Beasts in the Slums
After finishing the relief work alongside Anastasia, Logan made his way to a shabby little house in the slums. He had come to catch up with his master, whom he hadn't seen in far too long—though the journey itself had been anything but smooth.
"R-Renate! I want to go with Logan too...!"
"Sigh... I understand how you feel, Your Highness, but that much I cannot allow. You must consider your position."
"Heheh... Rest assured, Your Highness. Nothing of the sort you're worried about will happen."
"W-what exactly would I be worrying about!? And what do you mean, 'the sort'!? Regardless—Renate!"
Anastasia had thrown a stubborn fit about wanting to come along, and in the end—
"No. The answer is still no, Your Highness."
"Ah...! Logan...!"
—she was hauled away by Renate, dragging her heels the whole way.
By the time the sun had set, only a single small lantern lit the darkness inside the room. Fiona tipped back her wooden cup and gazed quietly at Logan's eyes, which were as deep and dark as the night beyond the window. All the clamor of the daytime was gone; a heavy silence had settled between the two of them.
"Hey... you foolish fool..."
It was Fiona who broke the silence first. Her voice carried a tangle of pity and frustration.
"...I'm sorry."
"What are you sorry for? You didn't do anything wrong to me."
"...I'm just sorry."
"Haa..."
Fiona had been telling Logan the same thing for years. Don't spoil Irene so much. What you've already given is more than enough. But he never took care of himself, blindly devoting everything to his childhood friend, and it had always pained her to watch. Yet her disciple—who otherwise hung on her every word—had, in a display of true idiocy, ignored exactly one piece of advice: this one. He'd loved Irene too much, wanted to give her more and more. If anything, he'd seemed almost contrarian about it, deliberately defying his master's words by devoting himself to her all the harder.
"The only reason I took you in as my disciple was because watching you like that broke my heart, you know..."
"I'm sorry... what?"
"Never mind. Talking to myself. Anyway—are you really all right now?"
"...Yes."
"Ugh..."
One look at Logan's shadowed expression, and Fiona let out another long sigh. Her disciple offered an awkward voice in reply.
"I really am fine. I seem to have worried you over nothing..."
"Worried me? It's not worry, it's aggravation, you dolt. Why did you have to endure it so stupidly, for so long? And..."
She wanted to ask—how exactly had he managed to let go of his feelings for Irene?—but she swallowed the question before it could fully form. From what Renate had told her, he'd already been through something horrific and cruel. And beyond even that... there must have been a decisive moment. That would have been what finally severed the attachment. Merely dredging it back up would be agony. So his master chose not to press him about it.
When Fiona fell silent and said nothing more, Logan spoke up himself, his face bitter.
"I regret a great deal myself..."
"I see..."
Fiona had been about to give him a scolding, but she stopped. This fool wasn't regretting why he'd let himself be walked over without ever fighting back. No—he was probably regretting that he'd been too good to her, as if his kindness were what had turned Irene selfish. She could barely hold back the curses herself, and here he was wallowing in self-blame instead. There was simply no way to call this hopeless disciple of hers anything but what he was.
"You impossible fool..."
"...I'm sorry."
"Forget it. It's over—let it go. You were never that girl's parent."
"...Right."
At Fiona's words, Logan nodded with a bitter face and drained his cup. That's right. I was never Irene's parent. And... I was never her lover, either. Just a childhood friend from the past, nothing more. The Demon King had been vanquished now, so he wasn't even a member of the Hero's Party anymore. He had grown strong enough to live on his own—which meant he had no obligation to look after her. All that remained was for each of them to find their own path. And as proof of that: she was doing well with Rian, and he was doing well with Anastasia. Wasn't that enough?
Fiona watched her disciple lost in such thoughts without a word, and tipped back her own cup.
Just as the heavy, gloomy mood had settled in over their drinks, a voice cut through it.
"Honestly, why is everyone so gloomy in here?"
Hanna, the house's owner, barged into the conversation as she set a plate of her freshly made dish down on the table.
"Hey, Hanna. I'm finally having a heartfelt talk with my disciple after ages—can't you take a hint?"
"Huh? And whose fault is it that you get to have that heartfelt talk, huh? Ow!"
"Shut it, brat!"
Perhaps it was the fresh presence clearing the stale air, but—
"Pfft..."
—Logan, who had been wearing that gloomy expression all evening, burst out laughing at the sight of Fiona and Hanna bickering like children.
"Wow, he finally laughed! See that? With me around, the mood perks right up—way better than stiff old sister here! Ow!"
"I told you to shut it! Stiff? What's stiff about me?!"
"No, that's not what I mea—ow!"
"Then what did you mean?!"
Logan watched the two of them squabbling for a while, until he suddenly found himself wondering how they'd come to know each other in the first place. When he asked, the answer came readily.
"Oh, this brat? A long-running bad relationship, that's what. Doesn't even remember that I saved her life—just keeps pestering me nonstop."
"'Pestering'? I was graciously keeping an old sister company in her lonely old age—ow!"
"Why do you keep dragging age into this, you little—!"
After giving Hanna another knuckle rap, Fiona explained how the two of them had met. Years ago, Fiona had been at the height of her career as a Gold-rank adventurer here in Arcadia, the imperial capital. Then one day, she'd stumbled upon a girl in danger in the slums—the very moment she was being dragged off by a filthy ring of human traffickers. Just as she had once helped a young Logan, righteous Fiona had swooped in and saved Hanna on the spot. And then she'd gone and utterly demolished the entire trafficking organization that followed.
"Turns out that organization was funneling money to some filthy nobles."
The nobles had cut off the tail immediately, so they never faced legal punishment or suffered any consequences. Instead, it was Fiona who ended up targeted for retaliation. Disillusioned with that reality, she'd packed her things on the spot and headed down to the remote country village where Logan lived.
"Ah... so that's how it happened."
"Yep. So when I came back to the capital after all this time, I dropped by to see her—and got my feet stuck, that's all."
"Your feet got... stuck?"
At Logan's puzzled question, Hanna jumped in to explain.
"Ah, right. So here's what happened..."
The organization Fiona had completely shattered in the past had been revived and was operating in the shadows once more. Because of the chaos of war, children who'd lost their parents to debt or disease had no choice but to drift, inevitably, into places like this slum. And now, word was, the predators who preyed on such orphans had reappeared.
"I can't be certain, since I haven't seen them with my own eyes—but Hanna told me kids have been vanishing lately, so I've been investigating."
"Ah... so that's why there are so many children in this house."
"Yep. And if those bastards figure out that there isn't a single child left wandering the streets—that they've all gathered here..."
"...then the bastards will have no choice but to come here themselves. Is that your thinking?"
"Yep. So while we're at it—want to lend a hand?"
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Well, they do say speak of the tiger and it appears—looks like our guests have just arrived."
"...Understood."
Logan nodded calmly. When he raised his senses just as she'd said, he could feel it: several people approaching from outside, murderous intent radiating off them.
"Hanna, go stay with the children."
"...Yes, sister."
All trace of the girl who'd been fooling around moments ago vanished from Hanna's face. Following Fiona's orders, she slipped quietly into the back room where the children were sleeping. Once he confirmed she was safely inside, Fiona rose from her seat and settled into a battle stance.
"Shall we see what our dear disciple can do, after all this time?"
"...You may be in for a surprise. I did fight the Demon King, modest as I look."
Logan rose as well, adjusting the dagger at his waist. Fiona smirked and nodded.
"Heh... Fine, I'll look forward to it."
"Though... do you think they'll really just charge in, out in the open like this?"
Granted, it was a criminal organization. But this was still the imperial capital. Even in the slums late at night, surely they'd have to worry about the city watch.
At Logan's question, Fiona bared a thin, crooked smile.
"They're more than capable of it. This is a blind spot the patrol barely ever reaches. And besides, they've probably..."
She was about to say they must have greased some palms, so the watch would turn a blind eye—when, in place of a knock,
THUNK!!
an axe buried itself deep in the wooden door. Fiona glanced at it and added with a wink:
"See? They're just outright lunatics. So no need for mercy or niceties. Think of them as beasts, not people—animals that don't deserve to be called human. If killing them all really bothers you, you can leave one alive."
"...Understood."
Logan felt a faint resistance to the idea of taking human lives, but he nodded at his master's instruction. His hands had been stained with blood many times before. Completing countless guild requests, he'd dealt with not just monsters but bandits and criminals as well. And he'd fought battle after battle in the war against the Demon King's army. He was hardly naive enough to claim he couldn't bring himself to harm a person.
And so—
CRASH!!
Logan smashed through the ruined door, wrenched it open, and swung his dagger without a moment's hesitation at the intruders surging through.
"You dog bitches! Hand over the brats right now unless you want to die—Kghk!"
Shff!
Shff!
His dagger severed the tendons of the lead man's shoulder and legs in several precise places. Fiona had said he could kill if it proved too difficult, but for Logan, thugs of this caliber were pitifully low-level—subduing them posed no real challenge. He stepped outside and squared off against the rest of the group. He counted roughly twenty of them. Judging by the weapons and ropes in their hands, they were exactly what Fiona had said: raiders come to abduct the orphaned children. He thought he understood why his master had told him to leave none alive. In the chaos left by the war, these creatures had come to prey on the weak and defenseless—beasts that didn't deserve the name of man.
How can people sink this low...?
As Logan released a savage killing pressure, one of the group shrieked in desperation:
"Crazy bastard! There's way more of us than of him! Don't be cowards—everyone, attack!!!"
The thugs rushed at him brandishing their weapons, but their resistance didn't last long. Logan's skill had been enough to defeat the Demon King himself, and—
"You're not leaving me out, you bastards!"
—Fiona, joining in right behind him, was a Gold-rank adventurer of considerable prowess in her own right.
"Kghk!"
"Guaaaaagh!!"
In the blink of an eye, all twenty-odd thugs were subdued, howling as they rolled across the ground.
"Whew... Logan, what did I tell you? You could've just killed them all and left one breathing."
Fiona dusted off her hands as she looked down at the fallen men. Her expression made it plain she was thoroughly displeased with her disciple. 'You could'—as if she hadn't practically ordered him to kill them. It seemed her soft-hearted disciple had hesitated, unwilling to commit slaughter.
But Logan shook his head and answered firmly.
"I'm not the good person you seem to think I am, Master."
"Huh? What's that supposed to mean? If you're not good, who in this world would we call good?"
To find anyone kinder than this fool... she'd probably have to go drag down an actual angel. The thought came to Fiona unbidden.
Logan simply gave his master a wry smile and changed the subject.
"You said these men might have backing—that they're more than a simple trafficking ring, didn't you?"
"I did. That's exactly why I figured one survivor for interrogation would be more effective than a pile of corpses. Hence: kill them all."
"That's not a bad plan, but I have a better one. That's why I kept them alive."
"Oh? Do tell."
Fiona grinned at her disciple's knowing tone, openly intrigued. Logan raised one hand, as if to ask for just a moment.
"Yes—but first, could you call Hanna for me? I believe we need to inform Lady Renate."
"Ah. Got it."
At his request, Fiona nodded, roughly grasping what he intended to do.
He's gotten bolder since I last saw him...
She studied her disciple with quiet admiration. Was this really the same boy barely past twenty? She couldn't help wondering.
And Logan, too, couldn't help a question of his own.
I've definitely changed since that day...
Ever since the Holy Sword had exploded in the conference hall, his own body had felt impossibly, absurdly light.
The next morning. The Hero's chamber, deep within the Church.
"Hero! Stop being stubborn and come out already! I have given you more than enough time!!