You're right, it's absolutely his fault that the people he thought were his friends gave him the boot the instant he stopped being useful to them, then sent him to his death before not even acknowledging that they did these things until he became someone important.
"But that wasn't their intent," you exclaim.
Intent is irrelevant.
It's like you and I are reading different manga or something. Lets to back to chapter one shall we?
1: Sasha and Hyce are close childhood friends, it also looks like they're basically the only 'family' they have left. They have a shared childhood dream to "make the best and strongest team together [and help tons of people]". So far, so standard.
2: Skill ceremony/baptism thing where they get their blessings. At this point, they're twelve years old. They're still children, even by 'medieval fantasy' standard. Hyce effectivly gets a completely useless skill (a skill that you can't use, is not useful after all). Next to Sasha's 'Sword Saint' skill, He can't really help much in direct combat.
3: Despite the above, they stay together for the next two years, working to turn their shared dream into a reality. Hyce's skill is still 100% useless; even if he could use it at this point, he doesn't know how. The party they've formed is B rank, so by this time, they should be fairly well experienced at this whole adventuring thing.
[[ 3a: WHY he has to carry everyone's gear is stupid, and I 100% blame poor writing. "IF we have to carry the luggage, how will we fight?" Uhh. you drop the gear then fight? It's not difficult. Or maybe you get a pack mule, or extra baggage handlers? But it's here because the author seemingly couldn't find a better reason why a skilless normie is still in a B-rank team. ]]
4: Sasha, contrary to popular opinion, isn't a heartless bitch, she still cares for Hyce. During the 30min break (which she calls, so Hyce can rest, 'cause Hyce is clearly struggling), you see her looking sad, not mean, not arrogant, SAD about deciding to let Hyce go. She still cares for him, but, as you'll see soon, Hyce isn't so much holding the group back (he's not), he's basically defenceless, which means he's got a much higher chance of dying than the rest of them. To someone who cares about him, that's a bad thing, so it's not surprising that that someone (Sasha) would want to keep him safe the best way she knows how, by kicking him from the group so he can go back and live safely back in the village or something.
5: Arrival at the Queen Cobra's cave. This is where we start to see how stupid Hyce is. Remember that this is a B-rank group. Hyce has been part of it from the start (He and Sasha started as a duo, then the group grew from there). They've been doing this for TWO YEARS, plenty of time to work out how to get things done, and who does what. They arrive at the Queen Cobra's cave and do a quick, basic briefing of who does what; nothing fancy, just more a pre-battle pep-talk/preparation to get everyone's head in the right place. Hyce is a non-combatant, the baggage carrier, he should know by this time that he's not part of the combat team. TWO YEARS they've been doing this, even if the full group has only been there for like six months or something, he should know he's a non-combatant, especially for the tougher jobs they'd be taking. Yet here he is, still yelling "b-but what about me! what can I do! How do I help with the combat that I've got not place in!!". Some people will claim that Sasha was a bitch when she told Hyce to wait there, but others (like myself) would see someone trying to keep a defenceless non-combatant who she cares about, safe. It's also possible she's tired of having to tell the twit the same thing yet again, but that's just a guess.
5: Queen Cobra fight. Hyce stupidity +100%. Despite being told to wait outside. Despite knowing that he's got a (currently)100% useless skill. Despite being a defenceless non-combatant, he STILL dumbly follows them into the cave. The combat group is there doing combat group stuff, working together, covering each other back, killing giant snakes etc.Then there's Hyce, gormlessly plodding around thinking of what he can do, barely paying attention to his surroundings. He almost gets his head bitten off by a giant snake. Remember that this wouldn't have happened if the skilless non-combatant with two years of experience didn't mindlessly follow the rest of the team into the cave, despite being told to wait outside. Have you ever seen a situation where a child almost gets horribly injured or killed, but gets out of it unharmed, and their parent get angry at them? That's not anger coming from being a heartless asshole, that's anger coming from the fear that comes from almost losing their child. This is basically where Sasha is coming from when she tells Hyce (after she saved him from his own stupidity) to "Stop causing trouble and stay still!!!". Despite ignoring orders to wait outside, Hyce went where he shouldn't have been and almost died. It's not wonder that Sasha wants to kick him from the group, both for his own safety, and so Sasha doesn't have to keep looking over her shoulder to make sure Hyce isn't wandering off into some danger of his own making.
And we're still in chapter 1.1.
[[ Sidenote: Hyce's ability is fucking stupid. I could be wrong, but so far it looks like it only works if he just happens to find a random 'guns'n'ammo' magazine or whatever, in a world that doesn't seem to have guns. But whatever, it's a dumb plot thing to poorly justify the story. I'm sure the author could have done this better but, like the baggage carrier bit above, he didn't. ]]
6: Hyce getting kicked from the party. I'll readily admit that Sasha handled this like shit. She could, and should, have handled this differently. In her defence (somewhat), she did almost see someone she cares about almost die (through his own stupidity). She's also still a kid (fourteen). Hell, for all we know, the whole team is still under eighteen, so they're all still kids (it's hard to tell sometimes with manga art). But Sasha 100% should have handled this better. Hyce then, understandably, has a childish tantrum due to being kicked out of the group, seemingly out of nowhere (remember, 14 years old, still a kid). Sasha accepts being hated if it means Hyce lives. "I don't want Hyce to die so this is fine, even if he ends up hating me for it." (ch1.2, page 11).
7: Two month time skip. White Clover, dragon attack etc.
"BuT SaShA sHoUlD hAvE KnooOOnn aBouT teh Dwaagon!" cries are all stupid. If Sasha 'should have known', then Hyce ALSO should have known. They've both been adventuring in the same group for two years. This happened ONLY two months after Hyce was kicked. Unless Sasha did a lot more info gathering than Hyce (I wouldn't be surprised at this point, since Hyce is an idiot), I think it's fair to assume they'd have roughly similar knowledge about the surrounding areas. We also don't see Hyce taking any kind if personal responsibility to find out more about the area he's heading to.
8: Hyce's conclusion that Sasha wanted him dead is understandable. He's still depressed he got kicked from the group, by someone who was basically his only family at that stage, and his 'childhood dream' is basically in tatters. This leads to him being more influenced by the
"hurr durr, that's the guy who got kicked from that group, he must be crap and they hate him, hurr durr" type rumours we hear. He's also being attacked by a frickin dragon. He's also a fourteen year old kid.
9: "But Sasha should have apologised! She had TWO YEARS!" HAhaha, like Hyce would have listened. but lets start with Sasha.
How responsible
YOU think Sasha is for the dragon attack is irrelevant, what matters here is how
Sasha feels about it. Feelings of guilt can be a weird thing, so lets take a real world example. Years ago I had a mate who loaned his car to another friend. A tire blew out while the second friend was driving down a back road and the car rolled. Thankfully there was no major injuries, but for MONTHS the first friend constantly felt guilty about it, because it was HIS car that failed. Sasha gave Hyce the idea to get the white clover, so it wouldn't be at all surprising if she carries a
lot of guilt about it, and not knowing how to deal with that (people deal with this stuff differently), combined with Hyce avoiding everyone and working solo, finding the 'right time' or opportunity to apologise might not be as easy as some people seem to think.
As for Hyce, he is in no way, shape for form willing to accept any kind of apology. By this time (Hyce and Sasha are sixteen now) it's basically hardcoded in his head that Sasha wanted him dead. Hyce has even been told 'countless times' by the Guildmaster, that Sasha didn't want him dead, and only kicked him from the group to keep him safe (ch2.1 page 10), but still finds it hard to accept and rejects the idea.
Sure, Hyce has understandable reasons for feeling wronged etc. But this massive hate-on 80% of these comments have towards Sashs is obnoxious, idiotic, and seems to completely absolve Hyce for his own stupidity. You will never convince me that the person most responsible for his situation now, is himself. (excluding the author, obviously). I'm going to keep reading this anyway, for now at least, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to stop reading the comments, since I think less about most of them than I do Hyce.
Fuck that's a lot of text. I probably shouldn't even post this (but I did anyway).
