Chapter 60: The Worst Reunion (6)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 60: The Worst Reunion (6)
The reed field had turned into a battlefield.
It was only natural, considering war veterans were crossing blades with one another.
I felt I had stepped in too early, but the old man had asked me to make sure Levantello didn’t die, so I didn’t have much choice.
More than that, I’d had a hard time suppressing Alto, who was furious at Yobeste for blabbing about our past.
“Alto Bertrand! Why do you stand in my way? Our goals are the same!”
“Are you out of your mind?! We finally earned this peace, and you want to let the Demons run rampant again?”
“The very existence of dungeons is proof that the Demons have not been fully extinguished!”
“We can eliminate them through steady research! That’s why the Adventurer Guild exists, you idiot!”
I swung my blade in a half-moon arc, shattering the javelin he had thrown.
Before I could even reset my stance, flames erupted from beneath my feet.
Fwooooosh!
It wasn’t an explosion, but a flamethrower trap using fire spirits—Yobeste’s specialty.
I quickly used Howling to gouge out the earth where the flames were emerging and hurled it back at him. As if by magic, the fire stopped.
“Ah… that’s hot.”
“Alto, are you alright?!”
“Old man, I know it’s confusing, but right now, I’m Bloodhound. Don’t call me Alto. That guy is beyond pissed.”
“Ugh!”
I was scorched in several places, and blisters were already forming.
Enduring the stinging pain, I kept a sharp eye out for more javelins while scanning the area for other traps.
“Pain, pain, fly away~!”
With a peculiar incantation, the burns on my body were instantly healed.
“Yarismal Bichante, daughter of Mirachi Bichante, is providing cover for Alto Bertrand! Do not worry about your injuries—just run!”
“Ho?”
I couldn’t act like I knew her while I was hiding in the mud, but surprisingly, we were old acquaintances.
“It’s been a long time. You’ve grown into quite the lady.”
“Hah! Lord Alto, you remembered me…!”
Why is her reaction so intense?
Anyway, with a reliable healer on my side, I could afford to tank some hits as long as they weren’t instant-kill traps.
“Alto! I’m coming too!”
“No, Rune! It’s a minefield of traps. If you charge in blindly, we’re done for!”
The little lady was trying to reach me with her shield raised, while Narupa was struggling to hold her back.
Regardless, I tracked Yobeste’s location by the scent of his sweat.
Despicable bastard, hiding after throwing a spear.
Wait, maybe I shouldn’t be the one saying that, considering I was the one lying in ambush?
“Old man, fall back and command! Levantello, I’ll clear the path. Follow me once I’ve confirmed it’s safe!”
“Understood. Lukart! Rangers, move to the front! Detect and disarm the traps! Priests, prepare to focus healing on the rangers! Tanks and mages, follow the rangers and advance slowly!”
The old man knew his role well.
He immediately moved outside Yobeste’s range to give orders, but the Lukart bunch was paralyzed with panic.
Why?
Because I had reappeared before them as both Alto Bertrand and the Bloodhound!
“Bertrand? That pushover?”
“You idiot, didn’t you hear what the other veterans said? Didn’t you see his prowess?!”
“Is that really the same Alto from Mirei’s party?!”
“Then all this time… we’ve been treating a war veteran like a total loser…”
Ah, the sweet sounds of denial and despair echoing from all sides.
I think I finally understand why those Demon bastards enjoy playing with people so cruelly before killing them.
I wanted to listen a bit longer, but time was of the essence.
“Yee-he-he-he-he!”
Yobeste lunged out from nowhere, thrusting his spear.
“Alto, let’s flank him!”
Levantello thrust his own spear from behind.
I lightly stepped on the shaft of Levantello’s spear, leaped into the air, and swung Howling at Yobeste.
Unfortunately, Howling only managed to graze Yobeste’s forearm.
“As expected of Alto! Crossing blades with you is truly terrifying!”
“It’s easier if you just give up!”
“I cannot do that!”
He vanished again, and vipers lunged from the ground where I was about to land.
“Pain, pain, fly away~!”
Thanks to Yarismal’s healing, I ignored the snakes and cut them all down, though her incantation really killed the mood.
“Lukart! Is this an act of insubordination?!”
“B-but, if that really is Alto, then we’re already…”
Despite the old man’s roar, the adventurers were hesitating.
Goddammit. If we weren’t in the middle of a fight, I would have taken their heads one by one.
I stood back-to-back with Levantello, bracing for the next attack.
If I were alone, I could have just tanked all the traps and focused on crushing Yobeste, but this was becoming a real nuisance.
“You useless idiots of Lukart! Get your heads in the game!”
The Lukart Adventurer Guild Branch Manager screamed, her voice cracking.
“That’s right! That man is indeed Alto Bertrand! The No. 1 National Merit Recipient, the Bloodhound!”
At the Branch Manager’s declaration, everyone turned pale.
Mirei’s party members, in particular, looked like they wanted to crawl into a hole, even taking steps backward.
Pathetic wretches.
Alto might forgive them, but I never will.
“If you realize the gravity of the sins we’ve committed, you must help him now and earn even a shred of merit! That is the only way we can beg for forgiveness! Yes! If we play our cards right, we can hand over Mirei’s party and save ourselves!”
“Just Mirei’s party? Is that even possible?”
“Why not? It’s true! We weren’t the ones directly involved!”
“But what about Claude and Gerend? Didn’t they seduce the girls in Mirei’s party, which is why Alto found out and left?”
“Really? He knew that when he left?”
“Leaving without a word wouldn’t make sense otherwise, you moron!”
“You bitches!!!!!!”
The Branch Manager collapsed to the ground, screaming in a frenzy, and the Carriage Station Manager took over.
“Even if we knew, it was an internal matter of a party, so it was hard to intervene! You fools, if we stay still, Yobeste will kill us all anyway! It’s better to help Lord Alto defeat him and offer up Mirei’s party, the men who slept with them, and the true sinners! Then we can live! We can survive! Follow Count Dakuus’s orders!!!”
What makes you think I’ll let you live?
However, the Station Manager’s desperate logic was like a lifeline to those already in a panic.
Driven by the singular desire to survive, the rangers remembered the old man’s instructions and stepped forward.
Meanwhile, a spectacle was unfolding in another corner.
“You lot, what do you think you’re doing?”
Gerend’s own party members were pointing their swords and spears at him.
Claude was in a similar predicament.
“If you hadn’t done something so insane, it wouldn’t have come to this!”
“Sleeping with Alto Bertrand’s woman? Are you out of your mind?!”
“You bitches… you were the ones wagging your tails at me…!”
Claude trembled with a sense of betrayal.
Seeing this, the Branch Manager added fuel to the fire.
“Seize Mirei’s party as well! Those wenches plotted to get us all killed!”
“That’s right! How dare those crazy bitches cheat on a war veteran!”
In an instant, dozens of people swarmed them. Mirei was pinned to the ground before she could even swing her sword.
“F-Fire…!”
The suspicious Resin was preparing a spell, but due to the strange properties of this area that hindered mana manipulation, she couldn’t even produce a spark before being punched in the stomach and collapsing.
“Please save me, please save me!”
Krima had long since surrendered, begging with her hands high in the air.
Ha… you seeing this, Alto?
This is the true face of the Hero-rank party you spent five years painstakingly raising.
Truly magnificent.
“Just what kind of treatment did you receive in Lukart, Alto?”
“Ha, do you have any intention of telling me what happened to you if I ask?”
I felt like ripping that mustache right off his face.
“In this reality, where not a single person receives gratitude for their sacrifice, I, Yobeste, declare that it is better to return to the days when there was glory!”
And there was Yobeste, standing right beside us.
This bastard, acting like he belongs here!
“You!”
“Levantello won’t do. He is already a pawn of the Duchy.”
Yobeste kicked a pebble-sized bead into the air and vanished into the reeds.
The bead rose to eye level between Levantello and me.
I knew what this was.
When that bead explodes, countless poison needles shower in every direction.
It was a cowardly bomb filled with a variety of toxins that would take ages to detoxify.
“Cover your face, Levantello!”
“I know, but we can’t dodge this!”
“Dammit!”
Is there no other way?
Just as I resolved to cup the bead with my hands, a scrawny girl appeared before me. She covered the bead by clapping two steel bowls over it from above and below.
Pop!
Clatter-clatter-clatter!
The explosion inside the bowls was muffled, but the sound of metal striking metal continued for quite some time.
“Ugh…!”
Unfortunately, the girl’s strength was barely enough to withstand the recoil.
Once the explosion subsided, she threw the bowls aside, her arms shaking uncontrollably.
But rather than looking at her arms, she stared intently at me.
With large tears streaming down her face.
“You…”
“Alto… Alto…!”
She fell to her knees right there.
“I shouldn’t have done that…!”
She pressed her arms, head, and forehead against the ground.
“It’s my fault you were hurt… I hurt you so much…”
The thrill was gone.
I thought I’d finally get to enjoy some swordplay and bloodshed, but the apology from the girl who intruded on my battlefield turned my heart cold.
“I was so wrong… I was so wrong…!”
Diane.
Are you doing this because you’re truly sorry?
Or is it because things have turned to shit for you?
“Enough.”
Well, whatever.
“Find the path to Yobeste.”
Her tracking skills were undeniably top-tier.
I’ll use her.
Just as they used Alto for five years.