WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

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◈ Sword Master of the Fallen Kingdom

Chapter 4

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The Nameless Mercenary (4)

Humans are creatures of adaptation. Kyle, who'd once run from even the weakest monsters, had become something else entirely along the way. A man without feeling. One who could cut through dozens of people without so much as blinking.

Twenty years on Earth. Ten years in this world.

Which weighed more. There was no easy answer. His roots were on Earth, but ten years in this world had been more than enough to reshape everything that twenty-year-old had been.

If you're weak, you die. Strength is essential to survival. Is killing someone unconditionally a bad thing? Why am I even still alive?

"......."

He opened his eyes to cold air. Lying in bed with only his head turned toward the window, he watched the morning slowly brighten.

Come to think of it, he'd dragged himself out of the bath half-asleep the night before and gone straight to bed. Kyle was completely unguarded. The sword he always kept at his bedside lay carelessly on the nightstand. All his tension had dissolved.

If an assassin had walked in while he was like this?

He probably wouldn't have died. He had relics and artifacts prepared for exactly these situations. Still, it had been a long time since he'd let himself go this loose. That said something about how worn down he'd been.

After staring blankly at the ceiling for a while, Kyle dragged himself upright. He threw the window open and cold morning air poured into the room. That cleared his head at once. The drowsiness faded. Today's tasks snapped into focus.

Early morning. The meeting point, according to the commission, was in front of the east gate.

Plenty of time left.

He got ready to head out. Same as always, he dressed properly and pulled the dark cloak over everything. The sword at his hip, a companion as much as a part of himself. He pulled the hooded cowl low over his face. He looked exactly as he had the day before. Unreadable. The look of a veteran mercenary who had seen everything.

One last glance at the room, and Kyle headed downstairs. Whatever he'd felt the day before had already been wiped clean. The homesickness, the exhaustion, the weight of a hard life, he'd cycled through all of it enough times that none of it was new. You just buried it and kept going.

As he'd arranged the previous day, he picked up breakfast on his way out. He didn't eat at the inn's common room. Just grabbed some bread and a few other easy-to-carry things. There was somewhere to stop before the east gate.

The smithy.

Out of the inn, Kyle made for the street where the workshops clustered. Unlike the inn district, craftsmen's row was thick with the clang of metal and heat rolling off the forges.

Choosing one took him a moment. Too flashy was out, no substance behind it. Too rundown was just as bad, meant no work coming in.

Solid without being showy. Not a master craftsman's shop, but somewhere with a smith who knew what he was doing.

"Welcome. Here to look at a sword?"

He found his place and stepped inside.

A heavily bearded man was tending to what looked like weapons of his own make. Various blades hung along the walls. Even a glance made the quality obvious. Not a speck of dust on the display counters, as if he cleaned them every morning.

Right place.

"Not exactly. Do you do maintenance?"

"Maintenance? Hmm. Let me see it first."

Kyle drew the sword from his hip and handed it over.

"A bastard sword. Plain to look at, but the craftsmanship is something else. The pommel, the crossguard, the scabbard... wait a moment."

The man squinted as he examined every inch of the blade. His eyes went wide.

"S-Stellarium?"

He drew it carefully from the scabbard. A flawless, smooth edge caught the light. The silver blade blazed in the morning sun, brilliant enough to blind you.

"How in the... no, where did you even get this? A Stellarium sword would have to be..."

"Can you do it?"

Kyle didn't answer the questions. Just the one: could it be done.

"Possible, sure, but... hah. Give me a moment."

The man hurried into the back. When he returned, his hands were full of cloth, oil, and various maintenance tools.

"Of all the things I've seen in my life, I never imagined I'd lay eyes on a sword forged from Stellarium."

There was something like excitement in his voice. He gripped the blade with both hands and began working, careful and reverent, as though handling something sacred.

"A mercenary?" he asked, still wiping the blade.

"That's right."

"Not a local, clearly. Your accent leans more Imperial than southern. There's a northern lilt in there too."

The people of the Velia continent all spoke the common tongue, but accents and dialects varied by region. A lifelong local could pick out an outsider from accent alone.

"Commissioned knight?"

"No."

"And yet you carry a Stellarium blade?"

"A gift from someone close to me. A long time ago."

"A gift. Who gives someone a Stellarium sword as a gift..."

At least make the lie believable, the man thought.

Stellarium. Also known as Star Iron.

Just as Earth had its alloys, this world had its own blessed metals, mana running through everything. Stellarium, more commonly called Star Iron, was the finest of them all by a wide margin. Extraordinarily rare. Light, incredibly durable, exceptional in mana conductivity.

Called the dream metal, Stellarium was what every mercenary and knight dreamed of for a blade. But the supply was vanishingly small. It rarely came to auction, and even a king's ransom wasn't enough to guarantee you'd ever find any.

"Stellarium is only ever mined in tiny quantities each year from the northern Caldra Mountains. And from what I've heard, even that dried up completely after the fall of the Hailen Kingdom."

"......."

"The condition is excellent, too."

He paused, turning the sword over in his hands.

"One look tells you how well it's been cared for. Quite attached to this blade, aren't you. Fair enough, I suppose, since a sword like this could buy you an entire castle in a decent-sized city. Not a chip on the edge, either, as you'd expect from Stellarium."

A sword so precious that even a great noble house might not own one. He finished his careful work and slid it back into its scabbard.

"There you go. It was in such good shape there's hardly anything to fix."

"I've run out of oil for the blade. Could I buy some while I'm here?"

"Oil? Easy enough."

He pushed an oil bottle toward Kyle, a brand-new one rather than the one he'd been using.

"And daggers, while we're at it."

"Daggers?"

Kyle tucked away the oil and pulled several daggers from inside his cloak.

"A few are too far gone, so those can go. For the rest, I'd like them maintained, and if you have decent ones for sale, I'd be interested in picking some up."

"Ha, no problem. Hmm... the wear on these is different from the sword. These weren't held, were they?"

"Throwing daggers."

"Thought so."

A nod.

"The stuffy knights look down on anything outside swordsmanship as cheap tricks, but real combat is different. Even knights who wield mana get taken down by a surprise arrow more often than you'd think. Knife-throwing can be more effective than a bow or crossbow depending on the situation."

He worked through the daggers, maintaining the ones in decent condition the same way he had the sword, and tossed the rest into a bin without ceremony. Then he brought out several quality pieces from his stock.

"Sharp enough to do the job, heavy enough to fly true. Good ones."

"The quality is excellent."

"Right. Honestly, you could use them in close quarters if it came to that. Looking at your sword and the way you carry yourself, you seem like someone with real skill. Spend a little more and do it properly, wouldn't you say?"

He wasn't wrong. Without the ability to cast without a spoken incantation, a single blade hidden inside a cloak was faster than any arrow or half-baked spell. Even something small, in the right hands, could end a life cleanly. Paying a bit more for quality daggers was worth it. He had plenty of money anyway.

"Anything else you need?"

"That's all."

"Right then. Two silver for the maintenance. Sixty-three silver for the oil and three daggers combined. Sixty-five total, but... just give me six large silver coins. Special discount."

A large silver coin was worth ten silver. A night at a high-end inn. The sum a poor mercenary might scrape together over several days. Six of those.

"Here."

Three quality daggers, oil, maintenance, all included. Quite cheap, all things considered. Kyle handed the coins over without hesitation. The gruff man's face went slack with shock.

"A gold coin?"

"Keep the change as a tip."

"That's a bit much, even so..."

"Then I'll be going."

"Wait!"

He was already halfway out the door.

"Just a personal curiosity, what's your name?"

Kyle turned slowly.

"Kyle."

"Kyle, Kyle... A good name."

He turned the name over, then added:

"Just a feeling, but I think I might be hearing that name again someday."

"It was a pleasure. I don't know where you're headed, but I hope the road treats you well."

Kyle said nothing. Just a small nod in thanks, and he was gone. Before long, the steady ring of a hammer on metal filled the empty smithy.

***

Out of craftsmen's row, Kyle headed straight for the meeting point. The sky had shifted from pale blue to a warm orange while he wasn't looking.

The city was waking up. Streets that had been quiet the night before now hummed with life. Kyle breathed in the cold morning air and quickened his pace. The east gate was already a market.

"You there! Stop standing around and get moving!"

"Yes, yes sir!"

"Goods checked?"

"All confirmed!"

"Check the horses. And make sure none of the wheels are loose!"

Before the gates opened, people were already up and preparing for the merchant run. More than ten wagons and carts drew the eye without trying.

The trading company members loaded goods into the wagons. The mercenaries on escort duty had gathered in their own clusters, conserving energy before the long road ahead. Idle chatter among them. A bit of small talk went a long way toward easing tension before a hard journey.

"You must be the extra mercenary the branch chief mentioned?"

Kyle was scanning the area for the Narme Trading Company head when a low voice reached him, set apart from the rest.

"Are you talking to me?"

Two figures stood leaning against the outer wall of a building. One was a heavily built man who looked to be in his mid-forties. The other was a woman in her late twenties with red hair.

"Veil. Silver-rank mercenary, joining this trade run."

Kyle studied them. The larger man stepped forward first, hand out.

"As you can see, I took the branch chief's direct request."

He stood about the same height as Kyle, who was somewhere around 185 centimeters. Not quite as tall as the Dex Company captain he'd crossed paths with before, but tall nonetheless. The long halberd strapped to his back was visibly high-end, and the way he carried himself confirmed the rest.

A fighter worthy of silver rank. At minimum, the equal of a knight.

"Kyle."

He took the offered hand.

"So, Kyle. You also took a request from Branch Chief Max?"

"Right."

"Rank?"

"Silver."

"A strong one. I like it."

He gave the handshake two firm pumps and grinned.

"Honestly, I was just worrying about what I'd do if the new arrival turned out to be some weakling. At least I won't have to drag anyone along. You can tell a fair amount about someone just from their gear and how they move."

"Just you?" Kyle glanced past him.

"No. One more."

Before Veil had finished the words, the woman pushed herself off the wall. Her ponytail swayed as she stepped forward and offered Kyle her hand, same as Veil had.

"Katrin."

"Kyle."

A quick exchange of names, a handshake. She glanced sideways at Veil.

"I'd like to say silver too... but I'm bronze, actually. Being sandwiched between two silver-ranks is a bit intimidating, honestly. Looking at how you're equipped, you seem to be more of a sword person, unlike us?"

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