Chapter 245: A Harsh Lesson For the Strongest Heroine
Ryan’s words echoed with force and seriousness. And almost immediately, the enormous expression full of confidence that Helen had maintained until now, changed abruptly.
The arrogant smile that adorned the black-haired warrior’s face vanished, giving way to clear confusion. She was not the only one to react so suddenly to the group leader’s cold declaration.
All the girls around her looked at each other’s faces, searching for answers that none of them had. Mirian’s eyes widened in surprise, Karol stopped playing, and Alicia clasped her hands in front of her chest.
But none of them was able to utter a single word to break the heavy and tense silence. Helen remained completely motionless in her spot, processing the harsh order she had just heard.
After a long and very uncomfortable silence, and seeing that neither Ryan nor the rest of the group was speaking, she reacted. The strong warrior forced her facial muscles and smiled in a rather strange and unnatural way.
"It’s a joke, right?" Helen said, letting out a very forced laugh completely devoid of emotion.
"You really scared me for a moment with that serious tone," she added, trying to downplay the matter.
But this was not a bad joke to lighten the tension before the impending war. Ryan had already firmly decided this long before even being present at this group meeting.
It was a very harsh and unwavering decision that, up until this precise moment, he had only shared with Ivis.
And Ivis exactly, who unlike the rest of the girls already knew the truth, took Ryan’s words with complete naturalness. The water dragon remained seated, observing the humans’ conflict without flinching in the slightest.
"It is no joke, Helen," Ryan said with a deep voice, cutting off the warrior’s fake smile immediately.
"You will not go with us to that battle. I had already decided it a long time ago, you will stay here."
The leader’s cold words fell like a massive block of ice on the black-haired girl’s immense ego. After making his definitive stance clear, Ryan looked away from her, ignoring her budding indignation.
He directed his attention back toward the rest of the group in the large room to continue with his strategy.
"Well, continuing with this important matter of our positions on the battlefield..."
"Wait a moment, Ryan... What are you saying?" Helen interrupted, raising her voice with evident fury.
The black-haired warrior clenched her fists with such force that her knuckles turned completely white. She gritted her teeth, feeling deep frustration and humiliation quickly rise through her chest.
"It makes absolutely no sense for you to tell me that right now," Helen complained.
She took a quick and aggressive step forward, closing the distance between herself and the wooden table.
"Besides you, I am clearly the strongest in this entire group," the girl asserted with immense pride.
"I must be there fighting on the front lines, tearing those demons apart with my own hands. Do you want me to stay all alone guarding the entrance of this boring dungeon like a simple guard?"
Helen frowned, baring her teeth with great annoyance at what she considered a massive insult to her strength.
"In that case, any of them can do it," the warrior declared, openly looking down on the rest’s power.
Her tone of voice echoed completely seriously and defiantly as she pointed with her gaze at the other girls present. But none of them, not even Mirian or the strict Alicia, spoke up to defend themselves from the accusation.
Nor did they seem to have the slightest intention of voicing an opinion or intervening in Helen’s favor in this delicate moment.
"Do you think my order makes no sense?" Ryan asked, maintaining his firm posture in the chair.
"Allow me to explain it to you in detail so you understand it once and for all."
Ryan slowly stood up from his comfortable spot, straightening his tall figure wrapped in the dark trench coat. His green gaze became even more serious and sharp as it fixed directly on Helen’s furious eyes.
And almost by inertia, in a totally unconscious manner due to the high tension of the moment. Ryan’s thick, dark mana began to release from his body, flowing rapidly outward.
That heavy, invisible energy further tensed the cold atmosphere of the refuge.
The immense pressure in the room became difficult to bear, making it very clear that the king was not playing around with her.
"Currently, you are the one who has caused the most severe problems in the entire group," Ryan declared with total harshness.
He had no mercy whatsoever in pointing out his best close-combat fighter’s biggest flaw in front of everyone.
"Yes, you are very strong. You are the strongest without a doubt in terms of pure brute strength." He acknowledged her immense destructive power, something he had never denied since he arrived in this world.
"But that immense strength is absolutely useless if you only put your own companions in danger."
Helen opened her mouth slightly to protest again, but Ryan’s intense gaze forced her to keep quiet.
"In countless moments in the past, I have overlooked your major careless mistakes and your incredibly selfish attitude," he continued.
"But this is no longer a simple game of catching monsters in the forest. This time we will have a truly formidable and highly terrifying opponent."
Ryan raised his right hand and clenched his own fist very tightly right in front of his face. He looked at her again, letting the massive weight of the harsh reality strike the warrior’s stubborn mind.
"The massive problems you could cause in that place due to your enormous lack of control in a fight. They are far more dangerous to our survival than facing the demon king Rigal himself."
That final, lethal sentence echoed in the refuge, completely destroying what little confidence Helen had left.
"No... what are you saying..." the black-haired girl murmured, taking a step back out of pure protective instinct.
The direct rejection from her leader, the only person she had decided to follow, was a devastating blow.
"Ryan, that’s only because I haven’t had suitable opponents to fight seriously," she defended herself with evident desperation.
She desperately tried to find a valid excuse to justify her savage and reckless behavior on the battlefield.
"Right?" Helen asked, with a faint voice that betrayed her growing and unusual insecurity.
She said, quickly averting her gaze to the sides, looking for some urgent support from her companions. But upon meeting the black-haired warrior’s gaze, the other girls slowly turned their faces away.
Mirian stared intently at the hard stone wall, and Beatrice closed her eyes, refusing to back up her crazy antics.
Every single one of them in that room was fully aware that Ryan was speaking the absolute truth. Helen was a massive walking hazard when she let herself be blindly carried away by the strong thrill of combat.
Ryan observed her in complete silence from his spot, maintaining his dark and cold posture as the undisputed leader. He absolutely could not allow a disaster of irreparable proportions to happen to his team.
He didn’t want a repeat of what had happened when Helen faced Solaris. Or when she almost endangered the alliance he would found with Ophelia.
Ryan knew perfectly well how immensely proud his aggressive combat heroine was. And experiencing such immense frustration in front of all her allies, being rejected in this manner.
Excluding her right now from the main plan, making her see her worst flaws without any kind of filter, was something vital.
It was something very painful to hear, but it would undoubtedly force her to mature.
From Ryan’s clear analytical perspective, Helen was still an extremely loyal woman to him. And he was very aware that if he asked her at this very moment to kill someone in front of them.
She would kill without hesitating for a single second, staining her own hands with blood with a willing smile. And she would do all that without discriminating between races whatsoever, fulfilling his precise orders with blind faith.
But the simple, undeniable fact was that, up until now, she had not matured enough in her mind. To be truly aware that any small mistake of hers could cost her own life in the future.
Or even worse, that her immense lack of tactical control could cost the lives of her own teammates. It was something that truly worried Ryan greatly as the king responsible for keeping them all alive in this war.
And because of that, because of that latent fear of losing them all over some useless stupidity, he was prepared for this.
He was completely prepared to be even more severe with her until she managed to learn the harsh lesson.