Chapter 26
Chapter 26
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Translator: crow
Chapter Title: Eastern Knights (2)
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A sharp blade.
Sharp enough to slice paper if dropped onto it.
Two characters were meticulously engraved on the blade by a master craftsman.
"Guardian."
That's right.
This sword belongs to an Imperial Knight sworn to protect the homeland.
It was the treasured sword Irina gave me in my past life.
A few days ago, she sent it to me along with the sunstone.
Probably as thanks for the protection stone incident.
It holds the wearer's mana well, and its durability is excellent.
Everything about it is just like in the old days when I fought countless knight captains.
I gripped the sword firmly.
With a serious gaze, as if facing those foes.
Miya-senpai gulped at my intense look.
She held her breath, waiting for my next move.
In response, I raised the sword high.
And in the moment I swung it decisively.
A red mass tumbled down in chunks.
―――.
"Do you have to pose like that just to cut it?"
Miya neatly gathered the watermelon slices on the plate.
"Of course. This kind of precision saves lives on the battlefield."
I replied proudly to her unimpressed expression.
Then I shook off the fruit juice clinging to the blade.
"You're probably the only one who uses a treasured sword from the princess to slice fruit."
Miya shuddered and grabbed a fork.
She speared a piece and popped it into her mouth.
"Mmm."
Sweet juice spreading in her mouth.
Cool, refreshing texture too.
"It does taste good."
She savored it with her eyes half-closed in bliss.
No wonder the expensive ones at the market cost so much.
"But is it okay for you to be here? What about Rupert?"
"Oh, it's fine. That guy's off at his family estate today."
Gone home during work hours?
I frowned in disapproval, but she smirked like it was no big deal.
"It happens all the time. Dad probably called him out for some riding, said it'd help build connections."
She gripped the watermelon rind like a bowl.
And started pouring liquor into it.
"Ugh—some people get to skip work 'cause Daddy Dearest sets 'em up with connections—"
Senpai glanced at me pointedly.
Then gave me a cynical look full of pity.
"While some reject promotions and chop watermelons with treasured swords!"
"You'll come to appreciate the value of a peaceful daily life over promotions someday, senpai."
I took a sip from the rind-cup and replied.
"What are you blabbering on about, you old fogey..."
She snorted at my demeanor.
Then we both gazed out the quiet window together.
Sweet liquor.
A serene vegetable patch.
In that patch, a single tiny sprout had emerged.
The first leaf we'd coaxed out with a sunstone and a mage.
I took a satisfied swig, using the leaf as an appetizer.
Imagining the lush vines it would one day bear.
But...
That fancy was shattered soon enough.
Two burly men visible in the distance.
Dressed in uniforms with red cloaks draped around their necks, approaching the patch.
"What the hell are those guys...?"
I furrowed my brow and headed to the window.
Miya, her face flushed, joined me.
"Oh, them? Eastern Knights."
Miya pointed at their red cloaks.
'Did they come for the sunstone?'
If so, they'd head straight to the office.
Why go to the back patch?
I shoved my hands in my pockets and went down to the first floor to check them out.
By then, the two knights had reached the patch.
They started scrutinizing it like a search party.
"This the place? That damn defense knight's workshop."
"Yes, senior. Our investigation shows he always comes here after patrols."
"Then he must've grown the poison herb for the captain here too."
Ox senior Tau stomped on the soil with his military boots.
He took in the barren patch bit by bit.
"Found it."
The junior pointed at the lone sprout.
As Easterners, they eyed the unfamiliar southern plant with suspicion.
"A sprout in winter...?"
"Exactly, senior. Aside from mana grass, no other plants grow in winter."
Tau swallowed hard and stared at the plant.
"Yeah, definitely not your average plant."
The two Eastern knights exchanged grave looks.
They reached out to secure the sprout.
But at that moment.
Their hands froze in place.
"What are you doing there?"
I'd arrived at the patch, suspicious of their behavior.
"Figured raiding the scene would flush you out."
The two knights turned to me in unison.
Wearing stern expressions like knights apprehending a criminal.
"I'm Tau, vanguard of the Eastern Knight Order. Here about the contraband issue."
"Yeah? Then come up to the office. Don't poke around out here for nothing."
I pointed at the building and led the way.
But instead of following, they slammed their feet into the patch.
"First..."
They fixed me with interrogator-like glares.
"What exactly are you growing here?"
His utterly serious gaze.
The moment I saw it, I realized.
'These guys... fellow gardeners?'
Hardly any Imperial Knights care about vegetable patches.
They focus on swordsmanship and self-training over farming.
In this world, to show such earnest interest in a patch...
It was a welcome surprise.
"It's a crop called watermelon."
Truth be told, I couldn't recall if it was a fruit or vegetable.
So I settled on calling it a crop.
"Watermelon?"
Unlike my delight, their eyes filled with killing intent.
As if they'd never heard of it.
"First time hearing of such a crop in my life."
"Yeah, you get permission from the Magic Tower to grow it?"
Did watermelons need permits...?
They circulated fine in the capital.
"Did it need a permit?"
At my nonchalant attitude, the junior's eye twitched.
He went from suspicion to certainty, his voice icy.
"Playing dumb too. Shameless bastard."
The junior Viz stripped off his uniform jacket.
Revealing chiseled muscles and a chicken tattoo.
"Come quietly and apologize to the captain."
He strode toward me in that intimidating getup.
His massive shadow engulfed me.
"And we'll get to the truth about the poison you used at the banquet."
Chicken junior Viz snorted through his nose.
To him, I countered.
"Poison? What are you suddenly talking about?"
He raised a fist to the air.
His patience at its limit, he growled menacingly.
"If you keep denying it, I'll drag you in myself."
The massive fist reared up.
It loomed over my face.
But that fist never reached me.
As he swung at my head, I ducked low.
Dodging, I channeled mana into my fist.
Before he could react, I drove it firmly into his gut.
Then, as his face twisted, I swung my elbow to his jaw, overcoming the size difference.
―――!!
Viz couldn't even groan.
He just crashed to the ground with a thud.
"So you're not just good with poisons."
Despite the overwhelming size gap, the junior went down in two hits.
Tau scowled at the sight.
"Then dodge this!"
Tau wrapped his body in mana.
Seizing the opening his junior created, he charged me.
The vanguard's charge.
A technique that pierces even elite shield-bearing soldiers.
I focused mana in my legs.
And hurled my body aside, evading his bulk.
Kwaaaang―――!!
The fence I'd built around the patch shattered.
He emerged from the debris, brushing off his shoulders casually.
"Not bad footwork."
Tau gathered mana around his body again.
Much stronger than before.
"But that's all you got."
He charged relentlessly after that.
He raised his massive fist to the sky.
The moment he tried to smash it down on me.
I blocked it solidly with both hands.
If I'd just dodged.
The patch would've been destroyed.
"You bastard...!"
He panicked at me taking it head-on.
Soon, veins bulging on his forehead, he drove the fist harder.
Perhaps because of that.
Mana surged wildly from where our arms and fists met.
Nearby objects began shaking violently.
――――!!
The junior's revenge.
The senior's revenge.
Tau strained to crush me with all his might.
"Urgh..."
But he gradually realized.
The gap in our mana.
Visually, his mana looked far superior.
But clashing directly, he understood.
My honed mana—even one tenth of it—overwhelmed his full power.
In the end, he was repelled, tumbling into the patch.
I approached him calmly as he lay there.
"You keep saying poison—what the hell are you talking about?"
"Exactly what I said. You attacked Captain Batsch with poison grown here..."
"What?"
His unexpected words left me dumbfounded.
"What are you saying? I've never used poison on him."
"Never used poison...? Then why's the captain limping?"
"That was just temporary paralysis from me hitting a pressure point."
I closed in on the slow-witted Tau.
And pressed my heel into his thigh.
"Graaaah!!"
"Like this."
Tau clutched his leg in throbbing pain.
He writhed side to side, crying out.
"A vanguard who's a total wuss."
The junior I'd downed first crawled over too.
He looked up at me and asked.
"Th-then why take a sunstone just to grow some stupid fruit...!"
At the junior's sharp question, I smiled.
"This isn't just some fruit."
I pointed at Miya, who'd come out to toss the rind, and declared solemnly.
"Precisely, it's my retirement fund."
The two fallen knights looked up at their senior.
Miya dumped the rind beside them with an awkward expression.
"What the...?"
Their serious eyes went wide.
They stared blankly at the watermelon rinds piling up before them.
"I thought you were fellow farmers and was gonna go easy..."
While surveying the patch, I spotted the pitifully crushed sprout.
With a sorrowful look, I buried it.
"But you idiots jumped to weird conclusions and wrecked my field."
I picked up a nearby hoe rolling on the ground.
Holding it aloft, I glared murderously at them.
"So, time to pay up, right?"
The two knights' thick shoulders shrank.
They gawked up at me approaching with the hoe, faces blank.
"You... what the hell are you?"
Like cattle and chickens moments from slaughter.
"Me? Your boss for the time being."