What Love Is...
Soon, the mana within Lahan's body began to take shape, transmuting into aura.
Mana and aura were forces of entirely different natures. Where mana drifted freely through the air, aura was that same mana, processed and refined within the body until its very properties had been transformed to suit a warrior — to suit a swordsman.
What aura typically carried was sharpness, a keen edge meant to cut an opponent down, to pierce and run them through with ease. And from Lahan, who had begun to unleash it, a killing intent so sharp it made the skin prickle radiated from every inch of his body.
"Gyaaah!"
Whether from fear or something else, the elite goblins that had surrounded Lahan faltered, taking a step back.
"One second."
The instant the words left his mouth, he vanished.
A wet, shearing sound cut through the air.
When he reappeared, it was directly in front of the Goblin Shaman. The startled shaman's eyes went wide as it watched every last one of its elite goblins cleaved cleanly in two, their bodies split horizontally.
Estella, standing behind him, wore an expression of utter shock.
"That's as far as we go working together, Estella."
Lahan said it flatly.
His hand closed like a vise.
"Khek!"
The Goblin Shaman thrashed as Lahan seized it by the throat. Slowly, by the strength of his arm alone, its body was lifted into the air until its toes left the ground.
"That ability of yours — I'll be taking it."
He still didn't know for certain whether he could actually obtain it. But it felt like he could. That was the sense he had.
"Krek! Kruk...!"
"Goodbye."
A sickening crack.
The body went limp. Having twisted the Goblin Shaman's neck with almost casual ease, Lahan spoke those words, then let it fall.
A thud. Leaving the shaman's corpse behind on the floor, a semi-transparent notification window greeted him.
Weakened Future Sight
You can glimpse a portion of the future. However, you can only peek at it through dreams.
Lahan looked at it and smiled with genuine delight.
"I knew I could get it."
It was considerably degraded compared to what the Goblin Shaman had originally possessed — a weakened ability — but that was fine. Even this much was more than useful enough. And more than anything, the fact that his Hunter ability from his previous life had properly carried over into this one was what mattered most.
Even if the ability itself has been somewhat degraded, the fact that my power as a Hunter was fully inherited is the most joyful thing of all.
With this, it's as good as saying I now possess not only this world's powers, but also the ability I needed most in my previous life.
Then Lahan turned his gaze toward Estella, who was still startled and thoroughly flustered. He smiled faintly and started walking toward her.
"We've confirmed it. Here is the reward the guild posted for the goblin subjugation."
Back at the Adventurer Guild, Lahan and Estella received their compensation from a clerk other than Rona. The reward for completely wiping out the goblins was one gold — a coin worth a full hundred silver. In the money of his previous life, it came to roughly a thousand dollars.
"Wooow! We're rich! We're rich now!"
Watching Estella beam, Lahan gave a wry smile and tucked the coin into the money pouch he carried.
"It's just one gold. We're going to have to earn a lot more than this going forward."
"Still! One gold is one gold! At least we won't have to worry about a place to stay or going hungry for a while!"
"Even if we're careful, that's an amount we'd burn through in a month or two."
"Ugh! Do you have to rain on my parade? I'm trying to be happy here!"
"Alright, alright. Sorry. Haha."
Looking at Estella puffing out her cheeks in a sulk, Lahan found himself laughing without meaning to. The more he looked at her, the more he found her... not so much fun to tease as simply adorable.
They headed back toward the Inn of Abundance, where they had been staying, chatting about this and that along the way.
"More importantly — that Star Magic earlier. What was that? Some kind of magic only witches can use? I've never heard of it."
Estella answered Lahan's question readily.
"Ah, that? Yeah. It's a kind of forbidden ancient magic that only witches can use. It's called Star Magic — a special power permitted solely to the Star Witches."
"Star Witches?"
"Mm-hm. The Witch's Forest, where I used to live, was home to witches who each possessed all kinds of ancient magics. From what my mother told me before she passed, they'd been living there in secret for hundreds of years, hidden from the eyes of the human world."
"Ah. I see..."
"Yeah. I left the Witch's Forest after my mother died. She'd always been frail compared to the magic she carried, ever since I was little. She used to lie in bed and tell me all sorts of adventure stories from fairy tales."
Estella tipped her face toward the sky, her eyes going distant, as if she were looking back on those days. Lahan walked quietly beside her, offering what comfort his presence could.
"So that's how you started dreaming of adventure."
"Ahaha. That's right. Nailed it."
"Anyway — I'll be counting on you from here on out, Estella."
"Yeah. Same here. I'll be counting on you too, Lahan."
"Right."
That night, Lahan decided to drink for the first time in a long while. He told Estella as much, and they agreed to eat downstairs at the inn and drink their fill. They had earned a decent sum this time, and he figured that on a day like this, raising a glass now and then in celebration wasn't such a bad thing.
As promised, they paid Eri — the young girl who ran the Inn of Abundance — a full month's meal fees in advance, and arranged to settle any extra costs on the spot whenever they added drinks or meat the way they were tonight.
And so Lahan and Estella clinked their cups again and again, as if at last shaking off the dust of a long journey, and drank with unguarded cheer.
"Haaah..."
Before long, a thoroughly drunk Estella planted her head on the table with a thunk. Then she turned her face to the side, cheek pressed to the wood, and spoke in a dazed, liquor-soaked voice.
"Lahaaaan~~~"
"Hm?"
Lahan was not drunk. Thanks to his passive skill, Poison Resistance, the alcohol in his system kept breaking down no matter how much he drank, and he was currently fighting a losing battle just to keep it from dissolving entirely. Passive skills were inconvenient in everyday life in all sorts of ways. Even when you wanted to get drunk, they wouldn't let you.
Estella wriggled and mumbled again.
"Heeey~ sooo..."
"Yeah. Go on. I'm listening."
Lahan knew, from his previous life, at least the basics of how to handle someone in their cups.
Drunk Estella worked her mouth for a moment, then managed, with some difficulty, to get the words out.
"..."
Lahan's hand, mid-tilt with his cup, went still. He set the raised drink back down on the table and looked steadily down at Estella's profile, her face still pressed to the wood.
"Estella... you..."
"Hnnngh...! Pwaaah~"
Flushed with drink, Estella let out a long, quiet sigh. Whether she had fallen asleep or not, she didn't move again.
"..."
Lahan could only look down at her in silence, his gaze unreadable.
"Auuung!"
Having carried a drunken Estella all the way to her room, Lahan laid her down on the bed with both arms.
"Mmph, mmph..."
She smacked her lips and made strange little sounds in her sleep. Lahan said nothing at all. He simply stood there without moving, looking down at Estella as she slept, lost to the liquor.
He sat. Lahan lowered himself onto the edge of the bed beside her, then gently brushed the hair from the side of her face, tucking it back behind her ear.
"......"
I think I like you.
The words kept circling in his ears like an echo he couldn't shake. Looking at Estella's sleeping face — more peaceful than he had ever seen it — Lahan covered his own face with his hand without realizing it, and lowered his head a little.
"Haa......"
As if releasing a breath he had been holding, he let out a deep, unidentifiable sigh. He dropped the hand that had been covering his face and tipped his head back, gazing up at the ceiling of the room. Then his hesitant lips parted, just barely.
He muttered it like a private remark, the words too vague to say who they were even meant for.
His gaze lowered again, coming to rest once more on Estella's sleeping profile. Their meeting had been brief, but he had come to think of her as a genuinely good woman. It had probably started with what happened yesterday. That was when some kind of feeling toward him had begun to take root in her...
That was Lahan's guess, at least. Because to a certain extent, he felt the same way. It wasn't as if he had no interest in Estella.
...But is this really all right? For Estella to suddenly harbor those kinds of feelings for someone as strange as me.
He could have told himself, And why shouldn't she? — but he didn't. If he could have, this conflict wouldn't have existed in the first place.
In this world, he was an irregular — a peculiarity who remembered a previous life. He hadn't even properly begun his adventure yet.
From here on, I'll meet countless people. I'll go through countless things. I might even find new companions to travel with.
Lahan thought it through. If they came to harbor special feelings for each other, then even on the dream-filled adventure Estella had spoken of — the search for mystery — and even in the countless crises they would face along the way, he and Estella would worry for each other. They would concern themselves with one another more than with anyone else.
And then, at some point, wouldn't they hesitate? Wouldn't they grow so anxious they could no longer set out on the next journey, the next adventure? Because they were worried about each other.
A romance that blooms on the road is, for adventurers who have weathered hardship, all but the typical final destination. Sooner or later the two who have fallen in love settle down somewhere, put down roots, and decide to spend the rest of their lives in quiet happiness — children and all.
But Estella and I haven't even properly started yet. In a situation like this, is it all right for us to already feel this way about each other?
For his own part, he didn't mind. From the beginning, the dream of adventure and that hopeful, passionate future had belonged to Estella, not to him. He was here to become a proper, great knight, like his departed masters Logan and Carlson — to find a chivalry of his own.
That path differed from the adventure Estella had spoken of, and yet in some ways it aligned with it as well. Because somewhere along that long adventure, that long journey, he might well find and complete the chivalry he was searching for.
That was why he had agreed. That was the biggest reason he had, in the end, accepted Estella's proposal to set out on an adventure together.
And in a situation like that — in a situation like this — was it really all right for the two of them to already be whispering of love, to already be bound as a pair of lovers?
Lahan lowered his head. Then he slowly rose from his seat and began walking toward the door.
No. It isn't all right. It can't be all right.
The handle turned with a quiet creak. Lahan opened the door, then glanced back one last time at Estella, sleeping peacefully on the bed. He turned his eyes forward again and stepped out into the hall.
I'm sorry, Estella.
What that man felt was worry and concern, and the greatest of those feelings was unease.
Love was still, for him, an emotion far too difficult.
Even counting the life he had already lived.