WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS
Translator: Hydrogen B
Editor: Abstract
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
A KNIGHT WHO ETERNALLY REGRESSES
Chapter 261: A Soft Strike Does Not Blunt the Blade.
= = =
“Did you enjoy the recruiting assignment? See any decent ones?”
At the question from an old friend he had not seen in a while, the Rapier Swordsman nodded.
“There was one.”
“...Really?”
He was not the kind of man who said things like that over ordinary talent.
Who was the last person his friend had called promising?
That one had shown exceptional talent even among prodigies.
Even in an Empire where geniuses gathered from everywhere, this man only acknowledged a handful.
And now he was saying this out of nowhere? Of course that would spark interest.
Had he not said he had been traveling around the continent, especially the Kingdom side?
For the man in front of him, this recruiting assignment had been a kind of vacation.
He was practically a work addict, so he had taken this on partly to rest.
That was why hearing words like this during a break was both rare and unexpected.
It was not the kind of answer you gave to a casual joke.
The two sat in a small room inside the inner keep of the Empire’s Gate Territory, furnished with only a round table and a few chairs with wool cushions.
One was the lord of the territory, and the other was a training officer returned from vacation.
The Rapier Swordsman plainly recounted what he had seen and felt.
Even though he spoke only facts in an even tone, there was heat in his eyes.
The lord thought it sounded like a quiet speech.
“So, it was talent even you could not read, and he shrugged off Pressure?”
The Rapier Swordsman relayed only facts, leaving out the part where he had stood in the rain for half a day going, “Huh?” in shock.
“He really is an interesting one.”
The commander of the Gate Territory stroked his chin and tossed back the whiskey in front of him.
It was a strong liquor called Farmer’s Tears.
The liquid announced itself as it stung his throat, then warmed his insides by the time it reached his stomach.
“About as good as a competent Frog?”
Competent Frog was Empire slang for the Frogs they employed.
In other words, a Frog who could wander the continent alone, survive, and still get the job done.
It was a question meant to set a standard for the man’s skill.
“A Frog.”
The Rapier Swordsman swirled his glass in his hand, then answered as if it was not worth thinking about.
“Not even close.”
Did he mean below Frog level? Or that Frog level was nowhere near enough? Of course it was the latter.
The lord had enough sense to catch that much.
Was awakening to Will special? Yes.
But there had been stranger things too, things that could not be conveyed by a calm list of facts.
Including the way he used a sword.
He had improved absurdly fast. Changed. Grown and evolved.
And it had happened in a single day, right before his eyes.
If someone had told him this, he would never have believed it.
It would have been easier to believe he had fallen for some spell.
A competent Frog? Maybe if it was one who only roamed the frontier.
How many exchanges would he last?
He would not stand a chance. That was how strong Enkrid was now.
The Rapier Swordsman raised his glass to the lamp.
The brown liquid inside had been made through a long process over a long time.
That was why it was called Farmer’s Tears.
It meant labor so hard it squeezed tears out of you.
Ordinary soldiers, squires, and apprentice knights needed that process.
Time, effort, tempering.
He could see that process so clearly it was almost visible. As a training officer, his eye was trained to pick such things apart.
He was recognized even among Frogs as a Talent Reader.
By that standard, he could see Enkrid had put in effort, yet it still made no sense.
Time was equal for everyone.
That was why people judged talent.
If two people lived the same day and trained, it only made sense to raise the one with superior talent.
So what was this man called Enkrid?
Something outside common sense. A man with explosive, unknowable talent.
That was his conclusion.
Unless he had gone to another world, repeated one day, trained for years, and then returned.
A short laugh escaped him.
He dismissed it as ridiculous.
It was easy to say. Repeat one day and keep training. Easy to say. If it was only words, it was truly easy.
But who could endure that?
He had seen many kinds of talent and raised many people.
No one could endure that process.
If someone did endure it?
If someone like that existed.
Empire or not, he wanted to make that person’s will bloom with his own hands.
It was talent worth coveting.
Once, in an academic paper he wrote in the Empire, he had posed a question. What is the greatest talent?
The liquor circling his glass still reflected the lamp.
He poured it down and organized his thoughts.
The greatest talent was never breaking, even at death’s door, and always facing forward no matter what happened.
To not know despair.
That was his conclusion.
Of course, without physical talent to support it, a person would only burn out and collapse.
How many had he tried to raise like that so far, one or two?
He looked at temperament and raw material, then tried to force talent into them. He had done it many times.
Every one of them had failed.
For the kind of talent he believed in to grow explosively, something mysterious had to help, whether a demon of curses or a goddess of fortune.
If that happened? If someone like that truly existed? If someone with insane willpower, someone who could endure suffering beyond common sense, whether born with it or forged later, rose above the level of knight?
That would be the birth of a monster.
As the Rapier Swordsman thought that, he let the face that had crossed his mind drift away.
Black hair and blue eyes.
An uncommon look. Not one easily forgotten.
* * *
“There is someone I need to find.”
That was Enkrid’s answer to the Elf Company Commander. Beside him, Gielpin was dripping sweat as he stared at Enkrid.
Still, Gielpin had enough sense not to butt in immediately. He only glanced between Enkrid and the Elf Company Commander.
“I see.”
The Elf Company Commander nodded and held her ground.
She looked ready to follow him anywhere.
Should he refuse? There was no need. So he let it be.
Enkrid turned to Gielpin.
The man wore a fur coif, and sweat streamed down his face.
He had clearly run hard to get here. His face was flushed, and the chest of his thick fur coat heaved.
“Please, help us.”
As Gielpin spoke, Enkrid suddenly remembered the name of the Frog who had come looking for him at Border Guard.
He had not forgotten that name. The man had said he would come back, and he was the type to keep his word.
Was that not what made them Frogs, keeping what they said with their own mouths?
“Maelrun?”
The thought slipped out before it even passed through his head.
Gielpin’s eyes went wide. His pupils expanded. He looked genuinely shocked.
“...How did you know? The guild leader got taken. Again.”
He sounded like he was stressing that word, again.
Officially, the Gielpin Guild’s leader was the bald man in the coif standing here, but all of them treated Kraiss as their real superior.
The Gielpin Guild had started as a criminal guild formed by illiterate street thugs.
Its color had changed a little now, but roots like that did not vanish.
To them, the one above them was the guild leader. That meant Kraiss was the guild leader.
And above that guild leader stood Enkrid.
“If it gets dangerous, run and call him right away. Captain Enkrid. Do not forget that name. If you see him in the market, lower your eyes and move on. If you spot that gray-haired barbarian beside him, just run. If your eyes meet, run.”
Kraiss had repeated it so often that every member of the Gielpin Guild knew Enkrid’s name and face.
Naturally, they knew Rem and the others too.
He had hammered in, again and again, that they were never to attack by mistake.
And Gielpin had seen Enkrid fight.
The moment trouble broke out, coming here was the obvious move.
“Let’s go.”
Enkrid spoke and started walking immediately.
Putting on armor and carrying weapons at all times was part of training.
That was advice he had heard when he first worked as a mercenary.
Enkrid had followed it.
He had been clumsy with weapons, so he obeyed that advice faithfully.
That habit had not changed.
He had wraps of magic-beast hide inner armor around his body, the demon sword Tutor at his left waist, and the gladius the dwarf gave him at his right.
He also carried five throwing knives in the knife sheath strapped across his chest.
He had not been able to get a Whistle Dagger, so that dedicated sheath remained in the lodging.
If he added a gambeson, chain armor, and a helmet, he would be fully armed.
Going out like this was fine.
“Uh, are you heading out?”
A soldier guarding the barracks asked. Enkrid kept walking at an unhurried pace and answered.
“Just taking a short walk.”
“Me too.”
The Elf Company Commander moved in beside him. Without a hint of a smile, she added an elf-style joke.
“Do you not know that affection is built by spending time together?”
“Is that so?”
“A woman filling bathwater told me. I thought it was excellent advice. So I think we should spend time together.”
A joke at a time like this.
Enkrid answered casually.
“If you mean we should train together, sure.”
If she were an ordinary woman, she would have kicked him in the shin.
Spend time together, and he says train? Not eat something nice and whisper love while watching the sunset?
But Sinar was not an ordinary woman, and she was not even human.
The elf spoke as she walked.
“That is not bad either, but how about looking around the market? A lot of interesting things have come into Border Guard’s market lately. Along with a lot of problems.”
He had not been away for months, only around one month at most.
How many problems could have happened in that time?
Thinking that, Enkrid and the elf kept walking, while Gielpin followed behind, wondering what pointless nonsense the two of them were talking about.
What about the Frog right now?
Even while thinking that, he had to half run to keep up, because their pace was so fast.
They looked like they were just walking, so why were they this fast?
As Gielpin hurried after them:
“You said a Frog came, right?”
Enkrid asked.
“Huff, yes, that same bastard. Huff, huff. The one with the white scar on his neck, right here.”
Gielpin answered between breaths, then raised his hand and touched the right side of his own neck.
The one who had come to collect from the Gielpin Guild before.
Enkrid still remembered his name.
Back then, all they could do was drive him off.
No, even that had barely been possible.
What about now?
“There he is!”
In a way, it was almost funny.
The exact same place, the exact same situation as before.
Should he call captured Kraiss an idiot?
He could tell by instinct.
They entered the mansion, passed through the corridor, and faced the door blocking the way ahead.
Had they learned from last time’s fight?
The door stood wide open.
Last time, he had kicked this door in and thrown a Whistle Dagger first.
Leaving that overlapping memory behind, Enkrid raised his left hand, showed his palm, and spoke.
“Been well?”
A greeting.
Kraiss was off to the side, and deeper in the hall, a Frog sat in a chair.
“Fuck, are we friends? You happy to see me after so long?”
Maelrun returned the greeting. He did not sound nearly as pleased as Enkrid.
Enkrid, meanwhile, was excited because he could now clearly show this man the gap between them.
And he saw no reason to drag it out.
He asked if he had been well, and in the instant the other man opened his mouth, Enkrid had already shot forward. The heavy thud of his step cracked against the ground a beat later.
Even with Enkrid charging at terrifying speed, Maelrun did not panic.
That bastard was a fighter skilled at creating irregular moves and variables.
He had already experienced that.
Before his line was even finished, Maelrun drew his Loop Sword.
Hooking a finger through the ring, he slammed down the thick blade.
A strike driven by Frog brute strength.
Enkrid drew his own sword. The blade flashed out from his left hip and rose. Then the silver Loop Sword met Enkrid’s blade.
Krrrraaaang!
A strange metallic shriek followed.
Maelrun planned to crush down with force, close in, and smash his skull with a fist.
But he did not get his way.
The sword he brought down slid off to the side, as if someone had yanked it away.
“Fuck?”
The curse escaped on its own, and then a sword tip that moved like a snake came for his face.
A blue-steel blade entered the competent Frog’s sight. More precisely, it struck his eye and tore past it.
“Gaaah!”
The Frog screamed.
Enkrid watched him roll backward after taking a blade to the eye, then flicked his sword through the air.
Drops of Frog blood splattered across the floor.
With a single move, the gap between them was made unmistakably clear.
More importantly, it was the first time he had used his new swordsmanship in real combat.
It works.
Rapture and joy surged together.
Enkrid raised his sword again.
When he created the Flowing Sword Style, one thought had guided him.
A soft strike does not blunt the blade.
And that became the first technique of the Flowing Sword Style he created.
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