WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Ceaseless
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ The Medieval Heretic King is Too Good at Developing ◈
Chapter 103: The Duty of the Living (2)
──────
The distance to the Bohemian border was several hundred kilometers even in a straight line.
In peaceful times, it was a journey that could be made in two weeks by hired carriage. But these were not peaceful times.
The lords' pursuit parties were everywhere, hunting the defeated remnants of the Bundschuh. Checkpoints had been set up along the main roads, and wanted notices were nailed to the entrance of every village.
The reward on Joseph's head, in particular, was fifty gold gulden.
It was more money than a peasant could earn after a year of breaking their back in the fields. Not merely enough to buy a few cows, but enough to abandon farming altogether and become a herdsman with an entire herd.
There was no telling where an informer blinded by that reward might be hiding, so Joseph avoided villages. He avoided roads as well.
Instead, he walked through the forests. He walked by day, slept curled up at night, and sometimes killed people.
A month passed like that.
He could not count the days precisely. This was a flight without a calendar or a clock, measured only by the cycles of the sun and moon.
Then, after walking and walking, he finally saw a different sight through the trees.
The Bohemian border checkpoint.
A tall wooden watchtower, a stockade stretching beneath it, and armored guards standing before it.
Even the atmosphere differed from the checkpoints in Germany. If the lords' checkpoints were dens of hunting dogs that preyed upon peasants and chased down defeated rebels, this place was order itself.
The guards' armor shone smoothly, the stockade was as even as if measured with a ruler, and peaceful smoke rose from the watchtower.
Pant, pant...
By the time Joseph barely reached the border stockade, he was closer to crawling than walking.
The wound on his thigh had festered, leaving him feverish. His frostbitten toes had long since lost all feeling. Hunger and dehydration had left his vision spinning.
“Stop! Who goes there!”
A Bohemian guard's shout struck his ears.
Joseph could not understand a word. It was Czech.
“...Bohemia...”
The word Joseph barely forced through his cracked lips was in German.
“I need to... enter Bohemia...”
Two guards approached with their spears raised.
One look at him told them all they needed to know.
Bloodstained clothes, a dragging gait, and a face so gaunt that his bones showed through.
Dozens of German refugees fleeing the lords' persecution crossed the border every day. The sight was no longer unfamiliar to the guards.
One of them, who spoke German, asked him, “Hey, put down your weapon. We cannot let you in while you are carrying a sword.”
A sword.
Joseph looked down at the sword in his hand.
It had been his lifeline. In the past month, it had taken five lives and kept his own safe.
But what mattered to him now was not the sharpness of steel, but the life beyond the border.
Clank!
He undid the sword belt and set the sheathed sword on the ground. At that moment, as though the final thread of tension had snapped, strength drained from his legs.
His vision swayed.
For an instant, sky and ground reversed.
“Hey?”
“Hey! Stay awake!”
Thud!
Then his consciousness went dark.
* * *
He opened his eyes.
An unfamiliar ceiling came into view.
‘...Am I alive?’
Heat surged from his right thigh as though it had been burned, but it was no longer the sharp, stabbing pain from before. Someone had treated the wound.
He slowly turned his head.
Scratch, scratch.
A faint sound came from beside him. Turning farther, he saw a woman seated on a wooden chair, applying something to a linen cloth. It was a glossy herbal paste, as though oiled.
“Oh... You're awake?”
She spoke in Czech.
“...Where am I?”
Joseph asked in German.
The woman hesitated, then answered in halting German.
“A refugee settlement. Bohemia... border refugee settlement.”
“A refugee settlement...”
He vaguely remembered reaching the border. The stockade. The guards. The cold gleam of armor. The sensation of his legs giving way as the world tilted.
“You collapsed at the border. Soldiers brought you here. You slept for two days.”
“Two days...?”
“Your fever was very high. The wound on your leg had festered badly. It is better now, but you must not overexert yourself yet.”
The woman cut away the cloth covered in herbal paste.
“What is your name? I have to write it in the administrative record.”
An administrative record?
He could understand asking a refugee for a name. But recording it?
No German lordship Joseph knew kept records of wandering people's names. They either drove them away or exploited them. He had never heard of anyone bothering to write them down one by one.
“Tell me your name. Otherwise, you cannot receive food.”
At the word food, Joseph's stomach responded. Grrrr... broke the silence.
He swallowed dryly and spoke.
“...Joseph. Joseph Fritz.”
Scratch, scratch.
The woman moved her quill.
“Jo... seph... Fritz...”
She slowly sounded out his name as she scribbled on the paper. The way she stuck out her tongue and concentrated over unfamiliar letters made her look exactly like an ordinary village woman.
But the very fact that she could write was astonishing to Joseph.
In Germany, it was rare to see a woman who could read and write unless she was a noble or a member of the clergy.
“Wait. Joseph Fritz?”
The woman stopped writing, turned, and stared straight at Joseph.
Curiosity and shock mingled in her eyes.
“Could you be... the German peasant army's Joseph Fritz? The Joseph Fritz of the Bundschuh?”
Thud.
Joseph's heart dropped.
‘My name has spread even to Bohemia?’
For an instant, the urge to deny it rose to the tip of his tongue.
A single claim that he was someone else with the same name would be enough. There was no way she knew what the Bundschuh leader looked like.
But Joseph kept silent.
He had spent a month fleeing through the forest.
That month had been stained with lies, concealment, and murder.
He did not want to begin a new life on more lies.
“...That is correct. I am Joseph of the Bundschuh.”
The woman's eyes widened.
“My, my goodness...! Really? I saw your name in the newspaper! You led the German peasants in battle...!”
“A newspaper?”
“Yes! There was a story about you in last month's Prague Times. It said the German peasants had risen against the lords' tyranny... Wait here! You must stay here! I have to report this!”
The woman sprang up and rushed outside.
Bang!
The wooden door shut, leaving Joseph alone again.
But his confusion did not settle.
A woman could read and write.
The state recorded refugees.
And news from beyond the distant border was printed on paper and delivered even to common people.
‘What kind of world is this...?’
How much time passed?
The door opened, and an armored man entered.
“You are Joseph Fritz?”
The German was awkward but clear.
Joseph raised himself on the bed and answered.
“Yes. I am Joseph Fritz.”
“Jan Roháč of Dubá. Commander of the Bohemian border garrison.”
“Lord Roháč...”
Before Joseph could say more, Roháč spoke first.
“You know that there is a reward on your head, do you not?”
“...I do.”
Fifty gold gulden.
That was the price of his head.
“An ordinary peasant would simply be allowed through. But you are an exception. You are not merely a peasant. You are the rebel leader whom the German lords are desperate to catch. Our Director of Intelligence wishes to see you.”
“Director of Intelligence...?”
Joseph frowned.
It was a title he had never heard before.
He could understand a royal adviser or counselor, but a Director of Intelligence? Did that mean there was a separate office devoted solely to information?
But none of that mattered now.
“Lord Roháč... I have one request.”
Joseph abruptly rose from the bed. His thigh wound throbbed, but he had no room to care.
“Please...! Tell me whether my wife and daughters are safe!”
Roháč's brow twitched slightly.
“Your wife and daughters?”
“My wife's name is Elsa. My elder daughter is Emma, and my younger daughter is Sophie. I sent them to Bohemia several months ago. I do not know whether they arrived or whether they are alive. Please...”
Joseph's voice cracked.
After sending his family from Germany to Bohemia, he had spent all that time without knowing whether Elsa was alive or dead. He desperately needed to know what had become of them.
Roháč fell silent in thought.
“Elsa, Emma, Sophie... Hmm.”
He stroked his chin.
“To be honest, I do not know.”
Joseph's face visibly went pale.
Roháč quickly raised a hand and continued.
“Do not misunderstand. I do not mean it in a bad way. More than one or two refugees cross the border every day. I am a soldier guarding the border, not a clerk managing refugee registries.”
After a moment's thought, he added, “But do not worry. All refugees crossing from Germany are recorded by the administrative office.”
“The... administrative office?”
“If your family arrived safely in Bohemia, there will certainly be a record there. Their names, where they came from, even where they settled. It should not be difficult to find them.”
Records.
That word again.
The woman applying medicine had written down his name, and now this border commander spoke of administrative records.
As leader of the Bundschuh, Joseph had traveled throughout Germany.
From Saxony to Swabia, from the Palatinate to Franconia. He had passed through dozens of lordships, but nowhere had he encountered the idea of a state recording peasants' names.
“You must have suffered on your journey, so rest well for a few days. Your wound needs time to heal. You will need some strength before you travel to Prague to meet the Director of Intelligence.”
“Th... thank you.”
It was the first word of thanks he had spoken in a month.
* * *
Several days passed.
Joseph ate, slept, and received treatment for his wound at the refugee camp.
It was a truly strange place.
In Germany, refugees were no different from hunted animals.
At every territory, they were often turned away as though they were walking disease, and for those without toll money, a city's walls were nothing but a massive barrier.
Their journey always ended in a cold ditch outside the city walls, or beneath a pile of fallen leaves in an unnamed forest.
But this place was different.
There was a roof.
There were beds.
There was medicine.
And above all, there was food.
Two meals a day, morning and evening.
The meals handed out in the communal dining hall consisted of a loaf of rye bread, barley porridge, and...
“Meat...?”
Joseph doubted his eyes.
A thick stew had been served in a wooden bowl. Chunks of meat were mixed into broth with root vegetables. They were not large, but it was undeniably meat.
In Germany, meat was reserved for feast days. Bread after Sunday Mass was the week's only luxury, and a piece of salted bacon was a stroke of luck that might come once a month, if at all.
Yet in this refugee settlement, meat stew was served every other day.
Perhaps because of that, Joseph recovered quickly as he ate well.
After spending five days at the refugee settlement, Roháč's adjutant came to his barracks.
“Joseph Fritz. Can you move?”
“Yes, I have no trouble walking.”
“Good. Gather your belongings. We are going to Prague.”
Prague.
The weight of that name pressed on Joseph's chest.
The city ruled by the heretic king.
The place cursed by the Emperor and the Pope.
And perhaps the place where his family lived.
With a trembling heart, Joseph stepped outside the barracks.
A covered wagon was waiting for him.
“Get in. The journey to Prague will take a full day.”
Joseph hesitated.
It was not a prison transport. Soft straw was spread across the cargo bed, and a sturdy canvas sheet hung partly overhead to shield him from rain and wind.
‘A carriage for a refugee.’
Was he being treated like an honored guest because there was a fifty-gulden reward on his head? Or were even prisoners treated this way in Bohemia?
Pushing aside his confusion, Joseph climbed into the wagon.
Roháč's adjutant personally drove the horses at the front, with four guards following behind.
“Move out!”
Creak, rattle.
The wheels began to turn.
Joseph sat curled in a corner of the wagon bed, tensing his body as he prepared for the bone-crushing jolts he had suffered on Germany's uneven dirt roads.
But even as time passed, the pain he expected never came.
“...What?”
Joseph raised his head and looked down at the floor.
The wheels were clearly turning. He could hear the bright rhythm of hooves. Their pace was fairly quick as well.
Yet the wagon did not bounce. Only faint vibrations tickled his backside, without the awful impact of his body rising and slamming back down.
Joseph carefully lifted the canvas and looked outside.
Then his mouth fell open.
‘What... is wrong with this road?’
It was not a dirt road.
But neither was it a stone road paved with huge slabs like a Roman road.
It was gray.
It looked as if an enormous gray ribbon had cut through the forest.
The wagon glided over its hard, level surface.
“Remarkable, is it not?”
A guard riding alongside saw Joseph's vacant expression and grinned.
“It is probably the first road of its kind you have seen. We doubted our eyes the first time as well.”
“Is this... a stone road? No, it does not look as though stones were laid down...”
“It is a method devised by His Highness. Thanks to it, even when it rains, the road does not become a mud pit. The water drains away to both sides, so wagons never have to stop.”
Joseph stared blankly at the passing landscape.
‘This country... is different from the ground up.’
When the wagon left the border forest and entered the plains, Joseph received his second shock.
The houses in every village were fairly neat.
There were thatched roofs, but here and there he also saw red roofs almost like tiles.
Even the smoke rising from the chimneys was different in color.
Burning firewood should produce whitish smoke.
Burn wet wood, and it produces thick gray smoke.
But the smoke from these village chimneys was thinner and blacker.
“What is that? That black smoke... Is there a blacksmith's shop there?”
When Joseph pointed and asked, the guard answered as though it were nothing unusual.
“Oh, that comes from briquettes.”
“Briquette?”
“Fuel made by pressing coal dust together. His Highness has been distributing it since last winter. One lump keeps the hearth warm all night. Thanks to it, people no longer have to carry an axe up the mountain.”
The guard shrugged.
“In the past, countless people froze to death every winter. Firewood cost as much as gold. Pick up even one branch from a lord's forest, and people would talk about cutting off your wrist. But that is no longer necessary. Go to the market, and those black lumps are everywhere.”
Joseph stared blankly at the chimneys.
‘No need to gather firewood?’
No need to go into the forest every winter, cut down trees, split and dry the wood, then feed it into the hearth all night?
Joseph could not close his mouth.
But neither technology nor roads gave him the greatest shock.
It happened when the wagon passed through a fairly large village.
A group of peasants herding geese along the roadside saw the wagon convoy.
In Germany, they would have immediately lowered their heads, prostrated themselves in the roadside ditch, or gathered their things and fled into the forest.
Armed soldiers were raiders, tax collectors, and objects of terror.
But here...
“Guards, you work hard!”
“Heading to Prague? Could you sell our geese for us on the way? Hahaha!”
A woman hanging laundry waved at them. Children chased after the wagon, bursting into bright laughter. A farmer lifted his hat in a light bow.
They did not avert their eyes. They did not hunch their shoulders. There was not even a trace of cringing submission.
There was no fear in their eyes.
‘It cannot be that there is no war.’
Joseph knew that Bohemia was fighting the Emperor and the Pope. Yet where did this peace come from?
He did not know.
He could not understand it at all.
Joseph felt as though he had fallen into another world.
Footnotes:
Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried
