Chapter 69 - I Dreamed of Holding a Woman (2)

Encrid dreamed. There was a Flower field and a woman. "I'll be relying on you for a while. Just so you know." She possessed a mysterious charm. Even Encrid, who rarely gave women a second glance, felt he would not forget her easily. The dream was a jumble. The Flower field gave way to a black river, then the ferryman appeared, then the woman, and suddenly a panther. 'What are you doing here?' He asked silently, but the panther shook her head, then sharply turned away as though sulking. It was so adorable that Encrid couldn't resist curling his fingers to scratch the top of her head. PURR. He had heard Lake Panthers were fierce predators, but at times like this, she was no different from a cat. She purred contentedly, a sound Encrid found comforting, too. Then he briefly opened his eyes, unsure whether he was dreaming or awake. The woman he had seen in the Flower field and by the black river lay in his arms. Naked, at that. He blinked, and the woman disappeared, leaving the top of the panther's head in view. It must have been a dream. 'But if it was...' He could still feel the weight of her in his arms. A scent and warmth the little panther could never have left behind lingered, making it all the stranger. 'That dream felt far too real.' Sleep swept over him again, and he made no effort to resist it. When he opened his eyes in the morning, the panther was nowhere to be seen. Usually, she never left his arms before he got up. "Pan—Esther." He had been about to call her whatever came to mind when he remembered the name he had given her in his sleep. Then he saw the Lake Panther move, standing tall off to one side. She had hidden herself so well in the shadows of the quarters that he could barely find her without looking closely. With her lake-blue eyes and ebony-black fur, she padded across the floor and primly settled to one side. She sat on the hide they had laid out for her to rest on. Warming hide, naturally. 'We've gone past comfort and straight into luxury overnight.' Even a mere panther was grooming her claws on warming hide. Some jerky lay on it, left there by either Big-eyes or Rem. She roughly sliced it with a claw, popped a piece into her mouth, and began chewing. But why did he feel so empty? Because the little beast that warmed his arms each morning was missing? Or because the dream had felt so real? He felt he could draw the naked woman from his dream if asked. Of course, he knew nothing about drawing, so it would be a complete mess. That was how clearly he remembered her. 'She certainly was beautiful.' Exceptionally so. Enough to rival the Fairy Company Commander's otherworldly beauty. "What's got you thinking so hard?"

"I had a dream, and I remember it so vividly." Esther watched him with an odd look in her eyes. Perhaps when she had told him her name in the dream, her projected thought had left a stronger impression than expected. That alone could cause mental damage in someone with weak willpower. What should she do, then? Should she try to find a way to intervene, even in her panther's body? The panther grew grave. "What kind of dream?" Rem asked, lying wrapped up in hide. "Are you a caterpillar?"

"That's right. A caterpillar, that's me. All mouth and nothing else. So feed me breakfast, or this frail little caterpillar will starve to death." The bastard really was half out of his fucking mind. Encrid let his words go in one ear and out the other. Rem was someone he could safely ignore. "So what was the dream?" Rem asked again. Encrid scratched his chin and answered.

"It was strange."

"Strange?" Rem tilted his head. With only his head sticking out, he had to express everything through it and his face. That was a talent in its own right. "I saw a naked woman." HACK! COUGH, COUGH! 'Hm?' Encrid looked toward the panther. She was coughing nonstop, as though a piece of jerky had lodged in her throat. "Esther?" The panther kept her head down against the floor and ignored him. From their very first meeting, she had exuded mystery from every inch of her body. A predator among predators, ruler of Green Pearl. A panther with eyes like a lake: the Lake Panther. That fierce beast was now drooling on the floor and coughing. HACK! So hard he wondered whether she might die. "Never in my life have I seen a panther choke to death stuffing its face with jerky. So, was she pretty?" Stunningly so. But he didn't answer. What was the point? It had only been a dream. "Aren't you being a bit too sluggish, even for winter, Rem?" Encrid said, getting up. Once he stood, he realized that every part of him hurt. Merely moving was agony. But staying still at a time like this would only make his body worse. He knew that from experience. That didn't mean he needed to train. In the past, impatience would have driven him to work himself even harder. Now he knew that would only damage his body further, and since learning that, he had kept within his limits. He wasn't as impatient as he used to be, either. 'Rest is part of training.' Countless swordsmanship instructors had told him that. If he loosened up a little today, tomorrow would be easier. The monks' exercises he had learned from Audin should be enough. "So, was she pretty or not?"

"What difference does it make? It was a dream." He gave that perfunctory answer and went outside. It was cold again today. Every inch of him hurt, but he began loosening up. His thoughts were not especially complicated. If anything, getting thoroughly battered in their spar had made things clear. There was always one question. 'What should I do next?' They said the gifted, those commonly called geniuses, could see the path ahead whether they wanted to or not. Identifying what you needed right now and where you were lacking was itself a talent. What about those without talent? They tried this, then that. They lost time from that first step. Their starting lines were different. That was why a good teacher was necessary. Someone who could point out your shortcomings was always a treasure. This time, the Fairy Company Commander had served part of that role. Now someone else would have to fill in what remained. "Audin." Audin came outside every morning. The cold? He wasn't a man who cared about such things. There was a reason people called him the Praying Bear. Surely it wasn't just his size. "Yes, brother. A fine day, isn't it?" A cutting wind whistled between them. Border Guard lay in the northern reaches of the Penn-Hanil continent. It was a particularly cold region, even by the continent's standards. The cloudy sky cast patches of shadow over their surroundings despite the morning hour. But Audin was always like this, whether the sun shone or rain fell. Though even he couldn't bring himself to call it a good morning when it snowed. "It is," Encrid replied. What did the weather matter? No, it really was a good day. Any day he could learn something new was a good one. "Teach me wrestling." Encrid was as he always had been. He did what he always did. His purpose and determination were clear. Always treating his squad members this way had helped shape the relationships they had now. Audin tilted his head. To him, this man was truly peculiar. Watching his skills improve in a matter of days, he had wondered what stroke of fortune could have made it possible. To Audin, Encrid, his Squad Leader, was a blazing flame. A flame that set everything around it alight, unaware that it was burning itself. And so that flame brought light and warmth to those nearby. When Audin had wanted to turn away from everything in the world, when he had, in truth, all but given up, this was the man he had met upon joining the unit. ["What are you doing?"] Their first meeting. Encrid had been swinging a club outside the barracks. Not an ordinary club, either, but three lengths of waterlogged wood lashed together. ["Building strength."] Could strength really be built so easily just by swinging something heavy? It would improve, but it was hardly efficient. He would be lucky not to ruin his body. Audin had expected him to quit within days. Encrid hadn't. Day after day, he remained the same. Whether he went to battle, had duties to perform, or faced rain or snow, he swung his sword, even at the cost of sleep. Audin recalled himself back then. Two words would describe him: utterly broken. Radiating gloom, he had asked, ["Your skills are terrible. Why do you do this every day?"]

["I'll get better if I keep at it."] There had been no sign of offense on his face. As though calmly answering an innocuous question, he had replied and gone back to what he was doing. Watching him, Audin had felt as though lightning had struck his head. 'How can he do that?' What moved him? What belief sustained him? There was no trace of religious faith. People said diligence was a talent, too, but without any natural gifts at all, even effort was impossible to sustain. Yet that was the kind of man Encrid was. A man betrayed each day by his daily efforts. A man who kept moving forward, despite being betrayed every single day. 'What are you?' After that, Audin had watched his Squad Leader steadily. The longer he watched, the more insignificant the reason for his own despair had seemed. 'Faith asks for nothing in return.' That day, Audin had begun to pray again. ["Brother, you'll ruin all your joints doing that."] Afterward, he had begun helping with his Squad Leader's training, little by little. Audin could read the human body. His eye for talent was practically on par with a Frog's. If Frogs were readers of talent, Audin could be called a reader of bodies: through acquired effort and talent, he could examine a body and judge its level of conditioning. In his judgment, Encrid needed to put in twice as much effort as others even to build his body. That was the frame he had been born with. The quality of his muscles wasn't particularly good, either. Would he give up because of that? No. The Squad Leader he knew wasn't that sort of man. "We'll have to start by conditioning your body. Is that all right?" Audin asked. The wind still cut like a blade, but ever since the day he had watched his Squad Leader and begun praying again, every morning had been a good one. Except when it snowed, of course. "Whatever it takes."

"It will be agonizing."

"That's fine." It would be better than dying, Encrid thought. "It will hurt."

"No problem." It would hurt less than being stabbed to death countless times. "What I'm about to teach you isn't the monks' exercises. It's a technique I developed myself. The 'Isolation Technique.'" The name sounded ominous, but it seemed just as promising. If he was going to learn, he ought to learn properly. Besides, these were the words of the best unarmed fighter among his squad members—no, among everyone Encrid had ever seen. "Isolation Technique." After the heart of the beast, the sense for the blade, and Concentrate on a Single Point, that was the name of his fourth technique. "This training will require you to understand with your mind and execute with your body, brother."

"Right."

"Then let us begin." His tone was matter-of-fact. Encrid nodded as though it were only natural. And then... "Nnnnghhhh." Groans, rather than screams, began drifting from one side of the training ground. "We're only beginning, brother." Encrid wondered whether Audin prayed to a demon every day. The exercises they had done before had literally been no more than a warm-up. So that was why he was always calling them the basics. "We'll build muscular strength by lifting weights on a foundation of flexibility. Let us proceed." Audin kneaded various parts of his body, then made him assume a bizarre position. It felt as though it would literally tear his muscles apart. Why did lying facedown with his heel pressed against his buttock make the muscles in the front of his thigh feel ready to rip? Audin held Encrid's leg and pressed down himself. His hands felt like shackles of steel. His grip was that unyielding. Lacking an understanding of the body, Encrid had to learn how his muscles moved through physical experience. "It will be easier if you think of it as dying a couple of times." He was already thinking exactly that. The agony was truly relentless, enough to make him wonder whether he would be better off just dying. "Grrrghhh." Strange groans began escaping his lips. "It's all right, Brother Squad Leader. I know your limits." 'How the hell do you know my limits?' Had Audin been a crazy bastard all along? Encrid couldn't help wondering. Even so, deep down, he was enjoying himself. He looked forward to what this suffering would bring him. So he smiled even as he groaned and writhed in pain. "Judging by your expression, you still have plenty to spare." No, he didn't. That day, Audin, priest of the devil, dismantled, split, and tore Encrid's body apart over and over. It was a day in winter, the last of the four seasons. After three full days spent developing flexibility... "Lift it." Next came lifting heavy stones and performing movements through a restricted range. "In, out. Control your breathing. Fill your belly with air. Use your abdominal pressure, brother." The Isolation Technique was not a skill for combat. It was a technique for remaking one's body. For a fortnight, a full fortnight, Encrid endured it feeling as though he were shitting blood. Then it became a little more bearable. Another fortnight passed. "Manageable now, isn't it?" It wasn't as hard as before. The pain was no longer as severe. The beginning had been difficult, but it had been worth it. For with that second fortnight gone—a month in all—his body had begun to change.