A Lieutenant's Atonement
To Mr. Kain, from Lieutenant Sigrid.
You must have grasped the full story by now.
The tragic truth behind the Ashen Battle.
The reason I had to kill the boy Juvik, and everything that unfolded in Garsha, the village of rocks called Kragdon.
What would have been the right thing to do?
No matter how many times I ask myself, no answer comes to mind.
Where did it all go wrong? What should I have fixed first?
Should I never have entered that village at all?
Or if I had kept Berian and Juvik from growing close, would this tragedy have been avoided?
If I had not killed the subordinate who witnessed everything, would the situation be better than it is now?
I truly do not know.
Even if I could return to the past, I suspect I would only repeat the same mistakes.
What should I have done? I really do not know.
Yet what I must do from this point forward—that much, I believe I now understand.
Sir, please lay every tragedy of the Ashen Battle at my feet.
Tell them that I was the one who killed Juvik and Garsha, that I lied to them.
Do this so that Lord Dalmon and Berian may secretly blame me.
Make them believe that all responsibility rested with me, so that Lord Dalmon and Berian will no longer torment themselves.
So that Lord Dalmon and Berian will no longer suffer.
Sir, I beg you to grant my request.
By the time this letter reaches you, I will no longer be among the living.
I intend to embrace every sin and atone through death.
I do not know whether this will truly constitute atonement, but still.
P.S. I offer my sincere apologies for the rudeness shown during my meeting with Lord Dalmon.
Yet I hope you will understand that it was done for Lord Dalmon’s sake.
“The kingdom’s army provides modest quarters for unmarried officers. They call it the ‘Bachelor Officers’ Quarters.’ Lieutenant Sigrid lives there as well.”
“Is there any chance he went out?”
“Sigrid isn’t the type to enjoy going out. Even on his days off or when he’s granted leave, he stays in his quarters reading books.”
Following those directions, we arrived at the military district where the bachelor officers’ quarters were clustered.
Thanks to Berian’s former affiliation with the kingdom’s mages, we were able to enter without difficulty.
I hope Sigrid is still here.
More precisely, I hoped he was still alive.
There was no time to hesitate. We ran until our lungs burned and reached the quarters where Lieutenant Sigrid was said to reside.
“Hah, hah…!”
I caught my breath quickly, then drew in a deep lungful of air.
The scent of emotion.
A thick, cloying scent of emotion seeped through the gap beneath the door…
The emotions were varied: despair, melancholy, sorrow… anger and helplessness.
Such a potent mixture of negative feelings produced a foul, terrible odor.
“Lieutenant Sigrid is inside!”
At my shout, Berian grabbed the doorknob and twisted it roughly.
Click, click!
But the door would not open.
It was locked tight. Berian’s face went pale, and he began pounding on the door.
“Sigrid, Sigrid! Open the door! What are you doing? Open up!”
“Lieutenant Sigrid, please open the door!”
Bang, bang, bang!
It was useless.
No matter how hard I kicked, the door would not break.
Even when I curled my body and slammed into it with all my strength, the door remained intact.
I was baffled. I was not particularly weak.
Yet even when I tried to force it open, the door did not budge.
Then Berian spoke in a trembling voice.
“Protective magic… For safety reasons, protective magic has been cast on the officers’ quarters.”
If protective magic was in place, breaking the door by physical means was nearly impossible.
“We need to call the administrator for the key…!”
“That… that would take too long!”
Berian was right. We had already spent far too much time getting here.
Any further delay and we had no idea what might happen.
If we waited for the administrator, we would most likely be greeted by Lieutenant Sigrid’s corpse.
Break the window? No, the protective magic would cover the windows as well. Since protective magic can be dispelled with magic, should I call Eris?
That was not a good option either.
Whether I fetched the administrator or called Eris, the result would be the same—precious time would be lost.
What do I do…?
A wave of helplessness washed over me.
“I… I’ll do it.”
Berian opened his mouth in a trembling voice.
“I’ll… open it with magic.”
“What? But…!”
Whoosh!
In that instant, a tiny spark of flame flickered at Berian’s fingertips.
I could not help but be astonished. Berian suffered from pyrophobia and PTSD; he was supposed to be incapable of using magic. I had heard he could not properly wield flame magic or any other spells.
As expected, the flame that had been the size of a fist shrank to the size of a fingernail, and terror flooded Berian’s face.
“Hah, hah, hah.”
“Berian, if you push yourself too hard…!”
“No…!”
Berian shook his head.
His complexion was ashen. His eyes were unfocused, and his entire body trembled.
Perhaps blood vessels had burst from forcing the magic; even tears of blood streamed down his cheeks.
Anyone could see his condition was dire.
If he continued forcing magic like this, he would undoubtedly break.
“Berian, let’s just call the administrator…!”
“I have to.”
Grind.
Berian bit down on his lip.
“I have to. If I don’t want to lose anyone else…!”
Blood from his bitten lip and the bloody tears left Berian’s face a mess.
His trembling arms and legs looked ready to collapse at any moment.
Only his eyes remained alive.
A flame called courage burned brightly within his pupils.
Whoosh!
The tiny spark that had seemed on the verge of extinguishing like a candle in the wind grew enormous.
A massive blaze large enough to swallow a person whole.
“Ghh… graaah…!”
Berian roared and hurled the flame at the firmly shut door.
BOOM!
With a sound like an explosion, the door burned away completely.
I had never witnessed such a sight before.
No matter how powerful a flame spell might be, it could not incinerate something so cleanly.
At the very least, there should have been ash or other remnants.
Not even a single speck of ash remains. It’s as if it simply vanished…
Perhaps, in the process of overcoming his pyrophobia, Berian’s magic had advanced to the next level.
Of course, this was not the time for admiration.
Berian and I rushed into the room.
“Ah…”
Berian, who entered first, let out a sigh.
The first thing I saw was a chair. It lay overturned in the center of the room.
Above it, a rope—no, a military bootlace—had been looped around Lieutenant Sigrid’s neck.
Seeing that sight, I felt relief.
He was not dead yet.
Slice!
With the dagger I had brought precisely for this moment, I cut the bootlace.
With a dull thud, Lieutenant Sigrid’s body dropped to the floor.
I immediately checked his condition.
No breathing. His pulse is weak.
Still, his state was better than I had feared.
It might have been because we had rushed here the moment we saw the suicide note, or perhaps because Sigrid was a soldier.
Soldiers and knights in this world possessed bodies sturdy enough to be called superhuman.
“Lieutenant Sigrid is alive. I’ll perform emergency treatment. Berian, please contact the nearest hospital.”
“Ah, understood!”
Berian hurried out of the room.
I secured his airway and continued emergency procedures, including CPR.
Some time passed.
“Kuh—!”
With a ragged gasp, Lieutenant Sigrid’s body jerked.
* * *
To put it simply, Lieutenant Sigrid survived.
The moment emergency treatment restored his breathing, the medical team Berian had summoned arrived from the hospital.
Lieutenant Sigrid received professional care, including healing magic, at the hospital. As a result, his life was saved, and…
“How is your body feeling?”
I had come to visit Lieutenant Sigrid.
It was the third day since his suicide attempt.
“Not particularly well. Quite a few aftereffects have appeared.”
Thanks to the swift emergency treatment, there were no major aftereffects.
However, minor issues remained: a sprain in the neck muscles, damage to the airway, and sensory impairment in the fingers due to brain injury.
“Is there no chance of recovery from the aftereffects?”
“They say that with healing magic and diligent rehabilitation, some recovery is possible, but it won’t be the same as before.”
“Well, healing magic isn’t omnipotent either.”
“Rather, it’s a relief. I feel lighter.”
Lieutenant Sigrid’s tone was gentle as he spoke calmly.
It was completely different from when we had met alongside Lord Dalmon.
That sharp reaction back then was never his true nature.
At the time, he had no choice but to respond sensitively in order to conceal the truth of the Ashen Battle—more precisely, for the sake of Lord Dalmon and Berian.
Just as it had been written in the suicide note.
“Once the trial ends, I won’t be able to remain in the army anyway.”
“If the trial concludes favorably…”
“Even if the trial ends well, the army will find some pretext to discharge me.”
A note of resignation colored Lieutenant Sigrid’s voice.
…That possibility is high.
Berian, Lord Dalmon, and Lieutenant Sigrid.
The three of them were currently embroiled in a lawsuit.
The kingdom army’s northern expedition had long drawn heavy criticism.
The claim was that the army had been recklessly driven to the battlefield, blinded by the resources buried in the north—or more accurately, blinded by the desire for achievements.
Especially after the Ashen Battle, public criticism reached its peak.
Not only had the kingdom’s main forces been captured as prisoners by the Orc Empire, but considerable losses had also occurred during the rescue operation.
Amidst this, Lieutenant Sigrid’s suicide attempt came to light, and his suicide note was made public.
As the hidden truth of the Ashen Battle was revealed, the army’s high command attempted to punish Lieutenant Sigrid, Lord Dalmon, and Berian for treason.
They cited the leaking of military secrets to the enemy and the murder of a subordinate to cover it up.
Their intention was obvious.
To divert public criticism of the northern expedition and the Ashen Battle.
They wanted to claim that the heavy losses in the Ashen Battle were not due to the incompetence of the army’s leadership, but because Berian, Lord Dalmon, and Lieutenant Sigrid had colluded with the enemy.
“Well, it doesn’t seem likely the trial will end favorably anyway.”
“That is the situation at present.”
“By the way… did Berian endure it?”
At the moment he burned through the locked door with flame magic, Berian had recovered his memories while overcoming his pyrophobia.
Even so, he did not remember every detail of what had happened.
He only barely recalled that he had killed Juvik, the tragedy between Dalmon and Garsha, and that he had unleashed flame magic indiscriminately to destroy evidence.
This was also why the trial was tilting unfavorably for Berian, Lord Dalmon, and Lieutenant Sigrid.
Berian’s memories were still incomplete, and the other soldiers who had participated in the Ashen Battle did not know the full details either.
Because Lieutenant Sigrid had cleverly concealed the truth of the Ashen Battle, the full picture remained ambiguous.
As a result, only the provocative charge of “treason” was being highlighted.
The army’s high command was even claiming that Berian, Lord Dalmon, and Lieutenant Sigrid had long been spies colluding with the Orc Empire’s forces.
“Berian is enduring it well. He occasionally relies on medication, though.”
“…I.”
Lieutenant Sigrid’s voice was filled with despair.
“I should have done better…”
“As you wrote in your suicide note, you did your best, Sigrid.”
“…Was it truly my best? If the trial ends and treason is confirmed, not only I, but Berian and Lord Dalmon as well will all…”
I could understand his worry.
If the trial proceeded as it was and treason was acknowledged, the three of them would be imprisoned. And that imprisonment would be far from short.
“I believe I mentioned this before, but I conducted a treatment called hypnotherapy with Berian some time ago.”
“Pardon? Ah, yes… You said it was a treatment that draws out unconscious memories through some form of magic.”
“Yes. It was thanks to that hypnotherapy that I learned the truth of the Ashen Battle.”
As he listened to me, Lieutenant Sigrid’s expression gradually grew blank.
“Hypnotherapy is conducted at the special counseling office.”
“But why are you telling me this…?”
“The special counseling office has one special function: an automatic recording feature.”
I took out the magitech plate on which Berian’s voice had been recorded during the hypnotherapy session.
In other words, it was the magitech plate containing the truth and full details of the Ashen Battle that Berian had witnessed and experienced.
“I, too, intend to do my utmost.”