〈 Episode 58 〉The East Targets the West 4

* * *

There was a lot of talk about the bandit raids.

"I heard the bandits are banding together?"

"Isn't this... a little dangerous?"

"I thought there were a lot of them, but..."

It was true that the Great Forest of Hammel itself was unusually full of monsters, and the danger from bandits was greater than the danger from the monsters that were said to have come from evil. Together, however, the bandits far outnumbered the monsters.

"I hear Sergen is conducting a mopping-up operation?"

A scout sent by Serghen reported to the Sirtus estate, and from the mouths of the servants who overheard it to the mouths of the people, the word spread quickly.

"I hope the bandits are wiped out in this operation."

"Honestly, even if the top is robbed...it won't do us much harm, but it's still dangerous."

Sirtus argues that he and Deckard are currently in a bad mood, and that they're not doing much to help the bandits, and the barkeep sips his beer.

"There's going to be a war, and this is the cornerstone of it."

"So the bandits are Deckard's men, then? That makes sense."

"Chisel, you're being taken advantage of by being so partisan."

"Bullshit again. Tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk."

"The war has already begun, and those who don't realize it will only end up dying without knowing how."

There was a reddish glint in the brawler's eyes, the kind of foreboding that gave rise to tales of bloody war to come.

"The reason Deckard and Sirtus are so high up in the East and the West is because one of them has to win to expand their power, and the rest of us, sandwiched between them, are nothing more than the dead, dead underclass of the East and the West."

"If you're going to be such an asshole, why don't you get into that bag early?"

"Chisel, I see a lot of dead people here. Maybe I should just go to the whorehouse and have some fun before I die."

Grumbling, he pulls several fairy tales out of his pocket and tosses them to the barkeep, then stands up.

"Good night, boss, and if Sirtus wins...well, I'll have another drink."

"Of course Sirtus will win."

"I don't know. If Sergen dies in the extermination... I doubt he'll win."

Cursing erupts from the group.

"Curse him instead!"

"Curse?!"

He shouts, raging.

"Curse what?! What, we're nothing but a bunch of bastards who get drafted and die five out of ten times, and we're just ghosts wandering the battlefields with no names and no tombstones!"

The drunkard said that in the past, he had wandered through many wars as a mercenary. Though he's been crippled and retired from mercenary service, he hasn't forgotten the bloodshed, so he's come to Sirtus to drink and make a living.

"When I told you about the local wars of the past, the noblemen who made speeches on our side were paid ransoms to come out of the woodwork, even when they were defeated, and the men who died on enemy territory were not rewarded! The armor and swords that were worth so much on their corpses are already in the hands of ravenous quartermasters and mercenaries, and the only reason I lived is because I was lame and missed the last war!"

He cackles drunkenly.

"War is glory to those above, but hell to the likes of me-no, to us! The reason we blame Deckard is nothing but propaganda, created to give us a reason to fight, to give war a reason to win!"

He chuckled, shrugging.

"I was a soldier before I was a mercenary...and I believed in the glory of it, too, until I got to be a mercenary, and then I got to be a mercenary because I got my ass kicked by some ten-headed bastard who didn't even know my friend's name, and then I got to be a mercenary because every fucker I ever met was torn to shreds and robbed of everything they owned, and I know what I thought when I dragged my fucking leg home!"

The cursers shake their heads in disgust.

"I can't tell if this fucker's corpse is right or wrong, friend or foe, it's covered in red blood, and I can't tell if it's a friend or foe because all the valuable things on it have been stripped away! I went looking for some kind of memento, at least, and all I found was a bunch of carrion left over from the crows and some gnawed bits of bone that they couldn't eat."

He staggers back and points a finger at them.

"Listen, assholes, it all started with a light culling operation? That's how it starts. Bandits, bandits, bandits, they'll use anything to win. The thieves' guilds you're always bitching about? Or the slumlords? They're the first ones to grab and use and be used when war starts. Get the fuck out of here if you don't want to die, you dumb fucks."

With a grunt, he leaves the bar like he's going to a whorehouse.

"Life is fucking glorious, why is death always so fucking empty."

The bustle of the bar dies down, and they all slowly sip their drinks as if in anticipation of their own deaths. Deckard is no different.

.

"We need to get away."

I said slowly to Sergen.

"What do you mean?"

"I was thinking about it last night. There are going to be beings that are going to be hard to beat."

Assuming a million things, what he was thinking, I had an answer.

"Run...you mean leave the bandits behind."

"Yeah, that would be pretty dishonorable."

"To suggest a retreat in the face of knights who value honor above life, and men who despise bandits so much that they have become marauders and mercenaries themselves, you speak with the knowledge that this is an opinion that will be punished with great severity if it is not correct?"

I nodded at Serghen's stern question.

"If I were Million, I would have wiped out the bandits, assuming we took any damage in this operation."

"Wiped them out?"

"Yes, but didn't your scouts report that they were scattered and moving about now?"

"Scattered, yes, but didn't they say earlier that they were preparing for all-out war?"

"Yes."

I nod obediently.

"And we're supposed to run away from them? We've got over ten knights and over a hundred men in our ranks alone. With all the bandits, we're talking about 500, but with only ten knights, we'll be outnumbered."

Sergen doesn't seem to agree.

"By normal numbers, we can't lose against them. Should we still flee?"

"Yes."

That was the kind of person Million was.

"If I think as I've been taught, he is.

He must be testing me, putting poison in places I can't see.

"There's no reason to lift the goblet to check for invisible poison."

"Poison?"

Sergen waited for me to say more, as if he were slightly agreeing with Million.

"They're bandits, things you don't need and shouldn't have, and yet you left them behind because they have some use, don't you think?"

"Yes."

"Ordinarily, if I had a group of bandits, I'd be preparing for an all-out war like this, using their numbers to open up the possibility of hitting the jackpot once and for all, but the Millions..."

He's a little different, which is why his past has always been about ravaging his opponents with a strategy of bluffing.

"If I lose even a little bit, I'll clean up right away. I don't want to give them any advantage."

And then he'd pull out another move he'd already prepared. It doesn't matter that he's not a bandit.

"Even if we have a prisoner now...

This could be interpreted as him preparing for an all-out war, since the prisoner wasn't that important.

"It can't be said that the past and the Millions are of the same mind, can it?"

Vice Corps Leader Zhao Feng asked next to him.

"I know him well enough to know that he is not a man of change, but rather a man who organizes his thoughts by sticking to them."

It's as if everyone is a chess piece that can be utilized. The pieces that are no longer needed are nothing more than sacrifices, the reason the bandits are still around.

"It's useful in the current battle.

And if we don't find that use, we will be doomed to defeat.

"If he's still testing me.

He must have realized I was there because of the Sirtus raiders' victory in the last guerrilla war. And yet he left the bandits behind, which means he's already using them.

'He knows I'm on the move.'

He knows I'm giving Sergen an opinion.

'If I were a million...'

Sergen must have been captured or killed in the last guerrilla war. She would have been badly damaged by the explosion of the oak barrels, and her confident charge would have been captured or killed by the hermits among the hiding bandits. It doesn't matter how much damage the bandits suffered at that point.

'It is to our advantage to capture Sergen, who will be a great asset in the war.

Capturing or killing a Serchen, whose expendable banditry would be of great use in the war, would be one of Deckard's must-win conditions.

'If you stop it, and you haven't cleaned up the bandits.

This means that the Million already knows I'm making a move and has made his next move.

"I don't know it.

I'll admit, I was a little afraid of his ruse. I don't know what he's hiding, but it's probably something like the tests he's done before.

'I've cleaned out many of the hermitages of Sirtus, and the hiding places among the bandits. And yet, somehow, the same bandits are being utilized instead of being cleaned up or left to perish on their own...'

'That would mean that there is still a way to exploit the bandits, even if they are more skilled at infiltration than the darklings.

'I don't know what that is.

He ponders. You come up with a number. But the frustration of blocking all options envelops me, and in the end, the only option that comes to mind is a car that chooses to flee in order to plan for the future.

"If you run away now, Sirtus will have a pretty big morale deficit before the war starts."

Serchen has a point. Already the knights are thinking of war with Deckard in the future.

"I see...you're right."

"Indeed."

Sergen hasn't ordered a retreat, so I'm forced to consider my next move.

"We could give up Sirtus, but...

If I gave up Sirtus now, it would be like losing a major hand in the fight against Million.

"Then I'll prepare another move."

I finally hear her expected words, and I step back.

"That's a little weird."

Jopin says. Sergen stares at my retreating back, then asks.

"What do you mean?"

"It's as if you've already anticipated the answer. It's as if..."

"As if?"

"As if you said it to absolve yourself of responsibility for what happens afterward."

"You expected me to...not allow you to retreat?"

Serghen's eyes narrow slightly.

"Yes."

Joffin's candor is out of character for the opportunist. Still, he says it.

"This battle will be costly?"

"Yes."

"...I see."

But retreat was not on Sergen's lips. After so many years of warfare, Zhao Feng could always predict what would happen when such a thing was said.

"It's going to be pretty bloody.

He could hear it in his mind, especially when so many of his own soldiers, knights, and others were dying.

* * *