Chapter 74 - Options the Boy Created (1)

"Lift your face a little."

Vlad wore a displeased expression at Dorothea's hand forcing his face upward, but there was nothing he could do.

"Don't draw it on my face."

"Do you want to end up a headless corpse?"

"That's why I'm wearing a helmet too."

"I told you not to speak casually to me."

Red inscriptions packed densely over his armor.

As if that were not enough, Dorothea had brought a tiny brush up to Vlad's face.

It was Dorothea's measure against the cold Lindwurm would spew, just as the Iron Duke's knights carried magic torches.

"Why are you only doing this to me... ma'am?"

"Because you'll be the one running until the very end."

Rutiger's knights, watching Vlad from the side, merely shrugged as if there was no helping it.

"What can you do? Your horse is the fastest."

"As Bayezid's finest dragon driver, you ought to handle at least this much."

Perhaps finding the boy's increasingly red-stained appearance amusing, the knights beside him tossed out jokes.

"I'll say it one more time. Look at this map."

While Dorothea carved inscriptions on the boy's face, Rutiger's adjutant unfolded a crumpled map and jabbed at the marked points with his finger.

"The Iron Duke's knights and we will only be able to drive it as far as this point here. So from this point on, you break ahead."

Countless lines were drawn over the map the adjutant was pointing at.

They were the traces left by those who must have agonized over how to lure in a dragon.

"Until then, stay behind the knights and avoid the wind. Preserve your strength."

"Understood."

It was an outline of the operation they had repeated again and again, but Rutiger's adjutant did not seem satisfied with that alone.

"If you draw it only as far as this point here, Lord Rutiger, who will be lying in wait, will charge out. At the same time, Lord Volkov's javelin will come flying from above."

At the adjutant's words, Vlad turned his gaze to look at the knight up ahead.

A knight of the Iron Duke with short javelins loaded across his back.

Volkov of the Javelin.

Vlad knew through Lamund that aura could be used in various ways, but this was the first time he had seen someone who could send aura into a thrown weapon.

The world was indeed wide, and full of extraordinary people.

"So in this plan, your role is the most important."

"I feel like I've heard that more than a hundred times already."

A terrain that suddenly narrowed like the neck of a bottle between hills on both sides.

The plan was that if they could only lure Lindwurm to a place it could not easily turn away from, Rutiger would block its advance on the ground, while Volkov hurled javelins from atop the hill.

If Vlad could just draw Lindwurm to the planned point, the subjugation would succeed.

"Good. Questions."

"I don't have any."

"Ask something. Anything."

Looking at the boy, who did not lose his bold attitude despite standing at the center of the operation, Rutiger's adjutant was the one growing anxious instead.

"... If we succeed, those people don't have to die, right?"

"Of course. Naturally."

At Vlad's question, the adjutant nodded emphatically.

At the end of the boy's gaze were barbarians being forced down onto the ground by the rough hands of the dragon killer knights.

Bait was not something one went out to find and use only when needed.

Catching it in advance and bringing it out when needed was the proper way to use bait.

That was why Mircea had captured the bait that would tempt Lindwurm in advance.

Vlad looked at Age behind him, who was gritting his teeth, unable to contain his rage.

The son of a tribal chief who had pursued a sacred horse, and a savage barbarian who had attacked the people of Bayezid.

Yet his actions had had the purpose of saving his tribesmen.

"... How does a thing go this wrong?"

And now, the bait caught by the dragon killer knights and sitting helplessly on the cold snowfield had called themselves members of the Budaat Tribe.

If the people of the North failed, their blood and screams would become the trap that tempted Lindwurm.

ROOOOAR!

From beyond the far-off horizon dyed white, the roar of the fallen dragon began to sound.

"Good. Look here!"

Rutiger's adjutant clapped his hands to draw the knights' attention, then turned his head and looked at his lord.

At his signal, the black-haired young man nodded.

"Go!"

With the signal to depart, the dragon drivers turned their horses' heads.

"..."

Vlad lowered the visor of his inscribed helmet and met the eyes of the people looking at him.

Dorothea, beginning to pray.

Rutiger and Lamund, nodding to him as they watched.

And even Mircea of the dragon killer knights, watching him from far away with a faint smile.

"Let's go, Noir."

NEIGH!

The horse bearing the black name the girl had given him began to kick off with his hooves.

Behind the pitch-black horse's tail, white snow scattered through the air.

* * *

Two days earlier, Berenheim Fortress.

There was a single sheet of white paper lit by a flickering candle.

"Name, Vlad. Age, seventeen. Birthplace, Soara of Bayezid County. As a special note, he is said to be from the slums."

"Hmm. Is that so?"

Listening to the details reported through the crystal ball, Mircea frowned.

"Soara. Soara, is it?"

Blond hair and blue eyes.

And the heartbeat he had been able to feel the moment he saw him.

The instant their eyes met, Mircea had felt a premonition almost like instinct, but the circumstances surrounding the boy were subtly throwing off his judgment.

"He was born far too distant a place."

"That is correct."

"And he was born far too low."

"..."

They said promising seeds bloomed wherever they were planted, but the background surrounding the boy seemed not merely low, but harsh.

Would a noble seed truly have been scattered in such a place?

"I cannot tell."

A map of the North lay on the desk.

And a single sheet of paper was spread atop that map.

Frowning, Mircea tapped the paper containing Vlad's personal details.

But no matter how much Mircea urged it on with his finger, the report written in ink could give him no further information about the boy.

"I cannot be certain from this alone. I would like to know a little more."

At Mircea's words that he wanted more definite information, the adjutant's expression began to darken.

"... The thing is."

The adjutant hesitated for a moment, but under Mircea's gaze, colder than ice, he had no choice but to spit out the answer he had been reluctant to give.

"We were able to determine the activities the boy named Vlad carried out outside, but we could not uncover his movements within Soara."

"Why? We should have planted the most agents in the North."

At the adjutant's report, Mircea looked puzzled.

At present, it was the figures from the West who were causing a stir, but originally, the region the royal family and central authorities had paid the most attention to was the North.

That was because the North, united around Timur Baranoff the Iron Duke by its fierce regional identity, had built up a sphere of its own to the point that it would not be strange if it broke away from the empire's reach at any time.

"Since a new mayor took office in Soara, all of our eyes have been shut. It seems he used the recent disappearance cases as a pretext and succeeded in bringing the city firmly under control."

Though Joseph was a man who could not hold a sword, he was also a man who understood swords better than anyone else.

The point of a sword had to be sharp, and it had to be flexible enough to extend anywhere.

Using a single incident as his pretext, Joseph's influence stretched out sharply, endlessly seizing and devouring Soara.

"... The two Bayezid brothers are very capable."

"My apologies."

Looking at the adjutant bowing his head, Mircea took a cigarette from his coat and lit it by drawing the candle closer.

Soon, the dense smoke he exhaled began to fill the room.

"Both of them are capable, but there is only one place they can climb to..."

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Only the sound of Mircea tapping the desk echoed through the room.

The victor gained what he wanted, and the loser lost everything.

Especially in a succession struggle between nobles, that would be even more true.

Rutiger and Joseph were men who had been placed on an unavoidable battlefield from the moment they were born.

"This is something I can shake up a little."

No matter how tightly knit the North might be, there was always a gap to squeeze into.

And to Mircea, it seemed as though he could see that gap.

Whoo.

The map of the North lying on the desk was wrapped in the cigarette smoke Mircea exhaled, turning hazy and blurred.

* * *

"In our day too, we did end up putting people forward. It wasn't intentional, but..."

Lamund, dredging up his old memories, crossed his arms and let out a low groan.

"In the end, we caught the thing while it was attacking a village, so if you look only at the method, we probably weren't that different from the dragon killer knights setting up barbarians as bait."

Several decades ago, there had been a Lindwurm that came down with the bitterest cold then as well.

Lamund, who had been a young knight at the time, and the knights of Bayezid had barely succeeded in subjugating it by taking advantage of the moment when Lindwurm was too occupied tearing into the villagers.

In the end, in the sense that they had caught it through someone's sacrifice, there was likely no great difference from the method the current dragon killer knights were taking.

"... So because we can't catch up to it, we must set a trap too."

Rutiger clutched his head and began to sink into thought.

"If we fail to catch the dragon, they may use that as an excuse to settle in here."

Like the mage and adviser to Rutiger that she was, Dorothea began to infer the dragon killer knights' course of action in a quiet, measured tone.

As she said, if they had the chance to kill the dragon stolen by the dragon killer knights, there was no predicting what sort of justification would build from it.

The dragon killer knights were a group that moved according to the will of the central authorities, using the justification of a dragon as their shield.

"If we try to make a trap now, it will take a long time, won't it?"

"If you intend to drive cattle or sheep here from a nearby city, then yes."

Seeing Rutiger troubled, the adjutant spoke in a cautious tone.

"... Shall we capture barbarians even now and bring them here? Or there is also the method of seizing the barbarians the dragon killer knights captured."

"Damn it."

At the adjutant's suggestion, Rutiger let out a low curse.

No matter which side he chose, the aftermath would not be small.

The barbarians and the people of the North were, in any case, neighbors standing shoulder to shoulder, and the idea of using them as bait would ultimately shatter the subtle peace that had existed between them until now.

Rutiger thought that this, too, might be the result the central authorities intended.

"Let us leave that as our final option."

But as Rutiger, he had to keep every possible method in mind.

Because that was the duty a person in charge had to bear.

"I hear Vlad's horse is fast..."

"Do not even think of riding that horse."

At the words he had offered casually, just in case, Lamund shook his head firmly.

"Everyone in Soara knows that creature doesn't listen."

"Hmm. To that degree?"

"Whatever you are imagining, it will be more than that."

Rutiger had been considering, if it came down to it, borrowing Vlad's widely rumored horse and trying to cut Lindwurm down as a lone rider, but at Lamund's firm restraint, he had no choice but to give up on the idea with regret.

"Then there is no way."

Lindwurm was far too fast to catch up to.

To catch such a Lindwurm, they had to call it in rather than chase it down, and the most suitable method for that would be to lure it with food.

"They certainly are qualified to bear the name of dragon slayers."

Rutiger let out a sigh with a heavy heart.

The dragon killer knights, simply by existing, were forcing a difficult choice upon him.

As if they were thrusting it before his eyes and telling him to do this.

"Lord Rutiger."

In the office where everyone had fallen silent because there was no suitable method, hurried footsteps and a knock suddenly sounded.

"What is it?"

The knight who received permission quickly opened the door and entered, then began reporting to Rutiger.

"There are people outside the fortress right now requesting that the gate be opened."

"... Who are they?"

Rutiger frowned, wondering if they were yet another uninvited guest, but the complexion of the knight reporting to him was strangely flushed.

* * *

In the northern snowfield, where the sun was quickly setting, there were men knocking on the gates of Berenheim Fortress.

"Identify yourselves!"

At the gatekeeper's words, the listening men raised high the flag they were holding.

The emblem engraved on the flag was a steel gauntlet gripping something tightly.

"Tell the commander of Berenheim Fortress."

The man with a ponytail, who seemed to be the men's leader, spoke to the gatekeeper in a calm voice.

He was a man who seemed extraordinary from the aura he carried alone.

"Tell him the knights of the Iron Duke have come."

The knights of the Iron Duke Baranoff Family.

They had come to Rutiger, who had been agonizing because he held no cards in his hand.

The spears Volkov had set into his back glittered in the light of the fading dusk.