Chapter 20
- Guests (3)
Everyone has their days of immaturity, and there are times when one suffers the consequences of youthful indiscretion.
Polo was no different.
He, too, had a past that was shameful, humiliating, and terrifying to recall.
It happened five years ago.
It was a time of transition, when the stalemate of the war had solidified and the continent’s “Six Strongest” had expanded to seven. Regardless of those external affairs, it was a time when Polo knew the small world of the Imperial Capital as the entirety of existence.
He had been at a banquet hall.
“Young Lord Notem!”
“Ah, Young Lord Bold! Good to see you again this year.”
“It is a banquet that happens but once a year. If not now, when else could we play to our hearts’ content?”
“That is true indeed!”
In the Empire, there existed a secret and exclusive circle that only the children of high-ranking nobility—Count or higher—could attend.
Once a year, at the start of the new year, young lords and ladies would gather to socialize and engage in secret trysts… Looking back, it was a rather debauched gathering.
Of course, not everyone played so dissolutely.
There were outliers, like the “Graham’s Talent” or the “Imperial Family’s Reverse Scale.”
But Polo was different from them, and because he believed he was right at the time, he had been frantically searching for a lady to spend the night with that day as well.
It was on such a day that he met the Sword Demon, Kasha.
“He has arrived. Graham’s Talent.”
“Who is the man beside him? Does anyone know him?”
“I inquired, and they say he is a guest brought by Young Lord Graham out of personal friendship. I heard he is a foreigner.”
Elbus Graham.
A hero who went to the battlefield and achieved military merit before even reaching adulthood, and a half-cripple who traveled in a wheelchair due to an indelible wound sustained in that war.
That man, more famous by his nickname “Graham’s Talent” and whose very purpose for attending banquets was quite mysterious, had brought a guest.
“He looks unpleasant.”
Beside him in the wheelchair stood a handsome man with a clean-cut appearance.
His aura was unique. Even though he had a friendly face, his cold expression and the muscles bulging beneath his clothes gave the impression of a knight standing on a battlefield. That was the only way to describe him.
At the time, Polo had assessed him thusly:
“He is a fellow who hasn’t escaped puberty. I know his type. The immature sort who thinks they are the only ones suffering in the world and believes that acting like that is cool. Look at the way he’s trying to set the mood. Doesn’t he look intoxicated by his own image?”
“Kuhuhu! Young Lord Notem, you are being too harsh.”
“What of it? It is the truth.”
“That is so.”
Thinking back, it might have been jealousy.
It might also have been wariness.
Was it not simply that he disliked the stranger who, from the moment he appeared, stole the attention of every lady Polo had set his sights on?
Polo wasn’t the only one.
The other young lords who wanted to befriend Elbus Graham, as well as those who had lost the interest of the ladies, all viewed him with suspicion.
To young men in their prime, driven by lust, an invasive species disrupting their ecosystem was a significant threat.
Amidst the atmosphere of sharp tension, only that man and Elbus Graham remained relaxed.
In that relaxed state, the ladies eventually began to form a circular wall around the two men.
It was at that moment.
“…Look here. Young Lord Notem, I have brought some surprising news.”
The second son of Count Bold’s family, who was with him that day, spoke up.
“That man is said to be a mercenary. Someone Young Lord Graham befriended while he was on the battlefield.”
“…He is not a noble?”
“I heard he is stateless.”
“Heh…!”
The jealousy of a young man had a one-dimensional and aggressive side.
That was Polo that day.
Had the weakness of the stranger, who seemed unreachable by any means, not been revealed?
His young heart was seized by greed upon seeing that exposed flaw.
He wanted to drag out that man’s defect and bring him to his knees. He wanted to prove his superiority.
And thereby, claim his rightful reward.
He acted quickly.
Polo led his group and approached the man buried among the ladies.
“A face I haven’t seen before!”
With a bright smile, he spread his arms, feigning goodwill.
“Oh, Young Lord Notem, a pleasure.”
“I greet the blood of Graham. May I be introduced to the gentleman beside you?”
“Umm…”
Seeing Elbus Graham’s troubled smile, Polo felt his confidence surge.
At the time, he took it for intimidation, but looking back now, he realized the trouble was Elbus worrying about Kasha’s fiery temper.
How could he have known?
He was too busy biting down, judging the hesitation as a sign that a weakness had been caught.
“What house do you hail from?”
“…None.”
“Hm? None what?”
“I have no house. I am merely a mercenary who roams the battlefields.”
The man’s mood seemed foul as he answered.
Polo felt a thrill of pleasure.
“Heh… Someone attending this banquet has no house? This is truly…”
The young lords in the group stepped forward as if in agreement, and their support made Polo feel emboldened.
Perhaps that was why he made the slip of the tongue.
“Everyone, calm down. He might not have parents. Did he not say he is a mercenary? Ah, or perhaps…”
He should not have said those words.
“…Perhaps he ran away from pathetic parents and became an orphan by choice.”
He didn’t remember well what happened afterward.
Rather, it was closer to not wanting to remember.
There was only one thing Polo recalled vividly.
Craaaack!
The sound of wood splitting vertically echoed, and a pain erupted as if his entire head was being torn off from his neck.
“Kyaaaaaak!”
The ladies’ screams rang out.
He could hear the other young lords hiccuping in shock.
Meanwhile, Polo was the only one dazed.
“Guh, guhaa…!”
Not even knowing when he had collapsed to the floor, he flailed his arms, but they touched nothing.
He only realized he had been slapped after the banquet was over.
It was inevitable; it wasn’t a normal occurrence for a slap with a palm to make a ‘crack!’ sound like splitting wood, after all.
At any rate, there was a sentence that still lingered in Polo’s mind.
“You certainly have a loose tongue. A shame. If we had met on a battlefield, I would have twisted your neck off.”
Even in that delirious state, the man’s voice was clear.
That chilling, sticky voice remained vivid in his mind even now, five years later.
It was a week later when he learned the man’s name was Kasha, and that he was the monster whose name had newly been added to the continent’s strongest.
The fact that he didn’t leave his room for a month, fearing the man would come find him in secret to finish him off, was another story entirely.
In conclusion, Polo had lived his life trying to forget that day.
Because his voice was so terrifying, and because he thought he would never meet him again.
However, he could not easily escape his influence.
That was the reason why he, born as the child of a military family, began working as a supply officer.
‘And I thought it was all over…!’
Finishing his recollection, Polo trembled and glanced at the back of Kasha—Elric Portman—who was sitting in the front seat of the carriage.
Once he became an officer, he could withdraw from the front lines.
Then, he thought he would never have to meet that man, who had spent his life on the battlefield, ever again.
But what was this?
Why did he appear as the returned, immature young master of such a humble rural barony!
“Ugh, the smell of fertilizer.”
“It’s the countryside, so it can’t be helped, can it?”
‘These crazy bastards!’
The supply officers from Armin and Disha were venting their arrogant complaints, not knowing their place.
Polo felt goosebumps erupt along his spine.
A sudden thought occurred to him: he had to stop them.
The fact that they were soldiers from enemy nations or competitors in today’s trade did not cross his mind at this moment.
One might call it a sense of humanity.
Polo was on the verge of reaching a heroic conclusion that he must pull them out of that terrible monster’s maw.
Of course,
“Haha…”
The moment his laughter echoed, Polo’s heart snapped.
Polo’s head dropped.
Cold sweat was pouring down his body like rain.
“Lord Polo, are you alright?”
When the Armin supply officer asked, Polo nodded his head frantically.
“I-I-I’m fine!”
He had to be fine.
Since the man hadn’t acknowledged him yet, was there not still a possibility that he hadn’t recognized him?
Please, let it be so.
‘Please…’
Polo prayed to the heavens.
But that was how the world worked.
If all wishes were granted by praying to the heavens, why would there be wars and conflicts on this earth?
Elric knew him.
And he remembered him quite vividly.
The one saving grace was that he was not in the same sharp-edged state he had been five years ago.
To be precise, it was quite the opposite.
‘Damn God, why are you doing this to me?’
Sitting in the front seat of the carriage and looking at the scenery, Elric felt his heart pounding madly.
The heavens were truly heartless; of all the people on the continent, how could they cruelly pick his enemy and send him here?
A sense of crisis and urgency took root within him.
What if he revealed Elric’s identity? What if he returned to the capital and reported the movements of the Sword Demon Kasha?
Such thoughts would not leave him.
Elric squeezed his eyes shut and thought.
‘…Where did I put my sword?’
Now that things had come to this, the only answer was intimidation.
And if that didn’t work, well…
‘…I’ll have to destroy the evidence.’
It felt like it had been a long time since he had buried a person.
Elric’s hands tightened with force.
