Only Then Did I Feel Relieved
Only Then Did I Feel Relieved
"Wake up and be ready by 6 a.m. tomorrow. If I knock three times and you don't come flying out, or if you come out unprepared, I'll put you to sleep forever."
Whether it was because they'd eaten their fill for the first time in a while or simply because Alisha's stew was that good, it was only after I'd shoved the kids—whose eyes were starting to regain some life—into their respective rooms that I could finally return to Yans's smithy where my horse was tied up.
Yans didn't even raise horses himself, but he sure loved them. He was grinning from ear to ear as he gave mine some feed, then the moment I arrived he put on a scowl and pretended to be angry.
"You little rascal. You think my house is a stable? Where the hell have you been wandering around all day?"
"Tell me about it. As an apology, you can just keep this one. Now show me a decent practice longsword. I'll buy a replacement."
"The hell is this? Did you wedge it between some wagon wheels? What's wrong with it?"
"It just sort of... happened?"
"I never sold anything that could just end up like this..."
Yans scratched his gleaming bald head in confusion, but still pulled out something suited to my height. It wasn't some hunk of iron made as a practice sword, though. It was a real longsword.
"Huh? This is just a longsword with a dulled edge."
At my visible bewilderment, Yans chuckled and said,
"With your build, it's about time you got used to one of these. Your muscles have filled out enough. Get comfortable with it, and when Asilie gives you permission, I'll sharpen it and touch it up a little."
"But still, the price...?"
"I'll give you a good deal, don't worry. Just 20 copper coins. Later, when you need it sharpened, just give me 5 more."
"Let's just settle all 25 now."
I handed over the silver coin before he could say another word. Even if my eye for appraisal was still lacking, I knew enough to realize a longsword like this would normally cost twice as much. Making a man impulse-buy out of nowhere.
"Good eye, and you do the math fast too. Asilie taught you well."
"And the fact that I managed to learn all of it is what makes me so impressive, isn't it?"
Of course, it wasn't exactly talent that let me learn it all.
After that, I simply went home as always. More time had passed than I expected, but I was satisfied just to have made it back before evening.
"I'm back, Sis."
When I reached the cabin along the forest path, Asilie, who had been milking a goat, welcomed me.
"It took longer than I thought. Did you sort everything out?"
"No more troublesome matters now, but the cleanup's still ongoing."
As I tied up my horse and gave it feed, Asilie, carrying the milk pail into the house, hesitated a moment before asking.
"...Haah. It really is strange to even ask this. But you didn't kill anyone, did you?"
"About five got their legs broken? And one. Their leader. I killed him."
"...Why?"
"He threatened me using you, big sis. So I killed him."
"Couldn't you have avoided killing him?"
"I thought it was better to kill the leader and seize the initiative outright than leave him half-dead, spark a power struggle, and leave room for trouble later. In that sense... no. I couldn't avoid killing him."
If I'd left the top dog half-crippled, the number two could've risen up, and might've even tried to make an example of the one who crippled the leader, all to expand their own influence.
But if the top dog who caused the whole problem got taken out completely, the number two could step in and run things smoothly on one simple condition: don't repeat whatever got the boss killed. Maybe he'd get greedy and cause trouble later, but that would be much farther down the road than if I left the first scenario alone.
I'd killed him based on that reasoning. The fact that it worked too well and there was no number two left at all was unexpected, though.
After I answered and tried to go inside, Asilie still seemed deeply unsettled.
"I've killed plenty of people in my life too. That's part of being an adventurer. Sometimes I fought people more often than monsters. Even so, if I saw a child—especially one who was only 11—killing people whenever he decided it was necessary, normally I would've tried to stop him somehow."
Setting down the milk pail, Asilie twisted a strand of hair around her finger, her face betraying a complicated mix of emotions.
"Even if he used me as leverage to threaten you, I think it would've been right for me to stop you from killing him, even if I had to do it myself... I just don't know. It's probably because I've watched you for the past three years, right? You saying you killed someone just lands on me the same way as hearing an adventurer comrade say they killed a bandit."
"So you want to say that while you want to believe there's no real problem with it, you're also worried that since I really am a child, I might grow up to become some murder-crazed maniac?"
I asked since her tone seemed to imply that. Her eyes widened for a moment, then she let out a hollow laugh and nodded.
"You're always surprising me... Yeah. Honestly, that's what it is."
"It'd be pointless for me to just tell you, 'don't worry'... so if something like this happens again, I'll tell you, Sis. Then let's talk it through together."
"Talk?"
"Yeah. I'll tell you everything: why I think someone has to die, or why I think I need to rough them up, whatever it is. Then you listen and judge whether I'm just relying on violence and killing to solve my problems, or whether I'm actually thinking before I act."
Asilie's instincts really were sharp. My actions and thinking ultimately came from a thirty-year-old man hardened by a lifetime of absurdity, so her comparison to a fellow adventurer was almost dead on. But I still looked like a child, and from the perspective of the guardian who'd raised and taught me, there was no helping her anxiety.
And I had no taste for neglecting a perfectly solvable problem and making my savior anxious.
"If you think my judgment is wrong, Sis, I'll listen to you. Even if you think my reasoning is sound, if you still don't like it, I'll do everything I can to resolve things without killing anyone."
That way, I thought, she could at least worry less about my mental state.
Asilie answered with an embrace. I felt both gratitude and guilt toward her, this woman who wasn't bound to me by a single drop of blood but cared this deeply.
Honestly, I'd expected we'd just live a life of teacher and student for eight years, or maintain an awkward relationship. Though neither Asilie nor I had managed that.
"Right. My little brother is a good, smart kid. Thanks for understanding."
"I'm grateful too."
We put on the brightest expressions we could, wrapped up the day, and moved to have dinner.
The meat stew made with freshly milked goat's milk was as delicious as always.
"But what do you mean, the cleanup is still ongoing?"
"Ah, after I killed the leader, it turned out most of the kids hanging around as his henchmen really were runaways, just like you thought, so I sent them all back. But five genuinely had nowhere to go. One of them was an actual orphan."
"Runaway te—... anyway, so?"
"I'm trying to help them get jobs and just give them a start so they can eat and live. Today, all I did was get them a room at Madam Alisha's inn. But it'll take time for them to settle, so I'll be going into the city more often than before..."
"Good heavens, you should've said that first!"
She shot up from her chair so abruptly, interrupting my savoring of the stew's flavor, that the chair nearly tipped over backward. She hugged me so suddenly I almost spilled the precious stew. But Asilie paid no mind to my bewilderment, simply stroking my head repeatedly.
"Right! There's no way my little brother is some murderer who kills people whenever things don't go his way! Look at all the good things you do!"
"Is it really that big a deal? I didn't even use my own money. I'm using the money I looted after killing the leader. Oh, right, here's the leftover money. 3 silver coins and some copper."
"Good, good! That's more like it. My little brother's always thought slavery was fucking disgusting. A heart like that doesn't just disappear!"
"Why bring that up out of nowhere? You're killing my appetite..."
I couldn't fathom the reason, but anyway, it seemed true that Asilie's worries had eased somewhat, so I decided to be satisfied with that.
◈
At dawn the next day, I got up and headed to Ogwen without breakfast.
It was obvious any job placement wouldn't happen before 7 a.m., so I could return by then and eat with Asilie without being late.
I did belatedly realize, with some concern, that I'd become the kind of lunatic who openly tried to kill people in town. But it was already done, so I decided not to dwell on it. Too much had happened in my life for me to lose sleep over killing one bastard who thoroughly deserved it.
It wasn't even 6 a.m. yet, but there were already plenty of people moving about in Ogwen. Not just the inns and restaurants, but even the grocery supply shops that did business with them were busily preparing to open.
All of those changes had come after the Adventurers' Guild established itself.
In just a single year, amid the many things already changing, even more were shifting rapidly.
"Milena! You busy?"
Amidst that crowd, I waved my arm and greeted a kindly looking woman in her forties. The grocery supply shop Milena ran supplied ingredients to quite a few restaurants and was always busy.
"Well, if it isn't Eldmia. What brings you here at this hour? Been a while. You looking for work again?"
"I'm here to introduce someone else, not me."
"Another kid?"
"Yeah. Picked up some street urchins yesterday, and couldn't stand the sight of 'em, so I figured I'd put 'em to work."
"Kid. This is a food supply shop, street urchins..."
"It's me, Eldmia Ega. I already got them cleaned up yesterday and bought them decent clothes at Tex's shop. You wouldn't know they'd been street kids just by looking."
"Clever as always. But why the sudden street urchins? What, did you take a job from the church this time?"
Just what kind of all-purpose worker did these adults have in their heads that I was? A job from the church. That was tough even for a seasoned adventurer.
"Just because. They're kids like me. When I thought about how I might've ended up the same way if I hadn't had Asilie, I couldn't ignore them."
"My... aren't you kind. Fine. I've been busy lately anyway—street stalls have started popping up around the construction crews, so I've been supplying them too. How many kids are there?"
"Three boys and two girls. The boys are all 14 or older, so they'll be useful fast once you teach them. How about a daily wage of 3 copper coins for the first day? If you're satisfied, 4 copper coins each from then on. How's that?"
"If they work well, I could even give 5 copper coins. But it's physical labor, so the boys would be better. I think I can take up to two."
"I'll be right back~"
After parting with Milena with a cheerful smile, I chatted up every familiar merchant I saw. Truth be told, if conditions were right, it was a good deal for them too. If someone truly excelled at the work, they could always be taken on as an apprentice, and even if average, they were easy to teach. Having no home meant they'd always work hard to cover living expenses, which was a bonus. Finally, it even allowed them to cultivate a reputation in town as 'a virtuous person who gives street urchins jobs and a profession,' so unless they hired a total incompetent, there was no downside.
Even if it wasn't immediate, it was enough to just raise the idea and tell them to think about it when they later heard the kids might be useful. Anyway, for now, I'd focus on placing them in shops that were intensely busy from dawn until around noon. Once they got used to it, they could do other work in the afternoons and save up money.
After exchanging all those greetings, when I arrived, the five kids were waiting for me in front of the inn, fully prepared. That was rather admirable. Seeing as they didn't look particularly tired, they must've slept well.
"If you wake up early, there's plenty more work to do. The places that work all day pay high daily wages, and even if you work just a half-day, you can do other work for the rest of it. That's the kind of thing I'll be teaching you."
I was roughly explaining things as we walked the streets together, having left my horse at the inn.
"...Why..."
One of the girls spoke up. She was the only one who was an orphan like me, a 13-year-old girl.
She had short red hair cut to her shoulders, a few freckles, and sharp eyes—a pretty yet plucky-looking kid. If it weren't for the war, I imagined she'd have been hailed as the neighborhood beauty, cheerfully enjoying days with boys clinging to her. Then again, with looks like that, she might've had the bad luck to catch some lord's eye and suffer something terrible.
"Why are you helping us?"
"That's awfully casual. Getting cocky because I told you yesterday that I'm 11?"
"...Why are you helping us?"
There was an odd lack of fear in her expression as she flinched and corrected her speech. Considering she'd witnessed someone get kicked to death right beside her and was now speaking to the very person responsible for that sight, it was no exaggeration to say she was frighteningly brave. Since I rather liked that pluckiness, I stopped walking and spoke.
"I'm a textbook war orphan. I was 8 when the Demon King's Army launched the first raid that started this whole mess—my village burned, my friends and neighbors died, and I lost my parents too. If anything, I've got seniority on you."
Not just the girl; every kid's expression stiffened. At least they understood just how fucked the situation had been. Few things were worse for working with people than a complete lack of empathy.
"The elf your leader had investigated back then is my benefactor. Without her, I'd have ended up like you or dead—one or the other. She was the chance I got."
Having confirmed their reaction, I started walking again. It was all old history now, nothing to make a big deal of. Three years wasn't a short time.
"I figured you guys were like that because you hadn't met someone like Asilie—I mean, my benefactor, the elf. You just never got your opportunity. So all I'm doing is giving you that opportunity."
Calling it 'helping' felt off. I wasn't a saint or some passionately good person.
"And I'm only tossing you that chance because I can afford to. For now, I'm giving you something I could take back whenever I wanted. It might feel like I'm helping you, but to me it isn't some grand act of charity. It's about that level."
You just happened to catch my eye.
"Obviously, the people of this town mean more to me than you do. If you do a shit job or I decide you aren't cut out for it, I'll throw you out and tell you to get lost. So we still don't know whether this is really going to help you."
I felt like I needed to say at least that much before I could help them with a clear conscience.