her; after all, she was probably blaming herself for panicking and breaking the formation during the start of the fight, and Williams later comment about her being too weak probably made her feel worse.

Thankfully, William didn't know that the only reason for Jasmine's gloomy expression was because she couldn't marry him or else he would have coughed blood.

"Yeah, sure," Jasmine replied.

"Are you okay?" William asked, concerned by her gloomy expression.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Jasmine replied.

"Glad to hear it, and I just wanted to say, Don't worry about what happened earlier, and I'm sorry for saying something rude; I didn't mean it," William said.

"Ohh," Jasmine exclaimed, shocked by hearing William worry about her and apologise.

'Maybe I do have a chance after all,' Jasmine thought.

"No, it's fine; don't worry about it." Jasmine reassured him.

"I'm glad there are no hard feelings. William breathed a sigh of relief.

William had already reconciled with Max and Raya, and Jasmine was the last one left.

William was glad to not be parting ways with his party on bad terms, as they seemed like genuinely good people.

'Now just one last thing' William thought as he made his way towards the miners.

As he made his way, the reactions he got were quite mixed; some were grateful to him for keeping them alive.

Others were angry at letting the miner, whose name  William learned to be Tony die despite promising to protect them. Keep the adventure going with m|vl-em|p-yr

But more than that, there was one man in particular who looked like he was dead despite still being very much alive as he stared at what was still left of Tony's corpse.

William knelt down as he stared the man in the eyes as he asked.

"May I ask who Tony was to you?"

After a few seconds, the man replied.

"Tony was my younger brother."

"He had just gotten engaged and was working tirelessly to earn money so he could afford his marriage."

"I had promised our parents to take care of him, and I even promised his fiancé to protect him."

"But now how am I supposed to look them in the eyes now?"

"It should have been me instead; Tony had so much to live for and so many people that cared for him."

"It's all my fault for being a bad older brother who couldn't protect his younger brother."

Tears were falling down the man's face as he struggled to speak, the guilt of letting his younger brother threaten to overwhelm and break him.

With a single command, William made a glass of ice and put some water in it, created with spirit magic, so it wouldn't disappear once he stopped supplying mana.

The man slightly calmed down after drinking the water William gave him.

William's chest hurt from guilt, and his throat was dry as he was unsure about what to say, but he still didn't want to run away from his responsibility.

"It's not your fault; I'm sure your parents will be happy at least to see you still alive."

"I know it can't replace what you have lost, but I'll give you five luminous blue stones. Please use them to give Tony a proper burial and take care of his fiance." William said he felt bad for letting something like this happen in the first place.

"You're right, motherfucker, it's your fault!! " the man said as he lashed at William, grabbing him by the collar.

Jasmine tried to move to stop the man, but with a single hand gesture from William, she was stopped.

"Why did you not protect him?" the man asked, anger oozing out of his tone.

"Didn't you promise to protect us?"

"You were clearly stronger than that statue, so why did you let my younger brother die?"

"And now you think you can get rid of your guilt by showing me fake pity and giving me some money."

"But you know what? Go fuck yourself; we don't need your money. I hope the guilt of your incompetence keeps you up at night."

"I hope you fucking die moth-" Before the man could say anything more, he was knocked out by Max with a clean chop to the neck.

"Alright, that's enough."

If before William was just feeling bad because his pride got hurt at letting someone under him die when he promised to protect them, now even his heart ached from the overwhelming guilt that threatened to crush him.

And this pain would have lasted for much longer if it wasn't replaced by a sense of dread from the words of another miner.

"Why hasn't the boss drop appeared yet?"

"Yeah, and now that you mention it, isn't the dungeon core supposed to appear once you defeat the boss monster?"

As these questions were asked, an ominous, chilly feeling spread through the room.