Small Places Need Watching
The morning air was cold.
The first thing I felt the moment I opened my eyes was the ache.
My arms ached. My legs ached. My shoulders ached.
A mild hangover of the body, maybe.
Considering yesterday, it was only natural. I'd run all over the forest, torn open the flank of an iron-tusked boar, gone back to my studio apartment for fried chicken and fire-chicken noodles, then come back and even hit the bathhouse. There was no way my body was going to be fine.
Still, it wasn't so bad I couldn't get up.
I sat on the bed and stretched lightly. The light filtering through the gap in the window was still faint. It was early yet. The bare chill unique to dawn brushed against my skin.
I left the room.
The hallway was quiet. The air drifting through the healing sanctuary was cold and clear. I splashed cold water over my face at the wash basin, and the sleep fled at once.
By the time I reached the training ground behind the guild, Garen was already there.
As always, he stood without a word.
Big frame. Closely cropped hair. A blunt, unreadable face. When a man like a human gigachad stood still in a training yard where the morning mist had yet to fully lift, the pressure was automatic.
I stopped a short distance away and gave a light bow.
"Good morning."
Garen nodded once, short.
"You're not late."
"Beating you here is still a bit beyond me, hyung~"
"Who's your hyung."
"Oh? I'm not allowed?"
Garen swallowed a sigh.
"Listen."
"Yes, sir."
I swallowed my grin and picked up a wooden sword. That was as far as the joking went.
The moment I raised a blade in front of him, the urge to mess around vanished fast.
Garen came in in a flash. The tip of his wooden sword drove in short and sharp.
In the old days I would have chased it with my eyes and gotten beaten like a dog in summer, but it was different now.
My body reacted first — I twisted my wrist, raised the wooden sword, deflected the blow, and immediately stepped off to the side.
Crack!
The sound of wood striking wood rang out, brief and clean.
Garen's eyes shifted, just a fraction.
The second attack was heavier.
I clenched my teeth, took it, and let it slide off. My arm went numb, but my stance didn't break. Reflexively I stepped in one more pace and thrust the tip of the wooden sword forward.
Whoosh!
It didn't quite touch him, but it reached the space right in front of his side.
In that instant, Garen stopped.
The air in the training ground settled for a moment.
I hauled in breath and adjusted my grip. Garen looked once at my wooden sword, then once at my face.
"That last one was decent."
"Oh, for real?"
"Again."
At that single word my heart kicked for no good reason. I wasn't sure exactly what had been good about it, but if Garen had acknowledged it, I must have done something right.
The sparring went on after that.
I still took a few hits in the end. My forearm burned, and my thigh caught one solid blow. Even so, I wasn't getting wrecked helplessly the way I used to. When I got hit, I could roughly tell why. When I blocked, the feeling of having actually read the movement and stopped it stayed with me.
A long while later I was still catching my breath hard while Garen, completely unruffled, withdrew to the edge of the yard.
I planted the tip of the wooden sword on the ground and rolled my shoulders loose.
I thought that might be the end of it, but Garen leaned his back against a pillar at the edge, crossed his arms, and quietly watched me. He showed no sign of leaving yet.
...Just how early does this guy get here?
He had probably been here since before sunrise. Earlier than me. Every single day.
That thought snagged in my head for a moment.
"Garen."
He swallowed a mouthful of water and looked at me.
"What."
"I've got a question."
"Speak."
I hesitated a beat, then asked.
"Are you just the deputy guild leader of this place — of Bresen Pioneer Village?"
Garen's gaze stopped, very briefly.
"No."
"Then what?"
"I belong to the Astraheim Guild Alliance. Deputy guild leader who rotates through the kingdom's guilds."
My mouth fell open.
"...You're, like, ridiculously high up?"
"There's no high or low about it."
"No, I mean — you're a seriously big deal, aren't you?"
Garen didn't answer. I propped my chin on the hilt of the wooden sword and kept going.
"But it's weird, you know. The villagers treat you like they're completely used to you."
"Who's your hyung."
"It's still provisional."
Garen sighed again. I pretended not to notice and pressed on.
"If you're deputy of the whole guild network, I'd figure you'd be insanely busy — but everyone around here seems pretty comfortable with you?"
Garen glanced up at the sky for a moment, then spoke as if it were nothing.
"Bresen isn't a place I come to for the first time."
"So?"
"I haven't just dropped by a few times to show my face. I check the outer perimeter, look over the guild ledgers. When problems come up, I handle them myself."
The words were calm, but the time inside them was faintly audible.
"Last winter, a pack of iron-tusked boars came all the way into the village. In spring I cleared the outskirts once before goblin breeding season. In summer I checked the roads the merchant caravans use. The smaller a place is, the more often you have to look in on it."
"Because if you wait until something blows up big, you're already late?"
"Yeah."
I shut my mouth for a moment.
Winter. Spring. Summer.
The time Garen had stacked up in Bresen sat quietly inside those words. Counting seasons as he passed through this village. Remembering when goblins would multiply. Learning which roads the caravans took. Things built one by one like that.
I had only been in this world for four days.
I didn't know winter here, or spring, or summer.
That brushed against some corner of my chest in a strange way. The sense that I had never stacked seasons like that anywhere. Because all I had done was hop dimensions — go in, endure, get out. Over and over.
Garen came here often, looked things over, moved with his own hands, left his face in front of people. That was why the villagers were used to him. To the people of Bresen, before he was the kingdom guild's deputy leader, he was just Garen.
"So, uh."
"What now."
"Why are you going this far for me?"
This time Garen didn't answer right away.
That silence felt long.
I fiddled with the hilt of the wooden sword for no reason.
Objectively speaking, I was a suspicious bastard. My looks were uncommon here, I was running an amnesia act, and my origins were unclear.
Garen spoke low.
"At first, you were suspicious."
"Yeah, figures."
"But you didn't look like a bad one."
"Oh..."
"You had the hunger to get stronger, and you weren't without talent. If you'd been a true scum, I'd have cut you down on the spot."
I couldn't say anything.
Hearing him say that just felt good. It wasn't some grand speech, but it hit me square in the chest like a hard blow. I'd been holding on ever since I got here, but this was the first time someone had actually looked at me and said something like that.
I set the wooden sword down beside me and asked with a very serious face.
"Then may I call you hyung from now on?"
Garen stared flat at my face.
"Don't talk nonsense."
"Aww..."
"Stop the useless chatter and pick up your sword."
"Yes, hyung!"
"......"
Garen's expression was pure disgust, but he didn't particularly stop me.
That was enough.
As I left the training ground, morning sunlight settled along my spine.
It was still early, but people were starting to move around the guild. A clerk walking with ledgers under one arm. A guard by the door smothering a yawn. A villager sorting something near the warehouse.
Bresen Pioneer Village was waking up, slow and unhurried.
I watched that scene from a little way off and felt the coins Luce had handed me yesterday clink inside the leather pouch.
Nice.
Somehow that thought fit this morning air perfectly.
As I got closer to the guild entrance, I spotted Mari and Kaya.
Kaya was adjusting a small pack on her shoulder. Mari had her back against the wall, eyes half-closed, swallowing a yawn.
"You're here."
Mari opened her eyes and looked at me.
"Yep. Reporting for another hard day of making money."
"You really do like money more than I expected."
"You need money to eat and live... it's actually important...!"
Kaya huffed a small laugh.
"Today let's stick to the outskirts instead of going deep like yesterday. Apparently there's a lot of sign."
"Got it."
The morning request was the same as yesterday: patrol of the forest on the outskirts of Bresen Pioneer Village.
We hadn't gone far into the woods before they came pouring out.
Eight ordinary goblins.
Before, my first reaction would have been tension — but not now. My heart was pounding, sure, but the cold sweat didn't come first.
"Incoming."
Kaya's voice dropped short and sharp.
Instead of the fireballs she always showed off, Mari poured out a low, spreading heat into the goblins. Heat burst in front of the lead pair's feet, and both lost their balance at once.
I drove into that opening.
Slash!
I cut one goblin's throat, twisted my body immediately, and deflected another goblin's club.
Wood cracked against steel; my wrist rang, but it was bearable.
Thrust!
I finished it by driving the blade through its heart.
Kaya's short voice came from behind me.
"Right side."
"On it!"
I dropped low on reflex.
A rock skimmed over my head and smacked into a tree.
At the same time Mari flicked her hand; a small flame bloomed and set the edge of the brush on fire. Two goblins that had been hiding burst out in a panic.
"Oh, smart!"
"Shut up and finish them."
I swallowed a laugh and went in.
I swung without hesitation, cut, and drove in again. One goblin charged like a bull; I kicked its leg hard. The moment it staggered and fell, I stomped its neck.
My breath was starting to come harder. But my body felt lighter instead.
Scary was still scary — but my hands didn't lock up anymore. What to do next moved through my body before it reached my head.
The last two came in together.
Mari flicked her hand short; a small fireball split midair and skimmed between them. The heat right in front of their faces made them flinch for a second. That tiny gap was enough.
One through the heart.
One through the neck.
When the fight ended, I steadied my breathing and flicked the blood from the tip of my sword.
Eight goblins. And this time, we'd taken them cleanly — no real strain.
That wasn't the end of it.
Just as we turned back toward the forest path, the distinctive kyeek of goblins rose from beyond the brush.
The sounds ordinary low-intelligence goblins made still registered as nothing but shrieking. But the words the shaman type in the rear spat out landed in my head again as clear meaning.
"Block them up front."
"Two of you together."
"Three humans."
"I'll cover the rear."
Shit.
I adjusted my grip on the sword on reflex and spoke low.
"Hold on a second. The goblins just surrounded us."
Mari and Kaya's eyes snapped to me at the same time.
"What?"
"Explanation later. There's a shaman type in the back."
The words were barely out before they burst from cover.
Two warrior types in front, three ordinary goblins on either flank, and a beat later one shaman type let out a nasty cry from the brush behind us.
Fewer than before — but a lot more annoying.
"We have to cut the shaman first!"
Mari shouted immediately.
The two warrior types shoved forward together. I took the left one's attack first. Instead of matching force head-on I twisted and let it slide, but I couldn't dodge the right one's club.
Thud!
A dull impact slammed into my side.
"Ghk...!"
"Siyun!"
Kaya's voice cracked sharp.
I had no intention of going down here.
As the heat Mari had laid low spread outward, the shaman type's form wavered into view from where it had been hiding. I clenched my teeth and drove straight in.
I knocked aside one arm of the left warrior, cut the throat of an ordinary goblin that latched on from the side.
Spurt!
I didn't stop. I closed the distance before the shaman could spit a curse.
Thrust!
The iron sword punched deep into the shaman goblin's throat.
As it gurgled and fell backward, the flow broke all at once. Even the two warrior types that had been holding out stubbornly lost their rhythm in that moment.
Without a second to breathe I spun and cut the nearer warrior goblin's throat; Mari flung a fireball and finished two ordinary ones. The last remaining warrior I took from the angle Kaya pointed out and drove straight through the heart.
A short chain of fights.
But I was less shaken than I'd expected.
I hauled in rough breaths and flicked the sticky blood clinging to the tip of my sword.
My side throbbed.
"Haa..."
Kaya came straight over and grabbed the hem of my clothes.
"Hold still."
"Ah, I'm fine..."
"You're not fine. You're bleeding."
From the tips of Kaya's fingers, after that short snap, a faint gold light bloomed. A warm sensation swept over my side, and the pain that had been pulsing moments before eased little by little.
"You've been diving in way too recklessly lately."
"Still, just now there wasn't much choice."
"That's true... but doing well and not getting hurt are two different things."
I smiled small.
"Are you worrying about me?"
"...Shut up."
The words were like that, but her hands were more careful and gentle than I'd expected.
Mari nudged a warrior goblin corpse with her toe.
"So what was that just now?"
"What was what?"
"How did you know we were surrounded before we did?"
I thought for a second.
Saying the Dimensional Archive had translated it would make the explanation way too long. The Dimensional Archive itself, and why I could hear goblin speech. I wasn't confident I could cut that cleanly into words. No — I couldn't say it.
"Just... something felt off."
"Felt off...?"
"Guess I got lucky. Kind of a creepy feeling? Haha."
Mari gave me another look, unconvinced, but she didn't dig all the way down.
I laughed it off roughly and adjusted my grip on the sword again.
We'd wiped out two packs of goblins, and my body was still holding up fine.
Mari seemed to notice; she glanced at me and said,
"You're useful, like Kaya said."
"A lot of compliments today."
"What, want me to take it back?"
"No? Thank you."
Kaya laughed quietly.
"The fact that nobody's timing fell apart was a big part of it."
"Yeah."
I wiped the sweat under my chin with the back of my hand.
I was clearly better than yesterday.
We headed back toward the guild just before the sun hit high noon.
Near the fields, a man moving cargo straightened up the moment he saw Garen, natural as breathing.
"Oh! Master Garen — how many days are you staying this time?"
"Not long."
"Still, having you here puts my mind at ease."
The exchange was so natural I found myself looking over at Garen again for no reason.
He didn't look familiar because he was high-ranking. He looked like someone who had come and gone through this village again and again, left his face here, and put his hands in when needed. Garen's words from earlier passed through my head again.
The smaller a place is, the more often you have to look in on it.
Just a few days ago this had been nothing but a strange pioneer village. It wasn't anymore.
The faces of the men in front of the guild had become familiar. The smell of Sunset Hearth had become familiar. Even the sight of Garen standing still in the training ground every morning had become familiar.
I hadn't fully put down roots yet — but at least a place where I could keep rolling along was slowly taking shape.
From a distance, Garen glanced back this way once.
I immediately threw my hand up high.
"Hyung!"
Garen turned his head as if he hadn't heard.
But he didn't go out of his way to deny it.
That was enough.