Chapter 42
"Ha.... You really don't understand words."
The man sighed as if frustrated, stuck his face right under Yaan's nose and lowered his voice.
"I get you're showing off in front of your girl, but you should size people up before jumping in, yeah?"
At those words, the two hulking n slowly closed in on Yaan.
"I guarantee it-if it weren't for him, you'd be regretting this."
"Shit, what the hell is this crazy bastard saying."
The man smirked, stepped back, lit a cigarette, and quietly spoke to the two brutes now in front of Yaan.
Flick!
"Dip it."
At that word the brutes charged.
Whoosh-!
Dodging the fist flying at him, Yaan clicked his tongue once and spoke to the brute in front of him.
"You threw the first punch."
Soon Yaan grabbed the hand thrust straight toward him.
"This punk, you're gonna take this?"
The instant one of the brutes said that-
Crackle!
Yaan, still gripping the man's hand, bent the middle finger all the way backward.
"Gyaaaah!?"
"Wh-what the hell is this guy!?"
In the blink of an eye the brute collapsed, clutching his finger and groaning at the sharp pain; every attempt to bend the finger that had popped out of joint sent bones grinding and pain coursing through him.
The finger, already dislocated at the joint, brought agony like twisting bones whenever he tried to move it.
"You little shit, you're dead!"
Shouting, the other brute swung his fist.
"Bite down hard. If you bite your tongue you won't handle it."
As he said that, Yaan slipped through the fist flying at him and slamd his heel into the brute's knee.
Crunch!
Pain surged from the knee bent backward like a deer's.
"Gyaaaaah!?"
"Ah, that was a bit much."
Seeing the two brutes rendered senseless in an instant, the man looked at Yaan in disbelief.
"H-hold on. It hasn't even been five minutes...."
"If this were a battlefield you'd already be a corpse."
Yaan stepped right up to the man's nose as he spoke. Recognizing the brand on Yaan's shoulder, the man's body trembled like an aspen.
Yaan pressed down on the trembling shoulder and headed back to the dining room.
"Don't draw your blade. I'm saying this for your sake."
With those final words, Yaan vanished from sight; the tension snapped and the man slumped, legs giving out.
"I'm back."
"Sit. Lieutenant Dandel brought your share."
The three already seated at the table welcod Yaan.
"There seed to be soone they called master."
"I handled it. So polite, they even gave this wine as a gift."
Cain grinned as he spoke.
Outside, groans of pain could still be heard, but he shrugged it off and offered Yaan a glass.
"With the war on, scum like that seem to be growing bolder."
"The one we just t claid to have ties to local bigwigs, didn't he?"
"Already sent soone in His Highness's na. Let's see if he can still act high and mighty in front of the Imperial tax auditors."
And so the four began to talk.
The main topics were events on the front lines and the ruins they had seen in the elf village.
Cain and Dandel asked, Yaan answered. Deep into the night, their conversation at the corner table never stopped.
***
"Capital Vailsar! This is Capital Vailsar!"
Yaan and his party were not the only soldiers getting off the train.
"Mother!"
"Oh, my son!"
"Anna! I'm ho! How are the kids!?"
"We're fine! We've been waiting so long for you!"
The station was packed with troops returning from different fronts or coming ho on leave.
"I'll head to the main house first."
"It was fun. Enjoy your leave."
"I had a great ti too!"
After seeing Dandel disappear into the crowd, Yaan looked around at the sea of people.
For the first ti he saw soone weeping tears of joy at eting the one they'd waited for.
Next he saw soone kneeling with the ashes of a loved one, sobbing.
Nearby an old woman wandered endlessly, searching for kin whose bodies never even ca back.
Elsewhere children were wasting away, waiting for fathers who would never return.
He saw crippled stragglers abandoned even by family, and youths in monastic habits dodging the draft.
In this crucible where every joy and sorrow mingled, he stood empty-handed.
"Yaan."
Startled by Ren's voice, he turned to her clinging to his side.
"Cover identity. Help. Escort."
"...What do I do?"
She laced her arm through his. In fresh white travelling clothes changed on the train, the girl in pure white led him through the crowd with light steps.
"Commander Cain?"
"Business with the knights. I've got the quarters address."
"Why you... no, forget it."
He had indeed been dazed by the station crowds; there was no use explaining further.
Soon Ren hailed a carriage and climbed in with Yaan, naming their destination.
"To the Diana estate."
"Yes, ma'am."
The carriage rattled over cobblestones as the driver spoke.
Though the jolts were worse than a convoy truck, the ride was still better than Glaepnir; Yaan adapted without trouble.
"You said it was a cover identity, how did you get into a viscounty?"
The Empire strictly tracked noble births and deaths. Rumor had it the Imperial Intelligence could even find illegitimate children cast away on distant isles, sending every noble's whereabouts to His Imperial Majesty in real ti.
"I didn't get in-I made it."
"...When was this?"
"Thirty years after the Empire's founding."
His mind reeled.
Now he understood how she could keep masquerading as nobility.
"So what's the real reason you brought here?"
The escort for cover identity had clearly been a lie once she told that story.
Ren studied Yaan's face, then pointed to a part of it with her finger.
"Your eye."
"Eye?"
Yaan touched the left eye hidden beneath the eyepatch-or rather, the place where the left eye had been.
"Treatnt? I heard recovery was impossible."
"Not treatnt-implantation."
"Implant? Like the one in the back of my neck?"
He fingered the device implanted at his nape.
Ren shook her head quietly and began to speak.
"That's a dium to connect you to Glaepnir. What I prepared is an eye-complete in itself."
"What on earth are you talking about."
While they spoke, Ren and Yaan arrived at their destination, stepped down from the carriage, and looked up at the mansion before them.
The viscounty of Diana's mansion.
Though its grounds rivaled those of a count's estate, the building itself was utterly ordinary. Repeated expansions and rebuilds had left the mansion unrecognizable from its original form.
"So you're here?"
The mont they entered, the greeting that greeted them was not from the servants but a gruff baritone.
As the figure with the rough voice walked out from the living room, Yaan's eye widened in surprise.
"A dwarf?"
"Aye. Dwarf. Na's Brak, lad."
Short limbs covered in thick hair, a beard reaching to his chest, and those unmistakably brash eyes-seeing a dwarf, a nomad, here in the Imperial capital left Yaan staring in bewildernt.
"What, first ti seeing a ground-crawler, lad?"
"Ground-crawler?"
"It's what dwarves call ourselves. Other races using it is an insult."
What kind of standard is that?
Even as that thought crossed his mind, Yaan, recalling who the woman beside him was, accepted the dwarf's approaching hand without protest.
"So you still haven't given up?"
"The last attachnt. My final master."
"Hah, until you cut it open you never know."
Dismissing Ren's cryptic remark, Brak began to stroke Yaan's face as if lost in thought.
"Lad, take off the eyepatch."
"Pardon..."
At his words, Yaan removed the eyepatch.
The empty socket, having lost the entire eyeball, showed no emotion.
"Ha, you kept your sanity with one eye in this state?"
"Kept my sanity and even fought."
"Mad bastard."
The curses rained down at once, but they didn't feel all that bad.
"The Fra's been delivered. Only the left arm was wrecked, so about a fortnight."
"Faster than I expected."
"Still, I won't be able to fix it perfectly. It'll creak more than when it was new."
"I'll adapt."
Saying that, Yaan parried the dwarf's questions while the dwarf poked at his empty socket.
"Ha, thick-skulled doesn't cover it. You're sure about this one?"
"By my standards."
"Fine. Then let's give it a go."
With those words Brak beckoned Yaan to co closer.
Guided by him, Yaan lay down on the sofa in the living room. Soon he felt the dwarf's fingers rummaging inside his vacant left socket.
"Um, what exactly are you doing..."
"Oh? You can feel it? poking around your socket?"
"If you prod like that, of course I'll feel it even if I hate it."
The tone was faintly mocking, yet the dwarf simply nodded, unbothered.
"Good. If your senses are this sharp we can implant it right now. Where's the item?"
"Here."
Lifting himself from the sofa, Yaan also looked at the object Ren handed to Brak.
An eye of the sa color as his own rolled back and forth in the dwarf Brak's palm.
"Tauros' calculation module improved with Nill, processed into an implantable form."
"Feels like the Ancient relic is gnawing away at piece by piece."
Even as he said that, recovering his lost eye was welco news.
"Anyway, who else in the world would work a fad dwarf like to the bone for both implantation and repairs? Ren."
"Complain to your ancestor."
"Already am! Dozens of tis a day at his grave!"
Saying that, Brak walked to a corner of the room and soon returned with a bag packed full of surgical tools.
"I'll be connecting the optic nerves one by one; it'll hurt, lad."
With that, Brak seated Yaan upright and began strapping his limbs to the sofa's armrest and floor.
"This brings back rather unpleasant mories."
"Heh-heh-heh, rember the first connection procedure? This'll be better than that."
"Not much comfort."
That was Yaan's last remark before Brak's operation began.
The procedure-scraping away necrotic tissue to find nerve stems and connect them one by one to the prosthetic eye-inflicted excruciating pain every mont.
"Ugh...!"
"Ha, to endure this-definitely a madman."
"I... hear that... a lot."
Even after pouring in two ampoules of anesthetic, the agony was beyond what a sober mind could bear.
Yet each ti a nerve ca alive, Yaan felt the sight in his left eye gradually returning; clenching his fists, he endured the tornt inflicted upon him.
***
Mornings in the capital were utterly different from those at the front.
Ring-ring! Ring-ring!
A paperboy on a bicycle rode through the alleys, tossing newspapers onto every doorstep.
'Central front reports no anomalies! Victory for Second Prince Gard!'
'Mana bearers, report to the monastery or governnt offices without delay.'
'Death to the elves! Long live the Empire!'
'Composer Tschoppsky releases march dedicated to the Imperial Army; currently perford by the 48th Symphony Orchestra...'
"Most of the capital's papers are fabrications."
"The essence of the press never changes. They don't present facts as they are, but tailor selected information to consurs-commodifying information."
"Did the Ancients have newspapers too?"
"Different dium, but the role is similar. The quality of their information was lower than modern humanity's."
"The Ancients who created monsters like Glaepnir were behind us? Ridiculous."
"I wish I could believe it was ridiculous, after what I've seen and heard."
In the morning light, Yaan dressed in his uniform.
On the sofa Ren, in airy sleepwear, sipped from a mug of coffee.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
"Lieutenant Yaan Verkut. I've co from the Imperial capital."
"Pardon. I'll be right out."
Yaan, now neatly clad in his dress uniform.
Attaching the Penal Corps brand and the company emblem to his shoulder, he opened the door of the quarters Cain had prepared.
"Pleasure to et you. Lieutenant Yaan Verkut. I'll be your guide today, from the Imperial Royal Guard-!"
The guard, who had introduced himself so eloquently, suddenly froze mid-sentence.
"P-Penal Corps...?"
The Penal Corps brand etched on Yaan's shoulder.
Wearing it openly, Yaan asked back as if nothing were amiss.
"Is there a problem?"
Startled back to his senses, the guard answered at once.
"N-no, sir. This way, please."
His voice, unlike monts before, was now filled with fear as he led Yaan to the carriage.
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