As Kasion’s Mercenary Company passed through the village, people stirred and gathered along the roadside.
The mercenaries fastened spikes to the wagons carrying their spoils and impaled the severed heads of the Cornu Tribe upon them.
The mercenary company turned the barbarians’ faces outward for the onlookers to see and marched on at their leisure. The people watched in astonishment.
“Aren’t those barbarians?”
“Looks like they caught some barbarians!”
“Who was it? Who pulled off something that incredible?”
Hearing the people whispering, one of the mercenaries shouted loudly.
“It was Sir Kasion! Our brave commander cut off the head of the barbarians’ leader!”
At those words, the villagers cheered and called out Kasion’s name.
As more people heard that the mercenary company had wiped out the barbarian raiders, the crowd that had come to see them steadily grew larger.
Amid a welcome grand enough to make one believe that a king had arrived, Kasion slowly rode his horse and enjoyed the people’s cheers.
Before they entered the castle, two mercenaries came riding up at the rear of the procession, kicking up dust. They immediately went to the front and met Kasion.
“Toby had his throat cut by a blade, and the other three suffocated to death alongside their horses.”
At those words, Kasion’s eyes sharpened.
Even within the mercenary company, Aura Users were uncommon. Even if Toby’s skill had been low, losing him was a significant loss for the company.
Since Toby had been cut by a blade, the culprit was likely the boy who had brought the Cornu Tribe there. But the one who had killed the other mercenaries was not that bastard.
“Everyone suffocated together in the forest......”
Kasion slowly muttered as he stared ahead.
“It seems there was a mage with him.”
The messenger quickly answered.
Kasion silently glared at him. He had not muttered to himself because he had failed to notice that.
When the boy had stormed into the encampment, Kasion had thought it was an accidental incident.
But after hearing that the boy had positioned a mage in ambush and wiped out the pursuers, he began to think that the bastard had deliberately led the barbarians there.
‘Could a plan like this have come from a child’s mind? Or is someone else giving him orders?’
Though faint, that bastard was an Aura User.
Young initiates traveled with the Guide who had awakened their Aura Heart and trained in the use of Aura.
For that reason, an initiate and a Guide generally formed lifelong relationships as teacher and disciple, father and son, or master and servant, maintaining a deep bond for the rest of their lives.
Kasion guessed that the bastard’s Guide was the true culprit.
“Given that they even travel with a mage, they do not seem like ordinary bastards.”
“Bastards who dared use me like a mere game piece would not be ordinary. More importantly, I must find out what they hoped to gain by doing this.”
All the spoils and the severed heads of the barbarian warriors had gone to Kasion’s gang.
The only thing those bastards had taken was the lives of Kasion’s Mercenary Company.
“Were they after us?”
As Kasion nodded at his subordinate’s words, his eyes fell on Shakim’s head, impaled upon the tallest pole.
He remembered the bastard intervening while he fought Shakim.
‘Recklessly intervening in the middle of a melee is the same as offering up your neck.’
Yet that bastard had risked the danger to intervene and cut Shakim’s leg.
If the bastard’s target had not been the mercenary company, but Shakim......
‘Did he have a grudge against that bastard?’
Kasion glanced at Shakim’s severed head, swaying atop the pole.
How many villages had the barbarians destroyed, and how many people had they trampled?
There must have been countless people who bore grudges against them.
But even if the boy’s target had been the Cornu Tribe rather than the mercenary company, it was equally unpleasant.
‘How dare he use me for free?’
A mercenary company was an organization that fought in someone else’s stead when paid an appropriate price.
Kasion could not possibly overlook the bastard who had hitched a free ride and inflicted enormous damage upon the mercenary company.
“Form a tracking party from the men skilled in pursuit. We will impale their heads upon the remaining spikes.”
“Yes, understood.”
The subordinate who had received Kasion’s command turned his horse toward the rear and disappeared.
‘Though I may count that as payment for the trouble, I must still collect the price of my subordinates’ lives. Otherwise, how will I save face?’
Ten mercenaries, including Toby the Aura Warrior, had died because of that one bastard.
Even if Kasion caught those bastards, chopped them into ten pieces, and killed them, the account would not balance.
As he considered how he would cook those bastards once he caught them, Kasion looked toward the lord’s party waiting to greet him in front of the castle gate.
“Welcome, Kasion!”
Baron Buzoni, the owner of the castle, threw his arms open extravagantly as though showing off to his subjects and embraced Kasion.
Anyone unfamiliar with the situation might have mistaken it for Kasion having eliminated the raiders under the lord’s command.
As he returned the lord’s embrace, Kasion sent a greeting with his eyes to Baron Buzoni’s daughter, who stood behind them.
***
Ernolf groaned from the pain in his body as he recalled what had happened the previous night.
He had been hiding on the cliff and sleeping.
He had been sleeping soundly without even dreaming when a sudden, agonizing pain pierced through his back.
The pain had been so extreme that his vision blurred and he could hardly breathe.
Then anxiety had washed over him.
At that moment, Ernolf had thought that Kazar was in danger.
He did not know why.
From then on, Ernolf had cast speed-enhancing magic on himself and run blindly in the direction where he thought Kazar might be.
And Kazar had truly been there.
‘What kind of sorcery is this now......’
He had no idea how he had found where Kazar was.
He had not received a divine oracle, yet he had arrived there at the exact moment Kazar was in danger, as though he had been summoned.
Rather than mysterious, it was absurd.
‘Damn it. It feels like my back is splitting open.’
His back hurt too much for him to remain lying still any longer.
As Ernolf grumbled and tried to get up, only to collapse back down because he had no strength, Kazar’s voice reached him.
“Sleep more. It’s still a long way until sunrise.”
“I can’t sleep because of you.”
Ernolf groaned as he raised his upper body into a sitting position. Kazar tried to help him, but Ernolf refused.
It was all Kazar’s fault that this half-dead body was being tormented by agonizing pain.
“Why are you picking a fight with someone who’s minding his own business? I even gave you an expensive ring.”
Kazar spoke sullenly.
He had been quietly training his inner art without making so much as a sound of breathing, only to suddenly be blamed. It was unfair.
“An expensive what?”
When Kazar gestured with his chin toward Ernolf’s hand, Ernolf raised it and examined it.
A ring he had never seen before was on his finger.
As the heir to a family whose trade was excavating relics, Ernolf was deeply knowledgeable about artifacts imbued with magic.
So at a glance, he read the magical circuits engraved within the artifact and grasped its function.
‘A low-grade artifact that strengthens stamina and the Aura Heart.’
It felt wasteful for a mage to be wearing a ring specialized for Aura Users.
Though magical engineering was not his major, Ernolf had learned its basics in university. If he had the materials and tools, he could make low-grade artifacts whenever he wished.
But right now, he was a perfect beggar with nothing.
“Take it back. You use it.”
“Are you pulling rank because you’re my older brother? You wear it.”
“No. You use it.”
“There are all kinds of ways to ignore someone’s goodwill.”
When Ernolf tried to remove the ring and give it back, Kazar suddenly became angry.
Ernolf sighed and adjusted how he was sitting.
It was merely a ring he had given to the appropriate person because it enhanced stamina and the Aura Heart. Ernolf could not understand why Kazar was losing his temper.
It seemed that this bastard was going through puberty.
‘Sigh, I’m the adult. I’ll endure it.’
Ernolf sighed again and patted the ground in front of him.
“Come here and sit.”
“Why?”
“I have something to test. Hurry and sit down.”
“Such a bother......”
Kazar grumbled as he came over and sat in front of Ernolf.
Ernolf had Kazar turn around.
“Do not tense up. Stay still.”
“What are you doing?”
Ernolf grabbed Kazar’s shoulder as he tried to turn around, made him sit upright again, and gathered mana in his hand.
“Because of you, my back hurts too much for me to sleep.”
At those words, Kazar became docile.
He seemed to know something.
Deciding to hear the explanation later, Ernolf cast healing magic.
“It won’t be as good as a healer’s treatment, but you should feel much better. Get it treated properly later.”
When Ernolf asked how he felt, Kazar did not answer and only wore a sullen expression.
Ernolf stared at him for a moment before quietly asking:
“Could it be that whenever you get hurt or are in danger, I feel all of it exactly as you do?”
Kazar pressed his lips tightly together and slowly nodded.
Ernolf’s fist struck the crown of Kazar’s head.
“You knew that! And you still weren’t careful! Why are you going around getting stabbed?!”
“Why are you hitting me?!”
“When you get hurt, I hurt too! You damn bastard, knowing that, why did you go to the village?!”
With every word, Ernolf hopped with rage and put more weight into his punches.
“You little bastard, why are you so reckless?! What did I say? I said if the Cornu Tribe caught you, there wouldn’t be even bones left to collect!”
“Ah, enough! Stop hitting me!”
“Why would I stop?!”
“Did you forget already? If I get hurt, you hurt too.”
“You......”
Even hitting him was labor.
Ernolf stopped getting angry midway through and sank exhaustedly to the ground.
“Were we cursed or something? Is that why this body is always sickly?”
“It isn’t a curse. It’s been that way since we were born. And you aren’t the only one, so don’t feel cheated.”
Though he was not in pain, Kazar rubbed his head because he felt unfairly struck.
“You too?”
“Yeah.”
“Then you can feel it whenever I get hurt or am in danger?”
“That’s why I went to save you.”
“When?”
The instant he asked the question, Ernolf recalled Kazar running toward him to save him at the mine.
‘It’s true......’
Ernolf could not close his mouth in surprise.
Among the special abilities known as psychic sensitivity, there was one called ‘Resonance (Resonance).’
‘It really exists.’
He had encountered it in documents, but this was the first time he had seen an actual case.
“Ha, what are we, twins......? No way!”
Ernolf stopped mid-sentence, snatched Kazar’s dagger away, and looked at his reflection in the blade.
“Why is your face here?!”
Ernolf was horrified when the blade reflected a face identical to Kazar’s.
“Are we twins? Huh? We’re twins?”
“You didn’t know that until now?”
“Why?!”
Ernolf used the blade to inspect different parts of his face. Every time he confirmed that they were identical to Kazar’s, he screamed about why they looked the same.
“Why of all faces is it this one? How do I look exactly like Kazar? How did this happen? Why?!”
“This bastard has lost it......”
Ignoring Ernolf as he babbled strange things and made a huge fuss, Kazar laid out everything he had gathered so far.
The luggage on the horse consisted of a mercenary company cloak that seemed to have been used as a blanket, a large quantity of jerky, a hunting bow and arrows, a little oil, and flint.
That was all.
The greatest gains from the previous night had been Shakim’s ring and the mercenary company members’ money pouches.
‘Let’s ride the horse for now, until Tiri recovers his health.’
In the wild, where beasts and monsters swarmed, it would be better to turn the horse into money than lead it around until it was killed.
But that was still better than carrying his brother on his back.
After checking the items, Kazar untied the leather pouch at his waist and poured all the coins onto the dirt.
At that moment, Tirad flew over like the wind and snatched up the coins.
“Baldif copper coins! Oh, Pelias gold coins, and even Sarapi Empire silver coins!”
Ernolf vigorously rubbed the coins against the rags he wore, held them up to the sunlight, and carefully examined the front, back, and sides before setting them down again.
Then he turned around and sighed.
‘What is wrong with him?’
Tirad had handled the coins with crazed eyes like a bastard mad for money, only to suddenly shrink into himself.
Kazar was dumbfounded.