Chapter 28
#28 Rookie Adventurer Bern (26) - Likes and Dislikes
Childhood.
Alsus admired adventurers.
He dreamed of a life where he would charge boldly into the unknown in search of romance and treasure, gather around campfires with his comrades to share memories, and effortlessly solve the problems of those who asked for help.
Alsus's father, a retired soldier, scolded him for that.
An adventurer is nothing more than a flashy-looking job that isn't a proper profession.
He said that being hired as a soldier somewhere was far more stable, and that if he truly wanted to aim high, it would be much better to grit his teeth and ask to be taken on as a knight's attendant.
Like many hot-blooded sons, Alsus rebelled against his father's words.
He ran away from home, became an adventurer, and rode that wave of talent all the way up.
He earned a huge sum that ordinary commoners could hardly dream of in their entire lives, and even gained the respectable title of branch representative.
But that was as far as dreams would take him.
His skill, which had seemed as though it could rise forever, gradually stagnated, and before long it completely stopped growing.
He made a good living, but if he thought about how he had to save enough to retire during that brief golden age, it wasn't really all that much.
More than anything, what gave Alsus despair and rage was the fact that the fame he thought he had won was nothing more than an appraisal from inside a narrow well.
No matter how much they praised him as a 4th-rank adventurer or the head of a branch, to the noblemen, Alsus was just a 'useful commoner.'
When he demanded the position of knight from some noble who had been swaggering around saying, 'Name what you want,' Alsus would never forget the reaction he showed.
A look and expression full of contempt and bewilderment, as if he were seeing someone who didn't know his place and was asking for something far beyond himself.
Alsus was furious, but he couldn't bring himself to vent that anger at the noble.
Because a knight stood at the noble's side.
Even if they were both 4th-rank and could both unleash sword aura, that didn't mean a knight and an adventurer were equal.
A knight, who had undergone systematic training since childhood, built his body by eating good food, and learned the family’s inherited cultivation method and swordsmanship, possessed far more than an adventurer.
Even if their realms themselves were roughly similar, there was no contest in terms of substance.
More than that, even if he somehow managed to win against a knight, what would he do about what came after?
What about the other knights and troops under the noble? What if the nobles of Birka, enraged that a commoner had drawn a sword at a noble, rose up together and tried to punish him?
Alsus was no longer a boy who dreamed without a care in the world.
He was an adult, and as an adult he made the 'wise' decision.
His pride was crushed, but safety and stability were put in his hands.
Even after that, his wise decisions continued.
He ignored a woman's plea to save her daughter. The one who had taken that daughter was a child of a noble family.
He turned a blind eye to the villagers' request not to abandon them. They couldn't offer enough compensation to keep Alsus's party there.
When he encountered a lich on a request he thought could be solved easily, he begged for his life instead of fighting to the end. He had no intention of dying just to show off some pointless heroics.
As the lich's subordinate, or rather his 'disciple,' he came to help gather living sacrifices, but Alsus felt no guilt over it.
From the very beginning, adventurers were a profession far removed from honor.
What's the problem with betraying an honor you have nothing to protect with?
“Hey, Alsus. Heard this? That woman mage Blanca? Apparently her downfall came when the staff she had broke. She got kicked out of her old party too, and these days she's apparently struggling even to pay off her debts. There’s even talk she’ll be hired as a receptionist soon.”
One day, he heard some news that was not at all pleasant.
“Really? Well, a receptionist is more stable than an adventurer, I suppose. Compared to putting yourself in danger and ending up in a bad way for nothing, anyway.”
In truth, there was almost no connection between Blanca and Alsus.
But it was also true that her existence, relentlessly charging toward the defeat of the lich, irritated Alsus, who was working behind the scenes as one of the lich's underlings.
Alsus had thought that he might need to deal with her separately someday, so hearing that she had collapsed on her own made him happily raise his glass.
And then.
The strange young man who appeared one day overturned everything.
「Frensia doesn't seem to have very good public order. With armed thugs coming at me over and over, I couldn't help but use a little self-defense for protection. Please do take care, my lord.」
A madman who did not hesitate to throw blatant provocation at a lord who was undeniably a noble and, in his own territory, practically no different from a king.
A monster who had toyed with Knight Gudren, whom Alsus couldn't even be sure he could beat at full strength, as lightly as if handling a child.
Bern. That red-haired adventurer settled the Frensia incident before Alsus could even carry out his sabotage, and on top of that he made the entire adventurer guild get its heavy backside moving.
The mage he had thought had collapsed in despair was, before he knew it, displaying monstrous ability beside him, and people naturally compared the veteran adventurer who had spent decades in the trade with the fresh-faced rookie who had been an adventurer for less than a year, putting them on the same level as if it were only natural.
Outwardly, Alsus had put on the act of being broad-minded, of being a great man delighted by the arrival of a promising junior, but inside he was full of displeasure and impatience.
That strength.
That unconventional conduct.
Even the nerve to willingly join in a girl's dream, a dream close to the delusions of an idiot, instead of dismissing it.
A being that seemed to embody the 'romantic adventurer' Alsus had dreamed of as a boy but had ultimately been unable to become.
Something like that should not exist.
Something like that, something like that—an adventurer who seemed to have stepped out of a story should not exist.
If something like that really existed, then.
Wouldn't Alsus himself become nothing more than a loser who had merely compromised partway?
For practical reasons and emotional ones alike, Alsus had to kill Bern.
That was what he had to do.
Slash! Thud! Boom!
At the sight before his eyes, Alsus could only stand there with his mouth hanging open.
‘What am I looking at?’
Every time Bern swung his sword, the monsters around him, with durability beyond ordinary steel, were cut down like bundles of straw.
The tank in Alsus's party, who could even withstand the charge of a beastified boar, had his limbs twisted and was rolling on the floor from one kick from Bern, and the archer who had fired a poison-coated arrow had his throat pierced by the very trick that sent that arrow straight back at him.
The Skeleton Mage's curse struck only the floor where Bern had been standing, and the slime that could corrode even steel was crushed by the force of his sword alone, splattering its goo over the other allies nearby.
‘This is, this is absurd...!’
In this space, where light was magically sealed away, anyone not previously assisted by the lich's magic couldn't see a single inch ahead.
Bern's vision right now must be darkness itself.
And yet he was handling the attacks that the hundreds of undead surrounding him were swinging and firing with absurd ease.
If Bern had at least been unleashing aura, if he had tried to overwhelm them with sheer output, Alsus wouldn't have been this shocked.
But Bern had only poured mana into his sword to strengthen it; he wasn't able to give mana physical force and swing it around, nor could he wrap it around his body like armor to raise his defense.
That meant Bern's level was nothing more than 4th tier.
Yes, the same 4th tier as Alsus.
An adventurer at that same level was fighting alone across this disadvantageous battlefield with nothing but skill.
“...Don't make me laugh, don't make me laugh!!”
Alsus widened his eyes and, with a rough motion, drew a black bead from inside his robes.
As the 'mark of a disciple' he had received from the lich spewed ominous mana and seeped into Alsus's body, bizarre sounds began to echo from within him.
Crack, creak, crunch.
The muscles all over his body swelled to bursting, and veins rose on the surface of his skin like spiderwebs.
Though the excessive enhancement made him bleed all over his body, Alsus, blinded by rage and excitement, didn't care.
Crunch!
With nothing more than a simple leap, Alsus left a huge footprint in the stone floor as he charged forward and swung his sword at Bern with all his strength.
Clang!
For the first time since coming to this space, Bern was forced back, unable to withstand the attack.
Seemingly exhilarated by that fact, Alsus did not stop and kept swinging his sword.
“What did I do so wrong! What's the problem with cooperating with the lich to survive! What's the problem with trying to gain even the slightest advantage!?”
Was it because the lich's mana had invaded not only his body, but his brain as well?
Without even knowing why himself, Alsus spewed words at random as if vomiting out the frustration built up inside him.
Even with his sudden outburst, Bern did not waver, calmly moving his sword to block the attacks.
“Have you ever seen people who begged and pleaded for someone to protect their village from monsters, then pretended nothing had happened and refused to pay the fee once the crisis was over!?”
“Have you ever fought a criminal organization for the sake of a boy who said he'd definitely repay you if you recovered his parents' keepsake, only for him to vanish without even a word of thanks!?”
“Have you ever followed a treasure map handed to you by a senior adventurer saying you could definitely pull it off, only to fall into a trap and nearly lose both your fortune and your life!?”
“Have you ever dueled for a noble girl who, in tears, said she didn't want to be left behind to marry a thug, only to hear from that very noble girl's mouth, 'That lowly adventurer tried to force himself on me'!?”
With Alsus's fierce cry, his sword finally grazed Bern's body.
The blood that spilled over turned to powdery light and vanished not long after touching the floor, but not a single person here noticed it.
“No matter how much you talk about romance, you'll only end up wounded by cold reality! Dream of adventure and you'll only be used by hyenas! You think you’re any different!!”
The more Alsus's fierce assault continued, the more wounds appeared on Bern's body.
At that sight, excitement and a vile satisfaction lingered in Alsus's eyes.
Yes, the red-haired adventurer was the same.
No matter how outstanding he seemed, no matter how special he seemed, in the end he was nothing more than someone who would be broken by the world's unfairness.
This guy too, in the end, was just like me—
“—Hmm, are you done talking?”
Spin.
Alsus's vision flipped.
Like a judo throw executed with a sword, Bern twisted the course of Alsus's attack, forcibly slamming him to the ground, then stomped on the ankle of the man who was scrambling back up and crushed it in an instant.
Letting out a beastlike scream, Alsus only then realized that no one else in this space was making a sound besides him.
The thought that had flashed through his mind, Alsus desperately denied it.
There was no way. There was no way something like that could be possible.
As Alsus desperately tried to deny reality, Bern said coldly.
“I said it already. You won't die, not until the very end.”
Blankly.
Forgetting even the pain in his ankle, Alsus looked around him.
The only existence standing in the darkness was Bern.
Everyone else, including Alsus himself, was sprawled on the floor, rolling about.
Bern hadn't been wounded by Alsus's fierce assault because he lacked the time to deal with every attack.
He had simply allowed a slight opening because, while facing Alsus, he was exterminating the other enemies at the same time.
Looking down at Alsus, who had lost the will to fight, Bern said.
“I can see you've had quite a few twists and turns in your life. I don't know why you were babbling all that at me in the middle of a fight, but well, I suppose that can happen when you're excited. And as for what I think about it— I don't exactly think you're 'bad.'”
Alsus, who had never imagined words of affirmation would come from Bern’s mouth, gaped in shock.
“Chasing a dream, an impossible goal, is an incredibly hard thing to do. In the end, your life is your own, so if you gave up on dreaming, what right do I have to lecture you about it?”
Bern added that he himself had no right to talk about diligence.
“So I don't oppose you because you're bad or because you've done something wrong.”
“…Then what is it?”
“Preference.”
Without the slightest hesitation, Bern declared it.
“Between you, who gave up on your dream and compromised with reality, and her, who keeps stubbornly going even while being laughed at by everyone around her, which one I prefer is obvious enough, isn't it?”
Silence fell.
Alsus moved his mouth, then muttered in a hollow voice.
“I misjudged you. I thought you were a hero who’d stepped out of a fairy tale, but you were really just an arrogant snob.”
“I'd appreciate it if you called that human charm. Anyway, so, are you ready?”
“Ready?”
Bern pointed the tip of his sword at one of the undead.
A corpse with all four limbs severed, leaving only the torso.
“From this point on, I want you to answer my questions quickly, accurately, and with proper courtesy. Otherwise, just as I warned beforehand, I'll test everything these friends here went through on your own body.”
Bern's tone was calm, as if he were talking about today's weather, and that only made it more chilling.
“Then the first question. ...Hmm, no. Let's do that again. The first question, if you please.”
-Where are the captured victims?
Within the darkness where you couldn't see even an inch ahead.
Feeling as though Bern's eyes, which had no reason to shine, were flashing ominously, Alsus swallowed before he knew it.