WeTried Translations x Flame Comics

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

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Chapter 109: 16. The Person Who Travels Abroad to a Conflict Zone During Vacation (1)

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There was something a great many people, truly, a great many people, misunderstood.

Ivan was not a racist. It was a rather unfair accusation. He had come from a world where discriminating against people based on skin color or personal traits was illegal to begin with.

The people of this uncivilized world probably could not even imagine such laws existing, but that was civilization.

Therefore, Ivan did not hate other races over their traits, peculiarities, or differences from humanity. That was behavior far too crude for a civilized person.

As Earth's representative, he had to act rationally at all times. Therefore, he judged other races for rational reasons.

For example.

Demonfolk such as orcs, giants, and tauros were closer to monster beasts than people. Did the ability to speak and having their own cultures make them people? No. Parrots could speak, and sperm whales engaged in cultural activities too.

People needed morality. Even in this terrible, barbaric world, that was one thing Ivan firmly believed. So demonfolk could be set aside.

Naturally, elves were another representative nonhuman race.

Ivan was confident he would not waste even a second defining elves. There was no room for deliberation. They were not people, because they lacked morality.

Elves and morality were words that struggled to coexist. Water and oil would at least mix if shaken, but Ivan had never seen morality blend into an elf, even briefly, after shaking one.

Still, elves tried in their own way to make up for their tragic nature. They had fought alongside the Allied Kingdoms during the war. They had risked their lives, so there was room for leniency. Sadly, no sign of improvement had yet been observed.

Finally.

Dwarves.

These half-sized moles, short, burrowing, bearded, and prone to squeaking, actually had something in common with Ivan. They had no prejudice when dealing with other races. The beards did not count.

Their utter lack of prejudice had led to the minor problem of siding with the demonfolk. Combined with their enthusiastic espionage efforts to spread a strange ideology called Averagism, and the geographical issue of their operating range being adjacent to the Northern Front, Ivan had made many memories with them during the war.

Therefore, he had never imagined he might ever do anything alongside dwarves in his lifetime. Other than killing each other, at least.

There was too much bad blood between them. How many dwarves had died by his hand? And how many humans had dwarves killed? It was ridiculous to even count the grudges, and just as ridiculous to argue over who had started it. That was war.

Therefore.

“Comrade Secretary said this! Averagism does not mean the future state we must achieve! We call Averagism the real movement that abolishes the current state of things, all of it!”

-Waaaaaah!!

The moles gathered in the banquet hall raised horn cups as large as their heads and howled.

Ivan felt like sighing.

Then an enormous bowl was placed before him. It was filled with frothing beer sloshing at the brim. Surprisingly, dwarves called this a drinking cup.

“Drink up, comrade!!”

The dwarf smiled, their tiny eyes gleaming with goodwill. Ivan got goosebumps for a moment, because the words dwarf, smile, and goodwill felt so unfamiliar together.

There probably was not any poison in it. They might put poison in something else, but these were the kind of people who could not even imagine poisoning beer.

Ivan felt lonely among the dwarves, who talked noisily, suddenly shouted quotations from Comrade Secretary, and occasionally sang a bizarre song called “Long Live Comrade Secretary.”

The road of civilization and reason was long and arduous.

To understand this situation, one had to return to just after the training retreat.

Back when the word peace had not yet become a joke. Ivan had already begun missing Pritchenkaya after only a few days.

EP16. The Person Who Travels Abroad to a Conflict Zone During Vacation.

“Nice.”

Ivan sat leisurely in the newly opened director's office, grooming his beard.

The orphanage where Droan siege tanks had carried out their terrorist attack had been rebuilt larger and grander with support from the Saintess and Elizaveta.

It even had a chapel inside now. There was no resident priest, so prayers were held only on Sundays, but it was still a remarkable achievement. The children were always covered in little injuries.

Being able to receive a priest's healing sacrament for free would make an enormous contribution to the orphanage's finances.

-Gulp.

Sipping fragrant tea brewed from roasted barley, Ivan enjoyed the peace that had finally returned.

He could not carry this perfect beard comb around for fear that it might develop some functional problem, so he had been unable to enjoy this precious time for quite a while.

It was a small but fulfilling pleasure, largely because he had no assigned mission at the moment.

The academy was on break, the spies from each nation's potential allies had all returned home, and the children of the Hero Party, the primary subjects of his protection detail, were all hospitalized at Pritchenkaya Cathedral.

The Saintess was personally caring for them, so there would be no trouble. They were safely shut away and quietly receiving treatment, which meant there was no need to guard them.

In other words, it was vacation for Ivan too. It had not been his intention, but the students who would sadly spend their entire break bedridden had made it possible. He had heard Isabelle had been warned by the Saintess for grinding her teeth too much.

-Bang!!

“Hm.”

So even when the door flew open as though it were about to explode, Ivan could carefully put down his beard comb instead of throwing an axe. This was why people needed to live with a little spare time.

“Enrika. You don't knock with your feet.”

“Yes, Director. Got a minute?”

“No.”

“What are you doing right now?”

“Vacation. I'm off duty.”

Enrika burst into laughter, then dropped onto the sofa in the director's office and whistled.

“Wow, a lot has changed. You even have a bed now! Right, people should sleep in beds.”

“Don't you sleep in coffins?”

“Huh?”

“Hm?”

Did vampires not usually sleep in coffins?

Come to think of it, Ivan did not remember her carrying a coffin around during the war.

He was witnessing the destruction of his common sense.

“I really want to hit you. Disciple, stop talking nonsense and pack your bags.”

“Bags.”

“Yes, we're going to work.”

“That won't be possible.”

This country did not have a concept of vacation. Even the Church would not conceive of a level of welfare like guaranteeing workers leisure time for sustainable labor.

Therefore, like all exploited workers, Ivan had to win his rights with his own hands.

“I told you I was off duty today.”

“This is absurd. Since when did we have on-duty and off-duty shifts? Aren't you the commander of the Counterintelligence Command now?”

“A superior must rest for subordinates to rest too.”

“Oh.”

Enrika nodded with an impressed look, then quickly came to her senses.

“I almost let you persuade me!! I told you, it's urgent! Disciple, do you remember how long it's been since you've seen me?”

“Eighty-seven days.”

“…You remember that.... Aren't you curious where I went?”

“Hm.”

That was not within Ivan's scope of work. He was a civil servant now, and civil servants were professionals uninterested in every field outside their own. Some Krasilov civil servants were even uninterested in their own duties.

Enrika clutched her forehead and sank onto the sofa. Without paying any attention to Ivan's expression, she put her legs on the table, then crossed them.

“There's a huge mess up north.”

“I see.”

“I mean the dwarves are in a huge mess.”

“Hm.”

Ivan continued combing his beard without even looking at her. One could not forcefully yank through tangled beard hair. He had to slowly work through it between the comb's teeth, using a flick of the wrist to smooth the strands. Otherwise, the hair would snap while tangled.

Enrika shouted.

“No, just listen!”

“I am listening.”

“Aren't you curious about what suddenly happened to the dwarves, why I know about it, and where I've been all this time?”

“I can guess.”

Without looking away, Ivan continued.

“The terrorist attack beneath Pritchenkaya was the disturbance caused by the dwarves' Earthweb Excavator. I know you left to personally intercept their underground invasion.”

“Uh... yeah. Right.”

“If dwarves dug tunnels underground, both you and I knew we had to trace that route back. We would need to identify and cut off their invasion route.”

“…Right.”

“You encountered dwarves along the way, fought them, and found out why they suddenly came as far as Pritchenkaya in the first place.”

“…That's right.”

Ivan set down his beard comb and looked at Enrika.

“Then it's the military's business.”

“...”

“Enrika. We cannot manage every conflict.”

That was even more true for the Hero Party. They had to be able to distinguish military affairs from their missions.

Heroes did not participate in war. War was the army's role. No matter how powerful someone was, they could not be deployed to every front.

A Hero's true value lay in not revealing themselves. The mere fact that someone capable of killing the Seven Dragon Generals was lurking somewhere along the front lines had been a powerful deterrent.

Even if the front collapsed, even if countless people were slaughtered, the Hero would never appear to save them. Instead, the Hero Party infiltrated enemy territory to assassinate the Seven Dragon Generals and the Demon King.

Strictly speaking, Heroes were not humanity's protectors. If their role had to be classified, they were closer to humanity's avengers, its agents of vengeance.

It was the same now that the war was over. The Hero Party's seclusion greatly contributed to peace in the Allied Kingdoms. The fact that people capable of assassinating even the Demon King had scattered to live in each nation was enough to terrify the ambitious.

“I know. I know. But disciple, this is more serious than you think.”

Enrika gave Ivan a bitter smile.

“They weren't preparing a terrorist attack. The dwarves were preparing for war. Military factories were operating throughout the entire mountain range.”

Meeting Ivan's eyes directly, Enrika spoke slowly.

“Not against us, not against humanity. They were preparing for a civil war. You remember Aviditas, right?”

“...”

Ivan's gaze darkened. Aviditas, Lord of the Evil Dragons. Why would that ghost, long dead, come up now...?

“That mad lich was completely annihilated, but Aviditas's apostles are still alive. They've been around ever since Aviditas's floating island crashed. They split the dwarves in two and kidnapped the Chief Secretary's son.”

“...”

“If they win the civil war, the flames of war will spread to the Northern Front. They want to destroy this country, without fail.”

What Aviditas's apostles wanted was probably revenge. Punishment for the blasphemers who had killed their god.

Their holy war would surely turn toward Krasilov. The dwarven civil war was only the beginning.

Enrika had spent all her time contacting the dwarves opposed to the war and assessing the situation.

“Krasilov no longer has the strength to wage war. Little Ivan, please.”

She looked toward the most reliable and capable expert when it came to dealing with dwarves and necromancers.

Enrika straightened up, her eyes serious.

“Let's save this country. Let's go finish what we couldn't finish in the last war.”

Ivan looked quietly into Enrika's eyes, then sighed. He carefully placed the beard comb in his desk drawer and clicked its complicated lock shut.

“This vacation will be a long one.”

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Footnotes:

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