Cyanide Rodeo
"What the hell are you all staring at?"
"We shall follow you, Your Majesty!"
"That'll be quite enough. Go draw the troll's aggro."
From what I understood, trolls instinctively singled out the strong. Get Alex and Hughes latched onto it, and the aggro should swing my way. Insolent, for a pack of monsters. But then, that was how such strength ought to end — even the mighty, by nature, deserved to have their napes bitten, taken down by the "weak."
Skreek! Skreeee! Of course, you lot don't qualify.
I steadied my breathing as the goblin swarm came pouring in. I'd never once trained with a sword, but the basic principle I knew. The instant the lead goblin came bounding at me with a dagger raised, I swung the blade I held level — as though drawing a single, flat line across the air.
Shhk—!
A sound past clean and straight into satisfying sheared the goblin's body clean in two. I hadn't felt so much as a hint of its weight.
This was the weapon Elise had pressed on me before taking her leave — protection arranged in her absence. A memento of the Sword Saint, left in her keeping.
Skreega!
"Absolutely do not panic." I murmured the words and twisted my wrist.
When had I ever had occasion to face monsters like these? Not that I'd spent my life cooped up inside castle walls, but this was only my second time laying eyes on monsters in this other world. Naturally they terrified me, and I had no feel for them. Cold sweat ran in streams from my palms, and I wanted nothing more than to burrow into the shadow of Elise's skirt and shut my eyes. Even so, I refused to do anything so stupid as to close them.
Shhk—!
Just forward.
Shhk—! Shhk—!
Forward, never letting my feet stop.
Shhk—! Shlaaak—!
Beheading each fresh assault as it came, I kept advancing on the troll's exposed rear.
Greeeeeh!
At last, in position, I glared up at the back of the troll's skull.
"Even the back of your head is ugly, you bastard? Then you're as good as dead."
The last clone I could muster from Fourfold Divine Shadow. I had the summon bend its knees and take a launcher's stance to fling me skyward. Stepping onto its palms, adding its heave to my own strength, I threw my whole body into the leap.
"Heave-ho!"
Another tiresome thing about trolls: unless an attack carried mana, you couldn't so much as wound them. I couldn't use mana to save my life — but the sword in my grip had once belonged to the Sword Saint.
A trickle's worth of it, at least.
Fwook—!
The blade came loaded all on its own.
Grheeaaaaagh!?!?
“!?!?”
"What the hell!?"
The troll's scream — knife buried in its back — drew cries of disbelief from all around. From the knights, from Ian, perhaps even from the monsters themselves. Half the battlefield forgot to breathe.
The flustered troll flailed a hand backward, but it never came close. Naturally — what creature built that round could ever touch the center of its own back?
Greeh!!! Gwaaaargh!!
"Uwah!? Gahk!? Ugh!? Blegh!?"
Faster than I'd expected, the troll gave up on grabbing me by hand and began shaking itself with everything it had. With nothing to hold but the knife's grip, my body whipped and slammed every which way. So much for Plan A — no way to reach the heart comfortably like this, you bastard. Thinking it, I carved a trench up the monster's back.
Kreheuaaaagh!?
The thrashing grew wilder still. Like a rodeo, I fought to smother the bucking that threatened to launch my body free. Its clenched muscles squeezed, trying to force out the intruder — not a chance. The instant I thought to push deeper, the monster broke into a dead charge toward the forest.
…Uh-oh. I let go before the groan could even leave my mouth.
It rammed its back into a tree even bigger than itself.
Crrreak— CRASH!
The tree toppled, and I hit the ground rolling. A drop of at least two stories — my side hurt like death itself.
Breathing was… hard…
Grrr… Keh-keh-keh…!
Looking down at my groans, the troll made a sound like laughter. Shook off an annoying fly, did it? No telling how pleased with itself it was.
I spat out the taste of iron and soil and heaved my creaking body upright.
"Protect His Majesty!"
Once again, Ian was the first to read the situation. He threw himself at the monster that had given even him fits. The shriek he wrung from it, and the sight of him clinging on for dear life, dared to raise a hope: maybe.
But that was where it ended. His weapon was gone. His body was ruined. If this went on, the moment that monster shook itself clean, the Emperor they were all sworn to protect would be butchered before their eyes.
Graaaaagh!!!! Aah—… Ah……?
But clever men always keep two or more plans on hand. Had this been an unwinnable fight, I would never have tried in the first place. That's the sort of man I am.
Watching the troll's hand finally begin to tremble, I felt a twinge of queasiness.
"I was glued to your back for a good five minutes, and it's only kicking in now? Unbelievable."
I wanted no part of the Gigant Troll or the Ice Troll, the species said to rank above that thing. Even monsters should know their limits.
Gwehk… Gwehk!? Gweeehk!!
Its complexion gone blue, the troll spat up bile. The fine tremor in its fingers became, in moments, a shudder through its entire body. Proof that it had spread, at last, through everything. The poison.
"Potassium cyanide. Cyanide salts, in technical terms."
Blue pigment saturated with cyanide compounds. The nitric acid found in rust remover. Stir in the potassium of alum, apply high heat, and there it was — potassium cyanide, thrown together on the spot.
At that lethal a dose, convulsing like that, even an elephant would be crossing the rainbow bridge inside of seconds… Even thinking back on it, that was one thing I never wanted to meet again.
Gaaagh…! Gaaagh!
Bloodshot eyes bulging, the creature strained with all it had — as though it could shake off the poison if it just fought harder. As though it could refuse to die. But the harder it thrashed, the faster the poison spread.
THUD!
That colossal bulk dropped to its knees. Then the upper body folded too, and the thing reached a hand out toward me.
—Please, save me.
—Help me.
—I can't breathe.
Roughly that, I'd imagine. I'll admit it wasn't entirely without a certain pitiful charm, the thing having bellowed nothing but Gwaargh and Grehehk from start to finish — but it was already far too late. Even if an antidote existed, at that stage there was no saving it.
Gaaah… Greeeeh!!! Hk…! Hk…
With its last scraped-out syllable, the creature's arm fell, limp and spent.
Dragging my aching body over, I went for the sword still buried in the troll's back. Borrowed things deserved to be returned properly. Filthy as it had gotten one way or another, a good scrubbing would set it right.
Only when I wrenched the blade free did I notice how quiet the din around us had gone.
"…Huh?"
"Wh… whaa…?"
"The… the troll…"
Every knight had frozen solid, all of them staring at me. The goblins had broken into cold sweat of their own, and the remaining troll wore a look of pure incomprehension — how could its kin have died to something so weak?
…Apparently I still had a job left to do.
"The hell are you looking at, you shrimp bastards? Pick up your weapons."
“!!!!”
"Let's go home!!!"
“UWAAAAAA!!!!!!”
A roar mightier even than Ian's cry shook the ground. To the knights scouring the goblins with heaven-piercing fury, Ian issued his orders: finish off the troll he'd been holding down, secure a route of retreat, and tend to the wounded — he and a small handpicked cadre, himself included, would take the remaining troll, so they were to attend to His Majesty.
As ever, his ability to read a battlefield and his instincts were simply something else.
Back at the barracks, of course, all hell broke loose.
Medics scrambled out on alert, and word spread in an instant, drawing every knight's attention. Knights fresh off what looked like their own training huddled close and whispered.
"Four years without so much as a single wolf turning up out there. Talk about a wretched draw."
"Still, no deaths — that's the true miracle. Three Gigant Trolls mixed into a goblin horde, if you please. As expected of the Vice-Commander."
"Well, here's the thing… turns out it was the Commander-in-Chief who took down one of those Gigant Trolls."
The knights jolted upright.
"A m-monster that takes a whole platoon to pin down… and the Blood Emperor killed it? Is that for real?"
"There must be some mistake…"
"The Vice-Commander said it with his own mouth. There's no mistake."
"If that's true… that's astonishing, isn't it?"
"A hidden master concealing his strength — was that it all along?"
"I'd pegged him as a desk jockey whining about a field he'd never set foot on… but he's starting to look rather different."
I could feel it from the knights — a warmth in their gaze that hadn't been there before. Too far away to catch exactly what they were saying, but it hardly mattered. All I wanted was to rest.
The medics swarmed me first of all.
"We've prepared a stretcher, Your Majesty! This way inside, quickly!"
"I'm fine. Start with the ones hobbling along behind me."
"Yes? B-but…"
"As of this moment, the death toll is zero. I have no intention of squandering a perfect result like this, so I'll ask the favor."
Plausible-sounding, all of it — the truth was that my conscience balked at riding the thing. Everyone else had earned their wounds being beaten, flung, and stabbed. Mine came from simply hanging on and getting wrecked anyway. A body far too frail for surviving in a fantasy world. No need to keep living tucked out of sight anymore, though, so it wouldn't hurt to try my hand at magic — or some proper conditioning.
"Did you just hear that…?"
"An Emperor who puts his knights first. How admirable is that?"
"Ah, dammit… I think my inner servant just grew a little more devoted."
Ignoring the whispers and the gazes that had only grown hotter, I returned to my personal barracks and took basic treatment. Fourfold Divine Shadow did not hand you back an unharmed body just because you dismissed a clone, after all. Every copy had been the same — like peeling identical dolls of myself off a line. Well, kill one off and summon anew, and a pristine clone did pop back out.
Knock, knock.
"Mind if I come in?"
"Enter."
The door opened, and Ian stepped through. He had taken down two trolls practically barehanded, and was still less battered than I was. He let loose his trademark wahaha! of a laugh.
"You're not hurt as badly as I feared — that's a relief. Had me worried."
"Obviously. A physique this magnificent isn't built in a day or two."
"You said there was something you wanted to discuss, so I brought some drinks along. What do you say? Care to join me?"
Offering liquor to an injured man?
I fucking love this guy.
Elise would have banned it on the spot.
He kept up his easy informal address all the same, yet received his cup with both hands, the very picture of courtesy, and we drank the first round together.
"Nothing major. I'd like an explanation regarding this treason suspicion of yours."
"…Eh?"
Right out of the gate, I'd drilled him with a fastball aimed square at the ribs — no curve on it whatsoever — and Ian blinked, visibly thrown. A few slow blinks later, a somewhat daft "Aaaah~" slipped out of him.
"Now that you mention it, there was such a rumor, wasn't there."
"…You're telling me you didn't even know it existed?"
"I've never had the slightest interest in politics. I couldn't be bothered with whatever nonsense the previous Commander-in-Chief went around spouting."
Ian had refused the previous Commander-in-Chief's orders at every turn. Coaxing wouldn't win him over, and driving him out had failed on the strength of his record and the knights' trust — hence, it seemed, the rumors. His defiance toward the old man, inflated into treason against the imperial family.
So I'd been played by that old codger's bluff?
I never should have killed him in one stroke. I should have starved out his line slowly instead.
"Exactly the sort of petty stunt that vulgar old man would pull."
"And yet you still suspect me? For all my rough edges, I'd say I've been quite favorably disposed toward you, Your Majesty. Genuinely so, at that."
"I don't trust a man with no darkness in him. Far too antique a character archetype, no? You'll be a survivor of the Knights of Oswald — something along those lines, I'd wager."
"…"
His head dipped slightly, and Ian looked down into his cup. Whether he had expected this topic or merely wished for it, I couldn't say. He drained it in one long pull.
"Telling that story means telling an older one first. That all right?"
"As short as you can manage."
"I've never been any good at this sort of thing…"
"I was prepared to demand a three-line summary. Consider this leniency."
He laughed, wry, then put on the face of a man arranging his thoughts and filled my empty cup. And slowly — who the Knights of Oswald had once been, what had befallen them, and why, betrayed as he had been, he bore Lawrence no grudge — he began to speak.