Chapter 28

Chapter 28: Chapter 28

Rickart, Ice, and Fallen followed the senior adventurers south once more.

While Beringen was a frontier region in the northeast, Torvail lay on the eastern frontier, so the roads were not particularly well maintained.

To the east, a magnificent mountain range stretched north to south across the continent, towering over the land as though gazing down upon it.

A wind that had begun far above, among the peaks capped with eternal snow, blew toward Rickart’s group. It was refreshingly cool—so cool that he wondered whether summer might never come.

"By the way, which one of you is Ricky?"

One of the four senior adventurers walking ahead spoke. His most distinctive feature was his large, hooked nose.

"That’s me."

Rickart, wearing the hood of his red cloak, raised his hand.

"Huh... You’re nothing like I imagined. When I heard you killed that jackal bastard, I figured you’d be some huge, arrogant prick."

"You must be pretty good in a fight, huh?"

"I don’t know."

"It’s just—go easy on us, all right? We’re fucking weak. But hey, at least we’re all from the same academy."

Although the concepts of senior and junior existed, there was no particularly rigid hierarchy between them. Besides, there was a saying in this line of work:

Whoever fought better was the senior.

Rickart merely smiled at the active adventurer from the academy who was talking himself down. That was because Rickart could tell that they were actually quite strong.

"Still, this is a relief. I was worried you might be some uncontrollable bastard. If a kid strong enough to kill a jackal was like that, we’d never be able to handle him."

"By the way, how old are you?"

"Eleven."

At the word "eleven," all four adventurers walking ahead whipped around. Their eyes widened.

Rickart was well developed for his age, so although they knew he was young, they had never imagined he could be only eleven.

"...Is that even possible?"

"What is?"

"No, I mean... What was I doing when I was eleven?"

"You were getting the shit kicked out of you in the chicken coop."

"That was before I went into the chicken coop. Oh, right. I spent my days getting beaten half to death by my father. Then my brother beat me, and when I went into town, I got beaten again."

"Anyway, that kid really is handsome. What’s your name?"

"Ice."

Perhaps because they were strangers, Ice answered coldly. The adventurers were quick-witted enough to realize immediately, Ah, this bastard doesn’t want us talking to him.

So this one was the troublesome one.

But rather than taking offense, they smoothly changed the subject.

"If Ricky’s eleven, then let’s see... By the time you become an adult at fifteen, you might even be one of the Empire’s Nine Swords."

"Nah, that’s going too far."

"He cut a jackal’s head off at eleven."

"...Maybe you’re right."

"What are the Empire’s Nine Swords?"

Rickart cut into their conversation to ask.

"If you plan on becoming an adventurer, you should at least know the basics of this world. The Empire’s Nine Swords are the nine best fighters in the empire. Nobody officially chose them or anything. People just started calling them that. There are the Emperor’s four champions, Steiner—the leader of the Ernberg Five—X the Nameless, Randel the Iron Arm... Let’s see, how many does that leave...? One, two..."

"Two of them live in the west, so there’s no need to know about them. We’ll never go that far in our lives anyway."

"Ah, shit. What were their names...?"

"Are those people Sword Masters?"

Fallen, who was curious despite Rickart’s lack of interest, asked the question.

"Nine Swords is only a title. Some of the nine don’t even use swords. The Emperor’s champions are definitely Sword Masters, but I heard two of them are so old they could die any day now. We don’t know about the others. We’ve never seen them. It’s hard for ordinary adventurers to wander around the places where the Nine Swords operate. Those are their territories."

Territories.

That made them sound like wild animals. Then again, there were many respects in which human society was little different from the wilderness.

In the wild, creatures that might compete with you for food were simply killed. Just as lions killed hyenas and other predators, an adventurer who wandered into their territory might find that the matter would not end with mere words.

Perhaps the true purpose of having a justification for conflict was the elimination of competitors.

Power struggles, wars, petty knife fights—it might have been the same for all of them.

"Anyway, that’s how it is. Hey, Ricky. If you were born a man, shouldn’t you try to become the greatest at least once? Don’t you have ambitions like that? Ricky the Golden Broccoli, one of the Empire’s Nine Swords!"

Rickart snorted with laughter. He thought things like that were nothing but empty fame.

To be honest, he had been called all kinds of names in his previous life, so titles no longer stirred much emotion in him.

The Murderer of Murderers.

The Demon Among Demons.

The Iron Reaper.

And so on...

Come to think of it, though, they were all nicknames that inspired fear in others, whether barbarians or imperials. The Empire’s Nine Swords, on the other hand, were objects of admiration.

Maybe that would not be so bad.

"I don’t know. Making it the Empire’s Ten Swords would give it a nice, round number."

"Ooooh!"

"As expected of the kid who killed a jackal. He thinks differently from the rest of us."

"Holy shit. Does that mean we’re traveling with a future member of the Empire’s Ten Swords? Someone at that level could at least become a guild master, right? Save me a position."

"No, I brought up the Nine Swords first, so I get first dibs."

"First come, first served."

"This bastard always acts like an obnoxious little shit."

"Fuck off."

"What did you say?"

"Hey, hey! Cut it out! Not again. There are kids here!"

For some reason, two of them suddenly tried to fight, forcing the other two adventurers to hurriedly restrain them. It was a ridiculous sight, but these people were not that old themselves and still had a childish side.

They were all in their early twenties, adventurers whose mandatory three years of post-academy service had ended only recently.

At least they did not seem like bad people.

Still, Rickart wondered whether there was really anything he could learn from them.

Fortunately, there was.

First of all, the guild had not requested support from the academy’s students for any particularly serious reason. They simply needed to search an extensive area.

They only required additional manpower, which meant the work itself was not especially dangerous.

However, deserters who had been driven to desperation could do anything, so it was not entirely safe either.

In any case, as a student, Rickart learned things such as questioning witnesses, conducting searches, and establishing communication networks from the active adventurers.

In his previous life, aside from his time in the military, he had always traveled alone. As a result, he knew little about this sort of organization and management.

Questioning people was not particularly difficult.

Unlike city dwellers, most people in rural communities were born in their hometowns and never left them for their entire lives. Because of that, they found the arrival of strangers unusual and remembered them clearly.

Thus, when asked whether they had seen anyone suspicious lately, they could usually provide remarkably accurate answers.

After tracking the deserters for three days, they finally caught up with one.

There was, however, one problem.

"You fucking bastards! Stay the fuck away from me!"

At the entrance of a ramshackle hut stood a man dressed in rags, holding a young girl captive. He had a crude knife pressed against her slender throat.

That was the problem.

The villagers had gathered in droves and surrounded the area to watch. The girl’s mother had collapsed onto the ground and was sobbing uncontrollably.

"Oh, heavens! Oh, heavens! Take me instead!"

The hostage herself, however, merely stared blankly, seemingly unaware of the situation she was in.

"Ah, fuck..."

The adventurer leading Rickart swore under his breath. Usually playful and cheerful, he now looked genuinely irritated.

After muttering "fuck" to himself for a long while, he suddenly shouted.

"Hey! Put the knife down! What are you going to accomplish by taking a little kid hostage? You’re already dead, you bastard!"

"Exactly! If I’m going to die, I might as well take the brat with me! Come on! Come and get me!"

"Ha! This fucking... Ha..."

The adventurer continued swearing as if his blood pressure might kill him.

There was no solution.

They could either sacrifice the girl or allow the deserter to escape.

In truth, sacrificing the girl would not cause any great trouble. This was an age when few people would make much of the death of a single commoner girl from the countryside. Letting the deserter escape might actually cause more serious problems.

The adventurers nevertheless understood that sacrificing her would be an inhuman thing to do. That was why the situation was so difficult.

"What the hell do we do?"

"I don’t fucking know..."

Rickart, Ice, and Fallen merely watched from a distance. If a fight broke out, they could have helped, but in this situation, there truly seemed to be nothing they could do.

"Couldn’t someone shoot him with an arrow...?"

Fallen muttered. However, they had neither a bow suited for long-range shooting nor a sufficiently skilled marksman. Most importantly, there was a risk of hitting the girl.

After quietly observing the scene, Rickart approached the senior adventurer.

"Should I try talking to him?"

"Sure... Do whatever you want."

The adventurer did not say that this was no place for Rickart to interfere. He seemed so frustrated with the situation that he had given up on everything.

All that remained was deciding whether or not to make the sacrifice.

After receiving permission, Rickart removed his hood and walked steadily toward the deserter.

"What the fuck! I told you not to come any closer! That sword on your shoulder—put it down! Put it down!"

Once he had moved a little closer, Rickart obediently removed the sword slung over his shoulder and tossed it far away. He threw his dagger aside as well, then opened his cloak to show that he was carrying nothing else.

"What the hell? You’re just a little brat! What’s with your hair? Are you mocking me? Huh?!"

Only after Rickart discarded his weapons did the man seem to see him properly.

That was how severely agitated the deserter was. No one knew what accident might occur, and a single wrong move could get the girl killed.

"I’m not mocking you. I just want to talk."

"Talk about what? There’s nothing to talk about! Just let me go! Let me go! I want to go home! I don’t even need the three months of wages they owe me! Just let me go! I want to see my mother!"

The deserter was practically screaming through tears.

Rickart remained silent and listened until the man had poured out all his resentment.

Only when the deserter exhausted himself and began gasping for breath did Rickart speak.

"Where were you stationed?"

"What?"

"Where was the battlefield?"

"...Raeldorf. Why?"

"Were the winters cold?"

"No matter how thick your fur boots were, didn’t the moisture build up inside until your feet swelled?"

"H-how do you know that?"

"You would have one good day every once in a while, but most days were miserable. A comrade you joked with last night would be dead the next morning. Moldy bread and fruit that had rotted through. You tried to drink yourself to sleep, but the nightmares never really went away. Isn’t that right?"

"..."

The deserter’s eyes widened, then blinked repeatedly.

Everyone else there regarded the deserter as nothing more than a madman.

Rickart did not.

Rickart understood the pain and sorrow that man must have felt.

Losing an arm or a leg, or having your body broken, was almost preferable. What was truly unbearable on a battlefield was having your mind destroyed.

Rickart knew that pain better than anyone.

He had experienced it himself.

That was why he felt a kinship with the deserter.

"The most fucked-up part is the idiotic orders coming from people above who know nothing about what’s happening on the ground. You know it’s wrong, but you go out anyway, and people die. Alcohol, gambling, women... Even those can only numb the pain for so long. It isn’t because you’re weak. It’s because you’re a good man. You simply weren’t suited for the battlefield."

The deserter fell into a daze, as though listening to a hypnotist.

He blinked repeatedly, shook his head, then slipped back into a stupor. It was as though he were dreaming with his eyes open.

"So you don’t need to do this. Let the girl go. Her mother is crying over there. It must be breaking her heart. The girl hasn’t done anything wrong, has she?"

The deserter stared straight ahead, but his eyes were unfocused.

He was not looking at Rickart. He seemed to be gazing through him.

Nor was he looking at the people gathered there.

His gaze had crossed the distant horizon and traveled beyond time itself, into the past.

But in the end, he could not move beyond that horrifying past.

He, too, must once have known innocent days.

At last, all the strength seemed to drain from the deserter. The arm wrapped around the girl fell limply to his side.

He stood there blankly for a moment.

Then he suddenly snapped upright and shouted.

"Raise spears! Hah! Spears forward! Hah! Seventh Infantry! Advance! Keep in step! Hup! One! Two! One! Two! Thrust! Hoo-ah! Thrust! Hoo-ah!"

He was no longer human.

He was a broken machine.

And that broken machine drove the crude knife into his own throat with all his strength, without the slightest hesitation.

As though he were simply carrying out an order.

"For God and the Empire! Glory to the Crown Mercenary Company!"

Thud!

He toppled over stiffly, his head striking the ground hard.

Eyes bulging.

Mouth hanging open.

Blood soaking the earth beneath him.

His body convulsed for a moment, then went limp.

An icy silence descended over the scene. The sharp wind blowing past felt colder than ever.

Rickart approached the corpse, closed the man’s eyes, and shut his jaw.

Then he took the girl’s hand and led her back.

Everyone who had gathered to watch—adults and children alike—stared at Rickart as though they had seen a ghost.

Was that magic?

Was it some kind of mind magic?

Rickart returned the girl to her mother. At some point, the woman had stopped crying. Her eyes were wide as she stared blankly at Rickart.

Her daughter had nearly died only moments ago, yet the sight she had just witnessed was so shocking that even this seemed to have slipped from her mind.

Rickart left the crowd and walked away.

"Ricky."

Ice called after him.

Rickart acted as though he had not heard. His eyes unfocused, he stumbled onward like a puppet with its strings cut.

Perhaps because of the chilling air around him, even the senior adventurers did not dare call out to him or stop him.

Fallen merely hurried to retrieve Rickart’s sword and dagger from the ground.

Rickart was completely dazed. All he could hear was the high-pitched ringing in his ears.

Emotionally, this was far more difficult than being ambushed and forced to fight in the forest.

There was no comparison.

Right now, he simply wanted to be alone.

So he walked aimlessly onward.

Farther and farther away.

And with that, the turbulent deserter assignment came to an end.