The Ganin Plains
Ayah…
After thirty minutes of sparring, Isilite dampened a towel and wiped the sweat and dust from her face and arms, letting out a soft groan.
There wasn’t a single place on her body that didn’t hurt.
Whoa.
She had stripped off her leather armor and shirt to clean herself properly, and the sight of her own body—mottled red and purple like a battered dairy cow—drew a silent gasp of awe from her.
Abdomen, solar plexus, flanks, shoulders. When she prodded her back she felt bruises there too; unbuckling her trousers revealed six more dark welts on her thighs.
This was only sparring, and she had worn the leather under-armor meant to go beneath a steel breastplate. If she had worn the plate itself, she was certain it would have been dented beyond recognition.
Or maybe my bones would have broken?
Amid the inspection she confirmed that her breasts alone remained unmarred. Lifting the soft weight of them to wipe the undersides, she stole a glance at her master, who sat meditating with a pearl-colored phase stone in his hand.
Did he deliberately avoid hitting my chest?
In any case, having experienced her master’s skill firsthand left Isilite’s heart pounding. It hammered so hard that even the brush of the breeze made her nipples tighten into stiff peaks.
Watching from the side and standing face-to-face were truly worlds apart.
She had never quite understood how the Bloodhide clan members had died without once dodging or blocking her master’s attacks.
His defense was nothing short of divine technique. Any strike, she was sure, he could evade or deflect with ease.
By comparison his offense had looked ordinary. The trajectories were plain to see, the speed almost leisurely. Why, she had wondered, could no one stop or avoid such blows?
The moment she faced him, that notion vanished completely.
Even your own body and weapon can block your vision.
Every time she raised her blade to parry or swing, a gap opened in her sight—and into that gap the long black spear had slithered like a serpent, delivering a jolt of electric shock before withdrawing. In a real fight she would have died without ever knowing what killed her.
There existed attacks you could see yet still fail to stop. The spar with Hwanin had burned that truth into her bones.
His skill truly defied imagination.
At first she had thought that if she trained hard enough she might at least reach his toes. Thirty minutes of sparring had erased that confidence entirely.
Still, I have to give it everything.
This was the second stroke of luck in her twenty-eight years of life.
She vowed to master every technique with all her strength so that her master would never grow disappointed and cast her aside.
After the spar, Hwanin ate the hot meat stew Isilite had cooked, along with some jerky, then rested briefly before calling for Emergency Food.
“You need to learn how to fight people as well.”
Kue? Kuuuut.
“That’s right. I’ll attack you in various ways; you do your best to dodge and counter.”
Kuet!
While clearing the dishes, Isilite watched her master’s spar with Emergency Food with open curiosity.
“If you just charge head-first like that, are you asking me to hit you?”
Thwack!
Kuet! Kuuu~.
“Telegraphing your attack from a distance and then coming in with your claws—what exactly do you expect to achieve?”
Crack!
Kyaek! Kueeek!
Flap-flap! Thud, thwack, clatter-clatter!
After several solid raps to the head, Emergency Food lashed out with its wing joints, flapped up like a startled chicken, raked wildly with its talons, and stabbed three times in an instant with its beak.
Watching, Isilite felt her mind go slightly blank.
…Is Emergency Food fighting better than I am?
Just like her, it failed to dodge a single one of Hwanin’s attacks and took every blow. Yet each time it was struck it managed to angle the hit toward a less painful spot, or block with beak and talons—movements clear enough to notice.
Kuu!
After twenty minutes of nothing but punishment, Emergency Food seemed to have had enough. It scrambled backward, lowered its head, raised its tail high, and gave the feathers a saucy little wiggle…
Kuit!
Then it sprang and shot skyward like an arrow.
Wow.
The sheer speed—cutting the air with a sharp whoosh-whoosh—was enough to wring a gasp of admiration from Isilite.
But then…
Kueeet—!
Like an eagle snatching a rabbit, Emergency Food plummeted toward Hwanin. At the last instant Hwanin seemed to leap—and suddenly he was astride the bird’s back, one hand locked around its neck.
Kuet?!
Startled, Emergency Food flailed in midair. A clear crack rang out, followed by a piercing scream that echoed across the night sky.
Kuek!
“You idiot. What good is an attack that’s completely obvious?”
Crack!
Kyaek!
Hwanin rapped the bird’s head again with the spear shaft and launched into a lecture.
“If you’re going to take to the air, at least fly far away. Unless a diving attack is so fast the eye can’t follow it, the point of impact is plain as day—making it easy to counter.”
That’s only true against Master, though…
To Isilite’s eyes, Emergency Food’s dive had looked exactly like a hawk stooping on a chick. Counter that? Before you could even try, your head would be gone under those talons.
“If you decide to attack, you must already be thinking about what comes after. How the opponent will react, how they might counter that particular strike.”
Think about what comes after the attack?
Isilite stared blankly at Emergency Food thrashing about in the sky like a drunken sparrow.
Crack, thwack!
Kuku! Kueeeng!
Whether her master was scolding it or not, the sharp raps continued and Emergency Food’s squawks of protest filled the air.
Hwanin’s words had given Isilite a small spark of insight. She lifted her greatsword and moved it this way and that, trying to fix the realization in her mind.
The counter that would come after her attack, and the attack that would turn that counter back on the enemy.
Like this? Or like this?
She was still experimenting when Emergency Food finally touched down, collapsed in a heap, and wrapped its wings over its head with a miserable groan. The sight made her snort with laughter—because it looked exactly like she had felt a short while ago.
Hwanin, who had been leaning against Emergency Food’s side with a blanket pulled up to his shoulders and his eyes closed, opened them at the sense of Isilite approaching.
Night had settled over the grassland; the campfire cast a warm yellow glow that lit the immediate surroundings.
“Is it time to change shifts?”
Yes, Master.
Hwanin drew the blanket over the softly snoring Emergency Food, stretched lightly, and settled by the fire.
He filled a copper kettle with water and hung it from the tripod over the flames. Isilite offered a quiet “Take care, Master,” then wrapped herself in a blanket and crawled under Kurti’s wing.
Watching Kurti shift even in sleep to enfold Isilite snugly, Hwanin murmured to himself.
Kues really are superior to horses in every way.
They weren’t picky eaters, they were sturdy and gentle, obeyed well, could carry as much as a packhorse, and had excellent stamina.
On cold nights they shared their warmth like this—probably an instinct for brooding eggs or chicks.
“…….”
Having taken over the watch from Isilite, Hwanin drew a long breath of the cool prairie air.
The rich scent of grass, the earthy tang of soil, and the smell of the campfire filled his lungs and drove the last dregs of sleep away.
Looking up, he saw the moon being slowly eaten from the left.
A few days ago, when they had emerged from the Labyrinth of No Light, it had been full. Tonight it was waning toward a last-quarter moon, the shadow advancing from the left side.
So this is the southern hemisphere.
When they escaped the forest-type labyrinth the weather had been late summer to early autumn; roughly four months had passed since then.
Winter should have been approaching, yet the nights only grew mildly cool—never truly cold.
We might be near the equator.
Wondering what the shape of this world’s continents might look like, Hwanin sipped the boiled water and found himself craving coffee with sudden intensity.
If this was a tropical region near the equator, coffee beans ought to grow somewhere—yet Wayford, Etbrook, Rehil, Yulkam, and every place they had passed through had no coffee culture at all.
Maybe I’ll look for coffee in Parhist.
As a holy city it would draw goods from everywhere. Coffee might turn up if he searched.
His idle thoughts had fully woken him. He turned his gaze to the red orbs on his left arm—the souls of the bandits he had collected that afternoon.
Hwanin called forth one of them.
「…Ah…….」
The soul orb rapidly took form, revealing a naked woman with dog ears. Hwanin gave her slender, clearly visible body a brief, clinical once-over.
What’s the real difference between clothed and unclothed?
「Ugh… uuu……. Hnnngh…….」
After glancing around and checking her own state, the female soul curled into a fetal position and began to wail like a banshee.
Her form gradually grew hazy—the precursor to ascension.
Stop.
He tried to halt the process with force of will, but ascension seemed as inevitable as any natural phenomenon. The soul left behind only a few tiny droplets of light before rising into the sky as a faint luminous haze.
Hwanin had not expected much, so he felt no disappointment.
He gathered the light droplets and summoned another soul.
「Gyaaaaah……! Aaaaaah……!!」
The deer-headed man who had been cleaved in two by Isilite’s greatsword writhed and screamed in agony, then began to curse Hwanin.
「If only you… if only you hadn’t been there……!」
Regret is painful no matter when it comes.
「It’s all your fault!!」
If thinking that makes you feel better, go ahead.
「You……!」
Still reeling from the pain and humiliation of a violent death, the Inrok man took the reply as mockery and was about to fly into a rage when he felt his body being dragged somewhere.
Spirit Possession.
「What are you— Aaaaaah—!」
The black fox beast filling his vision swelled rapidly.
The Inrok man sensed danger and thrashed his limbs, but it was useless; the black fox simply overlaid him.
Kyaeng—
At the same moment, a wolf-sized black fox that had been scouting the campsite from about twenty meters away let out a sharp yelp and leapt into the air.
Hwanin rose, gripping the stone axe at his waist.
The black fox twisted as though stricken with cerebral palsy.
Its appearance was grotesque: the arms and legs of the Inrok man’s soul sprouted from its torso and writhed.
After a short time the extra limbs sank back into the fox’s body. The screams and convulsions ceased, and the black fox slowly rose to its feet.
Then it bared its teeth at Hwanin with a low growl.
Its eyes no longer glowed yellow; they shone a bloody red.
Come to think of it, why are these soul orbs red?
The ones he had obtained with consent in Yulkam had all been the ordinary ash-white of normal soul orbs.
Did they turn red because he had killed them, or because they had been killed?
Kue?
The noise had woken Emergency Food. Still draped in the blanket, it stood behind Hwanin and asked, essentially, Want me to discipline it?
“No. This is an experiment.”
Awooo! Auk, awoogrk. Grrraaar!
The fox made noises that sounded like a human trying to speak through a fox’s throat, then began to radiate clear hostility.
Kyaak!
“Stop.”
At Hwanin’s short command the black fox, mid-lunge for his throat, froze in a dynamic pose.
Only its blood-red eyes rolled. A cool smile touched Hwanin’s lips.
“Sit. Stand. Turn around. Dance.”
Thump, spring, spin, prance-prance.
Watching the black fox obey every order with perfect fidelity, Hwanin naturally began listing the problems that arose.
When he possessed a host with a high-intelligence soul, could he seize complete control of the body?
Did it happen unconditionally, or did differences in intelligence or willpower change the outcome?
Techniques performed with a human soul had shown roughly the same power as those performed with ordinary beast souls.
Was the possession effect similar as well?
I need more experiments—much more varied ones. Until then… I should stick to spirit possession whenever possible.
He was also curious whether possessing a human soul would let him acquire the skills that person had possessed in life.
Beast souls had granted swimming, climbing, tree-scaling and the like; human souls might work the same way.
Possessing a human soul could also bring problems like memory contamination.
Hwanin organized the tasks ahead in his mind and left the black fox—still under the Inrok soul’s possession—on standby for thirty-eight minutes.
「Khuk! Guh, uuugh…….」
When the possession duration ended, a pale mist poured out of the black fox and reformed into the Inrok man’s shape.
The distorted form gradually regained its proper outline, the process apparently agonizing; the Inrok kept screaming.
And the black fox, its eyes no longer red…
Kyaeng!
…lunged for Hwanin’s throat again. Without so much as a blink Hwanin split its skull with the stone axe.
The next morning, while Isilite packed up the campsite, Hwanin walked over to Kurti, who was grazing nearby, and performed spirit possession with a spirit orb.
Kue.
Kurti realized Hwanin had done something good for it and came over to nuzzle affectionately.
Hwanin stroked the nape that Kues loved to have scratched and tried issuing various forced commands…
No effect.
He tried the same on Isilite; she likewise ignored any command laced with compulsion.
Ah, you don’t need to bless me just for packing… but thank you.
“Mm.”
Did the target need enough intelligence to understand speech for the compulsion to work? Yet spirits could speak, so why had it failed on them?
Because they were spirits and therefore immune? In that case, was a spirit’s approach simply goodwill?
Eleven of the bandit soul orbs remained.
The Inrok he had possessed into a beast the previous night had refused to ascend even after the possession ended and had thrown a tantrum; after Hwanin put six soul-arrow holes through its torso it had quieted down, and a few minutes later it had sobbed its way into ascension.
He would have liked to test the technique on a living person and study the reaction, but conditions were not ideal. Hwanin sighed in mild regret.
Master. We’re ready to leave.
“Good. Emergency Food, come down.”
Kuu~!
Fully geared and enjoying its morning flight, Emergency Food streaked down like a falcon at Hwanin’s call and landed with wings spread wide.
“I’ll be counting on you again today.”
He climbed onto its back and stroked its nape; Emergency Food answered with a vigorous Kue~! and bounded forward.
Let’s go too.
Isilite urged Kurti after them, struggling to suppress the racing of her heart.
Receiving a blessing right before battle filled her with exhilarating power and the confidence that she could fight any monster.
But receiving one in a perfectly ordinary moment…
It feels like that place is throbbing…
The surplus strength she could neither expend nor release, the heat of the heightened state, seemed to circle inside her body and transform into sexual desire.
Blood rushed there exactly as it did when she got herself worked up with dirty thoughts alone, leaving her hypersensitive.
The gentle rocking of the saddle kept brushing against that spot, sending tingling sparks crawling up her belly.
Thud.
Hah…
When Kurti lightly hopped a shallow depression and the saddle pommel bumped her, Isilite felt a light climax as if she had just finished masturbating.
Something warm began to trickle out. She gripped the reins hard and screamed silently.
Have I gone crazy?! Why am I suddenly in heat?!
She had no way of knowing it was the blood-flow acceleration effect of the possession. Even after the thirty-eight-minute duration ended, the lewd spirit that had seized her forced her to fight a silent battle against lust for quite some time.
On the fifth day after leaving Wayford, Hwanin found himself facing a fork in the road.
One path ran straight; the other branched off at a right angle.
He looked around, but only endless grassland met his eyes—nothing that could serve as a landmark.
They had a map, yet it was little more than rough lines; such minor details would never appear on it.
Maps of this era were almost always like that.
Villages and hamlets were usually omitted; even mid-sized towns appeared only if they were large or important.
Still, among the knowledge he had gathered in Wayford were the locations of nearby settlements.
Hwanin unfolded the map on which he had written those notes.
If they followed the road running southwest from here…
“…we should reach the village of Maestig, nestled near the jungle.”
I heard it’s nothing special. Why not skip it and head straight for Katon?
“No. We’re going to the village.”
Yes, sir.
Isilite changed direction at once without argument. Curiosity, however, made her keep glancing at Hwanin’s face until she finally asked carefully,
What business do you have in Maestig, Master?
“Well, I am a Soul Master, after all.”
Ah……!
How could she have forgotten something so basic?!
Isilite clutched her cheeks in mortification and stretched them, but Hwanin paid no mind, already calculating the schedule.
Thanks to Emergency Food our travel distance has shortened dramatically. Eight hours a day, a hundred kilometers…
A day and a half would bring them to Maestig. Two days there and back would make five.
From this point to Katon was two days; three days in Katon, then eight more from Katon to Parhist.
The grand festival tournament starts in two months, so we should arrive roughly forty-two days early.
Forty-two days would be more than enough time to explore one of Parhist’s five labyrinths.
“Let’s go.”
Yes!
Together with Isilite, Hwanin set foot on the road that led to the village of Maestig.