1065. With a few pebbles thrown
So, how was it outside?
Puff, tobacco smoke rises into the sky. The smoke, made by grinding a few leaves and herbs that emitted a peculiar scent, left a distinctive fragrance on the old woman’s body.
It was a scent he had smelled often in his childhood, deeply ingrained in his memory. As soon as Dunbakel smelled the fortune teller’s scent, he was reminded of the time he had left the City of Beastmen.
The only person who had seen him off on that day, the day he departed, was standing before him.
“You told me there would be a guide when I wanted to die someday. Did you get a glimpse of the future?”
Dunbakel asked. It would be a lie to say he hadn’t been curious all this time. Hadn’t someone worthy of being called a guide suddenly appeared right before his eyes just as he was about to die, about to end it all?
So much had changed since meeting him. Had the old fortune teller glimpsed the future like that?
The old woman chuckled, took a deep breath of smoke, and exhaled it. The smoke, exhaled silently, clumped together before quickly thinning out and scattering out of sight. With each puff she exhaled, the acrid scent intensified, stinging his nose.
Dunbakel didn’t find it terribly foul. Some memories never fade, yet the tobacco smoke from the old fortune teller who had cared for him after he had been cast out merely evoked a sense of affection.
They said some of the beastmen hated her tobacco smoke, but it wasn’t the case for him.
As he waited for an answer, the old woman cast her gaze into the distance, as if admiring the silent night.
Two moons and starlight mingled to illuminate the city above. Then, suddenly, the old woman opened her mouth.
“No.”
“…You say no?”
“Kid, my fortune telling only glimpses good and bad fortune. When I said that guy called a Guide would be by your side, it was all just wordplay.”
He speaks and giggles to himself.
What is that?
My resolve was intense when I grabbed Encred’s ankle, and the sight of him appearing before my eyes was impressive, but the old woman’s words also came to mind and influenced me. But apparently, that was a lie.
The old woman kept giggling. It was the deceiver laughing at the deceived, yet I didn’t find it unpleasant. Starlight curved along her laughter and brushed past the two of them.
“You bastard, you bastard, do you know what your eyes looked like back then? They were the kind of eyes that were looking for a place to die. For someone who suddenly has no family or friends left around, what they need is a place to rely on. That’s why I told you to grab onto just anyone—really just anyone—and cling to them.”
“What if you end up hanging out with some idiot?”
The corners of the old woman’s eyes curved gently. “Would you really do that?” Her eyes held that very question.
“You were the most cheerful and resilient child I’ve ever seen. Yeah, that could have happened. You might have gotten stabbed by a blind knife hanging out with a fool, but when the end came, you would have found a place to survive somehow. Your instincts would have led you that way.”
Is she sincere? No, even Dunbakel knew now.
The old woman merely wished. She made wishes, prayed, and simply hoped. Her fortune telling cannot glimpse the future. She can only wish and pray.
“No, I didn’t.”
Dunbakel recited the truth. Although he belonged to a bandit group, he never crossed the line and met a man named Enkrid, finding his true self.
“Welcome back, my daughter.”
The old woman spoke with a smile. Suin was raised communally; even though he was not born of her own womb, he was everyone’s daughter and everyone’s son.
Tears welled up in the corners of Dunbakel’s eyes. It was the old woman standing before him who had packed a few silver coins in his pocket before he left, and it was she who had taught him how to survive.
It was also she who had spouted false prophecies, telling him to cling to anyone if he could never stand on his own.
Dunbakel felt a surge of emotion welling up inside him like a wave.
“thank you.”
The old woman giggled and placed her hand on Dunbakel’s head.
“Right, I’ll have to ask again. How was it outside?”
Sometimes, really sometimes, I used to think about just secretly hiding and living by the old woman’s side, but I never did.
Why was that?
“Why, really? Back then, you were sad, yet you were hopeful. There was a vibrant child there, clenching their teeth to prove their worth outside.”
“Did I? You said earlier that I felt like I was going to die?”
“How can a person live with only one emotion? We go back and forth, and opposing feelings and hearts often coexist. You were like that back then, too. You felt like you were going to die, yet you still harbored hope.”
Did the old woman see him that way? Or was it really true?
It was time gone. It didn’t really matter. Dunbakel began by telling the story of Encred, and then recounted the tales of Rem, Ragnar, Audin, Esther who came with Saxen, Sinar, Theresa—a half-giant who insisted she was the eldest no matter what—Fell and Roford, and many others who made up the city. He mentioned that
a guy named Kreis recommended everyone work at the salon but always made sure to leave him out.
“I would do the same. Wash up, you rascal. You’d think every prisoner in the world was just like you.”
match.
The old woman struck Dunbakel on the back. Dunbakel could have dodged it, but he just took the hit.
“Ah, this is a subtle scent.”
“Are you planning to paralyze the noses of all the other beastmen?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know.”
The old woman stroked Dunbakel’s head several times and said.
You finally survived, you finally forgave those who abandoned you. And you finally made it this far.
Those eyes looked very sorrowful.
“why?”
Dunbakel suddenly asked.
“Are you going to the temple with me tomorrow?”
The old woman asked back. Dunbakel nodded. Was one of the reasons he had come here in the first place to look around the Beastmen’s Temple?
Well, it wasn’t important, but I wondered if there was anything inside. Dunbakel didn’t think deeply about it. He simply brushed it off lightly, thinking, “If I go, I go.”
“I am a diviner of good and bad fortune. You know that, right?”
“Why are you acting like this? It feels unsettling.”
“The Sanctuary of you and the Suin holds both good and bad fortune. The fact that the reading came out this way means that no one knows which way will turn out. Do you still intend to go?”
“Will you stop and run away just because you are afraid of the future?” Enkrid’s question could be heard. He had demonstrated his convictions through his actions and the life he had lived.
If it were the old him, he would have fled immediately upon hearing such words, because he was terrified.
But now, things were a little different. Dunbakel now knows how to make fear his companion; he knows how to wield his sword and fight for the values he believes in. He knows how to stake his life on it.
“What if I don’t go?”
At Dunbakel’s question, the old woman paused for a moment. Sweat trickled down her forehead. She finished contemplating and spoke.
“What could I not do for the hero who saved our city? Do not go. It is not your fault if the City of the Prisoners falls because you did not go.”
The old fortune teller had a terrible prophetic dream. It was a dream in which a temple collapsed, and a demon emerged from within to kill everyone.
It was so vivid that she could not possibly dismiss it as just a dream. The child’s scream was still ringing in her ears.
So she spent the entire day from morning till evening reading fortunes; while everything else was unfavorable, there was one path where good and bad fortune coexisted.
But is it right to ask this child to make another sacrifice? Shouldn’t she have told him to leave, to run away?
Of course, her fortunes might all be wrong. After all, the world, people, relationships, and will always spew out things that defy expectations.
Dunbakel suddenly burst into loud laughter. Her laughter covered the city in the middle of the night. After laughing for a while, Dunbakel spoke.
“If our boss knew, he wouldn’t have even scoffed. That bastard is a really strange guy.”
Even to the old fortune teller, Enkrid in Dunbakel’s story was a truly peculiar and special person.
He was a demonic knight, a demon slayer, a man obsessed with training, and a knight who would throw himself in front of the child behind him to protect it.
He was a man who wielded his sword like a monk, even though he had not sworn an oath to uphold the word of chivalry.
Through his flowing hair, his golden demonic eyes stared directly at the old woman.
And the future is variable.
This is Encred’s catchphrase. If everything in the world were predetermined, effort would have no value or meaning.
That is why the future, tomorrow, and the world are always changing.
My future isn’t determined by tossing a few pebbles.
Compared to her childhood, she is a beastkin refined beyond mere hardness, like black gold. She smiled as she sat kneeling before the old fortune teller. Her smile was more beautiful than any other beastkin’s, and a powerful vitality radiated from her entire body.
“……You’ve grown a lot, little one.”
“I’ve grown tremendously.”
“Still, it’s not just a few pebbles.”
“Huh?”
“I mean, it’s not a score calculated with just a few pebbles.”
“Ah, I mean, I mean. I mean.”
Dunbakel brushed away any sense of foreboding with a smile, and the old fortune teller did not dwell on matters that had slipped out of her grasp.
As is generally the case with the Beastmen species, they did not go out of their way to dig into the past or rummage through decisions that had already been made.
“Well then. Did you sleep with that bastard Encred?”
The old woman asked like a beastwoman.
“No, that’s impossible. You saw the witch and the fairy standing next to them.”
The two continued a conversation typical of Suin. It was a time to catch up and express their joy at seeing each other in their own way.
* * *
As soon as Encred opened his eyes at dawn, he excitedly patted Tofi and set off toward the Temple of the Beastmen.
“Ugh.”
Only then did Dunbakel stretch with sleepy eyes and step out.
Do you sleep all day?
Enkrid asked.
“You never know what might happen today, so you have to stay in top condition.”
Rem and all the madmen had become more eloquent. Dunbakel was no different. Encred subtly let out a commanding aura toward the beastman speaking confidently right in front of him.
Dunbakel crouched down like a cat, then sprang to the side, dodging the localized intimidation Encred had unleashed.
As he rolled, Dunbakel stepped on the back of the fallen Tofi and springed back to his feet.
“I almost died. I saw heaven for a moment.”
Topi, who had briefly lost consciousness due to physical exhaustion, woke up and spoke. A young woman named Suin put a piece of ripe peach into his mouth as he stood up covered in grass blades and dust. After chewing and swallowing the flesh, Topi lifted his head as if he had regained his senses.
“I should be the one guiding you.……”
“In your condition? Forget it.”
A beastman reeking of tobacco interrupted Topi’s words. It was an old beastman with eyes the same color as her dark brown hair peeking through her graying hair.
Should I say she looked the oldest among the beastmen I had seen here? I heard
that some of the elders were raised by her, too?
I had heard this story because there were many beastmen chattering beside me even after the banquet had ended.
I am the one who has been to the temple the most.
It was the old fortune teller who stepped forward to speak. Encred simply looked at her and asked if that was the case. After all, who was guiding him wasn’t important.
It’s this way.
She guided the way without hesitation. Perhaps because everyone thought nothing of it, no one, even among the elders, stepped forward to follow.
“I don’t necessarily go into the temple. Only those with business there need to go.”
Torsoe stepped forward as the representative of the Council of Elders and spoke. Whether it was a holy temple or a shrine, it was a place that was important to them yet also shunned.
Observing the nature of the beastmen, it was understandable. These were the kind of guys who valued having fun today more than looking back on the past.
That infuriated him, and he felt a constant surge of desire to put them through the wringer inside Encred.
Have a safe trip.
There was no particular instruction to be polite to my goddess. Perhaps Kriemhart herself was a god devoid of such pretense.
Primahild, too, used to address her goddess like a close sister.
That was the path they had set out on. It was one of countless caves. There were no stairs, nor any ropes to help them climb easily.
The old fortune teller, proving she was a beast-man despite her age, climbed the wall that was practically a cliff.
Enkrid followed right behind her. He roughly struck the wall a couple of times with his dagger and leaped upwards to climb, while Esther transformed into a leopard and ran up the wall as if it were flat ground.
Sinar leaped high as if showing off his light footwork, swung his blades to strike the wall, and used the force of the blow to land on the ground almost silently.
They were all quite skilled. Temares simply crawled up. Dunbakel climbed the wall similarly to Esther, who had transformed into a leopard.
The height seemed such that three people could reach it by stepping on each other’s shoulders and stretching out their hands, as if riding on each other’s shoulders. It was lower than the city wall, but it wasn’t a height that could be easily climbed either.
Everyone is truly talented.
The old fortune teller muttered.
“It might be climbable for an adult Suin if he knows a little bit about how to move his body, but I suppose the intention is to prevent the children from even daring to climb it?”
Encred noticed that some of the caves had been deliberately made uncomfortable and spoke. After hearing this much, I roughly understood the beastmen’s training methods as well.
“If you intentionally make it difficult to move, you will naturally train your body.”
Since everyone is busy running away whenever told to train or discipline, I simply incorporated methods to discipline the body into daily life. Encred gained a small realization.
Don’t force me.
It is about structuring life itself so that it becomes physical training.
Human willpower is limited. Not everyone is like oneself. Encred knows this.
That’s why a system is necessary.
A system that keeps them immersed in training without looking elsewhere, and it would be even better if some fun elements were introduced.
It wouldn’t be a bad idea to talk to Crys and change the soldiers’ training methods a little.
There are many who break their own limits, but wouldn’t it be better to guide them to do so naturally?
If the entire Border Guard standing army had known what Encred was thinking just now, they would have drawn their weapons in unison and veins would have popped out.
You’re already working me to the bone, what more do you intend to do here?
Such words were bound to come out naturally.
Encred’s thoughts merely passed by briefly. He had simply spoken whatever came to mind.
However, from the perspective of the listener, it was simply astonishing.
