Hawk's Eye, Kaufman Teosis (2)
An arrow buried itself in Najin's abdomen.
One. Two. Three. Three arrows slammed home in rapid succession. Najin's eyes flew wide. There had been no preparatory motion whatsoever before the shots. Kaufman had neither drawn a bowstring nor raised a weapon.
Only when the fourth arrow flew did Najin realize the bolts were coming from the small crossbow mounted on the back of Kaufman's hand.
His head was still reeling, costing him a full second of judgment and letting the first three arrows through—but he had no intention of allowing a fourth. Najin swung his sword and knocked the bolt aside. Even as he deflected it, he closed the distance with a single step toward Kaufman.
The gap was already narrow. One more step and the blade would reach.
Why the man had attacked him, how he knew about the subterranean city of Atman—those questions could wait. Right now he had to act.
Whiiish!
Najin closed the remaining space in an instant and swung. At this range a swordsman held the advantage over an archer. Hadn't Ivan himself said it? An unseen ranger was terrifying; a ranger standing in plain sight was far less so.
Najin's judgment was not wrong.
What he had failed to account for was this: Kaufman Teosis was no ordinary ranger.
An arm burst from beneath the poncho. In its grip was a machete with a rough, brutal edge. The moment the machete met Najin's sword—
KAAAAANG!
A tremendous clang rang out and Najin's arm was driven back. Kaufman's raw strength surpassed his own. The sword was knocked aside, leaving Najin's abdomen exposed. Kaufman drove a boot into it. The arrows that had been stopped short by armor were driven deeper under the sole of the combat boot with a wet crunch.
The shafts snapped. All three arrowheads punched fully home.
Najin scowled, teeth clenched, and reversed his grip on the sword. He crouched low, aiming to drive the longsword into Kaufman's leg—
Engraving release. Detonation.
KWA-AAA-AAAANG!
The moment the spells engraved on the arrowheads unleashed, three successive explosions erupted inside Najin's abdomen.
"Guhk!"
The detonating tips sprayed metal fragments like buckshot, embedding deep into his flesh. Caught dead-on by the blasts, Najin's body lost all balance and lifted into the air.
Another opening created.
Kaufman's right hand, still half-hidden in the poncho, now held throwing daggers. He flung them even as he swung the machete in his left. The two actions were nearly simultaneous—nearly impossible for Najin, posture shattered by the explosions, to counter or answer.
Nearly impossible. Not completely.
Bloodshot eyes wide, Najin had already predicted the nature of the attack. Because he had predicted it, he answered even from a broken stance. He forced his pain-locked body to move and swung the sword.
Kang—he knocked the machete aside.
Whiiish—he ducked under the thrown daggers.
Not all of them. One dagger buried itself in his shoulder. Seeing the blade begin to glow a vivid blue, Najin leapt hard backward and ripped the dagger free, hurling it away.
KWA-AAANG!
Fortunately the reaction had not been late.
Watching the dagger explode the instant it left his hand, Najin clenched his teeth. His abdomen throbbed. A wet cough forced blood past his lips. He spat the coppery mouthful and scowled.
He had misjudged.
He had given ground.
Against an archer, opening distance was the worst possible mistake. Najin found himself staring at the greatbow Kaufman now leveled at him. The arrowhead at its tip gleamed.
Thrum—and whiiish.
The instant Kaufman released the string, Najin swung as well. When the massive arrow met his blade he felt as though his shoulder were being torn from its socket. The stopping power of a shaft nearly as thick as a longsword, loosed from that greatbow, far exceeded anything he had imagined.
Kagagagagagak!
Sparks showered between sword and arrow. Even with his feet planted hard, the soles of his boots skidded and he was driven far back. By the time he forced strength into his arms and finally knocked the arrow aside—
Whiiiiiiish.
Another arrow was already upon him. It flew at a height that made ducking, leaping, or simply tilting the head impossible. He could not bring the sword around in time; some part of his body would have to be sacrificed.
Teeth grinding, Najin twisted.
The arrow grazed his side. Even a graze produced a wet thud as flesh split open. Blood poured from the hole. His face contorted with pain, yet he never closed his eyes—and so he saw it.
Kaufman drawing the bowstring once more.
The man was a hunter who never relinquished the initiative once he had seized it. In the end Najin chose flight. He judged that he could not seize victory by standing and fighting Kaufman here. Turning his back on a ranger and granting him time was another of the worst possible mistakes, but—
To live, he had to run.
He barely slipped the next arrow and sprinted deeper into the underground waterway. Kaufman watched the fleeing figure for a moment, then exhaled a long breath and began the pursuit.
The hunter's eyes gleamed in the dark.
2.
Kaufman Teosis was a veteran hunter.
For long years he had served along the Techel Mountains that bordered the empire, hunting everything that stood against the imperial name. He had long since mastered the art of the hunt itself.
Imperial knights attempting to defect abroad.
Mages trying to sell imperial secrets to foreign powers.
Countless escaped criminals, and sometimes even royal soldiers.
Strong or weak, he had hunted them all across every kind of terrain. No one understood better than Kaufman how a hunt must begin. A hunt began with observation. Especially a hunt against the strong.
The prey's traits. Its little habits.
Movement and reaction speed.
The weapons it favored and the way it fought.
The more information one possessed, the smoother the hunt became. So Kaufman had gathered every scrap of intelligence he could on the adventurer called "Ivan"—no, on the youth named Najin—and had observed him with his own two eyes.
A genuine madman.
The process of collecting information had left Kaufman clicking his tongue in disbelief. According to the client, the youth was eighteen. To have approached the realm of Sword Seeker at a mere eighteen years of age was absurd—talent that defied common sense.
Even Caron, genius among geniuses, had not become a Sword Seeker until he was thirty. Kaufman knew exactly how impossible an eighteen-year-old Sword Seeker was.
And that was not all.
The subjugation of a demon knight. Surviving a duel with the knight-commander of House Arvenia. Records of repeatedly challenging stronger opponents and walking away alive. Such things were impossible for those merely drunk on their own talent.
So Kaufman had watched with his own eyes.
And he had been forced to admit it.
The youth possessed more than talent. Instant judgment. The boldness to charge without hesitation. He had the makings of one who would climb to the highest places.
And Kaufman had to kill that Najin.
Because he had accepted the commission. Because he could not refuse it. Pursuing the fleeing youth, Kaufman pulled a cigarette from his belt, clamped it between his teeth, and lit it.
"...Damn it."
He drew the smoke in long and deep, then exhaled and clicked his tongue. Whether his mood was foul or he wanted to smash the client's face in, the hunt had begun. Once begun, it had to be finished.
Otherwise he himself would die.
Kaufman never grew careless.
Even when he held the advantage, even when he stood as the stronger party—he had experienced the board flipping more times than he could count, and he had flipped boards himself.
Above all, the youth he was chasing possessed the talent and judgment to overturn the board. The way he had taken a mortal wound from Fauve yet still forced his way upstream to land a decisive blow had already left the realm of ordinary men.
He tore the black mage Fauve apart head-on.
There were still hidden cards.
So drive him without mercy.
Thinking that, Kaufman followed Najin's trail. The upward paths were blocked by Kaufman himself, so Najin had gone deeper into the waterways.
And that place—
KWA-AAA-AAAANG!
A thunderous roar shook the tunnels. Kaufman flicked the spent cigarette into the water and scratched the back of his neck. Looks like he stepped in a trap.
Kaufman had arrived in the city the previous night.
And the hunt had begun that same night.
He had seeded the entire underground waterway with traps. He would have preferred a black mage to spring them, but it made no difference who did. Black mage or Najin—both were prey to Kaufman.
Scratch.
Skin flaked from the nape he had been scratching; blood welled. Fingering the brand carved into his neck, Kaufman walked toward the source of the sound.
3.
Rangers are absolute bastards.
Why? Because the traps they lay make you grab the back of your neck in pure frustration. Laying traps like that is a talent all its own. As far as I'm concerned, a ranger's rank is decided by just how obnoxiously he can set them.
That Horce bastard, for one—he lays a single trap so damn beautifully.
Ah, watching him work is pure creativity.
It's hard to screw people over that thoroughly. I'm a gentle soul, but one look at his traps and my blood pressure spikes. What? I don't seem that gentle?
Tsk. The fact that I'm not cracking your skull right now should be proof enough of my gentle nature, don't you think? Hm? You little shit.
Anyway.
A ranger is most terrifying when you can't see him. And if one of them shows himself in front of you... the hunt is already prepared. You know what they call Horce, right?
Trap-spider.
It's basically the same as the surface slur for rangers. A few of my seniors used to call them spider bastards.
They spin their webs and slowly drain the prey dry.
When the prey has no strength left, they sink their fangs in. That's why they're called spiders.
Same hunting method, see?
That's how rangers hunt.
Well... you probably won't ever fight Horce, but keep it in mind. The longer you fight a ranger, the worse it gets for you. Either force a short decisive battle or run far enough that he can't follow. One or the other.
And if you can't do either?
What else can you do?
You gamble.
"Huuu..."
Najin gripped his side and let out a long breath. The accumulated fatigue from the battle with Fauve and the fresh wounds from Kaufman were eating away at his mind.
Blood still ran from the arrow-pierced flank.
His abdomen—blasted by the explosions, riddled with deep fragments of arrowhead—throbbed with every step.
Ghhh...
He groaned as he pulled the metal shards from his flesh and kept moving. If these had been the only injuries it would have been fortunate, but stepping on traps while fleeing had added more. Now even walking required caution.
The waterways were thick with traps.
Traps whose operating principles he could not even guess, hidden so well they were invisible. Moving while constantly on guard doubled the mental exhaustion.
Yet he did not stop thinking.
Najin turned over every scrap of knowledge he possessed about rangers, every fragment he had overheard from Ivan, again and again. He had to find a way to overturn this situation.
You must never play on the board they set.
Do something insane if you have to—flip the board.
Ivan and Oppen had taught him so many things. To them it had been nothing more than drunken chatter over clinking cups, but to Najin their stories had been the world itself. That was why he remembered every word so clearly.
"Hey, Oppen, that story."
"Which one?"
"The one where you screwed over a ranger. No better drinking story no matter how many times I hear it."
"I've lost count of how many times I've told it."
"This brat Najin's never heard it. Tell it one more time."
Oppen's tales of the surface world.
Ivan's interjections, the applause, the delighted cry of "This guy was a complete madman!" The two masters clinking glasses under the sunset-colored lamps, and himself picking at the side dishes—those images circled endlessly through Najin's mind.
There had been a clue inside that story.
Najin made his choice.
Merlin.
-Speak.
Find me a path.
To Merlin, who shared the same scenery and the same thoughts—to his guide—Najin made the request. Find the path that would make this method succeed.
The plan Najin had conceived.
A plan that was still only a skeleton.
Merlin put flesh on those bones. She completed the unfinished picture. That was her role.