WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Ode of the Brave ◈

Chapter 38

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The silver coins on the table scattered everywhere with a jingle jangle.

Like a tiger pouncing on prey, the Nameless One charged at Hasphil with a battle axe in one hand.

It felt as if the entire scene had frozen. The startled faces of the people, and Hasphil, whose scream was just about to burst out.

But time moved on regardless.

“Aaaah! Ah!”

Crunch!

The axe, filled with vengeance, cleaved his enemy’s head. Naturally, Hasphil’s head split apart like a watermelon. They needed to take the head with them, but this was no time to worry about that.

The Nameless One crashed to the floor in a tangle with the already-dead Hasphil. Hasphil’s guards had no time to react. All they could do was stare in shock.

The spectators needed time to process what had happened. Then, sharp screams rang out.

“Aaaaaah!”

That became the signal for everyone to rush out of the gambling hall. But the exit was narrow, and with so many people, they quickly became tangled together, shoving and being shoved until they were nearly crushed to death.

“Don’t push!”

“I said, don’t push!”

Tables and chairs overturned, and money spilled everywhere. Ah, the sound of money pouring out. Even in a situation like this, it was enough to drive people mad.

So more than a few people ignored the fact that someone had just died and began picking money up from the floor. Boribori was among them. Looking all around like a startled rabbit, he frantically stuffed money into his pockets.

The tavern became a complete mess in an instant, and the Thieves’ Guild members belatedly drew their weapons. Yet they did not know what to do and only floundered.

They were just as overwhelmed and confused by the chaos. So much so that they had no time to care about Hasphil’s death.

The guards tried to grab the Nameless One at close range and do something, anything, but his body beneath the cloak was heavily armored.

When the Nameless One raised his bloodied axe again, Ricart climbed onto the table and shouted loudly.

“Everyone!”

Ricart’s voice pierced their ears like the point of a sharpened spear. The chaotic scene froze for an instant, and everyone looked up at Ricart with wide, startled eyes.

“What happens when someone gets caught cheating at gambling?!”

Ricart shouted with passionate conviction. Then he held up the broken dish and three dice.

“This man was just caught cheating! You all saw it clearly!”

Honestly, no one had been in their right mind enough to see it clearly. But dead men told no tales, so Ricart’s voice was bound to be louder.

Ricart shouted at the Thieves’ Guild members.

“Isn’t it only natural for a cheater to get his head split open?! Did we do wrong, or did you? If you’ve got mouths, then say something!”

Ricart’s forceful voice overwhelmed the room. He seized the justification and pressed them hard.

Hasphil lay there with his skull split open, yet it was the Thieves’ Guild members who shrank back.

“We only followed the iron rule of gambling! And this is a little something for all of you!”

Ricart scattered his pile of money like falling snow. Shhk! Here, there, everywhere.

People were showered in a rain of money. Their eyes went wild, and instead of escaping, they dropped to the floor to gather it up.

In that opening, Ricart shouted at the Nameless One. There was no time for politeness in this situation.

“Let’s go!”

The Nameless One understood immediately. In one motion, he overturned the heavy tables and cleared a path with a crash! Then, wherever people still blocked the way, he shoved through them like a bull.

Ricart jumped down from the table and followed. Boribori hurried after them, his pockets bulging as if they were about to burst with money.

But just as the three were nearly out of the gambling hall, someone shouted from behind them.

“Catch those bastards!”

They had almost reached the shadows of the night. It was unfortunate, but it did not matter.

As if he had been waiting for it, Ricart turned and drew his longsword. He swung it sideways at the first person rushing toward him.

Whoosh! Thud!

Ricart’s precise strike severed the man’s neck. A headless corpse fell near the entrance with a flop, and more than a few enemies tripped over it.

The entrance was narrow, so those in the back did not know what was happening ahead. They kept pushing, and even more people fell.

The Nameless One raised his axe again and began smashing Thieves’ Guild members’ heads as though playing whack-a-mole.

Thud! Thud! Crunch! Thud!

The bodies piled on top of one another twitched, and soon the corpses were stacked nearly as high as a person, blocking the entrance.

Ricart sheathed his sword.

“Let’s get our things from the inn and leave right away.”

The three headed for the inn near the city gate, hiding in the shadows of the night.

As they went, Boribori walked quickly while clutching his waistband like someone desperate to pee. His pockets were full of silver coins.

A jingle jangle echoed through the night streets, but there was no need to worry about being discovered because of the noise. The people who had been in the gambling hall had taken their shares and were fleeing in every direction.

Coins jingled everywhere, and the Thieves’ Guild members grabbed anyone they could catch.

And instead of chasing Ricart, those thugs simply killed people on the spot and took their money. The Thieves’ Guild members had gone mad for money too.

What loyalty would thieves have to their organization or their dead leader? It seemed they thought that since everything had already gone to hell, they might as well take their share.

The three stormed into the inn as though raiding it. The people lying in the hall, trying to sleep, jumped in surprise, but the three paid them no mind. They hurried up to their room on the second floor, grabbed their belongings, and came right back outside.

When they emerged, firelight shone from where Mother’s Sorrow stood. It looked like the place was on fire. In this cold winter, it was quite a warm sight.

But the city gates were closed for the night. For a moment, Ricart wondered what they should do, but the Nameless One, who had clearly experienced this kind of thing many times, strode toward the barracks beside the gate.

He kicked the door open with a bang! The guards inside, quietly playing cards, jolted in surprise.

“W-What is this?”

They saw the large, heavily armored man in a dark cloak and were too frightened and confused to rush him.

The Nameless One turned the large wheel, like a giant gear, that opened the city gate. It was something that normally took several people working together to turn, but he pushed it alone.

The thick iron chain wound around with a sharp, heavy grind. Ricart and Boribori joined in to help, though they did not contribute much.

Once the gate was open, they calmly left the barracks. The stunned guards could only blink.

In that way, they succeeded in killing an opponent who was, in some ways, tougher than the Ernberg Five. They had not taken the head, but revenge had been achieved, so it did not matter.

The winter night air was cold, but somehow, they were too excited to feel it.

“That was easier than I expected.”

Boribori spoke while carrying a thick bag.

“No matter how many there are, they’re like grains of sand. Just give them a little shove and they scatter. That’s thieves for you.”

Not all thieves were like that. There were countless Thieves’ Guilds in the world, almost one in every city. Some were truly organized, secretive, and terrifying. Thieves had their own differences in quality.

The Nameless One suddenly looked back. Firelight shone beyond the city walls. He felt something different from his usual vengeance.

He had never done this to make himself feel better or to vent his anger. It was more that nothing much stirred in him.

Perhaps it was because of the boys beside him, but a strange emptiness passed through his heart.

“This ended more easily than I thought. Since we’re at it, how about we take out the bandits too?”

Ricart looked at the other two as he spoke.

“Why?”

“They’re definitely holding people captive and trafficking them, along with all kinds of other bad things. We took down their leader, so let’s wipe them out while we have the chance.”

It made no sense for only three people to subdue a sizable bandit group.

But that was only true if one looked at numbers alone. With enough skill and wisdom, it was not impossible. They had just experienced that.

“Okay. What about Dad?”

Boribori looked at the Nameless One. Dad? Had he decided to call him that now?

In any case, the Nameless One silently nodded.

Once they had decided, the three crossed the bridge over the river in the middle of the night. Then they openly climbed the mountain path.

It was so dark that they could barely see anything, but they knew where they were headed. Torches burned at the bandit stronghold.

Ricart approached the stronghold with the other two, then hid behind a tree and observed it.

A few people stood on the palisade, but rather than keeping watch, they were watching the fire in the city. Ricart could hear them talking, but not clearly enough to make out the words.

The Nameless One quietly pulled out a throwing axe, but Ricart reached out to stop him.

“Let’s look around first.”

They circled the stronghold. It had been built carelessly, with gaps everywhere, and there were plenty of spots where they could simply grab hold and climb up.

But corpses lay scattered around the stronghold. There were skeletons and bodies that had not been dead long. Most of the bones were not very large. They were probably children.

Among those captured to be ransomed or sold, children often could not endure the harsh conditions and died.

What was even sadder was that many parents sold their children themselves because they could not repay their debts or endure hunger.

From the rear of the stronghold, Ricart looked down and got a rough grasp of the layout before climbing the palisade first. The Nameless One and Boribori followed.

Torches and bonfires lit the stronghold. Based on the layout he had already observed, Ricart headed for where the bandits were likely sleeping. When he opened the door, he saw about fifteen bandits sleeping soundly inside.

“Let’s burn them.”

When dealing with large numbers, or carrying out a massacre, it was efficient to lock people in a storage shed or barn and burn it down. Stabbing and cutting people to death one by one was hard labor too.

Ricart, Boribori, and the Nameless One each brought dry bundles of straw and whole bonfires. They threw the straw throughout the bandits’ quarters, then overturned the fires.

After that, they locked the door from outside.

“Ah, fuck! What is it? What the hell? Gasp!”

“What’s happening?!”

Cough! Cough! “What is this?! Hey, stop messing around!”

“Save us! Hey! Save us!”

When they woke to find their entire quarters ablaze and filled with smoke, they seemed too confused to think straight. As the commotion broke out, the people on the palisade and others sleeping elsewhere came out to look.

Before then, Ricart’s group had hidden behind another building and ambushed the bandits who came to save their companions.

The Nameless One rushed out first and brought his axe down several times. Each strike dropped one person.

Thud! Thud! Crunch!

His axe work was frighteningly precise. The difficult thing about wielding an axe was that missing could put someone in serious trouble, but he never missed.

The startled bandits panicked. The Nameless One raised a throwing axe and hurled it at an enemy holding a bow in the distance.

It buried itself in the target’s head without fail.

Thud! Crunch!

Those who ran out after waking had not even put on their equipment properly, let alone taken up their weapons.

Boribori chopped them to pieces, while Ricart calmly surveyed the area, found any dangerous variables, and killed them as they arose.

The three worked together so well that they almost carried out a massacre despite facing overwhelming numbers.

The remaining bandits could not understand what was happening. They only realized this was beyond anything they could handle, opened the gate of the stronghold, and fled.

And once one person began running, the rest were swept along and fled as well.

Meanwhile, the flames grew larger. At last, Ricart opened the door where the prisoners were held. He had sensed it from outside, but now the stench of feces, urine, and worse hit him full force.

Women huddled together in the corner, clinging to one another, and looked at Ricart and his group with faces filled with fear. They had heard people dying outside and smelled burning, so they had been terrified already.

“Come out. We’ll escort you to the city.”

“W-Who are you?”

The women had never imagined they were being rescued. There were no stories like that, not even in legends.

Legendary heroes slew evil dragons or punished demons. They did not save people.

“Um, X the Nameless and the kids? Anyway, hurry and come out. This place is on fire.”

Ricart spoke, but the women were so frightened that they could not make sense of the situation.

So the Nameless One went inside and forcibly pulled them out. Only then did the women come outside. They saw the burning stronghold and the bandits’ corpses lying horribly everywhere, and their eyes widened.

“I said, hurry up.”

Ricart calmly walked out of the stronghold. The women followed behind.

Only after they came down the mountain and reached Lunenberg’s city gate did the women finally collect themselves and offer their thanks.

“Th-Thank you.”

“Thank you, heroes.”

Firelight from the city and the burning bandit stronghold reached them from both sides. It was not very bright, so they could only see one another dimly. The smell of smoke was thick in the air.

The women looked to be in their teens to early twenties. To them, Ricart’s group looked like beings beyond human, wrapped in a reddish veil of night.

Ricart stared at them for a moment, then tossed them a purse of money so they could get back on their feet and use it for travel.

“Live well.”

Then he simply left with Boribori and the Nameless One.

Pity? Goodwill? Compassion? It did not seem to be a sense of justice. They simply acted that way.

They did not know what feelings drove their actions, but when dawn broke and the city gates opened, stories of the three spread from the rescued women.

From some point on, people began calling them this.

The Heroes of Sigpringer, who defeated villains and saved people.

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