A Man's Growth, Astonishing to Behold (6)
“If there’s something you want to ask, ask all you like.”
“?”
Lee Han wondered what the man was suddenly on about.
“…Out of nowhere?”
The two of them sat facing each other over the herbal tea a maid had brought. After the spar they had kept their silence and never quite managed a conversation worthy of the name, but it was not because things were awkward between them. Lee Han needed time to grow used to the Domain he had only just awakened, and Caesar, knowing the state he was in, had simply stayed quiet.
Then, just as Lee Han was beginning to get a feel for Domain, Caesar spoke to him out of nowhere—and in a tone that somehow felt like mockery.
“You tell the man who lost all twenty-six rounds to go ahead and ask the questions. How the hell am I supposed to take that? …How should I take that.”
“Ho. Back to the polite speech, are we?”
“A minute ago my head was on fire, and you looked shady, strange, and mean as a snake, so I ran my mouth. …Right now you look a little more normal.”
“…Isn’t that a harsh way to treat a man?”
“Which is why I’m being polite again.”
“…First the knife, then the bandage. Unbelievable.”
Caesar grumbled, but in truth he hardly seemed to care about Lee Han’s attitude. Lee Han knew it.
How?
Simple to the point of stupid—but talking with your fists really is the sure thing.
Trust had built between Lee Han and Caesar. They had crashed into each other body to body and come to know one another, and somewhere in the midst of it respect and trust had taken root toward each other. If they had merely traded blows while slandering one another and leaking killing intent, that feeling would never have formed.
Brother Dokgo said it. The depth of a relationship doesn’t depend on how many times you meet. It depends on how sincerely you treat each other.
It was just as he had said. Their “conversation” had been violent, yet it had its rules, and neither of them broke those rules. Trust grew between them because of it, and respect sprouted from the weight carried in fists that held no cowardice. And so, though they had not known each other for even half a day, Lee Han and Caesar had become the sort who could face each other and waste words on idle talk. They had treated each other with sincerity. They had learned each other’s inner selves, and the lives they had lived, by colliding with their bodies.
Because of that—
“Forget it. What questions? Then the Mercenary Catechism wouldn’t mean a thing.”
“True enough. But I offered the Mercenary Catechism because there was no such thing as trust between you and me. Now, though—you and I trust each other, at least to some degree, don’t we?”
“…….”
“The catechism was only a process. A process two men who had no relationship at all needed, if they were to grow close. Am I wrong?”
“…A little hard to agree, from the side that got beaten one way.”
“Hahaha!”
And so he already had no choice but to agree with those words.
…Except.
“Thing is, I don’t particularly have anything I’m curious about. Sincerely…”
“?”
The trouble, such as it was, was that Lee Han truly had nothing he wanted to ask.
The Mercenary Catechism—no, the spark that had started their quarrel—had been Caesar’s provocative question.
That did not mean the question itself had gotten under Lee Han’s skin.
If anything, the opposite.
“What grated on me was a stranger I’d just met showing up out of nowhere and acting and talking like he was picking a fight. I don’t think there’s anything I’m particularly curious about.”
“…So it didn’t particularly bother you that I said I’d kill Baltar?”
“No. It doesn’t.”
“H-he’s your master, isn’t he?”
“He’s not.”
“…….”
“You really didn’t hear a word I said. That man is not my master. An acquaintance, if you stretch it—but an acquaintance this close to an enemy.”
There was something everyone misunderstood alike: that Lee Han and Baltar were close, or that they respected each other. They were not. They had fought countless times and talked a great deal, and even so—
“We never once showed each other sincerity.”
“…….”
“We only fought, and traded a bit of idle talk. That is all we are.”
Put into words, it grew solid. Yes. To Lee Han there was no one quite so ambiguous as Baltar. Close, if one insisted they were close—and yet not simply close. If the man asked him to eat, he would eat; he would not invite him home and go out of his way to share a table. If he asked for help, Lee Han would help; he would not help with a true heart. And even then—
“If that man dies? It would leave a bitter taste. Someone I know would be dead. But I don’t think I’d actually be sad. Even if I heard he was dead, give it an hour or two and I’d probably eat just fine.”
“…I hate to be the one to say it, but isn’t that too cold?”
“Cold? I’m being honest, and you had the two of us wrong, so I set it straight. Roast him or fry him, suit yourself. It’s outside my concern.”
“…So this is what they call one-sided love…”
“Pardon?”
“Nothing. I wasn’t speaking to you.”
“?”
“That Baltar. For the first time, I almost feel sorry for him.”
“??”
Lee Han was not particularly curious. Caesar could not afford to be the same. How a man called the Mercenary King had ended up in the position of wanting something, he could only wonder—and then, what else was there to do?
“I came all the way to Vulcan because I received a certain commission.”
The one who wanted something had to be the one to open his mouth.
“I told you that you don’t have to say it.”
“You may be fine with it. I have business with you. What would you have me do?”
“You live an exhausting life. A Mercenary King ought to live comfortably.”
“I wanted to. This client is someone I dare not defy.”
“…Defy?”
The word itself was one used only toward a superior. Thinking of that, Lee Han could only blink. It was a deference impossible to imagine coming out of the Mercenary King’s mouth.
That man has someone above him?
Age aside, the Mercenary King was a legendary mercenary, a great figure whom even emperors and kings could not treat lightly. His personal strength was one thing. He also commanded the whole of the mercenaries, a vast warlord power, and the mercenaries who revered him alone could overturn two or three kingdoms. So it was strange. What manner of great figure could dare to handle the Mercenary King?
“The Martial God, then?”
“Hah. The Martial God? He’s nothing but a dead man. And more than that, I don’t particularly respect the late king. I never swore him loyalty to begin with.”
“…I heard you came from the White Dragon Knight Order.”
“A past that still disgusts me.”
“…….”
Caesar snorted, as if he had heard something that was not even funny. As if he loathed it.
“Of those who entered that White Dragon or whatever knight order, not even half joined of their own will. Every one of them was forced in.”
“What?”
“The White Dragon Knight Order. More than half the bastards who joined lost to Baltar and were forced into the order. Myself included.”
“…….”
“Ridiculous, isn’t it. I never even wanted to be a knight, and they made me one by force and hung titles on us—the strongest this, the strongest that. There isn’t a clown so clownish. No.”
“…….”
…In a way, it was a story that answered a certain question. As a rule, truly extraordinary people had strong selves and a strong dislike of belonging to any organization. He had wondered how men that extraordinary, that self-willed, could ever be gathered into one and made into an order called the White Dragon Knight Order….
…They were gathered by force?
A founding with not a scrap of romance in it.
“Want to know what’s even more absurd? The only way to leave the White Dragon Knight Order is to make that bastard Baltar submit and become captain yourself. …Utterly revolting.”
“…That man really was a vicious one.”
…It did not feel like someone else’s affair. Somehow Lee Han thought his situation and Caesar’s were alike. Had he not entered the Silver Lion Knight Order because he lost to Baltar? Even the conditions for leaving were the same….
“Only after the late king died was the White Dragon Knight Order forcibly disbanded, and the whole thing fizzled into nothing. Even so, to the knights who came out of it, Baltar is as good as a mortal enemy. He forced a collar onto our necks, and even now, with the order dissolved, he left us the humiliation of feeling as if that collar is still there.”
“…Is that why you’re trying to kill that old man?”
A reason like that, he felt, he could almost accept.
But.
“It plays its part. But that alone is not why I mean to kill him.”
“…….”
In Caesar’s eyes as he said it, there was a decision hardened somewhere deep. A conviction that did not waver—no exaggeration to call it resolve.
“Well? Curious now, about why I mean to kill him?”
“Not about that.”
“…No fun at all.”
“Unpack old history all you like. I hope the grudge sorts itself out between the people it belongs to. More to the point—who exactly is the client?”
Who was it, that they had business with him and could place a commission with the Mercenary King? When he asked that—
“Hm. It isn’t as if the matter has nothing to do with you. You can use this art, can’t you?”
Ting—
He tapped the teacup lightly with a fingertip, and the tea inside shot up like a fountain.
Splash!
The same art that had shattered rock while they grilled and ate fish, condensed small. Control of exquisite fineness.
“The Weighted Strike Method…”
“So that’s what you call this technique? Its original name is the Raging Bear Paw.”
“…The name is a bit…”
“Rustic. I know. More importantly, did you learn this technique from Baltar?”
“…I just saw it and roughly copied it.”
“Good. He didn’t pretend it was his own.”
“Was that originally your technique, too?”
“No. I learned it as well. To be precise, from my brothers.”
“?”
Brothers?
Lee Han thought he meant the men of the mercenary company, but he knew at once that it was not. In the next moment the ring Caesar drew from his breast offered the hint. Carved into the ring was an engraving that symbolized the Light of Radiance.
“The world calls my brothers this. The shield of light, and holy warriors who crush evil with their fists. By another name….”