Chapter 79 - How to Handle an Imbecile

One slender branch and one man. A loosely hanging arm, the branch barely clearing the ground.

It looked like a sword. A sword sharper and more pointed than any blade. After that, there was no time to think. Everything happened in an instant and ended just as quickly.

Encrid saw the phantom battlefield. The instant he thought his opponent's foot had moved, he brought his sword down on instinct. WHOOSH. His branch cleaved heavily through the air.

Nothing but air.

Then the tip of his opponent's branch touched his throat. TAP. 'How?'

He replayed what he had just seen. He had seen it. It would be more accurate to say he had seen it and still been caught. "Everyone seems to offer a word afterward, so I'll do the same. It was timing," the man said. His opponent had used a swift sword, applying it like a textbook example of the Righteous Sword Technique. Rather than moving first, he had turned Encrid's downward strike against him. 'Instead of parrying... '

Encrid looked down at his opponent's feet. He could see the smooth semicircle the man's boot had traced in the dirt. 'He turned his body to hide his centerline.'

Fundamentals. In a sense, it was a simple technique. Turn to evade, then finish with a stab. 'If this had been a battlefield... '

He would have experienced something much like that first stab, even though he had thought himself on an entirely different level now. So far away. So high above him. His opponent's skill was vastly superior.

The gap was enough to make an ordinary person realize his limits and sink into despair and frustration. The man had demonstrated all that with a single thrust of a stick. "You don't look particularly young."

The man let the remark hang. There was a question in it, so Encrid answered.

"Thirty. Another round?"

"You want another round?"

Encrid nodded.

"Hah."

The man gave a hollow laugh at his nod. As far as he could tell, this fellow wasn't normal. He had shown him the gap. Encrid's passion had drawn him out, but the man's limits were clear. He had meant to break his spirit so he wouldn't waste his time.

Defeat hurt anyone. It hurt all the more when the opponent was overwhelmingly superior. What did it mean to lose? What happened to someone who faced defeat?

They felt frustration, despair, and anguish. Some refused to accept it and struggled desperately. 'Is that what this is?'

It didn't look that way. "It seems you're stealing the timing of my downward strike. How do you do it?"

Instead, he was asking to be taught more. There wasn't a trace of shame. He simply watched with that same silent flame in his eyes that had first drawn the man in, a flame that could burn anything. 'He's mad.'

Despite that thought, the man took his stance again. Even though he could see his opponent's skill and its limits, he still wanted to oblige him. They sparred again. Naturally, Encrid lost.

He lost four more times. He kept challenging without tiring, and Polid's swordsman accepted every time. "You're not ready to face him yet."

Jaxon offered consolation rather than advice, but Encrid didn't particularly need comforting. Losing. Defeat. He had experienced them more times than he could count.

Younger talents had bested him. Mercenaries who had taken up the sword later than him had surpassed him. He had even lost to a village militiaman. To bandits, too.

As a mercenary, he had lost to a son of a bitch who proved that character and skill had nothing to do with each other. He had fled from demonic beasts and monsters countless times. Even when a harpy's talons gouged out a comrade's heart, all he could do was run.

If he had hung his head every time, he wouldn't be here serving as a Squad Leader now. Something like this couldn't hurt him.

There was only one thing to say.

"That was fun."

It was simply a pleasure. Encrid was being honest. "... Sometimes you're very strange, Squad Leader."

Encrid really didn't want to hear that from one of his own squad members. He had brought Jaxon because he was the most normal of the lot, but even he was hardly an ordinary soldier. Completely ignoring Polid whenever he spoke wasn't normal to begin with. Even now, Jaxon acted as though Polid weren't there.

At every opportunity, Polid would sidle over. "You soldier bastard. I've memorized your face. I'm the next head of the Roquefried trading company."

Jaxon ignored him completely.

"Hey. Hey! Aren't you going to answer? What, too scared to speak?"

Still ignored him.

"You bastard. I'll make you regret this with tears streaming down your face."

Even that got nothing. Consistent, if nothing else.

Eventually, Polid even complained to Encrid.

"Hey, why does that bastard keep ignoring me?" Being treated as though he didn't exist must have been driving him mad. To Encrid, he looked ready to cry at the slightest poke.

Feeling sorry for him, Encrid offered some advice.

"Because you keep talking to him." A wise answer to a foolish question. Wasn't he being ignored because he kept speaking to Jaxon? He shouldn't have spoken to him in the first place.

Encrid inwardly nodded at his own generosity. No advice could have been kinder. Polid, however, began trembling.

"You, you, you..."

Seeing that he couldn't get the words out, Encrid breezed past him. "Soldier, you're ruthless," the Company Commander remarked beside him.

But he couldn't have been kinder. Leona did spray out the tea she was drinking when she heard it.

"Mm. I feel compelled to tell you all over again how much I like you."

That was what she said afterward.

Really, why were they reacting like this to a little kindness?

* * *

The repeated sparring ended after a full day. It was time to wrap things up.

From the Border Guard members, the Company Commander, and even the unnamed swordsman, Encrid had gained a great deal. Everyone, Jaxon included, had merely marveled at his passion, but to Encrid, the time had been invaluable. 'Especially... '

The opposing swordsman had shown him what a swift sword was, how to respond to it, and what an opponent could accomplish through speed. Nothing had yet etched itself into his mind in a flash of lightning, but... 'That's all right.'

It would prove invaluable when he hit a wall. He washed off his sweat, warmed himself by the fireplace, and checked his arms and armor. The following morning dawned. "Squad Leader."

Krais opened the inn door. Behind him stood the bald Gilfin, holding a fellow whose face was half smashed in.

Beaten that badly, recognizing his face seemed hopeless. "That's him."

The Company Commander recognized him at once. There really did seem to be something different about a Fairy's senses. "Hic!"

The idiot Polid hiccupped. Encrid wondered what was going through his followers' heads, thinking of making someone like that the head of a trading company.

'Do they mean to set him up as a puppet?'

Well, if so...

Why else would a swordsman of that caliber be over there? It didn't look as though they had anything on him. "Uuugh, p-please spare me."

Their captive drooled blood-tinged saliva. It dripped down and pooled on the floor.

He must have taken quite a beating. "This fellow was rather rough at first, but after we had a conversation, he mellowed out a little," Krais said. Naturally, that conversation couldn't have involved talking. Fists or feet. A blade seemed to have joined in as well.

There was a cut around his forearm. An old linen bandage had been wrapped roughly around it, but the evidence was plain. "I'm the leader. That's right. I was blinded by Krona and carried out the attack."

The man blurted out answers to questions no one had asked. "A moment."

Everyone was watching the battered man's mouth when Leona's voice drew their attention.

"Could we clear some people out? Special-grade soldier and Platoon Commander Torres, you're in charge, correct?"

"... Very well." There were certainly a lot of eyes on them. At Torres's nod, two Border Guard members took the man under the arms and headed upstairs.

Leona, Polid, Torres, the smooth-talking brown-haired man, and the swordsman who had sparred with Encrid soon followed. Encrid and the Company Commander were to join them upstairs as well. "I'd like you two to continue guarding me."

At those words, Jaxon remained below. More precisely, he looked as though he had no intention of moving away from the Carmen Collection's Stiletto lying before him. As everyone moved, Krais approached Encrid just before he went upstairs and quietly asked,

"What's going on?"

"Are you asking because you don't know, or just to confirm?"

"Let's say I'm asking because I'd like to get what's owed to me." This Krona-crazed Big-eyes.

Of course he should be paid for his work. But Encrid couldn't give him the Stiletto.

"Keep all this month's funds." The moment he brought the man in, Krais had seen the corners of Jaxon's mouth rise a fraction, then stop.

Taking the Carmen Collection weapon from Jaxon now would require more than a little skill. Encrid had no intention of doing so.

But he didn't intend to have someone work for nothing, either. He relinquished the purse he was due from the guild—in other words, from Krais. "I'll hold you to that."

What would Krais do if he learned that the reward was a Carmen Collection weapon? Would he still let it pass?

There was no need to think about it. He would. He would let it pass.

Because Jaxon wanted it. Krais knew his place in the squad. Encrid wasn't the only one who had learned how to survive among its members.

Whether it was Jaxon, Rem, Ragna, or Audin, if they wanted something, Krais stepped aside without a fuss.

He wasn't foolish enough to stick his hand into a leashed hunting dog's mouth just to see whether it would bite. "See you later."

Encrid gave Krais's forehead a light push and went upstairs. The others had taken over a room. The spy unit's leader knelt in the middle, with Torres standing beside him, a hand on his sword hilt.

There were three on Polid's side, while Leona stood alone. Once Encrid joined the Company Commander at Leona's side, the arrangement was complete. With him there, Leona spoke. "I know he needs to be interrogated separately, but may I ask a few questions first?"

She was addressing Torres.

"Go ahead." Torres's manner hadn't changed since the first day. He was always stiff with people from outside Border Guard. Leona didn't seem particularly bothered.

She had been the assassination target. Even if she wasn't conducting the interrogation, she had every right to ask a few questions first. She was also at the root of all this trouble. The trading company's succession dispute was where everything had begun. The man had been beaten to a pudding. Leona bent her knees to meet the eyes of the man kneeling on the floor.

"Who ordered it?"

"I-I don't know. All I was told was to use the resources available to target the lady at the inn..."

Though trembling, he spoke clearly. He seemed to sense that failing to speak properly would be the end of him. "Do you recognize anyone in this room?"

The man looked around. After glancing at everyone, including Encrid, he shook his head. They wouldn't have been foolish enough to give the order in person. People usually put a few intermediaries between themselves and this sort of business.

Now the interrogation would begin. Polid had targeted Leona. Once that was revealed, the question of the company's succession would be settled.

That was what Encrid expected. "Oh dear. It seems a few fools got together and did this because they coveted my purse."

Leona began saying something entirely unexpected.

"... Pardon?"

The captured leader of the spy unit tilted his head. "I didn't do it!"

And the idiot Polid displayed his wisdom. He had spoken without even listening properly to Leona.

"Who said you did?"

She turned his words back on him.

"Uh, ah, that's not..."

Polid's eyes darted wildly. She had slapped him without warning when they first met, and now she was doing this? Encrid thought he would have been thoroughly flustered in Polid's position, too.

In the end, Polid could only splutter, making the stupidest noises a tongue could produce, unable to form another sentence.

Torres furrowed his brow. The trading company's people, apart from Polid, were calm instead. Things were taking a strange turn. Everyone had expected her to pin the crime on Polid. "Bold."

The Company Commander whispered behind him, barely loud enough for Encrid alone to hear.

Bold? What was?

He couldn't readily understand what was happening. Curiosity set his mind working, one thought leading to another. People had reasons for behaving strangely.

Of course, Rem and his other squad members often did crazy things for no reason. But Leona wasn't Rem. Encrid reviewed the situation.

The Roquefried trading company. Polid. Leona. The succession dispute. The attack inside Border Guard. The Border Guard members. The man they had captured. Aspen spies.

He organized what he knew and looked it over. Only then did something occur to him, and he nodded inwardly.

It was an aspect he had overlooked, absorbed as he was in sparring and training.

At that moment, he understood.