Hollow Places (2)
I flung the dagger in my hand to the floor.
The sound of metal striking stone echoed through the bathhouse, then slowly faded away.
I rose to my feet.
My wet clothes clung to my skin, heavy and clammy.
I peeled off the damp, miserable things and changed into the dry clothes the servants had left out for me.
What if I just went straight to the front lines and forgot about the ending, or whatever else?
Just mindlessly carving enemies apart, slashing them to pieces, and every so often having my own head split clean in two.
That might honestly be better.
By now, that was the one thing I was sure of.
I couldn’t even imagine a future where I lived happily with someone.
What came easily to mind was only the act of killing the people who could live that way.
That night, I spent it with my eyes open.
Staring up at the moonlit sky, I clenched a cigarette between my teeth and sat there, as I always did, drinking straight from the bottle until I was soaked through with liquor and stupidity.
Every time the alcohol slid down my throat, my belly warmed—but even that warmth felt like something that belonged to someone else.
The cigarette burned down until it touched my fingers.
A hot sting spread across my skin, and the smell of scorched flesh brushed faintly past my nose.
I stared at it blankly for a while, then brushed the ash away carelessly, took out another cigarette, and lit it.
The trembling in my hand seemed to have vanished completely.
Always… always, it had shaken as if someone else were there, as if it moved on its own.
When I held a sword, when I lifted a cup, when I pinched a cigarette between my fingers, my hand had quivered uncontrollably, no matter what I wanted.
Maybe because I’d finally erased one of the rotten things that had been left inside my head, even alcohol couldn’t cloud my thoughts now.
How strange.
All I’d done was set down one burden, and yet the world looked different.
Moonlight, smoke, even the taste of liquor lingering in my mouth—they all seemed a little fainter, somehow.
Then morning came.
Empty bottles rolled around at my feet, and the ashtray was piled high with cigarette butts.
I didn’t have a headache, but my stomach felt a little raw, so I knocked back some hair of the dog once more.
Then I looked at the clothes hanging in the wardrobe, the ones marked with the emblem of House Grian, and without caring one way or the other, I threw them on over what I was wearing.
There was nothing wrong with being born to a noble house.
Anything useful should be used well.
When I crossed swords with her last time, it hadn’t looked like even the head of the house could survive a clean hit, so maybe I should ask for the title myself.
Who knew? There might be an ending like that.
Endlog had been that kind of game.
Stuffed full of useless bad endings and hollow normal ones.
In any case, after taking a carriage onto campus and heading into the professor’s office assigned to me, I found someone already seated inside.
The bracelet on his arm marked him as a Platinum Rank adventurer sent by the Guild.
I’d heard Platinum Rank was high enough that you could speak to nobles as an equal, which made it higher than I’d expected.
The way he sat there with his arms folded, trying to look imposing in the chair, suggested he had at least some pride left in him—but barging into someone else’s office without permission and taking the seat anyway was, frankly, irritating.
“Sir Grian. I’ve come regarding last night’s incident at the tavern in the Eastern District.”
“The tavern?”
“I’m here on behalf of the Guild, concerning the adventurer stationed at the academy, Arin, and Bruno’s gang. Considering the seriousness of the matter…”
I put a cigarette in my mouth, lit it with a match, and then tossed the matchbox straight at his face.
It struck his forehead and dropped to the floor, clattering there.
I looked at him with his confused expression and said, “Stand up, leave the room, and ask permission first before you come in. Ask if you may enter. Ask if you may sit down.”
“……This isn’t House Grian’s estate; this is the capital. Do you not understand the situation you’re in right now?”
I ignored him.
I took a drag and let the smoke out slowly.
The adventurer stared at me for a long moment, then finally clenched his teeth and left the room.
Serious situation, my ass.
If you reduced it to words on a page, all that had happened was that a bunch of commoners came at me and died.
No one would care what emotions had passed between us, or what stories had been exchanged.
In the now-silent office, I waited while drawing in smoke.
Knock.
I didn’t answer.
I exhaled slowly and looked out the window.
Morning sunlight lay long across the floor.
Knock again.
“Isn’t it common sense to knock only once? I’m not deaf. Come in.”
The door opened, and he came in as if nothing had happened, stopping in front of the chair. For someone who’d just been thrown out, his steps were awfully composed. He looked like he was about to sit down again, so I tossed out a remark.
“Who said you could sit?”
“……May I sit?”
“I can’t very well leave a guest standing. Sit.”
“.......”
The adventurer sat down and, with a stiff posture, explained why he’d come.
According to the report, Bruno’s gang had been wiped out by a single man at the tavern in the Eastern District last night, and after gathering witness testimony, I was the only suspect.
His voice trembled faintly when he said the word wiped out.
I couldn’t tell whether he was furious that a comrade had died, or shaking at the thought that he might die too.
“So you’re asking whether I killed them?”
“Yes.”
“I did. Is that a problem?”
The words left my mouth with a lightness that surprised even me.
The adventurer’s eyes widened.
Then his face slowly reddened, and he balled his fist as he raised his voice.
“……You’re asking if that’s a problem? I may only be a Platinum adventurer, but this is an insult to every member of the Guild!”
If I was going to insult someone, I’d need to feel some respect for them first. How could I insult something I’d never had the slightest bit of regard for?
“Insult isn’t the right word. Humiliation fits better. And I don’t know how many adventurers like you there are in the Empire, but even if you gathered them all together, they still wouldn’t be stronger than the beastfolk I tore apart.”
The adventurer sprang to his feet in a rage, so I picked up the cup in front of me and threw it at his face.
The remaining tea splashed across him, and the cup rolled away across the floor with a clatter.
While he staggered, I stood up, walked over, grabbed his shoulder, and pressed him back down calmly into his seat.
He was apparently patient enough not to lunge at me, which was wise of him.
“And I didn’t come to this godforsaken school to teach anyone anything. I came to root out the heretics hiding here and burn them, as His Holiness commanded.”
Even as I said it, I realized it was the first time I’d properly remembered that.
I’d forgotten for a moment.
Because that damn Arin had been shoved into the back of my mind while I kept muttering her name like a lunatic.
Instead of doing what I was supposed to, I’d been butchering heroines and tearing them apart, so if the Pope heard about it, he’d probably have a stroke.
Though maybe he wouldn’t care as much as I thought.
Still, heretics, huh…
I wasn’t sure how far I was supposed to go, but probably I just had to deal with anyone who looked suspicious.
Like when I was grinding up beastfolk.
In the end, it was all the same sort of job.
It was the one thing I was actually good at in this world, so I wasn’t about to fail.
I slowly drew the dagger from inside my clothes and set it on the table.
The morning sun flashed across the blade and swept over the adventurer’s face.
“Is the Guild protecting heretics? Or did you come here on your own to defend them?”
The adventurer looked down at the dagger and shut his mouth tightly.
If this had gone all the way to House Grian, they could have raised a scandal about a noble killing innocent commoners, bruising the family’s reputation and maybe even extorting compensation out of the Guild. But if this involved the Church, making too much noise could stir up complications he clearly didn’t want.
“……I didn’t know this was that kind of case.”
“And if you’d like to demand even the slightest compensation from House Grian, go ask the deputy commander of the Imperial Knights, not me.”
“That’s… fine.”
Fine, my ass. He’d come because he thought I looked easy to shake down for money.
He’d probably assumed House Grian would cough up enough to keep their mouths shut.
People in the capital were usually bad at knowing their place.
Those who made money lived better than lowborn provincial nobles, and nobles couldn’t treat commoners however they liked either; it was just… the sort of place this was.
Maybe that was because all the capable commoners had already come up to the capital.
This was a place that pulled people in and swallowed them whole.
With nothing left to say, the adventurer looked like he wanted nothing more than to get out of there.
I didn’t feel like holding him any longer, so I gave him a perfunctory brush-off and sent him away.
And so Arin and Bruno’s gang were dead.
Some adventurer had butchered a noble with no meaning and no reason attached to it, and that was how it ended.
Without anyone ever learning about it, without a single person left to mourn them.
Still better than the front lines, I suppose.
At least the bodies would’ve been burned whole.
Right. I’d come here to deal with heretics.
I stared for a long while at the crumpled list left on top of the desk, then folded it up and tucked it into my clothes.
After leaving the office, I walked down the corridor and caught a beastfolk student who happened to be passing by, asking whether he knew a student from House Brueneha.
He looked at me and was so frightened he couldn’t answer properly, only nodded, so I told him to bring that student to me.
The student hurried off as though his life depended on it.
A short while later, an elf appeared in front of the professor’s office.
He looked a little frightened.
He stood at the door, peering inside with his face only half exposed, never even bothering to knock.
“Come in.”