The Savage Land of Greenfall
The war was over. The orc shaman who had been the root of it all had vanished without a trace, and the grimoire he had used was burned to ash before everyone’s eyes.
I stood watching the tome crumble into drifting black cinders when an orc knight approached me.
Before thousands of his kin, the orc knight dropped to one knee and faced me. It was a simple gesture, yet every line of his body carried respect and gratitude.
“Ke a go hlompha.”
I still could not understand the orc tongue, but now I had someone at my side who could.
I glanced sideways. Agul opened his mouth and translated.
“The orcs say they will never forget this debt.”
I gave an awkward smile. Whatever they felt, I had only made the choice to stay alive. I had not fought to save the other orcs, so the weight of their thanks sat a little heavy on me.
The orc knight kept speaking in that incomprehensible language. With Agul translating in real time, I had no trouble following.
“He wishes to name you Great Warrior. Will you allow it?”
“Ah… um. What exactly does Great Warrior mean?”
“It is a title given only to the mightiest of warriors. Gunter, standing before you now, is one of those who hold it.”
“Like an honorary medal, then?”
“Something close.”
“Well… all right.”
I nodded. The orc knight—no, Gunter—brightened at once. It was strange to see him smile when the city he ruled had been reduced to rubble.
Gunter raised his sword high and roared. The other orcs answered with a thunderous cheer.
The ruins of the fallen city were cleared with startling speed, and a village of temporary tents rose in its place. The wounded orcs treated the scars of war like medals; not a single groan escaped them.
The red orcs were executed. Bound in chains after their defeat, they accepted death in silence. Fresh blood soaked the earth where the fighting had finally stopped. Headless corpses were flung into a great pit of fire.
When night fell, Agul came to find me. I had been given a private tent, and inside it gifts left by hundreds of orcs were piled like a mountain.
“Ceris.”
“Agul.”
“The rite is ready.”
I frowned at his stiff, formal speech. I told him to talk the way he always did, but he only shook his head. Now that I carried the title of Great Warrior, he said, he could not dare speak casually.
Outside the tent the great ceremony was already prepared—or, as Agul had said, finished. Solemn silence hung over everything; only our footsteps broke it.
Agul led me to the heart of the ruined city. A massive bonfire burned there. Gunter, armor stripped away, waited with a shaman orc. Thousands of eyes watched us.
I swallowed dryly and walked forward. Gunter watched me approach in silence, then held out a large object wrapped tightly in leather.
I stared at it, stunned. I had not opened it, yet somehow I already knew what lay inside.
“This is…”
“e am ogele.”
“He asks that you accept it.”
Thousands of expectant gazes pressed in on me. I had hoped for a reward, yes—but this felt far too much.
I reinforced my body and took the enormous gift. When I unwrapped the thick hide, Gunter’s own sword appeared, just as I had expected. The blade that had once wrapped itself in storms and poured out lightning. I did not know its true name, but I knew it was no ordinary weapon.
“It’s a little big for me to use…”
I gripped the greatsword in both hands and lifted it toward the sky. Without body reinforcement I could never have held its crushing weight.
In that moment Gunter broke into a radiant smile and began to stamp his feet. The sudden motion nearly made me drop the sword. My complaint never reached him.
Thud—! Thud—! Thud—!
Song rose to match the pounding rhythm. I could not tell who started it, but the melody spread through every orc in moments.
Behind the grand chorus, Agul’s voice reached me.
“They call it Storm Bringer.”
“Storm Bringer?”
“An orc treasure that holds a storm inside.”
“I can’t take something like this… Isn’t there anything else?”
Agul answered by looking silently across the ruined city—buildings burned to black ash, others collapsed by the rampage of the Bone Dragon.
“Unfortunately, he says there is nothing else left to give.”
“What happens if I refuse?”
“They’ll probably follow you around until you accept.”
At that, I pulled Storm Bringer into my arms. Hauling a pack of burly orcs after me would be far worse than carrying one oversized sword.
After the song faded, the next part of the rite began. Agul guided me before the orc shaman. The shaman held a wooden bowl filled with a thick, unidentifiable liquid. Its deep red color made it look like blood.
“He will mark you with the sign of a Great Warrior. Choose a place—face, arm, wherever you like.”
“Do I really have to…? It comes off eventually, right?”
“Of course. It’s only a ceremony.”
I nodded and held out my right hand. The shaman dipped his fingers into the bowl and began painting a strange pattern on the back of my hand with the bright red blood.
When he finished, he seized my marked hand and thrust it high. A roar of cheers erupted from the thousands of orcs. I gave an embarrassed smile.
A hundred-and-forty-centimeter girl, surrounded by thousands of orcs and hailed as a Great Warrior. The picture was more than a little strange.
The moment the rite ended, the festival began. There was no liquor, but there was monster meat brought back from the hunt. The orcs sang at the top of their lungs and danced with exaggerated steps, as if trying to forget the pain of war.
In the small hours, when the festival’s heat began to fade, the songs and dances cooled and the orcs collapsed one by one from exhaustion. They had pushed themselves too hard while the weariness of war still clung to them.
I lashed Storm Bringer beside Nightmare. The horse flicked its tail in clear protest at the heavy weight, but there was no other choice. I could hardly walk around with a sword taller than I was strapped to my back.
“Well then… shall we go?”
I swung onto Nightmare’s back and took the reins. When the war broke out I had thought the Valley of Storms would be closed to me, but now that the fighting was finished I could pass through without trouble.
Thud-thud-thud—!
Nightmare’s powerful legs pounded the dark-red earth. Blood-soaked ground squelched underhoof, and the heavy air mixed with dawn mist to carry a metallic reek.
I looked up. The black smoke that had blanketed the sky was slowly withdrawing before the rising sun. Morning was arriving, as if to announce that the war was truly over.
Brilliant sunlight spilled across the blackened land. As the shadows lifted, the full horror of the battlefield was laid bare. Orc corpses littered the ground, already being torn at by monsters large and small.
I turned my eyes away without a word and rode on, staring only straight ahead.
By the time the mark of the Great Warrior on the back of my hand had faded, I reached the city of Kaum.
Unlike the intact place I had seen before, the city now lay in utter ruin. Orcs who had failed to flee still remained; among the rubble lay the bodies of what looked like grey-skinned orcs.
“Hmm…”
I frowned and rode past the city, heading deeper into the valley. The broad road narrowed with every step. Twin mountains cast deep shadows across the path, and the wind that funneled between them sounded uncannily like a person weeping.
After a long stretch of the narrow trail, a small light appeared far ahead. That light meant the end of the passage. The moment Nightmare and I plunged into it, a vast valley opened before us.
It felt as though my vision had been punched wide open.
At the bottom of the twin valley stood a small altar. The orcs must have held rites here. But that was not what mattered.
I stared across the far side of the valley, mouth hanging open.
“No way…”
I muttered blankly and slid from Nightmare’s back. The horse snorted in complaint, but I had no time for its sulking.
I walked slowly to the edge of the valley. There was nowhere left to set a foot. Only an endless expanse of blue sky stretched out before me.
Sky beneath the earth?
An impossible sight. Yet I could not deny it.
With a trembling hand I picked up a small stone from the ground and flung it out beyond the valley. The stone arced swiftly downward into the blue and vanished into pure white clouds.
In that instant a wind rose from the edge of the world. Cool and clean, it brushed pleasantly through my sweat-damp hair.
“The end of the world…”
Why had the mapmakers called the edges of every continent the end of the world? The reason was simple. Because it truly was the end.
Greenfall was the edge of the world, and beyond the place where this land stopped there was nothing but open blue sky.
I gazed down into that sky for a long while, then turned and mounted Nightmare again. The discovery that this world was flat rather than round had been a considerable shock, yet the shock did not last.
I had been measuring this place by the meager knowledge I brought with me. Once more I was reminded that this was not the Earth I had once lived on.