Chapter 27
Chapter 27
HOW many weeks and months had passed since Yuki met Vigo and Selena? When did she realize Vigo, who she found dreadfully scary at first, could never stand up to Selena’s smile? When did she learn Selena tended to say complicated and hard to accept things with a smile? Despite everything she had learned about them in their time traveling and camping out together since she was entrusted into their care, she never found out how strong they were.
Once she discovered this truth, she felt she should have noticed earlier. All the signs of them being more than your average traveler were blatantly visible. They had both been soldiers in Rvydom’s military. Rvydom had lost the war—they had survived a lost war in a land now under the control of their enemy.
***
RACING her horse out of the narrow mountain pass to the downhill clearing where she parted with Selena, Yuki yanked back on the reins and stopped from going farther. How many bandits had attacked Selena? Bodies were strewn down the hill and around the clearing. The bodies still squirmed and wriggled on the bloodstained ground. If that wasn’t just a reflex and they were still alive, they had lost pints of blood and were close to death.
Dead center of the clearing and the bodies, Selena danced. Blood drenched her armor and stained her face. An eerily gleeful smile was plastered on her face. She wielded her sword as if it were an extension of her body and cut down another man and then another one directly after him with such accuracy only one hit knocked them out of the battle for good.
What’s…going on?
The bloodbath playing out in front of her needed no explanation, but Yuki had a hard time stomaching the gore. Her mind couldn’t keep up with the obvious. She froze on the back of her horse, and he neighed warningly. Someone had followed her.
“Yuki, are you unharmed?”
“Eh? Ah, yes. I’m fine,” Yuki answered in shock.
Vigo eyed her carefully before squinting in Selena’s direction.
“I see the Mad Dog is still going strong.”
Mad Dog?
Yuki turned in her saddle to find Touta standing behind them.
“I’m not disrespecting her,” he explained. “When Selena served in Rvydom’s military she went by the name Mad Dog. She was the object of the troop’s admiration.”
“Admiration?”
“Yeah. You see the way she can cut down people like it’s a game? If only we could all be so skilled,” Touta said dreamily as though he wished to kill men like it was a fun game too.
Yuki shuddered in her saddle, her legs shaking in their stirrups. Her eyes darted back to Selena. She was taking on the remaining two men at the same time. The deranged smile on her face chilled Yuki to the core.
Why would people aspire to become someone who can happily cut down others?
During her months traveling with Luca and then Vigo, Yuki was no longer a complete stranger to the battlefield. She witnessed gore, death, and people being hurt for the enjoyment of others more than once. She was no innocent party either as her arrows had pierced their fair share of enemies, but she was too afraid to purposely kill.
“If we don’t kill them, they’ll kill us. You can’t protect anything if you have no intention of fighting back,” Luca told her when she shook in her boots during her first battle.
“But I don’t want to kill anyone! I’d rather die!” she raged at him.
“Then aim for their arms and legs. Lower their morale,” Luca instructed her.
“But—”
“Don’t think something stupid like you don’t want to hurt them. If you don’t do it, they might end up hurting me or the people traveling with us. Would you prefer one of your friends to suffer instead of your attacker? Remember, they have no issue hurting or killing us.”
Since that conversation with Luca, Yuki stopped hesitating to shoot people. Hitting her target had even started to make her happy inside. One enemy down meant the threat to her comrades had been decreased.
But I’ve never thought it was fun to hurt people.
Internally, she always apologized for hurting them. But they had left her no choice but to shoot them to protect herself and the people around her. Glancing around the clearing, she couldn’t find a single person who had qualms with Selena’s look of joy while slaughtering her enemies.
“Vigo! Praise me!” Selena shouted, snapping Yuki out of her absent wanderings. Alone in the bloody, body covered clearing, she shook her hands methodically. Fresh blood splattered from them onto the ground. “I didn’t kill anyone! Praise me! Praise me!”
Vigo sighed with relief and strolled into the clearing with a smile. “You put on a good fight. But you shed too much blood. Are you trying to ruin your efforts by making them die of blood loss?” He examined the bodies along the path to Selena and handed her a clean cloth. “Look, you got your armor all dirty again.”
“Ahaha. Old habits die hard,” Selena trilled.
That’s a habit? Only Yuki couldn’t follow the abnormal situation.
“We’ll treat the bandits with severe wounds to keep them from dying. Help me out,” Vigo addressed the men with Touta. “Selena, go wash that blood off before you get sick.”
The men behind Yuki happily complied and ran over to attend to the bloodied bodies. After she absently watched them go, her slow mind finally registered she should help out. She ran over to the nearest injured person.
“A-Are you okay?”
“Yuki! Don’t do anything! Keep from touching them!” Vigo yelled. Yuki flinched, her hand hovering in place over the injured man. Depression hit her in a terrible wave over doing something wrong. He quickly amended his tone, “Ah, sorry. I can’t make you help out with something like this. Go help Selena clean up.”
How could she stay hurt when he seemed to regret the tone he took with her?
“Okay. Is it all right to go to the river we passed earlier on the trail? It’s not too far away. Selena, let’s go.”
Selena laughed maniacally, her adrenaline still pumping under all the blood coating her. Yuki pinched the only spot on her sleeve that had less blood on it and tugged. Selena wiped most of the blood from her face and right hand and took Yuki’s hand in hers.
“The blood will get on my horse if we ride, so let’s walk there,” Selena exclaimed.
***
YUKI kept her back turned to Selena while she bathed in the bubbling river. The initial reason for not looking was to respect Selena’s privacy, but the real reason Yuki didn’t want to admit was how scared she was to look at her. Merely closing her eyes and the spine-chilling carnage replayed. The number of deaths she witnessed since coming to this world increased a hundred times from the few funerals for relatives who had passed away while she was in Japan.
I can never get used to people killing people. Especially when they are people I’m traveling with. But death is normal in Aridol. If you don’t kill your enemy, they will kill you and your friends.
Yuki kept her eyes closed and tried to convince herself there was a meaning behind all the death. The rustling trees, bubbling river, and sound of Selena splashing water over her body had taken the place of the screams she had heard earlier. Who would think a terrible tragedy had taken place in the serenity here?
Maybe I’m the weird one? The horror of their battle isn’t counted as a tragedy or disturbance here. They consider the stillness of the forest and the ferocity of the battlefield one and the same. That’s why…that’s why they can all be so calm while bathed in blood and taking lives.
The bile she kept down with sheer willpower threatened to come back up.
A cheerful voice cut through the images of severed arteries. “Hey, Yuki, did I scare you?”
“Huh?!” Yuki croaked, jumping at the sudden question.
Selena laughed aloud. “Looks like I shocked you pretty bad. I heard from Vigo that you were worried about me. Silly girl. I told you to only think of yourself.”
“How could I?!” She wanted to protest against Selena’s laughter, but couldn’t find the right words to get her point across. But as the frustrated feelings weighed down on her, the anguish and shame boiled inside her gut.
“It’s been ages since someone last worried about me. It’s kind of nice to know someone cares.”
“R-Really?”
“Really. I’m sorry for scaring you. You must have come from a country with little war, huh?” Selena’s calm voice blended with the sound of flowing water.
“I-I did. We went to war with other countries in the past before I was born, but I think it was fairly peaceful while I was there.”
Crimes still occurred in Japan, but the Swords and Firearms Control Law prevented any major incidents from coming to her attention in her lifetime.
“I never really liked cutting people much. Regardless of those feelings, I had to train and get stronger, so I forced myself to view it as something fun until my mind became twisted enough to believe it. Before I knew it, everyone started calling me Mad Dog! Once I take my sword in hand, I stop thinking about anything else. Disgusting, aren’t I?” she laughed self-derisively.
“You know, my commander used to love bloody fighting styles. The bloodier, the better. And they grinded that method into me too… There’s no need for me to kill anymore, but once you’re dyed with blood you can never get it off. It sticks with you… Ahaha, what am I even saying to you?!” Selena added forceful cheer to her tone. Yuki’s heart dropped. “Silly girl. You shouldn’t come near me.”
Why did Yuki think their tragic world was the norm for them? Guilt ridden and ashamed of her earlier thoughts, the blood went to her head.
I really am a spoiled child. The foolishness of believing everyone was okay with being covered in blood was the epitome of her naïve thinking. There’s no way they are fine. Selena is in so much pain for what she has done and even admitted she doesn’t enjoy hurting people. Why didn’t I notice something so obvious? I just assumed they were okay with it because they can do it. I’m so sorry.
Further shame assaulted her for not being able to apologize aloud and tears threatened to spill from her eyes.
“If only war didn’t exist,” she muttered to herself, blaming war for her naïveté.
How much happiness would have been in this world if war hadn’t brought them despair?
What Yuki failed to realize at the time was that despair was the predecessor to war, which only bred more despair.