Chapter 28

Ricard, Ice, and Fallen followed the senior adventurers south once more. Just as Beringen lay on the northeastern frontier, Torweil lay on the eastern frontier, and the roads were not particularly well maintained.

To the east, a magnificent mountain range raced across the continent from north to south, its towering peaks seeming to look down upon the world below. Wind swept toward Ricard's party from those distant heights capped with eternal snow. It was wonderfully cool—so cool that he almost wondered whether summer would ever come.

“By the way, which one of you is Riki?”

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

“Me.”

Ricard raised a hand, the hood of his red cloak pulled over his head.

“Huh... Not at all what I pictured. I heard you killed that Jackal bastard, so I was expecting some big, cocky brute.”

“You must be pretty good in a fight, huh?”

“Hard to say.”

“I'm just saying, go easy on us. We're weak as fuck. We did go to the same academy, after all.”

They recognized the distinction between seniors and juniors, but the hierarchy was not particularly strict. Besides, there was a saying in this line of work: whoever fought better was the senior.

Ricard merely smiled at the academy graduate playing down his abilities. He could tell these men were quite strong.

“Still, that's a relief. I was worried you'd be the sort who does whatever he wants. We couldn't handle someone who'd killed the Jackal.”

“How old are you, anyway?”

“Eleven.”

At the word eleven, all four adventurers ahead whipped around, their eyes wide. Ricard was rather well developed for his age. They had known he was young, but eleven had never occurred to them.

“... Is that even possible?”

“Is what possible?”

“No, it's just... What was I doing at eleven?”

“Getting put through fucking hell in the chicken coop.”

“I hadn't entered the coop yet. Oh, right. My father was beating the shit out of me. My brother beat me too, and then I'd go out and get beaten up around the neighborhood.”

“Anyway, that one's seriously handsome. What's your name?”

“Ice.”

Perhaps because they were strangers, Ice answered coldly. The adventurers quickly caught on: ah, better not talk to this bastard. This one was the problem.

But they took no offense and smoothly changed the subject.

“So, Riki, if you're eleven now... Let's see. By the time you're an adult at fifteen, you might be one of the Nine Swords of the Empire.”

“Nah, that's pushing it.”

“He took the Jackal's head at eleven, didn't he?”

“... Fair point.”

“What are those?”

Ricard interrupted to ask.

“If you're going to be an adventurer, you ought to know the basics of the trade. The Nine Swords of the Empire are the nine best fighters in the Empire. Nobody officially chose them. That's just what people call them. The Emperor's four champions, Steiner, the leader of the Ehrenberg Five, X the Nameless, Randel the Iron Arm... Let's see, how many are left? One, two...”

“The other two live out west, so you don't need to know them anyway. You'll never go that far in your life.”

“Ah, shit, what were their names...”

“Are they Sword Masters?”

Ricard himself had little interest, but Fallen's curiosity was piqued.

“Nine Swords is just a name. Some of the nine don't even use swords. The Emperor's champions are definitely Sword Masters, though I hear two of them are so old they're on death's door. We don't know about the others. Never seen them. Adventurers can't exactly wander around where the Nine Swords operate. That's their territory.”

Territory. That made them sound like wild animals. Of course, there were plenty of ways in which human society was little different from the wild.

In the wild, animals simply killed enemies that might compete with them for food. Just as lions killed hyenas and other predators, adventurers who wandered into those people's territory might not get off with a few words.

Perhaps eliminating rivals lay at the heart of every justification for fighting. Power struggles, wars, even petty knife fights.

“Anyway, that's the gist of it. Hey, Riki, if you're born a man, shouldn't you try to be the best? Don't you have any ambition like that? Riki the Golden Broccoli, one of the Nine Swords of the Empire!”

Ricard chuckled. He thought such things were nothing but empty renown. To be honest, he had been called so many things in his previous life that it did little for him. Murderer of murderers, devil of devils, the Reaper of Steel, and on and on...

On reflection, though, those names had struck fear into everyone, barbarians and imperials alike. The Nine Swords of the Empire, by contrast, were admired. Perhaps that wouldn't be so bad...

“Well, making it the Ten Swords of the Empire would give us a nice round number.”

“Ooooh!”

“Guess the kid who killed the Jackal really does think differently.”

“Holy fuck. So we're traveling with one of the future Ten Swords of the Empire? Someone that strong could at least be a Guild Master, right? Save a position for me.”

“No, I brought up the Nine Swords, so I'm first.”

“First one to call dibs gets it.”

“This bastard always has to be such an irritating little shit.”

“Fuck off.”

“What did you say?”

“Hey, hey, hey! Cut it out, you two! Here we go again. There are kids here.”

For some reason, two of them suddenly looked ready to fight, and the other two hurried to stop them. It was hard to know what to make of it, but these men weren't very old themselves and still had a childish streak.

They were all in their early twenties, adventurers who had only recently completed their three years of service after graduation. At least they weren't bad people. Still, was there really anything to learn from them?

Fortunately, there was. To begin with, the guild hadn't requested academy students as reinforcements for any particularly serious reason. There was simply a large area to search. They only needed more people, so the work itself wasn't dangerous.

But there was no telling what deserters might do if they snapped, so it wasn't entirely safe, either.

In any case, what Ricard learned from the active adventurers as their student included making inquiries, conducting searches, and setting up communication networks. Apart from his time in the army, he had always traveled alone in his previous life, so he knew little about that sort of organization and administration.

Making inquiries was not particularly difficult. Unlike city folk, most rural people were born in their home villages and never left them. They found strangers unusual and remembered them clearly. Ask whether they had seen anyone suspicious lately, and their answers were almost always accurate.

After three days of tracking, they finally caught up with a deserter. There was just one problem.

“You fucking bastards! I said stay awaaay!”

At the entrance to a collapsing shack, a man dressed in rags was holding a little girl. He had a crude knife pressed to her slender throat, using her as a hostage. That was the problem.

The villagers had come swarming over and surrounded the scene to watch. The girl's mother sat collapsed on the ground, sobbing.

“Oh, please! Please! Take me instead!”

The girl herself, however, simply stared blankly, as though she did not understand her predicament.

“Ah, fuck...”

The adventurer leading Ricard muttered a curse. Normally playful and cheerful, he now looked genuinely infuriated. After muttering “fuck” to himself for a while, he suddenly shouted.

“Hey! Put the knife down! What do you think taking some kid will get you? You're dead anyway, you bastard!”

“That's right! Might as well take a kid with me! Come on! Just try it!”

“Ha! This fucking... Ha...”

The adventurer kept spitting curses as though his blood pressure might kill him. There was no solution. All they could do was choose between sacrificing the girl and letting the deserter go for now.

In truth, sacrificing her would not cause much trouble. This was an age when few people considered the death of a commoner girl from a farming village particularly important. Losing the deserter was more likely to cause problems.

But the adventurers knew it was an inhuman thing to do, and that was what made this so difficult.

“What do we do?”

“Fuck if I know...”

Ricard, Ice, and Fallen could only watch from a distance. If a fight broke out, at least they could help, but there really seemed to be nothing they could do.

“Couldn't we shoot him with an arrow or something...?”

Fallen muttered. But they had neither a bow suited for a distant shot nor an expert archer. More importantly, the girl could get hurt.

After watching silently, Ricard approached the senior adventurer.

“Could I try talking to him?”

“Sure... Do whatever you want.”

He did not tell Ricard this was no place for him to intervene. The sheer frustration of the situation seemed to have made him give up. All that remained was whether to make the hard decision.

With permission granted, Ricard lowered his hood and walked steadily toward the deserter.

“What the fuck! I told you to stay back! That sword over your shoulder! Put it down! Put it down!”

After coming a little closer, Ricard obediently unstrapped the sword from his shoulder and threw it well away. He tossed his dagger aside too, then opened his cloak to show he had nothing else.

“What, you're just a little brat? What's wrong with your hair? Are you making fun of me? Huh?!”

Only once he had discarded his weapons did the man seem to get a proper look at him. That was how tightly wound the deserter was. Anything could trigger an accident. One wrong move might kill the girl.

“I'm not making fun of 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' pay they owe me! Just let me go! I want to see my mother!”

The deserter shouted as though he were on the verge of tears. Ricard listened quietly until he had poured out all his anguish. Only when the man had exhausted himself and was gasping for breath did he speak.

“Where were you stationed?”

“What?”

“Where's the battlefield?”

“... Raeldorf. Why?”

“Were the winters cold?”

“Huh?”

“No matter how thick your fur boots were, didn't moisture build up inside until your feet swelled?”

“... H-how do you know that?”

“You have a good day once in a while, but most days are hard. A comrade you were trading jokes with last night dies this morning. Moldy bread, rotten fruit. You try to drink yourself to sleep, but you can't shake the nightmares. Isn't that right?”

“...”

The deserter's eyes widened. Then he blinked.

Everyone here saw him as nothing more than a madman. But not Ricard. Ricard understood the pain and grief the man must have felt.

Losing limbs or suffering wounds was almost preferable. What was truly unbearable on the battlefield was the destruction of the mind. Ricard knew that pain better than anyone. He had experienced it himself.

And so he felt a kinship with the deserter in their shared suffering.

“The worst fucking part is the idiotic orders from above, from people who have no idea what's happening on the ground. You go out knowing it's wrong, and people die. Drink, gambling, women... There's only so much comfort you can find in those things. It's not because you're weak. It's because you're a good person. You just weren't suited to the battlefield.”

The deserter grew dazed, as though listening to a hypnotist. He blinked, shook his head, then went blank again. As though dreaming with his eyes open.

“So you don't need to do this. Let the girl go. Her mother's crying over there. She must be hurting terribly. The girl hasn't done anything wrong. Has she?”

The deserter stared straight ahead, but his eyes were unfocused. He seemed to be looking not at Ricard, but beyond him.

He was not looking at the crowd either. His gaze reached past the distant horizon, across time, into the past. Yet in the end, it could not get beyond those horrors. Surely he, too, had once known innocent days.

At last, his strength seemed to leave him, and the arm restraining the girl dropped limply. He stood blankly for a moment, then suddenly snapped upright and shouted.

“Raise spears! Hah! Spears forward! Hah! Seventh Infantry! Advaaance! In steeep! March! One! Two! One! Two! Thrust! Hah! Thrust! Hah!”

He was not a human being. He was a broken machine.

And that broken machine drove the crude knife into his own throat with all his strength, without a moment's hesitation. As though carrying out an order.

“For God and the Empire! Glory to the Crown Mercenary Company!”

THUNK!

He toppled stiffly, striking his head hard against the ground. Eyes wide, mouth agape, blood soaking the earth. He shuddered, then went limp.

A chilling silence settled over the scene. The wind blowing through the emptiness felt especially cold. Ricard approached the man, closed his eyes, and shut his jaw.

As he returned with the girl by the hand, every onlooker, child and adult alike, stared at him as though they had seen a ghost. Magic—wasn't that magic? Mind magic?

He brought the girl back to her mother. She, too, had stopped crying and was staring blankly at him with wide eyes. What she had witnessed was so shocking that she had forgotten even how close her daughter had just come to death.

Ricard walked away from the crowd.

“Riki.”

Ice called to him. But Ricard kept walking as though he hadn't heard, swaying, his eyes unfocused. He looked like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

Perhaps it was the eerie atmosphere, but even the senior adventurers did not dare call to him or stop him. Fallen merely scrambled to collect Ricard's sword and dagger from the ground.

Ricard was utterly numb, hearing nothing but the ringing in his ears. This was far harder on him than the ambush and fighting in the forest. Incomparably harder.

Right now, he only wanted to be alone, so he walked without a destination. Far, far away.

And so their eventful commission to hunt down the deserters came to an end.