The Person Who Received the Roasted Chestnuts
Hugo had been asking the same question for three straight days. “So! What’s your relationship with that grand duke’s daughter?!” Once during morning training, once at lunch, and now again during the evening patrol. This was the ninth time.
“I was her escort knight. I already told you.”
“The grand duke’s daughter travels a thousand miles herself to find a guy who ‘was’ her escort knight? Hey, do you know what the rest of the crew calls what happened that night? The Tragedy of the Embankment. They all saw it from a distance. That lofty lady sinking down onto the dirt.”
“……”
“But you just walked away without even glancing back. Man, I’m on your side, but even I have to say that was pretty… Nah, never mind. It’s not like I know everything about how you spent those ten years.”
Hugo stopped there. His ability to drop the subject had improved considerably in three days. It was the kind of restraint that understood not asking every question you wanted to was the price of friendship.
“Just answer one thing. Really, only one.”
“…What is it.”
“Did you do it because you hate her?”
Kyle counted the rhythm of his steps for a moment. Hate. He searched for the word inside himself. Even after opening every drawer, what emerged was not hatred. Resignation, a final accounting, and one thing that had no name.
“No.”
“Then what?”
“Because the contract is over.”
“…Dude, you really…”
Hugo clutched the back of his neck, then finally let out a sigh instead of a curse.
When they returned from patrol, the tavern was loud. Vargas stood atop a table.
The lord has granted the company official patrol rights as reward for the subjugation. Direct contract, no commission fees.
This means the Grey Fang has become the officially recognized armed force of Lord Valk.
The cheers that erupted were deafening. Every member understood exactly what a direct contract without fees signified.
“Therefore we are reorganizing the teams. Team One leader—Kyle!”
The cheers doubled in volume. No one objected. In the seat by the door where, three months earlier, he had been called a country bumpkin, Kyle stood holding his cup and remained still for a moment.
“A rookie becoming team leader in only three months—shortest in history! You owe us a round!”
“There is no clause in the regulations for a team-leader inauguration dinner.”
“There is now! The captain just added it!”
“When did I—!”
In the uproar, Hugo jabbed him in the side.
“Hey, Team Leader. You should say something.”
Kyle lifted his cup and slowly scanned the forty-two faces. Then he offered the longest greeting he knew.
“…I’ll be in your care.”
Applause burst forth. It was the first time such a short remark had earned him clapping.
Walter arrived at dawn the following day. This time he came alone instead of with five others, carrying an envelope instead of a sword. Behind the warehouse at the end of the dock—in the same spot as last time—Walter held out the envelope.
“I depart for the North at dawn. Her Highness ordered me to deliver this before I leave.”
Before accepting it, Kyle asked first.
“Have you heard the news from the northern border?”
“…The grey eyes. I have. The defense force has already taken down six. Reports from the outpost near the Grey Boundary say the fog is behaving strangely.”
“Tell the defense force that grey eyes feel no pain. Even after a fatal strike they will move for one more breath, so maintain distance and bring them down with coordinated spear volleys. And if bitten, the wound must be cauterized immediately.”
“…How do you know that?”
“I caught some here.”
Walter committed the answer to memory as though writing it down, then finally handed over the envelope.
Kyle took it. The thickness suggested two sheets of paper. The first was the resignation letter. Three lines, corners worn—the same document from the banquet hall three months ago. Beneath it, the crimson seal of the Wallenstein heir had been stamped.
Approved.
“…Confirmed.”
“Is that all you’re going to say?”
“Since it’s been settled legally. I’ll need to rebind the delegated remittance as well. The orphanage matter will now be handled under my personal—”
“Hey, Kyle.” Walter cut him off. He glanced at the sky, swallowed a curse, and pointed at the envelope. “Read the second page too. Before I go.”
The second page was a letter. Kyle unfolded it where he stood. In the grey light of dawn, neat handwriting marched across the page—the hand that had written a thousand orders, yet here and there the strokes trembled.
To Kyle.
The resignation has been approved. From today, you are no one’s sword.
Separately from the salary of the past ten years, I will send no consolation money or merit pay. I now understand that you would not accept it, and that such things could never repay you.
Everything I said on the embankment was clumsy, yet every word was sincere. My crime is that I could not translate those feelings.
I say one thing again. I will not rehire you.
The position of master was left on the dirt that night.
Not as employer, but from the very beginning. I speak as the person who received roasted chestnuts behind the greenhouse.
The roasted chestnuts for nine years were warm. Not once did I eat them cold.
The words of thanks are nine years late.
Next time we meet, I will call you by name.
Someday, I hope you will call me by something other than my title as well.
— Elise.
Kyle read the letter twice. The first time he read the words. The second time he stopped at a single line and could go no further.
The person who received roasted chestnuts behind the greenhouse.
He had known. The roasted chestnuts for nine years were warm—not once did I eat them cold. That was not a sentence someone who simply left freshly roasted chestnuts could write. It was the opposite. It was a sentence only someone who had watched the departing back for nine years could write.
Since when? From the beginning?
Kyle’s mind began to turn, as it always did, searching for the slot where everything fit.
First slot—surveillance. The Wallenstein heir could not have been unaware of anyone approaching her. If an apprentice had been loitering behind the greenhouse every winter, reports would have gone up. The reason she had allowed it was because she had classified him as harmless.
Yes, that seemed correct.
Yet the pieces did not mesh. If she had learned through surveillance reports, there would have been no reason to write that they were warm. Even less reason to write that she was grateful. There was no column in the threat assessment ledger for the temperature of roasted chestnuts.
Second slot—formality. The Wallenstein family’s ritual of apology, diplomatic phrasing meant to gently dismiss someone. But that slot was also empty. Formality did not record weakness. The sentences in the letter were not etiquette; they were confession.
The third slot—
There was no third slot in Kyle’s mind. For ten years he had lived in two columns: what the master ordered and what danger sought. Everything in the world fit into those two. Anything that did not was locked away in the drawer labeled “Unexplained Things,” like Hugo’s friendship.
Yet lately that drawer kept filling up.
“…Hey. What’s with that face?”
Walter peered at him. Kyle folded the letter.
“Walter.”
“Yeah?”
It was the first time he had called the vice-captain by name instead of title.
“That person… the matter of the greenhouse. Since when did you know about it?”
Walter blinked. Then, very slowly, he smiled. It was the face of someone whose ten-year-old indigestion had finally eased.
“Why are you asking me?”
“……”
“If you’re curious, ask her yourself. The contract’s over now, isn’t it? Then asking is free.”
Walter mounted his horse. Still holding the reins, he dropped one last remark.
“See you in the North. I don’t know when that will be—but don’t throw that letter away. They say it took her three days to write it. The inn maid saw five or six crumpled drafts.”
The horse took a few steps, then Walter looked back once more.
“Oh, and the youngest says hello. He fixed all the shaking at the tip of his sword. Next time he sees you, he wants to spar.”
“…I will.”
“After ten years, the only thing you left behind in Wallenstein Castle was teaching the youngest. You really…”
The sound of hooves faded into the dawn mist.
Kyle stood there a long time. Then he opened the letter again and read it a third time. Even then, the third slot remained unfound.
Without finding it, he did not discard the letter. He folded it and placed it in the same spot inside his coat where the resignation letter had rested for ten years. The weight of the paper was the same, yet the place where it settled felt strangely warm.
It must have been fatigue. He had not been sleeping enough lately.
That afternoon, Kyle stopped by the currency exchange and rebound the orphanage remittance under his own name instead of the Wallenstein account. A fee was charged, but since it was the first time he was sending money in his own name, the fee did not feel like a loss.
On the way back, Pin came running from the market.
“Mister! Mister!”
“Aren’t you on an errand?”
“I am, but this first! Last time some big sister gave me a whole bag of roasted chestnuts, right? I couldn’t finish them so I saved the rest. These are for you, mister.”
In the paper bag he held out were six or seven roasted chestnuts. They had gone cold.
“…What big sister?”
“A really pretty one! Silver hair, kind of a sad face. She asked a lot about you, mister. Was it true you taught her swordsmanship, were you a good person. Oh, and she said to take good care of you. She said she’s someone who likes roasted chestnuts.”
Kyle’s mind began turning again. Civilian intelligence network—recruiting children to gather information—yet there was no reason to hand over an entire bag of roasted chestnuts for simple movement tracking, the instruction to “take good care of him” did not exist in any reporting protocol, and the identifier “someone who likes roasted chestnuts” appeared in no imperial registry.
The third slot was empty once more.
“Mister? What’s wrong? Don’t you like roasted chestnuts?”
“…No. I’ll eat them well.”
The cold roasted chestnuts were still sweet. Strangely sweet, as though they carried the share of the person who had left only warm ones for nine years.
Imperial Palace, the capital.
Even at dawn, the lamps in Crown Prince Leonard’s office remained lit. Three reports lay side by side on the desk.
First. Southern free city Valk, subjugation of demonic beast flood. Mercenary company “Grey Fang” successful solo defense. Zero casualties. Multiple eyewitness accounts of an unidentified swordsman who instantly killed a berserk troll.
Second. Northern Grand Duke’s daughter Elise von Wallenstein remained in the south for six days under the pretext of recuperation. Location of stay—Valk.
Third. Traces of access to Wallenstein family apprentice records. Viewer: Grand Duke Gregor himself. Apprentice roster from ten years ago.
Viewed separately, they were nothing more than ordinary papers. When overlapped, however, they formed the outline of a single person.
The imperial intelligence officer standing nearby spoke cautiously.
“Your Highness. The third matter could be coincidence. Accessing the Wallenstein apprentice records is a common administrative—”
“It is not common. An administrative task in which the Grand Duke himself descends at midnight carrying a lantern in his own hand.”
“…That was as far as the archive servant’s report went. We could not confirm which year’s roster.”
“It was ten years ago.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because that is the year the escort knight entered service.”
The officer’s back stiffened. Leonard neatly gathered the reports and continued, as though speaking to himself.
“Ten years ago… what else happened that year? Do you remember?”
“…There was a demonic beast wave. And—”
The officer closed his mouth. The next word was not one to be spoken lightly inside the imperial palace. Leonard did not press him. He simply offered a smile that did not ask.
“How interesting.”
A commoner escort knight pursued by a former fiancée whose engagement had been broken. An unknown swordsman who felled a troll with a single stroke. And the Northern Grand Duke suddenly pulling out the apprentice roster from the year the Sword Saint disappeared.
With a faint smile, Leonard said,
“Station a permanent team in Valk. Spare no expense.”
“Who shall we designate as the primary subject?”
“That commoner escort knight.”
The Crown Prince placed his finger on the line in the first report that read “unidentified swordsman.”
“Investigate him thoroughly.”