The First Snow of the Northern Empire
The First Snow of the Northern Empire
The old man of the Northern Empire and Eric guided Aslan toward the ship.
It lay at a place called Habrisg Fortress, a site Aslan had visited before — a round-hollowed cove at the continent's northernmost edge, where cliffs and beaches stacked in layers.
There waited the ship.
"There it is."
At Eric's curt word, Aslan lifted his head and saw it.
It stood there like something irrefutable.
A Watcher's vessel. No doubt about it.
A ship that gleamed blue.
A blue-gleaming ship carved with the intaglio of a great eye.
Aslan knew this craft. Only the Empire could build one.
It was made from timber magically treated — greenheart lumber harvested from the Emerald Forest in the Maresa City Union, on the Empire's western coast.
That same lumber went into every personal vessel a Watcher operated. Aslan could not be mistaken.
The real question was why a Watcher had come here at all.
Something unprecedented even in the game, something Aslan had never encountered in twelve years of wandering. He studied the ship, mind churning.
No way to discern the reason now. The vessel was half-shattered. Nothing remained aboard but corpses heaped everywhere and the scars of battle.
So Aslan approached the ship, intent on examining those scars.
The Northern Empire men following behind groped at their belts with uneasy expressions.
Drawing closer, Aslan saw that the Watcher's vessel had not been broken by any natural cause. The ship was jammed between reefs as if someone had deliberately wedged it there by force.
Seawater sloshed in, hammered the hull, and drained away again, and with every retreat the moisture and salt left the ship groaning.
The vessel had split in half, folded like a collapsible bridge, and the mast had driven half its length into the sea.
No natural phenomenon could easily produce a sight like this.
A Watcher's ship, a masterwork by a first-rate shipwright, was a treasure built with ample means to survive any natural storm.
The crew sailing such a ship would be first-rate as well. Men like that suffering catastrophic damage from mere weather was nearly unthinkable.
The details would require direct investigation, but considering the Northern Empire's present state of affairs, Aslan could already guess well enough.
Still, certainty demanded a close examination. He strode to the ship and set foot on the collapsed hull where it sprawled against the ground. Eric abruptly spoke.
"My lord, do you truly mean to go aboard? Strange beasts haunt this area. It's dangerous..."
"If you're afraid, you may turn back."
"I am not afraid! I am a subject of the Empire, and Empire subjects are born warriors! I am not frightened by some mere ship or beast—"
"Then follow quietly."
Aslan cut off the unnecessary rambling. Eric shut his mouth, expression sour, and the old man trailed after Aslan, struggling to mask the fear in his eyes.
Thus they climbed onto the hull. The body of the great ship sloped gently toward the ground, and upon it lay countless scars and corpses.
Bodies now rotted and frozen, reduced to crumbling husks.
Traces of beast and man. Aslan surveyed the scene, searching for the mark that would seize his attention most.
After a brief scan, his gaze locked onto a scar that pulled at his eyes.
A vivid sword-cut.
A single slash carved simultaneously through a beast's carcass sprawled on the deck and the pillar supporting the mid-deck.
A single-stroke cut delivered with full hip rotation and body weight. The unrusted technique blazed fresh and clear in the mark.
Aslan approached the scar. Behind him the Northern Empire men lingered near the descent that served as an entrance, fidgeting and simply watching whatever he did.
Aslan knelt on one knee and examined the corpse. The sword-stroke that had cleaved through the frozen, crumbling flesh was distinct.
Precise and powerful. The technique is far from ordinary, too.
A single blow that had sheared halfway through the pillar and severed the beast's cervical vertebrae with precision — but had stopped short of cutting the hide behind the neck, thus pinning both pillar and beast's neck together.
The blade used was likewise a masterpiece, forged by a first-rate smith with top-grade materials. Despite splitting a wooden pillar and a tough beast's neck simultaneously, not even a fleck of metal lay on the deck.
From the neck's cross-section and the wound in the hide, Aslan read the weapon: a double-edged sword weighing around three kilograms, roughly one hundred forty centimeters in length — a textbook two-hander.
A Watcher.
That single sword-mark was all Aslan needed. The man who left it was a Watcher.
The instant he understood, his Luck and Combat Art reacted.
A near-vision shape shimmered before his eyes.
He flinched, hand reaching for the Kal at his back, then stopped. This was a phantasm shown by his Luck.
An extension of Foresight.
Indirect precognition triggered by meticulous examination and certainty about the identity and the trace.
A vision cast by the information his brain had absorbed while reconstructing what must have happened here from the vestiges of the past.
"My lord...?"
Aslan glanced back at the Northern Empire men, confirmed they could not see the vision, and turned again to the phantom.
The vision moved.
Aslan followed it, steps entranced.
His eyes kept raking across the space.
A decisive cut with full hip-commitment. Splitting beast and pillar, then twisting the body to evade an attack.
The phantom drove its sword down at a beast pinned to the deck, and beneath the beast's weight a corpse showed through the sagging planks.
More beasts charged the phantom. Antlers like a stag's tore into its flank, and the figure in the vision bled.
The spilled blood dried on the deck. A mortal wound. Under normal circumstances immediate staunching would be required, but the phantom did not staunch it.
It retracted the thrusting Kal and swung from low to high, and the grazing blade split a wolf that bore a deer's head.
Where the phantom strode, the cloven carcass revealed itself.
Next, mana responded.
Through mana elevated to the superhuman realm, Aslan perceived that the Watcher had used magic in that moment.
And the vision showed the same — the phantom employing magic.
The bleeding from its flank stopped. The dried blood-trail that had stretched this far ended at that point, and the phantom's fight continued.
While beasts surged, biting sailors to death, killing beastmen, killing each other, the Watcher kept cutting them down and advancing.
From stride-lengths left behind, Aslan inferred his speed. From the gouges in the hull, he saw that the man did not tire. From blood dried on the deck, he gauged how much the Watcher had spilled.
His swordsmanship never faltered — never too little, never too much. With precise relaxation and power-control he killed beast after beast.
The phantom fought upward, and Aslan followed it to the deck.
There a heavy tread halted before the phantom, and the phantom likewise lowered its sword and faced it — then docilely allowed itself to be led away.
Nothing beyond that was visible, but Aslan had already gathered enough.
He knew this Watcher's caliber.
...Strong.
The Watcher who had sailed this ship was a swordsman on par with Fay or Aslan himself. Final-level tier.
He had bled no small amount. Enough that any ordinary man would have to suspect death by hypovolemic shock. Blood volume equal to five average men.
Yet he had not died. He had kept fighting.
The scent of mana lingering at Aslan's nose confirmed it: this man was a master of the Restoration School.
Equalization could not have produced recovery like this. Equalization merely spread wounds evenly — it created a state where one could fight immediately, but it was not suited to prolonged combat. Wound-management, at best.
Replenishing lost blood, sealing wounds, restoring lost flesh — Equalization could accomplish none of that.
Only the Restoration School can do such things.
But that did not make the Restoration School omnipotent. It was far more difficult than most schools of magic. It required profound understanding of the human body, vast mana reserves, and exceptional control.
It was not magic one could wield as casually as eating while fighting, wary of one's surroundings, gripped by mortal danger.
Only one conclusion could be drawn.
This Watcher was a master who could claim to be the best among Watchers — a superhuman who could wield magic with cold precision even under the extreme tension of combat.
In other words: exactly the talent the party needed.
Swordsmanship approaching a Master's, superlative combat ability, the high station of a Watcher, and peerless Restoration School magic besides.
In gaming terms, a healer-DPS.
In a traditional RPG, he would be classified as a cleric.
The fact that he was a Watcher — something even Aslan had almost never encountered — introduced variables, but if the man was alive and docilely led away, this was an excellent opportunity to recruit a companion.
Most likely... at Valder.
High probability he was connected to Valder, who had plundered the ship. Their next destination could be set accordingly.
Aslan was turning away with that settled in mind when—
"M-my lord!"
The Northern Empire men had climbed the steps to the deck and abruptly shouted. Tension edged their voices with fear.
Aslan turned. Both men had drawn weapons.
But the weapons were not aimed at him.
A-woo-woo-woo-woo-woo
The howls of beasts rose from somewhere, and the weapons were leveled toward the sound.
Only then did Aslan lean past the gunwale. Across the frozen marsh, beasts were advancing.
Grrrrrrr...
Wuff, whuff!
Bellowing beasts. Their appearance could scarcely be called whole.
A creature with a bear's body, a wolf's head in the same hue, and limbs replaced with those of a reindeer.
A grotesque chimera with a moose's huge long legs and body, topped by an alligator's head with rolled-back eyes.
Even a boar crawling along with three or four snake-heads sprouting from its tail, shrieking a skin-crawling scream.
Twisted beasts. Clearly touched by the hand of the Self-Birthing Mother.
They filled the marsh as they closed in. The Northern Empire men sucked in horrified breaths.
"...M-monsters..."
"God of War preserve us..."
Calling on their god, spitting curses as though words alone could drive the advancing aberrations back.
They looked ready to flee, yet they did not flee. They drew the weapons at their belts.
Axes came out, crude shields slung across their backs were freed, and rusty Kals and daggers were unsheathed.
They readied themselves, swelling muscles that had been hunched against the cold.
Aslan watched their courage for a moment, then spoke.
"No need for that."
As the Northern Empire men turned to look, Aslan brushed aside his cloak, withdrew a single feather, and held it in his hand.
"Get inside the ship."
He did not explicitly say he would protect them, but even unspoken, the words were unmistakable.
Words a Northern Empire man could only take as insult.
The old man, crushed by fear, could not open his mouth. Eric flushed red and said,
"We cannot do that! The sons and daughters of the Empire do not shun a fight once it has come! No matter how great a warrior you are, my lord, this is Northern Empire—"
Whether it was shame or rage was unclear. But even that cut off when Aslan glanced at him with those peculiarly weary teal eyes.
The man froze, flustered.
Aslan looked away from the stiffened Eric and toward the beasts, which were slowly advancing and beginning to encircle them.
"Go inside."
Perhaps he meant it as a gesture of respect, because at the shift in tone Eric pressed his lips tight, then led the old man into the small cabin on the deck.
Creeeak. The door was loose as it closed, but Aslan pushed it shut and exhaled a relieved sigh.
Beasts were climbing onto the deck, or leaping up with unbelievable leg-strength to land atop it.
Aslan watched them and thought.
The beasts had not appeared here by coincidence.
In the distance, he could see roughly half the pack splitting off and retreating — along the same path Aslan and the two Northern Empire men had come.
Plainly heading for the village.
Probably a move designed to apply pressure and urgency, assuming that village was Aslan's. Whatever lurked behind these creatures orchestrating this, Aslan did not believe it was a simple beast.
"Th-there! The village! They're going toward the village! My lord! The monster bastards—!"
"We must stop them! Let us help—"
The Northern Empire men had only now noticed the beasts' movement and were shouting in agitation. Aslan answered in a low voice.
"Don't worry."
He offered no further explanation, but the two men, seized by urgency, finally recalled that Aslan's party was at the village.
"Ah..."
Only a choked sound emerged. Aslan did not reply.
He merely turned his back on the cabin where the Northern Empire men sheltered, gripped the feather firmly in his hand, and murmured.
"Purity."
With a sound like sudden ignition — whoomph — Aslan's fighting spirit manifested.
The beasts kept running.
Toward the ramshackle settlement visible in the distance, they ran, drool trailing and whines spilling from their throats.
Some of them had once been human — humans with enough intelligence to know that a wooden palisade meant only for keeping out the cold would collapse easily.
Though they now wore beast-forms, they still held human brains.
So they had discerned that much and swiftly closed the distance.
The beasts who lacked such knowledge because they possessed bestial brains simply followed blindly.
Monsters deliberately crafted to serve as leaders or "sergeants," and ordinary beasts — precisely as their maker intended, they functioned like a single army.
That army swept toward the settlement like a storm, running without pause, dripping greed.
The greed of those who still carried human brains went like this:
The settlement was full of old people and children, with no strength to oppose them — it would crumble at once.
If they did this job well, they would receive better forms.
The "sergeants" hurried their steps, panting as they ran nearly flat to the ground.
The palisade drew closer, and at last they emerged onto the plain.
What the sergeants had expected upon revealing themselves on the plain was this:
Frenzied motion erupting inside the palisade, screams ringing out, people yanking open the gate to flee and being bitten to death as they ran.
But contrary to their expectations, the interior of the palisade was still.
What?
The instant one sergeant felt the pang of doubt, a sudden wave of heat washed over them.
Heat strong enough to make heads turn involuntarily, a searing heat that could only harm the body. One by one, the sergeants turned their heads.
KWAAAAAAAH!
And saw an arrow hurtling toward them.
An arrow as though molded from the sun itself. Unmistakable danger. The sergeants screamed and tried to halt, but they only tangled with the beasts behind them and toppled.
Onto that piled mass of beasts, that wreckage of a mass-collision, Tiyamal's plasma arrow struck.
—KWA-WOOOOOOOM!
The arrow forged of mana as fuel birthed a colossal explosion.
As if the sun had bloomed upon the earth. Most of the beasts within it burned to death.
Those not killed outright writhed in agony, gasping for breath or thrashing ablaze, and so they did not notice the ones approaching them.
And caught unaware, no beast could withstand a Master's attack.
The sole surviving sergeant lifted its head — and saw a beast's head erupting in gold, and a golden spearhead hurtling straight toward its own face.