The Faraway Paladin Vol 4 Chapter 2

The Faraway Paladin Volume 4 Chapter 2

As they looked at the spear, Menel frowned, Bee’s eyes sparkled, and Al looked satisfied. It was early afternoon one day in winter. Logs crackled in the fireplace in the great hall of my Torch Port mansion, where the spear rested on a large table. Their three reactions to it couldn’t have been more different.


Menel rubbed his temple as though he had a headache. “Are you sure that was a good idea? That sword was a treasure they’d passed down for generations...”

The spear’s blade was awfully long, and gleamed a brilliant gold. Yes, brilliant gold—this was the dwarven heirloom said to have been forged by Blaze, god of fire, that had slain the foul-dragon Valacirca: the enchanted sword Calldawn.

“And you just went and turned it into a spear?!”

I laughed nervously.

“I know you were in a fix ’cause Pale Moon broke, and I know a makeshift spear won’t do the job, but who would do this?!”

“Well, it’s for actual usage.”

“Al, what about you, are you okay with this?!”

“It is for practical usage...”

“Like mentor, like squire...”

Of course, I hadn’t gone so far as to cut the blade of the sword short, so to be precise, it was closer to a glaive than a spear. I’d gotten Al to ask the favor of the dwarven craftsmen on my behalf, and now the blade was attached to a completely different style of weapon. The near-awakening of the foul-dragon Valacirca had sent the beasts into a frenzy, and demons were running rampant as well, so acquiring a usable main weapon had been an urgent necessity.

“It is well made, I’ll give you that...”

As Menel said, the glaive was made well. Just as you’d expect from dwarves, it had a pragmatic design with all excess stripped away, a sleek straight line without a single imperfection from the sharp point of the blade to the end of the shaft. I had no idea what kind of metal the golden blade had been forged with, but it had a captivating sheen. I wondered if the tools of this age were even up to the task of cutting down this blade in the first place, though I had no intention of trying it out.

Several dark-brown rings made of a strong-binding metal alloy had been fitted between the golden blade and the shaft to reinforce the connection. Signs such as Connexio and Ligare had been engraved into them. The shaft extending from the rings was white with a hint of pale yellow. It was made of white oak. The Words adorning it were the same ones I had been using previously with Pale Moon. They controlled the expansion and contraction of matter. The blade was heavier and longer than I was used to, so it did feel different, but I had a good feeling I’d be able to handle it in much the same way as Pale Moon.

Bee the troubadour was ecstatic. “I love this, I love it! I mean, getting to see the legendary Calldawn for myself was great too, but a paladin holding a glaive with a white handle and golden blade?!” Her hands were clenched with excitement and her eyes glittered. “What an image! You make my work too easy!” She darted around the table, gazing at the weapon from all different angles and singing impromptu poems to herself.

“A shaft pure white like lilies, a blade that shone like the morning sun~♪”

The way her unique red hair bobbed about as she moved was humorous in a way I found hard to explain. “Oh! Why don’t you try ordering armor and stuff made of silvery metal to go with it?!” she said, growing increasingly excited. “A young paladin in an outfit of pure white and gold? The girls’ll go ga-ga over you, I guarantee it!”

“Bee, Bee...” I laughed softly. “Armor isn’t for showing off with. And silvery metal armor would be way too much of a hassle to manage and maintain. It would stand out, though, which isn’t a bad thing.”

“Really? I thought you didn’t like standing out.”

“I do when it’s needed. Like when we’re outnumbered.”

“So the enemies focus their attacks on you?”

“Right, exactly.”

I remembered reading at some point in my previous life that a certain famous comic-book superhero deliberately didn’t avoid bullets when he was shot at. To avoid casualties caused by stray bullets, he let them hit the thing that was most resilient: his own body of steel. While I wouldn’t go so far as to call myself a superhuman like that, it was part of the job of a frontline warrior to draw the ire of the enemy.

“So you make a big thing of showing you are there, and that stirs up the team and discourages the enemy?”

“That depends on who you’re facing, but yes, it can have that effect.”

Battle gear often comes in colors and shapes that stand out: shields with unsettling eye designs that stare at your opponent, muscle armor that makes you look like a bodybuilder, helmets with enormous ornamentation, and grandiose warpaint. Blood had talked about this kind of thing back when I was a child. He said that most fighting happens between animals and that ideas like “intimidation” and “appearing strong” are pretty important for the same reason animals make their fur stand on end and take the high ground to make themselves look big and strong.

“And if you look cool, that gives you confidence and drive.”

True, it can sometimes lead to pride, arrogance, and overconfidence. But on the field of battle where the slightest flinch or hesitation can make the difference between life and death, even bravado and misunderstanding are functional weapons. Pretense is no joke.

“In that sense, this redesign of Calldawn into a glaive feels just right. It’s really cool.”

“If it’s to your liking, Sir Will, I’m sure everyone who worked on it will be happy as well.”

Just knowing I was allowed to use it as my personal weapon and I could swing it around as much as I wanted made me almost giddy with excitement. “I’ll visit the dwarves soon to thank them directly.”

They’d done me an incredible favor by lending an ear to my unreasonable request to redesign their legendary enchanted sword into something practical for actual battle. For this, I could only feel incredibly grateful to Agnarr and everyone in the part of Torch Port known as Dwarftown.

“Oh, and...”

I had another motive for having the sword redesigned.

“Al, as I mentioned before, I’d like to ask you to take care of its former housing.”

“Certainly.”

Calldawn had been entrusted to me by the ghost of the last monarch of the Iron Country, Lord Aurvangr. Just like the crown we had taken back from the beetle-demon Scarabaeus, it was originally royal regalia, a symbol of royal authority among the dwarves of the Iron Country. Though it was a very powerful weapon and I certainly needed it, keeping it all to myself for a long period of time would have been slightly problematic. I had promised to have it returned upon my death, but it wasn’t as if I’d be around to see that followed through, and if I died in some untrodden part of the land, it was possible that the sword would disappear off the face of the earth. So I decided that at the very least, I should split off the blade’s housing, including the hilt and sword guard—these too were a part of the sword, sacred objects made by the fire god—and leave it with Al.

And though I phrased it as “I’m changing it to a glaive suited for battle, so I’d like you to keep hold of the hilt and guard that I don’t need,” Al knew me well enough to understand exactly what I was trying to do.

“I appreciate the consideration.”

After making it through that large battle with the foul-dragon, Al’s stature was now that of a proper warrior, standing tall with a smile on his face. He still had a lot of improving to do in terms of his skills in battle, but those would grow with time. Even now, he was busy gathering his dwarven brothers and making preparations for resurrecting their homeland. In time, Al—Vindalfr—would surely forge a path to the Iron Mountains and revive that underground kingdom. I could believe that now without any doubt.

It was then that a reserved knock came at the door to the hall.

“Come in.”

“Pardon me.”

The door opened, and Anna entered.

Anna had loosely braided flaxen hair and a serious countenance that was a good match for her priest’s robes. She was like the glue of Torch Port, acting as a kind of coordinator of the priests involved in the running of the town whom we were borrowing from Bishop Bagley in Whitesails. She was a priest of the god of lightning, Volt, just like Bishop Bagley, and quite a gifted user of benediction. But her greatest skill was that she was a very competent official, performing her work quickly and efficiently. In addition to having a broad knowledge of religious services and ceremonies, she was also familiar with the uncodified rules of common law. Disputes within the farming villages over land, water, and inheritance. Business-related conflicts in Torch Port: late payments, price hikes, production delays, quantity discrepancies, quality issues. Mugging, stealing, fraud, extortion, destruction of property, and other criminal acts. In the name of Volt, Anna handed down appropriate judgments in accordance with written and common law for all these issues. Having someone like her to provide fair trials was as important to the villages as being granted physical protection. And it was in large part thanks to her that I was even able to call myself liege lord of the villages around Beast Woods.

Today, however, she had a dispirited look about her.

“Anna? Is something wrong?”

Her expression was melancholic, and her eyes were downcast. I got the feeling that she wasn’t looking as healthy in the face as usual, either.

“Um, I have something to discuss with you all.”

“Sure. We’re all okay with that, right?”

It was rare to see someone as unflappable as Anna wearing an expression like this. It had to be quite a serious problem. I decided to prepare myself internally. No matter what kind of tremendous problem was put in front of me, I would handle it with composure, not allowing myself to seem the least bit perturbed.

I steeled myself—

“Reystov’s been acting... kind of cold recently...”

“What?!”

And reacted to the unexpected subject with spectacular surprise.

◆

Anna and Reystov got on well. That much even I knew.

Anna, an industrious priest and competent official, and Reystov, a skilled adventurer with the title of Penetrator, both held important yet different positions within Torch Port. As the coordinator of the priests, Anna received all the legal disputes and problems reported by the villages and had knowledge of all the latest incidents and information that concerned them. As one of Torch Port’s most skilled adventurers, Reystov would use that information to determine where to head out beast-hunting and would also come back with more information on village incidents and problems.

Periodically, Anna would ride circuit around the villages to hold hearings on outstanding issues and offer free medical treatment to those who needed it. On those occasions, Reystov often served as her escort. And protecting her while she was traveling wasn’t the only benefit to having someone like Reystov around. Having the presiding priest accompanied by someone in charge of armed force to keep things under control meant that even in the villages there was less chance of someone arguing aggressively for a better verdict. So the two of them came into contact more than you might expect.

Reystov was a person of a slightly different stripe compared to the other roughnecked and irresponsible adventurers. Anna seemed to find him easy to talk to. And to Reystov, a man of few words, Anna, a serious person who wasn’t overly averse to silence, appeared to be a person he could feel at ease around. I remembered Bee once saying, “Something’s going on with those two! I smell love in the air!” while I naively thought of them as just a couple of good friends. As for the truth...

“No, um, we’re not in a relationship.”

Seated around a table, we all listened to Anna explain her worries.

“It seems as though Reystov has had something on his mind recently. When I try to talk to him, he often just stays silent, as if he’s deep in thought. Even more than usual. I tried doing all kinds of things for him, thinking, ‘I may not know what he’s worrying about, but if I can support him even a little, that’s something,’ and I don’t really know what I did wrong, but, um, he scowled at me... Oh, don’t get the wrong idea, this has nothing to do with relationships at all.”

Anna took a sip of tea. “And since then, it’s like he won’t look me in the face. Even when we talk about work, he speaks in a cold, quiet tone. And I even get the feeling he’s been sort of avoiding me recently... Do you think I’ve been insensitive to Reystov somehow? He won’t tell me anything, but I’m just anxious that I might have done something to make him hate me... Oh, this isn’t about a relationship.”

Yeah...

“It clearly is about a relationship!” Bee shouted bluntly, and I couldn’t have agreed with her more.

“N-No, I...” Anna covered her cheeks with her hands and turned bright red.

“Oh come on, what’s the big deal? Tell me what you see in him.”

“Reystov, that sly old dog...”

Bee and Menel, both quite into this, started to press Anna, and in between protests of “No, it’s not like that,” she gradually started to reveal her feelings.

At first, she had found him intimidating. Then she noticed that actually, he was always being considerate in one way or another. After he went out fishing and didn’t catch anything, he had picked some flowers and presented them to her in the empty wicker basket when he came back, saying they were an offering to the gods. Then there was the way he remembered her favorite things. The softness of the rare smile she glimpsed on his face. How glad she’d felt when he returned safely from slaying the dragon. There was no definite moment; it was a process where she grew closer to him little by little.

All of this was very heartwarming. Yet, as Al and I quietly exchanged glances, the words “What should we do?” were written clearly on his expression, and probably mine as well. Honestly speaking, I was probably the most useless person to ask about anything to do with love. The way the first thing that came to my mind was this kind of solution-seeking thought instead of a sympathetic one really said it all. My life on this earth as Will had so far featured only one remotely amorous moment: the time the god of undeath confessed to me. Talk about an atypical experience. So coming up with keen insight on matters of love was a little difficult for me.

That being said...

“Umm... I mean... I, I’m not really in love with him or anything like that, but Reystov is very dependable and... a gentleman...”

It wasn’t as if I couldn’t understand where Anna was coming from.

True, Reystov’s appearance was a little wild and rustic, but he definitely didn’t give the impression of someone sleazy. Even the way he behaved carried a strange sense of class. And obviously, when it came to his skills, he was the best of the best. He didn’t speak much and was a little blunt when he did, but he was a man who said what needed to be said, and he had a big heart.

“He has a serious look on his face a lot of the time, but he’s a nice person really.”

“Yes. He is nice. And yes, dependable.”

I agreed completely. Even I thought of him as a real man and a very likeable person. The phrase “heroic figure” was probably created for people like him.

Anna, who had been talking to Bee and Menel, now turned to me. “Um, my lord—no—Will?”

“Yes?”

She changed the way she addressed me. It probably meant that this was a personal matter, and so she wanted to talk not to the Faraway Paladin, governor of Torch Port, but to William, common friend to her and Reystov.

“I might just be overthinking it or imagining things. Or maybe it’s just that I’ve accidentally said something to upset him. But if it seems to you that Reystov has some sort of serious concern on his mind, please, I ask you to help him.”

While looking me straight in the eyes, she spoke not out of a desire to make up with him, nor to discover the reason he was avoiding her, but out of pure, sincere consideration for him. So I returned her earnest look and nodded. “Yes, alright. I will.”

Love was a difficult subject for me, and I doubted that sticking my neck into someone’s romantic affairs of all things would achieve anything much. But this was a plea from a friend. How could I shy away from helping with an answer like “It’s too hard,” “I’m clueless,” “I can’t do it,” or anything like that?

“I’ll do the best I can for both of you.”

“Will... Thank you.”

“Just don’t forget to invite me to the wedding!”

“I-It’s not like that!”

◆

Once I started paying special attention to Reystov’s behavior, one thing became clear to me: something did feel off about the way he was acting.

“Currere Oleum!”

At the same time that Reystov’s sharp slash cut through a mob of low-rank demons, my magic covered an area of the hall’s stone floor in thick grease, hindering the new demons entering the fray. As some slipped and fell on the greased part of the floor and others stopped in their tracks, Reystov unleashed another slash. Extending beyond the blade’s actual length due to Signs previously engraved by Gus, it easily cut the immobilized demons apart.

We were in the crumbling monastery in the ravine where we had once fought the chimera. We’d received news from the villages nearby that demons had started hanging out here again, so Reystov and I, both happening to have our hands free, had come to hunt them. The situation inside was once again blasphemous. The twisted, wavering silhouettes of Soldier demons were bathed in light streaming in through tall windows which must have once imparted a sense of sacredness.

But one after another, those demons’ vital points were penetrated. Reystov’s dirty cloak whipped and whirled. With deft footwork, he moved his well-built body clad in leather armor with astonishing swiftness, maintaining control of the position most advantageous to himself. The magnificence of Gus’s magical modifications certainly helped, but even without those, Reystov’s skill with a sword was as sharp as ever—no, he was sharper than ever before. He must have familiarized himself well with his beloved sword’s new magical properties and trained up even more. The way he slashed out the instant he perceived an enemy reminded me less of a swordsman and more of a skilled gunslinger in a Western, shooting from the hip.

Several demons let out a gurgling cry as they cast a blessing. Pitch-black, rough-edged claw marks tore through the air. I identified it immediately as a hex and one of the elementary protections granted by Dyrhygma, god of dimensions: the reverse-healing spell Open Wounds. If it made direct contact, it would rip open skin and tear away flesh.

In that short amount of time, I prayed for a miracle. What appeared was a wall of light. Sacred Shield intercepted the black claw marks and dispelled them. Immediately, as if he were attempting to slice the evil god’s dispersing blessing in two as well, Reystov unleashed another slash, dispatching another group of Soldier demons. There was never a stop to his movement. His legs flowed. The tip of his sword fluttered and danced, lacerating the throats of a number of winged demons that had attempted to fly at him from behind a pillar. His magic blade passed through the swarming demons with the ease of an experienced seamstress passing a needle through cloth.

I was making myself useful too, of course, and not only by supporting him with magic and blessings. Sometimes swinging my glaive, other times casting support magic, I made sure that things were only getting worse for the demons.

More of them poured out of another passage, screeching in demonjabber. They were probably the first group to organize themselves after the confusion of our surprise attack. Once out of the passage, they raised their swords and shields, formed a line, and advanced towards us with some caution. This formation felt very familiar.

“Shield wall!” Reystov shouted as he jumped aside. “Over to you!”

“Right!”

With the newly modified Calldawn in hand, I stormed the enemy line, charging forward holding the glaive aloft and yelling out a war cry. The demons screamed back in unison and held their shields firm. I swept Calldawn from left to right and slammed it into the wall of shields as hard as I could. I felt my weapon make powerful contact. The floor creaked underneath my feet. As I completed the swing, the glaive’s shaft groaning and bending under the strain, I heard a cacophony of metal, wood, flesh, and bone all breaking at once. I also heard a lot of different objects slamming against the right wall, but I disregarded that and stepped forward. Again I swung the glaive from left to right. The same discordant mixture of sounds rang out again. I heard all kinds of slamming noises coming from the wall to my left.

“Good!”

Once their formation (of a sort) had turned into a complete mess, Reystov charged in and opened the wound further. Of course, I did the same. Standing back-to back, we protected each other as I swung around the glaive and chopped down demons.

Although it was a barbaric battle best summed up with the words “strategy, shmategy,” there’s no need to come up with half-baked plans when you have the strength advantage.

— Get ripped, and you can solve pretty much everything by force.

Blood had taught me that the stronger side was better off avoiding ill-advised gimmicks and simply throwing their weight behind a frontal attack. And that was exactly what we did. Reystov struck the enemy through with skill, and I expanded the wound with power. The demon mobs turned to dust as if we’d taken a metal file to pie crust.

Reystov’s sword skills were on point. There were no flaws in his footwork or swordplay. His judgment was proactive and decisive. His fighting was as impressive as ever. But still, my impression was that something felt off.

◆

I couldn’t put into words what exactly wasn’t right, but I also knew that in itself didn’t disprove what I was feeling. Because Reystov was a swordsman among swordsmen. He had strong arms and legs, neat and uniformly trimmed nails, and a well cared for sword, always in good condition and held in a sheath modified to be easy to draw. He had full awareness of every part of himself and, for the sake of his sword, he kept good control of all of it.

He would never allow there to be anything so blatantly off about him that I could point out exactly what it was. And yet there was still a slight sense of wrongness about the way he was fighting. That in itself was strange.

After exterminating the demon horde in the crumbling monastery, we went around mopping up a few remaining enemies and collecting dust and other things as proof of the hunt. As we were doing this, I asked him the question. “Reystov, um, has something happened?”

“Like what?” Reystov’s posture as he replied looked no different to usual, but I didn’t miss the slight wrinkle that formed on his forehead. After all, I had sworn to live this life the right way. Avoiding interactions with people, shutting out everything, and reaching a dead end—those were the mistakes of my previous life. I had no intention of repeating them.

“Something feels strange about the way you’re acting.”

“You noticed, huh...”

“Only vaguely. You’re not the kind of person to fail to report being out of form, so it can’t be that you’re not feeling well, right?”

He grunted and nodded slowly, then fell silent for a while as if choosing his words. “I’m aware I’m... rushing things a bit.”

I nodded, realizing that was it. Whereas I was generally very direct in how I did things, the clever thing about Reystov was that he had a bit of a tricksy side. Even when it came to a brute force assault like this one, he would usually throw his opponents a curveball or two when he knew a miss wouldn’t hurt. There had been none of that this time.

“Something’s preying on my mind.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

He remained silent for a moment, then shook his head. “No.” His tone may have been gentle, but it was an unequivocal refusal. “Sorry.”

“Not at all.”

For Reystov to say that had to mean that there really was nothing I could do at this point in time. It wasn’t as if I could solve every worry in the world. Reystov was an incredibly skilled warrior with a well-rounded character. If he wouldn’t talk about it, then that meant he didn’t need or want help. Sticking my nose in anyway would make me the definition of a busybody.

“If there’s anything I can do to help, please tell me anytime.” The only thing I could really say to him was that I was on his side. “I think of you as my brother-in-arms, and I deeply respect you.” I made eye contact with him as I spoke. “I’d like to support you. So please, if you ever need my help, give me a shout.”

“Sure.”

Reystov did nod, but his expression looked somehow clouded. I got the unsettling feeling that something bad was coming. A couple of weeks later, it turned out I was right.

◆

The sight I witnessed that day caused my body to freeze up and only the quietest of sounds to leave my throat.

“No! Don’t die! No... no! Reystov, Reystov!”

Anna’s screams pierced the air, which was already thick with the stench of blood and the sounds of feet and shrieking, desperate voices. I rushed into the hall. At the center of the commotion was Reystov, laid out flat on the floor on a mat of straw. He was gritting his teeth and wheezing, his face pale.

But what shocked me more than all of that was his right hand, which had swelled up and turned purple.

If it hadn’t been on the end of his arm, I might not even have recognized it as a human hand. It was blown up like a rubber ball. Were those strange protrusions sticking out of it fingers? Really? Was that really the strong, calloused, and scarred hand of Reystov, the man who had only gone beast hunting with Menel just a few days ago—

“Will!”

A familiar voice broke me out of my state of shock.

“Menel! What is... How did—”

“It’s a demon bite!” Menel called out as he came rushing up to me, pushing aside the crowd that had gathered to see what was going on. “One of those left over from the Rust Mountains, best guess is a General!”

“A General?!”

According to Menel’s hurried and simplified explanation, the two of them had headed to a group of Union Age ruins to hunt beasts when they happened along a group of demons led by a General that looked like a mix between a person and a winged insect. The group of demons was so large that even Menel hesitated about whether they should engage them or retreat. Reystov argued that they should engage and gave several good reasons. For instance, the two of them still hadn’t been noticed. If they chose their timing well and attacked enemies in the right order, there was a good chance that they could kill the leader and pull out after that.

Menel thought for a moment and agreed with him. Reystov moved in, supported by Menel’s archery and elementalist skills. And though they did encounter some resistance, they succeeded in striking through the demon leader’s throat. However...

“That feckin’ bug, even though he’d had his arms and legs chopped off and his throat cut out, he somehow came down the blade to the hilt and bit Reystov’s hand.”

Demons ranked General were horrendously tough. Reystov had been well aware of that. He immediately kicked the demon’s body off him and hunted down the remaining enemies.

“But after we’d gotten to safety, Reystov complained that his right hand felt like it was burning. That was when it started changing color and swelling up.”

Menel immediately administered several herbs he always carried with him and also incanted an elementalist healing spell that worked using the spirits of life dwelling in the human body. However, neither cure had much effect. From this, he determined that it was probably either a powerful poison or a curse. To slow the spread if it was a poison, he restricted the flow of blood by wrapping a cloth tightly around the arm. Then he took the shortest route to Torch Port through a fairy trail, carried Reystov to my mansion, and laid him down in the hall. Unfortunately, he found me absent because I was out at the port, so he ran around calling people and quickly got hold of Anna, whom he asked to heal Reystov. However...

“It won’t heal!” she cried out. “His other wounds are gone, but his right hand just—I’ve tried everything! Cure Poison, Cure Disease, Remove Curse...” Paying no mind to her disheveled hair and the fact that her clothes were stained with Reystov’s blood, Anna reported the situation to me in tears.

I was shocked by what I heard. Anna didn’t have any battle experience, but she was a priest bestowed with high-level blessings by the god of lightning, Volt. She could clear up even quite strong, troublesome poisons and curses with just a few minutes of prayer. And yet...

“The blessings have no effect at all?”

“There is some amount of improvement, but then it turns right back to this again! I’ve just been doing that over and over and—”

“It’s agony for him every time. But we can’t just leave it, or the hand’s gonna die. Then if the purple spreads, it’ll go from his arm to his shoulder, then next’ll be his head and heart. This is serious, brother.”

“M-My prayers aren’t enough. That has to be it. Will—”

“I understand.”

I crouched down beside Reystov and reached over to his disfigured right hand.

“Ggnnhhh...!”

The slightest touch caused him to groan in agony as if a branding iron had been held against his skin. Feeling impressed at the level of fortitude Reystov was showing in gritting his teeth and bearing the pain instead of writhing or turning violent, I closed my eyes and recited a verse of prayer. “Gracefeel, god of the flame. Shine the light of healthy souls on evil wounds, evil curses, and evil diseases alike, and rid us of their shadows.”

This blessing was a very high-level one. It would take more than an instant to invoke.

I focused strongly on my connection with my guardian deity, the god of the flame. I imagined God’s helping hand, offered from her holy seat outside this material world, connecting to Reystov through me, and prayed with single mind for him to be saved. As I prayed, I had the constant, exhausting feeling that something was being drained out of me. It felt as though I was acting as a conductor, and something hot and blindingly bright was flowing through me into Reystov. In a state of extreme concentration, I got the feeling that I heard everyone around me draw a collective breath.

This was the prayer of Full Recovery. There were multiple blessings for fighting against all imaginable kinds of diseases, poisons, and hexes, but this miracle stood at the very top. No matter what kind of poison, disease, or hex it was, no matter what kind of ill will inflicted it, this miracle would brush it aside, even resolving peculiar kinds of symptoms like petrification and bodily deformation. Among the many miracles my god had granted me, this blessing was the most powerful and effective, at least in regard to poisons and curses.

Once the miracle had taken full effect, the discoloration and swelling in Reystov’s right hand began to fade, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief...

“Wh—?! No...”

But the effect was short-lived. Not half a minute later, the color and swelling started to return. Reystov groaned in intense pain, his body convulsing so violently that if I didn’t know better, I might have thought it was a joke.

“Reystov! Reystov! Stay with me! You’re going to be all right!” Her voice full of anguish, Anna desperately tried to support him.

“Fecking hell... What has it done to him?!” Menel had probably been expecting that things would work out once I prayed. He had been relatively calm until this point. This was the first moment that cracks in his composure were starting to show, and I wasn’t exactly calm, either. What on earth was this?! I racked my brain for ideas.

“I can think of... one thing it might be...”

The first thing that came to mind was a powerful hex that my prayers had no effect on. The demons used wicked prayers to the god of dimensions and powerful magic linked to hexes. I had been granted a great deal of protection by the god of the flame, but even so, it was conceivable that a General with greater specialization in prayers and magic could surpass it.

“But I don’t think that’s it.”

Something about that didn’t feel right to me. Normally, if you used a blessing to cure poisoning or remove a curse, it either worked or it didn’t. I’d never known a blessing to half-work, only for the symptoms to immediately return, nor had I ever heard of such a thing from Gus, Mary, or even Bishop Bagley.

The strange way my blessings were responding to these symptoms had to be some kind of hint. What was needed was probably a blessing or piece of magic dealing with something that was neither a poison nor a disease nor a curse.

Gus had told me a long time ago that there was a twin to most magics and miracles. Just as there was the Word Lumen, so was there the Word Tenebrae. Just as the followers of the good gods used the miracle of Close Wounds, the followers of the evil gods used its inverse, the miracle of Open Wounds. Even an ultimate magic of destruction like the Word of Entity Obliteration could be overturned by the ultimate miracle of rebirth, the prayer of Resurrection, were it to be used at its fullest potential. It is in the dark that there is light, and in silence the word, and in death life, and vice versa for each. Assuming the problem wasn’t simply a lack of power, even these mysterious symptoms of Reystov’s had to have some kind of technique that would be effective against them. But I didn’t know what.

Panic started to set in. If I didn’t do something soon, Reystov would—

“Off...”

With his blood-drained lips trembling, his eyes still unfocused, and his voice hoarse, Reystov tried to say something. Anna brought an ear to his mouth, tried to make out his words...

“My arm... Cut it off!”

...and looked at him aghast.

◆

It was a gruesome suggestion.

“Reystov, you can’t!” I was instantly opposed. “Yes, with a high-level blessing, I can regenerate large body parts like lost limbs! But after something like that, it’ll never be completely like it was! If you damage the sensation in your right hand...”

He would probably be able to manage day to day. But his hand would feel different, as though it belonged to someone else. He wouldn’t be able to make fine movements. And that—that would be the death of Reystov as a swordsman, Reystov who had given so much for his sword.

“If it’s... that or... dying...”

“But—”

“My fight did this...” He groaned in pain again. “I’ll live with it, cut it off!”

“No! Think straight, there has to be some other way... Menel, call the other priests! They might know something!”

“On it!” Menel dashed off. In that short amount of time, the discoloration and swelling had spread halfway up Reystov’s forearm. Something, there had to be something. Growing restless, I scoured my memory, trying to remember all the methods I knew.

He probably figured there was no point in repeating himself. With bloodshot eyes and clenched teeth, Reystov took a look at the people around him and said, “Anna, cut it off for me... please.”

“Wh—” For a moment, my mind went blank in shock.

How could he... How could he ask something so cruel of her...?

That was my natural first thought. However, the moment it crossed my mind...

“Alright. I’ll prepare a dagger and something for you to bite down on. Please don’t bite your tongue.” Her face was pale and she was trembling, but Anna looked Reystov straight in the eyes as she spoke.

Looking at her, I realized something. Although Reystov’s suggestion was very cruel, at the same time, it was proof that he had the greatest possible trust in her, enough to trust her with destroying his use of a sword, his own right hand. Anna understood that—and she was on the verge of carrying it out.

She drew a dagger and prayed for a few moments to Volt, the god with the sword of lightning. A lot of faith was placed in Volt as the leader of the gods, and so he possessed innumerable blessings, including blessings of the sword to increase the sharpness of a worshipper’s blade and blessings of non-lethality to prevent the enemy from succumbing to the wounds inflicted upon them. Even on a practical level, Anna was a better choice for this than an ordinary swordsman.

“Over to you.” Immediately before Anna put a rolled-up cloth in his mouth for him to bite, Reystov, his face pallid, left Anna with words that entrusted everything to her. He never said “I’m sorry.”

Anna nodded back. “You’re in good hands,” she replied, smiling through the tears spilling down her cheeks. “I’ll do it cleanly, I promise.” As Reystov lay on his back, she knelt down, pressed her left knee into his right shoulder, and turned to the others around her. “Hold Reystov down, everyone.”

She gripped the dagger in one hand, while her other rested on the handle. From that position, she was probably going to press it down with all her weight, cutting his arm off at the elbow joint. Reystov’s eyes were wide open and fixed on the dagger. In a few seconds, in just a few more seconds, Anna would cut off Reystov’s right arm. Severing the arm of the person you have feelings for—that would probably become proof of the bond between them.

But I didn’t want things to end that way!

As I clenched my own jaw and tears brimmed in my eyes, I desperately searched for an answer. What was it? What on earth were these symptoms? They weren’t poison or disease or a hex. Blessings had no effect at all. He had been bitten by a demon, a General that looked like a mix between a person and a winged insect.

An insect?

Like a bolt of lightning, inspiration struck. My body moved quicker than I ever thought possible. I grabbed Anna’s arm, which was being brought down at that very instant, snatched the dagger from her, slashed open Reystov’s swollen right hand...

“Eliminare vermes, eliminare insecta!”

...and I shouted the Word of Worm-warding.

◆

Anna cried. She clung to Reystov and bawled her eyes out. Reystov held her gently in his arms and patted her softly on the back with his right hand again and again. As I looked at them, there was a palpable sense of relief not just from me but from everyone there.

“Respect, seriously. I’d never have figured that one out.” Menel, who had come back with a few priests, slapped me on the shoulder. I’d had him running around for nothing in the end.

“I was really lucky. It was a close call.”

The true culprit behind the mysterious symptoms was a parasite. The General-ranked demon in question was like a cross between an insect and a human, and its mouth had harbored fiercely poisonous parasitic eggs, which it delivered into Reystov’s body at the moment it bit him. Once the bugs hatched from their eggs, they started eating him from the inside and spreading their poison everywhere. The physical wound and the poison could be reduced with blessings. However, benedictions to the gods for merciful healing would never take the lives of bugs who were just living there. That was why, even though the symptoms could be momentarily relieved, they could not be completely cured.

Immediately after I hit him with the Word of Worm-warding, all kinds of grotesque parasites poured out of the incision on Reystov’s hand. I had the feeling I’d be seeing them again in my nightmares. But, regardless, I used Words to bind them all down, not letting a single one escape, and burned them to death. Then I recast the healing and anti-poison blessings. This time, the swelling and discoloration in Reystov’s right hand didn’t come back. But if I’d been the slightest bit slower, if I’d taken just slightly longer to realize, Anna would have ended up completely severing Reystov’s right hand. The bugs had only spread as far as his wrist, so that would still probably have saved his life. However, his right hand would never have gone back to normal.

Healing using benediction was extremely powerful. It could easily perform the kinds of miracles that even the medical field of my past world couldn’t accomplish. And today’s events had taught me a serious lesson about becoming over-reliant on it.

An invasion of parasites—what an unexpected way to get around benediction. How many others could I think of? Healing-type blessings wouldn’t take effect if the patient refused them, so one way would be to give someone poison by lying and saying that it’s medicine, then making them believe that the symptoms of the poison are just the medicine’s side effects. Or, if you triggered a trap and got stuck in a situation where one of your limbs was crushed by a massive, heavy object and you couldn’t pull it out, healing the limb with a blessing would be meaningless. Hitting an opponent with a mix of quick-acting diseases and curses during a battle where there wouldn’t be time to calmly pray would probably also work. Once I started thinking with a malicious mindset, I realized there were many ways to work around blessings. Even the healing provided by genuine miracles of the gods wasn’t totally infallible in the hands of human beings.

“Wait, what?”

I suddenly wondered about something. Parasites couldn’t be killed, but illnesses could be cured—did that mean that my god didn’t view bacteria as living creatures and killed them freely? Bacteria aside, viruses and so on were treated as being on the border between living and non-living things even in my previous world, so maybe that wasn’t so unlikely. Come to think of it, though, this world didn’t have microscopes. I didn’t actually know whether diseases here resulted from bacteria and viruses in the first place. It seemed to be a fact that there was a connection between lack of hygiene and disease, but that didn’t necessarily mean that the principle underlying disease was exactly the same as my previous world. Maybe diseases here were caused by an elemental imbalance within the body. This world did have pretty mystical things living in it, and miasma and stuff existed, too...

“Well, I guess it doesn’t really matter.”

I decided to end that thought there. Thinking too much was a bad habit of mine. The priority for now was supposed to be getting everyone settled down again, and also, I felt that we ought to be considerate enough to let Reystov and Anna have some time alone if possible. It seemed right.

◆

It was a quiet night. The light of the moon shone awfully bright in the icy air of winter. Holding a lantern containing magical light, I walked down a street devoid of people. Before long, I arrived at a certain area of the river port. As I looked around, I saw the light of one other lantern besides mine.

“You came,” he said.

“Yeah.”

A few days after the stir of almost cutting off Reystov’s right hand, he called me out to the port’s cargo handling area. The cargo handling area was a large space used to organize, sort, and temporarily store the cargo being loaded and unloaded from the boats at the port. It had an open-air storage yard and some open, roofed sheds. However, it wasn’t the busy season for the port right now, and also it was night time, so the cargo was sparse. Over at the sheds I could still make out the shapes of large water pots and wooden crates of some kind, but about the only pieces of cargo in the storage yard were two bundled stacks of lumber. The only other things I could see were at my feet: cobblestone paving of an older age and half-buried by earth, and dry grass swaying in the night-time breeze.

Amid that lonely scenery, sitting on one of the stacks of wood, was Reystov. I recognized the messy hair, the beard, his unwavering, piercing eyes. I recognized his well-kept sword, his thick cloak, frayed around the hem, dirty with grass stains and animal blood, and by his feet, the sturdy, soot-stained lantern that showed plenty of signs of wear. It was Reystov just as I knew him. But somehow, he was different. He had an unusually soft atmosphere about him.

“How has your right hand been?”

“Normal. You saved my skin. I thank you.”

“You’ve helped me just as much.”

As I walked up to him, Reystov gestured beside him. I set down my lantern and sat. For a while, we gazed in silence at the light from the two lanterns, one of fire, one of magic. I lost track of how long we sat like that.

“I think I... couldn’t make up my mind.” Breaking the silence, Reystov spoke in a quiet voice. “I’m from a settlement of one of the Ice Mountains called Volt’s Stove. William, do you know the Ice Mountains?”

I nodded. I had heard stories from my grandfather Gus and the troubadour Bee.

A large mountain belt ran east and west across the continent of Grassland to the north, dividing it in two. It was called the Stairway to Heaven. Peak after peak of steep mountains rising tall into the sky, each one a nightmare of sheer cliffs of rock, this mountain belt was a natural barrier that divided the temperate plains of the south from the tundras of the far north, where giants and ogres who followed the evil gods waged unending war. The Ice Mountains were one of the mountain ranges belonging to the Stairway to Heaven and was also the most well known around the Fertile Kingdom.

Despite their fame, the Ice Mountains weren’t especially steep. The slopes were actually quite gentle, there were basins in places, and the climate was reasonably mild. Although it was still an unforgiving place, there were many areas where people could live, and there also existed records of adventurers who had set foot on the peaks by traversing the ridges in the height of summer. The Ice Mountains could be climbed—they were the ones with routes that made it just about possible for living creatures to cross.

Therefore, the ogres and giants who lived in the northern regions sometimes attempted to invade the south by crossing the Ice Mountains. They were often spontaneous small-scale attacks, but sometimes they were organized offensives led by heroes blessed with strong protection from the evil gods. The southward marches of the forces of evil had sometimes even made an impact on the history of Grassland. But it wasn’t very often that the giants and goblins from the north managed to spill into the southern plains. Because those mountains were where they lived.

“The northern protectors. The warriors of the cutting wind who serve blood and steel. The ferocious Silverpeak Clan.”

“You can say ‘those backward northern savages,’ you know.”

I chose the most flattering terms I knew, and Reystov undid all my effort in an instant with a single smirk.

“N-No, I wouldn’t... But yes, I can believe that.”

“I looked that much of a savage, did I?” he quipped, still smirking.

“I’m talking about your sword skills!” I laughed back. Reystov was pretty talkative today.

The Ice Mountains were home to the Silverpeak Clan. The various books and rumors described them as a barbarous and hardy clan of warriors that acted as the continent’s northern shield, engaged in constant war against the giants and ogres of the north. Partly due to the cold weather, both the men and women of the clan were large-bodied for the most part. They had a lot of hair, the men had thick beards, and they all preferred to wear thick clothing and fur.

Because they often had occasion to fight large enemies like ogres and giants, the way they fought with a sword was extremely aggressive. When fighting such huge opponents, defense means very little. They looked down upon defense and cheap tricks like feints, and sought only deadly blows, as powerful and sharp as possible. This was a clan that since long ago, before even the Union Age, had been producing figures like Nanok Nylav the Great, king of soldiers, who had climbed from the gutter to the throne using nothing but a single sword.

“Reystov, your impressive sword skills are a trait of the north, right?”

“Yeah. I learned from my father when I was a brat.”

He definitely embodied the sword skills of the north I’d heard so much about.

“This sword is also a family heirloom forged by my elders.”

The Silverpeak Clan were also well known as swordsmiths. Their smithing style was called Northern-style. It was said that they fanned the flames of their fires using the icy winds blowing through the valley and quenched the steel of their blades after heating and hammering by sticking them into the snow. The swords they made were known for having the cold, crystal clarity of ice and a robust, practical construction that rivalled the work of dwarves.

However...

“If you know the praise my clan gets, you also know the criticism.”

“Yes...”

I wasn’t sure whether it was their location or their traditions that was to blame, but I had heard that within their society, a good warrior was considered to be someone who was violent, ambitious, decisive, and valued neither possessions nor even their own life. They would sometimes risk their lives in tests of courage, and there would be no remorse if someone died as a result. Their greatest pleasure was to defeat their enemies, take their lives, and claim their treasures. It was also said that because of these traditions, people of the Silverpeak Clan were short-tempered and tended to be controlling and arrogant towards others. Many among them were said to be hot-blooded people with wild tempers, whose emotions could swing violently between love and hate.

◆

“It’s a savage place,” Reystov muttered quietly. “Worse than you’re imagining, probably. They might show a little unity when they’re up against those damn ogres, but the Silverpeak Clan isn’t a single unified community. It’s several groups in a never-ending fight over each other’s hunting spots and tiny patches of arable land.”

He told me that his homeland was a world of plotting, war, pillaging, blood washing away blood in the name of retaliation—and then, when the opportunity seemed to present itself, reconciliation parties, sometimes marriages between groups to reduce the hostility, while more plots were made in secret. When the servants of the evil gods attacked from the north, a temporary truce would be struck, and they would be united. And once the war was over, those brothers-in-arms would turn on each other again.

“Volt’s Stove was one of the settlements in those mountains. In a basin, like the peak of a low mountain turned in on itself. The story goes that in the time of the gods, the lightning god Volt dug out a mountain and made a stove to feed the army he was leading against Illtreat, god of tyranny. On the fire, he placed a mystical pot given to him by his wife, Mater the Earth-Mother, from which an endless supply of food could spring forth. And after camping for the night, all his countless soldiers were full and satisfied.”

It was a fascinating story. I wondered if it was a Caldera basin made by the eruption of an old volcano or something. Of course, in this world, there was a chance that it actually was the aftermath of the god of lightning’s cooking. In any case, if Volt’s Stove carried a legend like that, didn’t that mean...

“You guess right. The Ice Mountains don’t have much farmable land, but Volt’s Stove is one of the good spots. I was born as the second son of the chief of that village. I had a wise grandmother and a father who was a magnificent warrior. My mother was a straight-talker with a hearty laugh. My brother was cheerful and a joker, and I got a younger sister later, too. I guess I had a happy childhood, as things go.”

A cold breeze stirred. Southmark’s winters were nippy, but I was certain that the wind in Reystov’s homeland had a much nastier bite.

“I was ten. A group of nearby tribes, led by one in particular, invited ours to a feast. But they were all in collusion. The main warriors of our tribe, my father among them, fell victim to a surprise attack. Then the attackers poured in. They couldn’t fight them all off. My tribe was destroyed. My grandmother, my mother, my brother, my little sister—all of them died. And what game the gods were playing that day I don’t know, but I was away with my uncle on my mother’s side. I escaped harm and survived.”

After a pause, during which neither of us spoke, he continued. “My uncle and cousins took me in and treated me well. Of course, I devoted myself to training, dreaming of the day I’d kill that other tribe for what they’d done. But they prospered now that they had Vault’s Stove. I came to the realization that just because someone’s evil enough to stab your parents in the back, it doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t know how to rule.”

By the time Reystov became an adult of fifteen, the tribe responsible had grown even larger and was fast taking over the surrounding tribes. And so, realizing that he would only cause trouble for his uncle’s tribe and village, where he was staying...

“I decided to give up my quest for revenge.” Reystov spoke in a flat tone, as if this had all happened too long ago. I couldn’t read any emotion from it. What kinds of feelings was he hiding behind that dry tone? “Instead, I decided to make a name for myself. The forebears of our tribe made their names with swords in hand, and gained honor and glory that will stand forever. If I could repeat that feat—take up my sword and find honor and glory, spread my name so far and wide that it would reach the ears of my family in the pleasant fields of heaven—then their souls would be proud and they could be at peace.”

In the light of the lanterns, he told me the story of the birth of an adventurer. He made an oath to the god of lightning, Volt, swearing to pay his respects to his family by offering them honor and glory. He descended the mountain with a merchant. He was taken aback by the plenty of the world below and how much activity there was. He got into a few quarrels and fights, and gained definite confidence in his own sword skills.

With a faint smile, he told me about the times when things hadn’t gone so well, episodes of failure and disgrace. And he talked about his allies: the times when he found others to join him, the times they went their separate ways, and the times they were sadly lost forever.

“All in all, the life of a wanderer and an adventurer probably just suited my personality.”

He made a name for himself killing many monsters and conquering several ruins. Before he knew it, he had earned the second name of “the Penetrator,” and troubadours began to sing about him.

“And then I met you, and my list of exploits grew longer,” Reystov said while allowing his gaze to drift up to the starry sky, “and finally, I became one of the illustrious Dragon-slayers.”

◆

“Of course, I’m not brazen enough to claim credit for things I didn’t do.” Our private conversation held on a winter’s night continued without much emotion. “If anyone asked who the key player in the slaying of the dragon was, William, that’d be you. That radiant flash as you struck at Valacirca’s throat—it was enchanting.”

As usual, I couldn’t pick up on how Reystov was feeling. I remained silent, not knowing how to respond.

He continued, “But it’s not as if I played no part at all, right?”

That question, I knew how to respond to. “Of course. That’s as clear as day.” Like Reystov, I had no intention of claiming credit that wasn’t mine to claim. “You cut heads off the hydra, stabbed demons to death, and opened the way to the throne at the heart of the mountain. Together with Ghelreis, you repelled the demons surrounding the throne. You kept Valacirca in check several times and tore off his scales. If anyone ever criticizes you and says you did nothing, on the god of the flame and my soul as a warrior, I will personally challenge that person to a duel.”

Menel, Al, Ghelreis, and Reystov had all fought the foul-dragon alongside me. We had overcome him together, and had any one of us been missing, we would never have won.

But for him to bring this up, did it mean that...

“Is that what you’ve been...”

Reystov huffed a half-laugh. “No. I’ve got thicker skin than that. It’s just... it put the thought in my mind.” I wasn’t sure if it was just the light from the lanterns, but there seemed to be a darkness behind his put-on smile.

“What thought?”

“Well—” He paused. “That... this might be the time to pack it in.”

The warrior who had earned the name of Reystov the Penetrator and without doubt won honor and glory spoke softly. “I wasn’t the main force in the slaying of the dragon, but I earned recognition as one of the party and I played my part well. Soon, this accomplishment will be put into song and spread to countless people across countless lands, handed down through countless generations. And I’m certain that my tribe and my family, who rest with the gods now, will have found both pride and peace after seeing the scales I cut from the dragon. So...”

His quiet muttering sounded like he was confessing his sins.

“...wouldn’t it be all right for me to lay down my sword now? Is what I started to think.”

My instinctive thought was, Isn’t that only natural? For a long time, Reystov had been strict with himself, and now all of his training had produced definite results. What on earth could be wrong with wanting to close the book on it now? But Reystov went quiet again. Hesitating, he opened and then closed his mouth several times without saying anything. Then, finally, he spoke, as if throwing up the thing that had been festering inside him. “I felt weakness in myself.”

“Reystov, aren’t you being a bit hard on yourself?”

“Then what if it were you, William?”

“Huh...?”

“Imagine that after you made it through a grueling holy battle for your god, the thought occurred to you that maybe that was enough devotion to the god of the flame.”

I was aghast at the thought.

“What if that thought wormed its way into your head and kept coming back to you and you couldn’t easily shake it off. What would you do?”

I’d never even imagined it. I was stuck for words.

“Technically, I’ve sworn an oath to the lightning god Volt, but I’m not a deeply devout person. I placed my faith in the steel in my hands and the body and spirit I forged on my own. My sword was God to me. I devoted myself to God, I spent my life with God, and I thought I would die with God.”

“Is that why—”

“Yes, that’s why I continued to seek battle.”

In his moment of uncertainty, he had stepped forward. In his moment of uncertainty, he had tried to force himself to carry on as normal. It was the kind of stubbornly direct choice that warriors were known for. I now understood that this was probably also the reason he had been avoiding Anna.

“And that’s how that ended up happening to my hand, and you, Meneldor, and... Anna had to look after me.”

“You can’t blame yourself for that.” Claiming the head of a General leading a mob of demons was no easy feat. That alone was an accomplishment worthy of being sung about by troubadours for generations.

“Yeah, I know. But after that incident—” He paused. “I didn’t want Anna to ever have to cry like that again.”

I might have accidentally stared at him. I couldn’t believe that someone rough like Reystov, who always spoke in a stubbornly composed tone, was talking about another person so fondly. “You love her,” I said.

“Yeah, I probably do. But at the same time, part of me can’t imagine putting away my sword, can’t believe I’m letting a damn woman give me second thoughts.”

That probably summed it up. If he could sort out his feelings so easily, he wouldn’t be having a problem. I knew well the intensity of the passion Reystov had poured into his sword.

“Which is why I want my sword to answer this question.” Reystov stood from the block of lumber. Following his lead, I stood as well. I’d been able to sense the crackling tension in the air for a while now. It was Reystov’s inner determination, his fight.
“William. William G. Maryblood. Paladin, Dragon-slayer, warrior with the power of an ancient dragon. My brother-in-arms.”

An overpowering sense of intimidation crashed into me like a wave of pressure. I almost took a step back, but I stood firm and met his glare head-on.

“I challenge you to a duel.”

◆

As the cold wind blew across the storage yard, we stood facing each other. The distance between us was a blade and a step. Either of us could cut the other by simply drawing our sword and taking a single step forward. It was the kind of distance that set the nerves on edge. We were deadly close.

“How will we determine the winner?” I asked.

“Whoever sheds blood first loses. If you’re beyond my reach here and now, I’ll lay down my sword.”

“And if you win?”

“If my sword tells me to carry on, I’ll just pick up where I left off, on the path to honor and glory.”

“Leaving Anna behind?”

“Yeah. I realize this has nothing to do with you and you’d probably prefer to stay out of it.”

“Not at all. I’m cheering for Anna pretty hard, actually.” I kept my body tense, but I relaxed my face a little and smiled. “I feel pretty motivated.”

“Thanks. That helps.”

“Still...”

As things stood, I was already at a horrible disadvantage.

Even given that it was night time, Torch Port wasn’t such a dangerous place right now that I had to walk everywhere in full armor. I’d only been going out to talk with one of my friends, so I had no reason at all to head out fully equipped. At this moment, I was wearing nothing more than extremely ordinary everyday clothes and a coat. I had neither Overeater nor Calldawn by my hip, only the single steel sword I carried when I didn’t need anything more. Reystov, in comparison, looked to have the sword he always used for actual battles at his side, and under his thick cloak I could see he was wearing leather armor and other gear, like greaves and hand protectors. Not only did I have the worse weapon, the places where I could deliver an effective strike would be considerably restricted.

Also, because we’d been talking for so long in the middle of the night in winter, I was cold. I’d become more tolerant to low temperatures since gaining the power of a dragon, but I’d promised myself to suppress that power and stay as human as possible most of the time. So when it was freezing cold out, I was freezing, too. It goes without saying that being freezing hinders your movement. In particular, the fact that my hands were numb was bad. Really bad. Reystov, on the other hand, if my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me earlier, had stashed a warming stone in the folds of his cloak and been using it to warm his hands up. I hadn’t thought anything of it at the time. There was nothing particularly strange about carrying around something to keep you warm in this cold weather. But now I realized that even that had been part of the plan.

And, of course, because we’d been talking, I was within what I called “swordsman’s range.” I couldn’t imagine that Reystov would allow me to back away and try the strategy of defeating him with magic and stones from a distance. He would cut me to ribbons well before I managed to get a safe distance away. And last but not least, I’d come to a place of Reystov’s choosing. It wouldn’t be at all surprising if he’d set up little traps by digging holes or tying grass into snares. At the very least, that was one extra thing I now had to pay attention to.

“Let’s be honest, this is pretty unfair, isn’t it?”

“I don’t remember saying I’d fight fair. If I’m going up against you, this much preparation is just good sense.”

“Oh, come on. Is this a duel or a street fight? Good God,” I said, acting slightly indignant. “But I’m glad to see you acting more like your normal self.”

As I said it, I saw a closed-lip grin form on his unshaven face. This aspect of him was what made him so good, and I had a lot of respect for it. He would ensure he had full control of the situation before pushing through the victory with fully honed sword skills. It was crafty and yet somehow straightforward, and he straddled those two extremes masterfully.

“Do you accept? Or refuse?”

“Yes. I acce—” The slash was instantaneous.

◆

With the dull sound of metal scraping against metal, the blade grazed by my wide-open chest. I’d known he would strike out at me the moment I accepted his challenge. And because I knew it, I began to draw my sword half an instant ahead of when I said it. I moved first. I was certain of it.

“How...”

How did he manage to get his blade to me faster when I had a head start?! I’d just barely managed to slide my sword into the path of his and divert it, but if I’d been a moment slower, I would have been both bleeding and defeated.

The movement of pulling back the scabbard, his hip rotation, his legwork—every action involved with drawing that sword was exceedingly quick and had no wasted movement. I hadn’t even blinked, yet his ready stance had turned instantly into the tip of a blade heading towards me as though I were watching a film with several frames missing partway through. The first attack was lightning-quick. I was convinced that even a pretty skilled warrior would have had their chest torn open at that moment nine times out of ten. But surviving that absurd first attack was only where the real battle started.

The ground shuddered as Reystov stepped towards me, his entire face overtaken by a demonic expression. The first slash from the scabbard was followed up immediately by a two-handed slash back in the opposite direction. Roaring filled the air as a furious series of strikes followed, reminding me of one of Blood’s all-out attacks, except that Reystov’s sword was much shorter and the attacks came much faster. Throat, shoulder, wrist, chest, side—each attack thrown at me was precise and unforgiving and overflowed with power. If I succumbed to the pressure and stepped back, I’d eventually be hunted down. Ordinary ducking and dodging was doomed to fail.

So, shouting loudly, I stopped it by force. There was a violent crash of metal, and my sword chipped.

Reystov’s sword was a noted Northern-style weapon, and Gus had engraved Signs into it. Hitting a garden-variety sword against it, it was inevitable that my weapon was going to get bashed around and end up chipped. I couldn’t hope to win against Reystov while being precious about my sword. Even though the fight was to be over at the first sign of blood, this was a serious battle, a duel—not a play fight—using real swords. Either of us could die if we were stabbed in the wrong place. I didn’t have the luxury of fighting pretty and taking care of my sword.

So, resigning myself to having my sword destroyed by the end of the battle, I clashed blades on purpose. I slammed everything I had against him, including his own weapon, and he did the same. The powerful impacts shook our swords and stung the hands gripping them. Reystov tottered.

It was true that the speed, technique, and chains of attacks Reystov was capable of were formidable, but he was only using a single sword. If I met the sword that was his only method of attack head-on, smashing it and smashing it with enough force to hit him with his own weapon, at least then I wouldn’t get sucked into that whirlwind of attacks and torn to shreds.

If the back-and-forth of attack and defense was starting to get out of hand, I just needed to crush those moves with overwhelming power. After all, Blood had taught me that if you got ripped, you could solve pretty much everything by force.

“Goddamn you’re strong...!”

However, Reystov’s sword was attempting to surpass the limits that “pretty much everything” implied. He had probably predicted that I would try to use brute force to break through this situation. As our blades continued to crash against each other, suddenly, Reystov made a move. At the moment of contact, his sword took a large swerve. Using the momentum of my heavy attacks against me, the tip of the blade closed in on my chest. I diverted its path, the tip just barely missing. I slammed my feet into the ground to keep my footing. Our shoulders collided. He pivoted, trying to control space to his advantage.

But that was a bad position for clashing swords. I closed the distance. Our blades locked. Immediately, Reystov’s sword turned. Not good. My thumb, I was going to lose it. Letting out a yelp of alarm, I blocked with the hilt and knocked him away. We crossed swords again, metal slid against metal, and the next moment, I had no idea what he’d done, but the butt of his weapon was in front of my eyes. He was go—

There was a heavy thud.

Stars exploded inside my head.

I staggered.

◆

I groaned in pain. This time, I was the one who tottered backwards. It was fair to say I’d been pretty lucky to manage to fend off his follow-up attacks. As for the bash with the handle, my sturdy forehead had taken the blow, and...

“I’m... not... bleeding.”

“Looks like you’re right.”

By demonstrating a finger-chopping move, he’d drawn my attention to the tip of the blade, then taken a bold step towards me as he spun the sword around and whacked me with the hilt. If I hadn’t reacted in time and the strike had so much as hit my nose, there would definitely have been blood. In fact, though I’d managed to change the point of contact, my forehead could also have been fractured, so I could only count myself lucky that I didn’t bleed.

He really was terrifyingly strong. I had a good understanding of the kinds of attacks performed from a bind where the blades were in contact. I’d been taught by Blood about the swords of the north that the Silverpeak Clan used, as well as the techniques used in a host of other fighting styles. I was a fair amount stronger than Reystov in terms of muscle, too. Yet I was always on the back foot. He was on another level in terms of the finesse of his technique, how many moves ahead his mind worked, the number of patterns of attack and defense he’d trained until they were instinctual. This was the difference that obsession, a serious attitude, and years of experience with the sword made.

Of course, I’d known he was a fearsome opponent. But I hadn’t imagined just how fearsome. He was so strong. Fighting him was suffocating. There was no time to incant magic or pray for protection. I could tell that a lightning-quick thrust would come the moment I showed any sign of attempting it. He wasn’t the kind of opponent you could flippantly handle while distracted by something else. The only option was to go along with him and fight with the sword, but he had the advantage in both weapon quality and technique.

He was strong. He really was strong. What was I going to do? How was I going to attack? How was I going to win? As I drew up various plans in the back of my mind, I fixed my gaze on Reystov. He glared back at me, his eyes glinting with ferocity. I understood well. My eyes as he looked at me were probably glinting in the exact same way. I wasn’t smiling, and neither was he, but I was sure that on the inside, we were both grinning—with bared fangs. I had no idea that we could be this antagonistic to one another. I could push it this far with him? And still go further? And he would still go along with me? That feeling, that pride, that joy, overflowed non-stop. Everything we had trained ourselves to be capable of, that magmatic heat that built inside our bodies every time we trained, had now found a partner who could handle it at a very high level, and it was bursting to escape.

“Fun, isn’t it, William?”

“Yes. It really is.”

As we pointed the tips of our blades at each other, I even found myself thinking that I didn’t want this to end. Everything else, including the original purpose of our duel, had gone right out of my mind. I just wanted, so badly, to beat him. And I was sure that Reystov felt the same.

“Round two. Don’t die.”

“You too, Reystov. Please.”

We slowly moved toward each other. Outside noise faded from the world. Rays of silver light danced in the darkness to the loud echoes of swords colliding. All that existed was our own sword and the sword of the opponent in front of us. There was no more hesitation or restraint. We both knew we would be defeated if we dared.

I roared and Reystov hissed sharply as two furious strikes engaged with each other. Then, we both took a step back.

How long had we been crossing swords? I suddenly realized that the weapon in my hand could now be mistaken for a saw blade. It probably wasn’t going to last much longer. It wasn’t a bad sword, just average, but even so, a handful more collisions and it would likely break pitifully. I had to grasp victory before that happened.

And to do that, I had to abandon the very last hint of hesitation, go all-out, and attempt to kill him.

It was the only way to win against him.

I breathed in, then out.

“On the flame.”

“On the steel of Silverpeak.”

And with those few words, spoken like prayers, two rays of gleaming silver crossed paths.

◆

The end was anticlimactic. Fresh blood spattered onto the ground. It was as though a spell had broken. All the excitement and joy of unleashing our full power and skill dissipated the moment I saw the blood dripping down.

“Looks like I lose.”

“Why...”

My sword had ripped into Reystov’s shoulder; his had pierced only air. I was unscratched.

“Why did you let up?!” I shouted without meaning to. In the last instant, at that moment when we abandoned even our concern for the other’s life and traded final blows, Reystov had let up with his sword for some reason, and his strike lost its power. He pulled all the force from his own attack, twisted his body, and “blocked” the tip of my sword with his shoulder. The excitement, the joy, the glimpse of greatness, the resolution that was moments away—all vanished into nowhere in the blink of an eye.

“Why?!”

If Reystov had just stepped towards me, one of us would surely have won. Would his sword have found its mark? Would mine? Or would we both have struck the other? Just one more second, and the duel would have reached a conclusion. It would have been a clear-cut victory and defeat that we could have shaken on. Instead, it had slipped through my fingers like a phantom and melted into thin air. I lashed out at Reystov emotionally, my excitement turning to anger that our battle had ended in such an anticlimactic way.

“Sorry,” he said. “I saw Anna crying.”

“Oh...” As soon as he said that to me, I lost my words.

“In that last moment just now, William, I might have been able to earn a win against you. But at the same time, there was a chance I wouldn’t taste victory’s sweet honey, but a cold and bitter cup of death.”

It had been exactly like that. I had no idea which of us would have won. We’d been fighting for real. Depending on the way we each chose to move our sword and the angles of our individual approaches in that last moment, a sword could have hit a lethal spot for either of us, with enough speed to kill that person instantly.

“Right at that moment, what I pictured wasn’t me standing victorious over a dragon-slaying warrior. It was the crying face of a woman. What is that if not the answer?”

Reystov had said that he wanted his sword to answer the question. Would he seek honor and glory with his sword held tightly in hand, or would he lay it down and seize love and happiness? It sounded as though he’d reached the answer before our battle had even had a chance to finish.

“Sorry.”

As Reystov said a quiet word of apology, I shook my head. “A really well-matched sword fight like that... I’ll bet a person doesn’t get to have many battles like that in a lifetime.”

“Right.”

I would have been lying if I said I was over it. I wanted to shout, “How dare you!” at him.

“How could you just up and throw a great battle like that?! Just because the point of it was to sort out your feelings doesn’t give you the right to—I’m mad at you, you know!”

“Yeah.”

Part of me was grumbling that I’d wanted to close in and settle the fight. The warrior side of me who was raised by Blood was stamping in frustration right now, grumbling and yelling and throwing a fit. But the other part of me, brought up by Mary...

“I’m mad at you, so I don’t care what you say, I’m not going to heal that wound on your shoulder!”

“I see.”

“Good!”

That part accepted this conclusion with a smile.

Reystov and I looked at each other, me with a sulky face and Reystov looking apologetic, and we both gave each other ironic smiles. “Go on then!” I said. “Off with you, Reystov, you quitter. I suggest you go get her to heal that up for you!”

“Yeah, I’ll do just that. She’s gonna give me an earful for this, though.”

“And it serves you right. Oh, wait, am I going to get a lecture later, too?”

“Just leave her to me.” Holding his shoulder with his opposite hand, he turned around. “William,” he said as he started to walk away.

“What?”

“My friend, you have my deepest gratitude.” Leaving only those words behind, he walked off. Still holding my utterly wrecked sword, I stood there under the light of the moon and watched him go. The night was quiet.

◆

Reystov seemed to have bared his heart to Anna. I wasn’t about to pry into all the details, but at any rate, the very next day, they looked like quite a loving couple.

Menel put on a serious face and a solemn tone and said, “Penetrated...”

“Oh no, let’s not joke about that!”

It’s not like it didn’t cross my mind! I was thinking it, but you know, there are things you don’t say!

“How quickly he draws his sword,” Tonio said. “Reystov the Penetrator has lived up to his name. I am quite certain of it.”

“Not you too, Tonio!”

It was night time. I had sent the maids I was employing home, and the large hall of my mansion felt a lot emptier now. Four horns of ale sat atop the small square table by the fireplace, along with plates of roasted nuts, salty smoked meats, and dried fruit. Menel and Tonio were grinning broadly at each other across the table, while Al beside them only tittered.

“Right, so, no one’s gonna mind if we go on without Reystov tonight?” Menel said.

“I don’t expect so,” Tonio replied. “Let’s leave the lucky git to his own devices.”

“Yep,” I said. “On that I agree.”

Al nodded. “It’s not worth going and disturbing him.”

It was a busy time recently with all the chaos caused by the foul-dragon, but that was all the more reason for Reystov to want to be with the woman who was dear to him. I could understand that. “For the grace of the gods, we are truly thankful,” I said, keeping grace brief. “To Reystov and Anna’s health and happiness.”

“Cheers.” With lazy movements and not much enthusiasm in our voices, we raised our horns.

We hung out like this at my mansion sometimes, everyone bringing along booze and whatever food they had lying around. Then we all kicked back, raised our cups, and shot the breeze. We’d been holding these on the regular recently. It wasn’t for anything special. It was just an ordinary gathering of just us guys. Bee did join in sometimes, but these get-togethers were a bit grungy. Mainly, it was me, Menel, Tonio, Reystov, Al, and Ghelreis. The beard-to-face ratio was staggering. We didn’t make a pretty picture. The light novels of my previous world would never have allowed us; we simply weren’t attractive enough.

“Reystov, though. Who would’ve thought?” Menel muttered while munching noisily on some roasted beans.

Al, with froth all over his mustache, nodded. “Surprising, isn’t it?”

“I mean, going on risk-filled adventures after honor and glory isn’t something you can keep up for long, but still, who would’ve thought?”

“I was expecting Will to get the jump on him where matters of that sort were concerned,” Tonio said, tearing a piece of smoked meat apart with his fingers.

“M-Me?” I tilted my head.

“A well-mannered, devout, skilled hero with assets and status and no connection to the family to worry about. That’s a solid investment, if you ask me. I’ve heard quite a few young women on the street say they admire you, you know?”

Menel laughed loudly. “Tonio, this guy might tick all the right boxes, but he’s a wimp around women.”

“Ahh, that type,” Tonio said, nodding in deep understanding. “The kind of man with admirers and people who think he’s nice, but never anything more...”

I groaned, defeated. It was true, so I had no way of denying it. Apart from that offer from the god of undeath, Bee and Anna were about only the girls I had a close relationship with. And Anna was happily united with Reystov and I didn’t have that kind of a relationship with Bee. To sum up, the area around me was a woman-free zone to the point that it was actually a little sad to think about. “W-Well, what about you, Menel?” I said. “Umm, you and Dine from Lothdor!”

“We’re not like that.” He took a drink from his horn. “And anyway, even if we were someday gonna be like that, you’re talking about a long wait with an elf.”

“Really?”

“You spend a good ten years figuring out each other’s personality and if you’re a good match, then you can think about getting married.”

“Gods, that is a long wait.”

“And most elves would call that ‘rushing into things.’”

Stupendously long, I thought.

Seeing my look of shock, Al gave a nervous laugh. “Well, elves do live longer than any other known race.”

It was certainly said that elves could easily live many hundreds of years, sometimes over a thousand depending on the strength of their blood. Dwarves lived about a half to a quarter as long, and as for halflings—wonderfully, no one actually knew how long they lived, thanks to a combination of their unconcerned attitude (“Who on earth bothers to keep count of age?”) and their intensely strong wanderlust.

“Once an elf ties the knot with someone, they’ll be together for several hundred years, so they marry very cautiously. If the relationship gets complicated, it can start trouble that will drag on for centuries.”

“The fact that life in the woods rarely changes might also be a contributing factor,” Tonio added. “Elves take a cavalier attitude to time, but when they come to a human village, their perception seems to change.”

He had a point. I saw elves from time to time even here in Torch Port, and they didn’t leave that extreme an impression. They could probably adjust to the pace of the culture around them to an extent. They were generally clever people, after all.

“So nothing like that’s going on with me. What about you, Tonio, no thoughts about getting remarried?”

“I am open to the possibility, but no, not as of right now.” He gave an embarrassed smile.

Tonio had been married once already, but his wife passed away. She’d had a weak constitution and tended to fall ill easily, but she was a smart and cheerful person. After that, the trading company he was working for went bust, and he became a hawker, then met me and managed to get back on his feet. His life had been kind of a rollercoaster, actually.

Perhaps remembering his wife, Tonio’s eyes glazed over for a moment. Then, he asked Al the same question that had been asked of everyone else.

“I am technically betrothed.”

We stared, astonished.

◆

“Oh?”

“The hell? No one told me.”

“Please, do tell.”

“Well, I’m not even sure if it’s still going to happen or not...” In his usual reserved tone, Al began to explain. “A long time ago, when the dwarves were a wandering tribe, there was a time when we found a safe haven in a place called the Vale, in Grassland’s Misty Valley.”

“The Misty Valley...” If I remembered correctly, that was an enormous canyon in the northeast of the Fertile Kingdom.

In the eastern part of the Fertile Kingdom, there was a region called the Hundred Warring Kingdoms. The land there tended to be poor and there was a lot of wasteland. Small states run by powerful families or clans would rise to power there and wage war against the others until they fell into ruin. Because of this destructive cycle, it wasn’t a very stable region. To the north of that was a breathtakingly vast valley surrounded by foggy mountains. Hidden by dense forest, it was a kingdom of dwarves that produced several types of ore.

“Huh. We were living pretty close to each other. Actually, never mind, guess that’s pretty common.”

Menel’s homeland, the Great Forest of Erin, was immediately north of the Misty Valley. But as for whether you could call this a huge coincidence, Menel was right that it wasn’t really the case. Among all the nations of elves and dwarves in Grassland, the Great Forest of Erin and the Misty Valley were pretty large ones. If you asked an elf or dwarf in Southmark right now where they were from, about half of them would probably name one of those two.

“So, there’s a woman there you promised your future to? A fiancée?”

“Something like that. My late parents made a promise that when their child was born, he would marry the—well, she was the granddaughter of the king of the Vale at the time.”

“So, a princess? Fig. Hold on, then why the hell did you leave that behind and come all the way out here?!”

“Well, um, you see, the Vale has been in kind of a mess in recent years with the succession issue...” Al had a complicated look on his face.

“Succession issue?”

“Not even you know about it, Tonio?”

“The Vale is terribly insular. You will never get in as a member of another race unless you are a diplomatic envoy or someone on very good terms with them. So even for a merchant like me, I must say it is quite hard to obtain information. Most dwarves are very tight-lipped.”

“I won’t go into the details, but internally things were on a bit of a knife edge. Weapons were being brought out, and even bloodshed looked possible.”

“Whoa...”

Arguments among one’s flesh and blood do escalate easily, but if weapons were being brought out, things had to have gotten pretty bad. If they weren’t careful, next would probably be civil war, ending with the losing side’s entire family and all their followers being killed.

“More than a few Iron Country refugees are there, given protection by the Vale two hundred years ago. The two places are on opposite sides of Middle-sea, of course, but there was still some intermingling, and there were people who had relatives in the other place. So anyway, when this kind of disagreement reared its head, certain people started to get ideas about how they could involve the group of people who formerly lived in the Iron Country and use them for their own ends.”

“Ah...”

Al was the last member of the royal family of the Iron Country. If they could lure him over to their side, they would be able to get the support of the former people of the Iron Country in the fight for the throne. It was a dangerous situation for Al to be in. The people around him probably realized that.

“So, it was to make sure nothing happened to you?”

“I think that was definitely part of the reason everyone sent me away. I practically had to run away under cover of night.”

As people of the Iron Country, they couldn’t risk the final member of their royal line dying a violent death caught up in the conflict over the succession. Perhaps they thought up some excuse, like a group of old dwarves wanting to go back to their homeland, and stowed him away to get him out. Al’s life had its share of drama as well...

“So whether the marriage is still on or not depends on the outcome of the fight for the succession. Not even I know how it’s going to turn out.”

“Would you be happy if it’s still on?” I asked.

“I’m not sure...” Al seemed to think for a moment. “It isn’t as though I was ever close to her. The dwarves of the Vale are strict about the separation of men and women. So all this about a promise of marriage doesn’t quite feel right to me, but I do hope she’s okay.”

At some point, our lazy gab about nothing had turned surprisingly serious.

“Al, the next time I go to Whitesails, I will do some investigating for you to find out how things currently stand.”

“Me too,” Menel said. “I’ll, uh—” He paused. “Figure out a way to bring it up with the adventurers from the north.” The two of them smiled at him.

He bowed deeply to them. “Thank you, Tonio, Menel.”

Then, to loosen up the atmosphere, Menel grinned. “Getting married is such a pain in the ass, huh? You’ve gotta think about parents, family...”

“Yes, it really is a rigmarole. Oh, come to think of it, I’ve never met him, but Anna’s father, wasn’t he the head of the temple in Whitesails?” Al grinned back at Menel. “I hope he’s a nice person who will approve of their marriage!”

He said it casually, but a deep silence fell.

“U-Um... Hello?”

Confused by the profound silence, Al looked around at everyone, but we were too deep in thought to answer. Of course—how had I forgotten? It was Bishop Bagley. The person Reystov had to take on to get permission for this marriage was Bishop Bagley. In this world, if a man and a woman were to be joined, the permission of the parents was very important.

“I wonder how he’ll react,” I said at last.

“Go stark-raving nuts?”

“You never know. He might be surprisingly accepting of the idea.”

It was anybody’s guess.

Reystov “the Penetrator” vs. Bishop Bagley—a fight card I’d never imagined had sprung out of nowhere.

◆

What on earth did the future have in store for Reystov and Anna? I greeted the morning of the following day with that thought in the back of my mind. As usual, I prayed to my god and then started training. No matter what else was going on, it was important to keep making small efforts day-in, day-out.

“Four...” I grunted. “Five...”

I was in my yard. Exhaling slowly, I pulled two stones up to chest-height using simple handles I’d made from a training rope, one held in each hand. These stones were about the size of a baby’s head, but they had Signs carved in them to increase their weight. I had converged mana into them before training.

The thick straw rope creaked under the weight. The stones were comically heavy. There was no way I could do this quickly, so I summoned all my strength and lifted them up slowly. Al was also pulling up stones beside me, red-faced and dripping with sweat.

“Nine... Ten!”

A long groan came from Al.

The rope creaked with every rep. My muscles were screaming that they couldn’t take any more. I grit my teeth and ignored them. “Keep... at it...!”

“Yes, sir...!”

Al and I lifted the stones several more times, finally reached our limit, and set the stones back on the ground. The ropes and the rocks landed back down with a heavy thud and sank into the ground a bit. We both sat down on the spot and caught our breath.

After warming up with a training run and some stretches, we’d been constantly torturing the muscles throughout our bodies with the murderous weight of these stones with Signs carved into them. My muscles had been worked hard and felt hot. That was proof that the training was working. Unable to speak, I rested for about a minute and a half as I felt warmth fill my entire body. Then, I stood up again and said, “Okay! Let’s do another lap! This is when it’s important to push yourself!”

“Y-Yes, sir!” Al came with me.

After that, we did another set of stone exercises in various positions: picking them up, pushing them up, lifting them up, and so on. Then we collapsed and gathered our breath. “Okay! Let’s do another lap!”

Al was already at the point of exhaustion. His eyes shimmering, he finally cried uncle.

“But you just said that!”

“This is when it’s important to push yourself!”

“You just said that as well!”

Yep, that I did, I thought. But this is important. Clapping my hands onto his shoulders, I looked him in the eyes.

“Listen, Al.”

“Yes? What is it?”

“There’s nothing more fun than lifting something heavy off the ground.”

Al gave me a shocked look that said, “You’re serious.”

“At least, that’s what you have to believe while you’re training. Now, with a smile...”

“Th-There’s nothing more fun than lifting something heavy off the ground!”

And so we fired ourselves up with forced smiles and, together, we did another lap. By the time I had pushed myself to my absolute limit, Al had dropped to the ground, completely wiped out.

◆

“Y-You were really fired up today...”

“Oh, uh, right. Sorry. I got carried away. Sorry for making you go along with that.”

While recovering from my fatigue, I gently went through the motions of a few spear techniques, and to wrap up we did some fighting practice with sticks, the ends of which I had wrapped in cloth and cotton. Al was on his last legs. He did well to stick with me until the very end.

This had probably been the influence of my battle with Reystov. Even I thought I’d been a little too enthusiastic today. Overworking was a thing as well. Training too much was just as bad as too little.

“But you did well to keep up.”

“Thanks!”

Al’s strength and stamina were quite impressive at this point. The characteristically stocky nature of dwarves certainly helped, but I could really tell that he had been working hard at his training without slacking off, even when I hadn’t been around to watch over him.

“After fighting all those battles one after another in that mountain, I realized the importance of being able to fight when you’re exhausted.”

I nodded. It really was important to be able to put up a decent fight even when you weren’t at your best.

As a sport, fighting involved keeping in good shape so you’d be in peak form on the day, and facing off against your opponent in that condition. But in a real battle, you weren’t necessarily going to be in top form. In fact, fighting in less-than-ideal form was probably more common. Extreme tiredness from traveling from place to place and fighting battle after battle, food and water shortages, injuries and illness—even while suffering from these conditions, a warrior had to swing around his heavy weapon and slam it countless times against his enemies and their shields.

Less-than-perfect conditions were the hallmark of real battles, and muscle was exactly what was necessary to deal with that. When it came to sophisticated moves, there was a lot to think about: how to sequence them, the timing, the conditions that would make them a good choice, and more. Repeated attacks relying on brute strength, however, could be performed even when you were so exhausted that you couldn’t think straight. “Rough and simple strength,” where you could pose a serious enough threat just by randomly firing off ordinary attacks, was sometimes superior to “intricate and complicated strength.” And most important of all...

“Anyone can get muscle just by training and eating a lot.”

Some advanced techniques required a certain type of aptitude. Not everyone could learn every technique. But anyone could train to have strength and stamina, even if they were a little bit clumsy, just so long as they didn’t have any physical issues. I even thought that these kinds of factors might actually be the most important part of military strategy.

“So make a little progress every day,” I continued. “I’m not around a lot of days, but keep up with your training on your own, and please don’t forget to switch things up every so often.” Then, dropping the deadpan voice, I declared the end of our training. “Alright, that’s it for today! Eat a hearty breakfast so your training doesn’t go to waste!”

I watched Al slowly stagger off towards the mansion, then went around casting the Word of Negation on all the stones. If I left a large number of stones with abnormal weights lying around, it could cause some kind of accident.

Incidentally, this also doubled as magic practice. While incanting one Word of Negation, I wrote another by hand, and as I wrote a Word of Negation with one hand, I wrote the Words Lumen and Tenebrae alternately with the other, canceling them both out. Double-casting magic also required steady training.

As I cancelled the Pondus Sign engraved on each of the stones, my mind once again drifted back to Reystov and Anna.

I’d given it a lot of thought, and I was pretty sure that Bishop Bagley was indeed going to be angry. After all, he was a religious man with common sense. Reystov may have been a renowned and hard-working adventurer, but he was also a flinty-eyed man of uncertain age with unkempt hair and a scruffy beard who clearly had connections to some unsavory people. The bishop probably wouldn’t be happy about letting such a man have his daughter. But Reystov was a friend. If he was going to put down his sword, I wanted to offer him the best work I could find and help him to win over Bishop Bagley. I was already indebted to our tubby and short-tempered bishop, but maybe I could grovel...

Just then, I heard a voice from behind me.

“You’re good at that. Is there a trick to it?”

It was a voice I was very familiar with.

“I just practiced until I could do it somehow,” I replied while drawing several symbols with both hands. I didn’t bother to turn around. I only had a couple more stones to do and I’d be done. “I started with drawing a circle in the air with my right hand while drawing a square with my left one.”

“Hmm. That’s trickier than it sounds.”

“It is, isn’t it?” As I spoke, I wrote a Word of Negation with a finger on my right hand while writing a Word that broadened its range into the air with my left. The fingers I had converged mana into glowed with ghostly light as they moved, inscribing letters into thin air. The Word of Negation, which added a negative sense to already emitted Words, easily dispelled the effect of the Signs carved into the stones. I hadn’t made the Signs that potent in the first place, to make it easier to clear them away later.

“I struggled a lot at the beginning, too,” I said, turning around as I spoke. “My grandfather shouted—”

My eyes widened. The person before me was not a flinty-eyed man of uncertain age with unkempt hair and a scruffy beard. It was a confident young man with refreshingly short hair and a beard that was neatly trimmed. He was wearing an impressive northern-style formal outfit. The white fur made it look warm.

“Wait... what?”

Was he a completely different person with a similar voice? That was my first thought.

“It’s me,” he sighed, pulling me back to reality.

“Wh—” This person with princely features who could definitely pass for someone in his twenties was—

“Reystov.” In his voice, he gave his name.

“What?!” I shouted in shock.

Anna’s head popped into view from behind Reystov, and she stuck out her tongue. “Isn’t it incredible? He asked me to cut his hair and... well, I was a little surprised!”

“Y-You’re telling me!”

She giggled. “Oh, and thank you for what you did the other day. I caused you a lot of trouble.”

“No no, you’re very welcome...”

As Anna and I exchanged pleasantries, other people started to gather, wondering what I could have been shouting about. As expected, each of them went wide-eyed in shock or cried out in surprise.

“No waaaay.”

Menel, for instance, was staring at Reystov, blown away by his appearance.

“Ooh, now that is a nice coat.”

“It was my father’s. My uncle passed it down to me along with my sword when I left home.”

“The winter coat of a snow-white wolverine... I must say, not every day do I have the fortune to see something like that.”

And that was Tonio, gazing at Reystov’s outfit in admiration.

“Wow! Reystov, that suits you so well!”

Al gave his earnest praise of Reystov’s dignified appearance, and Ghelreis also showed up and hummed in approval. It really was an incredible transformation.

“Hell, you might look more like a paladin than the Paladin.”

“Hey!”

Menel cackled. “Real talk, though. This might be enough even for that grumpy old fart, don’t you think?”

“Oh!” He had a good point. If Reystov looked this presentable... But I quickly changed my mind and shook my head. “Bishop Bagley’s not so easily swayed.” Reystov may have changed his appearance, but we’d never get so lucky that Bishop Bagley would let something as trivial as that mislead him.

“I wouldn’t have thought so either.” Reystov nodded. “The right approach has to be holding a good job and living life diligently for a while, and only then going to ask him permission.”

That was absolutely the right way to look at it. It was hard to believe that those words had come from a so-called “madman” who had taken pleasure in going after monsters of all kinds, chasing honor and glory. But I thought the seriousness behind them was pure Reystov. When he decided to do something, he was very thorough about it.

“Therefore, with all who are present here as my witness, I supplicate you.”

“Huh...?” I tilted my head in confusion as Reystov got down onto one knee in front of me.

“Faraway Paladin, William G. Maryblood. Warrior who carries the Torch. Liberator of Lothdor and the Iron Country. Wise one versed in the old Words, he who is beloved by the Goddesses. Hero of our generation, who crushed the wyvern, impaled the chimera, and finally slayed the foul-dragon.”

I’d heard of this from Blood. It was a specific, very old-fashioned format of speech.

“My name is Reystov, descendant of Nylav, given life in Volt’s Stove in the Ice Mountains of the distant north. A scarcely educated, unmannered deviant, a vagabond in search of the shining star of glory. A man with naught to his name, who relinquished even the sword in his hand, that the one he loved might be his to hold in its stead.”

It involved singing many praises of the other person and their accomplishments, and putting yourself down repeatedly as you spoke of your own history.

“Although I am powerless and incompetent, if you would find even the most humble position for me as one of your retainers, I should be most overjoyed.”

This speech, following the prescribed ancient format, was unmistakable. It was the speech used when requesting to serve a lord in government. I was so surprised, I couldn’t think of what to say for a while.

“Am I superfluous to requirements?” he prompted.

“No, not at all!” I felt confident in saying that even without his sword, Reystov would be a very useful person to have around. He was well-connected and had a wealth of knowledge. He could negotiate with people at all levels of society. He had all kinds of skills. But I hadn’t quite anticipated him asking to serve me. I couldn’t offer him any especially amazing compensation. “But why me?” I asked.

“If I have to bow my head to someone, it might as well be someone who’s worth it, right?” Reystov looked up at me and grinned. It was very contagious. I cracked a wry smile myself.

As Anna looked at the two of us, I could tell that her expression was full of mixed emotions, but overall, it was gentle.

On that perfectly ordinary morning, Reystov gently laid down his sword.

◆

A few months later in spring after the new year had passed, I found myself in a room at the heart of the Whitesails temple. The room was quite large, there were rows of desks and reading stands, and the shelves on the stone walls were packed with countless scrolls and bundles of paper. However, it felt more cluttered than majestic. The room was used for all kinds of jobs: managing financial books and records and the yearly event schedule, keeping records relating to the people at each temple, creating registers and invitations to various kinds of functions, and more. It was the central office for desk work in the main temple of Whitesails. Normally, it was a noisy hive of activity packed full of priests engaged in conversation, but right now, you could have heard a pin drop.

At the back of the office, on the other side of the widest desk, wearing luxurious priest’s robes interwoven with gold and silver thread, sat Anna’s adoptive father, Bishop Bart Bagley. His stout body planted firmly in his chair gave me the impression of a massive boulder.

Reystov, dressed in his formal white fur coat, stood tall beside Anna in front of the desk, with his hand placed on the left side of his chest, and spoke. “Father—”

“I hope for your sake that you mean to address me as a bishop!” His thunderous yell was enough to make the skin quiver. The priests in the room flinched. After discovering that Reystov had come to request Anna’s hand in marriage, curiosity had gotten the better of them, and they had missed their opportunity to get up and leave. I felt sorry for them.

Bishop Bagley always wore an irritable expression, but today was worse than ever. A blood vessel stood out on his temple, pulsating. “So you are the adventurer who worked his wiles on Anna.”

“Father, he—”

“Anna, you hold your tongue!” He punctuated the last word with a loud slam of his fist against the desk.

His vociferous attitude caused Anna’s breath to catch for a moment, but she pushed ahead. “He isn’t an adventurer anymore!”

The moment she answered back, Bishop Bagley exploded with rage. “It’s the same difference! The gods know what kind of history this man has! You are shameless!”

Anna was shocked speechless.

“An adventurer? A risk-taker with gods-know-what background? You expect me to allow this?!” As he shouted, the bishop grabbed an earthen jug from the desk and threw it. Narrowly missing Anna, the jug crashed against the wall, breaking violently into pieces and splashing the water inside everywhere. The female priests present—if memory served, they were also the adopted daughters of Bishop Bagley and effectively Anna’s sisters—yelped in surprise.

I silently watched this unfold from my position a little behind Reystov and Anna. I had come along to speak to Reystov’s standing and character. However, this was their stage. It wasn’t my place to jump in.

Nevertheless, Bishop Bagley’s eyes turned on me. “And you, neophyte! I left my daughter in your care, and this is what happens?! What do you have to say for yourself?!”

“Nothing.” I met his glare straight-on. “It is my belief that this brave warrior, Reystov, is of suitable character to marry your daughter.”

He snorted dismissively. “Lies dull your Words, sorcerer. I hope that one was worth it.” He sat back down on his luxurious chair and sank deeply into it. The chair creaked. And then the bishop went quiet, and an oppressive silence began to fill the room.

“Father,” Reystov said, opening his mouth again. Bishop Bagley folded his arms and only gave Reystov the slightest glance, making no attempt to answer him. “I hear you saying that your daughter cannot be wed to a risk-taker of dubious origin, and you are very right to say so. That is why I now serve the Paladin, and refrain from taking dangerous—”

The bishop barked a laugh. “I’ve heard about that. You put your sword away for a few months. How much does that really tell me?”

“You are also very right to be suspicious. Should you ask me to do so, I intend to swear an oath, as strong as you wish, to the gods at this temple.”

At those words, Bishop Bagley went quiet. By “strong,” Reystov was referring to something like, “Should I betray this oath, may lightning strike me down and rend me asunder.” In this world where gods existed and Words carried power, such an oath required considerable resolve. Nothing would necessarily happen if you broke it, but you also couldn’t ignore the possibility that the gods might be in the mood to make it reality. Stories of people who kept trifling with the gods by making false vows and received divine punishment for it were a staple of fairy tales in this world as well.

As Bishop Bagley remained silent, Reystov continued. He was very wordy today, having clearly abandoned his usual terseness. The meaning of the gesture he made as he spoke, placing his hand over the left side of his chest, was of course, “I swear it on my heart.”

“Father, I love Anna. I would spare nothing to be with her. I may have much to learn in life, but I will devote it fully to making Anna happy.” He spoke quietly. I could feel the sincerity in his words. “If problems arise, I will resolve each and every one as they come. I will do everything in my power to that end, abandoning everything that must be abandoned and obtaining everything that must be obtained.”

He took one step closer to the desk and bowed.

“Please grant us permission to marry.”

It was a very passionate plea. Anna’s sisters throughout the room were quietly squealing with their hands over their mouths. Even I had been so captivated by Reystov’s marvellous speech that I’d failed to realize I had also become nothing more than a member of the audience. I thought the sight of Reystov and Anna standing side by side as they directly faced off against the bishop was very beautiful.

But even after Bishop Bagley had listened to Reystov’s speech and seen him bow, his expression remained stubborn.

“Let us imagine—” The bishop’s tone changed. He no longer yelled. Instead, his voice was quiet, yet deep and resonant. “Let us imagine that I were still to say no. That I don’t like you. What would you do?”

“I should come to visit you like this as many times as necessary.”

“You are from different worlds. Anna and I may not be related by blood, but she is my daughter. I can find any number of partners for her that are more wealthy and more exalted than you.”

“I should love your daughter more dearly than any of them, and make her happier still.”

“In that case—”

I saw an icy glint in Bishop Bagley’s eyes.

“What if I still said no, and I told you that I would confine Anna in this temple, kick you out of here, and give notice to bar you from entering?”

I thought I felt the temperature in the room drop.

“Imagine that no matter whether you sat here all day in protest or begged the Paladin over there to negotiate for you, even if you gained the support of His Excellency himself, I refused to listen to any of it, sent Anna off to Grassland, and had her wed to an appropriate partner.” His tone was tremendously intimidating, to the point that it felt as if it exerted physical pressure. “A scoundrel has attempted to lay hands on my daughter. It would be an appropriate response, don’t you agree? I am in fact considering it. And if I did, what would you do about it? What could you do?”

Bishop Bagley’s eyes had the ice-cold quality of a deep-water shark. But even when confronted with those eyes, Reystov’s back was as straight as a board. “What could I do?” he said. “I could make off with her.”

◆

He stretched an arm around Anna’s waist and pulled her towards him. “No matter where you confine Anna, I will find her and steal her away. And make her happier than anyone. Simple as that.”

His clipped tone caused the bishop’s expression to twist. “You have some nerve...”

“Do you think any man proposes without total determination to see it through?”

In comparison to the stubbornly intimidating bishop, Reystov’s response was quiet—yet full of power and resolve. Bishop Bagley’s lips remained closed for a while, and finally he snorted again and said, “Bride kidnapping. I dare you to try.”

“Is that a challenge?”

“I have no intention of allowing you to succeed! But if you want to try, on your own head be it! What happens to you is no skin off my nose!”

I noticed that Bishop Bagley’s tone had softened a little. Bride kidnapping—marriage by abduction—was a practice found all over the world in my previous life. The nature of the practice varied a lot in both worlds.

“That is, of course,” the bishop scoffed, “if you are able to find both accomplices willing to aid you in a kidnapping against the temple and a residence in which to conceal her!”

However, after that comment... Yeah, I could guess what form of “bride kidnapping” the bishop was hinting at here. He was blustering in a way that felt forced and looking in my direction with intense eyes that said, “Am I making myself clear?!” So there was no doubt in my mind.

“Anna, you stay here! Reystov or whatever your name was, out, now! And never come back!”

Reystov and Anna looked at each other for a moment. Then, without saying another word, Reystov gave Bishop Bagley a very deep bow and walked out of the temple on his own.

The bishop waited until he’d seen that Reystov was completely gone, and irritably puffed air out of his nose again. Then he called together all the priests who were still in the office and instructed them to keep Anna locked in a room. He was even so nice as to mention, out loud right in front of me, which room she was to be shut in. And so everyone except the bishop and I left the office.

“Hm?” He looked at me as though he’d only just noticed me. “Oh, you’re still here. You have such little presence, I forgot all about you.” He narrowed his eyes. “You brought trouble to my door again.”

“I brought you auspicious news. Some gratitude would be appreciated,” I said, being a little snarky.

“Dream on.” Then the bishop cleared his throat. “I am making myself clear?” he asked in a low voice.

“I will do it with finesse and hurt no one.”

“Hah. I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He very transparently feigned ignorance. “Oh, and I am just talking to myself now, but...”

“All right.”

“It seems there are those in this world who would throw away a sword capable of tearing the scales from a dragon for the sake of a single woman. Utter foolishness, don’t you think?”

I said nothing.

“No one would criticize a man for wearing a sword and being prepared in the event of crisis, so long as he does not put himself in any unnecessary danger. How foolish. Utterly foolish.”

I only nodded. He was talking to himself, so it would be strange if I responded.

“Paladin.”

“Yes?”

“How do I say this... She is serious to a fault, and not only that, she always tends to take a step back and let someone else make her decisions for her. She’s probably the kind who’s bad at finding happiness.”

The bishop gazed somewhere far away as he spoke. He normally had a stern expression, but now it seemed somehow lonely. “Happier than anyone, he says.” He let out a single, humorless laugh. “Would you tell him it’s up to him now?”

I simply nodded firmly.

◆

There isn’t much to say about what happened after that.

Reystov and I, as well as a few other people whose assistance we asked for, including Menel, were able to steal Anna from the temple without any problems. Not only did we have the foul-dragon slayers as members of our kidnapping team, word had gotten around from Anna’s sisters who had been in the office at the time, so everyone was already on the same page. There was no way they could have stopped us, and they had no intention of doing so. Just when I was starting to worry that the holy warrior on guard duty might have noticed our presence as we snuck in, he “suddenly got tired” and disappeared into the chapel. It was so blatant that I had to suppress a laugh. Of course, Anna didn’t make any attempt to resist either. In fact, she was very cooperative. So there really was nothing to give us any trouble.

It did technically count as unlawful trespassing and abduction, but I was sure my god would forgive me for it. After all, it was her revelation that had told me about all the good entry points. I could never be so rude as to ask her, “So do you actually quite like human love stories and stuff like that?” but she might actually have been pretty eager about this.

In any case, having stolen Anna away, we took her back to Torch Port. The pair of them had just started to live a new life in a small house beside my mansion when a priest who I supposed counted as Anna’s brother turned up saying, “I have been sent here to take back Anna.” Straight away, I jumped in to wine and dine him, and after only a little alcohol, he declared, “I am drunk. Oh no, I took a bribe,” in a deadpan voice, and left laughing.

A few days later, a letter arrived from the bishop. Paraphrasing, it said, “This is not really a marriage I can allow, but my daughter was taken from me by force, and the man I sent to take her back was bought. There is nothing more I can do. Therefore, I reluctantly acknowledge the marriage.” The seething wording of the letter was at odds with the truly gentle handwriting in which it was written.

The customs of bride kidnapping and marriage by abduction were also hotbeds for hostile abduction and rape, so in my previous world they were on the decline as the world became more conscious of human rights. However, when they functioned in a sensible way in an era like this, how nice they were. Even if two people were from different levels of society and the man couldn’t pay the bride price, all it took was for the couple to have feelings for one another and friends around to help them.

“Not as if he can do anything about it now that she’s been taken,” Menel said, laughing with a cup of drink in one hand.

“Yes, there’s not much you can do at that point,” I said, nodding and laughing, too.

It was an evening in spring. Straw had been laid out across the hall of my mansion, where a small party was being held to celebrate the holy matrimony of Reystov and Anna. Brightly colored cloth had been strung along the walls, the partygoers spilled out into the yard, and the place was packed with chairs and tables brought in for the occasion.

At the far end of the hall stood Anna. She had a little makeup on and was wearing a veil and a crown of wildflowers. She was smiling. Reystov was as quiet as usual and dressed in that same formal white fur coat, but his expression was soft.

A song to bless the couple standing side by side filled the hall, sung with great feeling by Dine and several other elves of Lothdor who had come to visit Torch Port. Musical accompaniment was provided by the red-headed troubadour Robina.

Admiring the white clouds, we live on the strand

Never once dreaming of dressing in gold

The wildflow’rs ignore us on thatched cottage roof

Flourishing, withering, lives uncontrolled

How joyous the pleasures of cottage life here

Never in poorness forgetting our feelings

Never in richness forgetting our bonds

Dine and the others finished singing the old septet about a poor yet happily married couple, and Bee strummed her rebec quietly as the song ended. Then, as the last note trailed off into silence, she shouted joyfully and raised a cup. “Woo-hoo! Congratulations to the newlyweds!”

We all shouted “Congratulations!” together and raised our cups, none of us minding that we’d already done the same thing several times.

With the song over, a group of dwarves led by Al approached the couple, carrying various objects. Al said, “Congratulations on your marriage!”

“Oh my! Thank you very much!” Anna beamed at them.

The majority of their gifts were daily necessities, dwarven-made and built to last: an iron skillet, jars of different sizes, a writing desk, a long clothes chest—the list went on. But Ghelreis alone had brought something different. The gift he had brought was a brand-new fishing rod.

“We have to prove to Menel that we’re not bad at fishing—we just need the right equipment,” Ghelreis said with a serious expression.

“Yeah,” Reystov replied with an equally serious nod. Everyone burst out laughing.

Cups were raised over and over in congratulation. Everyone smiled and looked like they were enjoying themselves. The wedding of two of my dear friends was a wonderful ceremony.

It wasn’t especially extravagant. There was nothing breathtaking to see. It was just a simple night-time wedding ceremony. But it was something I’d never managed to obtain in my previous world. As all these emotions welled up inside me, I raised my cup and shouted my greatest blessing with all my heart.

“Congratulations!”