Chapter 115
Chapter 115
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 115
Chapter Title: Ethan's Family
-----------------------------------------------------------------
On the road south, a few people were still staring at Arsen like he was some exotic sight, but when the knight waved them off as if shooing flies and scowled, they promptly averted their gazes and disappeared.
It was obvious why he was chasing people away like that. He probably wanted to keep this shady errand under wraps from as many eyes as possible.
Of course, it wouldn't stop the rumors from spreading about him, but for someone not entirely aboveboard, attention was an unwelcome guest.
How long had they walked like that when a black curtain began to blanket the sky, and the green moon started to rise?
The place the knight led Arsen to was a remote corner even by southern standards—a slum light-years away from any notion of wealth.
Reading something in Arsen's steady gaze, the knight spoke up as if pricked by his own conscience.
"It's not half bad, in its own way. Not that it's much to look at, or a place you'd ever want to come back to."
The spot they arrived at featured a single ramshackle house.
It was the sort of utterly ordinary dwelling that could swap places with either of its neighbors without raising an eyebrow.
Standing in front of the house, the knight said,
"Then go take care of your business. Don't drag it out too long."
He added that he hoped Arsen would hurry up and come out.
The knight showed no sign of wanting to follow Arsen inside, which was a real relief.
With potentially sensitive matters to discuss, Arsen had been racking his brain over how to shake off the knights.
"Got it. I'll be right out."
Under the knights' watchful eyes, Arsen knocked on the door.
Politely, but firmly enough to be heard inside—tap-tap-tap.
From within came the voice of a young child calling for their mother.
After a brief wait, someone opened the door.
The first thing he saw was a middle-aged woman with a round face that gave off a plump, kindly impression.
Arsen noted that her hands weren't empty—her right hand, still holding the door half-closed, clutched something.
It was a pouch heavy with some weighty contents, a makeshift blackjack of sorts.
Given the late hour and unexpected visitors, she'd clearly prepared some means of self-defense.
The woman spotted Arsen and startled, tossing the blackjack somewhere behind her.
Since this was supposed to be discreet, Arsen pretended not to have noticed.
"Knight, sir? What brings you to such a humble place...?"
She seemed genuinely shocked that a knight had come looking for her.
To put her at ease, Arsen smiled gently.
Thanks to his natural good looks, his smile tended to win most people over.
Though it sparked jealousy in some.
"I'm Arsen, a knight from the far east. I'm looking for someone named Nidea. Is this the right house?"
Even addressing a lowly village woman far beneath his station, Arsen spoke politely, using honorifics.
He was considering she might be a close relative of Lattis's.
At his courteous demeanor, the woman looked flustered but a bit more relaxed.
"W-well, that's my mother-in-law's name."
"I've brought news of Ethan."
"Ethan?"
Unexpectedly, she seemed puzzled by the name.
Arsen, already on high alert and scrutinizing her, detected no hint of artifice in her expression.
"Ethan... Ethan... Doesn't ring a bell. No one by that name here, and none of my husband's brothers either..."
"Could I possibly speak with Nidea?"
The woman hesitated at his request for a moment, then nodded readily and invited him in.
The typical reaction of a commoner who knew a knight's request was as good as a command.
'What exactly is their connection to Lattis?'
Pondering that, Arsen stepped inside.
The door was small, the ceiling low, so the tall Arsen had to stoop to enter.
He'd brought the Black Lion along too, unsure if someone might snatch it, guiding it by hand. Being larger than a standard jin, it was no small feat.
"Sorry, the house is so cramped."
Once the Black Lion was fully inside at last, the woman bowed deeply as if she'd committed some grave offense.
Arsen waved it off dismissively.
He glanced around the interior, but it was just as ordinary.
Rough wooden walls that would prick you just to touch, furniture cobbled together from haphazardly cut lumber, plain earthenware dishes molded from clay.
A dimly glowing lamp gave off a foul smell from whatever oil it burned.
It must have been dinnertime; on the table sat something like porridge alongside vegetable dishes.
Around it were a girl about Arsen's age, a slightly younger boy, and two children who looked eight or nine.
They all seemed thrown off by Arsen's arrival.
"Wow, what a huge guy! And he's got a magic beast!"
One child pointed at Arsen and blurted it out, only for the girl to clap a hand over their mouth in horror.
"Quiet, Wigo!"
The kid struggled to pull the hand away, frustrated, but the girl's grip held firm.
Ignoring their apologies and bowed heads, Arsen surveyed the room.
"Where is Nidea?"
"In the back."
The woman pointed to a firmly shut door.
Before he entered, she said cautiously,
"But Mother's not quite right in the head these days. Please be understanding..."
"Understood."
Just next to the main room was a tiny side chamber. The first thing visible was the bed.
Worn and shabby, looking as aged as its owner.
The woman sleeping atop it resembled a corpse.
Proof of life came only from faint breathing and the slight rise and fall of her chest.
The woman shook her mother-in-law awake.
"Mother, wake up. A knight's here to see you."
After some gentle patting and shaking, the old woman finally rubbed her wrinkled eyes and stirred.
Her liver-spotted face gained a spark of life, making her look human rather than a corpse at last.
"Eh? Handsome fellow, aren't you? But what's with the giant height?"
It was rude for speaking to a knight, but Arsen brushed it off.
Hunched over in the rundown hovel just to talk to the old woman was tiring enough; he had no patience for such trifles.
"I've brought news of Ethan."
At those words, the old woman's face flooded with shock.
"Ethan? Ethan, you say? Ethan!"
She let out a screech and bolted upright in bed with startling vigor, only to stagger and slump back down.
Watching impassively, Arsen continued.
"I'm not close with Ethan myself. I just happened to be heading this way and was asked by one of his acquaintances to pass along the news."
Arsen relayed exactly what Lattis had told him.
Ethan was doing well and happy, no need to worry, and he still had the horn pipe.
At the mention of the horn pipe, tears began streaming down the old woman's wrinkled face.
"So it's true... that boy Ethan's still alive... What a relief, truly..."
Arsen quietly watched as she broke into sobs.
Strictly speaking, his task was done.
He'd delivered all the news; time to go.
But he didn't leave right away, waiting for the old woman to compose herself.
Once somewhat calmed, Nidea began to speak.
Or rather, to babble nonstop.
"Do you know where Ethan is now? That boy loved meat pies. Whenever I made them, he'd devour them like they were the world's finest. Especially the ones with horn rat meat..."
From there, she rambled on incoherently, as if chatting with a dear friend rather than the Arsen before her.
Her chatter soon turned directly to Ethan.
"I believed in you, Ethan. People said you were mad, said you were dead, but I knew you were alive. I just knew..."
Moments later, she clutched at Arsen's armor, calling him "Papa" and grinning vacantly.
The wild mood swings and disorientation were classic dementia symptoms.
Judging further talk impossible, Arsen turned to the middle-aged woman who'd greeted him—Nidea's daughter-in-law—and asked,
"Is she always like this?"
"Pretty much. It's gotten much worse these last few years."
He'd wanted to ask what sort of man Ethan was, but in her state, conversation seemed futile.
Sifting useful info from her ramblings would be exhausting and time-consuming.
Just as Arsen was about to leave empty-handed, the front door opened, and a man's voice called out.
"Pia, what's going on? There were knights outside..."
"Daddy! Daddy! A super tall guy's here!"
It seemed the woman's husband—Nidea's son—had returned.
Undoubtedly Ethan's brother.
As Arsen emerged into the main room, the middle-aged man, who looked like a working-class laborer, let out a small yelp.
"Are you Nidea's son?"
"Y-yes, sir. Name's Farim."
Arsen repeated that he'd brought news of Ethan.
The man looked puzzled at the name for a moment, then suddenly clapped as realization dawned.
"Ah, right! Ethan!"
"You know him?"
"Yes. My brother. Thought he'd died after running off years ago."
That answer drew an involuntary look of disbelief from Arsen.
Catching the implication—how could he not even remember his own brother's name?—the man explained defensively that Ethan had left over twenty years ago, and with five older brothers above him...
Hearing that, Arsen reflected that he himself didn't remember all his siblings' names.
Just Philus, the half-brother who'd tormented him relentlessly, and Raf Ram, the one he'd been close to; the rest were a blur.
"By any chance, do you remember what kind of person he was?"
It was an odd twist: the messenger asking questions. Sensing the man's confusion, Arsen played it off lightly.
"Just curious. What was he like in his youth?"
The explanation seemed convincing; the man nodded and began describing his brother.
He even shrugged casually, tension easing now that he saw the visitor as a bearer of good news.
"Total weirdo. Even as a kid, he hated being cooped up in a cramped place like this and threw tantrums. Ignored what our parents told him to do, made wooden swords and swung them around. Fought with street toughs sometimes, too."
"Not a mage, then."
"Huh? Of course not."
Seeing the puzzled look, Arsen discarded the hypothesis that Ethan was Lattis's real name.
No one would forget if their brother was a mage.
Arsen chuckled lightly and shook his head; the man took it as a joke.
"Anything else?"
"Then around sixteen, he ran off with a merchant caravan that came to the estate. Haven't heard from him since. I must've been about ten."
"Nothing particularly unusual about him?"
At Arsen's question, the man furrowed his brow in thought.
For a moment, it seemed his memory failed him, but then he shook his head.
"To me, everything about him from one to ten was unusual... Hard to say what stood out most."
After pondering, the man spoke up.
"Come to think of it, you mentioned a mage earlier, and it reminded me. He saw a mage going on an expedition with the estate knights once and said he wanted to be a cool mage like that, getting escorted by knights."
Grumbling that his brother was the first oddball he'd known to see a real mage and think it was awesome, the man added more.
Arsen fought desperately to keep his expression neutral as he listened.
"Then..."
Just as he was about to ask something else, a pounding came from outside.
[It's late! We need to get home too!]
He'd given them a few gems, and already? Arsen swore inwardly but rose obediently.
He'd gotten the key information, after all.
Before leaving, Arsen handed the man a single gold coin.
"Thanks for the talk. Here's payment for your time."
Outside, the knights grumbled about how long he'd taken.
Arsen meekly followed them toward the walls.
All the while, his mind swirled with questions.
'Why did the previous successor ask me of all people to deliver news of his well-being?'