The Faraway Paladin 4: The Torch Port Ensemble Read online

  And though I phrased it as “I’m changing it to a glaive suited for battle, so I’d like you to keep hold of the hilt and guard that I don’t need,” Al knew me well enough to understand exactly what I was trying to do.

  “I appreciate the consideration.”

  After making it through that large battle with the foul-dragon, Al’s stature was now that of a proper warrior, standing tall with a smile on his face. He still had a lot of improving to do in terms of his skills in battle, but those would grow with time. Even now, he was busy gathering his dwarven brothers and making preparations for resurrecting their homeland. In time, Al—Vindalfr—would surely forge a path to the Iron Mountains and revive that underground kingdom. I could believe that now without any doubt.

  It was then that a reserved knock came at the door to the hall.

  “Come in.”

  “Pardon me.”

  The door opened, and Anna entered.

  Anna had loosely braided flaxen hair and a serious countenance that was a good match for her priest’s robes. She was like the glue of Torch Port, acting as a kind of coordinator of the priests involved in the running of the town whom we were borrowing from Bishop Bagley in Whitesails. She was a priest of the god of lightning, Volt, just like Bishop Bagley, and quite a gifted user of benediction. But her greatest skill was that she was a very competent official, performing her work quickly and efficiently. In addition to having a broad knowledge of religious services and ceremonies, she was also familiar with the uncodified rules of common law. Disputes within the farming villages over land, water, and inheritance. Business-related conflicts in Torch Port: late payments, price hikes, production delays, quantity discrepancies, quality issues. Mugging, stealing, fraud, extortion, destruction of property, and other criminal acts. In the name of Volt, Anna handed down appropriate judgments in accordance with written and common law for all these issues. Having someone like her to provide fair trials was as important to the villages as being granted physical protection. And it was in large part thanks to her that I was even able to call myself liege lord of the villages around Beast Woods.

  Today, however, she had a dispirited look about her.

  “Anna? Is something wrong?”

  Her expression was melancholic, and her eyes were downcast. I got the feeling that she wasn’t looking as healthy in the face as usual, either.

  “Um, I have something to discuss with you all.”

  “Sure. We’re all okay with that, right?”

  It was rare to see someone as unflappable as Anna wearing an expression like this. It had to be quite a serious problem. I decided to prepare myself internally. No matter what kind of tremendous problem was put in front of me, I would handle it with composure, not allowing myself to seem the least bit perturbed.

  I steeled myself—

  “Reystov’s been acting... kind of cold recently...”

  “What?!”

  And reacted to the unexpected subject with spectacular surprise.

  ◆

  Anna and Reystov got on well. That much even I knew.

  Anna, an industrious priest and competent official, and Reystov, a skilled adventurer with the title of Penetrator, both held important yet different positions within Torch Port. As the coordinator of the priests, Anna received all the legal disputes and problems reported by the villages and had knowledge of all the latest incidents and information that concerned them. As one of Torch Port’s most skilled adventurers, Reystov would use that information to determine where to head out beast-hunting and would also come back with more information on village incidents and problems.

  Periodically, Anna would ride circuit around the villages to hold hearings on outstanding issues and offer free medical treatment to those who needed it. On those occasions, Reystov often served as her escort. And protecting her while she was traveling wasn’t the only benefit to having someone like Reystov around. Having the presiding priest accompanied by someone in charge of armed force to keep things under control meant that even in the villages there was less chance of someone arguing aggressively for a better verdict. So the two of them came into contact more than you might expect.

  Reystov was a person of a slightly different stripe compared to the other roughnecked and irresponsible adventurers. Anna seemed to find him easy to talk to. And to Reystov, a man of few words, Anna, a serious person who wasn’t overly averse to silence, appeared to be a person he could feel at ease around. I remembered Bee once saying, “Something’s going on with those two! I smell love in the air!” while I naively thought of them as just a couple of good friends. As for the truth...

  “No, um, we’re not in a relationship.”

  Seated around a table, we all listened to Anna explain her worries.

  “It seems as though Reystov has had something on his mind recently. When I try to talk to him, he often just stays silent, as if he’s deep in thought. Even more than usual. I tried doing all kinds of things for him, thinking, ‘I may not know what he’s worrying about, but if I can support him even a little, that’s something,’ and I don’t really know what I did wrong, but, um, he scowled at me... Oh, don’t get the wrong idea, this has nothing to do with relationships at all.”

  Anna took a sip of tea. “And since then, it’s like he won’t look me in the face. Even when we talk about work, he speaks in a cold, quiet tone. And I even get the feeling he’s been sort of avoiding me recently... Do you think I’ve been insensitive to Reystov somehow? He won’t tell me anything, but I’m just anxious that I might have done something to make him hate me... Oh, this isn’t about a relationship.”

  Yeah...

  “It clearly is about a relationship!” Bee shouted bluntly, and I couldn’t have agreed with her more.

  “N-No, I...” Anna covered her cheeks with her hands and turned bright red.

  “Oh come on, what’s the big deal? Tell me what you see in him.”

  “Reystov, that sly old dog...”

  Bee and Menel, both quite into this, started to press Anna, and in between protests of “No, it’s not like that,” she gradually started to reveal her feelings.

  At first, she had found him intimidating. Then she noticed that actually, he was always being considerate in one way or another. After he went out fishing and didn’t catch anything, he had picked some flowers and presented them to her in the empty wicker basket when he came back, saying they were an offering to the gods. Then there was the way he remembered her favorite things. The softness of the rare smile she glimpsed on his face. How glad she’d felt when he returned safely from slaying the dragon. There was no definite moment; it was a process where she grew closer to him little by little.

  All of this was very heartwarming. Yet, as Al and I quietly exchanged glances, the words “What should we do?” were written clearly on his expression, and probably mine as well. Honestly speaking, I was probably the most useless person to ask about anything to do with love. The way the first thing that came to my mind was this kind of solution-seeking thought instead of a sympathetic one really said it all. My life on this earth as Will had so far featured only one remotely amorous moment: the time the god of undeath confessed to me. Talk about an atypical experience. So coming up with keen insight on matters of love was a little difficult for me.

  That being said...

  “Umm... I mean... I, I’m not really in love with him or anything like that, but Reystov is very dependable and... a gentleman...”

  It wasn’t as if I couldn’t understand where Anna was coming from.

  True, Reystov’s appearance was a little wild and rustic, but he definitely didn’t give the impression of someone sleazy. Even the way he behaved carried a strange sense of class. And obviously, when it came to his skills, he was the best of the best. He didn’t speak much and was a little blunt when he did, but he was a man who said what needed to be said, and he had a big heart.

  “He has a serious look on his face a lot of the time, but he’s a nice person really.”

  “Yes. He is nice. And yes, dependable.”

  I agreed completely. Even I thought of him as a real man and a very likeable person. The phrase “heroic figure” was probably created for people like him.

  Anna, who had been talking to Bee and Menel, now turned to me. “Um, my lord—no—Will?”

  “Yes?”

  She changed the way she addressed me. It probably meant that this was a personal matter, and so she wanted to talk not to the Faraway Paladin, governor of Torch Port, but to William, common friend to her and Reystov.

  “I might just be overthinking it or imagining things. Or maybe it’s just that I’ve accidentally said something to upset him. But if it seems to you that Reystov has some sort of serious concern on his mind, please, I ask you to help him.”

  While looking me straight in the eyes, she spoke not out of a desire to make up with him, nor to discover the reason he was avoiding her, but out of pure, sincere consideration for him. So I returned her earnest look and nodded. “Yes, alright. I will.”

  Love was a difficult subject for me, and I doubted that sticking my neck into someone’s romantic affairs of all things would achieve anything much. But this was a plea from a friend. How could I shy away from helping with an answer like “It’s too hard,” “I’m clueless,” “I can’t do it,” or anything like that?

  “I’ll do the best I can for both of you.”

  “Will... Thank you.”

  “Just don’t forget to invite me to the wedding!”

  “I-It’s not like that!”

  ◆

  Once I started paying special attention to Reystov’s behavior, one thing became clear to me: something did feel off about the way he was acting.

  “Currere Oleum!”

  At the same time that Reystov’s sharp slash cut through a mob of low-rank demons, my magic covered an area of the hall’s stone floor in thick grease, hindering the new demons entering the fray. As some slipped and fell on the greased part of the floor and others stopped in their tracks, Reystov unleashed another slash. Extending beyond the blade’s actual length due to Signs previously engraved by Gus, it easily cut the immobilized demons apart.

  We were in the crumbling monastery in the ravine where we had once fought the chimera. We’d received news from the villages nearby that demons had started hanging out here again, so Reystov and I, both happening to have our hands free, had come to hunt them. The situation inside was once again blasphemous. The twisted, wavering silhouettes of Soldier demons were bathed in light streaming in through tall windows which must have once imparted a sense of sacredness.

  But one after another, those demons’ vital points were penetrated. Reystov’s dirty cloak whipped and whirled. With deft footwork, he moved his well-built body clad in leather armor with astonishing swiftness, maintaining control of the position most advantageous to himself. The magnificence of Gus’s magical modifications certainly helped, but even without those, Reystov’s skill with a sword was as sharp as ever—no, he was sharper than ever before. He must have familiarized himself well with his beloved sword’s new magical properties and trained up even more. The way he slashed out the instant he perceived an enemy reminded me less of a swordsman and more of a skilled gunslinger in a Western, shooting from the hip.

  Several demons let out a gurgling cry as they cast a blessing. Pitch-black, rough-edged claw marks tore through the air. I identified it immediately as a hex and one of the elementary protections granted by Dyrhygma, god of dimensions: the reverse-healing spell Open Wounds. If it made direct contact, it would rip open skin and tear away flesh.

  In that short amount of time, I prayed for a miracle. What appeared was a wall of light. Sacred Shield intercepted the black claw marks and dispelled them. Immediately, as if he were attempting to slice the evil god’s dispersing blessing in two as well, Reystov unleashed another slash, dispatching another group of Soldier demons. There was never a stop to his movement. His legs flowed. The tip of his sword fluttered and danced, lacerating the throats of a number of winged demons that had attempted to fly at him from behind a pillar. His magic blade passed through the swarming demons with the ease of an experienced seamstress passing a needle through cloth.

  I was making myself useful too, of course, and not only by supporting him with magic and blessings. Sometimes swinging my glaive, other times casting support magic, I made sure that things were only getting worse for the demons.

  More of them poured out of another passage, screeching in demonjabber. They were probably the first group to organize themselves after the confusion of our surprise attack. Once out of the passage, they raised their swords and shields, formed a line, and advanced towards us with some caution. This formation felt very familiar.

  “Shield wall!” Reystov shouted as he jumped aside. “Over to you!”

  “Right!”

  With the newly modified Calldawn in hand, I stormed the enemy line, charging forward holding the glaive aloft and yelling out a war cry. The demons screamed back in unison and held their shields firm. I swept Calldawn from left to right and slammed it into the wall of shields as hard as I could. I felt my weapon make powerful contact. The floor creaked underneath my feet. As I completed the swing, the glaive’s shaft groaning and bending under the strain, I heard a cacophony of metal, wood, flesh, and bone all breaking at once. I also heard a lot of different objects slamming against the right wall, but I disregarded that and stepped forward. Again I swung the glaive from left to right. The same discordant mixture of sounds rang out again. I heard all kinds of slamming noises coming from the wall to my left.

  “Good!”

  Once their formation (of a sort) had turned into a complete mess, Reystov charged in and opened the wound further. Of course, I did the same. Standing back-to back, we protected each other as I swung around the glaive and chopped down demons.

  Although it was a barbaric battle best summed up with the words “strategy, shmategy,” there’s no need to come up with half-baked plans when you have the strength advantage.

  — Get ripped, and you can solve pretty much everything by force.

  Blood had taught me that the stronger side was better off avoiding ill-advised gimmicks and simply throwing their weight behind a frontal attack. And that was exactly what we did. Reystov struck the enemy through with skill, and I expanded the wound with power. The demon mobs turned to dust as if we’d taken a metal file to pie crust.

  Reystov’s sword skills were on point. There were no flaws in his footwork or swordplay. His judgment was proactive and decisive. His fighting was as impressive as ever. But still, my impression was that something felt off.

  ◆

  I couldn’t put into words what exactly wasn’t right, but I also knew that in itself didn’t disprove what I was feeling. Because Reystov was a swordsman among swordsmen. He had strong arms and legs, neat and uniformly trimmed nails, and a well cared for sword, always in good condition and held in a sheath modified to be easy to draw. He had full awareness of every part of himself and, for the sake of his sword, he kept good control of all of it.

  He would never allow there to be anything so blatantly off about him that I could point out exactly what it was. And yet there was still a slight sense of wrongness about the way he was fighting. That in itself was strange.

  After exterminating the demon horde in the crumbling monastery, we went around mopping up a few remaining enemies and collecting dust and other things as proof of the hunt. As we were doing this, I asked him the question. “Reystov, um, has something happened?”

  “Like what?” Reystov’s posture as he replied looked no different to usual, but I didn’t miss the slight wrinkle that formed on his forehead. After all, I had sworn to live this life the right way. Avoiding interactions with people, shutting out everything, and reaching a dead end—those were the mistakes of my previous life. I had no intention of repeating them.

  “Something feels strange about the way you’re acting.”

  “You noticed, huh...”

  “Only vaguely. You’re not the kind of person to fail to report being out of form, so it can’t be that you’re not feeling well, right?”

  He grunted and nodded slowly, then fell silent for a while as if choosing his words. “I’m aware I’m... rushing things a bit.”

  I nodded, realizing that was it. Whereas I was generally very direct in how I did things, the clever thing about Reystov was that he had a bit of a tricksy side. Even when it came to a brute force assault like this one, he would usually throw his opponents a curveball or two when he knew a miss wouldn’t hurt. There had been none of that this time.

  “Something’s preying on my mind.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  He remained silent for a moment, then shook his head. “No.” His tone may have been gentle, but it was an unequivocal refusal. “Sorry.”

  “Not at all.”

  For Reystov to say that had to mean that there really was nothing I could do at this point in time. It wasn’t as if I could solve every worry in the world. Reystov was an incredibly skilled warrior with a well-rounded character. If he wouldn’t talk about it, then that meant he didn’t need or want help. Sticking my nose in anyway would make me the definition of a busybody.

  “If there’s anything I can do to help, please tell me anytime.” The only thing I could really say to him was that I was on his side. “I think of you as my brother-in-arms, and I deeply respect you.” I made eye contact with him as I spoke. “I’d like to support you. So please, if you ever need my help, give me a shout.”

  “Sure.”

  Reystov did nod, but his expression looked somehow clouded. I got the unsettling feeling that something bad was coming. A couple of weeks later, it turned out I was right.

  ◆

  The sight I witnessed that day caused my body to freeze up and only the quietest of sounds to leave my throat.

  “No! Don’t die! No... no! Reystov, Reystov!”

  Anna’s screams pierced the air, which was already thick with the stench of blood and the sounds of feet and shrieking, desperate voices. I rushed into the hall. At the center of the commotion was Reystov, laid out flat on the floor on a mat of straw. He was gritting his teeth and wheezing, his face pale.