I reincarnated as a losing heroine, the hero’s childhood friend who lost to the main heroine, so I switched jobs to alchemist

Chapter 02: Quitting as the brave hero's childhood friend

Remembering that I'm the future losing heroine, the first thing I wanted to do was to distance myself from the future hero, Lucas.

The problem was... for the past eight years, there weren't many child living here in this small village of the same age of us, there're only three boys and three girls, but they weren't very close with us, that's the reason that I, Laura, have only played with Lucas this whole time. It was the same for Lucas, we were not in the "social circle" of other kids.

From the dialogue at the beginning of "The Last Brave", I can assume that the "Laura" of the game didn't recover her memories of her past life, if she had known, she wouldn't have stayed in this situation until the day Lucas left the village.

The villagers gave us words such as "You're with Laura today again, huh?..." and "You're so good friends", so resuming, they're assuming we will be together all our life.
In a place full of villagers that think like that, will Lucas the Brave be able to come back to the village after choosing someone else?
That will happen in the future, anyway, so...

The first thing I decided to do is to change the relationship between the two of us and so, if possible to change the common perception among the villagers that we will marry and live happily ever after in the future.

Although a demon attacked me, I was not injured at all thanks to the power of Lucas, and I resumed my activities the next day.
 

None of the villagers, including my parents, looked very happy with my decision, saying that I should take it ease..., but for me, time was running out.

--I've great changes of changing the future if I get the most out of my time now.

That's the goal I'm trying to achieve.
 

However, one problem arose that prevented me from achieving that goal and it is....

"Lucas, I'm fine now...."

It's a matter of time but for now, hero-sama doesn't want to leave my side. 

The day after he promised to protect me, this attitude of him appeared.
I knew from the look on his face that he hadn't said it out of a sheer momentum, I knew this, but it will derail my plans if I don't push him away.

"I promised Laura's mom I'd keep her safe, too."
"I appreciate that, but nobody has never been attacked by a demon in the village before, right?"
"Yes, but... but it might happen today."

That's the future brave man, he's 8 years old, but he has a solid idea.
And just as Lucas says, on the near future, demons will appear in the village as well.
Currently, the village's surrounded by a charm that even if it's weak until now it was enough.
It's holy magic to keep the demons away, however, as the Demon King's return approaches, the demons have become more powerful, and the weak magic is no longer effective.
With such a phenomenon occurring all over the world, the king of this world begins to search for the brave hero.
A messenger from the castle comes to this village as well, and a demon appears at the right time.
Lucas repels it with the power of a brave hero, the first hour or so of the story begins with Lucas being recognized as the brave hero by the messenger who saw him and traveling to the royal capital.

It's a little off-topic, but I honestly want to do something about the fact that Lucas is following me like a chicken to his hen mother.
It would be nice if I don't fall in love with Lucas, but I also have to be careful of people thinking that the two of us are "specially" close to each other.

"I'm really okay now!"
"No, No matter what Laura says, I'm going to stay with you."
"I'm not sure if I will be right or not later, but I AM sure I'm all right now. Where has Lucas, the one who used to be ridiculed by the boys in the village for being a cry baby and a wimp, gone?"

In addition to the anger I felt now, "the previous me" also recognized the image of the future brave hero in his stubborn attitude.

The future hero-sama that "I" knew had a gentle personality that certainly reminded me of the current Lucas.
 

However, he was never frightened in the face of a monster, and because he was usually gentle and kind, his strength of will and stubbornness were sometimes impressive.
 

Apparently, his childhood friend Laura's presence was also important on the formation of Lucas personality, when I think of the future, that fact is also somewhat sad.

"...Laura, are you okay?　There's something wrong with Laura today, I can tell..."

I'm sure you'll be able to get a good idea of what I'm talking about.
Yes, the brave Lucas seemed to be noticing the changes on me, he was sensitive to the emotional movements of others, this means that he really cares about other people feelings a lot.

Laura is still me, but her mind aged nearly 20 years, On the contrary, to the eyes of someone else it's like a new person was born when Laura opened the eyes again.
 

The "I" of my previous life and the "me" of this lifetime will never completely merge, and it's not surprising that there will be a substantial change in what we say and do now.

"No, it's not."

I'm not sure if it's a good thing or not for the game development, but it's a good thing for Laura.
 

Perhaps it's because of the eight years we've spent together that he's been able to notice something unusual in me with such agility, a childhood friend is a really troublesome matter.
 

Even though I'm past 20 years old on the inside, I'm still in a state of bewilderment about the situation, with two people's memories and personalities I can't get used to.
 

So what I'm trying to say is, please don't feel sorry for me when you see this situation where I'm being confronted by an 8-year-old boy and I'm struggling to respond.

"Is that you, Laura?"

I looked back reflexively at the somewhat sweet voice that shook my eardrums.

And there she is, a red-haired girl. This girl-- yes, Petra!　

Petra Eme, she is the only daughter of the village chief of this village, Eme.
 

In "The Last Brave," she was one of those mob villagers whose name I can't even remember, to be clear.
 

But to me now, she seems as a heavenly helper, an angel. What a nice place I walked into!

"Laura, are you hurt? Are you feeling all right?"
"Petra! Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. I'm sorry for worrying you."

Petra opened her eyes widely as I rushed over and shook her hand without thinking, she must have been surprised by my actions.
Petra and I exchanged greetings and comments, but we weren't particularly close and I don't remember any communication with this kind of reaction.

Now that I think about it, I wonder why there were girls of the same age of Petra in the village, but we had only a superficial relationship....
Perhaps it's because Lucas' mother and my mother are close and have a family affair that I could be his friend... and that's fine, but Laura should have extended her connections more.

"I'd like to get to know you better in the future and become friends with you..." - Whether it's to fulfill that wish or to distance myself from Lucas, now is surely the time to do so. -"... Are you going somewhere?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm going to Radmila's house."
"Can I go with you?"

Petra was even more surprised than before. Perhaps because behind her, Lucas also had his eyes wide open.

Future Warrior, you should extend your connections too.
A guy my age who says nothing but "Hey, you look the same" no matter how many times someone talks to him is not going to make many friends.
 

I was still smiling and staring at Petra, who had stopped moving with her mouth half-open, and she glanced behind me for a second

"It's okay." She nodded in agreement.
I responded with a quick, "Thank you," and then turned around.

It's a good idea to have a bit of time to talk with other girls, I'm sure he's going to follow me.
The grin I had on my face thickened. Then, I looked back and said, staring directly into his blue eyes.
"Lucas, you can go home first."

*******

About Petra, I managed to visit Radmila's house.
I believe this will be a big step forward in changing my role as the childhood friend of the brave hero.
As soon as she entered Radmila's house, a fierce sense of familiarity struck her.
It's not that I've never been here before, but what is this sense of déjà vu that I felt for the first time?
I hesitated for a moment and soon realized what it was.
 

--In my past life, the recovery potion must have come out of that closet over there. No, I would have to paid with some Madokas(the currency of this world) in that place over there before receiving it.

"Laura!"

As I was digging through my crappy memories, my name was called from behind back.
This voice is not Radmila, Radmila speaks in a more indulgent way.
This young-sounding, yet calming figure of speech...

"Yulia!　Was Yulia here too?"

Her name is Yulia, and she has long, beautiful black hair.
A girl a few years older than us. I'm older than anyone else in terms of mental age, though.

"Are you sure you're completely recovered?"
"Yeah. I'm sorry for worrying you. I'm fine now."

I replied with a smile, but I was somewhat, no, quite devastated by the fact that not only Petra, but Yulia was also in Radmila's house.
There are three girls of the same age living in this village, except for me.
As you may have guessed, those three are Petra, Yulia, and Radmila and that means the three girls of the village, except for me, had made plans to hang out together!

You're out of your league.
She frantically shook off the words that popped into her brain.
The reason they didn't ask me out was out of concern that I was attacked by a demon yesterday. It must be because of that...

--No, let's not be arrogant.
 

Been attacked by a demon yesterday, that's not the real answer because they didn't invite me to join them. 

The relationship between me and the other girls was that distant, despite living in the same village.

However, there is no time to be depressed.
I'm rather lucky to have been able to realize this fact.
It's just a matter of building a relationship from now on.
Laura in "Last Brave", who didn't realize it, had such a sad outcome, but I won't.

"Yulia, Petra's here!　--Oh, there's Laura too."

Just as I was firmly determined, Radmila comes over, swinging her fluffy, soft-looking orange hair.
I scolded myself for feeling sorry for myself, and put on an innocent smile that was as friendly as possible and suitable for my age. And says.

"Radmila, and two others. Can I come in and join you too?"
"Yeah, of course"

They accepted it more readily than expected. I was delighted by that, though.

"But... and Lucas, huh?" I dropped my shoulders in dismay at those words.

Have I already been recognized by the whole village like Lucas's eternal couple?
The sense of crisis increases all at once.
It can't go on like this, I'm only 8 years old. Lucas was 16 years old when he started his journey as a brave her.
I remember hearing the line at the beginning of the game that I was about to turn 17 at that moment.
In 8 years, you have to get out of the role of ONLY being a childhood friend of the brave hero.
It won't be in eight years to be exact.
It is possible that if I remain in this village until Lucas leaves, the people of the village will be expecting us to be a couple, no matter how much I don't want to.
I still think I should leave this village as soon as possible, this village is small and rural.
If I don't, I'll probably continue to be the childhood friend of hero-sama forever.

Once again, I have two major goals for the future:

1 - "keep your distance from Lucas without being suspicious."
2 - "find a suitable job and leave this village as soon as possible."

"Achieve these and you will change the future!! "
"Don't let them call you a losing heroine!! "
"It's fine if the brave hero forget about you!! "
"You're going to take hold of your own happiness!!"

These are the life aims of the brave hero's childhood friend girl!