Chapter 11
“In fact... our family has been mending the clothes of soldiers on the northern front for generations.”
Head Tailor Closer spoke up.
“During the war, we risked our lives with needles in hand. But when the war ended and peace arrived... do you know what the people in the capital call us? ‘Country-bumpkin menders from the North,’ they say.”
His fist trembled.
Years of being looked down on by dandies who made dresses for noblewomen in the safe capital.
His inferiority complex and anger were exploding at that very moment.
“There’s a man before me with the most perfect physique in the history of the Empire... and he’s heading into the Empire’s interior, into that prideful capital.”
The head tailor looked up at me.
He should have been a merchant, but his eyes held only the gaze of an artist and gambler who wanted to send his masterpiece out into the world.
“I’ll sew the Closer family name into this outfit.”
“......”
“I’ll make all those hollow men in the capital tremble when they see this outfit. This is my revenge—and my proof!”
He held the Behemoth hide against my chest and shouted.
“I don’t need any money! I won’t even charge a labor fee! But let me embroider my family crest on the lining.”
“Hey... old man. Calm down....”
“Wear this outfit... and trample those capital-dwellers into the ground! With that magnificent physique of yours!”
At his solemn shout, the other tailors around him raised their fists and cried, “Ooooh!”
The soldiers shopping inside the store also joined in as one and began cheering, “Show them the strength of the borderlands!”
I looked at Kara with a bewildered expression.
Kara shrugged with an expression that said ‘This is fun’ and mouthed,
‘It’s free, right? Just wear it.’
She had a point. The Behemoth hide looked far too fine to refuse.
More than anything, the word ‘free’ spoke straight to this barbarian’s practical heart.
I had no idea what Count Eisen would say when he found out later, but for now, what’s good is good.
“All right. Since you’re making it anyway, just make it sturdy. But....”
The moment I gave my permission, the tailors charged at me with a roar without even pretending to listen to what I was saying next.
“All right! Take his measurements again! Not a single millimeter of error!”
“Bring the needles! The special needles for Behemoth hide!”
The clothing shop in the border city heated up like a blazing smelter in an instant.
“Wait a moment.”
Only then did I remember the biggest problem.
“The thing is, our schedule....”
Our travel and lodging schedule was entirely in the hands of our patron, Count Eisen.
I had no idea when the carriage arrangements would be finished or when we were supposed to depart.
I had clearly said earlier that we couldn’t stay long.
“Hey! Call a mage! We need to infuse the hide with mana to refine it!”
“Take the pattern! Now!”
I was doomed.
The craftsmen had already lost their minds, and it seemed they could no longer hear me.
* * *
Jingle-!
The shop door opened cheerfully, and a familiar voice rang out.
“Mr. Varg, Miss Kara. Have you picked out your clothes ye... Gasp!”
It was Count Eisen, who had returned after arranging the carriage.
But he covered his mouth the moment he stepped inside.
The shop was an absolute madhouse.
Torn scraps of fabric were scattered across the floor, while tailors clung to my bare back like ants and chanted incantations.
More than anything, what caught Eisen’s attention was Head Tailor Closer’s behavior.
He was kneeling at my feet, clutching the waistband of my trousers and sobbing.
“Waaah! Please! Just once!”
“......What in the world is going on here?”
Count Eisen adjusted his glasses and asked me.
A reasonable suspicion lingered in his eyes: ‘Did Mr. Varg finally lose patience and get angry?’
I shrugged as though I had been wronged.
“Uh, Count, please don’t misunderstand. This old man suddenly started acting like this....”
Before I could finish, the head tailor came crawling toward Count Eisen on his knees.
“Count! You’re Count Eisen, aren’t you? Please, I beg you!”
“No, what are you asking me?”
“One day... no, exactly five hours! Give me five hours! I’ll complete this garment with my life on the line!”
The head tailor cried out with a solemn expression.
“The trousers... sob, I’ll leave the trousers to 「Eisengard」. But the upper garment! Let me finish this Behemoth garment with my own hands! On my family’s honor, I’ll create a masterpiece that will go down in history!”
“Be... Behemoth?”
Count Eisen’s eyes turned toward the black fabric on the table.
As an administrator, he was a man who knew the value of things better than anyone.
Having grasped the situation at once, the count narrowed his eyes.
‘This man really is insane.’
Count Eisen fell silent for a moment after witnessing the craftsman’s madness.
Every gaze in the shop turned toward him.
Varg scratched his head awkwardly.
“I told him it would be difficult because of our schedule, but he refuses to listen. I think you’ll have to decide, Count.”
Count Eisen pulled a silver pocket watch from inside his coat.
Click.
The lid opened, and the ticking of the clock’s hands sounded unusually loud.
“Hmm... five hours.”
When he checked the time with a deliberately serious expression, the head tailor stared at his lips without daring to breathe.
He looked ready to bite his tongue and die on the spot if Eisen refused.
A moment later.
Snap.
Count Eisen closed the watch and smirked.
“I happen to be hungry.”
“......Pardon?”
“There’s an excellent restaurant nearby. I’ve been a regular there for twenty-five years. If we leisurely enjoy a meal there and come back... the timing should be perfect.”
At the count’s cool permission, the head tailor’s face lit up with joy.
“Th-thank you! Count! Thank you!”
“But only five hours. If you’re even one minute late, we’ll leave immediately.”
“Don’t worry! I’ll finish within four hours and fifty-nine minutes!”
The head tailor sprang to his feet and shouted toward the workroom.
“You heard me! Everyone, get to work! From now on, no bathroom breaks! No eating! No drinking!”
“Waaaaah!”
The tailors began moving in perfect unison, raising a battle cry.
The sight of them taking out mana stones and seamstresses heating their needles looked just like a battlefield.
Count Eisen shook his head and beckoned to Kara and me.
“Let’s go. If we stay here, they’ll start stitching us up too.”
We left the clothing shop behind, abandoning that scene of madness.
Shouts of “Make those stitches tighter!” and “Increase the mana output!” rang out behind us like background music.
And so, we headed off for our first meal in the border city, leaving that blazing scene behind.
* * *
“Whew... I can breathe again.”
The moment we left the clothing shop, I let out a sigh of relief.
The tailors’ crazed shouts and the sounds of mana refinement could still be heard behind us.
Count Eisen hurried off, saying, “Then I’ll see you in five hours. I’m going to confirm our restaurant reservation first.”
He had clearly been worn out by that madness too.
The cold border wind blew through the streets, but it was far more refreshing than the heat inside the clothing shop.
“Varg, how do I look? Isn’t it strange?”
Kara asked shyly beside me.
I turned and looked at my lovely wife.
And for a moment, I was speechless.
“......”
She was wearing the Imperial Army’s simplified dress uniform that had just been altered.
Originally, it had been a man’s officer uniform.
But the tailors’ inspired craftsmanship had refitted it perfectly to Kara’s body.
The black uniform contrasted with her white skin, creating an even more alluring atmosphere.
The fit cinched elegantly at the waist and fell gracefully over her hips.
Combined with the wild atmosphere unique to a barbarian, she looked exactly like the goddess Valkyrie descending onto a battlefield from mythology.
Her overwhelming appearance was enough to make passersby sneak glances at her.
Meanwhile, because the tailors had taken my upper garment, I was wearing a huge blackish-gray hooded robe lent to me by the shop.
I looked as crude as though I had thrown a bear hide over myself.
I chuckled and wrapped an arm around Kara’s waist.
“Wow... My darling, you really look like an Imperial knight commander. Aren’t you too cool?”
“Really?”
“Yeah. With me beside you, it makes a perfect picture. A dignified knight and a bandit chief being hauled away from the forest.”
At my joke, Kara blushed and poked me in the side.
“Don’t tease me. The clothes are already so tight that I’m embarrassed.”
Kara gently stroked her belly and looked worried.
“I’m fine for now, but... by the time we enter the academy, my belly might be too big for me to wear this.”
She was still in the early stages of pregnancy, so it wasn’t showing yet, but once her belly began to swell, she would no longer be able to wear this tight uniform.
But I nodded with a relieved expression instead.
“That’s a relief.”
“What is?”
“I didn’t like other men staring at you. I wanted you all to myself.”
I deliberately put on a serious expression and pretended to look around.
In fact, soldiers passing by were staring at Kara in a daze.
I shot them a look that said ‘She’s my woman’ and whispered in Kara’s ear,
“And... once your belly swells and shows a little, that’ll be even more alluring in its own way.”
“......!”
Kara’s ears turned bright red.
“W-what are you talking about? Honestly! You’ve become even more shameless than before!”
Kara slapped my back, but she couldn’t hide the smile spreading across her lips.
We walked through the streets of the border city arm in arm.
Unfamiliar scenery, unfamiliar people.
But the warmth of our clasped hands was familiar and warm.
Even the troublesome five-hour wait was nothing more than a sweet date with my beloved wife.
* * *
At the same time.
Across the street from where the barbarian couple was walking.
A luxurious café with a second-floor terrace.
A thoroughly disgruntled boy was sitting there.
He had glossy black hair and arrogant eyes.
He still had a boyish air, but the nobility radiating from him was extraordinary.
He was none other than Kairon von Northgard, son of the Grand Duke of Northgard.
Clatter.
He set down his teacup irritably.
“Damn it, what kind of border inspection is this? It’s just a picnic.”
Kairon grumbled in an irritated voice.
He was surrounded on all sides by heavily armed escort knights.
“Young master, please lower your voice. There are many eyes watching.”
“Let them watch! Can’t I even say what I want on my own land?”
Kairon pouted.
He had come on an inspection under the plausible pretext that conducting a military inspection before entering the academy would help with the military studies he would later learn there.
But the border inspection he had expected was not like this.
He had wanted to climb atop the massive Wall and see the snowfields teeming with savage beasts and barbarians.
He had come dreaming of heroic adventures, wielding a sword and fighting wild beasts.
But reality was nothing but overprotection.
‘Young master, the wind is cold up on the Wall, so it’s dangerous.’
‘There’s too much dust over there, so please don’t go.’
‘Barbarians are dangerous, so don’t go anywhere near them.’
In the end, he was stuck in a safe city café, sipping the same black tea he had grown sick of drinking in the capital.
“How boring. I’m so bored I could die!”
Kairon rested his chin on his hand and stared blankly down from the terrace.
Every person passing by was just a soldier in a drab military uniform.
It was a bleak city with nothing to feast his eyes on, let alone the glamorous young ladies of the capital.
“...I want to go home.”
It was just as he sighed and turned his head.
Swish.
Something caught his listless eye.
The only thing shining in the gray street.
“......!”
Kairon’s eyes widened.
A woman was walking down the street.
She wore a jet-black uniform, and her silver hair streamed in the wind as she walked.
A huge man draped in a ragged covering was beside her, but Kairon could not see him.
He could see only her.
Thud-!
A shock as if his heart had dropped into his stomach.
He had the illusion that the world was moving in slow motion.
A quintessential romance-fantasy love-at-first-sight scene was being forcibly played inside Kairon’s mind.
Love at first sight.
That clichéd expression was not enough.
The original novel <The Bastard’s Snowflake Path> had activated the 「Force of Fate」 to correct its twisted course.
‘...Beautiful.’
Kairon murmured as though enchanted.
A wildness he had never felt in the lavishly adorned young ladies of the capital.
And yet, an untouchable nobility.
The borderland romance he had dreamed of.
Adventure.
She possessed all of it.
His heart pounded at the powerful vitality that seemed to blast open the constricted chest of someone trapped beneath overprotection.
“Th-that woman....”
Kairon sprang to his feet.
The sound of the chair falling backward startled the escort knights, who hurried over.
“Young master? What is it?”
“Move! I have to... I have to follow that woman!”
Kairon gripped the railing and leaned out over it.
His eyes were already gleaming with the obsession of a beast that had spotted its prey.
Perhaps the timing now resembled that of the original.
And the woman he had set his sights on was already married.
But fate was trying to force the two of them together anyway, ignoring even this discrepancy in the setting.
The gears of their ill-fated connection began turning again with a creak.