WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Abstract

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

A KNIGHT WHO ETERNALLY REGRESSES

Chapter 389: [Who Stood Before the Queen]

= = =

Today always ended before sunset, but this time was different. Ragna, proof of that change, turned around.

He lowered his sword and steadied his breathing. Behind him, the squire who had looked like a reaper collapsed with a thud.

Blood welled from the severed cut. Fresh blood spread over a carpet already soaked red.

"How?"

Enkrid spoke. It was not enough to make him panic, but he was definitely surprised.

He was genuinely curious too, so he asked.

Was he asking how Ragna got here? Crang, who had been watching, wondered the same. Help had arrived at a strangely perfect moment.

In truth, this was the result of a repeated day, a twisted day, reaching its end. Crang had no way to know that.

While Ragna silently flicked blood from his sword, Enkrid asked more clearly what had shocked him.

"How did you find your way here?"

How could anyone not be shocked?

Ragna had made it all the way here alone. He could not have secretly followed behind them, so he must have come from the castle gate.

Unless the goddess of fortune had done more than kiss him and personally taken his hand to guide him, this should have been impossible.

At Enkrid's question, Ragna straightened his chest and replied.

He looked like he had come all this way for this exact moment.

"I know shortcuts."

"Luck?"

Enkrid threw out a short, loaded question.

He meant: did luck bring you here?

Ragna gave a short, loaded answer too.

"Skill."

He meant he was born with a talent for finding shortcuts.

Crang blinked.

What the hell were these bastards talking about?

He could not make sense of it at all.

This was the kind of conversation only lunatics could have.

Then again, he was in no position to judge. The important part was that they were alive.

Night had not fully fallen yet.

Before what he had prepared could even arrive, Crang realized it was over.

"I almost pissed myself."

Crang said it as he dropped to the floor.

Not the kind of thing a man aiming for the throne should say, but those words did not diminish Crang's dignity. He was that kind of person.

Why would a man's dignity fall just because he was glad to survive?

If anyone asked, that was exactly what he would say.

After his short exchange with Ragna, Enkrid roughly reset his twisted right wrist with his left hand.

Even then, his eyes stayed on Ragna.

By now, his gaze was different from when he had tossed out that joking line earlier.

Fine, finding the way was one thing.

Then what came after?

Ragna had forced back the man Enkrid could not handle and cut off his head.

Enkrid had watched the whole fight.

Anyone who saw Ragna fight, who saw his sword, would know.

He had not become a knight yet, but Ragna would become one.

That was his talent. A piece of it had just spilled out into the open. Matthew's eyes were wide, his breathing quick.

The shock ran that deep. Enkrid opened his mouth.

"Thanks."

The words were gratitude, but his tone carried something beyond thanks.

Crang's ears perked up and his head turned.

Normally, Enkrid did not show emotion easily, but now he looked like he could barely hold it in.

Crang looked at Enkrid and shouted.

"Healer! Bring a healer!"

Two of his guards were badly injured. Taking care of them was urgent too.

Whether out of professional duty or loyalty, an attendant and a maid appeared at once.

"Y-yes, Your Highness."

No one knew where they had been hiding, but somehow neither was dead or hurt.

No, that was normal.

If the dead squire's plan had worked perfectly, these two would have handled Crang's corpse.

And unless someone was a murder-mad pervert, there was no reason to kill attendants and maids for no reason.

Even after turning, the dead man had still been part of the knight order. Crang knew that too, which was why he called for help.

"Call a healer."

Crang spoke from the floor, and the attendant and maid moved. Even so, Crang's eyes never left Enkrid.

"You almost died."

Ragna spoke. Naturally, he meant Enkrid. Had he sensed the emotion in Enkrid's thanks? Was he scolding him, as if to say, is that really the look you give the man who saved you?

That seemed to be part of it.

Crang had a talent for hearing the private meaning mixed into people's words.

You could call it insight.

Even so, Enkrid's gaze did not change.

Enkrid dreamed of becoming a knight. Yet even when he set his jaw and tried to stop that man, he could not.

And he was not alone. Matthew and another spearman, both Crang's guards, had helped him, and still this was the result.

He lost. A clear defeat.

An ordinary person might have felt frustration and despair. Even if they did not, once they saw Ragna, they could not help thinking certain thoughts.

If you felt no jealousy, you were not human. Could anyone be human if envy never seized their heart?

That was what Crang believed.

Then he looked at Enkrid and thought:

That bastard is not human.

"When this heals, let's have a match."

Enkrid said it, lifting his right wrist.

What burned in those blazing eyes?

Not jealousy. Only thrill, joy, and fighting spirit.

Ragna looked at him and scolded him.

"If you barely survive death, you should know how to restrain yourself."

Not the kind of line that usually came from Ragna, but this time Enkrid had gone too far.

Enkrid knew it too, so he nodded.

"Crang?"

Enkrid called him. Crang had been thinking for a moment, about to move.

His head was already full of what came next.

Then he saw one of his own "preparations." All that wandering across the continent had not been just for running away.

This was one result.

"You're late."

A man with short brown hair said it as he approached.

Ragna looked at the man striding down the corridor and knew at a glance he was no easy opponent.

"Sir Ingis."

Crang called him. Enkrid immediately recognized where he belonged.

No one could miss it. Two swords and the Sun Beast emblem over a steel breastplate.

"I am Ingis of the knight order."

His voice sounded young. His face looked young too. At most, maybe a little over twenty. In reality, Ingis was only twenty-eight.

Looking young was a complex for him.

He was also the greatest genius in the Red Cloak Knights.

When Crang had been fleeing and wandering, he had traveled through the south as well. More precisely, he had met knights who held the line where the southern border touched the Demonic Realm.

"Sir Cyprus."

He saw a knight with a unit under his name and spoke with him. Then he watched battles in the south. There, Crang nearly lost his head four times.

Because of that, he had seen southern warfare and learned how dangerous they were.

"I will not take the throne by borrowing a knight's power."

Crang had seen the future. He had pictured what lay ahead for the royal palace. That was why he knew he could not pull in power outside the normal frame, like a knight, right now.

To claim the throne, should he carve flesh from the palace itself?

"Protect your honor. I'll do my own work."

He chose not to do that. He chose the stupid, foolish path instead. That was Crang's choice.

Was that why?

He gained one promise, and now he could see Ingis here.

This was the preparation he had made, the thing that would appear after he held out for half a day and become the solution.

"I came with eight squires."

Ingis said it, and it was true. The others were clearing things at the castle gate, and Ingis had rushed here first.

His gaze shifted to the dead squire Ragna had killed.

"Sir Pilten."

Regret colored his voice. Still, he did not blame Ragna or anyone else.

He only looked at the dead squire with briefly shadowed eyes. In the end, everything was that man's own choice. Ingis had long known Pilten envied him. Even so, this was not the outcome he had wanted.

Pilten became a traitor and chose the opposite side. Right or wrong, it was the road he chose.

So he had to bear the result himself.

Ingis also felt a little gratitude. If Pilten had lived, Ingis would have had to kill him with his own hand.

Ingis soon lifted his head and said,

"We must go to Her Majesty the Queen."

Master Cyprus had given two orders.

Ingis was told to protect Crang, yes, but also to suppress and silence any seditious threat inside the royal palace.

"I was on my way there anyway."

Crang agreed.

Did he really think the blade he prepared was only one squire from the south? If one person changed his mind, would everything end? Had he staked everything on a single decision?

Of course not.

Yet nothing else had come.

That meant trouble had broken out somewhere else.

They all moved toward one place.

They were headed for the Queen's Great Hall.

* * *

"Are you the Tax Collector?"

Jaxon arrived at the royal palace and reached his destination.

In other words, this was exactly where he had meant to come.

Jaxon had come for the one who commissioned the Assassin Alliance.

At first, he thought it was Viscount Mernes, since he had profited by using the Black Blade bandits.

After finding several pieces of evidence and acting on them, he realized there was one more person.

He had gained a lot by killing the entire Assassin Alliance.

That was the result. He learned who led the Black Blade and who the client was.

He had not uncovered everything alone.

External pressure had forced the result.

More precisely, it was because of the trickery Crang had pulled.

What Crang did was physically split the nobles into sides.

So.

"Can't say the captain had nothing to do with this."

The Black Blade got beaten senseless, and hidden faces were forced into view.

If that had not happened, no one would have pressured assassin guild groups into forming an alliance or pushed contracts through them.

No, they would not have stepped forward directly in the first place.

"Did you fail?"

The question came back as another question.

A huge man stood with a wide window behind him. Jaxon nodded.

"Not even close."

"Why?"

"Gap in skill."

"You're honest."

"I have something to ask too. Will you answer honestly?"

"I will."

He had started as a merchant, then bought his way into the nobility and became the Tax Collector, a royal official who collected taxes for the crown.

People said he had sold his soul to a devil to rise that far.

"Black Lily?"

The large Tax Collector twisted his mouth. He laughed, but his face was too crumpled to call it a smile.

"Fuck, I should've killed and burned every last one of you back then."

At those words, the image of the burning mansion rose in Jaxon's mind.

So he had come to the right place.

Jaxon raised his sword and said,

"The heir of the Bensino family has returned."

The Tax Collector never once removed his hands from beneath the desk while speaking. Now he pulled them out from under the thick, sturdy, expensive red sandalwood desk.

He held two crossbows.

Modified crossbows.

Both were already loaded with bolts and ready to fire as soon as he pulled the trigger.

"Think you can dodge these in a cramped room?"

"I stand here in the name of a man who lost his family and a child who lost his parents."

"Cut the crap and come at me."

As the final measure after everything he had prepared and set in motion with the Black Blade, it was pitifully shabby, but Jaxon did not criticize him.

He wanted only one thing.

"Please. Don't beg for forgiveness."

He meant it.

"Fuck off!"

The Tax Collector fired the bolt in his left hand. The string snapped with a twang, and a black-painted bolt flew into the darkness of sunset.

The bolt tip was coated with Ten Breaths poison. Even a graze would end it.

Jaxon did not hide in the dark to rattle him.

This was the moment to follow his heart, and he wanted the man to see him clearly to the end.

He swung his sword and knocked the bolt away.

That much was not even worth calling skill.

Crack. The bolt split and bounced off wall and floor.

In that gap, a second bolt came flying.

A staggered attack.

Jaxon pulled his sword and smashed the second bolt too.

Snap. A broken shard grazed his cheek. He did not want to dodge, so he did not.

A scratch opened on his cheek.

A sharp pain rose.

Poison.

"Got you!"

The Tax Collector shouted. His light tone did not match his build. Jaxon did not like it.

He had never wished for the target of his revenge to be some great figure.

Still, what was this?

Just a filthy man.

"Are you the one making them grand in your head? Thinking there had to be a grand reason for the men who burned your family?"

His master's words came back to him. They were right. He had seen it that way. Great men must have had great reasons.

A demon altar, the revival of an evil god, at least that level.

Or a grand noble who controlled the nation.

He had thought it had to be that way. He had raised them up in his own mind. Otherwise, there would have been no reason to go that far.

No, there was a reason. Humans could kill for petty greed.

It was a mistake. Fine. He could fix it.

Had Enkrid not shown him that?

When you take the wrong path, what do you do?

You come back.

You start over. And if it happens again? If mistakes keep piling up? That was fine too. Repeat. Start again. Keep going until it works. Enkrid had picked up a sword and dreamed of becoming a knight.

Was that dream absurd? Ridiculous? Something to laugh at?

Not at all.

Repeat, move forward, refuse to give up, build your tower, and walk your road.

That was all.

Jaxon decided he would not be disappointed just because his enemy was shabby.

"Ten Breaths?"

Instead, he told him what poison it was.

"...Was it really Georg's Dagger?"

The Tax Collector spoke. He looked flustered and tense. At the same time, he palmed another item and tossed it down.

Bang!

Smoke burst up. A smoke bomb. Jaxon felt a vibration that numbed his hearing. The smoke blocked his sight too.

Still, none of this was a problem.

He had seen through tricks like this hundreds of times.

Sixth sense, presence, shifts in the air. He felt them and found the target by sensation alone.

The man was trying to flee through the window. Jaxon strode over, grabbed the back of his neck, and threw him backward. The man swung his hand. In it was a hook-like weapon.

Jaxon seized him with his left hand as he threw him, then drew a stiletto with his right and raised it.

He blocked and knocked the attack aside, then took a few steps toward the man he had thrown back.

The man let out no scream or groan. Inside the smoke, he said what he thought he needed to say.

Of course, those words were only for himself. They meant nothing to Jaxon.

"Spare me and I'll give you wealth you couldn't dream of in a lifetime. I'll even give you treasure! I know the Black Blade's secret vault!"

"I know the secret vault of the greatest assassin guild on the continent."

A mere Black Blade vault?

The meaning in that reply made the Tax Collector sweat.

Jaxon opened the door.

Several corpses sprawled outside to greet him.

His work. The people who had tried to stop him on the way here.

Some were guards, some were assassins.

Likely the preparations the Black Blade's leader had made for him.

Not everyone died. He had no reason to harm attendants or maids who hid in a corner and did not attack.

Jaxon waited for the smoke to clear, then turned his head. In the Tax Collector's hand, he saw a dagger with a curved blade. More precisely, he saw him holding it in reverse grip and hiding it beneath his thigh.

Jaxon raised his longsword and shut down that intent with a single stab to the thigh.

Thrust.

The tip sank into the thigh.

"Aaagh!"

A scream rang out. Jaxon moved the blade as if stirring, pulled it out, then stabbed the other arm and leg. After severing the tendons in all four limbs, he took the weapon and tossed it aside, then pressed a wide cloth against the wounds and tied it to stop the bleeding.

"You crazy bastard!"

The Tax Collector shouted, voice full of rage.

"I've heard that often. It never sounds endearing."

Jaxon answered flatly, then took out a stiletto and whetstone and sharpened the edge.

He also laid out a serrated dagger, sharp like a saw blade. Beside it he placed an awl, pliers, and other tools.

Torture tools.

"What do you want? Black Lily? Should I tell you who the rest are? Or what else? What do you want to know? What, you bastard!"

Jaxon blinked a few times and answered.

"Nothing."

"...What?"

"Please, don't ask for forgiveness. The tongue is last."

Jaxon did not think his revenge was beautiful, and he did not think it was righteous either.

"So what? Who cares."

Enkrid's words came back to him.

Just because it was necessary did not mean he wanted to stab a friend in the back.

He wanted to look to the side too, not only straight ahead.

Didn't people say everyone survives by screwing someone else over?

Some people do not.

In any case, he did not care.

He would only do what his heart told him.

"If anyone asks, tell them Jaxon of the Bensino family sent you. I'll send all your friends too. One is probably already there."

"Aaaaargh!"

The Tax Collector's screams shook the mansion.

"It wasn't me! Not meee!"

The Tax Collector kept shouting that it was not him, but Jaxon did not listen.

* * *

"Should I call this long time no see?"

The Queen's Great Hall was a mess too. There had been trouble here as well.

The Queen sat on the throne. On one side stood a mage, and on the other stood Frog Ruagarne.

Below them sat several nobles.

From Enkrid's view, on the right were the Marquis of Okto and, beside him, an old man he had never seen before who resembled Marcus.

On the opposite side stood the one who had just said long time no see.

It was Count Molsen.

= = =

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