Chapter 27

Translator: Willia

The overcast sky stirred up an angry wind, as though it were about to summon a storm.

A torn banner stood planted in the ground, snapping wildly in the wind, while broken spears, weapons, and corpses littered the field.

Someone stood alone amid the chaos. The ragged cloak draped around him whipped just as violently as the torn banner.

Not one of the elite soldiers who prided themselves on never having known defeat dared approach him rashly, even from a distance.

Then, at some point, the heavens rumbled, Rrrrumble!

At the same moment, the lone man thrust his hammer high toward the sky. Lightning struck him.

KABOOM!

For one fleeting instant, the entire world flashed pure white, followed by a tremendous explosion. No matter how many times they heard it, it was a deafening roar they could never grow used to.

Everyone squeezed their eyes shut and turned their heads away. When they opened them again and looked at the lone man, their hearts trembled with fear.

How could a human being do such a thing? As though he had somehow snatched lightning itself from the heavens, the hammer in his hand blazed with dazzling light and crackled with electricity.

Crackle. Crack-crackle. Rumble. Rrrrumble!

The crackling of electricity and the low growl of thunder radiated from a single man. Worse still, his two eyes gleamed with flashes of light and ceaselessly spat out electricity. He could hardly be said to have the form of a human being.

When such a man roared, it felt as though thunder were crashing not in the distant heavens above, but right there before them.

“Come out! Valery! You cowardly bastaaaard!”

The man's shout seemed to hammer directly against the hearts of those facing him.

Everyone trembled with fear and shuffled backward, until Valery walked out from among the soldiers.

But there was a girl beside Valery.

The girl was trembling in fear, while Valery calmly kept an arm around her shoulders.

At the sight, the lightning the man had gripped so fiercely scattered into nothing. His eyes returned to normal, and that overwhelming presence vanished as though it had never existed.

“Drop your weapon, Torvald.”

Valery spoke.

A moment later, the man called Torvald hurled his hammer far away, then dropped heavily to his knees as though utterly devastated.

Valery released the girl beside him and walked toward him.

“Y-Your Highness.”

His startled subordinates hurried to stop him, but Valery continued forward without the slightest hesitation.

When he reached Torvald, Valery looked down at the man's bowed head and said,

“To possess power like that, only to waste your life as some carpenter. That is your sin.”

Torvald did not fully raise his head. He merely looked up at Valery with bitter, resentful eyes and said,

“There's no point telling you. You wouldn't understand. Someone like you could die and come back to life, and you still wouldn't understand.”

“Whether I understand or not, if you'd come under my command, many lives could have been spared. Every sacrifice until now was the result of your foolishness, not mine.”

At Valery's reply, Torvald's shoulders shook as he let out a low chuckle.

“That's why I said you wouldn't understand. One who walks his path by the light of his own true nature knows neither goodness, nor evil, nor folly. He simply walks his own path.”

“You're saying being a carpenter is your true nature?”

“Enough talk. Kill me.”

“You don't even need to say something like, ‘Spare my granddaughter’?”

“I live and do what is mine to do while I'm alive. What happens after I die is yours to decide. What more would I add?”

His answer sounded detached, but it was not devoid of love.

“For the record, I didn't bring your granddaughter here by force. She came of her own accord. Seems she loves me. And I'm a man incapable of love.”

“......”

Whether the man called Torvald simply no longer wanted to answer Valery or had fallen into despair, he said nothing.

In a way, it was an exceptionally cruel thing to say. Especially in a situation like this.

Valery stood there for a moment, then drew his sword. The sword named Gramr.

As he stepped beside the kneeling Torvald to behead him, Valery said,

“I may not have understood anything else, Torvald, but there was one thing I did understand. You would gladly die for your granddaughter.”

“Shut your mouth and swing!”

Torvald shouted, baring his neck.

Gramr fell upon him. So did his head.

To the many people watching, the sight was unbelievable. They simply could not believe that a man who had unleashed such tremendous power could die so easily.

Torvald the ‘Thunder-Herald’. He had not been a member of the Royal Guard, but if, for convenience's sake, those with superhuman power were all called Einherier, then he had unquestionably been the strongest among them.

In other words, he had been the strongest man in the world.

A man who carried thunder and lightning with him, who had beaten four Einheri to death with his hammer, and who had dominated a battlefield alone against an entire army.

And yet that man had allowed a Prince to take his head, all to save his granddaughter. People could not understand it.

Then what was it that Valery himself had failed to understand? Now, he thought he might finally be beginning to see.

“Wid.”

Arne gave him a light nudge from beside him. Valery, who had been gazing up at the cloudy sky, came out of his thoughts.

“What are you looking at?”

“......Trying to see the first raindrop fall?”

Arne thought it was a pointless remark and simply let it pass, then jerked his chin toward something.

Valery turned and saw a little boy holding out something wrapped in paper. When Valery took it, the boy held out his hand for payment.

“Got any coin?”

When Valery asked, Arne handed the boy a copper coin for him. The boy took the money and ran off into the distance.

Valery unfolded the paper, revealing something grotesque inside. It was so grotesque that, at first, he had to stare closely at it for quite a while to figure out what it was.

“Isn't that a pig's teat?”

Skard said from beside him.

Once Valery realized what it was, he simply tossed it onto the ground.

“Those are supposed to be a delicacy when you roast them. Nice and chewy.”

Yorik said regretfully, eyeing what had been thrown away.

“Don't ever eat that.”

“Anyway, who sends something like this? Gives me the creeps.”

“You lot should keep your heads down for a while.”

“All of a sudden?”

“For the time being, don't even train inside the citadel. Go outside to do it. Practice riding or something.”

“Why? Something going on?”

“When it rains, you take shelter. Take good care of Knut while I'm gone.”

Since Valery would soon be heading out on patrol, he would not be in Torvik.

“You've got to tell us what's going on if you expect us to know what to watch out for.”

That was the trouble. It was hard to explain. How was he supposed to explain away the Second Young Lord's death? It was not that he distrusted his friends, but if he told the truth to all three of them, word was bound to leak out.

“You'll find out when the time comes. Arne, you hold on to the jewels.”

Valery still had jewels he had not managed to sell, so he entrusted them to Arne.

And just then, the first raindrop landed softly on Valery's cheek.

It began to rain.

Rain fell outside the window.

The wooden shutters had been left open, so the steady patter of rain could be heard, along with the crackle of firewood burning in the hearth.

While Valery idly wondered why the sound of rain was so pleasant, someone entered the guest wing's war room.

He was a man in his forties or thereabouts, with a long scar cutting across his bushy beard. His impassive eyes carried the air of a veteran who had been through every hardship imaginable.

He held a large roll of parchment in one hand and offered the other for a handshake.

“I'm Tankred.”

“I'm Wid.”

Only now were they properly introducing themselves, though in truth, they had met before. Tankred had been the first person to speak to Valery after he began staying in the guest wing. He had shown him where the dishes were kept, asked how old he was, and complimented his horse.

He swept aside what was on the war room table, then immediately spread the large parchment over it. It was a roughly drawn map of Duke Sven's directly ruled lands, Nordlanding and Krisher.

Nordlanding was the county containing Torvik, and going on patrol meant making the full circuit all the way through Krisher as well. That was why Tankred had brought the map.

“Take a look around the east. It's about time someone made the rounds there again. The eastern road is comparatively safe. You'll need to check here, here, here, here, and here. Just see whether the people are getting by. Whether there've been any Bandit or Monster attacks, whether the Rangers are still alive. If the Marcher Knights or villagers start complaining about this hardship or that, just listen with half an ear and move on. There's nothing you can do for them anyway.”

A patrol was exactly what the word implied: going around and taking a look. Unless there was some major irregularity such as plague, famine, or fighting, there was no reason to involve oneself unnecessarily in local problems.

“This road is fairly safe, but be careful when you pass through the ‘Thunder Forest’ here. You won't be able to ride your horse as freely as you please. If you run into Exiles, don't start trouble with them first. As long as you don't bother them, they probably won't bother you either.”

Outside lands directly ruled by a Lord, local village communities sometimes punished criminals with Banishment.

Exiles ended up living in forests or mountains, and all manner of things happened there.

Some abandoned their humanity and ate human flesh, some gathered together into Bandit gangs, while others established rules of their own and formed new communities.

Every eerie tale associated with the forests, from Werewolves to Witches who devoured children, was tied to Exiles.

Tankred glanced at Valery once before speaking.

“I'm not doubting your skill, but there's a fellow in the Exile village here who knows how to use his fists. New knights used to charge at him without knowing any better and come back beaten to a pulp. He's not completely unreasonable, so if you happen to meet him, treat him with respect. Then you shouldn't have any trouble.”

“Would that man's name happen to be Torvald?”

“How do you know that?”

“Mm, I've heard rumors.”

“Rumors? He's not famous enough for his name to be that widely known. Anyway, since you've brought him up, he's a man who can beat a knight senseless with his bare hands. To be frank, I'm warning you this thoroughly because you're young, and I worry you don't yet know how dangerous the world can be. Everyone knows you're highly skilled if you killed The Ball-Ripper one-on-one, but this man Torvald is different.”

Valery gave a faint smile as he replied.

“I probably know better than anyone just how strong he is.”

How could he not? He had seen with his own two eyes the sight of Torvald single-handedly smashing Valery's army apart. On top of that, the man had beaten four Einheri to death, and two of them he had fought and killed at the same time.

“......Have you met him before?”

“Well, not yet.”

Tankred thought that sounded rather strange, but soon nodded and let it pass.

“Just think of it as going out to see the sea and take it easy. That doesn't mean you should let your guard down too much. You know what I mean, don't you?”

“I'll keep it in mind.”

“Good. Leave once the rain stops. Come to think of it, maybe it's because of the rain, but there's been no word from the people who went to Grinnen.”

“It's only been a day.”

“That's true enough. The best of the younger fellows went, so I doubt anything's happened to them.”

“......”

“If you need any equipment, tell me. And if there's anything else you want to ask, come find me whenever you like. I'll be going now. I'm busy.”

“Understood. Thank you.”

Valery bid farewell to the veteran knight. Tankred rolled the map back up and carried it out with him.

With a clack, the door shut, and silence settled in. No, rather than silence, the sound of rain and the crackle of the fire filled the war room.

A moment later came the low rumble of thunder. Just like that day.