Chapter 703 - Used Both
Alexandra had a habit of tormenting her opponent during sparring.
Odincar, when engrossed, couldn't distinguish between practice and real combat, while Grida had difficulty recognizing faces.
Rhinox had a similar deficiency.
He lacked the ability to judge which side to take.
If he didn't act according to his whims, he felt an unbearable itch, as if he couldn't sit still.
A particular anecdote from his younger days, when he wandered the continent as a mercenary, perfectly illustrated his bad habits.
"Why are you standing over there?"
When yesterday's ally asked, Rhinox answered confidently.
"Oh, I decided to be on this side from today."
"What the hell? Even a mercenary sold to Krona should have some sense of ethics!"
"Ah, whatever."
Rhinox shut his ears, attempting to assassinate those around him with frustration.
Of course, he failed.
Yesterday's ally had become today's enemy, all because he had switched sides after a few drinks.
His real reason, known only to himself, was that he found someone he liked on the enemy's side.
After crossing swords once, he had encountered someone too valuable to kill.
So, he changed sides.
The conflict was between nobles fighting over land.
However, this decision led the opposing noble to recklessly hire a famous mercenary group.
One could say that rage had slapped reason across the face.
Not to be outdone, the other noble hired a mercenary group of similar scale, and what had started as a minor skirmish among ten or so individuals escalated into a large-scale battle.
The outcome was truly disastrous.
Both nobles were ruined in the end.
One lacked the Krona to pay their mercenaries, and the other faced a rebellion from the conscripted peasants.
Had Rhinox and the mercenary group intervened and subdued the situation, it might have been resolved.
But at that point, with the battle nearly over, they saw no reason to bother and simply withdrew.
There was a reason Rhinox had earned the moniker "Destroyer."
While it was mainly due to his specialty in dismantling techniques, his actions also had a tendency to lead to complete disaster.
As such, he had also acquired the rather unflattering title of "mercenary who could always become an enemy."
For these reasons, Rhinox never made his own decisions.
He was not a pioneer.
He did not carve his own path but followed others.
Having realized that acting on his whims led to chaos, he accepted that he could never be a patriarch.
His question now reflected his life and personality.
After he finished explaining a situation, the decision was left to the patriarch.
That was Rhinox's way of thinking.
And the patriarch's verdict was: "Let's fight."
At that moment, a fierce voice erupted from the divided group.
"Are you saying my father did that?"
Kwaaaah— The pouring rain muffled part of the voice, but it was still clear enough.
The reason for the division within Yohan was simple.
Or rather, it was complicated.
One side consisted of those who had suffered at Heskal's hands.
The other side consisted of those who believed Heskal would never do such a thing.
No matter how much they were told of Heskal's deeds, those who had received his kindness refused to believe it.
As tensions between the two factions escalated, something began coalescing in the sky, forming an unnatural shape resembling a human face.
What is that now?
Enkrid, intrigued, instinctively looked up.
The rain struck his eyes, forcing him to squint as he tilted his head.
Above them, the enormous face-shaped mass spoke.
"O cursed ones, I shall take you into my embrace. Leave that place and seek the light. Those who do will live and obtain what they desire."
A spell.
And a threat.
Moreover, its presence was overwhelming.
Who wouldn't be overwhelmed?
A head larger than a training field had suddenly appeared above them, speaking.
The will carried in its voice was so strong that it sent a tingle through their skin.
Shaaak.
A crude trick was mixed in.
As everyone stared at the floating head, a dark shadow rose abruptly behind the patriarch.
All four of them reacted.
Enkrid stepped aside, the patriarch twisted his waist and swung his elbow, Rhinox extended his hand in a knife strike, and Alexandra's sword flashed in and out of its sheath faster than anyone else.
The heavy rain obscured sound and smell, dulling the senses.
It was a scaler attempting an assassination.
The creature had black scales interspersed with red ones.
Not quite a named entity, but clearly a unique specimen—a beast that had undergone either evolution or metamorphosis.
Thud!
Alexandra's sword pierced its neck, creating a gaping hole, and the patriarch followed up with an elbow strike to its head.
The creature flew through the air like a severed kite and crashed to the ground.
Thump, thud!
It tumbled a few times but then began to rise again, twitching.
Impressive tenacity.
To endure that and still stand?
Did it possess extraordinary vitality?
Rhinox finished it off.
Retrieving his extended hand, he swiftly closed the distance to the creature.
"What are you?"
Muttering those words, he unsheathed a slender blade and severed its already wounded neck entirely.
Schkk— The severed head rolled through the rain.
With terrifying speed, Rhinox's sword returned to its sheath.
"Tch."
As he sheathed his sword, Rhinox wiped his hands in the air, a gesture that revealed his current abnormal condition.
The area where Heskal had struck him had turned black—an unmistakable sign of poisoning.
"That bastard said the symptoms would worsen over the next two days. On top of that, I got scratched by a poisoned blade. That lunatic even coated his engraved weapon with venom."
Engraved weapons carried a knight's Will.
To apply poison to such a weapon?
If he had used poison from the start, it would be one thing.
But if he resorted to it simply to win, that would surely damage his Will.
And yet, he had done it.
One had to wonder what went on inside Heskal's mind.
Enkrid felt a similar curiosity.
And the answer wasn't difficult to deduce.
He stacked up everything that had happened so far in his mind, organizing the events based on what he had seen and heard.
'Schmit came from the Empire and has no ulterior motives.'
But Heskal had certainly used him, as if pressuring them to board the same ship as the Empire.
One only had to look at Schmit's expression to see it.
He looked like a man who had stepped on dung while enjoying a flower-scented picnic.
He was furious at the unexpected turn of events.
'They're using Schmit's presence to create confusion.'
A simple tactic, but easy to fall for.
Looking back, it seemed obvious, but when Enkrid had first seen it, he had also suspected imperial trickery.
'Heskal manages the traffic between three villages and acts directly.'
So it would have been easy for him to hear about Odincar and Magrun's return.
And in doing so, he would have also learned that Enkrid, Ragna, and Anne had joined them.
"Why did they target Anne?"
That wasn't Heskal's doing.
He merely played along.
"Heskal opened the way and guided the direction, but this wasn't his intention."
He had seen his swordsmanship.
The precision evident in his techniques suggested a mind adept at strategic thinking.
But such machinations weren't his style.
Which meant the real instigator had to be a mage or a sorcerer.
"He has mages and sorcerers under his command."
Or perhaps they were his allies.
"He didn't leave things to chance."
That was what Heskal had done.
Now, seeing everything in hindsight, Enkrid realized—he himself had been used.
"The patriarch was made to suspect me."
Ragna, returning after years, had abruptly demanded Sunrise.
The patriarch and his wife, aware of the current crisis, wouldn't have been able to hand it over so easily.
And then came the doubt.
Could Enkrid of Border Guard be the hidden backer aiming for Yohan?
Wasn't that a reasonable suspicion?
From an outsider's perspective, the Border Guard had seemingly appeared out of nowhere.
To those unfamiliar with them, it might have looked like Naurilia had revealed a hidden military force, much like Aspen had concealed its knights.
So Naurilia had indeed kept a dagger hidden.
It wasn't hard to see how the thought process could lead to such a conclusion.
Yohan had power.
Enough that Schmit, the imperial recruiter had personally visited to extend an offer.
Yohan had always refused the calls of those seeking its strength.
Sometimes with force, sometimes with negotiation.
But because this had happened repeatedly, those observing from the outside had grown wary of what this secretive force truly intended.
Heskal had exploited that wariness, skillfully pitting both sides against each other.
"He deliberately showed Grida traces of monsters."
So what had Heskal been doing behind the scenes?
Stalling for time.
And as a result, Yohan found itself facing the same kind of manipulation Enkrid had endured on his way here.
"It stings."
They had been completely played.
Would it have been different if Krais or Abnaier had been here?
He wasn't sure.
At least he understood Heskal's tactics now—delaying.
But his goal remained unknown, beyond speculation.
What about the patriarch?
According to Anne, the patriarch had even delayed receiving treatment.
He had outright refused a diagnosis.
His words at the time had been, "Not now."
Anne was the only one who heard that.
And she only shared it with Ragna.
Which made sense.
Ragna, guarding her, had heard it directly.
But even if he hadn't, there was no one else she could have confided in.
Anne had stirred things up, claiming she was here to cure an illness, not to lift a curse.
No one voiced their discomfort outright, but their unease was clear.
Having an outsider suddenly arrive and ask about someone's cough—
"That must have seemed like an insult to the Mileschia, their healer."
Clever.
The patriarch's "Not now" wasn't directed at himself or Ragna—it was meant for them, through Anne, using his own illness as a message.
Was he saying it wasn't time to take Sunrise yet?
Or was he asking them to wait, regardless of their reason for being here?
Realizing this now felt a little late.
But every time he recalled those words—"Not now"—new thoughts surfaced.
Which meant the patriarch's intent had, to some degree, succeeded.
One conclusion emerged from all this speculation.
"The patriarch was waiting for this too."
On the way to Yohan, Odincar had complained about the unseen enemy lurking in the shadows.
"The patriarch was the same. He wanted the enemy to reveal itself."
He had known that if left alone, things would eventually fester and explode.
So he had sought to draw the hidden foe out as quickly as possible.
"…Ah."
The patriarch had used Enkrid too.
He had recognized Enkrid's reputation as the Border Guard's commander and Ragna's skills.
He had also ensured Anne faced no obstacles as she moved about the estate.
Even if it wasn't obvious on the surface, he had done so.
"And he had Alexandra train me."
Why?
Because it was a sign—this side was an ally.
If Enkrid turned out to be an enemy, there would be no helping it.
But if his arrival here was merely a coincidence—
"Then they didn't leave coincidence as just coincidence."
The unexpected outsider was drawn in as much as possible, making sure the one holding him had the upper hand.
The patriarch had forced Heskal into the open.
Heskal, in turn, had stalled for time, waiting for his moment to strike.
The patriarch had spent years engaged in a battle of wits with an unseen foe.
"These people…"
Enkrid muttered under his breath.
Meanwhile, the face floating in the air, still smug even after sending a Scaler their way, spoke brazenly.
"You think adding two swordsmen and a little girl changes anything? Tempest Yohan?"
Then, as he saw what the patriarch did next, Enkrid involuntarily laughed.
The patriarch raised his fist toward the sky—his middle finger extended.
Across continents, cultures varied.
But everyone present understood the gesture.
It was, in essence, telling him to shut up and get lost.
Or perhaps, suggesting he take his own genitals and enjoy them.
A gesture wholly incongruous with his serious expression.
The patriarch wasn't hiding his emotions.
And now, Enkrid finally understood that.
"Grida can't recognize people for what they are, Alexandra breaks out in hives if she doesn't torment her opponent in sparring—"
"That's not entirely true."
Alexandra interjected from the side.
But wasn't this the sort of thing that an outsider noticed best?
That was objectivity.
"Magrun can't hold back his sharp tongue. And you—you don't know how to express your emotions."
The patriarch nodded at Enkrid.
The emotion he had shown toward Ragna earlier—that had been real.
His worry was real.
His joy was real.
A thunderclap, unlike anything before, split the air.
Dozens of jagged streaks of white light ripped across the sky, striking the floating face.
As lightning tore through him, all that remained in the heavens was the dark storm cloud.
Only then did Ragna finally emerge from within and ask—
"Some half-wit was targeting Anne, so I cut him down. What's going on?"
Enkrid gave a brief answer.
"We fight."
Ragna nodded.
It wasn't obvious, but there was a subtle hint of anticipation in the gesture.
If it weren't that, he would have just brushed it off as nothing important.
For some reason, he seemed frustrated, like he was holding something in.
It felt like he was on the verge of letting it all out as anger but was barely keeping it together.
In short, that bastard was itching for a fight.
Well, Enkrid could guess why he was pissed, though.
'I'm not as bad as him.'
With that thought, Enkrid felt a thrill at the idea of proving the face in the sky wrong.
'Just two swordsmen, huh?'
Where did the limits of that "just" lie?
It was worth exploring.
Of course, there was a mountain of things to do first.
But for now, the priority was stopping the groups up ahead before they tore each other apart.
***
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