Chapter 48
In front of the labyrinth, the group decided to make camp.
As dusk fell, they set up camp. The witch floated a glowing orb to light the area, then opened a book and sat down.
The others gathered around the campfire and began discussing the labyrinth they would attempt to conquer tomorrow.
As the conversation turned to monsters, Tarmin casually remarked,
“Monsters have no nutritional value.”
At the out-of-the-blue comment, the prince grabbed his stomach and laughed without a shred of dignity, while Tarmin's face turned bright red.
Only after laughing to his heart's content did the prince raise a hand in apology.
“Oh, sorry. But nutritional value? Hahaha! That's a masterpiece. Did you try eating one while we weren't looking or something?”
“Of course not. I shouldn't have said anything.”
“No, you said it well. I expected you to say they were dangerous or evil. That's an interesting way to put it. I should write that down. Anything else?”
The prince actually opened his journal and prepared to take notes, making Tarmin look embarrassed.
“Uh, I only said it because arrows are precious. I didn't mean anything else.”
The prince had asked what the defining trait of monsters was, and this was the answer that had come to Tarmin after reflecting on his brief experience as an adventurer.
Monsters clung to places all over the world like boils, and their numbers were endless.
There would be no end to eliminating them one by one, and even if you hunted them with a bow, no amount of arrows would be enough.
The prince smiled and continued writing despite Tarmin's answer.
“Sometimes it is not a sage, but a miserly hunter, who understands the nature of the world. Rather than infinity, worthlessness could be said to lie at the heart of monsters, and the hunter described this as having no nutritional value.”
“Hey, Your Highness. If you're picking a fight, why not just say so?”
“What are you talking about? Tarmin, I agree with you. My homeland is overflowing with monsters, too. If you piled up mountains of monster corpses, wouldn't it be only natural to look for a way to use them?”
The prince set down his pen and gazed briefly east, toward the land where his country lay.
The reason he was devoting himself to the Hero in a distant foreign land.
Understanding what the prince meant, Tarmin turned pale and looked at him.
“They really have no nutritional value.”
**
He couldn't understand Enya's sharp reaction.
Tarmin remained silent for a moment.
The material was a little unusual, but was it really such a big problem?
When he'd gone hunting with his father as a child, the family bow had never caused any particular problems.
“Enya, you said it's a monster's horn?”
“Yes.”
Enya maintained a serious expression.
After thinking hard for a long time, and even nodding to himself, Tarmin finally let his shoulders droop and said,
“…Sorry. Honestly, I don't really understand what the problem is.”
Enya furrowed her brows in frustration and said,
“Taal, did you really forget?”
“Forget what?”
“Monsters, when I'm around,”
Enya trailed off mid-sentence, her expression shifting as she realized she'd let something slip.
Her gaze was turned toward Tarmin's father.
Enya bit her lip, stood up, and tugged at Tarmin's arm.
“Come over here for a moment.”
“Uh, okay.”
It was just as Tarmin was hurriedly rising, pulled along by Enya.
His father lifted his head.
The harsh ringing of bells being struck against brass sounded from all around.
-Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding
A sharp bell whose only purpose was to convey anxiety and urgency, with no regard for musical beauty.
While Tarmin stood frozen in surprise, someone pounded on the cabin door.
“Mr. Alchin, are you home?”
An unfamiliar man's voice.
He hadn't come looking for Tarmin.
His father got up and headed for the front door.
When he opened it, a man stood there wearing the round breastplate characteristic of Akhraba and holding a slender spear.
His father greeted him casually.
“Well, Anuf. What brings you here? I can guess, of course, but this bell...”
“Mr. Alchin. The bell is for the same reason.”
“What? Don't tell me…”
“Monsters. An awful lot of them.”
His father's face twisted.
**
Along with the urgent ringing of the bell, a soldier rushed past the two of them and knocked on the door.
Lise pressed her sword hilt against the wall and used the recoil to step smoothly forward.
The scarred centaur's words flashed through her mind.
‘We will meet again, Benoa.’
She'd told Ivar that, but had the centaurs really come to attack?
For now, that was the only conclusion she could draw.
She'd thought they'd wait until they tried to leave the city.
Was it possible to attack the city with just a little over twenty of them?
They couldn't even climb the walls with ladders on their own.
She didn't have long to think.
She didn't know what kind of fearsome attack they might launch, but she had to prepare for the worst.
“Ivar, can you get us some horses?”
Ivar wasn't so foolish as to ask where he was supposed to find horses in an emergency.
He shouldered his pack and ran out without hesitation.
“Understood. Should I bring them here?”
Lise thought for a moment, then answered.
“To the center. Where the marketplace was.”
“Understood.”
As Ivar disappeared into the distance, Lise unfastened the sword at her waist.
After taking a short run-up, she planted her scabbard against the ground, kicked off the wall, and leapt up.
In a movement more like acrobatics, Lise climbed along the wall onto the rooftop and surveyed the street.
People, overcome with confusion and fear, were hurrying into their homes and shutting the doors.
Soldiers were rushing toward the city wall.
After gauging the direction of escape and climbing down, she saw the Hero coming out through the door.
**
The other four, excluding Ivar, followed the messenger up the spiral staircase that ran along the tower.
Tarmin spoke to his father, who was climbing in front of him.
“I was wondering how you managed to live in such a desolate city, but you've been hunting monsters?”
“That's right. They drift close to here.”
“Oh? Then are the people all right? I saw fields stretching all the way to the grasslands on the way here.”
“The fertile soil of the grasslands must be more precious to them than their lives. Or they're confident in their ability to run.”
Tarmin exclaimed in admiration at the farmers' audacity in cultivating even monster territory.
To be able to plow a field and bend over in a place where a monster might bite your leg at any moment.
Tarmin's admiration turned into a groan when they reached the top of the wall.
“It really is as awful as you said.”
From atop the tall city wall, the clear blue sky stretched out before them.
Far below, small, wriggling things could be seen in the fields where the autumn harvest had ended.
Each had a different appearance, except for their black skin or fur.
Some staggered beneath oversized snouts or excessively long horns, while others crawled along without legs.
They were creatures that wouldn't have survived a single day if they were living things.
But they were monsters.
As Tarmin felt dizzy at the sight, like some divine prank he hadn't seen in a long time, his father approached the soldiers on the wall.
“Hey, Captain Giran. What's going on?”
“Ah, you've arrived?”
A young man called Giran came over to them.
He was wearing a splendid helmet and armor, but had nothing in his hands.
He raised a finger and pointed beyond the wall.
“It's just as you can see. An enormous number of monsters are approaching the city. Could you tell me this is a dream?”
His father stared sharply beyond the wall.
As if trying to count them, he then shook his head and said,
“Nearly a thousand? We won't have enough arrows.”
“If we put a price on each of those, the treasury would run dry before we ran out of arrows.”
After staring for a long while, a strange light came into his father's eyes.
“And those are centaurs, aren't they? Am I right?”
“Huh? What are centaurs?”
Instead of Giran, Tarmin answered over his shoulder.
“That's right.”
“Did those horse lovers lure the monsters here? Why on earth?”
“I don't know, but we ran into them once on the way here.”
“Were they chasing you?”
“Maybe. I'm not sure.”
Captain Giran's gaze turned toward Tarmin.
”And who is the person behind you?”
“My son, a hunter. He's inexperienced, but you can trust his bow.”
The two men exchanged greetings.
“I'm Tarmin.”
“I'm Captain Giran of the garrison. I guess you're popular because you take after your father?”
He was referring to Lise and Enya standing near the entrance to the tower.
To have the energy to joke at a time like this.
Tarmin's face twisted, but Giran smiled considerately despite the emergency and called out to the women.
“Ladies, it's dangerous up on the wall. Why don't you go down?”
How surprised would he be to learn that both women were stronger than anyone on the wall?
Instead of telling him, Tarmin only snorted.
Giran grinned, perhaps after making eye contact with the women, then came to his senses.
“Ah, right. So, what should we do? Is there any way to repel them? Should we order an evacuation?”
“I don't know how to repel them, but I can tell you when we should abandon the city.”
“When?”
His father let out a heavy sigh and declared,
“If the monsters knock on the city gate even once, the city is finished.”
**
Lise gave the captain a little smile, then spoke to Enya.
“After he put it that way, shall we go down?”
Enya didn't answer, staring at the grassland with a terrifying look in her eyes.
Lise was genuinely impressed by the enemy's strategy.
“To think they'd summon monsters—the enemy of their enemy.”
“…”
“An army that needs neither supplies nor rest will attack this city.”
The worst enemy the centaurs had drawn in was closing in.
Slowly, irreversibly.
Lise paused briefly, then said,
“I told Ivar to prepare horses. If we need them…”
Enya wasn't listening.
She was only thinking of the white sword hidden in her backpack.
*****