Awakening the Great Chapter 61

Chapter 61: The Fire that Fills the Gap

The battle against the Niboria Imperial Army had just ended. Strewn across the village were the bodies of fallen soldiers, burnt rooftops, and a deep, pervasive silence.

The Mountain Rabbits cleaned the blood from their weapons and gathered the corpses into one place. A few had sustained minor wounds, but no one had been seriously injured.

Much of that was owed to Calix.

They had all seen it. The trail of flas embroidered across the open air.

Fwoooosh!

Mana surged along the tip of Calix's blade. His allies cried out in awe and cheered, while the enemy was psychologically overwheld.

Naturally enough, after the Centurion fell in a single blow, there was no further fighting. The soldiers were too busy fleeing. Not even Niboria's famously strict military discipline or their well-tempered weapons had held against fear.

Amid all this, the dwarf Basim turned the lted sword over in his hands and grumbled.

"This thing's turned into outright garbage. Can't even use it for scrap. This is exactly the problem with burning through mana like that."

"I'm sorry. After you went to all the trouble of picking it out."

"……Picking it out, he says. We bought it in a village the size of a rat's dropping. What great weapon was going to be found there? I knew it might co to this, so I bought several—doesn't matter in the end."

His tone was gruff, yet he looked genuinely fascinated. The blade, lted by the Falling Fire, still bore the traces of every swing he had made. The surface tal had been pushed to one side, preserving the shape of the flas that had since disappeared.

Just then, several village elders stepped forward and bowed their heads in silence. The problem was that their gratitude was directed at the wrong person.

Calix quickly waved them off and pointed to the commander, Royce. Perhaps because they had spent their whole lives in this one village, they had mistaken who was in charge.

The villagers jolted in surprise and crowded around the unit leader. Most of them were grateful for the Mountain Rabbits' intervention, but a few bit their lips and looked away.

"We are grateful for your assistance. We don't know how we could ever repay you……."

"Never mind that. It wasn't a commission, but it was sothing we needed to do for ourselves as well."

Royce deflected the village chief's flattery. The Mountain Rabbits hadn't stepped in out of simple compassion.

* * *

Ella rolled up the hem of her cloak and carefully brought her hands to the wounds of the injured. A faint Sacred Light spread from her fingertips. As divine power flowed down like lted wax and enveloped the girl's leg, the child swallowed a sob with effort.

"Does it hurt?"

"……I'm fine. It feels warm."

The surrounding adults bowed their heads repeatedly. The emotion on their faces was less one of reverence and closer to montary relief.

Calix watched the scene from the outskirts of the village, beneath the shade of a tree. Clustered close around him were mid-rank rcenaries—Volga, Wheatley, Romance, and the others.

"Did things turn out well?"

"They turned out well. We accomplished our objective. There were almost no casualties, and even those who were injured were healed quickly thanks to Ella."

Volga handed a strip of dried at to a child who had wandered close and continued speaking.

"The objective, you an……. The war?"

"Right. We did take on that assignnt to escort the prince of Latia not long ago, but after that there's no official record of what we've been up to. For our part, we need to make our presence known before the Niboria Empire withdraws. We have to leave so trace that we were active sowhere in between. We can't have stray sparks flying our way once the war wraps up."

"No, what do you an we need to make more of a presence? We fought so hard against those wolf pack bastards. What about the assassins jumping out of the shadows?"

"There are no witnesses."

"The mage? The Storm Forest? The investigation team?"

Calix answered with silence. The mbers of the investigation team were the most likely to be able to testify on their behalf, but they were currently heading deep into the eastern reaches of the continent.

Fortunately, Volga grasped the unspoken aning without difficulty.

"……Damn it, I thought being a rcenary just ant you had to fight."

He took his frustrations out on the village children. He pulled all manner of food from his pack and handed it out one after another without pause.

In truth, though, even that wasn't the real goal. The reason the Mountain Rabbits were pushing north—it could be glimpsed in the rage-laced curses of the unit mbers.

"I want to see Adrian's face again, that son of a bitch. What? He paid the commission fee in promissory notes? What good is that if no one will cash them?"

"He's saying you can't cash them in the Astria Kingdom."

"Right, that's why we're heading north now. You heard what the rchants were saying? Go to the Elvra Holy Empire and cash them there in person."

And that was it.

The promissory notes Adrian Deconti had handed over as paynt for the commission couldn't be exchanged for money. At least, no one in the Astria Kingdom would honor them.

But should that be written off as purely a bad thing?

In Calix's estimation, no.

Two hundred gold coins, no less. A sum that ordinary people would never even speak of in their lifetis. And that enormous amount had beco their justification for slipping free of Duke Saitz's grasp.

For rcenaries, money was everything.

Of course, that reason alone felt a touch insufficient. The rcenary guild would understand, but the nobles would seize on it as grounds for complaint eventually. That was why they needed to keep leaving traces—evidence that the Mountain Rabbits were working on behalf of the Astria Kingdom.

"E, excuse !"

Just then, a middle-aged man burst out from among the villagers. He was wearing a threadbare coat and ragged trousers. He didn't quite seem to belong among the locals.

"I'm a peddler. A traveling rchant, if you will. Could it be that you are…… The Mountain Rabbits?"

Dwarf Basim narrowed his eyes and responded.

"……What of it?"

"Oh my, so it really is you! No wonder there was a dwarf! I'd half believed it and half doubted it until now!"

The man clapped his hands together with an expression of deep emotion, then steadied his breath and muttered as if to himself.

"So the rumors were true. That you were moving around disrupting the empire's rear lines……. It was real!"

"Rumors?"

Royce frowned as he echoed the word.

"Ah, yes. It's sothing that's been circulating among rchants lately, you might say……. The war has been dragging on, and the Mountain Rabbits had been unusually quiet for a group of their reputation. Then word spread that you'd been given so sort of secret mission. That the royal family had commissioned you directly, that you were moving in place of the knights……."

"And where did those words co from?"

"Ha, well. I couldn't say, honestly. But the strange part is, rchants traveling between completely different regions were saying the sa thing. Which ans they all heard the exact sa rumor."

At that mont, Calix's gaze t Royce's. The two exchanged no words, but sothing definite passed between them in that brief instant.

……It could be an intentional rumor. Whether it's baseless gossip or not, soone steered it along. Most likely nobles who spread the word.

They were making use of the na Mountain Rabbits without permission, but it was also tily help.

Royce carried on in a composed voice, as though he hadn't heard any of it. He kept an eye on the rchant's reactions while probing with questions.

"I see. In that case, have you heard any recent news about how the tide of the war has been turning?"

"Ah, I suppose it would be difficult for you to keep up with news out here. Unfortunately, the situation isn't good. These n aren't pulling back even as spring approaches."

"……They're not pulling back?"

"Yes. Normally they would have withdrawn long before now……. But this ti looks different. There are widespread rumors that they're attempting to annex the northern region. Word has it that their forces were reinforced once more through the border territories."

After that, it was ti to wait.

He had gained new information, but gave no sign of it—he simply folded his arms and kept his mouth shut. Silence was a prompt directed at the other party.

Ask.

Go on.

The traveling rchant did not disappoint. He scratched his head, and then his eyes lit up in an instant as his tongue got to work.

"Might I ask…… Where you are headed?"

"You do seem to love talking."

"Ah, er, that wasn't my intention. I was simply asking in the hope that, if we were headed in the sa direction, I might impose on your company for a while. I, if it was a rude question, I do beg your pardon. As rchants tend to do, I carry news of the world back and forth, so……."

He asked.

Without quite realizing it, Calix gave a small nod. Royce, on the other hand, let out a quiet snort and shook his head.

"You cannot travel with us. We're heading north."

"As it happens, I'm also heading north……. Ah, a secret mission, of course! But if you're going further north from here……. Surely you're not heading to the Holy Empire?"

"Weren't you the one who called it a secret mission."

"Ah, ah……. Right, of course. How rude of ……."

It was almost as if the man's thoughts were visible. The middle-aged rchant pieced together the rumors he had heard, fitting them this way and that, and soon arrived at a single conclusion.

An envoy from the Holy Empire had co to retrieve the Draug's Core! That's it—this ti, the Mountain Rabbits are playing the role of envoy! They're going to request reinforcents, reinforcents!

At just that mont, the Mountain Rabbits' unit leader stepped forward. His low voice carried quietly on the breeze.

"You're a fellow subject of the Astria Kingdom, so I won't go as far as a warning. Just don't spread word that we've been entrusted with a special mission."

"Yes, yes, of course. You have my word. Absolutely. Ab-so-lute-ly."

But even as those words left his mouth, the flas of desire burned plainly in the rchant's eyes. He knew this information was worth money.

And likewise, Royce and Calix both knew the sa.

The rumors the traveling rchant would spread would inflate the Mountain Rabbits' reputation and serve as an invisible shield.

Yet because none of it was the truth, Calix found it bittersweet that it would be taken as real. It was a strange feeling.

* * *

Preparing to depart took no ti at all. They loaded the spoils of battle onto the wagon, checked on the horses, and repaired or replaced damaged weapons.

Calix, too, buckled a new sword at his hip. It looked fine on the outside, but the quality wasn't exceptional—he'd need to find sothing sturdier before long.

That was when it happened.

"……Hey, mister."

A quiet call. He turned, and there stood the child who had taken the dried at from Volga. Both hands were empty, the child's appearance was shabby, but those eyes were steady.

"Do you need food? Should I give you more?"

Calix smiled and reached into his pack. Thankfully, he still had a few pieces of dried fruit. Just then, the child shook their head.

"Don't want any. I just……. Ca to say sothing."

"What is it?"

"The soldiers are going to co back."

It was said too flatly to be a warning, and yet it carried absolute certainty.

"Those people were the sa way before. They co like this, they kill people, they run away, and then they co back again."

"……."

"So you be careful too, mister."

For a mont, Calix's hand stilled.

The child's words were plain, but they lodged in his chest like a thorn. He knew it too. He had raised his blade and fought, drawn flas through the air, and so had regarded it as a miracle.

But the child standing before him treated it as nothing more than a mont.

The village fence would be broken again, and people young and old alike would die again. This couldn't be called protection.

No—to begin with, even the intention itself had not been pure. The Mountain Rabbits—Calix himself—had only done this because it had been necessary to them.

He felt sothing heavy pressing down on one corner of his chest.

Perhaps it was because he had co to know his bloodline. He was the descendant of a hero. But fleeing like this seed far removed from what a hero would do.

Or perhaps it was because he understood, practically speaking, that there was no answer here. The opponents they had fought this ti numbered only around a hundred. He had felt the change in his strength as an Upper-Rank Swordsman, but staging a direct confrontation with the Niboria Imperial Army was still suicidal.

That's right.

Just as the Falling Fire was imperfect, Calix's capricious appearance and assistance was not complete salvation, either. He didn't even have the ability to be so.

That fact weighed on him.

Pitter-patter-patter!

But his inner turmoil lasted only a mont. The little child blinked once, then turned and dashed away without looking back.

Calix stood without a word. He looked like a man who had reached down into the deep earth to pull up so emotion, only to find he couldn't tell what it was.

In that mont—

"You're making a complicated face."

Gregor ca to his side and spoke. He didn't turn his head to look. From behind, a heavy palm landed on his shoulder with a solid thud.

"What you want to do and what you can do are different things. A cook's friend can't change that child's world. But didn't you buy the people of this village ti to choose? That alone is a remarkable gift."

"……Is that so."

"Indeed. War is like a storm, you know. Even at its most fierce, it only lasts so long. Perhaps that's why the brief mont it pauses, that gap, stays in the mory longest. And you are the person who made that gap for them. Everything will be fine."

Gregor let out a small laugh, gave his shoulder a few firm pats, and quietly turned and walked away.

Everything he said was right.

But Calix could not simply accept his own imperfection as it was. He stood there for a ti, staring down the alleyway where the child had disappeared. A place where the weak ca and went—those who resembled his younger self. He gazed in silence at a place where a bitter wind might blow again without warning.

So emotion, very old, slowly crawled up from sowhere deep beneath the floor.