Heroes and Their Qualifications (13)
The wind blows.
The Dragon Kingdom mountain range is filled with wind, a gale so strong it feels as if it could tear one’s skin, whipping through every nook and cranny of the valleys.
There is no place untouched by the wind.
The vast mountain range of the Dragon Kingdom is filled with calamity, with a climate so lethal that ordinary creatures would lose their lives the moment they set foot in it.
We set foot in such a mountain range.
It was not an easy journey. With every step forward, wyverns slicing through the sky and earth dragons erupting from the ground appeared frequently. Thanks to Valkvogel’s surveillance of the skies and my own of the ground, direct combat was not frequent, but even without those threats, advancing was still treacherous.
There were no paths for humans to walk. This is the land of dragons, the city of dragons, and their means of travel are their wings. Although they mimic human life, in rugged terrain, it’s typical to use wings. It’s faster than walking, and there’s no need to bother with unnecessary paths.
If I were a dragon, I would have agreed several times over.
But I’m human, and damned paths here mean crossing cliffs that seem like they’ll send you plummeting hundreds of meters down with just a single log, or sheer rock walls with nothing to grab onto. Telling someone to move quickly in such a place is like telling them to die.
Isn’t that a bit much to ask of someone who just narrowly escaped death?
It would have been somewhat bearable if the scenery were pretty. But all that surrounded us were trees, trees, trees, trees, and more trees, rocks… and trees, with the occasional wyvern screeching in the skies.
That was the natural landscape of the northern Dragon Kingdom.
A journey exhausting both body and mind. There’s nothing to see. That’s one way to put it.
That’s why I’m suffering like this.
It wouldn’t have been this hard if I hadn’t fought with Nicola….
“Sigh… So, how much farther is it to the nearest village?”
Valkvogel, using her wings to walk atop the trees.
She says it’s the perfect place to keep an eye on the sky. Good for blocking wyverns.
What’s she going to do if an earth dragon swallows her along with the tree?
After a brief pause, she glides down with an indifferent expression that hasn’t changed.
Valkvogel flicks the leaves off her wings and opens her mouth.
“Just a bit. With your pace… it’ll take a bit longer.”
“Give me an exact time, like how many minutes and seconds.”
“It’s because you’re too slow.”
“No, you’re just too fast.”
If Valkvogel says it’s ‘just a bit’ further, we must still have quite a distance to go.
You can’t trust the word of a creature that flies.
Looks like we have more walking to do.
“Well, anyway. Let’s keep going.”
With that, Valkvogel heads back up into the trees. Her wings haven’t fully recovered, so the sight of her clambering up, gripping the branches, is rather comical.
Even with her looking like that, I need to walk diligently to keep up.
I shake off the distracting thoughts and get ready to move.
I still have to walk a bit more to deliver this letter.
I exhale a tired breath and take another step forward.
We’re now in the northern part of the Dragon Kingdom, searching for a village where Bella might be staying.
Putting thoughts of the letter aside for a moment, we headed straight for the mountain range. Even Bella wouldn’t camp out in the north.
You might think there couldn’t possibly be a village in such a desolate place, with nothing but wyverns and earth dragons in sight, but even here, villages exist sporadically. They’re inhabited by people who have been exiled under the guise of being pioneers… because dragons live here. There are always people who have to live in such places.
Even though I know this… the absence of any sign of a village is starting to make me anxious.
From my point of view, all I can see are trees.
I briefly considered climbing up into the trees myself, but someone has to keep an eye on the ground. Besides, I’m not in great shape right now; I might pass out up there.
Well, regardless, I have to keep walking.
In such monotonous moments, one might ponder the contents of the letter… but I just can’t bring myself to do it. It’s bothersome to think about, and I don’t particularly want to recall it.
The truth of it. I’ve roughly grasped the goddess’s purpose, but that doesn’t erase what I’ve done. In this situation, living freely is an impossibility.
So, I just open the letters.
I haven’t thought about what comes after.
I’ve been holding on with the thought that everything will be better once I get home.
The idea of living freely once I return is just empty words. Too much time has passed for me to go back to who I was before, and the days of innocence are long gone. I’ve known love and lost it, forgotten people.
It’s only natural that the goddess wants me dead, and it was surprising that the damned cursed sword kept my mind intact.
The information that I can go home after opening all the letters is good to know… but why, there was a saying. We live by looking forward to an uncertain future. There’s nothing more boring than a life where you know everything that’s going to happen.
I have two letters left.
Once those two letters are opened, I will…
How should I live?
If I return to my original world, I won’t even be able to honor her memory. If I don’t go back, it feels like the people I’ve killed will come back to haunt me.
Maybe then, it’s a better life to stay here, where at least I know some faces.
But then again, if I don’t return to my original world, they’ll probably execute me here.
The more I think about it, the more my head hurts.
“…Up ahead.”
It was after several hours of continuous walking that Valkvogel suddenly appeared in front of me. She crouched as low as possible, blocking my path with her tail while intently watching something.
I couldn’t sense any presence. There was nothing but trees in front of us.
But Valkvogel wouldn’t act without reason.
Well, she’s a dragon. Maybe she’s spotted something beyond human sight. Perhaps a wyvern, an earth dragon, or maybe…
Quietly, I crouched down and opened my Mind’s Eye.
With a slight pain, my vision whitened. Then, a world of black and white unfolded before me.
As the trees that obscured my view disappeared, something finally caught my eye.
Standing alone in a treeless field was─ a girl.
Her age… with horns, wings, and a tail, I shouldn’t make assumptions.
The girl was gathering tree fruits and branches. Her clothes looked shabby, making her seem vulnerable, but she’s of the dragon race. Unless a wyvern pack appears, she’s unlikely to be in danger.
She seems to be a half-dragon… but as long as it’s not a horde of demons, she should be safe.
But I heard that the pioneers hunt wyverns and earth dragons to make a living, not gather tree fruits. Maybe I was misinformed.
Well, that doesn’t really matter.
As long as I can find out the location of the village, nothing else is important.
“There’s a girl. So there must be a village nearby.”
Valkvogel’s eyes are sparkling, so there’s no chance of missing the location. And since it felt like something was about to flow from my eyes, I closed my Mind’s Eye.
“It seems a bit far… Ah, why not just go and ask? That might be faster.”
“That’s just asking to be suspected.”
Valkvogel, being a high-ranking subordinate in the Demon King’s army and not having many friends, probably doesn’t understand this.
Well, it’s not like I had many either.
A stranger suddenly appearing in such a desolate place is bound to be suspicious. To avoid looking like a suspicious character, I need to approach as naturally as possible.
For example, I could offer a bottle of drink and then ask if there’s something I need to know, something like that.
Or maybe I just won’t approach at all.
“Let’s just tail her discreetly. Showing up out of nowhere and asking for the village’s location is way too suspicious.”
After all, a stranger who ‘happens to’ meet a local and enters the village is more suspicious than one who seems to have wandered in by chance after getting lost.
Truth be told, I wanted a bit of a rest too.
Judging by the girl’s scant harvest of tree fruits, it seemed like it would take at least a few hours to reach her. That time could be spent resting comfortably.
Valkvogel seemed to catch on to my strategy and looked at me with a disdainful eye before turning her head away.
I wasn’t in good enough shape to care about such looks, so I promptly sat down at the base of a tree and caught my breath.
Finally, a chance to rest.
The respite was sweet.
Even when I was in good shape, two hours of travel would be tiring, but in my current state, this much movement was akin to a grueling march.
If I didn’t rest like this, recovery would be difficult.
I wonder if Cecilia has recovered a bit by now.
With such trivial thoughts, I was taking my break.
Then, from somewhere, I heard the sound of the air being split.
A roar, like that of a plane passing by, echoed through the air.
A fleeting glimpse of black leather in the sky.
The source of the roar was probably…
“A wyvern.”
Valkvogel said so.
Her tone was nonchalant.
We were in the forest, so the wyvern couldn’t approach us. Wyverns, by nature, don’t dive and attack when there are obstacles. A wyvern that pounces on prey hidden in the forest is destined to crash into a tree and meet its end before it can pierce the neck of its target.
So there’s no chance the wyvern will attack us. And with Valkvogel here, even if one or two wyverns attacked, we would be safe.
But what is this strange feeling?
I feel like I’m forgetting something…
This slightly unpleasant and unsettling sensation…
“…Hey, was there a tree near her?”
The girl.
We were in the forest.
She was in the field.
The girl had no way to protect herself from a diving wyvern. Being of the dragon race might offer her some defense, but her form was that of a half-dragon.
Even a single wyvern could threaten the life of a half-dragon.
“…No.”
“Right. We’ve confirmed that. …So, which direction did that sound head towards?”
“…Probably, that way?”
Valkvogel pointed in the same direction where the girl was.
With those words, I started running.
Valkvogel followed behind me and, before I knew it, overtook me.
If it were a wyvern, I could fend it off with a few casual swings of the holy sword.
But using the holy sword now is out of the question. If I use it, I’ll be the one to die first.
Valkvogel could probably handle up to two wyverns. Any more than that would be dangerous.
The best course of action now was to drag the girl into the forest.
It might make me look like a crazed kidnapper, but there was no other way. No matter how agile a wyvern might be, it couldn’t engage in aerial combat within the forest, nor could it recklessly leap about.
Please, just be alive.
With that thought, I ran.
“Valkvogel, bring her!!!”
I shouted towards Valkvogel, who had dashed ahead out of the forest.
But there was no reply. I couldn’t see her either.
It was too quiet for a battle to be taking place.
And then, I caught a whiff of a metallic scent.
Could the hunt already be over?
I pushed off the ground, trying to get out of the forest as quickly as possible.
When I emerged a step too late, what met my eyes was a field stained with blood. It was a scene reminiscent of a battlefield, with black stones soaked in blood filling my vision.
“…Shit.”
Valkvogel was staring blankly at the scene.
We were too late.
“Ha… Yeah. A little, no. Ha…”
What should I say?
I didn’t particularly feel guilty. The time for being hurt by the death of someone I didn’t know had long passed. After all the killing I’ve done, feeling guilty now for something I didn’t even do would be wrong.
Yeah. That’s it.
Let it go.
“Hey, let’s go. We’re a bit late. Let’s just walk.”
I said that and grabbed Valkvogel, but she didn’t respond.
Instead, she seemed to be intently watching something, as if on guard.
“…There’s something else.”
She said.
There was still something there.
Something she couldn’t take her eyes off, something dangerous.
What could it be? I couldn’t see anything. With that thought, I activated Mind’s Eye.
As expected, there was nothing else.
For the first second, that was true.
The blood soaked into the field was not the girl’s. Mind’s Eye told me. The black stones scattered around were wyvern corpses. In other words, the blood flowing from the corpses had stained the field.
So where was the girl?
Mind’s Eye told me.
There was a figure standing atop the black stones, the wyvern corpses.
Could it be that the girl had killed all the wyverns?
No, that wasn’t it.
The girl was lying face down on the field, trembling.
Then who was the figure standing tall atop the wyverns?
As I pondered, I closed Mind’s Eye and the world of black and white began to regain its color.
The mysterious figure who had slain the wyverns was covered in blood but had a familiar face. With hair the color of blood, mirroring the surroundings, and eyes the green of the fields.
As he, no, she wiped the blood off her sword and our eyes met.
“……You are?”
She said.
It was a voice I recognized.
It was Bella.
