Chapter 17

"So if you want to keep this from reaching Louise's ears... who should your milk be going to?"

Bell tilted her head.

"I-I'll do it!"

It was Amon who bowed low and shouted.

"Good to know there's at least one of you who can understand reason."

She patted Amon's head.

The 66th class of the Imperial Army's First Training Center.

The trainees laughed, scowled, and gossiped over nonsense like this.

They were becoming soldiers at the cost of their lives.

As if they'd forgotten the terror of dying any day now.

Teenagers, acting like teenagers.

Mingling. Fitting in.

"Hah..."

It was... almost pleasant.

"Are you laughing?"

"Yeah, laugh. Keep laughing like that for me."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Because I'll be the one protecting your lives.

Kinzo Shua.

Louise Murphy.

And Bell Red.

Five days before their deaths.

---

The front lines.

Imperial Army Special Unit, 1st Division.

"What the hell are those things?"

The Special Forces Captain pointed a finger at the sky.

Marjelo followed his gaze.

"They're clouds, sir."

"No, not that."

"Then I can't help you, sir. Listen carefully. When evaporated water vapor rises..."

"I said not that. I'm talking about those massive crow-like monsters. They just fly around all day. What do you think they are?"

"Massive crow-like monsters?"

"You're not thinking at all, are you, Marjelo."

"We're barely holding the defense line as it is, sir. I don't have the time to worry about the airspace."

"I figured you'd say that."

The two of them examined the orcs Marjelo had sliced down in a single sweep.

They didn't seem any different from the usual orcs they encountered.

But one of them...

"Marjelo. Over here."

The Captain gestured with a grave voice.

"What is it?"

"Let's think about this for a moment."

He crouched down and studied the orc's armor.

Only this orc was wearing a different set.

Crudely hammered-together pieces of iron.

The peculiar thing was...

"There's a ring."

Marjelo fidgeted with the armor.

"Exactly. Two on each shoulder. Four total. What the hell are they?"

"Shackles. Hooks. Maybe something hangs from them? Like ropes?"

"Why would you hang ropes?"

"I don't know the reason, sir."

"Maybe it's not for hanging ropes," the Captain said, frowning at the armor. "The holes are too big. You could thread ten ropes through at once."

"Then a weapon holder?"

"Too small for that. And if you hung a weapon from these rings, it'd dangle horizontally, not vertically. That's impractical."

"Then..."

Marjelo lifted her gaze, thinking hard. Her eyes wandered aimlessly across the sky as she turned the problem over.

And then she saw it.

"We need to leave. Now."

"Where?"

"Anywhere. But I think it's already too late."

"What?"

"There."

She pointed at the clouds.

"For the last time, Marjelo, I know what a damn cloud is!"

But she wasn't pointing at the clouds themselves. She was pointing at something passing beneath them.

The very monsters the Captain had questioned earlier.

"...Ah."

He understood.

They both scrambled onto their black horses.

"The capital. We have to stop them there first."

"Yes, sir."

"Marjelo, you ride straight for the capital. I'll alert the rest of the unit."

"Understood."

They moved faster than they ever had before.

"Those things were transport...!"

"Four rings on the armor. Perfect size for talons to grip."

"He's not the only one wearing that armor."

"All the ones we saw before were just decoys to draw our attention. A second invasion is coming."

She cracked the reins against her horse's flank.

"Yeah. They're going to fall from the sky."

---

I lifted my head and looked up at the clouds.

The Demon King Army's second invasion.

They didn't break through the Imperial Army's defense line.

They simply sailed over it.

Through the air.

Aerial combat was a concept that didn't exist.

No one had ever imagined that goblins and orcs could be carried through the sky by the talons of drifting monsters.

All we could do was massacre the monsters that had already penetrated deep into our territory.

Or be massacred.

The Empire lost its capital that day.

[Second Invasion]

I wrote it on the palm of my hand with a quill pen.

The black ink streaked across my skin.

[Half of the 66th Class of the First Training Center died]

I scrawled it.

Kinzo, Louise, and Bell were among them.

[I must protect them]

What did I need to protect them?

And conversely... what hadn't existed in my past life?

[Weapons]

On that day, the only thing we could use was wooden swords.

And then.

[People]

A handful of instructors and trainees weren't enough.

I had five days.

I had to figure out how to get weapons and people.

I couldn't just leave to find them—that would make me a deserter.

That left only one option: someone coming to the training center.

I underlined the word [people].

There was one strong person arriving soon.

"Elizabeth Red."

Tomorrow.

I stared down at my ink-stained palm, my mind wandering. I let myself imagine it, just once. The moment I ask for help. A single plea.

I'm from the future. I know everything that's going to happen. So trust me and follow my lead.

"Ridiculous."

Of course no one would believe me.

And even if they did... Mago knows the future, so believe what Mago says. That one sentence would change everything. And I'd have to live with the consequences of that changed future.

This was a fight with myself.

---

December 20, 614.

Four days before I would lose my life.

The hill battle had just ended.

"Company Commander. How do you lead soldiers well?"

It was Jin Rodmain. The recruit who had talked back to me from his very first mission.

"What, do you want to take my place?"

"No, sir!"

"What do you want most right now?"

"Sir?"

"A personal desire."

"Right now... peace. A quiet life."

"And what do you fear most?"

No answer.

"Can't say?"

"It's not that, sir."

"What about the desires and fears of the other men in your company?"

"I don't know theirs."

"It's not easy. Talking about fear. People will hide it like their lives depend on it. Fear is a weakness. And if your weakness is exposed, you're easy to manipulate."

I had feared one thing my entire life.

And I had lived my life being controlled by everyone who knew my phobia.

The masters who owned me when I was a slave.

The military superiors. The Demon King's army. And others.

The moment my weakness was discovered, I became the weaker party.

So I knew it well.

"This is a battlefield. It's a place where the desires you've held in your heart and the fears you've buried can swap places in an instant."

The words came out with a sigh.

I was tired of it.

Soldiers. War. Battlefields.

"We all want to survive. We all fear death. In the end, we're all living with the same desires and the same fears. You'll become the same, recruit."

"Even me, sir?"

"You're already showing what you've been hiding. Don't you see it? Before the war, you had things you wanted to achieve. Things you wanted to avoid."

"Yes, sir."

"Right now, I can't even remember what they were. The situation I'm in is too raw. But still, when the moment of death comes, I want to die as a human. That's why they trust me and follow me."

"Why... is that?"

"I'm not a god or a hero. But when you're about to die, the first thing you'll meet..."

Even that is neither a god.

Nor a hero.

"...is me, setting up your tombstone."

"Me, setting up your tombstone..."

I murmured the words from my past life again in the present.

And that was exactly why this was a fight against myself.

A fight between the me who had given up everything and picked up a hammer instead of a weapon...

And the me who could correct everything I had given up.

If I lost here, I would just become the same as my past life.

I clenched my fist.

Black ink dripped like blood.

---

"Four days left until the fourth exam. Today, we have a special instructor."

The Head Instructor planted the tip of his staff into the ground.

"Some of you may recognize this face."

He introduced a woman.

"The second daughter of the Red family. Elizabeth Red."

A woman in vivid red bowed silently.

"Today, you'll be sparring with the special instructor."

The instructor stepped aside.

Bell's blood relative.

"Just call me El. Simple and easy."

Elizabeth Red set her own title.

"I'm sure you've all handled live steel before... but be careful! I... I can't be held responsible if you get hurt. I only know how to cut..."

El drew her sword.

She had borrowed it from the training center's supplies.

El was the complete opposite of her younger sister, Bell.

Her voice had no strength behind it.

She stumbled over her words from time to time.

"She looks just like her. But where's her actual family? Where's Bell?"

Kinzo whispered.

"The Instructor said seeing family ruins discipline. He sent her to the Capital. She's probably on some other mission there."

"That's a shame. I was curious how she'd react."

"Either way, Bell's not getting a special instructor."

"Then why is Amon gone too?"

"You think they'd send him alone?"

Just like Amon and Bell had left as a pair.

The sparring was also done in pairs.

Two against one.

Of course, the trainees were the two.

One by one, the classmates who faced El first fell to the ground.

After the rounds passed.

I was paired with Kinzo.

We stood before her, our bodies tense.

"P-please take care of me...!"

El said in a trembling voice.

Before I drew my sword, I said,

"Kinzo."

"Yeah?"

"I'll do this alone."

"What...?"

I ignored his slack-jawed expression and raised my hand to ask a question.

"Instructor. Is it okay if I go one-on-one?"

The moment I asked, the crowd stirred.

"Mago. Wouldn't it be polite to ask your opponent's permission first?"

"Ah. Sorry."

"Hey, Mago! What about me? Don't I get a say?"

Kinzo's voice rose.

"I'd like to face her alone. Would you allow it?"

I looked at El and repeated myself.

"I... I don't mind either way."

She nodded.

"But I am curious... about the reason."

"It feels like a chance to truly test my skills."

"Skills? What do you think you're... capable of?"

"I've only ever fought classmates. I don't really know my own level. But if I can beat you, El... then at least I know I can take on the Red family."

A subtle provocation.

According to the plan I'd set yesterday, she needed to stay at the training center and fight against the Demon King's army. Before I could ask that favor, I had to get her interested in me first. And winning this spar was the way to do it.

A faint smile crossed El's lips.

Her mouth was smiling, but her eyes weren't.

She definitely thought I was an arrogant brat.

"Take on the Red family, huh... What's your name?"

"Mago."

I added the next part myself, knowing she'd ask anyway.

"No surname."

"Not even a nameless family. If I lose to a trainee with no family at all... I won't be able to show my face anywhere."

"I'll keep it a secret."

At my words, she laughed out loud.

"You've got spirit. For now, at least."

"Then I'll take that as your permission."

I closed my eyes and laid down a lake.

"I'm starting."

In the same motion, I drew my sword.

The blade sang as it left the scabbard.

The sound wasn't clear, but it wasn't harsh either. Through the vibration, I felt the truth of the weapon in my hand—a tool meant to kill.

"What are you doing?"

El's voice.

She sounded baffled that I'd closed my eyes.

I was getting used to that reaction.

Instead of answering, I gripped the hilt with both hands.

"Bluffing has its limits..."

El stared at my sword, still.

Her focused eyes felt sharp.

If this were Bell, she'd have already charged in, all worked up.

Aside from the red hair, she didn't resemble Bell at all.

"Hah..."

I took a single deep breath and then lunged forward.

The sand kicked up by my feet scattered in every direction.