Chapter 142 - The Beast of Possibility (3)

They were tall and broad-shouldered.

Even judging only by their outward appearance, they looked so dignified one might think they were nobles.

Yet more than any of that, what drew people's eyes was their ears.

The pointed, long ears no human could possess told everyone who they were.

"It feels as though a war was fought here quite recently."

"The bloodstains and soot everywhere all appear to be recent."

"Lord Varadis. Could there truly be traces of Mother World Tree in a place like this?"

Their words sounded almost like whispers, yet their pronunciation and rhythm came through clearly.

The guards stared in fascination at the elven language they were hearing for the first time, but what the elves were actually exchanging were only ominous first impressions of Deirmar.

"... Knight Vlad said so. He said Mother World Tree's memory was brought from this city."

The rangers had given negative reports, but even so, Varadis decided to believe.

Because Vlad had clearly said Mother World Tree's memory had begun from a place called Heinal's Deirmar.

He might not have trusted other humans, but the words of Vlad, who had protected the young World Tree, were worth trusting.

"You have waited a long time. My lord has just granted permission for you to enter."

The quiet sound of the elven language drifted amid the gazes of humans.

Duncan approached the clearly perceptible boundary between two worlds and spoke with a smile spread across his face.

It was sudden, but they were certainly honored guests, so there was no reason not to welcome them.

"Please come in. I will guide you."

Would he know, perhaps?

That he had become the first person in the history of the empire to open a gate for elves.

At Duncan's command, the castle gate, which looked as though it would need to be replaced entirely, began to open little by little.

Yet though it was Deirmar's shabby, creaking gate, its movement held meaning enough.

"... So it was true."

The city of Deirmar began to open wide for the elves.

As they looked at a human city for the first time in their lives, the rangers' eyes began to shine.

The human city they were seeing for the first time was certainly full of unfamiliar sights, but the scent of the air drifting through the city had a familiarity that somehow reminded them of Aushrina.

----?

And the place where that familiarity began.

Deirmar's white mansion.

Above it, the white snake on the hill was poking its head up.

The snake, visible even from afar, seemed to be looking at the elves with a bewildered expression.

"Welcome to Deirmar, honored elves."

Varadis gave a small nod as he listened to Duncan.

A human city greeting them for the first time.

Though they were tense from all that unfamiliarity, Deirmar was certainly welcoming them.

Like the white tail swaying toward the elves who recognized it.

※※※※

In the darkness that settled over the city, there stood an old tavern.

A scarred man leaning against the shadow cast between the taverns nodded as he saw Vlad approaching from afar.

"Thank you for coming, Marcus."

"It's Poznan now."

"... Doesn't it get confusing, changing your name that often?"

At Vlad's playful rebuke, Marcus, who had now become Poznan, only gave him a cold smile.

"With this, I've repaid all the cooperation from back then."

"All right. I won't act like you still owe me for what happened with Charles anymore."

Seeing Vlad shrug as if he understood, Poznan merely turned his gaze away.

An audacious brat who had dared to strike a deal with the captain of the secret intelligence squad.

Even the two heirs who carried Bayezid blood would not dare handle him this easily.

"Use it well and return it."

"Got it, Marcus."

Vlad tucked the crow Marcus handed him into his breast and sauntered toward the tavern in front of him as if nothing were out of the ordinary.

His attitude was as though he did not care at all what was waiting inside.

"Just as I heard, he really is a man who doesn't listen."

Though he had said Poznan, Vlad had insisted on answering with Marcus.

The nameless man realized that he would be remembered as Marcus for a long time, just as stubbornly as that young knight insisted on it.

"The name Marcus did have a decent ring to it."

A cigarette was already dangling long from the mouth of the man who was not supposed to be remembered.

※※※※

A brilliant golden color gleamed atop the cup the tavern owner held out.

Beer, a specialty of the West and the pride of this tavern.

As Vlad looked at the liquor he had never seen before, his tongue ran over his dry lips.

The instincts of a candle peddler who had worked at Rose's Smiles were telling him.

This liquor, with white foam floating on top, would surely taste incredible.

"Dwarves, you say?"

"Yeah. Dwarves. Short, stocky fellows."

Though his gaze never left the drink called beer, Vlad's open palm was pointing somewhere around his own waist.

Watching Vlad move his hand as if to say they were about this tall, the tavern owner only tilted his head.

"But why would dwarves suddenly..."

"I heard you buy and sell them here. Dwarves, I mean."

At Vlad's casually offered words, the air around them began to sink in an instant.

The tavern owner, who had been staring blankly in front of him, the server carrying plates.

Even the men who had been sprawled over tables as if drunk.

All of them began glaring at Vlad with eyes completely different from before.

"I came here knowing everything. So let's not beat around the bush."

Yet even with everyone glaring at him, Vlad merely lifted his cup in silence.

A knight of Bayezid born in the darkness of the back alleys.

In Vlad's eyes as he lifted the beer mug as if nothing were wrong, there was a viscous warning only those of his kind could recognize.

"I'm going to ask questions from now on, so all you have to do is answer. They won't be that hard."

Even the slave trader who had been through all manner of hardships could not hide his tension before the force Vlad was giving off.

The scent of someone powerful, utterly unlike his youthful appearance.

The being known as Vlad had now become a world too vast and broad for the dark back alleys to contain.

"I heard there are dwarves you people have locked up in the warehouse here."

Vlad had been ordered to take leave, but even so, he had come here to finish his duty.

He was a knight of Bayezid, but also a knight of Joseph.

After leaving Deirmar and reaching Nassau, Vlad had received one small mission from his lord, who had ended up bedridden, and had come all the way here.

"I have no idea what you are talking abou— Aaaaargh!"

"Usually I start with the fingers, but I'm a little busy right now. So let's start with the wrist."

Behind his calm voice, a wrist flew far away.

The slave trader disguised as the tavern owner screamed at the top of his lungs from the delayed agony, but his men could not easily rush at Vlad.

"I'd like to let you know that after the remaining hand, it goes straight to the neck. That's the Soara way."

The blue eyes shining above his calmly smiling face were chilling.

The slave trader, desperately clutching his severed wrist, only then realized who the man before him was.

"V-Vlad of Soara! Blue-eyed bastard!"

"... Ha. What the hell is blue-eyed bastard? Seriously."

In the North, it carried respect and pride, but in the West, fear.

"So, the dwarves. Are they here or not?"

Vlad's name, which could only differ as much as his appearance did, was being called with such different meanings as it spread across the continent.

※※※※

The reason the cavalry of the West was famous.

No one could deny that while it was partly due to the excellence of their horses and horsemanship, the greatest reason was the light yet sturdy weapons they carried.

Arrows that flew farther.

Sturdier shields and armor.

Differences in weaponry that were small, yet made critical differences on the battlefield.

All of these things were seized from the blood and sweat of dwarves.

That was why trade in them was so active in the West, just like the dwarves now locked behind bars.

"..."

Inside the bars was a man whose beard, no different from a dwarf's pride, had been cut into a mess.

The muscles revealed on his gaunt body looked pitiful.

The whip marks carved all over his back clearly showed what kind of treatment he had received all this time.

CLANK!

When the heavy sound of a lock spread from above, the tense breathing of the young ones trapped inside could be heard.

The dark underground prison and the chains that bound their hands and feet tightly.

And the countless abuses that had taken place within it were enough to break even the strong spirits that flowed in dwarven blood.

"Let's see... Vulkaru? Volkano?"

"... It's Vulcano."

A man came down with the creaking of wooden planks.

It was daytime, yet the sharp smell of beer was already coming from the young fellow.

The way he was grinning looked delinquent, and he seemed to be a bad seed, as yellow as the color of his hair.

Well, at that young age, he was already snooping around slaves, so he was surely prime material to rot splendidly.

"Mm. Mm. Good. Vulcano. Right."

"...?"

But as the blond youth before him came closer, Vulcano could smell the fishy scent hidden between the beer.

It was the smell of blood.

And it was a clear smell of blood that could not have come from only one or two people.

"There really are only dwarves here, huh? They did say you were merchants specializing in dwarves."

Just as Marcus's information had said, the iron cages stacked up like boxes were filled with dwarves.

Dwarves were locked inside spaces so small they could not even properly stretch their hands and feet.

After confirming the young dwarves visible among them, Vlad quietly tilted the beer mug he was holding.

"... I will accept your proposal. If you release only the children here, I will cooperate in making weapons..."

"I'll release all of you."

It began cool, and went down smooth.

It was surely cheaper than whiskey, but Vlad felt as though he might fall for this drink called beer, which he was tasting for the first time.

"What?"

"But there is one condition, Vulcano."

Vlad pulled over a nearby chair, threw the beer mug aside, and met the dwarf named Vulcano's eyes.

He had finally found them.

Dwarves.

"I am Vlad of Soara. A knight serving Lord Joseph Bayezid, second son of the Bayezid Family."

The sound of the beer mug falling to the floor was loud.

Along with it, Vlad's hand held a bundle of keys covered in bloodstains.

Proposal and choice.

The words Joseph had commanded flowed from Vlad's mouth.

"He wishes to form ties with the dwarf liberation front."

An underground prison where even air seemed unable to enter properly.

There, through bars that had barely opened, a letter and a single crow were handed over.

"If you swear to bring back an answer to this letter, every dwarf here is free."

The dwarves trapped within the narrow bars, and Joseph, who had been trapped since birth inside a frail body.

Wretched as they were, both needed a hole through which they could escape into a wider world if they were to survive.

"And I'm asking this just because I'm curious."

The first cup, filled with duty, had been for Joseph.

And the next cup, filled with settled gold, was for the voice.

Looking at Vulcano, who was bewildered by the sudden proposal, Vlad decided to bring out another question he had kept inside.

"Is there, by any chance, any legend related to a Swordmaster on that island where you people are?"

Vlad had not forgotten.

The contract from back then, when he had promised to find the name.

The traces of the Swordmaster indicated in the village of the elves had clearly pointed west, toward where the dwarves were.