Chapter 188

The next morning.

The coach setting out from the front gate picked up the two people waiting at the stop and moved off. The sound of hooves striking the ground carried on without letting up.

Clop. Clop.

Around three hours in, maybe. Lloyd let the rattling of the wheels fade behind him and stared at the scenery slipping past outside the window, then turned his head forward.

Mikhail, seated across from him, had his arms folded and his head bowed quietly.

Whish—.

The steady sound of breathing rose and fell. Lloyd let out a low sound and thought back to Mikhail as he'd seen him at the front gate.

[…Let's go.]

He'd worn a face bleary from having gotten up early, but now, with the sky-foxes tucked in beside him, he was sound asleep.

"Hey, sleeping like that's going to hurt your neck…."

…His neck's going to be sore.

Lloyd started to say more, then shut his mouth. Watching him sleep dead to the world like that, no amount of talking was going to budge him.

Might as well wake him a little later.

Lloyd turned his head back toward the window and let his eyelids fall and lift.

Come to think of it, hadn't his companion said this trip would give him a kind of experience he couldn't get otherwise?

Not a bad pitch, really. Not given the task at hand — no, the goal he himself was carrying.

Even though he'd completed every prescribed course of study as Cloelle's sole heir, the reason he'd ended up at Salvator was to stack up new experiences.

[This is the last task the Grand Duke has set. Do not forget your name or your position; come into your own perspective, and return to this place once you have.]

Honestly, that man. Nothing but instructions I can't make heads or tails of.

Lloyd recalled the last time he'd left the estate and quietly furrowed his brow.

The Restorer, inheritor of an ancient civilization. Cloelle, the First Noble house.

Separate from the pride he took in the name he carried and the role that would fall to him one day, the current head — his father, Grand Duke Cloelle — was not exactly a man he was fond of.

A face that seemed only to have been painted over with authority. A figure that held its place like a rock, and nothing more….

Facing that gaze that looked down at him from behind the heavy fall of the insignia, betraying no emotion, was enough to twist his stomach and put his nerves on edge. The manner that suggested the man knew everything about him, the eyes that seemed to peer down from above — he didn't like any of it, honestly….

"…Tch."

Lloyd clicked his tongue in dissatisfaction, then shook his head and changed the subject inside it.

There was plenty else to think about. The winged tyrant they were about to run into, for instance.

[…I'm going to bring down the head Pokryongse, and you want me to serve as your bodyguard while I do it?]

The eastern hills, which they'd be reaching before long.

There, apparently, was a Pokryongse that flew in on a regular cycle and made a wreck of the whole area before leaving.

The people around there just call it the Great King Chicken, right?

The nickname was comical, given how notorious the thing was. But he knew it had been made silly on purpose — to soften people's fear.

That birdbrain has a real reputation.

Lloyd folded his arms and let out a low sound. As for information on the wild, fierce bird in question, he'd picked up a bit here and there from sailors passing through.

[You don't know what a Pokryongse is? Ha, saying you're a proper seaman and you're not even a hatchling yet? That crazy bird, see….]

Its beak was as hard and sharp as if it had been forged from iron; its wings, sprouting stiff feathers, were massive enough to blot out the sky.

On top of that, its temperament was so aggressive and violent that it attacked anything it laid eyes on without a second thought — and if it got riled the wrong way, it would let out inaudible sound waves and reduce everything around it to rubble.

[Skreeeee—!]

For that reason, generally the best policy was to let it rampage as it pleased for a while and steer it off toward wherever it was going….

The story changes when there's a reward on the line, though.

The byproducts you could get from taking down a Pokryongse — feathers, claws, the heart — brought in a pretty tidy sum, so every year people gathered from all over to try to bring it down. That was about the extent of what he knew.

That aside.

Lloyd set aside the thought he'd been running with and looked across at the other seat again.

The one who'd made the offer to go take the Pokryongse down.

He was still sleeping dead to the world, wandering somewhere in a dream.

The hair falling forward hung and swayed like ivy draped across the window of some old mansion.

This young lord isn't heading out to the hills because he needs the money. So what on earth—

Lloyd stroked his chin and watched Mikhail in silence, then narrowed his eyes slightly.

There were roughly three plausible motives.

The first was preparation for the coming term. The second was carrying out the duties of his role as Guardian.

And the third….

He might be trying to wake something up inside himself.

Lloyd tapped a finger as the thought settled.

Joseph Senit's ability was said to have emerged as if by miracle at the end of a long series of battles, coming out gradually over time.

The things Mikhail Senit was doing might follow the same pattern as his father.

If the ability itself was the same, chances were it would manifest in a similar shape.

In which case, maybe I should move a little differently myself.

Should he prepare a way to keep it in check? Or was it too early? A line of thinking that ran through the situation and the contingencies stretched on….

Tap. Tap. Lloyd had been rapping his fingertips against the window frame as he weighed the thought, then let out a light breath and paused.

"Nnh."

The sound came from across the way. Mikhail's lips were twitching and his eyelids fluttered. Then his eyes drifted open, and his gaze met Lloyd's.

"……"

Eyes as dark and deep-blue as the ocean floor.

Lloyd studied the settled, still pupils, then smiled with no particular change in his expression.

"Neck all right?"

"It hurts."

Mikhail answered as if it were obvious, then scrunched up his face and worked at the back of his neck.

At that small movement, the sky-foxes that had been dozing beside Mikhail started to yawn and lift their heads too.

Mikhail patted the two swaying with sleep, then asked Lloyd,

"You didn't sleep?"

"Nope."

Lloyd gave a bright smile in reply. Mikhail blinked slowly, then turned his head toward the window and asked, offhand,

"So what were you doing?"

Lloyd shut his mouth instead of taking the question.

Why? The question landed on him with a low buzz at his ear, as if it had seen straight through what he'd just been thinking.

But… no. It couldn't have. Just a feeling, surely.

"Nothing. Wasn't doing anything."

Lloyd shrugged as he always did and, like Mikhail, turned his gaze out the window.

He didn't feel like talking any more right this moment. Better to pick up where his thinking had cut off.

Lloyd pretended interest in the scenery. What crossed his line of sight instead were the things Mikhail had been doing lately.

[…I just want to see if he's all right.]

Putting his relationship with Ethan Welton — practically an archrival — back to what it had been.

[But… inside… Senit… is—]

Bringing Verte Fischer, who kept coming after him relentlessly, to submission through gentle means.

[Julien's state — is he like his usual self? Please look in on him.]

Catching on to his friend Julien Leventia's unease before anyone else and asking Lloyd to check on him.

Mikhail Senit… he's got more of a human side than I'd figured.

Lloyd let out a breath and stopped thinking. What sharpened in his head — settled back into its usual calm — was a single course of action.

At this point, moving on him would cost more than it gained. For now, keeping things as they were was the better call.

Rather than trigger any unnecessary wariness, it was right to trade in goodwill and stack up more human moments between them.

That much ought to soften even the small edge of caution left, and if there was any weak spot, better to spot it now.

And on the off chance there was no vulnerability worth noting, gradually etching one in place wasn't a bad move to try either.

Shaping a tool for easy use meant also crafting a handle to swing it by….

"—I can't wait."

A dry voice pushed in through Lloyd's thoughts.

Lloyd startled and looked at the seat across from him. Mikhail, propping his chin on his hand and looking out the window, was meeting his eyes.

"We'll be near the hills any time now."

"…What?"

Lloyd asked back, puzzled at the sudden shift. Mikhail tipped his thumb toward the window and spoke.

"See those trees standing over there? The ones where the base is scraped up in patches, or leaning a little to the side."

"……"

"Looks like the Pokryongse cried out on a real tear and spooked the animals around. They must have gone tearing every which way to make a mess like that."

---

By the time the coach carrying the two of them reached its destination, the sun was well past the middle of the sky, deep into afternoon.

[Hill Village: Welcome to Dexton.]

Mikhail checked the signpost at the village edge with a sidelong glance and stepped off the coach with Lloyd.

The coach that had dropped them turned back the way it had come and pulled away along the road that ran out of the village.

"Hmm, mountains all around, is it? Air's nice. Different from the sea wind I've been breathing every day."

Mikhail set Han and Ul down at his feet and glanced over at Lloyd beside him.

The moment Lloyd had stepped down into the village, ringed by greenery, he'd been sniffing the air, and now he was actually shading his eyes with a hand as he scanned the view.

"Heh, no matter how you look at it, coming here was a good call."

The eyes bright with curiosity carried no trace of worry or brooding — the look of a young child.

Mikhail drew his gaze from Lloyd and pointed toward the center of the village.

"Let's go. To file the request."

Lloyd nodded, no objection, and moved along behind Mikhail.

One walked with a light, easy swing; the other stepped neatly and precisely.

The two different rhythms carried them further along the road.

The scenery around them shifted from a residential district packed with homes into a stretch of shops.

"Hmm?"

They were just starting to see the plaza in the distance.

Lloyd let out a small sound of doubt and looked around at the shops circling them.

Then he lengthened his stride, drew up alongside Mikhail, and spoke.

"Hey, though."

Mikhail rolled his eyes over to answer the voice. Lloyd looked around one more time and said,

"Why do all the shops here sell magic scrolls on the side? Can't spot a single place that doesn't."

"Ah."

Mikhail let out a small sound and answered in a casual tone.

"The Pokryongse only takes damage from magic… well, from directly discharged mana. That's the only way it goes down."