“Am I really that powerful, Adlet? What if all this time, everyone has been going easy on me?” Nashetania fretted, looking at her palms as they dripped sweat.
“Calm down. Don’t think about that.”
“We haven’t even encountered any fiends yet… I have to calm down…” The way Nashetania was trembling, it was as if her earlier enthusiasm had never existed. Or no, perhaps her cheer thus far had been an attempt to stifle her anxiety. But Nashetania was no coward. Everyone felt nervous before their first real battle. That was always the case, regardless of strength.
“Nashetania,” he said. “Smile.”
“Huh?”
“Smile. Start with that.”
Nashetania stared at her hands, saying, “I can’t, Adlet. My hands won’t stop shaking. I can’t smile.” As she spoke, she lifted her head to face her companion. Adlet pressed up his nose with a finger while smooshing both his cheeks. Hnerk. Nashetania snorted, then covered her mouth, averting her eyes.
“So you can laugh. Have you calmed down?” Adlet asked.
Nashetania considered her palms again and then touched her neck, checking her pulse. “I feel a lot better. Thank you.”
Seeing Nashetania’s expression, Adlet nodded. She would be okay. While she was still innocent and inexperienced, she was a fine warrior at heart. “That was the first thing my master taught me. To smile.”
“You had a good teacher.”
Adlet shrugged as if to say, I dunno about that.
Now from that point onward, they headed directly for the entrance to the Howling Vilelands. Their primary goal was to unite with the others, but Adlet figured there would be other trials ahead of them first.
It was then that a man carrying a child and a woman with an injured leg came running toward them from farther down the road.
“What’s wrong?!” Nashetania dismounted and approached the trio.
The woman clung to Nashetania and began to cry. “We tried to run away! We tried to run, before the…before the fiends came!”
“Please, calm down!” said Nashetania.
The woman began wailing, unable to continue. Nashetania looked at the man.
“The people of our village were planning to escape to the capital together with the soldiers,” he explained. “But on the way, we were attacked by fiends, and we…left behind…our friends…and our youngest…”
As Nashetania listened to the man’s story, her hands began trembling faintly again. Adlet put a hand on her shoulder and spoke to her quietly. “Stay calm. With your power, you don’t have to be afraid of anything.” After reassuring her, he hurried his horse, setting out at a gallop. “Nashetania! Follow me!”
“C-coming!”
As Adlet held his horse’s reins, he considered the situation. This was just as he had expected. The fiends were aiming to eliminate each of the Braves individually. That was why they were burning villages and attacking people in this area—to lure out the six Braves. Last time, falling for that tactic had cost one of the Braves their life. If victory were their singular focus, then the correct choice would be to ignore this and move on. But in Adlet’s mind, that “correct choice” was a load of bull. Why were they going to fight the Evil God? To protect the defenseless.
“There they are!” shouted Adlet.
Ten fiends were attacking a cluster of wagons. The monsters were about ten meters long and shaped like leeches. A single horn and a few tentacles grew from their head segments, and on the end of each tentacle was a very humanlike eyeball.
While fiends were all of the same species, sharing a common ancestor, they varied infinitely in form. Some, like these, resembled leeches. Others looked like gigantic insects, still others looked like birds and beasts, and some even looked human and could speak. The only thing they shared in common was that they all had a horn somewhere on their heads. That was it.
About a dozen soldiers and farmers with their families were under attack. Many were wounded, and a number had already succumbed. Adlet leaped from his horse and rushed the hoard of fiends. “I’ll slow them down! You finish them off, Nashetania!” he yelled as she ran behind him. In a flash, Adlet whipped an iron bottle from one of his pouches, removed the cap, and poured the contents into his mouth.
“…!” A few of the fiends spotted Adlet. They raised their heads and spat liquid at him.
Adlet dodged it with a forward roll. As he regained his feet again, he struck the flint in his front teeth. The iron bottle contained a specially mixed, concentrated alcohol. Flames spewed from his mouth into the fiends’ faces. The heat was low enough that most could escape unscathed by batting the flames away, but these fiends writhed in pain. It was just as he had guessed: This breed was vulnerable to heat.
Most of Adlet’s secret tools were not powerful in and of themselves. Their true value lay in their versatility, allowing him to take advantage of the fiends’ weaknesses in a variety of circumstances.
“I knew you were good!” exclaimed Nashetania as she employed the power of the Spirit of Blades. Blades sprouted from the ground to quickly decapitate three of the creatures.
The remaining seven paid them no mind as they continued attacking the farmers. Adlet immediately withdrew his next tool—this one a small flute. He put it to his lips and blew.
“…?”
No noise. But the fiends that had been assaulting the villagers turned all at once toward Adlet. This flute emitted special sound waves that attracted fiends.
Adlet calmly dodged the charging monsters, and Nashetania did not let that opportunity go to waste. She stabbed another five to death, and Adlet dispatched the two remaining with his sword. Now that it was over, the battle had actually elapsed very quickly. Killing all ten fiends had taken less than a minute.
“Phew.” Adlet wasn’t tired, but he had broken a sweat. Though this wasn’t his first time, real combat still made him anxious. Nashetania was panting. Adlet put a hand on her shoulder and said, “That was perfect. I wouldn’t have known it was
