The Knight Sets Out Once More (5)
"Congratulations."
"?"
For a moment he couldn't imagine what there was to congratulate—and then he understood exactly what the man meant.
"The way of handling a Domain. You've more or less got the feel of it now, haven't you?"
"...Ah."
"What, you didn't even know?"
"...I wasn't paying attention."
"...How deep does your hatred of mages run, that you can sink into it like that?"
"Isn't everyone like this when they're fighting a spell-slinger?"
"What kind of nonsense are you talking?"
"..."
Caesar muttered that it was absurd. Lee Han only scratched his cheek.
Embarrassed?
No.
Isn't it obvious you give it everything you've got when you're killing a spell-slinger?
He had always assumed everyone's focus climbed threefold or more the moment it came time to kill one. Other people aren't like this? He tilted his head.
Lee Han had finally learned how to handle a Domain.
More precisely, it would be truer to say he had grasped it without meaning to, in the instant he drove his concentration endlessly upward for the sake of killing a spell-slinger. Either way, wasn't the important part that he had learned it?
...So even this thing called Domain needs willpower.
The moment he sank in hard to kill the mage, he felt the Domain handled as if it had become his own hands and feet, and he understood. What it required was willpower—a stout rope fierce enough to break the wild bull called Domain. And that, in the end, ran on the same current as Intent.
Even Domain was ultimately a part of Intent, which meant that governing it demanded willpower as well. In short, it was something you overcame with the mind. Caesar could simply have told him not to make it difficult and to settle the thing with willpower, so why circle around it in such an elaborate way...?
The knack must be different.
They might look alike at a glance, but the way you used them was nothing like the same. If Intent was a retriever that listened well and liked people, Domain was a finicky, haughty cat.
Had Caesar told him outright to use willpower, Lee Han would have clung to a single method, stubbornly trying to handle Domain the way he handled Intent, and wasted several more years learning to wield it. He could use it now only because he had not insisted on willpower from the start—because he had repeated his failures and opened his eyes to a new way of applying that will. Otherwise, the realization would have been impossible.
"Thank you."
"Thank me for what? What did I even help you with? But don't get cocky. You're only at the beginning, and you've still got a long road ahead. Entering Domain doesn't mean there aren't plenty of mountains left to climb."
"I know. I'll have to train my willpower hard from here on, too."
"Get more real fights than training."
"...?"
"Willpower is like iron ore that hasn't been worked yet, and the best way to shape ore like that is nothing other than real combat. In the tension of a fight, and in battles against all kinds of people, that willpower of yours will grow firmer. That's the shortcut if you want to get strong fast."
"I don't particularly mean to get strong in a hurry, though...?"
Lee Han's face said there was no rush. Caesar shook his head.
"Those Blood Cross bastards, or whatever they call themselves—after this business, they've surely marked you as a dangerous sort. Seeing as they had a great-sorcerer-class monster with them, who knows how many more of that caliber they've got. And if it were me, I'd throw everything I had at removing a dangerous element like you. ...On the premise of sacrifice."
"..."
"...I'll keep it in mind."
Lee Han didn't argue. He simply agreed.
It wasn't that he had nothing to refute, and so held his tongue. He nodded because he was grateful that the man called the Mercenary King had offered advice like that for no one's sake but his own.
"Well then. Come here."
"Yes?"
"Didn't I say it? You need to taste a real fight. And as it happens, someone far stronger than you is standing right in front of you. A fitting opponent, wouldn't you say?"
"...Oh."
"Well. If you're afraid of getting hit, you don't have to come."
"...Fists only again this time."
"Heh heh. I knew you'd take it."
Lee Han gladly rose to that cheap provocation. Of course he did. How could he not?
He's offering to be a sandbag so I can get stronger. Of course I ought to be grateful!
A student had to show the teacher who had instructed him what rapid progress looked like.
Lee Han clenched both fists hard and lunged. Caesar clenched his the same way and drove out a crushing straight. Boom! The two men's fists crossed once more.
...And so, the next morning, Caesar was simply gone.
Scratch. Scratch.
You okay? Human master.
"I can take it."
Scratch. Scratch.
Good. You got pounded five hours yesterday. Thought I was dead.
"...Now that I look at you, you sly little bastard, you're not worried at all. You're making fun of me."
"Woof, arf...?"
Wh-what is he even talking about...?
Orthrus stopped writing on the sand board, played dumb, and bolted. He fled on the excuse that he was going hunting, and Lee Han clicked his tongue.
"I really ought to catch that thing once and straighten the discipline out..."
He muttered the complaint as he clicked his tongue, but halfway through his mouth hurt so badly he ended up clutching it.
"Aigo..."
"Does it hurt a lot, Sir Knight?"
"...I'm fine. I didn't even get hurt that badly."
"Your face is covered in bruises, though?"
"..."
"And you're breaking out in a cold sweat."
"...Ahem."
"Hehe, don't hold it in, Sir Knight! They say if you endure the pain, you only get sicker!"
"...Yes."
"Hehe, I'll go fetch an ice pouch. Just holding that against it ought to make you feel a little better."
"...Thank you."
Layla headed for the icehouse. The moment she was out of sight, Lee Han clutched his face again.
Hell of a constitution. Seriously.
He rubbed at the sore places, looking thoroughly fed up. In yesterday's sparring he had gone down more than twenty times and passed out five. For all that he had declared he would not be a sandbag, he had only been beaten black and blue. Damn it all.
...As expected of the Mercenary King. The man was on another level.
In truth, he was the one who had taken that beating and lost consciousness in the final round, and when he opened his eyes the sun was blazing overhead. Would anyone believe it? He got up meaning to go another round, only to find Caesar already gone. It had ended with him still defeated, and he could not have been more put out.
Win and run... fights like a real piece of shit.
A mercenary, all right. The air of a man seasoned in the trade was no ordinary thing. Didn't he know exactly how to toy with an opponent?
Lee Han breathed out his praise of the Mercenary King and a sigh that came of itself, and yet neither disappointment nor the sting of defeat showed on his face. He had been thoroughly played with. Even so.
What I gained isn't small.
The irony was that having something to show for it put him in a good mood.
Only...
"He could at least have eaten before he left."
A rematch was a rematch, but a faint regret still lingered over sending the man off without a proper reception. Lee Han had received so much, and given the other man almost nothing in return. It was only natural that he felt sorry.
"Should I go after him even now..."
A soft smack.
"You don't have to. Lord Caesar isn't the sort of person to demand any payment from you, Sir Knight."
"...Well, that's true."
At some point she had brought the cold ice pouch and was pressing it to his face, and he nodded at the soundness of her argument. A man like that certainly wouldn't want anything so trivial as another man's thanks.
"Hehe, when he left I packed him some food, too. Bread, honey, things like that. You don't need to worry so much, Sir Knight."
"...I'm always in your debt, miss."
"Ehehe. Not at all."
Something he had learned of late: the young lady liked being praised. Empty, soulless compliments she sniffed out like a ghost, and she answered only to praise that came from the heart. A curious thing.
A low, thick buzz rolled through the air.
"Oh, the bees are bringing honey. Perfect. We can put it on where you're hurt, Sir Knight."
"I'm fine. Rest in a hot spring like this and I'll be right as... Hm? Miss, what's that?"
"Hmm?"
"That. In your pocket."
"Ah! Right! Lord Caesar said to give it to you!"
"..."
A compass hung from Layla's skirt like an ornament. It looked like an antique, and at a glance like a thing one step from breaking, but Lee Han—who had come by a discerning eye without ever meaning to—could tell it was no ordinary object.
Nothing other than this.
That...
A Sacred Relic. And one of a fairly high grade...
Are Sacred Relics usually this common?
Even a decent noble was said to die without ever seeing one, so why did he keep running into them so easily? Lee Han blinked, dumbfounded, and whether he was or not, Layla wore her usual bright smile and introduced the compass.
"Lord Caesar said this compass is borrowed. He has to return it to its owner, but when it actually came time to return it, he said he didn't have the time. So he hoped that if you had time later, Sir Knight, you'd take it back to the original owner!"
"Hm..."
"Oh, and finding the owner is easy, he said. Just go the way the compass points! Hehe, really simple, right?"
"...Yes. Simple. Truly."
"Hehe."
Whether she was pleased with her own memory, Layla looked satisfied, and Lee Han smiled because the sight was cute—while on the other hand he wanted to click his tongue.
That old man really is a mercenary.
He had piled up a debt of the heart so there was no refusing, and then he had left. Not an ordinary degree of cunning. Anyway.
A mercenary, all right. He doesn't do anything that costs him.
...It seemed Lee Han's next destination had been decided.