The Gates of Jefran

"That's right! That's right! That's you! You're our junior! You damn well are!"

"Listen to him talk pretty. Face as handsome as his words."

Ilekdra broke into a bright grin. Jeina, her mood lifted as well, wore a gentle smile.

"Senior Ban, I look forward to working with you too."

I addressed Ban last. He regarded me with a blank expression for a moment — maybe he didn't care for the title — then turned his head slightly and opened his mouth.

"If there's anything you don't know about the sword, I'll teach you in place of these amateurs."

"This bony bastard just casually looked down on me?"

"Hey, you finished? Looking down on Jeina I can understand, but you're looking down on me?"

"You tattooed hog — you want to die first?"

And there they went again. Delinquents who brawled from sunup to sundown, living up to every word of their infamous reputation. We shared a master, but I had no intention of getting tangled up with them any more than I had to — Dreygan had warned me as much.

I cracked my Third Eye open on them, just a sliver. Rough, roaring life flames blazed off their bodies. Huge. These people had so much vitality it dwarfed even a mid-sized monster.

They said they couldn't take down a mid-sized monster alone...

...These three could take one down and have plenty left over. There was an age gap with Maria, but all three of them were stronger than she was. At my current level, I wouldn't stand a chance. Dreygan had raised a pack of monsters.

"Seniors — you're not heading to the capital?"

With skill like theirs, they could have gone to the capital and then some. That they were still sitting in Laoren struck me as strange. Their old rivals, Golden Coral, had already left for the capital, after all.

"The capital, huh?"

Ilekdra scratched the back of his neck.

"Why bother?"

Jeina shrugged, looking equally unimpressed.

"We've been at our master's side since we were children."

Ban, at last, gave me a proper answer.

"If Master returned to the capital, that would be one thing. As it stands, we have no reason to go. We're better off staying here and learning more from him."

I wondered how the three of them had ended up as Dreygan's disciples. I didn't know the details, but there was clearly a long history woven through it.

"What? Don't tell me our cute little junior wants to go to the capital?"

Jeina's question made me pause. Did I want to go to the capital? Honestly, I wasn't sure. The capital was a place ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠so far from me it might as well have been another world. But the day would come when I had to go. There was only so far I could get hunting monsters in Laoren. If I wanted to survive, the capital was inevitable.

"Yes. I think I will."

"Our junior's going to make it big! I mean, he's already taking down mid-sized monsters! Of course he's going to make it big!"

Ilekdra had taken a real shine to me, apparently, because he bellowed it at the top of his lungs. His voice was so loud that every head in the vicinity snapped toward us — then snapped right back the moment they saw who was shouting. Nobody wanted to get mixed up with the delinquents. On that point, at least, everyone agreed.

"Come to think of it, I hear monster hunters are coming down from the capital to support this one."

Ban offered that unexpected scrap of news.

"From the capital? Why would they bother?"

"Rumor has it one of the large-class monsters here is worth a fortune."

A large-class monster valuable enough to draw hunters all the way from the capital. I didn't know what it was, but it was bound to be dangerous. With monsters, the higher the bounty, the deadlier the beast.

"Oho. So this is our junior's chance to make a name for himself with the capital hunters."

Ilekdra's expectations for me were getting out of hand.

"Hey. All three of you, look over there. We're almost there."

I turned in the direction Jeina was pointing. Far ahead, the city walls came into view. The western city. We had finally arrived at Jefran.

Smoke was curling up over the battlements. From the look of it, things inside the city were already a mess. Small monsters had been spotted in droves even outside the walls.

"All units, prepare for combat!"

At Krevan's shout, the monster hunters drew their weapons as one. I unstrapped the shield from my back and settled it into place — the shield Oble used to carry.

"Junior, you don't seem to have a weapon."

Ilekdra, hefting his massive battle axe, had noticed that my hands held nothing but gauntlets.

"The gauntlets will do."

"Waha! Listen to that confidence! I like it!"

"At least he's not all talk, unlike a certain balloon-muscled loudmouth."

I left the two of them winding up for another fight and fixed my eyes ahead. The small monsters had already caught sight of us and were charging. Running at a force of hunters this size without a shred of fear — that was monsters for you.

"Laoren hunters!"

Krevan roared with everything he had.

"Run wild!"

"WAAAAAAAAAH!"

The hunters surged forward on his command. In a heartbeat, small monsters and hunters were a single tangled mass. They cut the creatures down with every kind of weapon imaginable. Small monsters were what hunters faced most often; no hunter worth the name feared them.

And among that chaos, three figures stood out above all the rest.

Every time Ilekdra swung that battle axe — a weapon as big as the monsters themselves — a beast simply burst apart. Jeina was no different. She whirled a pair of enormous longswords like a windmill, and every small monster that came near her was carved to pieces. Their weapons had the reach to match their frames, and the other hunters scrambled backward in alarm, terrified of getting caught in the sweep.

Ban, unlike the other two, moved with an almost supernatural gait. A few steps were all he needed to close the distance, and then his blade flicked out and punched through a monster's weak point. A keen sword. And the piercing power behind those thrusts rivaled anything the other two could do.

I had known the delinquents were strong in a vague, abstract way. The reality was beyond anything I had imagined. Maybe my eye for these things had sharpened as I grew. They occupied an entirely different tier from the hunters around them.

I couldn't just stand there and watch. This was a chance to absorb small monsters, and in a melee like this, not many people would be watching me too closely.

I opened my Third Eye to pick out a suitable target — and a single violet-black flame snagged my attention. In the thick of the fighting, surrounded by ordinary small-monster flames, this one burned far larger than the rest. It was practically mid-class in size, and it was charging straight at a hunter.

The hunter squared up to meet it, thinking it was no different from the others. A variant — the kind that turned up rarely among small monsters. Small on the outside. Mid-class on the inside.

The instant I spotted it, my legs were already driving forward. Explosive power surged through them. A few months of Dreygan's training, and I was launching myself far faster than I ever had before.

I snatched the hunter by the collar and yanked him back, a split second before he and the variant collided.

"Wha—!"

The hunter I'd pulled went airborne, then tumbled across the ground. And then the variant was right in front of me, its vicious claws already scything in.

I had to block. I hauled the shield up and dropped my body aslant as far as it would go.

A heavy boom slammed through the shield and sent me tumbling across the dirt. I had trusted my instincts and tried to glance the blow aside, and my body still went flying. I kicked off the ground and scrambled up. The arm behind the shield was ringing, and deep gouge marks scored the face of it. At least it hadn't broken.

So a mutant's attack could be blocked. Oble, whatever else he'd been, had bought himself one hell of a shield. Looking at it now, I could see it was a special alloy — monster materials, forged.

"That one's a mutant! Get back!"

"A-a mutant?"

The hunter who had been about to face it startled and scrambled away, finally realizing how close his life had come to being torn apart like paper. In that same breath, the variant's gaze locked onto me.

I hadn't gotten a proper look in the rush. Now its shape came into focus. A black-striped leopard, a little larger than a man, with fangs like knives jutting from its jaws and an extra pair of legs. The life flame roaring off it was vivid and dense — a mutant's body, packed with fire.

This is a completely different fight from the mid-sized monsters I've taken down.

Mid-sized monsters were huge, and that bulk made them slow. A mutant was small, and that made it fast. For me, the mutant was far more dangerous to handle. It might look close to a human in size, but what was inside was nothing of the kind.

The variant paced a slow circle on its six legs, each step a coiled preparation to pounce. I drew the shield in close and waited it out. The impatient one here was the mutant. There were a lot of small monsters, but there were just as many hunters. Once the rest of them were cleaned up, this thing would be standing alone — and it knew it. It had to move first.

A monster's patience never lasted long.

The variant kicked off the ground and came at me. It moved so fast it looked like a black streak, leaping in a zigzag that made my eyes swim. Absurdly quick. But not so quick I lost it.

I poured power into both legs and pulled the shield tight. From here on, it was a fight over timing. If I took this head-on with the shield, I'd end up exactly as I had a moment ago. I didn't have the raw strength to overpower a mutant. So I would use its own force against it.

The variant launched itself from a position where it could no longer pull back. Its jaws yawned wide, revealing row upon row of teeth — and in that same instant I kicked off the ground and drove the shield forward with everything I had. The shield slammed straight into that gaping mouth.

The force of the mutant's charge and the force of my thrust collided, and its teeth crumpled. Of course that wasn't enough to kill it. New ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠fangs sprouted in place of the crushed ones, and it went straight for a bite.

But there was one ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠thing the variant didn't know. Beneath its jaw, my left hand had already found its mark.

I seized the mutant's roaring life flame and crushed it in my grip. The variant's body locked rigid. Its four eyes swung toward me a beat too late, the look of a creature that had only just realized something had gone terribly wrong.

It was already too late. From the moment I touched it, there was no escape.

I clenched down on the life flame and forced it out.

The variant thrashed in one last convulsion, a huge, useless spasm. The strength drained from its body. The light went out of its eyes. Then it listed to the side and went down with a heavy thud.

My hand had taken the monster's life. In exchange, the variant's life force poured into me intact. The flame of life inside me burned hotter and fiercer than before, and my body grew with it once more.

Maybe it was all the training. I could take a mutant now, and win.

I let out a light breath and turned.

"Over here! There's a mutant!"

The hunter who had fled earlier came running back with others in tow — then froze, staring at the variant collapsed at my feet.

"A mutant, you said?"

"It's already dead."

The hunters murmured among themselves, and one of them recognized me.

"Haren. That's Rookie Haren."

"The one who takes down mid-sized monsters by himself?"

"No way. So he killed a mutant on his own?"

I had drawn attention again, without meaning to. Fortunately, none of them seemed to have seen how I killed it. The fighting was still loud all around us — small monsters and hunters locked together. In a melee like this, nobody had the luxury of watching someone else's fight.

"The other small monsters come first. You can gawk later."

The hunters snapped out of it at that.

"Right, yeah."

"Let's finish ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠this!"

They charged back toward the monsters.

"Thanks for saving me."

The one I had pulled out of the way ducked his head in a short bow and ran. That was enough.

I was about to turn on the remaining monsters myself when my eyes met someone else's, a beat too late.

Ban. He was looking straight at me. His gaze moved from the fallen monster to my face, and his eyebrows lifted. Then he turned his attention back to the small monsters that were still standing.

Had he noticed something? I didn't know. Things had happened too fast for me to put on any kind of act.

Whatever he wanted to say, it could wait until the rest of the monsters were dead.