Chapter 193: The Tin Knight and The Crossroads of Swords and Magic (3)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 193: The Tin Knight and The Crossroads of Swords and Magic (3)
“—She’s not here, Master.”
About thirty minutes after entering the city.
That was Gale’s assessment after giving the Tower of Annihilation a quick scan from near its entrance.
The action had been so brief that Dorothea asked again, her face full of disbelief.
“Are you sure you checked properly? If you’re just messing with me, I swear we’ll have a real life-or-death showdown later.”
“A life-or-death chase with a Dorothea who has to wear rags for the rest of her life… that sounds like a rather amusing existence in its own right.”
“Hey!”
Gale shrugged.
“My promise to help you find your master was the result of our duel, wasn't it? I wouldn’t joke about something like that, no matter what. That would be demeaning to my fight with Sig as well.”
At his unexpectedly serious demeanor, Dorothea’s anger subsided.
She couldn’t help but let out a sigh, though, still feeling a pang of disappointment.
“Well then, I guess we’ll just finish this guy’s modification and Adelaide’s test, then head to the next place as quickly as possible.”
“This is the first time I’m trying this, so I’m not sure I can rush through it so carelessly, you know?”
“We’ll give it a shot first. If it doesn’t work, we can just continue inside the carriage or in the next city. What’s the worry?”
And so, the party split in two.
Dorothea and Gale, the two knights, headed to a high-end inn with a spacious room to begin the modification.
Adelaide and Sophia, on the other hand, made their way to the Lennart dojo to take the test.
“Oh, is Miss Sophia coming with me?”
As Adelaide tilted her head, Dorothea answered bluntly.
“We might run into another headache of a situation like in the City of Scales. It’s best to avoid acting alone if possible. Besides, with Sophia by your side, you won’t get roped into some strange scheme by someone’s sweet-talking like last time, will you?”
“Ha, haha, ahaha.”
Adelaide let out a dry laugh at Dorothea’s pointed remark.
From Adelaide’s perspective, the incident in Justitia felt less like Maris’s fault and more like being suddenly swept up in a storm, but Dorothea seemed to think differently.
“And take this with you.”
Clatter!
A mouse made of bone darted out from Dorothea’s feet and stood before Adelaide.
“Ah, Mr. Mouse.”
When Adelaide held out her hand, the mouse leaped onto it with a nimble movement.
A red gem was embedded in its forehead. It was clear this was no ordinary bone mouse, but the special kind equipped with the sight-sharing function they had used during the Rescue Rapunzel Operation.
With this, if anything happened to Adelaide or Sophia, Dorothea and the Tin Knight would know immediately and be able to respond.
Gale, who was watching from the side, commented.
“My, you’re quite overprotective, aren’t you? I don’t think even a mother sending her child on their first errand would go this far.”
“Who are you calling a mother? You think I want to be doing this?”
Dorothea said, annoyed.
“If I could, I’d rather not meddle in the details and just leave her be. But what am I supposed to do when things go to hell every time I do? It’s not like we can all stick together every time we stop somewhere, so we need at least this level of preparation.”
“Hmm.”
Adelaide hummed in thought.
Considering their journey so far, where an incident had erupted every time they stayed in a reasonably large city, regardless of the minor stops in between, she couldn’t say Dorothea’s worry was entirely excessive.
[The ‘Tin Knight’ says that man proposes, but God disposes!]
[The ‘Tin Knight’ says that no matter how thoroughly you prepare, things will go wrong when they’re meant to, so it’s better for your mental health to just take it easy!]
“Umm, Sir Tin. I don’t think that phrase is used in that kind of context.”
[The ‘Tin Knight’ says that when you’re unlucky, you’ll break your nose even if you fall backward!]
“That one seems about right, maybe?”
“Ah, um! We’ll be on our way!”
Sensing that they could waste half a day on wordplay if she let this continue, Adelaide grabbed Sophia and half-dragged her away from the scene.
The sight of the Tin Knight waving cheerfully stood in stark contrast to the solemn white knight beside him.
*
Finding the Lennart dojo was not difficult.
In fact, finding any building related to the Lion Duke’s bloodline was always this way.
Lennart’s buildings were always magnificent and wielded great influence in their respective cities.
However.
“It feels so… desolate.”
Adelaide nodded in agreement with Sophia’s assessment.
The building itself wasn’t shabby or old.
The surrounding walls were smoothly painted without a single scratch or piece of graffiti, and the building itself was one of the largest in the city, second only to the Tower of Annihilation they had just seen.
But that was all.
It was grand on the outside, yet it felt utterly devoid of the human presence that should have filled it.
Indeed, the passersby on the street didn’t just avoid visiting the dojo; they didn’t even come near it.
If it were temporarily closed like in the City of Scales, that would be one thing, but the sight of a perfectly operational dojo being so thoroughly shunned was quite a shock to Adelaide.
“Well, whatever their status in the Empire, from the Magic State’s perspective, the Lennarts are like the vanguard of the enemy. They showed signs of reconciliation during the Iron Blood Emperor’s reign, but after his death, the situation has become delicate again. So, this atmosphere isn’t entirely unexpected.”
“…Miss Sophia. Does reading books really tell you all of that?”
Adelaide thought that while specialized knowledge or ancient history might be found in books, it was unlikely that contemporary history, with all the involved parties still very much alive, would be detailed so thoroughly.
“Some things are written, and some are not. But books are a reflection of their time, my lady. That applies to what is written, and what is not.”
With those enigmatic words, Sophia gestured for Adelaide to proceed, as if to say, ‘Now, if you please.’
As if responding to the call, Adelaide stepped forward and pulled a rope hanging near the main gate.
Dang- dang- dang-
A metallic sound, not as heavy as a great belfry’s toll nor as light as a bell’s jingle, rang out several times.
The response was quite slow.
After counting to thirty with no reaction, just as Adelaide was about to ring the bell again, a clank sounded and the thick iron gate opened, revealing a man from within.
The young man, who appeared to be in his early to mid-twenties, quickly scanned Adelaide and Sophia.
“How may I help you?”
“I’ve come to take the test.”
“I see. Are you from another dojo? Do you happen to have your tokens?”
“Yes, right here.”
Adelaide presented a locket containing three fan-shaped tokens.
Seeing the more than half-completed golden lion emblem, the young man’s eyes widened.
He bowed his head again, his face filled with respect.
“A sincere welcome to our dojo. Please, come inside.”
Step, step.
Unlike the exterior, which had felt almost bleak, there were a fair number of people inside.
However, Adelaide felt a subtle sense of unease.
‘…There are almost no people here who have trained their bodies.’
It wasn’t a matter of them being lazy or neglecting their training.
The dojo was filled with people who had either never held a sword or had clearly only learned the bare minimum for self-defense.
As if voicing Adelaide’s question, Sophia spoke.
“There seem to be quite a lot of civil officials.”
The man guiding them nodded.
“Yes, that’s correct. Our dojo also serves as a liaison between the Empire and the Magic State. Apart from the warriors from our dojo, there are a number of civil officials dispatched from the Imperial court.”
Adelaide tilted her head.
“Then, um, isn’t it dangerous?”
She had seen countless external enemies targeting the dojo members in the City of Scales.
Even they, with their ample number of warriors, had not been able to avoid trouble. It seemed incredibly precarious to station so few warriors in an enemy nation with which they had once shed blood, even if they were under a temporary truce.
At Adelaide’s question, the young man fell silent.
He didn’t seem offended by the question, but rather, he looked like he was struggling with how to explain it.
Fortunately for him, the answer came from another direction.
“—It’s the opposite. It is precisely because we have not deployed a large military force that we are safe from external threats.”
“Representative Instructor.”
The man the youth called Representative Instructor was a middle-aged man with a gentle impression.
No, considering the faint wrinkles on his face despite the slow aging characteristic of the Lion Duke’s bloodline, it wouldn’t be strange to call him an old man.
Adelaide reflexively bowed her head in greeting.
“Hello. I’m—”
“Ah, it’s quite all right. Please, come inside first.”
The man said this as he opened a door behind him and stepped through.
It seemed he had known Adelaide was coming and had been waiting for her outside the room on purpose.
The young man who had guided them here stepped back, not entering the room, as if his role was finished. The reception room was left with only the man, Adelaide, and Sophia.
The man, who greeted them without a single guard or attendant, introduced himself without any fuss.
“I am Norman, the representative instructor of the Lennart dojo’s Trudvangar branch.”
“I’m Adelaide…”
Adelaide trailed off because she had hesitated for a moment on whether to reveal her last name.
She had no intention of hiding her surname inside the dojo, unlike elsewhere in the Magic State, but she had to guess why her counterpart, who was clearly a member of the bloodline, had only given his first name.
After Sophia also gave a simple introduction, Norman continued the conversation.
“You must have found our dojo somewhat peculiar. However, it is impossible for us to command a large number of people or defend ourselves with a large force like other dojos. No, we could if we wanted to, but that would be foolish.”
“Foolish?”
“This place is the front yard of the Tower of Annihilation. They are extremely belligerent and do not fear our bloodline. If we were to try and defend ourselves from them with military force, our bloodline would have to pour in resources with the resolve to move our main base here. Naturally, pouring that many resources into a single dojo is, to put it plainly, a waste.”
That was why they had to think in reverse, Norman added.
“Just as the Lion Duke’s bloodline represents the martial might of the Empire, the Tower of Annihilation represents the martial might of the Magic State. Just as our bloodline has its pride, so too does theirs.”
Slowly, Adelaide began to understand what Norman was trying to say.
“Deploying few warriors and many civil officials is a way to show that you have no intention of fighting with force, right? So that it makes it awkward for them to touch you?”
“If a host were to stab an unarmed guest who attended a banquet they themselves held, no one would respect that host any longer. For the sake of their pride, it is impossible for them to attack an unarmed opponent who has laid down their weapons. Of course, common thugs might jump at the chance, but we can handle that level of threat with just a small number of people.”
“Aha.”
Norman looked at the wide-eyed, nodding Adelaide with a gentle gaze, then took a small metal fragment from his waist and placed it on the table.
It was a fan-shaped fragment engraved with a five-part lion emblem. It was the token of Trudvangar.
“Lady Adelaide. I understand you have already obtained three tokens. In that case, there is no need to test your martial prowess. However, the Lion Duke’s bloodline is not composed of mere warriors who are only strong. If they were, they would have been consumed on the battlefield long ago and met the path of extinction. Therefore, I wish to test you in a different way.”
“A different way?”
Adelaide felt a sense of dread.
From the flow of the conversation, it seemed he intended to test her on knowledge or etiquette, areas in which she was not very confident.
Whether he knew of her worries or not, Norman spoke.
“—I would like to entrust you with the role of a peace lion, to act as a bridge between us and the Tower.”
“C-can’t I just fight?”
Without even pretending to think it over, the little lion immediately asked for a different option.