Chapter 68 - I Dreamed of Holding a Woman (1)

WHOOSH.

The world spun. He hit the ground back-first with a thud, and the breath caught in his throat.

"If I throw you a little harder, your ribs and internal organs will suffer."

As he frowned through the pain, the Company Commander's musical voice rang out above him.

"Enough?"

"One more."

Encrid wanted nothing more than to repeat this, even if it meant letting the Nidle slit his throat, if only he could.

He had known he would be no match for her. Rem had once glanced at the Fairy Company Commander and said:

["That one's a downright monster too."]

Then came Ragna's assessment.

["She's the best of the Company Commanders."]

Audin had added his own opinion.

["Her body is well conditioned."]

Knowing he was no match for her changed nothing. Encrid gripped his sword with both hands.

"Here I come."

The Fairy Company Commander was her usual self, her voice flat and devoid of emotion. The Nidle curved toward him.

The Nidle, a sword made by Fairies, slashed in curves, then abruptly became a point that stabbed. Last time, he had let her close the distance while trying to dodge a stab. This time, he stepped back and swung his longsword upward.

He definitely had the advantage in strength. Knocking the Nidle upward would create an opening.

He pictured how the fight would unfold. This ability to anticipate combat had developed naturally through countless real battles, battles with his life at stake. He predicted his opponent's reactions and prepared accordingly.

For those with innate talent, or those who had perfected their martial skills in actual combat, this came as naturally as breathing. Encrid had acquired that weapon only after losing his life countless times.

SWISH.

Just before the Company Commander's Nidle met his longsword, it bent smoothly. True to its nickname, the leaf sword, it seemed to have become an actual leaf. The blade flexed pliantly.

It was a feat of her wrist, angling and shaking. Even as he watched the blade bend, Encrid put more strength into his swing, determined to strike it.

In the end, it flowed past without even touching his rising blade. Encrid cut empty air. This Flowing Sword Technique could only be called a marvel.

Then the Fairy closed in again. She slipped right up against him. Ready for her, Encrid drove up his knee.

TAP.

The Company Commander did not dodge. Instead, she stacked her hands and pressed down on his knee. By pushing before he could put his full strength behind it, she upset his balance.

He knew it was coming and still fell for it, Encrid thought. He had known perfectly well she would attempt close combat like this.

He desperately tried a Headbutt, but the Company Commander tilted her head out of the way and took his forehead on her shoulder.

What followed was much like before. Only the striking technique differed. Interlacing the hands that had blocked his knee, she struck him near the heart.

THUD!

Again, his breath stopped, and all strength drained from his limbs. In a life-or-death fight, he would have bitten his tongue if that was what it took to keep struggling. But this was a spar. At this point, he had already lost.

"Ghk, huff, huff."

Encrid staggered back several steps, then dropped to his knees to brace himself and gasped for breath. Looking up, he met the Company Commander's green eyes.

"More?" she asked.

"Whew."

His heart ached, but Encrid smiled. He was truly glad that she did not stop simply because she had won.

And so he charged her again and again, countless times. He was struck again and again, and left sprawled on the ground.

* * *

"Did you get beaten up for not clearing snow? Is that it?"

When he returned to the quarters, Rem, wrapped in warming hide, was the first to react.

"What?"

"Why do you look like that? Who did it?"

He sounded ready to rush out that instant, but his hands drew the warming hide tighter. Yes, that stuff was nice and warm. Encrid knew it too. Today was particularly cold, besides.

"What happened?" Ragna asked as well.

For some reason, Jaxon was in the quarters today too. He studied Encrid closely, his eyes seeming to ask what had happened.

Audin murmured quietly, "Why do you always come back beaten up, brother?"

'You make me sound terribly frail.'

Didn't that make him sound like some immature child who got beaten up at every turn? Encrid answered as he thought this.

"I was sparring."

"With who?"

"The Company Commander."

"Our Company Commander?"

He nodded.

"Why'd you do that? If you wanted a beating, I'd have given you one."

That bastard had such an irritating way with words. Encrid gave up on answering. He had just washed himself through a superhuman effort of determination.

Fortunately, the barracks had a bath where paying a few Krona got you hot water. Otherwise, he might have given up on washing.

His entire body throbbed. He lacked the strength to twitch a finger. But that was all right. He could rest. A couple of days of proper rest should do it. With neither duty nor training, he had plenty of time.

["In recognition of your efforts to preserve order in the city, you are granted four days' leave. There will be no monetary reward."]

That was what the Company Commander had said when she ended their spar around sunset. It meant no duty.

She had also said there would be no monetary reward, but Encrid considered the spar a reward in itself. Besides, there was the wealth they had brought back from the criminal guild.

'I think it was more than ten times.'

That was how often he had ended up sprawled on the frozen-solid ground. His body had suffered, but he had learned something.

'What I'm lacking right now.'

Instead of opening her mouth, the Company Commander had spoken through her sword and fists.

Naturally, he needed to hone his swordsmanship, Concentrate on a Single Point, the heart of the beast, and his sense for the blade. Those were the basics. But before that, Encrid had realized what he needed to add to his repertoire.

["You're slow."]

The Company Commander's last words had flown at him like a dagger, but that much did not even hurt. The teachers who had taught him over the years had constantly said worse.

["Must you learn this?"]

["Give it up, go home, and farm."]

["I can't teach someone who's going to die a third-rate swordsman."]

The more competent the teacher, the harsher the words. The Company Commander had called him slow, but despite that slowness, Encrid had gained what he wanted.

'A lack of technique.'

More precisely, he lacked the techniques to use his body. The Fairy Company Commander had kept throwing him down in the same ways. She had taught with her body, and he had taken those lessons in through his own.

When it came to opportunities to learn, he missed nothing, like a hawk hunting prey.

'What I need.'

The combat skills called wrestling, fighting arts, martial arts, or hand-to-hand combat. Wielding a sword did not mean fighting with the sword alone. It included using the hands, feet, and torso.

Encrid had made considerable use of such tactics already, but...

'It was painfully obvious I'd never been properly taught.'

The Company Commander's technique was extraordinary. In particular, he had no answer when she let go of her sword, rushed in almost crawling along the ground, toppled his balance in an instant, and seized and twisted his knee.

What if he drew a dagger and stabbed down? No, the Company Commander could dislocate and shatter his knee joint, then pull away before he drew and plunged it into her.

'It isn't easy.'

The crux of it was a difference in technique. There was a difference in proficiency too, but their knowledge and repertoire were different to begin with.

'It was fun, though.'

His whole body throbbed, and even now he felt battered to the bone, but he had learned something. Better still, that lesson had opened a new path. Encrid was happy.

As he went to lie down, the panther poked out her head and regarded him with blue eyes.

'I did say I'd give you a name.'

It would be awkward not to have a proper name to call her. As he slid into bed, she burrowed into his arms. He felt her warmth. Somehow, it seemed to ease his battered body a little.

"You're warm. Should I call you Stove?"

"You call that a name?"

Rem chimed in from beside him. Was there anything this bastard didn't butt into?

"Is it strange?"

"Do you even need to ask?"

The reply came from Ragna in the bed opposite. He was still lying down. Too lazy to get up, but his mouth worked just fine.

"Do you dislike the panther, brother?"

Even Audin was joining in.

"You don't like it?"

When Encrid asked the panther, she slapped his cheek with a forepaw.

"You really must hate it."

Murmuring, Encrid gathered her into his arms and thought. What should he name her? He had never expected to agonize over something like this.

Blackie? No, that sounded like a dog's name. Her eyes were blue as a lake. How about Blue-eyes? That seemed fairly good.

Cradled in his arms, the panther tapped his chest as though reading his mind and rejecting every idea. She didn't like Blue-eyes either? Then what should he call her? How about Black Panther? That would be convenient enough.

The panther pressed a paw firmly against his chest. Judging by the way she kept pushing and rubbing, she really disliked that one.

'Wait, are you reading my mind?'

He had spent the night away on an operation, surrounded by the companions of people he had killed. Rem, who had snored through the night, and Ragna, who had slept like the dead, were the strange ones. A certain amount of vigilance was necessary.

As a result, he had been unable to sleep soundly in the thieves' headquarters. He had dozed lightly, barely getting a little shut-eye. Then he had reported in as soon as he returned and gone straight into a spar. A spar that abused his body, sending him rolling over frozen ground time and again.

That had left him weary. After washing in hot water and returning, he wrapped himself in warming hide and then a blanket, letting the warmth seep into his body. The panther's warmth helped too. Even the rhythm of her kneading paws lulled him to sleep.

Encrid was already half asleep.

'What's your name?'

With half his mind in dreams and half in reality, he hovered between sleep and waking. The moment he asked in that state, he dreamed.

A beautiful woman with silver-blond hair and blue eyes appeared in his dream. Her level gaze was clear and wide-eyed, and her straight, high nose seemed to reveal her temperament. He thought her a proud beauty, upright and perfectly composed.

In the midst of a meadow lush with white, red, yellow, and blue flowers, she stood alone like a star shining among the blooms. A star that gave light to every flower.

"You're pretty."

Encrid spoke. His voice crossed the meadow and reached her. He knew that because it was a dream. Then:

"My name is Esther," she said.

Her voice, too, crossed distance and space to reach him. Then the meadow vanished, and so did she. Still half asleep, Encrid mumbled.

"Esther. Let's call you Esther."

"... You dreaming?"

Rem answered from beside him, but Encrid was already asleep and gave no reply. Rem tilted his head as he looked at his sleeping Squad Leader. However tired he was, this wasn't a man who fell so completely unconscious.

"Must be tired."

Rem murmured. It seemed the Company Commander had deliberately put the Squad Leader through the wringer. He wasn't particularly pleased about that.

That Fairy woman they called the Company Commander was impossible to read. Besides, why was she putting his Squad Leader through all that as she pleased? Who had given her permission?

PURR.

As though responding to the word Esther, the panther let out a contented rumble in the Squad Leader's arms.

"Fine, Esther it is."

Rem said it jokingly, then closed his own eyes. He was satisfied with the warmth. He hated the cold. Truly, horribly hated it.

Hadn't he said they had three days off duty? Rem had no intention of leaving his warming hide during that time except to eat and shit.

* * *

Esther, the Lake Panther, had caught a familiar scent from the man named Encrid. It was a scent associated with spells, mysteries, and arcane secrets. To be precise, it was closer to a curse.

'It stayed on the surface.'

The mystery called a curse had left only traces around Encrid, unable to exert any power. Judging from her experience, someone seemed to have set a spell trap that had been triggered. Triggered, but failed to take effect.

She had a guess as to why the curse had merely lingered. Only a guess, of course. In her current body, she could prove nothing. She wanted to know more, to delve deeper, but she could not investigate it now. More precisely, it was not something to concern herself with.

Breathing in the scent of the spell to her heart's content, she absorbed the energy that remained on the surface, unable to affect the man named Encrid. The intent and determination that made it a curse had already vanished, leaving only pure energy: mana.

Esther savored it fully. Such a sweet scent. It had been so long since she had tasted a part of the world of spells.

Meanwhile, she projected herself into the dream of the man who was trying to give her a name of his own choosing.

["My name is Esther."]

She conveyed her proper name. She simply could not let this pass. Names held a special meaning in the world of spells. All the more so given her current, less-than-ideal condition.

Receiving a new name in her present form would deepen the curse. She had to tell him her original name. That was why she had strained herself to appear in his dream.

Was it thanks to the mana left on Encrid's body and her projection of herself into his dream? Esther regained her original form, if only briefly. Naked, in the arms of the man she had chosen.

"Mm."

The man drew her close. Having never allowed a man to hold her, Esther flushed scarlet in an instant. But no one saw it.

His firm chest muscles were right before her nose. Esther remained perfectly still, letting out only faint breaths. She was in no position to make a fuss.

Her original form had returned for only a moment. The man's eyelids slowly rose. His eyes were drowsy, not alert. The instant she met them, Esther was so startled she forgot to breathe.

"Hm?"

He stared blankly, closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again. They were still heavy with sleep. In that interval, Esther had returned to panther form. Such was the mystery of magic.

The man closed his eyes again and drifted back to sleep.

"Esther, Esther."

He murmured her name in his sleep. He wouldn't remember, would he?

She was grateful to have turned back into a panther. To be held naked in the arms of a man she had only just met—strictly speaking, she hadn't only just met him, but still, a man. She didn't even want to imagine it.

Then Esther regretted that thought.

'Grateful for the curse?'

She should not think such a thing, even by accident. But she had never been held in a man's arms like this before.

The panther started to push him away for no good reason, then stopped. The scent of mana still lingered in his embrace, tempting her. Telling herself it was for the mana, she burrowed into his arms.

Just as Encrid felt the panther's warmth, she felt his.

She had recovered enough strength to regain her original form, however briefly. Now she should be able to do a fair amount even as a panther. Though she would still need time to regain her true self.

'Soon.'

It was, quite literally, only a matter of time. At the side of this human named Encrid, it could happen. Otherwise, she would never have sought the fellow out in the first place.

'I do like his face.'

Even to her eyes, Encrid was an exceptionally handsome man. Of course, Esther thought that wasn't what mattered.