Vargas's Legacy
Karelteian, the Hero of the Northwest.
Roughly four years from now.
He was the one who had been sentenced to survival punishment on Bareda Hill for assaulting a superior who had been systematically abusing the men under him. He had been an exceptionally proactive soldier with outstanding skill—but the superior he struck happened to be a noble.
The sentence was excessive for the crime of striking an officer. Yet he came back alive.
And he came back carrying a strange spear.
After that… everything about him changed completely.
It was as if he had become an entirely different person. Later, he revealed the secret behind that transformation.
—At the edge of the cliff on Bareda Hill. That was where I was reborn.
When he claimed he had discovered the legacy of the hero who once ruled the North, countless others climbed Bareda Hill in search of it. Nothing was ever found again.
Which was why…
"I have to find it now."
Arteon set out toward the sheer drop of Bareda Hill. Snow swallowed his legs to the calves; every step felt as if his feet were freezing solid. A snowfield wolf's pelt kept the blizzard off him, but it could do nothing about the cold that set his whole body trembling.
Even so—
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
Arteon did not stop walking. Enduring cold this vicious was something he had long since grown used to.
If there's anything out here, it has to be this place.
Arteon knew the terrain of Bareda Hill in intimate detail. He followed the cliff the man had spoken of, walking on and on.
If it isn't here either… I'm finished.
"…Huh?"
Something caught his eye. It was buried under snow—easy enough to miss entirely.
Crunch. Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch!
Arteon's stride quickened. One wrong step on that steep cliff face and he would plunge sideways into the void, yet his movements never faltered.
And at the cliff's farthest edge—
"Found it."
A cave mouth lay below the cliff. Arteon's eyes lit up.
Being on the underside of the drop made it dangerous, but—
Scrape! Skrrrk! Grip!
He drove power into his legs, skidding down as if shoving the snow aside, and caught a jutting rock with his hand. The face was nearly vertical. Clinging hard to the protruding stone, Arteon worked his way lower.
"Hup!"
He rocked his body forward and back, building momentum, then hurled himself toward the cave.
Thud!
"Got it…!"
Arteon hung from the entrance by sheer will and shouted. By then the cold had flayed his hands raw; they were slick with blood. He did not care.
"Gah!"
He heaved himself up and rolled onto the floor inside the mouth. The mere absence of that knife-edged wind made his body feel almost warm.
"Hah… hah… hah…"
The tension broke and his breathing turned ragged. He lay on the ground, gulping air, then pushed himself to his feet and looked deeper into the cave.
"Bigger than I expected…"
For a cave cut into a cliff this steep, it was remarkably spacious. A winding passage continued inward with no end in sight. Something about it smelled of danger—
"But I didn't come this far to hesitate."
Arteon stepped into the depths without a second thought.
Step. Step.
The farther he went, the more surprised he became. The cave was larger and longer than he had imagined—almost as if someone had carved it deliberately. The ceiling soared high. The twisting path had been smoothed with care.
But more than anything else—
…There's warmth.
His body was growing warm. The freeze was melting out of him; sensation prickled back into toes and fingertips that had gone numb.
Arteon kept his guard up and pressed deeper. When at last the passage brought him down into a lower chamber—
"…Ah."
A broad space some twenty meters across. At its far end stood a small but distinctly special dais.
"What the hell is this place…?"
Nowhere in the North was there a cave structured like this. He had lived in these lands for more than ten years; he knew that better than anyone.
Arteon approached the dais with care, half expecting traps. His steps were cautious. But the moment he stood before it—
"This is…"
He knew at a glance. This was the legacy of the hero who had once ruled the North.
Arteon looked at the small rod resting on the dais. Barely three handspans long—a short stick. Karelteian had returned with a spear, and yet…
Arteon studied the rod on the stone. The perfect size for a club, really. Without hesitation, he reached out and took it.
Grip.
In that instant—
Fwoom!
Light erupted from the dais, flooding the entire cavern, and something indescribable poured into Arteon's mind.
"Ugh!"
He staggered, nearly losing his balance. What flooded into his head was knowledge he had never encountered in his life.
Arteon looked again at the rod in his hand—the thing he had dismissed as a worthless stick.
"A spear…?"
It had only been sealed in the form of a short rod. To transform it into a spear required mana.
And then—
Thud.
Arteon sat down where he stood. The strange diagram etched into the floor before the dais—he now understood it was a magic circle that amplified the density of mana.
New knowledge…
An entire domain he had never known. Arteon began to practice the Vargas Mana Cultivation Method.
The Vargas Mana Cultivation Method differed from ordinary techniques. It turned extreme cold itself into power, allowing mana to rise steadily and naturally.
"Vargas Wolfhart…"
The man who had once reigned as master of the North. Every scrap of knowledge he possessed had been passed down to Arteon.
Focus.
First he would lay the foundations of the Vargas Mana Cultivation Method right here. How long it would take depended on talent, but—
"I'll just keep going until it works."
In sheer grit, he yielded to no one.
Five days passed.
A full week had gone by.
…As expected.
He had allowed himself a sliver of hope, but nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.
"Steel hearts! Division Commander, every task you assigned has been completed. There appears to be nothing further."
Staff Sergeant Claw served as Velkain's escort and bodyguard. Beyond that, he also handled the discreet inquiries Velkain needed pursued. At Claw's report, Velkain let out a quiet breath.
"Is that so? You've done well."
Velkain turned his head toward the direction of Bareda Hill. The cold of the North far surpassed any ordinary notion of "cold." At night especially, the temperature plunged so low that even heavy winter gear barely held it at bay.
And into snowfields like that…
They had thrown a boy out there in little more than a thin uniform. There was no surviving it. Even if he somehow endured the cold, the snowfield wolves would mark him as prey and begin the hunt. A green soldier who had not even been here a year could never have lasted.
"Are you thinking of that soldier, sir?"
Claw asked. He had never imagined Moldrek would go that far. In that light—
"There is a certain regret, I suppose. It would have been better if we had investigated a little further."
"Even so, nothing would have changed. The murder of a superior officer is summary execution, no matter what justification is attached."
"…Yes, sir. You're right."
The aide nodded. It was not as if either of them felt any particular guilt. One way or another, the outcome would have been the same.
Velkain erased the name Arteon from his mind.
Or rather—he was about to, when—
"Division Commander!"
Someone burst into the commander's office in a rush and shouted. Velkain's brow furrowed slightly as he looked over; the soldier flinched and snapped into a hasty salute.
"S-Steel hearts!"
"What is it?"
"Th-That is…"
At the soldier's next words, Velkain's eyes wavered.
Shift.
Had he ever concentrated this deeply in his entire life?
How many days has it been?
His pressed lips refused to part, as if glued shut. His parched throat tasted of blood. At least two days—perhaps three—had passed since he sat upon the mana-amplifying circle and began the Vargas Mana Cultivation Method. In all that time he had not taken a single sip of water, yet somehow his mind felt sharper and clearer than ever.
…Is it complete?
Just below his navel, in his lower abdomen, he felt a tiny but distinct current of energy. Arteon knew at once what it was: mana.
In size, perhaps half a pinky nail? Yet the force it radiated was fiercer and stronger than anything he had felt in his life.
Still—
"…I wish I'd had just a little longer."
A dry voice scraped out between cracked lips. When he slowly rose, his stiffened muscles seemed to scream. Even so, Arteon calmly turned his eyes to the water pooled nearby—droplets that had fallen from the ceiling and gathered over time.
Slurp!
Water cold enough to jolt him fully awake. After days without a drop, it sank into his body like the water of life itself.
Splash!
Arteon shoved his face to the floor and drank every last bit. A few swallows were enough to empty the shallow pool, but—
"Burp."
—to him, right now, it was pure elixir.
"Well then… you'll have to pay for the interruption."
Arteon picked up the rod he had set on the ground and turned his gaze toward a certain direction. There had been only one reason his concentration had broken while practicing the Vargas Mana Cultivation Method.
That thing.
"Grrrrrrr!"
A low howl rolled out, and a pair of crimson eyes flashed.
The Black Butcher.
Most of the snowfield wolves on Bareda Hill wore white coats—protective coloration to vanish against the white northern backdrop. But among them, a rare few bore black manes. They had no official name, yet people said they were a full half again larger than ordinary snowfield wolves, and more than twice as swift.
Folk called them—
"…Black Butchers."
Encounters were almost unheard of. When one did occur, death was certain. Any beast that could survive the North with black fur had to be terrifyingly strong.
But—
A faint tremor rose around Arteon as the mana condensed in his lower abdomen stirred and moved.
He did not need to be taught how. He already knew. What Wolfhart had bequeathed him was not mere knowledge—it was the whole of his experience as well.
Then, answering Arteon's will, the mana flowed into the rod in his hand.
Crack!
Arteon's face registered shock.
"This is…"
The distinctive pattern along the shaft caught his eye first. But—
It's very different from the one Wolfhart used.
He already knew why. It was a growth-type ego weapon—a weapon that "evolved" to match its user's mana, mastery, and skill.
"Iglis."
The very first stage. Wolfhart had wielded the ninth.
"Meaning I've got a long road ahead."
It did not matter. Surviving this place and walking out alive came first.
And then—
"Grrrrrrrng!"
The Black Butcher still would not commit, unsettled by Arteon's transformation, bristling with killing intent as it kept its distance.
Arteon looked at the beast. Strange. Ordinarily, that murderous pressure should have turned his legs to water and dropped him where he stood…
So why—
"I look easy, do I?"
Arteon's eyes flashed sharp as a blade. Then he spoke.
"How long are we going to stare each other down, mutt?"
He crooked a finger.
"Come on, you son of a bitch."
As if it understood every word, the Black Butcher—
"GROOOAAAR!"
—roared and charged straight at Arteon.