YMFT • 06

<CHAPTER 06>

After leaving Sarodeung, the only thing Belona discarded was her hair.

Judging by the way it had been deliberately tampered with, it was obvious the mages had planted some trivial trick on it beforehand to track her.

Still, that trick had been far inferior to the shadows that served the imperial family.

Unaware of any of this, Belona’s eyes had already shattered into transparency from shock.

The sudden brightness overwhelmed her vision, and she squeezed her eyes shut.

A long, white streak lingered as an afterimage.

Solishar had drawn the longsword he always carried.

“You don’t remember how to ride a horse, do you.”

The absurdly calm question, given the situation, carried a note of certainty.

Either way, Belona couldn’t even respond, like any ordinary person caught in something like this.

She didn’t know whether she should run from Sol, or from the sheriff, or whether escape was even possible.

At the sight of the long sword, her body froze completely.

“I’ll let it slide just for today.”

Uttering nonsense, Solishar immediately spurred his horse forward.

The sheriff’s subordinate hastily drew his bowstring, but Solishar closed the distance in an instant.

He knocked the bow aside with his longsword and thrust it straight into the man’s neck.

As he twisted the blade free, blood sprayed up into the blue sky.

The ease with which he cut down his opponent without effort was terrifyingly clean.

The sheriff, who had felt reassured bringing along a mage, instinctively retreated behind the mage the moment Solishar charged.

The only fights he had ever known were petty violence in alleyways or marketplaces.

So the only thing he could trust was the mage.

But before the mage, who could raise the earth to stop criminals, could even act, the sheriff was struck by a blade, fell from his horse, and died with a broken neck.

“Aaaagh!”

The last mage, exhausted from the long journey and barely managing to cast magic, screamed as he reached out his hand.

Belona saw the air ripple in a circular shape before the spell.

The boundary shimmered faintly, but it was clearly red.

Fire was burning.

But even at the sight of the flames, Solishar thrust his sword straight through, piercing and cutting down the mage.

The moment he swung his blade, all elements sustaining the fire shattered and vanished.

The mage met the same fate as the others.

In the field, only the cries of riderless horses echoed as they scattered.

“Get down.”

As Solishar helped her down, Belona absentmindedly set her feet on the ground.

Her eyes met the corpse lying on the ground.

The sheriff, who had been shouting just moments ago, now lay with his neck bent at a grotesque angle.

His words kept echoing in her dazed mind.

Without realizing it, Belona slowly approached the body.

The corpse had already begun to stiffen, and blood continued to seep out.

What had this man known while he was alive?

“Staring at a corpse all day won’t give you answers.”

Solishar, who had quickly caught the frightened horses before they could flee, had approached without her noticing.

He passed the stiff Belona and crouched beside the sheriff.

“W-What are you doing?”

Her voice, gasping for breath, was barely audible, but Solishar simply held up a pouch of coins.

“Take it.”

Belona caught the pouch thrown at her.

A few coins clinked inside.

He had already begun searching the next body.

His speed in deciding whether to keep or discard items he found was astonishingly fast.

Belona couldn’t keep up with his judgment.

“What is all this…?”

“What do you mean.”

More precisely, she didn’t understand anything at all.

Solishar turned to look at her.

Her face was pale, her eyes wide, her lips parted in shock, trembling faintly.

“Why did you lie?”

“Because it’s simple.”

That, too, was a lie.

It had simply been easier.

For the first time, Belona felt resentful of knowing nothing.

“It won’t last long anyway.”

“True.”

Solishar replied indifferently.

“Then do you want to go back? There are plenty of horses, just take one.”

Belona thought it was incredibly cruel to say such a thing to someone who had nowhere to return to.

“I’m asking why you lied and what you plan to do by taking me somewhere.”

It wasn’t easy to face someone who had just killed people without hesitation and question him directly.

But Belona did her best.

Whether from shock or anger, her voice trembled more and more, but she spoke clearly.

“Why did you do it?”

“If I answer, will you believe me?”

Strangely, his question sounded slightly kind.

As if he were quietly urging her to think carefully.

Belona thought for a moment, then shook her head.

“No. But I still want to know, so I’m asking.”

She couldn’t help but ask, even if it was a foolish question.

She bit down on her trembling lips.

The sorrow she had cried out in the inn courtyard that morning rose up again.

Her eyes grew hot.

“Someone who knows you contacted me and said they’d pay if I brought you in. So I’m taking you to that person.”

At the unexpected answer, Belona snapped her head up.

The man who had been speaking so lightly now frowned.

“Who is that person? How do they know me?”

Solishar, unwilling to answer, instead asked back.

“Do you believe me?”

“Answering and then asking that is cowardly and unfair.”

She blurted out what she had wanted to say.

Then immediately regretted it.

But Sol simply nodded calmly.

“That’s true.”

He said no more and silently finished what he was doing.

After collecting money and useful belongings, he released two horses.

He kept one as a pack horse and placed Belona on the horse he had been riding.

Leaving the bodies behind in the wasteland, they departed.

Belona looked back.

A cold wind swept over the abandoned corpses.

She thought that people died far too easily.

Even after riding late into the evening, they found no signs of human habitation.

They crossed forests and wastelands until their bodies stiffened and the tip of her nose went numb, yet the mountains watching over them did not seem to grow any farther away.

Stars glittered endlessly in the black night, and below them stretched a barren land of dirt, stone, and sparse, withered plants.

Following the uneven terrain, Solishar found a place just suitable to spend the night and lit a campfire among rocks beneath a cliff.

Here, the firelight would not be exposed.

Wrapped tightly in a robe, Belona crouched near the fire.

“Eat.”

He handed her bread and cooked bacon briefly.

It seemed staying at the inn earlier had been fortunate.

Unsure if she could sleep even if told to, Belona stared blankly at the ground.

Perhaps she had once lived rough enough that this might be tolerable.

She didn’t know her past.

“Those people earlier… was it okay to kill them?”

“It’s better to kill them.”

Unexpectedly, he answered.

“Why?”

“Your friend doesn’t know enough to appoint street thugs as a sheriff. If they saw the bodies, they’d panic. Once we leave the north, they won’t even be able to track us.”

It was a longer explanation than expected.

But how much of it could she trust?

Belona hugged her knees as she watched him.

Could she escape?

She looked into the darkness beyond the fire, where nothing could be seen.

A beast’s cry echoed somewhere.

Startled, she quickly turned her head back.

Solishar watched her face as confusion, fear, and resignation passed over it.

He tossed more twigs into the fire.

Sparks drifted into the air as the wood blackened, then turned gray, eventually glowing red before crumbling into white ash.

“Sleep.”

Even without her memories, she was inherently sharp.