There's a more valid reason why the king and the country is biased with the shield hero.
Heavy Spoiler Warning ahead. If you don't want to be spoiled Don't click the spoiler tag. Don't blame me since I've put so many warnings ahead. ?
Melromarc is a Human Supremacist country with a Neighbor Demi-Human Country which are not in good terms. There was a war between the Demi-Human country which results into his little sister being a prisoner of war. Since the Shield Hero is revered by the Demi-Humans, I'm pretty sure you can guess why the king is seriously biased against the shield hero. And the Human Supremacist thing in the country is the result of *cough*religion *cough*.
This is not the end of it!!! It can't be!! Don't you have any other shield that can protect your body???
The powers aren't explained that well in this manga.... guess.... I'll have to go with it...
Logic: You coward for using slaves to fight for you when you can't do any meaningful damage on your own, thus, it would be illogical for you to do a one-on-one duel.
I find it kinda funny that out ShieldBro might have been able to win this duel if it was party vs. party... Based on their performance, no one on the side of Mr. Compensate-with-Spear can't even hurt him and Raphtalia is a pretty damn good DPS major.
Edit: Should we feel pity for the Spear hero for a single instance? He can still be damaged by an orange balloon at like level 30 with some pretty high tier armor? What does that mean? If shit did not go his way, he could have been bodied by a flood of orange balloons.
If I remember correctly, in the WN, The Three Heroes Church suddenly sprout out of nowhere, then they suddenly grow more powerful because of the war with the neighboring Demi-Human Country. The King did help the Three Heroes Church to gain more influence later on but he did not setup the foundation of the Three Heroes Church.
You don't need to pity the other 3 heroes, karma will hit them pretty hard later in the series.
@slayerdart Oh, I know about that, since I am already caught up to the current chapter AND read the webnovel. I'm just rereading in case I missed something and to read the new comments.
Still, I mean pity in the sense of, "damn, yall are friggin' weak sauce. I feel bad for this world if you are their hope."
This cheat buying, battle pass using, white fucking blood of a ten year old is pisssy cause the shield hero though of a clever fucking way of attack? I understand why spear-San fucking hated his pre-loop self