The Journey Begins – 1
Maxwell, head of the Tongues Merchant Firm — the man who hadn't just run off with my money, but had also stabbed me squarely in the back on his way out.
I'd ended my years of seclusion for the sole purpose of making him pay, yet now that I was actually out here, I had no idea where to begin. I knew the first step was to hide my old identity and forge a new one, but back in the day, I'd always left that sort of thing to Maxwell.
"Haah...! Turns out I was leaning on that one merchant firm far more than I ever realized."
I'd spent my life avoiding people because I had no desire to waste effort widening my circle of connections — and ironically, that very attitude was what had done me in. I'd tied myself to a single firm, built a relationship of complete trust by letting them handle everything, and gotten burned for it.
"I'm hardly in any position to call Aleyna's judgment poor, am I."
My face grew hot as I remembered the taunts I'd hurled at the Holy Sword I'd sold off eight years ago. After all, I hadn't managed to see that Maxwell had been nursing a snake in his bosom the whole time.
How embarrassing...
Be that as it may, hardly anyone knew me, and enemies filled every direction — the Holy Kingdom, the demons, the Creed Assassin Guild, and even those coveting the title of Sword God. Wherever I went, only hostile factions awaited, so I needed a plan.
First things first — I need to hide my face.
The hood and mask that the assassins who'd charged at me so recklessly had worn. The smell of blood and sweat mingled together was unpleasant, but I had no choice but to use them. I pulled the mask up over the bridge of my nose and yanked the hood over my head.
Swapping my top for a leather armor and standing before a mirror, I looked every bit the passable assassin.
Preparations are done, and I'm already sick of this...
Honestly, I could have simply cut down anyone who came at me without bothering to hide my identity at all. But if I rampaged in full view of the world, word of my whereabouts would eventually reach Maxwell's ears — and the farther he fled, the harder he'd be to find. If I wanted to deal with him quickly, I had no choice but to move in secret, face hidden.
"It's all my own fault, really."
Having vented a full cup's worth of complaints, I set fire to the house I'd grown so fond of, turned my back on it, and left.
Crunch! Crunch!
No one ever climbed this mountain, so the sound of snow compressing underfoot rang out with every step. It was a sound I'd heard countless times over the past eight years — which meant the moment anything foreign mixed into it, I noticed immediately.
"What idiots climbed all the way up here during Ice Smilodon breeding season?"
A beast's roar and a human's scream, faint but rising from somewhere down the mountain. Having lived on this snow mountain so long, I could identify any creature by its cry alone. I'd once captured one of every species living on the mountain, so I knew their appearances too.
The thing attacking the humans now was a tiger-like monster with strikingly oversized fangs — a beast whose ice fangs, sharper than icicles, could sever a creature's carotid artery or punch straight through a skull. It was so ferocious that even five knights would struggle to bring one down.
But if the humans being attacked number only two...
If I ignored them, they would most certainly become the Smilodon's next meal. I felt no particular duty to help them — but as I'd just been regretting, I'd lived my whole life without building ties with other people. If I'd had someone besides Maxwell I could trust, things might have gone more smoothly. It was regret come too late, but perhaps it wasn't a bad idea to start building connections little by little, even now.
My mind made up, I ran toward the sounds.
"Krrgh!"
"Kyaaaaaak!"
I slid down the slope in one long glide and leapt from the cliff's edge. Through the swirling blizzard, I locked my eyes on the dim silhouette of the Ice Smilodon. Just before reaching the ground, I spread my palm and brought my fingers together.
"Hngh!"
A heartbeat before my feet touched down, I brought my knife-hand — level with my arm — down onto the Smilodon's neck.
BOOM—!
As I landed, a thunderclap slammed into my eardrums and cracks spiderwebbed across the ground. The snow piled at the impact site burst outward in every direction, raising a hazy fog of ice crystals. When the mist slowly cleared, the head of an Ice Smilodon lay rolling at my feet — and at the same moment, its headless body tilted sideways and toppled over.
"Huaaak!"
"Are you all right?"
"Huh? Ah... yes?"
"I asked if you were all right."
"Oh...! Y-yes! Th-thanks to you, we survived!"
"Then I'm glad. Ice Smilodons are in heat this season and grow extremely aggressive, so it's best not to set foot near the snow mountain at all."
"Ah... I hadn't realized that."
"Anyone living around here knows it. Are you perhaps from another region?"
"That's right. I'm Fabiel, a wandering merchant from the south. This is my daughter, Rama."
"I-I'm Rama!"
A scruffy-bearded middle-aged man, and a young woman with fiery red hair and baby fat still on her cheeks. Red hair was a color you'd rarely find in the Northern territories. Their story about coming from the south seemed safe enough to believe.
"I'm sorry to say this, but this is hardly a place for a father and daughter to come peddling their wares."
"Yes, we know. But we urgently needed money due to difficult circumstances, and we had no other options."
"Th-the North has so many monsters, and the terrain is so hard to travel — we heard they pay high prices for specialty goods from other regions!"
"So you set foot here knowing all those dangers?"
"Yes, sir!"
Reckless. The very reason I'd made this snow mountain my hideout was because it teemed with ferocious monsters like the Ice Smilodon. Even a skilled fighter could lose their life in an instant if they let their guard down. That was precisely how I'd managed to live here all this time without anyone discovering me. A father and daughter wandering around this deadly mountain without an escort? It was practically suicide. And the reason they'd done it anyway was the circumstance they'd just mentioned, no doubt.
"If you value your lives even now, turn back."
"...We can't do that."
"Then at the very least, hire an escort or a guide who knows the roads. Otherwise, you'll die for nothing."
"We don't even have the money to hire anyone. We'd love to repay you for saving us, but we can't do that either. We're truly sorry...!"
The pair's situation seemed even worse than I'd imagined. They'd staked everything on this journey, prepared to face death if they failed. They lacked strength, but the resolve dwelling in their eyes was firmer than anyone's.
"Haah...!"
Throwing everything in without thinking of tomorrow — you could call it truly foolish. But personally, I liked them. After all, I'd once picked pockets myself with death staring me in the face.
"Don't worry about payment. I'm hardly destitute, and I didn't do it expecting a reward anyway."
"Thank you so much for your consideration. We can't give you anything now, but I promise — when we find our footing, we will repay you without fail!"
"Hmm. And what if there were a way to repay me right now?"
"Yes?"
"Nothing grand. You simply hire me as your escort mercenary, and use that to vouch for my identity."
"As I said, we don't have the funds to hire a mercenary...!"
"Don't worry about that. If you promise to honor the terms I've laid out, I'll help you free of charge."
Not that I could say it aloud, but this was a golden opportunity to make use of the Sword God himself, free of charge! Opportunities like this didn't come around every day.
"But wouldn't that put you at a great loss, sir?"
"Not particularly. Just as you have your circumstances, I have circumstances I can't speak of. I'm making this offer because I've judged the gains outweigh the costs."
For one thing, it would let me travel under a false identity. Whenever an individual entered a village, they had to go through a formal identity verification process. But for merchants, only the merchant's own credentials were examined closely — their hired hands were settled with a verbal confirmation. That was because employment contracts were required to include a clause stating the merchant took responsibility for their employees. In other words, simply traveling with this father and daughter would let me walk into any village without a hitch.
Beyond that, there were other gains to be had from their being wandering merchants. Merchants who roamed not one region but many gathered a vast amount of information — and among it, there was a good chance news of the Tongues Merchant Firm and the fugitive Maxwell would surface. It might not come now, but if I waited, it would arrive naturally.
"Well? Doesn't that tempt you?"
"We know having you protect us would be a great comfort, but..."
"If that's how you feel, then all the more reason to hire me! Who knows what dangers lie on the road ahead?"
Perhaps they couldn't fully trust me yet — the pair hesitated to accept my offer outright. Their measured suspicion actually earned passing marks. If they'd snapped up my proposal without a second thought, I'd have told them I'd changed my mind and walked away. Nothing is less trustworthy than a person who believes every word they hear. Of course, excessive suspicion isn't good either — but that concern was moot before it even arose.
"Very well. We will hire you as our escort mercenary."
"F-Father?"
"If you hadn't helped us, we'd be cold corpses by now. Besides, we've already thrown the dice once — what reason is there not to throw them again?"
"...That's true."
"For those reasons, we're in your care. Um..."
"Pardon me — I'm late with the introductions. I'm called Aaron, Master Fabiel."
"What a splendid name. We're in your care, Master Aaron."
"W-we're in your care!"
"Don't worry. I will see you both safely to your destination."
And so I disguised my identity — from Sword God to hired escort.
Within the Kinel Holy Kingdom stood the Papacy.
Aleyna, grown so gaunt with gloom that her face had hollowed, was attending to her duties alongside the cardinals. The reason for her despondency was that three years had passed since the search began, and still no word of Rian had come. Things had grown so dire that rumors of his death were spreading among the populace. Naturally, Aleyna refused to believe the rumors — but in their place, she suffered all the more for it.
Rian had vanished at exactly the moment he'd sold away his swords. She had interpreted it to mean she'd wounded him so deeply that he now lived somewhere no one could ever find. With every wordless day that passed, the guilt inside her only swelled. Lately she could barely endure without carving wounds into her own flesh — she was slowly approaching her limit.
"Lady Aleyna! Urgent news!"
"You fool! Do you know where this is—!"
"Stop. What is the matter?"
"Just now, word arrived that the Hero's location has been identified!"
"Is that true?!"
At long last, news of Rian — and Aleyna shoved her meeting with the cardinals to the back burner. For her, Rian mattered more than the affairs of state.
"Wh-where did the news come from?"
"According to our verification, the information came from the head of the Tongues Merchant Firm!"
Aleyna remembered well that Rian had frequented the Tongues Merchant Firm. But whenever she'd gone to Maxwell, the firm's head, and pressed him with questions, he had answered only with silence. She didn't know what wind had suddenly changed his mind, but he had released the information about Rian. A certainty bloomed in her that she could finally find him, and a single tear rolled down Aleyna's cheek.
"Where is he?"
"We were told it's near Mount Pernil, in the north!"
"Not so far away, then. Very well — bring Sir Roland to me at once."
"You intend to dispatch Sir Roland?"
"No. I will go myself. Sir Roland will accompany me strictly as my escort."
Telling the cardinals to handle the remaining work themselves, Aleyna tossed the duties aside and returned to her private chamber. The moment she stepped inside, she began gulping down all the breath she'd been holding back. Her heart trembled beyond her control, and she clutched the Holy Sword embedded in her chest.
Not long now. Her reunion with Rian was close at hand.
When I meet Rian, what should I say first? I'll begin with a heartfelt apology, and then...! But what if Rian refuses to forgive me?
Lost in one delusion after another, worrying over the days ahead, Aleyna seized her own head — and her carefully arranged hair came undone into a wild tangle in an instant.
What do I do...! What do I do...! No, this is no time for this. I'm going to meet Rian — I can't go looking like this.
She bit her nails, trembling with anxiety — then, at the thought that a reunion was possible, broke into a bright smile once more. In the extreme swings of her emotions, one could glimpse the symptoms of a mind fraying at the edges. Her guilt, and her obsession with Rian, were growing larger by the day.
