Slaughtering the Bandits
"Cross the peak you can see over there and head down toward the east, and you'll find more strongholds. Two or three, at the least."
"Oh, nice!"
Before she even realized it, Lupin's path had overlapped with yet another acquaintance's. When their routes crossed, though, only one person ended up suffering for it, so the scene that remained was of a thoughtless Lupin having a perfectly lovely time.
"Well then, see you again! If we run into each other later I'll actually buy you a meal, so don't pretend you don't know me. Got it?"
The moment that one-sided farewell was done, Lupin tore through the hall at full speed and launched herself from the entrance in a powerful leap. Even a cannonball—the most advanced piece of technology in all of Elysium—fell in a curve, and yet here was Lupin rising dead straight into the sky, gravity be damned. Faced with a spectacle rarer than anything she had ever seen, the little bandit couldn't hide her excitement and bounced in place.
"What a refreshing, magnificent person. I really hope we meet again. Don't you think so, Dharma Protector Cheong?"
Walking along the trail she had left, Dharma Protector Cheong—playing the part of stronghold chief, though in truth he was the little bandit's bodyguard—drew in a long, deep breath. A faint trace of the Ten-Thousand-Li incense worked into the gold token still lingered, tart and savory at once.
At this rate, tracking her and joining up as if by chance won't be any trouble. Share a few meals, and we'll grow closer as a matter of course. A bond with the benefactor who held off one of the Rounds, no less!
Certain they would meet Lupin again, Dharma Protector Cheong smiled.
"We most certainly shall."
He deliberately refrained from asking about the music box. He had not even managed to offer a single meal or gift to the benefactor who had helped them survive a brush with death; to ask her to find an object on top of that would have been a breach of courtesy. He had granted her the right to open the vault where the treasure chests were piled, but that had been a strategic choice made so that he himself might live, not repayment for having been spared. More than anything, if the music box was in Lupin's hands, it would surely make its whereabouts known someday. Hearing that news and going after it then would not be too late.
The young master, who had been bouncing about, had at some point come to a stop and was kneading at the air with an upturned palm. Above her small hands, laid one over the other, ice crystals stacked themselves into a hexagonal lattice and gradually grew into a lump no bigger than a child's fist.
"Dharma Protector Cheong. Aren't you hot? Want some ice?"
Cheong flinched, snatched the ice, dropped into a lower stance, and lightly gripped the young master's shoulder.
"I told you that you must not use your power carelessly. It is harmful to your health."
"Ah. Sorry. You just looked a little warm..."
For the one who will someday be Empress of a restored Snohaim to be this tenderhearted and kind... Even so, he could not let that worry show. Dharma Protector Cheong promptly popped the ice into his mouth, crunched it noisily, and smiled.
"Ith twuly wefwething and dewicioush."
Mount Mojeon, Mount Moceuk, and Mount Momi had been scorched barren by Lupin and Ekaterina. Cross one more peak from there and pass the border toward Rostov, and the bandits of the 108 Green Forest Strongholds had staked out territory on that side as well. Most of the bastards had pitched their camps facing Rostov. People of Cheonghwa rarely ever left their own country, so there were plenty of bandits lying in wait for anyone slipping across in secret from Rostov. An attack slamming into the backs of their heads out of nowhere left them utterly helpless. Even a frontal charge would have left them little chance of survival, but a strike from the rear annihilated them completely, and the treasure they had been holding became Ekaterina's in a flash.
Looking over the chests heaped on the wagon, Ekaterina let out a breath of relief.
"Good. How many is this...? Twenty? If I just clean out four more places like this...!"
But Ekaterina, who had spent the whole day running about while splitting off clones, was down to roughly a third of her aura. The moment of exhaustion arrived at last. Worse, just as Dharma Protector Cheong had said a little while ago—though Ekaterina hadn't heard him—only two strongholds remained. No matter how hard she tried, she could never reach a haul of a hundred. The pigeon perched on her shoulder seemed, somehow, to be watching her with pity.
Even so, giving up now was not an option. Even if the sun went down. Even if she had to cross the highway linking Cheonghwa and Rostov and scour yet another mountain inch by inch, she had to finish her goal today.
Come on. You can do this, Ekaterina.
For the first time, a woman who had lived idle and dissolute was breathing courage into herself and charging forward with everything she had.
Except—if the second stronghold she reached had already been reduced to a trampled wreck, and if at the third, hit right on its heels, she found Lupin sprawled out after having her fun, then there would truly be nothing left to think.
"W... why?"
Why does she keep showing up in front of me? Did she hate the idea of forming a party with me that much?
Despair billowed up inside Ekaterina. Before she knew it, the feeling had swollen into a great black cloud, dumping a still more agonizing acid rain upon her already aching heart.
So that was it. She just wanted to get in my way. Because if I don't gather a hundred within a week, we'll be forced to part. Because a restriction will lock in so I can never draw close to her again—and she did this on purpose, for that. Too cruel. Too cruel. Too cruel. If a person is thrashing this hard just to stay alive, you could cut them a little slack just once!
"Lupin!!"
Unable to hold it in any longer, Ekaterina gave up watching from a distance and leapt into the stronghold in a single bound.
Lupin was flopping and twitching on the ground from the symptoms of a dopamine binge. She herself had never recognized the state she was in, but open too many treasure chests and she ended up looking exactly like someone at the height of climax. Desire surged up inside Ekaterina, sudden and fierce—but fear crushed the thought of pouncing on her right then. It wasn't so much that her lower belly itched as that the back of her head throbbed. That was because Ekaterina was dominated by Lupin through words alone, with no formal restriction binding her.
"Lupin! Get up, right now!!"
"Hhk. Wh-what."
Startled, Lupin shot upright, glanced around, and found Ekaterina scowling and trembling. Instinctively shrinking in on herself, Ekaterina shuffled backward.
"What. You giving up now? Can't hit the goal, so you're just gonna jump me?"
"Th-that's not it, okay?!"
Genuinely furious, Ekaterina shrieked.
"You're the one who's been sabotaging me this whole time so I couldn't hit the goal!!"
Lupin tilted her head. Did I do that? I don't think so at all. Ah—is blocking that attack at the stronghold earlier supposed to count as sabotage? Except Lupin had only defended. The one who attacked first had been Ekaterina.
"Earlier, all I did was block, you know? The one who barged in swinging was you."
Hearing that, Ekaterina had to admit it was true again. But it was also true that she hadn't been able to secure the treasure chests because Lupin had been there.
"Why were you even playing bandit there in the first place. If it wasn't some scheme to get in my way, then what on earth was it for?"
"Me? I was just looking for treasure chests and happened to end up there...? This is seriously unfair."
At those words, Ekaterina's eyes rolled white. And who's the one being wronged here, and who's the actual villain. On the verge of tears, she seethed and poured out a tirade.
"Do you even know how hard I ran around today? I found a hundred treasure chests. And every last one of them got cleaned out! My heart broke once and I almost gave up, but I pulled myself together and went looking again. I found twenty. Twenty! And then! And then...!!"
You show up like you're telling me not to even dream of hitting the goal, and you throw a fit. You vicious bitch!
Except Ekaterina, who couldn't quite bring herself to curse out loud, only gulped down sobs. Watching those heaving shoulders, Lupin felt a pang of sympathy despite herself. It also looked a little like crocodile tears, and she found it hard to empathize too readily. After all, she had offered several choices, and Ekaterina was the one who had chosen to suffer. Having made that choice herself, it wouldn't do to blame Lupin when things failed to work out.
But she really did find treasure chests? If their meeting at the stronghold earlier hadn't been coincidence, but had happened while Ekaterina was actually doing the job she'd been given, then Lupin was curious about the results too.
"I don't know how you managed to lose the hundred, but... you're saying you found twenty?"
Ekaterina collapsed flat on the ground and wailed.
"They're outside.... Go look for yourself. I really did everything I could......"
So Lupin stepped outside, and sure enough, the cart was piled high with treasure chests she had never seen before. She opened one on the off chance, and the counter ticked up exactly as it should. They really were chests Lupin had never discovered.
And the number 500, which had been nagging at her, passed without a hitch.
Well, would you look at that. This is basically auto-farming. And here I sent her off certain it would never work.
With things turning out this way, Lupin's thinking shifted a little. Enemy, grudge, or even a crazy bitch obsessed with her—Lupin was an open-minded boss who would hire anyone, so long as they were useful for treasure chests. And, unexpectedly, the nature of Secret Chests played a part in that judgment. Unlike the Abandoned Chests, which she had opened alone by clearing traps and solving puzzles, Secret Chests came with no shortage of pests making a nuisance of themselves. If someone had shown up who would deal with those pests in her place, the only proper answer was a gracious by all means.
A crazy bitch who actually pulls her weight? Then send her out on a long posting. See her face as little as possible, and maximize the treasure chests. This was killing two birds with one stone—the wise deployment of talent.
"I've changed my mind."
"Yeah! We're finished now........................ Huh?"
Ekaterina, who had been pounding the ground, lifted her head with bloodshot eyes.
"Changed... your mind?"
Lupin had already unhooked the gold token from her waist and was dangling it. In that moment, the work of thrashing the bandits passed naturally into Ekaterina's hands.