“Excuse me...but His Lordship has requested your presence at the command post,” the messenger managed to blurt out.

  “He has?” I asked.

  “Yes. He says it’s urgent.”

  “Understood. I’ll come right away.”

  With a spare thought for the firebed—I concluded there shouldn’t be any problems, even if I left it lit—I headed for the command post straight away.

  I followed after the soldier. Along the way, we passed an open space where soldiers armored in metal and leather were gathered. Leroy was with the soldiers and looked to be performing final checks. It seemed like they would be setting off toward the cave at any moment.

  It was my fervent wish that they’d fight hard and resolve the conflict by day’s end.

  When we arrived at the command tent, the soldier announced my presence formally to Marius: “My lord, I have brought the blacksmith.”

  The soldier had been correct to introduce me like that. Marius and I were friends in private, but right now, he was the count and I was but a humble blacksmith.

  “Good work,” Marius praised kindly. “Everyone, please leave us.”

  At his command, the soldiers filed out of the tent. Miss Frederica followed them, shooting anxious glances back at me as she left. I didn’t think I was here to be punished, but I couldn’t rule that out...or the possibility that it was something even worse.

  “I’m guessing you have crucial news for me, seeing as you cleared the room,” I said without preamble. I didn’t need to be diplomatic when it was just me and Marius left alone in the tent.

  “Yes, well, crucial may be overstating it somewhat,” he replied. It seemed like he was struggling with what to say, which was unusual for him.

  “No sense in beating around the bush. Give it to me straight. But of course, trust I won’t be doing it for free,” I joked.

  “All right then,” Marius began. “I’m sorry to ask you to do this, but I need you to head into the cave as an escort. Not for me, but for an elf from the village nearby. They will be helping us destroy the spawn origin.”

  “Is there a shortage of soldiers?” I asked.

  “Nothing like that. Redistributing personnel is a possibility. The camp can spare a soldier or two to serve as guards. It’s not a problem of quantity per se...”

  He hesitated.

  “Aaah.” I nodded my understanding.

  An escort was responsible not only for the safety of his charges but for his own safety as well. Therefore, when push came to shove, being an escort wasn’t only a matter of being willing to stake one’s life—an escort who was killed in action had failed their mission.

  Veteran officers commanded squads of a dozen men each, but they had their own duties. Other than that, most of the soldiers who joined this campaign were still green.

  “You’re asking a lot of an ordinary blacksmith,” I protested for formality’s sake, knowing that this wasn’t the kind of request a lord would normally make of a blacksmith.

  “But you’re strong, aren’t you, Eizo?”

  He’s not going to budge.

  Marius knew I had the skills to undertake the mission. In the midst of his family dispute, he’d seen me withstand the margrave’s attempts to pressure me.

  “Truth be told, I didn’t want to involve you in this either,” he said. His words may or may not have been genuine, but his demeanor was apologetic. Marius wasn’t my benefactor nor had he saved my life, but he was a friend to whom I owed much. So, if he was in a bind and I could help, I would.

  But I had one more reason to accept the request, a reason more important than anything else...

  “I promised,” I mumbled.

  “What did you say?” Marius asked.

  “Just talking to myself.”

  The day before I’d left, Diana had asked me to take care of Marius, and I couldn’t break a promise I’d made to one of my precious family members.

  “All right, I’ll do it,” I conceded at last. “But you’ll have to explain to the troops why a smith who’s past his prime is doing protection detail.”

  “I got that covered. I’ll tell people you were originally an experienced fighter and became a blacksmith in order to obtain the ultimate weapon for yourself. You realized that you were suited for the profession and continued to do it. However, your combat skills never rusted, and you’re still stronger than any new soldier,” he recited glibly.

  I reluctantly agreed to the cover story with a shrug. Marius had clearly thought through everything in advance. “Am I heading out immediately?”

  “Yes. We’ll be meeting up with your charge a little ways away from the camp,” he explained.

  “I got it. I’ll go prepare.”

  “I’m counting on you.”

  I nodded, then left the command post behind me and returned to my tent to grab my shortsword. Next, I stopped by the workshop. I piled up the extra charcoal outside and placed the heated breastplate on top, then I constructed a barrier around the charcoal with bricks.

  On the way out, I grabbed the goddess figurine and slipped her into my pocket as a protective charm. I took the spear I’d made as well—it’d be a deadly weapon as long as the interior of the cave was spacious enough to accommodate its 120-centimeter length. As an escort, it was better for me to arm myself with ranged weapons than close combat ones.

  And, if we had to make a hasty retreat, I could just abandon the shaft and bring the speartip back with me.

  Armed with my two weapons, I trotted back to the command post where Marius was waiting. There was a piece of leather chest armor prepared. “If I may, is this meant for my use, my lord?” I asked, adopting a formal address since there were several other people in the tent, including Miss Frederica.

  “Yes. Take them,” Marius responded. He called over a female soldier. “Assist him.”

  “Yes, my lord.” She brought over the armor and helped me put it on. I wouldn’t have been able to make heads or tails of it myself. The woman was remarkably efficient with her movements, and when I took a closer look, I realized that she was one of the servants who’d helped me don formal wear for the banquet at the Eimoor estate.

  She’d recognized me as well, and she shot me a faint smile.

  Once armored, I looked like a proper foot soldier. Though, if I wanted to march in a phalanx, I’d still need a shield.

  As the female servant departed, she whispered to me under her breath, “It suits you.” I felt embarrassed by the compliment.

  Miss Frederica witnessed my moment of discomfort. When our eyes met, she asked out of the blue, “Eizo, you have military experience, correct?”

  “No, not even a little,” I admitted. “That’s why I needed help to put on the armor.”

  “Well, you look good,” she said.

  I smiled. “That’s very kind of you to say.”

  All right. It’s time to go.

  I glanced over in Marius’s direction where he was standing with the servant. They were both looking over at us with soft expressions.

  Could it be that Miss Frederica is here as a soothing presence?

  I soon left the command post and headed to the square where I saw the soldiers gathering. I took my place in line behind everyone else. Apparently, I would be joining the unit under Marius’s direct command.

  Not long after I joined the group, Marius came out of the command post. The soldiers reorganized themselves into their units and greeted Marius. Instead of saluting, they brought a fist up to tap their chest.

  Marius raised his hand in a signal, and everyone brought their fists down again.

  As Marius cast his gaze upon the ranks of soldiers gathered before him, he raised his voice to speak. “My fellow warriors, today is the day we bring the hammer of righteousness down upon the scourge that has taken root in our lands. We shall emerge from this day victorious!” His voice projected across the lines of men. “Unfortunately, I cannot promise you all the rewards you deserve for your part in this historic moment—the vaults of the Eimoor estate would be emptied of treasure. On the other hand, the vacant rooms would make excellent lodgings for those of you who are looking to save coin on taverns, so one could call it a boon of sorts.”

  Marius’s candidness earned him a round of laughter from the troops.

  Good start. It wasn’t much of a joke, but laughter is a good sign. We’d really be against the ropes if no one could muster up a smile.

  Marius continued. “Today is the first step on the path to riches and glory. I hope that you will step up to your futures with determination and excitement. My brothers-in-arms, this victory—the first of many—shall be written down in history, and so, too, shall be your bravery and valor!”

  A cheer roared through the crowd at the end of Marius’s speech. The count had done his job, inspiring and invigorating the troops.

  May we ride this momentum and successfully root out the monsters today.

  Leroy took off first, taking the majority of the soldiers with him. The troops were lined up neatly, marching in lockstep, and they departed in high spirits. It was overall an intimidating sight.

  The escort team, which included Marius and me, was heading in a different direction so we could rendezvous with the elven villager. It’s not like we were a special ops unit, not by any means—we were only splitting off from the main troops because it would’ve been logistically difficult to route the entire force to the village. After all, it was a complicated task to move ten thousand soldiers anywhere. Besides, Marius wanted to keep his hand of command as light as possible, so opting for a smaller escort team was ideal.

  One of the soldiers took the lead. “The rendezvous point is this way.”

  I remembered seeing him before on the Eimoor grounds, so he must’ve been a servant with martial arts training brought along as a personal guard.

  Why didn’t Marius just assign these men and women to the elf’s protective detail?

  But as soon as I had that thought, I realized that my idea would mean leaving Marius undefended.

  After a short while, we entered an area that was too densely populated with trees to be called woods and too sparsely populated to be called a forest. The lower branches of many trees had been sawed off. I suspected that the trees here were cultivated as a source of wood.

  We’d been walking for just under half an hour, and the trees had started to crowd around us. Suddenly, I caught sight of an elven woman standing with her back to us. Strapped to her waist was a valuable-looking sword.

  I wonder if she uses that in actual battle...

  Several men were chatting around her; they must’ve been sent to guard her on the way here.

  The soldier leading us pointed her out. “She’s the one,” he said to me and Marius.

  The woman turned as if she’d heard him. She had almond-shaped eyes and fine, silver hair that fell down to her shoulders. Her ears were long and pointed—no surprises there. In fact, none of her features were particularly remarkable, but nevertheless, I was shocked to see her.

  My charge was far from a stranger to me.

  It was Lidy.

  I called without thinking. “Miss Lidy?” My brain short-circuited in shock. It would’ve been smarter to pretend that this was the first time we were meeting, but it was too late to put on that farce.

  “Eizo?!” Lidy exclaimed, her voice surprisingly loud. Her eyes were wide open, an expression I’d never seen while she’d lived with us. Clearly, she hadn’t been expecting to see me either.

  “The two of you are acquainted?” Marius asked, not even trying to hide his curiosity. Judging by his tone, it didn’t seem like he’d planned this reunion on purpose. If he had, he would’ve been grinning shamelessly right about now.

  There was no reason to hide our relationship, so I answered truthfully. “Y-Yes. She is a former client of my forge.”

  Lidy nodded without speaking. She’d schooled her expression back to its usual placidity, but I could tell that she was feeling a bit shy.

  “Is that how it is?” Marius teased, his lips twitching into a smile. “I’d pegged you for a bit of a stiff, but it looks like you have a few tricks up your sleeve after all.” His eyes twinkled like he’d just found a shiny new toy to play with.

  “I implore you to save your jokes,” I protested, striving to maintain a formal facade.

  “Introductions won’t be necessary, I imagine. This woman is your charge. Your mission is to escort her safely into the innermost cavern of the cave,” Marius commanded.

  “I understand. I will protect her with my life.”

  It still felt awkward for me to speak so properly with Marius given that we were good friends.

  “I can rest assured knowing that Eizo is the one guarding me. I’ll be in your care,” Lidy said. A smile bloomed on her face, delicate and elegant like a flower.

  I couldn’t tell if she had sensed my embarrassment or not.

  “You can count on me,” I replied.

  The journey to the cave was rather relaxed. Though I was Lidy’s official escort, we were surrounded by other soldiers, so the chance of encountering a truly dangerous monster was slim. Nevertheless, I held my spear at the ready so I could whip it up at a moment’s notice.

  After some time, we emerged from the forest onto a grassy plain. Across the level ground was a chain of low mountains where the rumored cave was no doubt located.

  We caught sight of the tracks left by the main body of troops and followed them. There were no signs of other animals in sight, so perhaps they’d fled after seeing the ranks of humans filing through the area. Though our group was small, I doubted that any wild animals would try to attack us.

  Before long, I saw the yawning mouth of the cave entrance set into the mountain wall before us. A dozen or so soldiers were standing guard. Everyone else must’ve already gone ahead.

  The commander of the soldiers at the entrance watched as we approached. When we arrived, he said, “Let’s go in.”

  We all nodded.

  Marius gave no orders to his personal guards. They would be staying outside of the cave as backup, and would only join the battle if the situation became truly desperate.

  One of the soldiers lit a torch from a campfire near the entrance, and the flame illuminated our path as we walked into the cave’s murky depths.

  Thanks to the diligence of the troops under Leroy’s command, we didn’t encounter a single monster for the first half hour.

  “These passages run deep,” I murmured.

  “Yes, even more than they appear,” the commander explained. “Yesterday, we advanced to the innermost chamber. If we’re unimpeded, it should take us an hour to reach it.”

  By my estimates, the passage went deep, some four kilometers in length. There were hardly any branching passages, and the earlier troops had left torches along the way to guide our path, so there was little danger of us losing our way.

  “Magic tends to pool in complex cave systems like this one. Once the stagnant magic exceeds a certain threshold, monsters will spawn. At least, that’s what I’ve heard, but I don’t know the specifics,” Lidy explained.

  In other words, a monster encounter out in the wild was unlikely unless you came to a place like this one. Now I understood why we’d never seen a monster in the Black Forest despite its high concentration of magical essence. However, this mission had impressed something important on me—I needed to ask Samya about any caves in the vicinity of the Black Forest. It would be a problem if monsters suddenly started appearing near our home.

  We walked for a while longer, and soon, we started to hear the muffled sounds of metal clashing against metal. In this situation, that could only mean one thing: there was a battle up ahead. Because of the echoing, it was hard to tell how close we were. We increased our pace, but we didn’t run—that would only tire us out before the main act.

  “Hold on,” I said to the commander. “You said you went into the innermost chamber yesterday, right? But you weren’t able to root out the monsters?”

  “No, we weren’t. There was an unexpectedly tough one amongst the enemy’s midst, so we played it safe and retreated,” he answered.

  “So why are Miss Lidy and I joining today?”

  “As long as their chief is alive, the monsters will continue to spawn. Unfortunately, bringing down the chief is a difficult task for new soldiers. The elves know how to do it though, so we have requested their assistance.”

  Lidy was the equivalent of a barrel of gunpowder, hauled into a monster’s lair to blow it to smithereens once and for all. I didn’t want to compare Lidy to a mere tool, but essentially, the mission’s success relied on the safe delivery of the all-important weapon.

  The sounds of fighting grew louder as we darted down the passage.

  “Why is it mission-critical to take down the chief?” I asked the leader.

  Lidy answered in his stead. “Monsters are the embodiment of stagnant magic,” she said in a soft but clear voice. “They are made of magic.”

  “They’re not living beings?” I asked.

  “Not technically. Not most of them. Dragons, demons, and beasts corrupted by magic are exceptions, but monsters spawned by magic are not alive the way you and I are. They will continue to spawn out of control and attack living creatures of flesh and blood.”

  The way she talked about them reminded me of the monsters in video games from my previous world. They spawned with no limit, for the sole purpose of attacking victims, and had no lifestyles or backstories. Truly, they lived an existence of mindless violence.

  “What happens when you defeat them?” I asked.

  “The magical essence that makes up their bodies will disappear. If the monster was originally a wild beast, the body alone will remain.”

  So, the bear I killed previously might have been a magical beast, but it definitely hadn’t been spawned from pure magic. I’d been thinking of magic as a type of energy, but it looked like I’d been slightly off the mark. Or rather, magic seemed to violate the law of conservation of energy—the types of energy I knew couldn’t just vanish from a system.

 

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