To Cavelon
The awkward silence hanging over the inn lasted only a moment.
"Did you hear? Apparently that's her teacher...?"
"Tiana's?"
"That teacher Tiana keeps talking about—it was that guy?"
"...He looks pretty ordinary to me."
"What would a mere B-rank know, anyway!"
"Then why is someone like him staying at an inn like this?"
Whispers rippled through the inn from every corner, all of them catching Tiana's words.
Sian wanted nothing more than to slip away right then and there—but since escaping from Tiana was, of course, impossible, that left him with only one option.
"...Right. It's been a while, Tiana."
All he could do was talk. Sian suppressed a sigh, then put voice to the one question he most wanted to ask.
"So, uh... how did you know I was here?"
"I cannot say for certain, but something told me that if I came to this place, I would find you, Teacher!"
"......"
What kind of lunatic reasoning was that? Elina had tracked him down by scent, and now this one was finding him by vibe? Sian couldn't help but wonder if these people had secretly cast some kind of tracking spell on him.
"For you to leave the village like this—is it safe now?"
"?"
Why was she suddenly bringing up the village? As Sian stood there puzzling over it, Tiana seemed to realize something, her face going pale with alarm.
"D-don't tell me the seal weakened badly enough to force you out of the village, Teacher? Or has some new danger appeared?"
No—seal, danger, none of it made the slightest sense. Just what misunderstanding had taken root in this girl's head since her letter, that she was living in a world of her own making? Deciding he would have to untangle this calmly, one word at a time, Sian opened his mouth.
"Let's sit down and talk first."
"Yes, of course."
Tiana answered and sat down.
Not at a chair. She knelt on the floor.
"......?"
They say the human mind simply stops when confronted with the truly unimaginable. Gazing down at Tiana kneeling before him, Sian found himself incapable of a single coherent thought.
Only one question filled his skull: what, exactly, did she think she was doing?
"I shall listen attentively to your every word, Teacher."
Only a beat after her voice rang out did it dawn on him that she had 'sat down'—on the floor.
No, seriously....
Sian covered his face with one hand. What possible chain of logic turned sit down into kneel on the floor?
Naturally, the entire inn, watching the scene unfold, could only whisper louder than ever.
"He's making an S-rank kneel?"
"Out in the open like this, no less?"
"Is he disciplining her?"
"Teacher or not, that's a bit much..."
"Maybe he's really that strong."
"Has to be—an S-rank's pride isn't nothing..."
"Did you see that? She didn't hesitate for even a second. Just dropped straight down."
"She knows refusing would be pointless."
"Or it's been carved into her instincts."
"Then exactly how strong is this guy?"
The misunderstanding was spreading in an increasingly bizarre direction.
Sian wanted desperately to clear things up on the spot—but then Tiana spoke.
"If it is your will, Teacher, I shall silence every one of these noisy onlookers at once."
"No, it's fine."
It took everything he had just to restrain her as it was. The mana that had begun seeping out of her, quietly, ominously threatening to flood the room, died in an instant at a single word from Sian.
"...For now, take a seat, please."
He genuinely could not predict where this girl would go next. When he gestured toward a chair, Tiana flustered and protested.
"I am perfectly comfortable here!"
No, I'm not comfortable with this...
If you're fine with it, is that supposed to make everything fine? The words climbed all the way up his throat before he swallowed them back down. But trying to hold a conversation like this, with all those staring eyes boring into him, was far too much to bear.
Sian heaved a sigh and spoke.
"Let's move this to a room."
After the two of them went upstairs, the suffocating tension that had gripped the inn slowly drained away. The patrons each let out a sigh of relief and immediately launched into animated speculation about what they had just witnessed.
"Who is that guy? Anyone know?"
"They said he's Tiana's teacher."
"We just saw him with our own eyes—of course we know that! What I want to know is what he does, that his name's never been heard of until now!"
"Did anyone here actually know his name before today?"
The inn's patrons—and before long even the innkeeper himself—joined in, trading theories about Sian back and forth like a panel debate.
"Anyone catch his name?"
"I think I heard it once from a merchant Tiana bragged to while passing through... S-Sian? Sian? Something like that."
"Never heard of him."
Sian's adventurer rank had been a mere D. With the ranking system spanning F all the way up to S, D sat comfortably in the lower tiers—so of course nobody would know him. And even if someone vaguely recalled the name, they'd assume it was a different man entirely. Nobody would ever imagine it was the same person.
"But seriously, was that S-rank aura for real?"
"When she threatened us just now? That was no joke."
"I honestly thought my head was coming off."
The people in that inn were seasoned adventurers who'd been around the block, and yet in that single instant, every one of them had known: if they moved wrong, they died.
"Now I finally understand what they mean by being in a completely different league."
"And yet even Tiana knelt without a word of complaint..."
At that point, the highest-ranked adventurer present—A-rank Drek—spoke up.
"...Hey."
"What?"
"Was I... being loud earlier? While we were drinking?"
"...A little?"
Hearing his companion's answer, Drek's face collapsed into the expression of a man watching the world end, and he clutched his head in both hands.
"Ahh, dammit... I noticed him glancing over from partway through, so I got louder on purpose, just to show off..."
Yes—Drek was the very adventurer whose loud retelling of Tiana's exploits had first drawn Sian's attention.
When Sian had kept sneaking glances toward his table, Drek assumed he was being told off for the noise, so he'd raised his voice even more. Part of him had even thought, fine, pick a fight, let's see what happens.
Truthfully, as an A-rank, Drek could have afforded a much finer inn. He'd chosen this one because his companions were staying here, and because he liked lording it over adventurers beneath his rank—never imagining anything like this would happen.
At Drek's words, the adventurers around him regarded him with pitying eyes.
"You kept glaring over at him, being obvious about it. That's what happened."
Then again, it wasn't as if anyone else in the room had been quiet enough to point fingers, himself included. With no way to prove otherwise, Drek could only wail his innocence to a jury of no one.
And of course—
"Yeah, sure. Keep telling yourself that."
"You think someone who can bring an S-rank to her knees would be that easy to read?"
"More like he just didn't like your face and you were begging for trouble."
"Well, at least he recognized you're A-rank strong, huh?"
"Even if he had no idea how strong."
Not a single adventurer bought his excuse. The truth was that Sian's clumsy eavesdropping was what had given Drek away—but that explanation had exactly one advocate, Drek himself, so it was written off as a lie.
"...What do I do?"
"Do? You camp outside his door tonight, and when he comes out tomorrow morning, you smash your head into the floor and beg forgiveness."
"...Maybe he'll just let it slide?"
"Do whatever you want. When you're dead, don't come crying to me."
"Drek, it's been an honor. We'll start looking into other warriors."
Faced with his companions' clean, surgical severing of ties, Drek could only wear a face on the verge of tears and trudge toward Sian's room.
Time passed, and the next day arrived.
"Whew."
Recalling the previous evening, Sian had no choice but to sigh.
Yesterday had been a duel of spear versus shield. Except the spear in his hands was a battered, bargain-bin weapon, while Tiana wielded a shield straight out of legend, deflecting everything he threw at her.
No matter how gently, how precisely he laid things out, she misunderstood completely, then layered misunderstanding upon misunderstanding until she'd constructed an entire world of delusion all her own. What on earth did she think about from day to day? He genuinely wanted to crack her skull open and have a look inside.
The one thing he had managed to salvage from the conversation was this:
'The village has something called Pandemonium?'
Pandemonium—the place where, legend had it, the Demon King was born. A location that existed only in myth. From what he could piece together of her rambling, she seemed convinced that he was the one holding that seal shut.
'As if.'
Sian dismissed it out of hand. If somewhere that dangerous had been anywhere nearby, there was no way he wouldn't know, after all the years he'd wandered that forest. The village never would have stayed habitable in the first place.
She must have misremembered something, or misread it entirely.
'Or maybe...'
A thought surfaced even as he marveled at the sheer absurdity of her delusions. Could Tiana—having lost her entire village—actually be suffering from PTSD...?
'She did look desperate when she first showed up, too.'
Perhaps that was it. Perhaps, in her desperate search for peace of mind, she had projected her salvation onto him. A pang of sympathy crept into Sian's chest, and he resolved to treat her a little more kindly from now on.
But the moment he opened his door to arrange a carriage to Cavelon—
"Ah, Teacher, you're awake!"
"You've emerged!"
Alongside the familiar figure of Tiana stood one new addition: an enormous, burly man. He looked familiar somehow—ah, yes. The adventurer who'd been loudly telling Tiana's story yesterday, the one Sian had overheard.
"I sincerely apologize for yesterday!"
"...I'm sorry, what?"
Had he done something yesterday that warranted an apology? If Drek had picked a fight with Sian and Tiana had intervened, that he could understand. If anything, it was Sian who owed an apology for eavesdropping—there was not a single reason in the world for him to be receiving one.
"We heard you're departing for Cavelon!"
"Uh... yes. That's the plan, but... how did you—"
"Our lady told us!"
The "lady" in question had to be Tiana. And how had she known? Sian turned to her, and she answered with unmistakable pride.
"I visited every single stable in this city and verified them all!"
So that was what she'd gone off to check after their talk ended yesterday.
"......"
"I have rented a carriage, so we may depart at once!"
"No, that's really not necessary—"
"If Teacher himself is on the move, it must be an emergency of the gravest order. I judged that not a single moment should be wasted!"
The resolution he'd built up before opening that door seemed to melt away like snow in spring—but Sian decided to let it go. A journey he'd expected to take in three days, or rather two, could now begin today. Think positive. Nothing bad had come of it.
Then Drek, as if struck by a sudden realization, spoke up.
"Ah, allow me to introduce myself. The name's Drek! A humble A-rank adventurer, nothing more."
Since when had A-rank adventurers become "humble"? Sian had plenty of retorts lined up, but he swallowed them all—Drek's face was practically begging, please take me with you.
And so the carriage for Cavelon set off.
"Cavelon, you say? I know that city like the back of my hand. I'll take you the full scenic route!"
"......"
That had a familiar ring to it, come to think of it.
Drek took up the reins while Sian and Tiana rode inside, facing each other.
'Well, at least she's not kneeling in the carriage.'
Even as he indulged in that idle thought, a single fact belatedly struck Sian. He'd spent quite a long time talking with Tiana yesterday—but every minute of it had gone toward untangling her misunderstanding about the village.
He'd never actually asked why she'd come here in the first place.
"Come to think of it, Tiana. Did you ever finish... your revenge?"
"Ah, that is..."
Just as Tiana opened her mouth to answer—
The carriage lurched to a halt.
Wondering what was going on, they looked ahead to find a sizable swarm of monsters blocking the road.
Drek began digging out his equipment, piece by piece.
"I shall take point, so—"
"Teacher's time is precious. I will handle it."
Tiana stepped out of the carriage without another word.
The horde numbered far too many to count.
'She's just going to mow them all down.'
The Gratitude Sword Draw was fast and devastatingly strong, but it was, at heart, a single strike—not ideally suited to clearing out a crowd. Surely, Sian thought, swinging the sword around normally would be quicker than praying over and over again—
Then she quietly brought her palms together in prayer.
And—
A single prayer. A single swing. Every target falls at once.
Shiiing!
By the time the sound of the blade reached his ears, every last monster lay sprawled across the ground, cleanly cut down.
He was fairly sure he'd only heard the sword once. Had it simply been too fast for him to register, the strokes blurring together into a single sound?
"...Tiana. What was that, just now?"
"While performing ten thousand Gratitude Sword Draws each day in devotion to you, Teacher, I arrived at a new insight. And it is entirely thanks to your teachings."
His disciple—self-proclaimed—was evolving, rearranging the original technique into something new.
And Sian's review of the result was as simple as could be.
'I don't know what that was, and it scares me...'