Chapter 105 - The Man in the Fog (2)

Two wagons and more than thirty people.

The merchant caravan, which seemed to have more people wearing swords than porters to load and unload the cargo, looked strange no matter who saw it.

Add in the ominous looks in the eyes of the knights visible here and there, and it looked more like they were invading somewhere.

"Is this why you brought me along?"

"... Well, more or less. Two birds with one stone."

Stefan, who had been scratching the back of his head under that stinging gaze, gave a hollow laugh at Vlad's half-hearted answer.

No wonder he had offered such a large fee; this trap had been hiding inside it.

"We have only just managed to establish ourselves in this city for a month. And now we'll already be getting on someone's bad side."

"The Count said he would take special care of it."

"Even so, there are always areas that the people above cannot look after."

With those words, Stefan turned his head slightly and looked behind him.

There were the Vitskaya knights, looking at him and Vlad with unsettling eyes.

"We can just make one big score and move somewhere else. Isn't that how mercenaries work?"

"... You're saying the right thing in the wrong situation, so I don't know what to say."

Stefan knew full well by now that there was nothing he could do even if he complained.

This naive knight, who had been wandering lost in the forest, had already had a major clash with the Vitskaya knights, and they had been hired by Vlad without knowing that fact.

In other words, they were being saddled with the grudge Vlad had created.

"I'll give you a little from my share later too, so let's do this properly. We won't get many jobs this good in the future."

"... This is driving me insane."

Vlad deliberately pretended not to hear Stefan's last words.

He was perfectly willing to accept that much grumbling and complaining from him.

Stefan was a man worth that much.

'I'm glad I brought him.'

The Thorn Tree Mercenaries controlled the caravan skillfully, as befitted capable mercenaries.

Thanks to the way they moved briskly, almost like soldiers, Vlad was able to take command with ease.

As expected, choosing to hire mercenaries instead of forcing the likely uncooperative Vitskaya knights to obey had been the right decision.

"At this rate, we should arrive within three days."

"Good."

As Vlad listened to Stefan, he stroked Alicia's amber out of habit.

The only clue the voice had left behind.

The only beings who might recognize the scenery engraved inside it would be the elves, said to be deeply connected to spirits.

'... Three days from now.'

The elves were a race shrouded in mystery and an object of longing to some.

Vlad's heart stirred a little at the thought that he might meet them three days from now.

It was a feeling he had never experienced in his life, but the trembling of his heart right now did not feel all that unpleasant.

It had begun as a search for the voice's name, but this journey was clearly broadening Vlad's world.

* * *

The last day of the three-day journey.

Perhaps because of the densely packed trees, even the smell of the air he breathed seemed to have changed.

The farther they went, the more the road disappeared, and the wagons creaked loudly.

"Sir Vlad, from here on, we will guide the way."

"Please do."

It was not because he had backed down from the knight's sharp gaze.

Vlad had followed them only to stop an unidentified plunderer, and since he had led the caravan safely this far, half of the mission had been successfully completed.

"As we heard, it seems they only attack wagons loaded with tea."

"Mm."

Vlad, who had naturally slipped out and taken a place at the rear of the procession, nodded at Got's words from beside him.

As Got said, they had not been attacked by anything even once during the journey so far.

Even though the wagons were carrying silver ingots to pay for the tea.

'Are they being cautious?'

Perhaps the large number of armed men had been too much for them, so they had not appeared.

However, since the unidentified plunderer was said to appear only when there were wagons loaded with tea, they would have to watch until the return trip.

"We've arrived. I can see it up ahead."

Having finished his thoughts, Vlad looked where Stefan was pointing.

Inside the dense forest, there were a few small buildings erected as if pushing their way through the trees.

It looked like a camp where lumberjacks might stay, but the fences surrounding it looked far too sturdy for that.

"That must be the place for the trade."

"It seems so."

Trade is permitted, but you may not enter our forest.

The elves did not easily give humans access to their territory, and the Count of Vitskaya had been forced to devise his own method in response to their exclusionary attitude.

Though the building in sight looked small, it must have contained the Count's painstaking efforts.

"It seems the elves have arrived first. Sir Vlad, would you guard the cargo for a moment?"

"Understood."

The Vitskaya knights were openly blocking Vlad from meeting the elves, but it was also an understandable action.

Connections with the elves were no different from the Vitskaya house's lifeline.

It was only natural not to let an outsider into something so precious.

Of course, their antipathy toward Vlad must have played a part as well.

"I wanted to see an elf at least once..."

Vlad quietly nodded at Got's words and climbed up onto the roof of a wagon.

The breeze, cool rather than cold, was tousling Vlad's hair.

"What choice do we have? We guard it. Everyone, stay alert."

The good thing about being a knight was that he could give orders.

After giving instructions to Got and the mercenaries, Vlad crossed his legs, lay down on the roof, and looked up at the sky.

For Vlad, who had spent his whole life in a city full of people, air this crisp was a first.

It was the kind of air he had never felt on the plains of the North or even on the Kannor Family's ranch.

* * *

Inside a small log cabin, men were facing each other across a long table.

"... So this is all we can pay for now."

A box was pushed forward with a jingling sound.

The man's ears pricked sharply when he realized how little was inside the box.

"This is different from what was promised."

His voice was quiet, but it rang out deeply.

The Vitskaya knight swallowed before he knew it.

There was an unfathomably deep resonance inside that voice.

"The process of making tea from Tuzon leaves requires great effort. It is not work that takes only one or two people's labor."

"We are well aware of that, Lord Varadis. But..."

Though chairs had been placed right before them, the elves insisted on standing.

Under the silent pressure that they wanted to end the current conversation as quickly as possible, the Vitskaya knight had no choice but to speak about the unidentified attackers currently blocking their trade route.

Along with the circumstances that forced them to delay payment a little because of it.

"... Is the tea selling well?"

The negotiations could fall through.

Since the elves were endlessly difficult to deal with, he had been thinking through even the worst-case scenario, but what came back was only a question about whether the tea was selling well.

"Yes. So if you give us just a little more time, we will be able to pay the full amount."

"What about regions other than the central region? Do they like our tea as well?"

"It is already the talk of the nobles in the central region, so the nobles elsewhere will certainly like it too. That is how trends work."

The elf called Varadis listened to the knight's explanation and quietly nodded.

He had thought the elves would fly into a rage because the payment was late, but it seemed they also had high hopes for this business.

"I hope you will not make us go through the trouble of finding another lord."

"... Thank you."

They could find another lord to trade with at any time.

Along with those final words from Varadis, which sounded almost like a threat, the box on the table was passed over to the elves.

Though the payment was only half the usual amount, they had decided to accept it.

"By the way."

"Please, go ahead."

The knight, who had been sighing inwardly because he thought the negotiations were finally over, saw Varadis narrowing his eyes toward the outside before he knew it.

The wall was blocked by wood, yet the way he tilted his head made it look as if he could see outside.

"What is that one who came with you?"

"Whom do you mean?"

"The one lying on top of the wagon."

"... Is someone lying on top of the wagon right now?"

Varadis turned a cold gaze toward the human who failed to understand him, then stood still and felt the strange presence coming from outside.

The chaotic presence, hard to define clearly, was certainly confusing his senses.

"It must have been tiring coming all the way here, so I will serve you a cup of tea."

"Excuse me?"

"I will not charge you separately for it."

The Vitskaya knight was flustered to see Varadis suddenly treating him warmly.

However, the elf's eyes were looking not at the knight before him, but at someone far away.

"Call in those outside as well, and let us drink together."

A strange yet familiar presence.

As the guardian of the forest, he had a duty to confirm that suspicious presence filled with all manner of things.

* * *

He had not fallen asleep, but he dreamed.

In that dream stood a maple tree he had not seen in a very long time.

The colors of the falling leaves were deep.

"... What is this?"

Vlad had closed his eyes in the cold winter, but when he opened them on a hill where he could feel the lingering breath of autumn, he was flustered.

In scenery too vivid to be called a dream, Vlad hurriedly looked around.

Far in the distance, the sunset sinking beyond the horizon was dyeing the swaying wheat field red.

"I don't think this is a dream."

Vlad clearly realized where he was standing now.

It was the scenery inside the amber, which he could now rely on only as a memory.

It was the place that held the landscape the voice had said it had once visited.

Vlad hurriedly turned around.

There stood a single maple tree, firm as if it had been looking at him from the very beginning.

"Flowers?"

Flowers were blooming on that tree.

They were flowers that had no reason to bloom on a maple tree, but it was clearly full of flowers.

Flowers of many colors hid themselves among the fading leaves.

Following the swaying wind, one of the flowers there fell toward Vlad along with the fallen leaves.

It was a blossom of white platinum.

"... This is insane."

It had been a flower when it fell, but as it descended, it became a butterfly.

Seeing that sight, Vlad had no choice but to admit it now.

That this place was not reality.

The fluttering of the butterfly's wings as it drifted down through the sunset was impish.

In a landscape where everything was fading away, only one butterfly kept its own light as it settled on the bridge of Vlad's nose.

Watching the butterfly slowly fold its wings, Vlad quietly closed his right eye.

With the left eye when drawing up imagery.

With the right eye when calling reality to mind.

Though no one had taught him, Vlad understood the rules engraved in the world and, through his slowly closed eye, recalled the scenery where he had shut his eyes.

"Boss... Boss!"

Got's voice came faintly, as if through a dream.

Within the afterimage still rippling like waves, Vlad finally set foot in reality.

"..."

When Vlad opened his closed eye, he could still see a butterfly fluttering before him.

The last breath of twilight sinking beyond the mountain rested on a girl's platinum-blond hair.

"What is this?"

The armor imbued with the white snake's blessing,

"And this."

Alicia's amber, imbued with the mole's blessing.

"And this."

And a white finger gently pressing the bridge of his nose.