Chapter 164 - Beekeper's Alliance (2)
"Ernest, you're back."
Fortunately, Ernest didn't have to wander around searching—Baumann found him first. The two shook hands and smiled at each other.
"I heard the news, but actually seeing you back really makes it feel like everything turned out well. Nothing happened, right?"
"I just relaxed at headquarters for a while, that's all. Are you alright now?"
"I wasn't really injured or anything. But with this hot weather, trying to train just makes me sweat buckets—I feel like I might collapse from dehydration."
"Don't even joke about something as awful as dehydration."
Talking with Baumann, Ernest finally felt that he had truly returned to the 1st Battalion of the 13th Regiment. Originally, he should have been sharing a conversation like this with Robert, but that damn bastard had just dumped all the work on him and ran off...
"Have you seen Robert?"
As soon as Ernest thought of Robert, Baumann brought him up as well. Ernest gave a wry smile.
"He just threw a pile of work at me and took off. He did look pretty exhausted, though...."
"Don't be too disappointed. You have no idea how much Robert worried about you."
"That guy?"
Baumann chuckled.
"When he heard you'd been cleared of all charges, he ran around crying in just his shirt and got scolded for not maintaining his dignity."
"..."
Just as Ernest considered Robert his best friend, Robert also considered Ernest his closest friend.
When Robert received the news that Ernest had been acquitted, he was overjoyed—literally over the moon.
"After that, he started whining about wanting to quit working right away and got in trouble all over again."
But once he heard that Ernest was in the clear, any frustration about being stuck with extra duties as Company Commander and Ernest taking his time coming back—well, that only lasted about a day.
As soon as Robert knew Ernest was safe, his worry vanished and was replaced by annoyance over having to fill in as Company Commander, which is why he dumped all the work on Ernest and quickly took off when he returned.
Maybe that was Robert's awkward way of hiding his embarrassment. …Or maybe not.
With a quiet sigh, Ernest changed the subject.
"What happened to Georg?"
"..."
At that question, Baumann's face, which had been all smiles, suddenly froze over like a corpse.
He clamped his mouth shut and stared blankly down at the floor.
"There weren't any missing pieces, so… at least we were able to send him off properly."
After a long silence, Baumann forced a thin smile onto his pale face as he spoke.
"It's not much consolation, but I heard they're awarding a medal to the deceased as well."
Ernest didn't bother with a strained smile; he let his gloom show plainly.
"A medal, of all things…"
At those words, Baumann muttered as if spitting the words out. A medal—utterly meaningless. No matter if you gave him a hundred or a thousand of those, it wouldn't bring Georg back.
"Georg was my friend too, but we weren't as close as you two were."
Ernest gripped Baumann's trembling shoulder tightly as he spoke.
"It's too late now, but… I'm sorry, Baumann. If only I… If only I'd made a decision a bit sooner…"
"No."
Baumann grabbed Ernest's hand tightly as he started to blame himself.
"Ernest, don't misunderstand. No one blames you, and no one has the right to."
Baumann lowered his voice to a whisper.
"It was something we all agreed to. If Robert and I had been there in the field, we would've agreed too. You did what had to be done, and you saved us all. And… that's never an easy thing to do. Not as a person, and not as a soldier."
Ernest had killed his superior, Lieutenant Colonel Bailey Hoffman, with his own hands.
It was the first real killing he'd ever committed as a human being. And as a soldier, it was something he was never supposed to do.
"At the very least, we're all grateful to you for it. Ferdinand too… Yes, even Ferdinand."
Baumann's face twisted with emotion.
"How's Ferdinand holding up?"
Baumann couldn't bring himself to answer Ernest's question. He let go of Ernest's hand and, after meeting his deep, troubled gaze, slowly shook his head.
"No, he's not okay. He might seem fine on the outside, but he's having a really hard time."
Baumann had known Ferdinand since their days at the Juvenile Military Academy, and he understood better than anyone just how much Ferdinand was struggling.
"I wish you could talk to Ferdinand. You're probably the right one for it—better than me or Robert."
He gave a bitter smile.
"For Ferdinand to show weakness… the truth is, we're all too weak ourselves for him to lean on us."
For Ferdinand to show weakness, Baumann and Robert are simply too fragile. And as for the rest of the 1st Battalion, Ferdinand can't open up and talk freely with them either. Unless it's someone who surpasses Ferdinand in certain areas, is strong, and—most importantly—someone Ferdinand can trust, like Ernest, he'll never let himself show that vulnerable side.
"Alright. I'll try talking to Ferdinand. But before that, there's something I want to ask."
"Yeah? What is it?"
Ernest and Baumann looked at each other with serious expressions.
"What kinds of rumors are going around about me, exactly?"
"…Oh."
Baumann's eyes went wide, and the cold, lifeless look on his face melted away, replaced by the playful grin so often seen on young men his age.
"Captain Fox, you'd better ask the 1st Company Commander about that. I'm busy, so I'll just—"
Thump.
Baumann, who had been about to run off after teasing Ernest, suddenly froze.
Ernest's hand was gripping his shoulder so tightly it felt like it might break.
"I've asked that question so many times today and no one will tell me."
"…Seriously, though, I'm really busy. I just squeezed in a little time to come here."
"You can spare a few more words, can't you? Just say it before you go."
Baumann rolled his eyes, then gave an awkward smile to Ernest, who was towering over him with a frightening look.
***
Ferdinand sat upright in his chair, eyes closed, not moving a muscle as the time ticked by.
He had finished all the tasks that needed immediate attention, so he figured it wouldn't hurt to take a short break.
Ever since surviving the previous battle, Ferdinand had barely slept at night. When he shut his eyes in the darkness, he would find himself right back in that forest, and the moment when Georg's feverishly hot corpse slowly turned cold in his arms—and the heaviness, the dead weight of that body—would come to life again in his senses, as vivid as ever.
So Ferdinand had taken to tossing and turning through the nights, grabbing brief naps whenever the daylight came flooding in. But with how busy things were, even that wasn't enough, and lately he was only able to steal about an hour's worth of real rest at dawn, just as the sun was rising, or in the evening, before it had fully set.
Ferdinand now averaged less than five hours of sleep a day. That wasn't nearly enough to withstand the grueling summer training and all he was going through.
If he hadn't been born so tough, he would have already collapsed by now, and lately, he could feel himself reaching his physical limits.
Over the past twenty or so days, Ferdinand's face had grown noticeably gaunt, to the point where it looked like half of it had sunk away.
That wasn't just an expression; his cheeks really had become hollow.
This wasn't the first time Ferdinand had lost a friend in his arms—it was the second. He still couldn't forget the shock of losing Tobias just after he first took command of the platoon.
But Georg's death was eating away at him, leaving behind a sense of loss so profound that even Ferdinand himself couldn't fully grasp it.
Crash.
The door opened rudely without so much as a knock—the door to the 13th Regiment's 1st Battalion, 1st Company Commander's office, who was also the Corps Chief of Staff's eldest grandson.
Ferdinand, exhausted to the bone, forced his bleary eyes open and blinked, unable to focus.
Click.
In that short moment, Ernest had already come inside, quietly shut the door, adjusted the chair across from Ferdinand's table, and sat down.
"…Ernest. You're back."
Ferdinand spoke in a rough voice.
Ernest simply stared at Ferdinand for a moment, saying nothing.
"I'm glad everything worked out."
"Baumann's been worrying about you a lot."
When Ferdinand couldn't stand the silence any longer and spoke, Ernest finally opened his mouth.
"Hard to keep up the tough act when you look like that, Ferdinand."
"..."
Ernest's voice was quiet as he spoke to Ferdinand, whose appearance really was a mess.
"…Are you alright?"
After a long silence, Ferdinand asked in a flat voice.
He wasn't asking if Ernest was fine because he himself was struggling.
He was simply expressing concern for Ernest's condition.
"My body… Well, even physically, it's uncomfortable—my fingernails still haven't grown back."
Ernest placed his left hand on the table. His battered hand still had nails that weren't even halfway regrown.
"My mind, honestly, feels like death. But I think I can somehow hang on."
"..."
At Ernest's candid words, Ferdinand slowly lowered his head.
He, too, placed his own scarred hand on the table, his movements unhurried.
It reminded them both of the moment they first truly met, when they talked about the meaning of those battered hands.
Ferdinand drew a deep breath and exhaled.
"I regret it."
Ferdinand muttered, letting go of the feelings he'd kept tightly bottled up.
Even as he told himself to endure, the words slipped out.
"If things were going to turn out like this anyway, maybe it would've been better if I hadn't stopped you back then."
Thinking back to the moment when he had stopped Ernest from shooting Bailey, Ferdinand confessed his guilt.
"It's a cowardly thought. After already making you carry so much, now I regret not letting you shoulder even more."
Ernest listened quietly, not responding to Ferdinand's words.
"And that day, I regret using my strength and Grandfather's authority to overpower our superior officer. I think I could have handled it better. I don't regret protecting you, though."
"..."
"I regret the moment I decided to go to the field. I regret stubbornly ignoring Grandfather and Father's attempts to persuade me. Sometimes I wish I'd just run away instead of clinging to conviction, even if it meant being a coward."
Ferdinand spoke of his regrets calmly.
"I regret believing I could accomplish something. I've realized that I'm just an incompetent, foolish greenhorn. I regret letting Georg put his trust in someone like me."
He lifted his gaze and met Ernest's eyes head-on.
"But I can't stop now. If I stop here—if I betray even Georg's trust—then Georg's death will have been for nothing, just a pointless, meaningless death."
Georg had always believed in Ferdinand.
Even as he lay dying from wounds sustained fighting under Ferdinand's command, even in his final moments, he never blamed him.
With his last breath, he'd said thank you—that it was an honor to have served together—and closed his eyes with a smile.
If Ferdinand were to stop here, then for Georg, who accepted death with a smile because of his trust, what could possibly be left of his sacrifice?
"I always thought I was strong."
Ernest finally spoke.
"But I wasn't. I'm just a young, fragile greenhorn. I was only pretending to be strong."
He held up a finger without a nail and tapped the table with the tip. Even the pain was dull now.
"We're only seventeen. People say you're an adult at fifteen, and we tend to think we're all grown up. But even those who've lived nearly twice as long as us still struggle."
Ernest spoke, thinking of Yurgen—the Company Commander who, even while laughing and joking, would bite down on his cigarette to hide his weary sighs, a man too kind to be just another cog in the military machine.
At seventeen, Ernest himself had believed he was all grown up. But he realized he wasn't. Yurgen had been right.
"We're still just naive, inexperienced greenhorns. We're too young and weak to take responsibility for others and lead them forward. The only reason we've made it this far is because, by some stroke of luck, we happened to have skill."
Ernest forced a bitter smile as he remembered Yurgen's words about him—words Yurgen had spoken not even a month after they'd met, yet they'd been exactly right. And they fit Ferdinand just as well.
"If you look at it another way, the truth is, we took responsibility and made it this far in spite of being unfit to do so."
Ernest clenched his battered hand tightly. The two young men, bearing the same wounded hands, looked at each other.
"I know it's cowardly. But for now, it's okay to be a little bit cowardly, isn't it? We're still just seventeen—still greenhorns."
"..."
"We did our best, and even so, it didn't work out. And… it's not like we only took lives or only lost things. We saved someone too. Didn't we? Ferdinand?"
Ferdinand slowly raised his hand and wiped it down his face.
"…Yeah…"
He replied quietly, his voice tinged with a sigh.
"You're right, Ernest."
"Are you crying?"
"I'm not crying."
"Don't cry too much. You'll get dehydrated."
"I told you, I'm not crying. And don't even mention anything like dehydration."
"I'm going to spread the rumor that you're crying."
"..."
At the word "rumor," Ferdinand, who'd been trying to get back at Captain Fox, clamped his mouth shut.
Rumors about Ernest had already spread uncontrollably throughout the 13th Regiment.
If he tried to get even here and said something rash, Ernest, who had nothing to lose, might actually spread a rumor.
"Who on earth started those crazy rumors, anyway?"
"…The details may be exaggerated, but the end result isn't exactly wrong."
"I'm just a normal guy, you know. Not… not some kind of monster."
"You're not exactly… normal…."
"This is so unfair. I should hunt down the original source of the rumor and have them severely punished."
"You can't really call it an insult if it's a compliment, can you?"
"You caused confusion within the unit with those rumors."
"Other than boosting morale, nothing's actually changed."
"I'm the one who's confused. The real victim here is me, and I'm the one who's confused."
"..."
Once again, Ferdinand tried to tease Captain Fox—no, the legend… or was it a myth…?
Anyway, he tried to poke fun at Ernest over those stories, but ended up giving up.
"Oh, can you give me an update on the battalion's current status?"
When Ernest abruptly remembered to ask, Ferdinand put his hand down and blinked at him, his eyes still red.
"Why are you asking me about that?"
Ferdinand wasn't the battalion staff officer—he was the company commander from another company.
Why would Ernest be asking him? Of course, Ferdinand was a meticulous and capable officer, so he always kept close tabs on the unit's situation and stored the details in his head.
To Ferdinand's perfectly reasonable question, Ernest replied in a solemn voice,
"If you have any complaints, don't take them up with me—tell those useless senior officers instead."
Those damn captains just skipped out on their duties, so if they get in trouble, they deserve it. Besides, Ferdinand isn't the type to just hand things off to someone else.
"I'm already swamped. This is going to drive me crazy."
Ferdinand grumbled, but with a hint of relief.
***
"Second Lieutenant Jitman, when exactly are you going to finish the task assigned to you? At this rate, the sun will set before you're done."
"I'm finished here."
"Alright, let me check. …You've improved a lot, Isaac. I think it's time we move on to the advanced material. Ah, it would be wonderful if we could get our hands on some books written in the Imperial Language."
"Oh, really! That would've helped Isaac's studies a lot. Of course, it'll still take him a long time before he can whip through books like Captain Fox does."
"Can you stop calling me Captain Fox already? Just hearing it gives me a headache."
"Why not? After all, people are acknowledging and admiring your greatness, Captain Fox!"
"Enough! Enough! Enough!"
Bang!
Robert let out a shout at Ernest, Isaac, and Bruno, who had barged into his room for study and conversation.
He slammed his fist on the table and sprang to his feet.
"Everyone out!"
"Oh my. Imagine a lowly Platoon Leader showing such disrespectful behavior to a company commander and senior officers as distinguished as us."
"Hey! Why am I doing this when you're the one who's back now?"
Flap!
When Ernest shook his head with distinguished composure and sighed, Robert, grumbling, threw the training plan he'd been working on right at Ernest's face.
Since it was just paper, it didn't fly far and fell all over the floor.
"Oh dear... Second Lieutenant Jitman, if you have any complaints, you should hurry up and get promoted so you can be the one giving orders instead of just taking them…"
"Bruno! Not you too!"
"I was left with a deep psychological scar from the last time, and just getting here drained me physically. So, since you've been holed up here in Lanosel taking it easy, I thought you could wrap this up for us. Ah, and since we have to deliver it to the Section Chief, could you please pick it up and finish it quickly?"
"You bastard!"
As Robert sputtered in frustration and began to stomp around, Ernest let out a sigh, stooped down to gather the documents scattered on the floor, organized them, and began to review the contents.
"I gave you all this time and you still didn't finish? In the end, I have to take care of it myself."
After saying that, Ernest picked up his pen and completed the training plan that Robert had almost finished.
"Done. Really, something this simple and you still haven't managed it…"
"Get out! I said get out!"
"Wow, if you keep this up, I'm going to get hit. Should I take off my rank insignia?"
"Leave! You're a terrible Company Commander!"
As Ernest teased and tormented Robert, he felt as if he'd returned home and was living his daily life again.
"Good job. Get some rest."
"Buzz off!"
At Robert's expulsion order, Ernest left the room with a laugh.
"I don't know why he's always so angry."
"Right? Especially after he worried so much he almost cried."
"You two can get out too!"
Even after Ernest left, Isaac and Bruno lingered, chatting away, but Robert shooed them out, firmly pushing them along.
"Hey, what's with you?"
"Ah, just let me finish what I was writing..."
"Out!"
"No! At least let me take what I was working on! That's my homework! I'll get in trouble!"
Bang! Click!
Ignoring Bruno's desperate plea to finish his Rhetoric homework, which Ernest had just assigned him, Robert kicked both men out and even locked the door behind them.
"Ji—Second Lieutenant Jitman! Second Lieutenant Jitman! Please, just let me grab my homework!"
"It's Jimman! Jimman!"
Ignoring Bruno's begging, Robert untied the damned boots, shook them off his feet, and tossed them aside.
Then, wearing only his shirt, he flopped down on the bed and closed his eyes.
"See? Why did you tease him so much?"
"Hey, Isaac, you were teasing him too!"
"What? Me? When did I ever do that?"
Isaac and Bruno's voices could be heard chattering outside the door. But to Robert, utterly exhausted, none of it registered.
Now that he'd seen Ernest return safely, Robert could finally relax. For the first time in ages, he let himself drift off into a peaceful afternoon nap.
Bang bang bang! Bang bang bang!
"Second Lieutenant Jimman! My homework!"
"Get lost before I tear it up and burn it!"
"I'm begging you, seriously!"
"Ugh! Come on!"
Annoyed, Robert jumped up barefoot.
Honestly, he's just too soft-hearted and kind for his own good.
After Ernest returned, everything in the 2nd Company fell neatly into place.
The Platoon Leaders, who used to struggle through their duties, now finished their work quickly, and Captain Hans Schum, the Acting Battalion Commander and Section Chief, relied on Ernest for help—just as much as ever, if not more.
And not only because Ernest was useful, but because he had proven himself to be trustworthy.
Before the previous battle, Ernest had felt adrift, not truly belonging in the 1st Battalion.
But now, things were different.
Everyone who had survived now respected and admired Ernest.
Even the new staff officers treated him with considerable caution.
Everything was going smoothly.
Of course, Ernest was still having a hard time because of the rumors going around.
But after a couple of days of behaving just like everyone else, people's interest started to wane.
Ernest decided to stay quiet and just wait out the storm of rumors.
It would be foolish to stand up to a raging storm.
The smart thing is to hide and wait for it to pass.
Meanwhile, news finally arrived that a new 1st Battalion Commander would soon be appointed.
It was the news everyone had been waiting for—and, at the same time, secretly dreading.
"Ahhh! God, please!"
"Who exactly are you praying to?"
"I don't know! Whoever it is, God is supposed to be all-powerful, so He'll hear my wishes and grant them!"
"If I were God, I'd probably do the opposite just because your attitude is so disrespectful."
"You should pray too!"
"I don't see any connection between my prayers and the new Battalion Commander."
"Please, just let us have a Battalion Commander like Yurgen! Please, someone like Yurgen as our new commander!"
Robert prayed fervently to a god that didn't even exist, desperate for a commander with good character.
Still, wishing for a superior like Yurgen—what an impossibly ambitious dream.
'This guy has no idea who I am, yet he asks for so much. Ugh, why am I getting mad for no reason?'
If God actually listened to Robert's prayers, He might get irritated and send them a commander like Bailey instead of Yurgen out of spite.
Strangely enough, it wasn't only Robert doing this sort of irrational thing.
Everyone who had survived Hell under Bailey and made it back alive was also praying desperately, in unison, to some god whose very existence they couldn't even confirm.
And at last, that day finally arrived.
The new Battalion Commander was assigned to the 1st Battalion of the 13th Regiment.
Even Ernest and Ferdinand were so tense that they swallowed nervously, unable to hide their anxiety.
If we get another commander like Bailey, I really might lose my mind this time.
Looking back at all this desperation, Ernest thought he finally understood why people started believing in gods in the first place.
The 1st Battalion waited in a state of extreme tension for the new Battalion Commander, who had gone to see Levin.