Thirin Feels a Mighty Threat in the Other World for the First Time (2)
Klaus watched Thirin chewing with her mouth working busily and thought to himself, Surely there must be some unsightly flaw beneath that mask. That’s why she only reveals the parts she’s confident about. If she hadn’t covered her face, even the soldiers would have been completely bewitched.
Thirin’s very existence was spreading the cutting-edge concept of “mask scammers” across this other world. Once again, the fantasy realm was suffering a one-sided cultural invasion. Since modern civilization was built on the foundations of imperialism, it couldn’t be helped.
Klaus continued observing her. Once this job is over, maybe I should invite her to a meal. Just as Thirin had received K-style brainwashing education, Klaus had undergone the fantasy realm’s own thorough “ladies first” indoctrination. In any case, watching the woman before him nibble on something as pathetic as hardtack bothered him. Besides, how good could a bounty hunter’s meals possibly be?
True, Thirin had unleashed horrific verbal abuse on him until now, but thanks to her, Klaus had learned a great deal. He wasn’t thinking of paying off his debt with a meal, but still… it wasn’t as if he was curious about what lay beneath that mask. Absolutely not.
That gaze—half discomfort, half curiosity—had no chance of escaping Thirin’s hypersensitive senses.
“What are you looking at?” Thirin stopped chewing and snapped.
“Are you that curious about what’s under the mask, Mr. Stalker?”
“...I never said anything of the sort.”
“Oh yes you did. Your eyes are screaming it. You were thinking about how delicious it would be to pick up the bread crumbs I dropped while eating!”
Klaus swallowed hard. Just how far did this insane woman’s imagination stretch?
“I did not.”
In truth, Thirin knew perfectly well that Klaus wasn’t thinking anything like that. But she was from the Peninsula. When the opportunity for tea-bagging presented itself, she simply couldn’t resist. Klaus’s deliciously stiff reaction had slammed the “pummel the sandbag” button in her mind.
Thirin unleashed a torrent of words.
“No, no. You are clearly the Professional Retriever of Bread Crumbs Dropped by Women, the Official Appraiser of Saliva Components on Women’s Napkins, the Dedicated Licker of Sauces from Women’s Used Tableware, and the Chairman of the Committee for Establishing a Museum to Preserve Unwashed Forks Used by Women—”
“Please stop…”
Klaus found it horrifying that he could actually understand those bizarre titles. It was truly a curse of knowledge. But Thirin showed no sign of stopping.
“It’s certain. You are undoubtedly a woman’s—, a woman’s—”
“Stop it…”
“It’s definite. You are a woman’s—, a woman’s—, a woman’s—”
“Will you please stop…!”
“Nope. You are fucking a woman’s—, a woman’s—, a woman’s—, a woman’s—”
“Stop… stop… stop!”
Thirin had overlooked one thing. Unlike before, Klaus was no longer bound by divine speech. He possessed both freedom of words and freedom of action. At last, Klaus’s reason finally snapped.
“ENOUGH!!!”
Klaus roared. “Enough already, damn it! That damned ‘woman, woman, woman’! I have zero interest in women!”
“...What? You don’t like women?”
Thirin’s mouth froze mid-chew.
Klaus, having lost all restraint, shouted, “That’s right! I have no interest in women! Damn it all, if I were into women I wouldn’t have joined the military—I’d be attending social gatherings instead! I’m sick to death of hearing about women!”
“You… don’t like women…?”
“Exactly! I’m not interested! How many times do I have to say it before it gets through your thick skull? Are your ears blocked? I truly have no interest in wo—”
Klaus stopped mid-sentence and clamped his mouth shut. Even though he was the one saying it, something about the statement felt terribly off. What the hell am I even saying…?
A heavy silence fell.
A passerby on the road stared at Klaus with a dazed expression. Thirin, too, stared at him with a blank face.
“......!!!!!”
Klaus quickly realized how his words must have sounded. His face drained of all color.
“N-no, that’s not— It’s a misunderstanding.”
“......”
Thirin’s body stiffened like stone. Just as even an earthworm will squirm when stepped on, even a sandbag produces a rebound when struck. Thirin had not anticipated this particular rebound.
Inside her mind, the K-brainwashing education from the Peninsula began blaring emergency sirens. Sexual orientation-related statement detected. Political Correctness protocol activating. Switching to Respect Mode.
“Uh, um…” Thirin opened her mouth awkwardly. “W-well, that’s possible. Of course. Sexual preference… should be respected. Absolutely, it should.”
“No, that’s not what I meant—”
Thirin’s cursed, high-speed rotating brain did not stop there.
Wait. This guy doesn’t like women.
My body is female, but mentally I’m a man.
Then…?
All blood drained from Thirin’s face.
Perhaps… perhaps in this guy’s strike zone, I’m a perfect match…!
Thirin didn’t even consider the possibility that she might not be his type. She was the sort of person who believed the world revolved around her. She was Chinese. She was a Chinese 2-stack, Swedish 1-stack hybrid. She was an Earthling.
“....”
Klaus felt the world go dark. It was obvious what misunderstanding this woman was cooking up. To clear it up… No. Given everything that had happened so far, she would definitely use this as ammunition to toy with him like a plaything.
“This is fucking hell…”
Watching Klaus spit out curses, a cold sweat ran down Thirin’s spine. Before Klaus could say another word, Thirin struck first.
“Oh my. So you possess such refined tastes. Ohoh, ohohoho. Hoo, hohoho.”
“...Why has your speech suddenly become so bizarre?”
“Hoo, hohoho, hee, heehee?”
Since falling into this other world, Thirin was feeling the strongest threat she had ever experienced. To her, the realm of “gay” was an unknown world. Like any ordinary person, the unknown terrified her.
To prevent Klaus from feeling any attraction toward her, Thirin had to act like a woman.
It’s fine. I didn’t get the Oscar for nothing.
I can do this…!
“T-this young lady has always employed such speech, hohoho. Oh my, hohoho. Hohoho, ohohohot.”
“God damn it, what exactly are you misunderstanding?!”
“This young lady is not misunderstanding anything at all, hohoho. This young lady believes that a man liking another man is… perfectly natural? Yes? This young lady considers it an entirely natural occurrence, hohohoho.”
“......”
Klaus’s face flushed bright red. Unintentionally, Thirin had instilled a sense of gender equality in him. He had just realized that the target of murderous intent did not discriminate between men and women.
“C-Commander of Ten, sir. Your complexion looks rather poor…?”
Thirin’s attitude grew even more cautious and polite.
“Huk, huk, heuk, huk, ugh…!”
Klaus clutched his chest. Thirin’s behavior had finally driven him into respiratory distress.
In the end, Thirin succeeded. Just as the Spanish had conquered South America with smallpox, she had successfully transmitted the chronic disease of the Peninsula to the fantasy realm.
“Uuuuugh…!”
Klaus had come down with a stress-induced illness.
I have to be careful.
Seeing this, Thirin swallowed nervously, tension rising as she observed his reaction.
I mustn’t act like a man. I mustn’t use male speech patterns. Just in case, I’ll keep imitating a woman…
In a single day, Klaus had fallen ill, and in a single day, Thirin had lost her favorite sandbag.
“Huk, huk, heuk, ugh…!”
Be careful… be extra careful… I can do this…
It was the completion of a world where everyone gets hurt.
Before they knew it, a full day had passed and night had fallen. Whether the world hurt everyone or whether a world where everyone gets hurt was completed, time flowed on regardless, and the pursuit continued.
Despite the churning in his stomach, Klaus did his best to maintain a calm facade and spoke to Thirin.
“Bounty hunter.”
“What is it, Mr. Human Stick?”
“......”
Thirin had dropped that repulsive speech pattern, but she had also stopped calling Klaus “Mr. Stalker.” Klaus felt something heavy and dark piling up inside him, but he didn’t show it as he continued.
“...It seems they aren’t heading for the pioneer village.”
“Really? Then where are they going?”
Klaus searched his memory. The direction the carriage was heading was definitely…
“If we continue this way, there is an abandoned Imperial Army barracks.”
“Barracks?”
“Correct.”
Klaus recalled the map. It wasn’t the path to the pioneer village, nor was it the path into the Sea of Trees—it was a third route. What lay at its end was clear.
The Imperial Army Eastern 137th Forward Barracks. Of course, it was now nothing more than a ruined shell.
There had once been a time when the Empire expanded with mad fervor. Just like the endlessly stretching roads, everyone believed the Empire’s territory would expand without limit. The Empire had even mobilized entire legions to carve into the massive Sea of Trees to the east and plant the eagle banner on unknown lands. The 137th Forward Barracks was a product of that age of expansion.
But no flame can burn forever. At some point, the Empire’s violent expansion came to a halt. The excessively vast territory created gaps in governance, and the endless waves of demonic beasts and barbarians gnawed at the borders. The Empire decided to stop advancing and instead focus on protecting what it already possessed.
Thus, the duty of pioneering passed from the legions to civilian hands. Those willing to risk danger to cultivate the wilderness were granted land and tax reductions. That was how the pioneer villages came to be. The places abandoned by the legions were filled by the poor but tenacious.
As a result, the numerous forward bases that had once symbolized the Empire’s growth were abandoned to the flow of time. Some barracks were swallowed back into the Sea of Trees and became nesting grounds for demonic beasts and nameless monsters. Others became shelters for wanderers with nowhere else to go. And some became…
“Hideouts for criminals. What a cliché,” Thirin said.
Klaus nodded. “I can’t think of any other possibility. But there’s one thing I don’t understand.”
“What?”
“Why on earth would they kidnap children?”
Thirin gave a crooked smile. “We can just go ask them.”
Klaus shut his mouth. He had plenty he wanted to say about this woman’s methods, but he needed to focus on what was in front of them.
“I see torches.”
Klaus spoke in a low voice. Thirin nodded. The two hid their horses and cautiously approached the barracks. Beyond the broken wooden fence, several torches burned brightly, casting long shadows of the patrolling sentries.
They circled the barracks from a distance, staying alert. Where should they strike first? Where were the children?
“...No.”
After completing one full circuit, Thirin muttered quietly.
“What do you mean, no?”
“Look there.”
Thirin pointed at the entrance to the barracks.
“There are traces of the carriage entering, but none of it leaving.”
“Then that would mean their main base is here…”
“No, that’s not it either.”
Thirin jerked her chin toward the other side of the barracks.
“There are faint wheel tracks leading into that forest over there.”
Klaus narrowed his eyes, but all he could see was thick undergrowth. Just what was this woman looking at?
Thirin reached a conclusion without hesitation.
“The carriage already left the barracks. This was just a midway stop. They resupplied or rested briefly.”
Klaus couldn’t see anything. It was understandable if he couldn’t spot the carriage tracks. But a carriage was large. There would need to be a path for it to pass through the forest.
“There’s no road. How could it have gone that way?”
Thirin shrugged. “I don’t know either.”
Seeing Klaus’s dumbfounded expression, Thirin smiled brightly.
“It’s fine. There are plenty of guys who can give us the answer.”
Thirin said this while looking at the barracks.
“Shall we begin, then? Time to open the chatterbox convention.”