Obtaining the Land
At Marhal's words, the others simply accepted it as fact, but Marin's face was etched with confusion.
Marin had staked her life on the Land Race without exaggeration. Participating wasn't easy. First came the flag. The official flags sold by the Union were never cheap. True ownership of land had always been the exclusive domain of kings and nobles. A flag that allowed even commoners to become legitimate landowners on the surface commanded a hefty price.
But acquiring a flag was just the beginning. Unless you planned to turn hyena and kill other flag owners, you needed a top-grade warhorse to race ahead and plant your flag in empty territory first. You also needed enough food to last until the surveyor arrived—and weapons to fend off those hyenas.
Ask about the pasts of people scraping by day-to-day in Pioneer Village, and you'd often hear unexpected answers: knights, merchants, noble apprentices, even nobles with titles still valid today. The Land Race turned even them into hand-to-mouth drifters.
Land was the soul. Having lost hers once, Marin understood this more deeply than anyone. So she asked, suspicion heavy in her voice.
"We can obtain land?"
"Of course. Who do you think I am?"
"...The Hero's guide."
"Can't trust a guy like that?"
It was impossible by any common sense. In the barbaric West cloaked in the guise of civilization, nothing was certain. Marin had seen a knight slice a man in half over a drunken quarrel. The knight, who cut down two men without breaking a sweat, was found the next day in the vacant lot behind the tavern with a dagger in his back.
And that was just one of many things she'd witnessed. This was the West, where anything could happen—and the Land Race was where the rawest violence erupted. It should be impossible, but the man talking to her had turned even greater impossibilities into reality.
The Hero Party was like a faith to her. She couldn't bring herself to deny the words of her idol. Instead, she grumbled curtly.
"How?"
"Like this."
Before Marin could stop him, Marhal yanked out her flag. That flag was her life. How many years had she toiled to save for this one race? Blood rushed to her head, her hand gripping her dagger.
If not for the chill grazing her nape, she would have lunged. The killing intent piercing her soul made her freeze.
"This is how you use killing intent. Not spewing it wildly."
"......"
"No fighting, you two. Let's check that way first."
In the direction Marhal pointed, another flag was visible.
"A flag. Pretty ordinary sight, no?"
"Not just the flag—over half the pole is visible too."
Rebella was an aspiring tracking knight. Tracking knights differed from regular knights, who only needed superhuman prowess. They required vast knowledge of tracking and had to pass rigorous exams. It demanded talent for both physical action and mental acuity.
The imperial tracking knight exam even included navigating open plains to pinpoint your exact position and select destinations.
"The pole? You don't mean... navigation?"
"Spot on."
Navigation. A term for sailors, but any long-distance travel technique could be called that. Once she grasped the core, the rest clicked quickly. She nodded.
"Another key to the Land Race is maximizing distance between flags. To optimize, you need solitary island methods, navigation, or at least advanced math."
"Sticking flags in visible spots became habit, but the precise rule is: 'From flag height, if another flag is visible to the east, it's valid.' All it takes is a ladder—but seen anyone bring one on the way here?"
"None..."
Strekl grunted. Even he, treated as quasi-noble, had assumed visibility from the east was enough and joined the race. A fallen war hero, but not all his connections were severed. High knights' might and those hedging bets on his resurgence kept lines open beneath the surface.
Yet no one had tipped him off when he headed west.
"We can space flags much farther than we thought. And greater distances bring two big advantages."
Marhal held up two fingers.
"One: more land, obviously. Two: less interference from other flag owners."
"Interference from flag owners? Why?"
"Hmm. Rebel la, I get you can handle it all, but isn't this overkill?"
"The Land Race is a smokescreen. The real goal was relics from the start. The race is Plan B. That's why I didn't tell Her Highness."
Before Rebel la could speak, Marin's fury boiled over like lava.
"Hold up—Highness? Explain properly."
With the Bachea Empire fallen, only Muet imperial royals could claim princess. Westerners hated the East. It offered no aid while the West crumbled; Empire and Holy Empire never stirred. They loathed the duchies that exploited them, but resented the Empire and Holy Empire for letting demons claim the West even more.
She held back only because of Marhal. Her idol stood beside her... Without him, she'd have drawn her blade, knowing it meant death.
"Better to rip the bandage off now than let it fester and explode later."
Marhal subtly signaled Strekl. The politically savvy high knight nodded faintly.
"Bayola Muesilrigo. She's the real Muet imperial princess."
Marin turned beast. Roaring, she unleashed her daggers' full power on Bayola.
Strekl, aiming to subdue with bare hands, drew his sword at the daggers' ominous aura.
Clang!
Strekl's arm reeled back. Marin's flew up too, exposing her front.
'Bounced? Me?'
Absurd. Matching a high knight in strength with a non-knight girl? Was this the Bachea relic she'd only heard of?
But her opponent was stunned too. Eyes wide, as if a relic strike rebounding was unheard of.
Strekl moved on instinct. Dropping his sword, he kicked Marin's gut.
Thud!
Leather tore with the sound; Marin flew back, tumbling across the ground several times. A normal person would have ruptured organs and died instantly, but she just coughed, rising.
"Unbelievable."
"That's a special item. Even Bachea high nobles had just one each... Where'd you get it, Marin?"
Marin, crouching to charge again, froze mid-motion. Not her will. Marhal's voice hit like lead weights pinning her body.
She suddenly re-recognized the legend before her. A boy who conversed as equals with the Hero Party, tested their opinions, even confronted them head-on.
Marin knew nothing of history or 'accumulation.' But faintly, she knew something set people apart. The Hero cleaved the sky with one sword before slaying the Demon King. Untouchable even by kings.
And Marhal had matched that Hero Party in a battle of wills.
[If you're gonna burn everything in a flash of rage, I won't stop you. But is that all you are?]
[...No.]
"Looks like reason's winning. And Marin—killing Bayola won't faze the Empire? She's half a runaway herself."
"A princess runs away?"
"Hear the details from her later. Easier for Bayola too, right?"
Bayola nodded, face ashen. She'd endured her brothers' malice countless times, but raw killing intent directed at her was new. Malice transcended into murderous will—the kind that would self-immolate to slay another. For a greenhouse flower like her, it flipped her world. So shocking, the corpses and blood she'd avoided entered her peripheral vision unnoticed.
Seeing Bayola's state, Strekl clicked his tongue.
"First killing intent of her life? She'll be out of it awhile. Let's talk among ourselves."
"Right. Once the city's cleared inside, whoever claims it will make their flags visible somehow. What if ours aren't?"
"Flag tricks won't fly. With a whole city at stake, those inside have backers. Plenty of flags too."
Strekl hadn't thought of navigation like Marhal, but he and his men brought at least five. With the city secured and leisure, they'd slaughter nearby flag owners and swallow the area.
"Even with flags, if they can't plant them? Lucky for us, a ducal high knight's here."
"You want me to fight?"
"Just set the mood; I'll handle the rest. Probably no actual fighting, and if there is, we take zero losses."
"That certain?"
"Can't swear on my life. But my name? Yeah."
"I'm in."
The two with no alternatives but following Marhal agreed readily.
"Marin, your call. Come with us? Guard solo?"
"I'll come."
Marin couldn't refuse the living legend's offer either.
With everyone's buy-in, Marhal began drawing a map on the ground. Not a typical one—from when the city was intact. Major facilities inside, surrounding terrain—all in impossible detail for an on-the-spot sketch.
Rebella stared at the fluidly drawing Marhal like a monster.
"Pre-demon West maps are military secrets. How?"
"Basic for the Hero's great guide."
"No... even so."
Reading maps wasn't drawing them from memory. She could read them, but couldn't replicate even the capital's map despite lifelong residence.
Marhal marked three dots on the map.
"City center here. Our spot probably here. Eastern flag there. Remove it, and..."
He drew a crescent enclosing the city's east on the ground.
"Block others in this range, and no one takes the city, no matter what."
"Easy to say. Defending that wide needs thousands minimum."
"Not a battlefield. No need to seal every gap or do it solo. Judging by visible flags... Nearby ones number and position roughly here. We talk to them."
"No guarantee they'll cooperate. And what we can do, city holders can too. Flag owners will side with city masters."
Pressuring city claimants via flag height and rules was smart. But if Marhal could, so could insiders. A mere mercenary like him versus organized groups? Flag owners would pick the latter.
"Sure. Whatever I offer, theirs'll be sweeter."
"Then it's pointless..."
"First move wins. Eternal truth since humanity set foot here. This plan assumes we act first, they second. Even if late converts switch flags, what if they can't? If pulling one forfeits all land rights?"
"Impossible..."
"Surveyors. Land Race laws. West's absolute power. They make it possible."
Pull your flag, surveyor arrives? Hyenas circling? No flag owner dares. Those staking lives on land can't abandon it for the same reason.