WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble

Chapter 86

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Alhad Den (4)

"What did you say?"

"I said Airen Farreira, official trainee of Krono Fencing Hall."

Airen Farreira spoke clearly and evenly at Kazar's question, in a voice much louder than before.

His manner almost seemed to flaunt his identity, a stark departure from his usual demeanor.

Of course, the merchant party didn't care about that at all.

They only cared about the content of what Airen had said.

"Krono Fencing Hall's official trainee?"

"27th cohort?"

"A 27th cohort official trainee is out on the continent?"

"Airen Farreira? Never heard the name..."

"They say this year's cohort has more than twenty trainees. Might just not be well known yet."

"Well now, to see a 27th cohort trainee here of all places..."

"So that's why he earned a Silver Plate at such a young age."

"Wait, then... doesn't that solve our problem here too?"

"Huh? Oh! It does!"

"Makes sense. They wouldn't be crazy enough to lay a hand on a Krono trainee. Right, that has to be it!"

'The mood's turning the way I hoped.'

Airen gave a small nod, hearing the shift in the crowd's voices, positive now, so different from before.

He hadn't stepped forward so boldly in front of den chief Kazar because he'd fully sorted out the thoughts he'd been wrestling with the whole way up the mountain.

The question of what it meant to cut down a person.

The question of what to make of this strange group called Alhad Den.

Neither one had an easy answer.

To someone who'd lived a long life and gathered plenty of experience, maybe the answer would come easily. But Airen Farreira, as he stood now, couldn't afford to jump to a conclusion.

Granted, the mood at the den right now was very different from what he'd heard about...

'Which only confuses me more.'

So Airen changed his approach.

He wouldn't settle either question right now.

There'd be time enough to work through them later, once he'd gathered more experience and let his thoughts mature on the road.

So what was the most important thing he could do, needed to do, right now?

It was simple: his current mission. Escorting the merchant coalition.

'Not one merchant or mercenary dies here.'

No, not even injured.

That was the goal Airen had set for himself.

And the best way to reach that goal was to make sure a fight never broke out in the first place.

"I have a plate here that proves I'm an official trainee of Krono Fencing Hall."

Airen pulled the trainee plate from his pocket and held it out to Kazar.

The merchants' faces brightened even further at his open display of Krono's authority.

Even a man pulling a stunt as crazy as Kazar was right now couldn't just ignore this.

If they could talk him down into renegotiating now that he looked so cornered, they might cross the mountains without losing goods or lives.

That was what everyone was thinking.

Kazar glanced over Airen's trainee plate, then flicked it away with a toss of his hand.

Far too short a look to count as a real inspection.

He grinned and said, "Fake, isn't it?"

"...What? No. Hall Master Ian gave me this personally. Check it properly."

"Don't know, don't care. Don't have the eye for that kind of thing. But... over the past five years, I've roughed up about three punks who claimed to be Krono swordsmen and tried throwing their weight around. Never had any trouble afterward."

"..."

"You're probably just another one of them, aren't you."

"Ha ha ha ha ha! That's right, Chief!"

"If we believed every little thing like that, we'd be the fools! How is it that every single person we run into is a Krono swordsman or from some famous house of the Five Great Sword Houses?"

"Chief! Let's just wipe them all out!"

Far from being cowed by Krono's name, the bandits only grew more savage.

Kazar watched his men with clear satisfaction.

The merchants' faces went pale again at the sight.

They understood now. The men of Alhad Den weren't worried about backing or consequences at all. They only wanted to fight.

It made no sense, but that was how it was.

Not Kazar, not a single one of his men, showed the slightest interest in whether the trainee plate was real.

The senior merchant felt something deeply off about that.

'This can't be right... Kazar's too sharp a man to check something that carelessly.'

Kazar was the type to keep meticulous track of every notable figure in the world, precisely so he'd never risk provoking someone dangerous by mistake.

And to begin with, he wasn't this aggressive by nature. Neither were his men.

Why had this happened.

Why had these men turned into completely different people, tormenting them like this.

The merchant didn't know.

But Airen Farreira, standing face to face with Kazar at the front of the line, thought he might understand the secret.

He studied the area around Kazar's neck closely.

'...Guess there's no choice but to try the next method.'

Airen let out a slow breath.

He'd wanted to avoid this method.

It carried more risk than borrowing Krono's name, and he had no guarantee it would work.

If it were just a matter of beating Kazar, he had confidence enough. But what he had in mind now called for something bigger.

Airen tucked the returned trainee plate back into his pocket.

Kazar sneered at his blank expression.

"Why not keep holding it out? Go on, stick it to your forehead. I'm from Krono, please don't hit me. Might scare off the other guys, though not us, obviously."

"Ha ha ha ha ha!"

"Kazar."

"Hm? Hey, kid! Relax that face a little while you talk, would you? Don't tell me you're about to beg for your life with that dead serious look."

"Ha, ha ha ha ha!"

"Would it help if I showed you the difference in strength between us?"

"Hm?"

"I mean, if I show you I'm strong enough to beat everyone here, would you back off quietly?"

"...Ha, hah."

Three seconds.

Given how briskly the conversation had been flowing, that was no small silence.

But the moment Kazar let out a dry, hollow laugh, the bandits couldn't hold back their laughter any longer.

"Pahahahahaha!"

"Kkkk... kkkkeuh."

"What the hell did that kid just say?"

"Says he'll wipe us all out alone?"

"Chief! Can we keep this one alive? He's hilarious!"

The bandits mocked Airen, faces turning red with laughter.

Even the merchants and mercenaries on his own side couldn't back him up.

The blond young man's words had sounded far too outlandish for that.

The tense, taut atmosphere of Alhad Den dissolved in an instant into something like a rowdy marketplace.

But everyone knew.

This laughter would only last for now.

Once this moment passed, the jokes would end, and a brutal fight over spoils would begin.

Even the happiest ending left them handing over half their goods and running.

That was when it happened.

The blond young man, who'd listened quietly to all the mockery, gripped his sword.

Shhk.

Thump!

"...!"

"...!"

Every bandit stopped laughing.

So did the merchant party.

A greatsword pulled from empty air, nothing there a moment before. The astonishing sight drew every eye.

But what came next was even more shocking.

The young man closed his eyes as if gathering his strength, and a fierce force began to churn out from his body.

Fwooooosh.

"Uh, uh..."

"Hic. Hiccup."

This wasn't a matter of a fierce expression or a sharp mood.

It was Aura, the mysterious power built through cultivation of the inner cosmos, pouring out in every direction.

It hadn't taken shape the way a Sword Master's Aura Sword would, but its sheer presence alone was an overwhelming force, crushing everyone in reach and showing no sign of letting up.

Everyone in the clearing felt it.

And they panicked. That panic quickly turned to fear.

The impossible was becoming reality step by step: one single person standing against an entire bandit den.

'No! This has to stop!'

Kazar alone stood against Airen's overwhelming presence.

It wasn't that it left him unaffected.

If anything, the thought that he'd lose ground the instant he stopped resisting was exactly what drove him to move.

Gripping his hammer's handle hard, he stepped forward, eyes wide, toward the young man.

An eerie force coiled around his body, granting him new strength.

Sensing it, Airen Farreira's own eyes went wide.

Their gazes met, and Kazar found himself taking a step back without meaning to.

'What... what kind of eyes does this brat have...'

He couldn't go any further forward. That was what Kazar thought.

Watching him freeze in place, Airen Farreira let out a sigh of relief.

Not because he doubted he could beat the man.

He'd worried that the demonic aura pouring off Kazar might affect him, push him toward something he hadn't planned.

'I can't kill him. If I do, his men will charge in, a real fight will break out, and we could end up with casualties on our side too.'

Again, Airen Farreira as he stood now couldn't offer answers to complicated, difficult questions.

He simply didn't have the experience for it yet.

So right now, in this moment, the only thing he needed to focus on was protecting the merchant coalition.

Doing everything he could to make sure a fight never actually broke out.

And to do that, showing his strength without holding anything back!

Hummm.

Airen's freshly renewed resolve coursed through his entire body.

The will of the man who'd briefly surfaced under the demonic aura's influence faded away, and the fierce hostility toward Kazar went with it.

His strength had also gathered to its peak, just in time.

Since he hadn't been able to focus properly, the strike lacked the precision he'd shown against Hall Master Ian. But he thought that might actually work better here.

'Rather than a clean strike with all the force focused into one point...'

Fwoooooosh!

'A rough, blunt blow that spreads out wild and unrestrained will make a better show!'

With that thought, Airen's greatsword came crashing down toward the ground.

It looked less like swinging a sword and more like swinging a club.

An instant later, a tremendous roar tore through the entirety of Alhad Den.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

Crack, crackcrackcrack.

"...!"

"...!"

"Uh, uh..."

"Hic, hic!"

Ears rang. Vision blurred.

The huge impact and the dust it kicked up made it hard to see much of anything.

But even so, everyone could clearly feel the result the remarkable young man had made, the one who'd introduced himself as an official 27th cohort trainee of Krono Fencing Hall.

The scale was too massive to miss.

The crack in the ground was easily five times the size of the mark left by Kazar's war hammer.

No, ten times.

Maybe even larger than that.

Everyone stared at the fissure in the earth, faces slack with shock.

Fwoooo...

Then the wind picked up, blowing away the dust, and the work of the monster called Airen Farreira revealed itself in full, unmistakable clarity.

The monster walked, slow and steady, toward the bandit chief.

Startled, Kazar stumbled backward, words tumbling out.

"S-s-sorry! You can just pass through, no need for... no, I surrender! Whatever you need, just say the word! I'll get it for you within reason... no, even if it's not within reason, I'll find a way somehow. Just spare my life, just my life..."

All his earlier bravado had vanished without a trace, leaving him a beaten dog, backing away again and again.

This was exactly the outcome Airen had wanted.

But he didn't stop walking. He kept closing the distance until he stood right in front of Kazar.

Not to take the man's life, of course.

Airen reached out quickly and snatched the necklace hanging from Kazar's neck.

Snap!

"Gah!"

The bandit chief's face went pale, apparently certain his neck was about to be broken.

But Airen Farreira's attention was fixed entirely on the necklace he'd just pulled free.

Up close, it was unmistakable.

This was the source of the demonic aura.

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