WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Ode of the Brave ◈

Chapter 25

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Unlike other places, the forest had its own distinct freshness in the air. The scents of trees, soil, moss, grass, and tiny unseen things mingled together, bringing a sense of peace.

The breath of old trees and young trees alike seemed to cleanse one’s lungs.

The forest was a place where life could be felt, a place that lived and breathed in itself.

That feeling was especially strong at dawn. It was like having one’s muddled mind and soul washed clean.

But amid that pleasant air, a strange, fishy smell brushed against the tip of the nose.

The smell of blood.

Bodies lay scattered along the winding forest path. A group of people wandered among them.

A man with rough stubble covering his lower face and short brown hair hanging to his chin stared down at the corpses.

The many sword and spear wounds made it obvious that a fight had taken place. At first glance, it was hard to notice, but every corpse had its eyes closed.

As though someone had paid their respects.

“Clan Master. Over here.”

Someone called to the short-haired man from off the forest path.

The man’s name was Lorenz, the clan master of the Rubens Clan.

A clan master was someone who managed several clans within a guild. Guild master, advisory council, clan master, clan leader, then adventurers. Most Adventurer Guilds had an organizational structure like that.

A clan master’s personal combat ability mattered, but it was also a position that required a high degree of expertise.

Adventurers were free-spirited people who often took disobedience for granted, so managing them was no easy task. It required a delicate touch. Too strict was no good, but neither was being too lax.

Leading operations involving several clans also required complex and varied knowledge, along with extensive field experience.

At the call, Lorenz walked over, his footsteps crunching against the ground.

Not far away lay a corpse in a grotesque position. It was kneeling, its upper body bent backward, and above all, it had no head.

It looked terribly uncomfortable. Though perhaps that no longer mattered now that the person was dead.

Still, Lorenz could guess how the person had died.

The head had been cut off while the person was standing. That was Lorenz’s conclusion.

Judging by the cut, the neck had not been sawed through several times. It seemed to have been severed in one stroke. Unless someone deliberately stretched out their neck like an execution victim, cutting off the head of a standing person in one strike was no easy feat.

Above all, there were no other wounds.

It had ended in a single blow.

The severed head lay nearby. Lorenz nudged it with his foot to see the face, then muttered under his breath.

“This is absurd...”

His expression did not change much, but Lorenz truly found it absurd.

The beheaded person had been one of the guild’s prized talents.

There were several stages before one reached Sword Master. The classifications differed by guild, but the Rubens Guild divided them into the petal stage and the blooming stage.

At the petal stage, striking the blade against something caused petal-like forms of mana to ripple over it. At the blooming stage, swinging a sword left afterimages of mana along its path. Finally, upon becoming a Sword Master, light shone from the blade.

No one knew the exact way to become a Sword Master. Training Mana Drive alone would not do it, nor would practicing swordsmanship alone.

What every guild agreed on was that real combat experience was necessary.

They believed that killing someone, or entering a battle where one’s life was at stake, could make one’s mindset or mental process into a kind of ignition point.

The headless person before Lorenz had reached the petal stage. Such a talent emerged from the Rubens Academy only once every few years.

It was absurd that such a person had died, and as clan master, Lorenz could hardly escape responsibility.

Neither those at the petal stage nor Sword Masters became immortal. They too were humans of flesh and bone. They could fall to their deaths while climbing a mountain, be struck by an arrow, or die from poison.

Still, they did not die easily.

Especially not in a sword fight.

Yet this one had died.

Why? How?

Who could kill a swordsman who had reached the petal stage?

“Did they catch on...? Strange... That can’t be possible...”

Lorenz muttered as he took his foot off the head.

He could not understand it.

The key to this operation had been killing the Beringen Guild’s adventurers, and that had already been accomplished by raiding their hideout.

During the raid, they learned that Academy students were coming to assist. To gain some additional results, they had ordered people to lie in wait along the road and launch an ambush.

It was something they could have done or left undone.

But in the end, wiping out a rival guild was the only way their own guild could survive and draw closer to power. If they could do it, they should.

But now one of the guild’s prized talents was dead.

Was that a loss, or a gain?

Lorenz weighed the costs and benefits in his head.

Twelve active adventurers, or one promising talent with the potential to become a Sword Master.

Which was worth more?

The difference was not enormous, but no matter how he considered it, it leaned toward a loss.

Then he had to make up for that loss.

How?

Lorenz stroked his beard, deep in thought.

If an Academy student had killed a promising talent, perhaps that student had reached a similar level. Then killing that student would make up for the loss.

They had to kill them.

This was no longer a fight to gain some additional results. If they had suffered a major loss, the other side had to suffer one as well.

Having reached a tentative conclusion, Lorenz looked to the side. Six or seven young people stood there as if they had committed a crime.

“What did they look like?”

“Th-they were short, wearing a red cloak. They looked young, too, and used a large sword that didn’t fit their body. It was a longsword with leather wrapped around the ricasso.”

“If they were young, they weren’t active adventurers?”

“Yes... They definitely seemed to be a student... That’s what we thought, too...”

Lorenz was sure of it.

There was someone at the Beringen Guild Academy who had reached the petal stage, or perhaps even higher.

He had to kill that bastard.

Once the target was clear, everything Lorenz needed to do came to him automatically.

“Search the area and block their escape routes. Don’t let even one of them get away. If word reaches Beringen, the whole operation is called off. Then you can forget about getting any reward. I’m fucked, and you’re fucked too. Understand?”

The original purpose of undertaking this operation was to inflict one-sided damage on the Beringen Guild through a surprise attack.

But if the Beringen Guild caught on, even belatedly, and deployed its full force, both sides would suffer losses. At that point, carrying out the operation would have been meaningless.

However, Ricart had already expected that order.

The enemies might block the roads to Beringen, but they would not linger around the hideout they had already visited or around Griffinswald.

Conversely, Lorenz had not expected that mere Academy students would choose to continue the request instead of running away.

Griffinswald meant the forest where griffins lived.

But griffins, creatures close to sacred beasts, were so difficult to find that the village’s name felt rather undeserved. Perhaps there had been many of them in the past.

For defense, the village had been built atop a somewhat steep hill, the surrounding terrain cut away. A sturdy wooden palisade encircled the hill.

A single temple devoted to a god stood at its center, while everything else was a hut. The population was not large, and most people made their living gathering herbs, hunting, and foraging.

It was a difficult place for a large population to survive, but decent enough for a small one.

Much like Stormhertz.

It was not certain, but there was one theory about this village that was probably true.

An imperial ranger had stayed and worked here, married an elf, and settled down. Their descendants had then made this place their home.

They no longer had any connection to the imperial family.

Still, most of the village men were rangers. It was best not to act carelessly here, unless one wanted an arrow lodged between one’s eyebrows without even realizing it.

Outsiders rarely came through the village, yet nine outsiders wandered through it now. They all wore cloaks, but weapons were clearly visible at their waists.

And one of them wore a bright red cloak and carried a sword over one shoulder, standing out even from a distance like an obvious target.

The villagers simply watched the group. Children looked on with curious, shining eyes.

From the watchtower, a man stood guard and quietly looked down at Ricart’s group.

A bow rested in his hands.

As Ricart looked around, one house caught his eye. In its yard, unfinished crossbows had been hung up as though they were laundry left out to dry. The owner appeared to be a bowyer.

Crossbows were famous as a local specialty here.

An old man was shaving wood with a plane.

Ricart approached him and spoke.

“May I ask you something?”

“...”

The old man stopped planing, raised his head, and stared at Ricart and his companions.

One might have expected fear at the sight of armed people, but there was not the slightest sign of it.

“My name is Ricky. I am a student at the Beringen Guild Academy. Do you happen to know the Beringen Adventurer Guild? There should have been a hideout nearby, and adventurers who mainly operated in this area.”

“...I heard those idiots died.”

“We know that as well. But I was wondering if you happened to know who killed them.”

“Adventurers are fighting each other with swords, and you want me to get involved? If I tell you, I’ll be helping you. Then the people on the other side will hold a grudge against us.”

“Hmm. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Then have you heard anything about deserters?”

The old man looked at the boy who had readily admitted his mistake, then said,

“...Wouldn’t you have to go to a city for that? Fugitives blend into cities. They don’t stay in places like this.”

“I see. Then what is the nearest city?”

“Thorweil. A day south of here. If you leave now, you should be out of the forest by sunset.”

“Understood. But could we possibly get some herbs or food? I will tell the guild to pay the cost later.”

In their frantic escape, several students had lost their luggage. They had been sharing what remained, so they were short on food.

They also needed supplies here, but they had no money.

Ricart had spent all his money before coming. The other students had lost even the little they had.

The old man frowned slightly.

“What reason do I have to trust you with food?”

“Your instinct, sir.”

“What?”

“Look into my eyes and decide whether I am trustworthy.”

Perhaps finding it absurd, the old man’s frown eased, and he let out a hollow laugh. He looked quietly at Ricart, then called into the house.

“Lester! Lester!”

“Yes, Grandpa!”

There was a sound of hurried movement from inside the hut, and a sturdy young man soon emerged.

The old man spoke to him.

“There were a few chunks left from that deer we caught last winter and salted, weren’t there? Give all of it to these people. And bring them a few sprigs of herbs.”

“Yes, Grandpa.”

The young man did exactly as he was told without a word of complaint. He went inside the hut, then came back out carrying salted meat and several bundles of herbs used to treat external wounds.

Ricart accepted them, handed them to the students, and spoke to the old man again.

“I will not forget this kindness.”

“It isn’t free, so there is no kindness to remember. I have work to do, so be on your way if you are finished.”

Ricart bowed deeply to the old man and turned away.

Then he left the village and headed south.

“Weren’t you being a little too humble? He’s just some old man in a backwater village.”

Volka asked.

“When you’re somewhere unfamiliar, getting help from the locals is best. But if you can’t, you must not make enemies of them. Locals are even scarier than enemies. Someone once said that if they could receive help from the locals, they would even kneel before a commoner. The person who said it was royalty.”

It was something Caldebert had said.

His only close friend from his previous life, and now his ancestor.

Caldebert the Breaker.

Caldebert had originally been a member of the Adelorne royal family. After earning merit in Fernland, he established a branch family. That family was now Ricart’s.

“Liar.”

“It’s true. Once you’ve suffered at the edge of death on a battlefield, you change a lot. Those who don’t usually die.”

“...But how do you know that?”

“Let’s say I heard it from my father.”

Volka furrowed his brow slightly, as though something did not seem right.

“The villagers didn’t look that strong.”

“Either way, we got meat, and we know where to go. Let’s move. There might be a guild branch in Thorweil.”

“Yeah, well, that’s true.”

Volka readily nodded.

And so, instead of returning to their Academy, the nine students headed toward a new city.

Meanwhile, Lorenz searched the forest and blocked every escape route, yet could not find Ricart’s group.

So he returned to the hideout they had raided.

The darkest place was beneath the lamp. There, he found traces of the students.

Lorenz was once again dumbfounded.

As far as he was concerned, those clueless students had lost all sense of fear and come back here.

In any case, believing the Beringen Academy students had stopped by the village, he entered it with roughly thirty adventurers and students.

It had been one day since Ricart left the village.

Lorenz also found the old man Ricart had spoken with.

“Hey, old man.”

Lorenz called to him with one hand resting on the hilt of the sword at his waist.

The old man was once again carefully shaving wood with a plane when he looked up at him.

“Some unfamiliar young punks came through here, right? I know all about it, so don’t give me any nonsense. Where did those bastards go?”

“...I have no intention of interfering in a sword fight between adventurers. If I tell you, I’ll be helping you. Then the people on the other side will hold a grudge against us.”

The old man gave Lorenz the exact same answer he had given Ricart yesterday.

But Lorenz’s response was entirely different.

Lorenz narrowed his eyes at the old man.

“You bastards really are unbelievable... Old man, don’t you understand your situation? There are thirty of us, and we’re well armed. Burning down and killing everyone in some worthless backwater village nobody cares about would be easy. Do you understand what I’m saying? Where did those bastards go? Should I kill your grandson right in front of you first? Huh?”

The old man looked quietly up at Lorenz, with a gaze that seemed almost like a glare.

“...Thorweil. Yesterday.”

“If you’re lying, I’ll come back and kill every last one of you. Let’s go.”

Lorenz led his subordinates straight out of the village and toward Thorweil.

But the old man watched Lorenz leave, then shouted toward the hut.

“Lester! Lester!”

“Yes, Grandpa!”

Just as yesterday, the young man rushed out at once.

But the old man’s order was entirely different from yesterday’s.

“Gather the boys. Then chase down those bastards who just left and kill them all.”

“Yes, Grandpa.”

The young man named Lester answered calmly, as though he had been given a simple errand.

Then he went around the village gathering the men.

They were all rangers armed with bows and crossbows.

There was a saying that one skilled ranger could stop an army’s advance.

It sounded like an exaggeration, but there was some truth to it.

Armies already found it difficult to pass through forests. Once soldiers were caught in all sorts of traps and shot from afar, they grew frightened and collapsed to the ground.

Perhaps the reason fierce beasts and monsters rarely appeared in this forest, leaving it so peaceful, was entirely because of Griffinswald’s rangers.

They were the apex predators within this territory.

And they quietly pursued Lorenz and his subordinates.

Their quivers were full of arrows.

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