〈 Episode 41 〉Wild West 5

* * * *

Blending in with the crowd was the hallmark of the one I knew best. His inconspicuous face, his size, and his mischievous expression. I stepped behind him, moving closer to him.

"A little more.

Without him realizing it, I use his favorite chase technique. It was important to walk the streets around him, as if he were just looking, as if he was walking down the street for some other purpose. Then, when I got close enough to my target, I'd aim for the gap.

"...."

A man who said nothing. He wanders around, looking blank as if he hasn't found his target, and then turns into an alleyway, as if he's used to navigating through crowds.

"He's going to make a tangent.

I hadn't wondered what he was doing by disappearing so far, and I figured that's the distance we understand each other as pickpockets. But he's the one who betrayed me so badly.

"Now.

I need to block his way out of the alleyway he's trying to enter. Naturally, I blocked his way in the back, even as I was being seen by him.

"Who, who!"

"Me."

With a muffled voice, I shoved my hands into my sleeves.

"T, tir?!"

"Uh."

My eyes were already tinged with betrayal, a disgusted glare that was quite unseemly.

"It's been a while."

"...How could you..."

His expression of disbelief fills my eyes.

"Alive?"

"....."

"That doesn't matter, if you were alive, and I found you, knowing the whole truth, have you thought about what you would do?"

"....."

"You wouldn't have thought about it, you would have looked at the pathetic little rat being taken advantage of, you would have laughed at it, and you would have known how it would end."

"...You wouldn't leave me alone."

"It's no use trying to run, I'm not the same person I was then."

I can see his every move. I could see the orc's every move. I could predict the movements of a mere hermit and informant with my eyes closed, especially when it was someone I thought I'd known for years.

"Jeffers."

My pickpocketing partner who'd been lying to me for years, living in a hermitage. He was one of the few pickpockets I'd ever met that I'd gotten along with, and another I'd thought of as a friend.

"No excuses."

The words came out of his mouth in a voice tinged with self-pity. But this was a man who had deceived me for years, and I wasn't about to believe every voice and thought he uttered.

"Deckard is preparing for war on Sirtus, and I'm not the only one who's been sent there."

"Of course."

"If I don't return, you'll die. If I disappear, they'll start tracking me down. If I'm found dead, it doesn't end the hunt."

"That doesn't make it so you don't die, you disgusting Jeffers."

"I won't deny it. I've known the consequences of what I've done for a long time. I'll just have to accept dying this way, as part of my role in leading you to that place. However, I do ask that you do not use your usual dark sword technique to kill me."

"If I do, you'll be in quite a bit of pain when you die."

"I know, but the swordsmanship you've been taught belongs to our Earl Deckard...no, Lord Million. The others will soon notice my wounds and weigh the odds of you still being alive."

"...."

"You'll have to use a different technique as much as possible... No, I know you well enough to know that you won't be able to break your habits. You're a right-handed man, so you reverse grip and stab with your left hand. It's not in our technique, so it won't be obvious."

I obeyed his wishes and held the short sword in a reverse grip in my left hand and thrust it at him.

"...."

He closes his eyes silently. My sword stopped near the base of his neck.

"...You son of a bitch!"

"Puck!

I punch him in the head with my remaining right fist.

"What are you doing, playing that act you're so good at?! Trying to survive on pity?"

Squeezing his throat, I shouted.

"Kill him quickly...and make it as clean as possible, because if you end up with a lot of wounds, the hermits will be able to track your habits."

He grabs the blade of my short sword in his hand and brings it to his throat. When I hesitate, he yells.

"You filthy ignoramus, I don't care if I'm putting on an act or begging for your last bit of sympathy...you'll only be safe if you kill me. Get the hell out of Sirtus and head west."

"Jeffers. You piece of shit..."

"Tuduk!

Blood dripped from the hand that held the blade.

"I don't know how you survived, but I didn't even consider the possibility that you were alive, and Noel's finished, so what the hell are you doing here?"

Instead, Jeffers glared at me and began to grind his teeth.

"You asshole, why are you here, in a dangerous place with the possibility of Sirtus receiving Deckard's Hermits? You should be living under the radar as much as possible!"

"It's none of your business!"

"Puck!

I punched Jeffers in the cheek again. His head snapped back.

"Ever since you became an earl, I've been up for disposal, and what I have before you now is merely a change in Lord Million's usual method of disposing of me."

"....."

"Listen, I'm just as cowardly and filthy as you think I am, and I'm just as much a disposable piece of waste awaiting death as you are. Can't you see that by the way you're being used as a hermit in an enemy house now?"

A self-deprecating laugh escapes him.

"You're nothing but an asshole now, like Bastard in Sirtus."

"What..."

"Listen to me, a hermit without proper hermit skills, or even a learned hermit, wandered into Sirtus and died fighting a sword-wielding bastard, fist to fist, grabbing your dagger and scarring my hand."

With all the strength he has, he tries to pull the grabbed short sword to his throat.

"Stop!"

My strength is fortunately stronger than his. His hand and my Short Sword are clashing at the base of his neck. But I'm not pushing, just pulling on the short sword.

"You, in a struggle, ended up stabbing me, and you took the money from my waistband. Do you see the pouch on my waistband?"

He points to his waistband with his eyes.

"So, take this one, by all means. At the very least, taking the money from your waistband will delay the trace. If you'd killed him with a single stab... he'd be less likely to be traced. I can't help it."

"Why would you do this for me?"

I wanted to ask the fundamental question.

"You asshole, do you know why you've always been the most pathetic thing I've ever seen?"

"...."

"When you're getting fucked, you don't pry why, when you're scared, you run! How fucking long are you going to do that? That curiosity is what made you so easy to take advantage of, asshole."

"So why the fuck are you doing it for me!"

"...Asshole, if I gave you a chance, you'd still be talking for some stupid reason... I'm running out of time, asshole, and if I don't show up soon, others will be looking for me here."

"Tududuk!

More blood drips from his hand.

"I've made it my life's goal to fuck you. No, it was a mission given to me by the fucking Earl of Deckard, and when it was done, do you know how scared I was of the Deckard hermitage bastards, who could come at any moment? I could fill my belly with all the strong rum you and I used to drink and not get drunk!"

"....."

"I was the original target, but then I didn't know if it sucked to be a cub-selling bastard who thought he was a friend, or if it sucked to be a hermit who would come and slit my throat at any moment, and then...I realized I looked like an asshole when you told me to go to Sirtus instead of letting me live."

The chuckling one, taking advantage of my listening to his story, plunged the knife into his throat with a snap.

"Jeffers!"

"Stop being such an asshole and...run...fuck.... Earl Deckard's not all that easy. I tried to run away too, but..."

He exhales with satisfaction, trying to stem the flow of his own blood. Perhaps he was trying to disguise the stab wound in his throat as a bloodbath with the bastard.

"....."

"It didn't work. These bastards...they come from everywhere, and they seem to take my breath away...you're different now..."

Slowly, his grin began to fade, replaced by a dazed expression.

"...."

"Fuck you...get the fuck out of here..."

"Tuduk!

His blood and body soaked the floor.

"...."

The Shortsword was bleeding in my hand, and my eyes were welling with tears that looked more and more like blood. As I questioned what he had lived for, I turned to the one who had come after him.

"....."

"....."

I recognized her at once. She was disguised as an Anak, carrying a basket of ordinary apples.

"Ha..."

My breath tastes of misery and futility. I look at her and shake my head, not wanting to see any more blood.

"If I find you, I'll kill you, so get lost."

Unsure of what to say, I end up saying what I've always wanted to say to her. No, technically, I hadn't wanted to, but the thought of a dead body lying there now made it impossible.

"Run."

"...."

"The other hermits haven't come yet, so you're the one I haven't met."

"...."

"Don't you dignify Jeffers' death."

"I could have pretended like you didn't know."

"No."

She shook her head.

"You don't know us. Now you know us, and...if we know you, all hell will break loose again...not us...you."

"Sophia, what if I told you I wanted to destroy you?"

"You can't."

Sophia approaches Jeffers's body, slowly extends her hand and looks at the dagger wound, then draws her own dagger.

"It's one thing to try to pull a dagger out, it's another to try to push it in, so you'll have to forgive me if I see the damage."

He clasps Jeffers' hand in his own and thrusts the dagger in, his hand forming a gash as if he'd tried to block the thrust.

"Go fast, and don't look for us."

"Sophia."

I spoke on impulse.

"I'm escorting Count Sirtus's young lady, so I'll have no choice but to capture and kill you, and your identities will be revealed soon enough."

"...Right. I see."

"If you let me go now, my sword will end up in your throat."

Then, a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth, which had never shown a smile before.

"Yes."

"Are you laughing at me?"

"No. Just keep in mind that we...I mean, the boss is a lot more dangerous than you think, now."

She hands me the money pouch from Jeffers' waist.

"Take it. Jeffers got screwed over by a bully, not by you, but by some nameless slum kid."

"I'll be back here tomorrow."

"...."

"Until then, if you want me alive, give me information on the Earl of Deckard. No, dig a trap, all right, but just remember that I'm not your puppet anymore."

"Tyr."

Sophia turns to me as I retreat.

"It was good to see you, Jeffers would have wanted to say that."

It was a shitty reunion, and all that was left of it was...a crime on the Sirtus estate, where a bully stabbed a young man, a common migrant, and robbed him of his wallet.

* * *