Chapter 47 - Once You Have Faced the Mysterious, You Can Never Return to the Way You Were (1)

While everyone was looking at the massive spear embedded in the wall, Arwen alone was searching for the First Prince.

She dug through the snow after the Prince, who had vanished beneath the snowfield.

She even threw aside her sword and scooped out the snow with her bare hands.

Her fingers soon ached as if they would fall off.

Even so, she did not stop.

THUD.

After digging through the snow for a long while, something touched her fingertips.

It was still-warm flesh, the Prince's hand.

"Hup!"

Gripping his hand tightly, she pulled her body back.

The Prince, who had been buried in the snow, came sliding straight out.

She hurriedly pulled the Prince out of the snow and examined his condition.

His chin and front were dyed bright red, as if he had vomited blood midway, and even while unconscious, his right hand, still clutching his sword tightly, was twisted in a grotesque direction.

She placed her hand under his jaw, against his throat.

There was no pulse.

"Your Highness!"

Startled, she slapped his cheeks.

The Prince's tightly shut mouth was full of something.

She pressed both his cheeks hard with her fingers.

His lips parted, and blood gushed out.

But the Prince's pulse still did not return.

Arwen lowered her head.

She put her mouth to the Prince's and breathed into him.

"Hoo!"

She repeated the same motion again and again.

"Cough!"

The Prince coughed.

Dark red blood surged out.

She reached out.

The Prince's stopped pulse was beating again.

"Ah..."

The strength left Arwen, and she collapsed onto her backside.

Suddenly, she lifted her hand.

In the confusion, she was still holding the Prince's hand.

His battle glove had become a rag, his palm was torn and blood-soaked, and calluses showed here and there through the red blood.

They were traces of the hard days the Prince had spent.

But what caught Arwen's gaze was not that trained palm.

She hated her own hands.

Compared to men's large hands, her small and delicate hands were not especially suited to holding a sword.

And yet the Prince's hand was smaller than hers.

She saw the First Prince with his eyes closed, panting for breath.

The arrogant Prince who looked down on people was not there.

What was there was only a young boy who had not yet fully matured.

Had he been this small, this young?

For the first time, Arwen realized that the Prince was only a boy who had not even held his coming-of-age ceremony yet.

"How is His Highness!"

The knights of Winter Castle, who appeared belatedly, asked after the Prince's condition.

You certainly show up quickly.

She disliked the knights' reaction, delayed by far too long, but she did not show those feelings outwardly.

"...rwen."

As the knights crowded around and made a commotion, the Prince regained consciousness and moved his lips.

"Your Highness! Arwen is here!"

The Prince said something, but his voice was far too small and faint to hear.

Arwen lowered her head and put her ear near the Prince's mouth.

"Ah..."

At the Prince's words, she snapped her head up.

"What did he say?"

The eldest son of the lord of Winter Castle asked.

Instead of answering, Arwen adjusted her grip on her sword.

"His Highness says..."

Her sword began to cry once again.

"Finish the duel at once, he said."

In truth, he had said a few more things.

Things like, those fucking Orc bastards, honor my ass, you sons of bitches, and as expected, the only good Orc is a dead Orc.

At the end of his curses, he had added that he was in so much pain he could die, so they should finish the duel quickly.

But she did not relay that much.

Because what they needed right now was only one sentence to resume the duel.

"We should finish this quickly."

The knights adjusted their grips on their swords.

The Orcs, who had been floundering after losing their leader, belatedly shouted and charged.

The Orcs who had moved organically and harried the knights no longer existed there.

And ordinary Orc Warriors were no match for the knights of Winter Castle.

The Orcs quickly revealed their collapse, and the duel ended with surprising ease.

"Escort His Highness inside! Take care of the Rangers!"

No sooner had the duel ended than Rangers rushed out through the opened gate, scattered in all directions, and loaded bodies onto carts.

The surroundings were noisy.

The Rangers kept shouting without rest.

Yet for some reason, those voices sounded lively.

"You bastard. I barely survived, and now I'm going to die because of you."

"If your mouth's flapping, you're fine."

The sounds of blood-soaked survivors and Rangers bickering reached her ears.

"Carry me gently, you ignorant bastards."

"Like this?"

"Agh! You son of a bitch!"

Winter Castle truly was a strange place.

So many people had died in a single night.

And yet they were so utterly unaffected.

Whether that was because of their joy that allies they had given up on had returned alive, or because long battle had worn them down and spent them until their emotions had dried up, or because of something else entirely.

Suddenly, the blue-burning flames rose in her mind.

Arwen could not know why she suddenly thought of them.

They had literally just come to mind.

Just then, the Prince, lying on a stretcher, was passing before her eyes.

"He is an honored person! Treat him with special care!"

She stared blankly at the First Prince, who now had splints and bandages applied, as if he had received emergency treatment in the meantime.

The voice that had whispered in her ear came vividly back to her.

["Those fucking Orc bastards..."]

["Honor my ass. The only good Orc really is a dead Orc..."]

["It hurts like hell, so finish it quickly."]

They had sounded like complaints at first glance.

But what they contained was an anger whose reason she could not understand.

Just what is he so furious about?

She wanted to ask, but she did not.

The Prince had lost consciousness again and lay limp on the stretcher, and he looked as though he needed rest.

It would not be too late to ask later.

"Dame Arwen..."

As she watched the Prince, the eldest son of the lord of Winter Castle approached.

"The mood is a bit much for declaring victory."

He abruptly held out a banner.

"This banner is also His Highness's."

I should have faced that bastard, the man grumbled, then suddenly raised his hand and pointed toward his mouth.

"Do something about that blood..."

"Ah..."

Only then did Arwen realize what state she was in.

Her hair had become disheveled from the duel, and her mouth was smeared with blood from administering emergency treatment.

It could not have been a particularly pleasant sight.

She scooped up snow from the ground and rubbed it over her mouth.

At the feel of the cold snow, the heart that had somehow been stirred cooled coldly.

The reddened snow fell to the ground in clumps.

After looking at that red lump for a moment, she turned.

Winter Castle, with the massive spear embedded in it, entered her eyes.

The First Prince woke up one day after that.

"Fucking Orc bastard!"

The Prince's first words after regaining consciousness began with that curse.

* * *

Just before I drove my sword into the leader Orc's heart, I felt a gaze watching me from somewhere I could not see.

It was different from the furtive gaze of the voyeuristic Elder High Elf.

That was a gaze far more blatant than hers.

Yes, for instance, it was closer to the gaze of a massive being looking down on a worthless insect.

The pressure and distinctive aura contained within it told me its identity.

The being of high grade that Sigrun's messenger had mentioned.

The master of the praise that the noble Orc, facing death, had shouted instead of a death cry.

It was undoubtedly the King of Orcs.

Under the King's watch, I drove my blade into the heart of his loyal noble.

Naturally, the King was displeased, and he expressed anger to match.

And now I was reduced to recuperating in bed with my arm broken like this.

It was not even that I had faced him directly, crossed swords with him, and been sent flying.

I had merely dealt with a single spear thrown from a terribly distant place.

And yet I had ended up in this miserable state.

Right now, I really am fucking weak.

"Fucking Orc bastard!"

I poured out a curse filled with self-loathing and anger, but my mood did not improve.

If there was any small consolation, it was only the fact that in the last battle, I had fully risen to Extraordinary Grade.

"How is your body, Your Highness?"

Vincent came to see me and asked.

"My whole body aches, and my arm hurts too. But this hurts more."

Because I'm so pissed off.

When I said that while poking at my chest, a smile appeared on damned Vincent's face.

But only for a moment.

Vincent suddenly turned solemn.

"Thanks to Your Highness, we were able to save allies we had given up on. I sincerely thank you."

Vincent even snapped into a military salute, and his face was filled with sincerity.

Feeling pointlessly embarrassed, I rubbed under my nose and looked away.

To me, Vincent summarized the things that had happened while I was unconscious.

Immediately after the duel ended, an Orc legion appeared one kilometer from the castle and set up camp, he said.

It was a large force of two legions made up of twenty combat units, he said.

"They appeared somewhat earlier than expected, but it is not a force we cannot stop."

But contrary to his words, Vincent's expression was very stiff.

"What in the world was that spear, and what was that thing howling in the mountains?"

It seemed this was not a simple sick visit.

As if they had promised it beforehand, the leaders of Winter Castle, including my maternal uncle, came to see me.

I told them everything I knew.

The leaders of Winter Castle were extremely confused.

The King of Orcs they knew was no more than a chieftain leading a single tribe.

So when I grandly started talking about some king or other, it seemed they found it very hard to accept.

"There is no need to think about it in a complicated way."

I explained it more simply to them.

A king encompassing all the Orcs that existed within the mountains had simply been born.

"Now Winter Castle has become the boundary line dividing the kingdom of the Orcs from the kingdom of humans."

I warned them.

The force outside was nothing more than the vanguard.

From now on, a horrifying number of troops would pour down from the mountains.

The leaders of Winter Castle half-believed and half-doubted my words.

"Even if Your Highness's words are true, I cannot believe that the Orcs would readily follow a king who has only just been born. Those creatures challenge even their own chieftains whenever they get the chance."

At Vincent's words, the commanders nodded in agreement.

"An Orc who would challenge a king powerful enough to throw a spear from the mountains all the way to Winter Castle. If such a bastard exists, that would be an even bigger problem."

Because that would mean there were two or three monsters, each one hard enough to deal with alone.

"Even so, would it not be too much for a king who has only just been born to already set his sights below the mountains?"

The commanders kept raising objections, but I did not get angry.

The fact that people who would have simply ignored anything I said in the past were now listening this closely and offering counterarguments was a tremendous improvement in itself.

"Do you know what the King of Orcs is called?"

At my sudden question, Vincent asked whether a king was not just a king and if there was another name for him.

Yeah, there is.

I half-raised myself from the bed.

Then from the far side of my memories, where dust had piled up layer upon layer, I took out one ancient name.

A greedy being whose only purpose was to fight, trample, and at last conquer.

"Warlord."

The name of that savage warlord was mentioned in the world for the first time in four hundred years through my mouth.

"Mm."

The atmosphere in the room froze.

Merely mentioning that name made the surrounding air ripple ominously.

The leaders' complexions were pale.

"A Warlord, you say."

"If such a being exists among the Orcs..."

Belatedly, the leaders began making a commotion.

I ignored them and looked at my maternal uncle.

My maternal uncle was also looking at me.

His sunken eyes were asking me.

Can I believe you?

Nod.

When I nodded, my maternal uncle raised his hand.

The leaders, who had been chattering loudly, closed their mouths.

"We will have to make a new defense plan."

"It would be good to request support too. As quickly as possible, if we can."

"I will keep it in mind."

No sooner had my maternal uncle finished speaking than the commanders spread out maps and began debating back and forth.

Experience and wisdom from having endured dozens of winters poured out without end.

It was indeed the insight of old veterans hardened by battles against monsters, and the discernment of experts.

I was purely impressed.

But then,

"Why the hell are you making this fuss here when there's a perfectly good conference room!"

Why were they doing this in my bedroom?

"We need Your Highness's help."

"There is something Your Highness must confirm for us."

"As this is our first time hearing of this King of Orcs fellow..."

The commanders brazenly replied.

"So they say."

For some reason, my maternal uncle looked pleased.

In the end, I had to be tormented by the leaders of Winter Castle for several more hours after that.

"Your Highness must rest."

Only after Arwen and Adelia, unable to watch any longer, stepped forward and pleaded my condition did they gather up their maps one by one.

"Mm."

Even after all the commanders had left, my maternal uncle remained and lingered, and for some reason he looked as though he had something to say.

"Do you have something to say?"

"Was that blue flame the power of the Poem of Martial Deeds you spoke of?"

As if he had been waiting, my maternal uncle asked.

I looked around.

Arwen, pretending otherwise while glancing at me.

Adelia, unaware of what the situation was and only busy taking care of me.

They were all my people.

I nodded.

My maternal uncle squeezed his eyes shut.

His face was full of thought.

After a long while, my maternal uncle's closed eyes opened.

The eyes that had been clouded and faded from falling into the Inner Demon no longer existed.

The eyes brimming with vitality and the firmly closed mouth were just like when I had first seen my maternal uncle.

"I will ask you."

His voice was low, but powerful.

"Was that power also granted to knights of the circuit?"

I smiled.

Because it was a question I had been waiting for, for far too long.