Hunter Drakes
While he sat endlessly in the carriage, Karem never had a chance to grow bored.
Iona, who looked as good-natured as he was stout, seemed to enjoy talking about everything under the sun as befitting an elderly man. Even without Karem asking a single question, he poured out nonstop what Iceland had to offer, what was good about it and what was bad.
For Karem, who had spent more than nine-tenths of his life since reincarnation confined to a single village, this was actually a welcome thing. Of course, he could hardly have refused someone who served as both chief seneschal of a ducal house and an elder of a major faith.
Catherine had never mentioned it outright, but it was a fact Karem had already begun to suspect. Through Iona, he was able to confirm that she had been invited—hired—as the exclusive mage of a noble house: specifically, of Alfred Felwinter, Duke of Iceland.
Iona’s information-gathering disguised as chatter. Attending to Catherine’s meals. Sleeping when the time came. Beyond that, there was nothing particular for Karem to do.
Or rather, even if there had been, no one assigned it to him.
The cooks and servants of the escort procession seemed not to trust him in the slightest. They would not even let him near the fire, much less touch the cooking utensils.
“Isn’t that obvious? Not just because of your age—if you got hurt doing something like that, lightning would fall on your superiors. The young exclusive servant of the mage the Duke hired with a personal letter gets harmed during travel? That’s a perfect case for getting one’s head chopped off.”
Physically or politically.
Catherine declared it while waving her scroll. Karem was instantly convinced.
In modern terms, it was like the secretary of some external consultant the company president had suddenly hired barging into the staff cafeteria. If that secretary got hurt, it was obvious who would be breathing fire.
For the sake of the cooks and servants, Karem gave up cooking—at least until they reached Felwinter territory. Though his hands itched with longing for the solid weight of a knife and the lick of open flame.
While Karem swallowed his regret and listened to Elder Iona’s endless chatter, they passed several villages. At last the escort procession entered Iceland, and Karem could finally understand, with absolute clarity, why the place was called “Ice”land.
The moment they left Borderster and crossed into Iceland, the very air changed.
The piercing, cool scent of winter—when temperatures drop to single digits, below freezing—sank deep into his lungs. As even light breathing began to chill him from bone to stomach, thick cloaks that had been loaded in the cargo were distributed. Karem received one as well.
The reason, of course, was that he had stubbornly tried to drape the raw hide of the moss boar over himself.
“Ah, come to think of it, now that we’ve entered Iceland, we should start applying oil soon.”
“Oil?”
“Yes. Iceland tends to grow severely dry as winter approaches.”
“Ah, so that’s why?”
Karem grasped the reason at once. Upon entering Iceland, the cold was one thing—but he also felt his skin gradually tightening. Clear evidence of dry air.
The collaboration of dry atmosphere and bitter winter was something the current Karem had never known, but his previous life had experienced it to the point of exhaustion.
“Kid. Stay still and put it on. Unless you want the cutting wind to tear your face open.”
“Hiek.”
Karem vaguely recalled that in the old days, winter winds tearing skin had been a frequent occurrence. Just imagining it was horrific. Applying oil to the skin or wrapping a scarf was the natural defense.
Even in his previous life he had often smeared lotion on skin that dried out every winter, so the idea itself was familiar. Applying raw oil like this, however, was an awkward and strangely fresh experience.
Screech—
Screeeeeeeech—!
Suddenly the carriage stopped. Outside, a sharp cry like an eagle’s call rang out close to the carriage wall. Anyone who heard it would know it for a warning.
“Hm? A warning signal?”
“An ambush?”
“It seems so. Lady Atanitas. For a moment—”
Knock knock knock—!
The instant Iona agreed with Catherine’s words, someone rapped on the carriage door and the window was flung open. Cold outside air rushed in, and a knight whose face was hidden behind a visor delivered the warning.
“Lord Iona. It’s an ambush.”
“Monsters? Bandits? Which is it this time?”
“A pack of Hunter Drakes is closing the distance.”
Hunter Drake. Karem simply blinked, unable to feel the reality of it. He knew what a Drake was, but a Hunter Drake? He turned his head and stared at Catherine.
Feeling that gaze thick with questions, Catherine lifted her head from the scroll she had been buried in.
“Simply put, Drakes are sub-dragons with thin dragon blood—like worms, wyverns, and lindwurms. Among them, Hunter Drakes form packs the way wolves do.”
Catherine’s explanation was concise and easy to follow, yet Karem’s curiosity only grew. After all, the only monsters he had seen in this life were goblins and slimes—and now, suddenly, a Drake? It was only natural for curiosity that hadn’t existed before to bloom like mold.
“Are they similar to lizards?”
“Think of them as a hybrid of wolf and lizard—with scales, carapace, and feathers.”
“Hunter Drakes grow thick feathers in several layers instead of scales.”
Having finished speaking with the knight, Iona cut in with a long sigh. He closed his eyes briefly over the rosary buried in the folds of his neck, made the sign of the cross, and turned to Catherine.
“Lady Atanitas. I know it’s improper since you haven’t been formally appointed, but may I make a request?”
“Even though the escort forces are quite elite?”
“I trust our soldiers, knights, and warriors—but one never knows. The more forces, the better.”
“That’s not wrong.”
Catherine rolled up the unfurled scroll and tucked it into her robes as a sign of acceptance.
“I was getting stiff just sitting in the carriage anyway. Perfect timing. Kid. Let’s go.”
“Yes.”
Karem followed Catherine out into the cold wind. There was no resistance—curiosity about the new monster outweighed any sense of mortal danger. Where the needle goes, the thread must follow. And as her exclusive servant, he could hardly have stayed behind.
“Sir Haifon?”
“Careful! The monsters are close!”
The reeds, dusted with pure white autumn flowers, began to shake unnaturally. At the sound of rustling, Sir Haifon barked a warning.
Soldiers who had formed a shield wall around the carriages thrust their spears forward. Behind them, warriors scanned every direction. Riders and knights already mounted on horses and snowrunners adjusted their weapons and reins, ready to charge at a moment’s notice.
Grrrrrr! Keoheong!
The moment the canine threat-growls ended, a roar like an air cannon firing split the air—and a pack of wolf-shaped monsters burst from the reed field, charging the formation.
Hunter Drakes: gray-feathered, wolf-shaped, larger than bulls and looking for all the world like dinosaurs. Just before the spears could pierce them, the monsters leapt back. They barked as if about to spring forward at any second, then lunged out and retreated again and again in a kind of frenzy.
It wasn’t retreat. It was threat display. Pack hunters, just as she had said.
Karem realized the Hunter Drakes surrounding the formation were trying to scatter their prey’s attention—exactly the kind of scene he had watched countless times in wildlife documentaries. Only this time, the escort procession itself had been marked as the prey.
Grrrrrr! Keoheong! Keong! Keong!
Still, he couldn’t help flinching every time they barked. They were pseudo-dinosaurs bigger than cattle!
Seeing a few warriors and soldiers show the same reaction brought him a small measure of comfort. Age didn’t matter—being scared was only natural.
“Huhuhu. Kid. Are you afraid?”
“Ugh, I’m a kid who’s never held anything more than a dagger. Of course it’s creepy.”
The only wild beasts Karem had ever seen up close had been at a zoo during his school days. Even the two kinds of monsters he had encountered here, he had only watched from a distance. And now Hunter Drakes were about to be added to the list.
“Well, still—you’re admirable.”
Iona, stroking his beard beside Catherine, ruffled Karem’s hair.
“Among those with weak hearts, or those facing Hunter Drakes for the first time, there are people whose bodies simply go limp.”
“Well, that’s not wrong. Is it because the kid is more mature than his peers?”
“Perhaps he’ll make a fine warrior someday. Karem. By any chance—”
“Don’t even think of taking away my exclusive chef and servant.”
“Hehehe. A joke, a joke. I only mixed in a little seriousness.”
All the while, the ambush continued.
As if the probing phase was over, the monsters that had been waiting still behind the surrounding pack—bodies half again as large—burst forward. Several more Hunter Drakes charged.
The warriors behind the formation answered with a furious volley of daggers, throwing axes, javelins, and arrows, blunting the surprise attack.
Catherine, who had been iron-walling Iona’s attempts to poach Karem’s future, took the entire scene in with both eyes. She had come outside on the off chance something unexpected might happen—but it looked as though there would be no need for her to intervene at all.
“Now!”
“Are you not paying attention!?”
“Get out of the way to the sides!”
“The knights are going out!”
The moment the Hunter Drake pack showed the briefest gap—blocked first by the shield wall, then by the warriors’ attacks—Haifon roared the order.
At the signal, soldiers and warriors scrambled aside. Immediately, horses and snowrunners carrying knights and riders, with Haifon at their head, swept through the momentarily cowed Hunter Drakes.
The monsters’ formation collapsed in an instant. Warriors began reverse-surrounding the Hunter Drakes at once. Only soldiers and a handful of warriors and knights remained to hold the original formation against any surprise.
Keoheoeoeoeong—!
A low but unmistakable cry rolled out from beyond the reeds. Karem felt every hair on his body stand on end.
With that sound as the signal, the Hunter Drakes that had not yet been surrounded turned and fled without a backward glance, as if they had never attacked at all. Even those in the middle of being encircled began to break free, taking wounds as they ran.
“They’re suddenly retreating?”
“Hunter Drakes form packs, and whether in the wild or in civilization, a pack is power. This ambush must have stopped adding up, so they abandoned it on the spot.”
“They already lost some of the pack, though?”
Karem pointed beyond the formation.
Kkaegaeng! Keoheong!
“Whoa!!! Watch the claws!?”
“Don’t let your guard down! Get bitten and your arm’s gone!”
“Shields forward!”
The three Hunter Drakes that had been completely surrounded and failed to escape resisted with ferocious desperation. But every attack was stopped by shields and pinned by a dozen spears. One after another they uttered their final death cries under the finishing blows of knights and warriors.
“A pack can be rebuilt as long as there’s prey, and the season is still autumn. They’ll be looking for easier game. Since we’re close to Kingsland, they might even cross over that way.”
“Uh… but are we just leaving those?”
“We don’t have the time to spare.”
Karem had wondered if they might at least claim the spoils, but the soldiers’ and warriors’ mission was purely escort. This was not a subjugation, and the road ahead was long.
The soldiers and warriors could not hide their regret, but when Sir Haifon and the other knights roared and glared, they had no choice. They dragged the monster corpses into the reeds on either side of the road and covered the site with dirt.
Before the smell of blood could draw unwelcome guests, the procession moved on at once.