WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble

Chapter 162

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Battle of Nerves (1)

"........."

"........."

Hearing Kubharu's words, no one could find anything to say.

Airen Farreira was no exception.

He, more than any of the others, had wanted to meet Kubharu's master, Gurgar.

It had seemed like the perfect chance to finally get some clue about the identity of the man in his dream, a mystery he hadn't managed to crack at all until now.

But even his own disappointment couldn't compare to what Kubharu must be feeling.

'Dragged away for seventeen years against his will, finally working up the courage to come home, only to find his master already gone...'

If Airen had spent five years trapped in the Otherworldly Realm and returned to find that something had happened to one of his own family, how would he have felt?

He didn't even want to imagine it.

So Airen had no idea what expression to wear in front of Kubharu.

But Kubharu held himself together better than expected.

"I'd actually thought this might happen. He was older than my father, and my father's already past seventy."

"........."

"Still, here's the fortunate part. Unlike a fraud like me, my master really was a gifted fortune-teller. He must have known roughly when I'd come back, because he left behind a letter with a riddle in it."

"A riddle? What kind?"

"I haven't solved it yet myself, so I don't know for sure, but I think once I find the answer, I'll get whatever he set aside for me. Probably..."

Something connected to you, Airen Farreira.

Kubharu said this, and Airen, catching himself feeling relieved even in the middle of all that sorrow, felt a bitter twist in his chest.

No one spoke up, and that silence pressed the feeling down on him even harder.

Maybe Kubharu had noticed the uncomfortable mood.

Forcing a bright expression, he spoke up with a smile.

"Ha, no need to make such faces. If it weren't for you all, I'd still be wandering the continent, never once thinking of coming back here, not in a year, not in ten."

"But..."

"No buts about it, I'm nothing but grateful to you all. Anyway, things being what they are, just give me a little time. Even setting my master's business aside, I wasn't planning to just finish the escort job and vanish without another word, was I?"

Airen and the others all nodded at the same time.

Kubharu smiled again and stood up from his seat.

"Anyway, I've said what I needed to say, so I'll head back now. Haven't slept yet. I'll come find you all again later."

"Get some rest, Kubharu."

"Oh, right! Just a bit of worrying on my part, but when it comes to dealing with the fortress's senior warriors... you'll want to be a little more careful."

"...Understood."

Seeing Kubharu speak with an unusually serious expression, Brett Lloyd answered in a low voice.

Kubharu nodded at that, smiled, and left the room.

In the silence that followed the click of the closing door, four humans and one cat sat quietly with their own thoughts.

'We really do need to be careful.'

Brett turned Kubharu's words over in his mind.

Karakum, Durkali's greatest warrior, and Tarakhan, the tribe's leader.

The fact that the two of them still got along well with Kubharu was excellent news.

That alone solved half of what could have been a complicated problem.

But the other half remained unresolved, and that half was the orcs on the maternal side who had backed Tarakhan.

'From their point of view, we're basically uninvited guests who showed up carrying a spark into their peaceful daily life.'

On top of that, they were a different race entirely, and they'd briefly crossed swords with Karakum too.

There were plenty of reasons for the situation to feel grating from every angle.

Worse still, there were rumors that even Tarakhan, the tribal leader, couldn't fully disregard the authority of Master Halifa, brother of the first wife and effectively the head of that faction.

'No matter how favorably Tarakhan thinks of Kubharu... Master Halifa won't feel the same way.'

Brett, being closer to politics than the others, felt this more acutely than anyone.

Factoring that in, it made a certain amount of sense that Kubharu had seemed more troubled by this than by his master's death.

"Well... guess we just need to keep to ourselves and not wander around."

"Right. Honestly there's nowhere else for us to go besides our rooms and the training grounds anyway."

"They might try to pick a fight... but if we just avoid it from our side, it shouldn't be much of an issue. Takes two hands to clap, after all."

Brett and Airen talked it over, and Illia and Lulu nodded along.

Judith didn't say much, but her mood seemed to agree with the two of them.

They'd stay quiet and just keep training until Kubharu solved his master Gurgar's riddle.

Having settled on that, the four swordsmen put Lulu down to sleep, then rose from their seats as if by some unspoken agreement and headed for the training grounds.

Each of them found a comfortable spot and began swinging their swords.

No matter how much the stares and tension from these strangers grated on them, they couldn't skip training with a training ground this magnificent right in front of them.

'If we just train quietly, they won't come picking fights with us over it.'

Whoosh!

Going through a textbook downward strike, Brett nodded to himself.

Probably nothing would happen. Just in case it might provoke the orcs, he hadn't even taken out the red and blue swords he'd been gifted.

Even though he desperately wanted to use them!

'I wish someone would appreciate what I'm going through here...'

Maybe that thought reached someone.

For the week that followed, not a single orc warrior bothered Brett Lloyd.

It wasn't exactly courtesy, but at least none of them came at him openly looking for a fight.

Given how combative orcs tended to be as a people, that counted as a decent outcome.

But the expression on his face as he swung his sword wasn't a good one.

"wjgmlemfdms eksdur dprtmxmfkdlqslek."

"wkrrkrk tlzutj djWjf tn djqtdl skQmsakfdmf gkrh dlTtmqslek."

The orcs left him alone. They left Illia Lindsay alone. They left Airen Farreira alone.

But Judith was different.

Every so often, a few of them would come deliberately close to her side, muttering something in the orc tongue.

Watching them, Brett Lloyd ground his teeth hard enough that he thought a molar might crack.

* * *

Orcs, as a rule, carried themselves with fierce pride.

Their superior strength and massive build compared to other races was something they took pride in, and it was the source of the confidence they carried even in front of monsters and demonic beasts.

In truth, they'd earned countless achievements during the great turmoil four hundred years ago and again a hundred fifty years ago.

The houses of the heroes who had struck down demons back then had risen to a status equivalent to nobility within human society, and their bloodlines still carried a pride bordering on arrogance, buoyed by that inherited glory.

Of course, no matter how proud a descendant of heroes or the bloodline of a senior warrior might be, none of them could afford to treat the four openly with disrespect.

That much made sense. Illia Lindsay's ancestor was Dion Lindsay, the very man who had struck down the infamous Dragon King, and House Lloyd, while somewhat less renowned, was still an old and storied house that had produced its share of heroes.

Airen Farreira's house lacked that kind of reputation, but the simple fact that he was a Sword Master meant no warrior dared look down on him.

That left only one.

Judith alone, in the eyes of the orc warriors, seemed to have a background worth pushing around.

"skdirgks dlsrks wnwpdp Rho gksp."

"rmfjrp akfdldi. emerlfhsms wjstkdml vltwnfeh dkslfkau? rmfjs rjt clrhsms skQmwl dksgsp."

They weren't picking fights outright.

But they'd pass close enough to be conspicuous to anyone watching, muttering in orcish just loud enough to be heard.

Brett could even make out part of what they were saying.

The first thing he'd learned after getting close to Kubharu had been orc curse words.

'Not from a warrior bloodline, some lowly background, is that what they're saying? On top of that, mocking her as some weak human? Judith, of all people?'

It was absurd.

The thought of these guys, who wouldn't last one punch in a real match against her, strutting around like that was both laughable and infuriating.

What made it worse was that Judith clearly had a rough idea they were talking trash about her.

Fwoosh!

Fwooosh!

Even so, she didn't react.

She just kept a blank expression, calmly and steadily refining her swordwork.

But watching her, Brett felt an anxiety that kept gnawing at him.

He couldn't guarantee she'd keep holding it in forever.

'At this rate, sorry to Airen and all, but forget the master's riddle, I think it'd be better to just leave soon...'

Even thinking of Kubharu, that seemed like the right call.

Unless they planned to stay here for the rest of their lives, their presence might end up doing him more harm than good.

All they were doing was keeping the tribal leader's maternal-side warriors on edge, or so Brett figured.

'Damn it!'

While he was still turning that thought over, another group of orc warriors approached Judith.

They spat out something unintelligible, then walked off with an obviously nasty laugh.

Fortunately, thank goodness, Judith didn't let her expression crack this time either.

She simply looked out at the scenery around her with a flat, unbothered gaze, like someone tuning out a barking dog.

Watching that, Brett let out a quiet sigh of relief.

But...

This time, it didn't end there.

Thud, thud, thud.

Wiping the sweat off with her sleeve, Judith walked over toward Brett.

It was the first time she'd done this since they'd arrived in Durkali.

The atmosphere hadn't been right, and neither had the timing, to clear up their misunderstanding, so a cold distance had lingered between the two of them the whole time.

Which was exactly why Brett felt an even sharper stab of unease now.

What was this?

What in the world was she planning, coming toward him like this?

The question didn't stay unanswered for long.

Judith closed the distance until she was right in front of him and leaned in close to his ear.

Then, staring straight at the group of orc warriors, she started rattling off every insult she could think of.

"Sea cucumber, idiot, dog turd, sea anemone, moron..."

Not sentences, just words.

Simple enough that even orcs, not just humans, would have heard them before, and obvious enough that anyone watching could tell exactly who they were aimed at.

Some of the orcs even understood the continental common tongue, so there was no way they'd have missed what Judith was saying.

The orc warriors, looking utterly baffled, walked over to stand in front of Judith and Brett.

One of them spoke in the human tongue.

"What did you just say?"

"Idiot, eunuch, moron, dumbass."

"Well, I never. Are you trying to start something with me..."

"Wasn't talking to you."

"What?"

"I wasn't talking to you. I was talking to this guy standing next to me with the dazed look on his face."

"You expect me to believe..."

"What's so hard to believe about it?"

Judith asked, her face perfectly blank.

The orc warrior, blood boiling, opened his mouth to say something, but in the end swallowed it back down.

There wasn't much choice.

It was an obvious excuse, sure, but it wasn't so different from what they'd been doing to the red-haired human this whole time.

Both sides had been provoking each other with petty, childish tactics, so neither could exactly claim the moral high ground here.

"...Our mistake. We'll go."

In the end, all they could do was turn around and walk back the way they'd come, wearing expressions like they'd just bitten into something rotten.

Watching the standoff with an uneasy heart, Brett let out a belated sigh.

'I honestly don't know if that was a good thing or not.'

Should he be relieved it ended there, or point out that she should have kept holding it in a while longer?

After a moment of thought, Brett decided to lean toward the former.

Given Judith's usual temperament, honestly, the fact that she'd held out this long already counted as remarkable.

If it hadn't been for her consideration toward Kubharu, this would have blown up a long time ago.

But he didn't realize something.

If she'd never drawn her blade at all, that would be one thing.

But once drawn, it was Judith's nature to cut something, anything, down with it.

"Hey, you big lugs over there."

"...You talking to us?"

"Yeah."

"What. If it's more nonsense..."

"Cut the crap, let's settle this with a fight."

"........."

"What, scared? Getting cold feet?"

At Judith's shocking declaration, neither Brett Lloyd nor the orc warriors could find words for a while.

Watching them, she wagged a finger.

Then she added one more thing.

"Nice and clean, no grudges after. Just let each other blow off some steam. Sound good?"

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