It was good that I had begun learning Siegfried’s swordsmanship, but I had only learned the First Form.
To learn more techniques, I needed to look deeper into Fafnir’s memories, and to do that, I first had to strengthen the Demonic Sword.
[I am hungry. Hurry and bring me something to eat.]
Watching her buzz around me like a fly made me wonder whether this was truly the right choice, but I decided to think of it as preparation for the enemies I would face in the future.
After telling Lina that I was going for a short ride, I quietly left the castle.
In my previous life, I had spent a great deal of time investigating Mother’s death.
Even while traveling across the nation on assignments with the noble unit, I had searched for clues whenever I had the chance.
That was how I learned of several incidents.
As I rode, I repeatedly sent my sword flying through the air.
For now, all it could do was ride the wind like a kite, soar upward, and return, but the more I moved it, the deeper I became absorbed in the swordsmanship.
Whenever I stopped to rest, I dismounted, stared at the horizon, and sank into memories of the past.
The people who came to mind most often were my former comrades.
Among them, Melina’s face appeared most frequently.
“……She’s probably still imprisoned in the Imperial Capital.”
[Who is imprisoned in the Imperial Capital?]
Fafnir suddenly emerged from my shadow.
“No one.”
[Judging by your eyes, you were thinking of a lover you dearly miss.]
“……Stop talking nonsense.”
[You cannot deceive these eyes. Consider how long I have lived. One glance is enough for me to know.]
“Stop flaunting your age and go back inside to sleep.”
I shoved the grinning woman into my shadow and resumed riding.
The vast horizon seemed to call to me.
After riding for a long while, I reached the outskirts of the territory.
While wandering across the nation in search of clues, I had once heard something from a former mercenary who had lost an arm.
He had apparently shown considerable promise as a mercenary.
The incident that cost him one arm would occur here today.
***
I entered the village in disguise.
After tying my horse at the stable, I asked the stable keeper where the Mercenary Guild was.
When I paid him twice the usual fee for looking after my horse, his grin stretched from ear to ear, and he even drew me a map.
An old building with a red sign at the end of the market street was where the mercenaries gathered.
When I entered, I found dozens of them inside.
Some sat around circular tables, guzzling alcohol.
Others examined the requests posted on the wall, maintained their weapons, or gathered in small groups to divide their earnings.
I walked toward an old man sitting at a desk in the back, counting money.
“Are you the Guild Master of the Red Shield Guild?”
Even at my question, he kept his eyes fixed on the stacks of coins.
“Who else would be counting money here? The cleaner?”
“I want work.”
“Deposit.”
He spoke curtly and held out a basket.
CLINK.
When I tossed in one gold coin, he quickly snatched it up, hid it inside his clothes, and handed me a wooden badge.
“You’re a mercenary now. Tell me if there’s a request you want.”
“That quickly? Aren’t you going to investigate my identity?”
“How many bastards who live by the blade do you think have clean pasts? Money is your identity. If you don’t like it, leave.”
Just as I had heard in my previous life, the Red Shield Guild had completely given up on verifying anyone’s identity.
All manner of people came here from all manner of places, so it seemed they collected deposits instead.
No wonder incidents never ceased.
Still, as someone who needed to conceal his identity, I was grateful.
I accepted the wooden badge proving that I was a mercenary.
“The request board is over there.”
After saying that, the Guild Master resumed counting his money.
I left him behind and walked toward the request board.
Several mercenaries examining the notices glanced at me.
“I haven’t seen you before. Where are you from?”
One of them, a middle-aged man, spoke to me.
The moment I saw him, emotion surged within me.
He was Jack, the one-armed mercenary who had told me about today’s incident.
“I came from the North.”
“My, you came from somewhere cold. It’s cold here too, but I hear it becomes indescribably bitter the farther north you go.”
He spoke freely even though I was a complete stranger.
As I looked at his face, the image of the man from my previous life overlapped with him.
With the arm that had already been missing when I knew him in my previous life, he pointed toward one of the request notices.
“Since meeting like this must be fate, how about we take a job together? It’s guarding a merchant company, and they apparently need plenty of people.”
“Sounds good. But what’s today’s date?”
“Today? Let me see. Today is…….”
As he counted the days on his fingers, his eyes gradually widened.
“Damn, now that I think about it, today is my wife’s birthday! Sorry about this, but I need to head home. I completely forgot and haven’t bought her a present.”
“It’s fine. You should hurry home.”
“Thanks! I’ll see you again!”
Jack left those words behind and bolted outside.
“That man really is scatterbrained.”
I shook my head as I watched him disappear.
In my previous life, he had regretted forgetting his wife’s birthday even more than losing his arm.
That would not happen now.
I removed the request notice he had left behind.
“I want to take this job.”
The Guild Master, who had been counting money with his head lowered, glanced up and pointed toward a circular table in the corner with a finger like a dead tree branch.
“Good timing. We were short on people. Sit at that table and wait. We’ll depart once enough people gather.”
I went to the sparsely occupied table and sat down.
The people already seated there glanced at me, but I pretended not to notice.
After an hour, everyone needed for the request had gathered.
There were twenty of us in total.
‘He claimed there were sixty. Mercenaries and their damned boasting.’
I rose with a faint smile.
Even with only twenty people, this was undeniably a large request.
In particular, since it was an exclusive escort mission issued by a single merchant company, it meant the client possessed enough wealth to pay the wages of all twenty mercenaries.
“John will lead you today.”
The Guild Master pointed toward a man.
His body was covered in scars of every size, and his hair was streaked with gray.
One glance was enough to tell that he was a seasoned mercenary.
“This request comes from the Richgold Merchant Company, one of our highest-paying clients. If any bastard tries something foolish, I’ll personally smash apart that useless head of his, so keep your wits about you.”
After warning everyone, John approached me.
“You’re the newcomer?”
“That’s right.”
“I won’t go easy on you just because you’re new. If you’re going to become a burden, leave now.”
“You look more in need of someone going easy on you than I do, old man.”
Like most newly arrived mercenaries, I answered with a boastful provocation.
“Arrogant bastard. Let’s see whether that skull of yours remains intact until the end.”
“I won’t be dying.”
“That remains to be seen.”
The twenty mercenaries divided themselves among horses and wagons and headed toward the client.
***
Only after traveling for a long time did we meet our employer.
The client was a young woman.
At first glance, she appeared cold, but her eyes held a generous warmth.
Only after meeting her did John reveal the true request.
“Our mission is to escort this woman safely to her destination. We must move as quickly as possible, so hurry.”
The mercenaries were confused when the merchant-company escort abruptly became a personal escort.
However, they erupted into cheers when told they would receive an additional half of the original fee if they arrived early.
While I prepared to depart, the woman’s eyes met mine.
Sitting inside the carriage, she gave me a slight nod before closing the window.
I could sense the worry and anxiety she carried.
The mercenaries positioned their horses in front of and behind the carriage, then departed while surrounding it.
Once they started, they did not stop until the horses had become too exhausted to run any farther.
The mercenaries were desperate to receive the promised bonus, but they could not force the horses back to their feet when the animals snorted and refused to move.
In the end, they tied the horses in place and decided to eat a simple meal.
John lent waterskins to the thirsty mercenaries.
A considerable amount of time had passed since they departed, so everyone crowded around him.
“All right! If you’re finished resting, we’re leaving!”
After resting for approximately thirty minutes, John shouted toward the mercenaries.
That was when it happened.
“Ugh!”
A mercenary who had been mounting his horse fell to the ground.
“What the hell?!”
The other mercenaries rushed toward him.
His face turned bright red.
He gagged, vomited, and collapsed.
“Is he dead?!”
The eyes of the mercenary who shouted widened.
He had been staring at his fallen companion, but his own face was gradually turning crimson.
“Ghk!”
That mercenary also clutched his throat.
“Poison.”
One after another, the mercenaries either lost the ability to breathe or vomited before collapsing unconscious.
‘This is different from what Jack told me in my previous life.’
He had said that they encountered a group of bandits and that he escaped after losing one arm.
When he barely made it back to the village, he heard that everyone else had been massacred.
I looked around.
Only three people remained standing.
One was me.
Another was a different mercenary.
The last was John, the leader of this escort party.
“Oh, newcomer. You really didn’t die.”
John looked at me and chuckled in a voice thick with phlegm.
“I’d rather endure thirst than drink water given to me by a stranger. What reason did I have to trust you?”
It was a habit ingrained in me during my previous life.
After meeting a black mage who appeared to be a pitiful old man grieving the loss of his son, only to discover him torturing that son in a basement while attempting to summon a demon, I stopped consuming anything given to me by strangers.
The meat he had offered us in gratitude had been pieces of his son’s flesh.
John pulled out a heavy-looking mace.
“I’ll finish you in one blow.”
CRACK—!
John’s mace smashed the remaining mercenary’s skull.
The man collapsed without even managing to scream.
“What are you doing?”
“Removing the competition, I suppose. If I kill him, there’ll be more for me.”
“What are you planning to do after earning that much money?”
“Listen. You’re young, so you don’t understand. Money is something you earn first and think about later.”
John lightly kicked the corpse of the accomplice who had betrayed the Mercenary Guild alongside him.
“Using poison was this bastard’s idea. He said we didn’t know how strong the newcomer was, so we should poison you instead. I agreed because it sounded good, but it still worried me.”
He poured the remaining water from the waterskin onto the corpse’s face.
“How could I know when this bastard might poison me?”
He tossed the waterskin behind him.
“It’s unfortunate that I couldn’t kill you too, but life doesn’t always go the way you want.”
A vile killing intent flowed from his eyes as he stared at me.
“Come here, newcomer. I’ll make it painless.”
Crimson blood dripped from the mace in his hand.