The languid camp began to stir the moment the sun set and dusk settled over the land. Soldiers and knights rose from their rest, gathered their weapons, and assembled. Ivan and his companions followed Gilles Vert.

STEP, STEP, STEP.

The footsteps of soldiers gathering in twos and threes gradually merged into a single tread. Their discipline and training were impeccable.

The knight initiates naturally spread out along the edges of the formation on horseback. Their horses moved at an easy pace, their maneuvers to guard the soldiers' flanks flowing like water.

Perhaps their soaring morale was only natural. Here and now, their commander was Gilles Vert de Etakrich: the strongest man in this land save Maximilien, and the pinnacle of all knights. Such was the weight of the title Lord Protector.

"Not bad, eh?"

Gilles Vert glanced at Ivan with a smug little smile. Irritating as his boasting was, this time Ivan could only agree. Impressive. All the more so when he recalled the battlefields of a time when there had been no such thing as high-quality troops.

Thinking back to the front lines on the brink of annihilation, when there had been no time to train soldiers before deploying them, it seemed fair to call this a change brought about by peace. Elite troops raised not through combat experience, but through systematic training and military manuals.

"That must have taken a great deal of work."

"Still had to be done."

Gilles Vert smiled in satisfaction. He surveyed the troops following him with something approaching affection.

"The First Corps on the Eastern Front has no time for sustained training. They can't leave the border unguarded. And the other forces..."

"Yes. The nobles' private armies."

"Exactly."

Thilles was an old-fashioned country that retained its feudal system. In each domain, troops rivaling the king's corps in number were raised at the discretion of the local nobles. At the king's summons, they would naturally become soldiers of the nation. But that still amounted to nothing more than a motley assortment of forces with disparate organizations and troop types.

Under those circumstances, Gilles Vert had been obliged to focus on developing the capital's defense forces. This corps, which he had begun preparing even before the Demon King's death, had only now reached this size. Merely securing the resources for it had required tremendous effort. An army burned through money just by breathing.

"How is Krasilof doing? Better than here, at least?"

"Are you trying to extract national intelligence from an intelligence agent?"

"Hahaha! Your jokes have improved considerably while you were dead!"

Gilles Vert laughed heartily. Isabelle rode up beside him and asked quietly,

"Um, Your Highness..."

"Uncle."

"But, but there are so many people here..."

"Uncle."

"Uncle Gilles Vert..."

"What would you like to know, my Bella?"

"This is driving me crazy."

Isabelle clutched her forehead and groaned before finally managing to speak in a tiny voice.

"You're leading an army this size, so, um, well. Aren't you going to give a speech before marching to war or something?"

"A speech before marching to war?"

Gilles Vert burst into hearty laughter. Then he wiped the amusement from his face and replied solemnly,

"You only need one of those when you're marching to war."

"What?"

"We're going hunting."

That supremely confident face was insufferable. Ivan sighed softly and looked back.

The army following them gleamed beneath the torches the soldiers held aloft. Their well-maintained armor shone red in the torchlight.

STEP, STEP, STEP.

They marched in step, eyes fixed straight ahead.

There was no sign of worry or doubt, even though they were ordinary infantrymen whom a single dragon's breath could wipe out by the hundred. Saying that a rampaging dragon required three to four thousand infantrymen to subdue meant, conversely, that a single dragon could erase that many troops. Whatever preparations humans made.

Yet there was no fear in their eyes, even though this was no safe hunt for deer or wild boar.

Gilles Vert marches.

His Highness the Grand Duke of Etakrich leads the way.

The Lord Protector guards this country, and every step taken in his wake is a step toward its defense.

These soldiers marched forward as though doing nothing more than what was expected of them. Their bearing never wavered; their steps were precise. Yes, impressive. Ivan nodded. Raising such an elite force in so short a time was proof enough of Gilles Vert's ability.

"Ah, are the others the same, by any chance?"

"The others?"

"You know. Those assassins your country churned out. The ones Enrique raised... Ha, do you have any idea how terrified our country's old men were of them back then?"

"Hah."

Ivan turned away as though he had no wish to answer. Facing forward, Gilles Vert failed to notice his expression. He continued in an amused voice.

"Then why haven't you married yet? What was her name? That young lady with the pretty name... Ra... Rachel?"

"Raella."

"Ah, yes! The young lady you fancied."

Everyone in the party went rigid at his words.

Mister had fancied someone?

Ivan looked back at Gilles Vert, his face barren of emotion. Only then did Gilles Vert realize what he had done and flinch.

"She's dead."

"I'm... sorry. I thought... all of you had been working in secret, hiding whether you were alive or dead..."

"They're dead, Gilles Vert. All of them. Every last one."

"... I apologize, Ivan. That was thoughtless of me."

The party fell silent at Ivan's words.

CLIP-CLOP, CLIP-CLOP.

Only the horses' hoofbeats continued. In the silence that had finally arrived, Ivan let out a quiet sigh.

All wounds eventually became scars with time. Any wound that did not kill would someday heal. Scars, however, never disappeared.

That was why Kim Seonwoo could never master himself whenever he recalled those days. Ivan understood how he felt. Raella Cherenovika, that woman who loved roses, had been Kim Seonwoo's first love.

Not anymore. She was dead and could never return, and he was no longer Kim Seonwoo. So it was all right. He already had more than enough scars on his body. A wound of this magnitude was nothing of consequence. The memories an old scar brought were merely numb records of the past.

So...

Ivan suddenly noticed that the hand gripping his reins had turned white and was trembling. Quietly, he relaxed his grip.

CRACK.

His bones ground together.

He loosened his stiff hand and took up the reins again. There was no tremor now. The corps entered the Bernina Mountains.

* * *

As though they had done this many times before, the soldiers smoothly dispersed at the foot of the Bernina Mountains. Detachments of roughly a hundred men each set off toward different slopes.

"We'll move separately."

"Ah, will you? Hmm... Then take this."

At Gilles Vert's gesture, an adjutant approached and handed over a cylindrical rod. A signal flare. Sticking to the traditional methods, then. Ivan tucked it inside his coat without a word.

"You know how to use it, I assume? Just fire it into the sky when you find the dragon. Every unit will converge within thirty minutes."

"Understood."

"And about earlier..."

"Enough."

Ivan shook his head. It was pointless. Gilles Vert had meant no harm, and this was no grudge to carry into battle. Instead, he silently extended an arm. Gilles Vert smiled broadly and extended his own. They clasped each other's forearms firmly, then parted.

"Good fortune in battle."

Ivan nodded and jerked his chin toward his companions. Faces stiff, they followed him up the ridge without a word.

* * *

Thanks to the silence of these usually talkative youngsters, Ivan was able to begin his search with ease. He was not searching for the dragon. Dragons were, by nature, enormous creatures. With so many searchers tightening a broad encirclement, its discovery was inevitable.

Until now, the only obstacle had presumably been Gilles Vert's lack of motivation. Today was different. Now that he had a reason to finish the hunt quickly, he would delay no longer. His claim that all troops would assemble within thirty minutes was meaningless. Within ten minutes of a flare being fired, Gilles Vert would come running. One swing of his sword, and it would be over.

It was like picking up a coin from the ground. With the Capital Defense Force and the Eastern Order at his side, Gilles Vert might as well have been invincible. And so...

'Find the count's spy.'

If driving the dragon into these mountains was the great counts' scheme, they could not possibly have left Gilles Vert unwatched. And with all their plans doomed the moment he left these mountains alive, that watcher was highly likely to possess some 'means of assassination.'

Ivan felt something akin to pleased anticipation. Just how did they intend to dispose of Gilles Vert? By what unimaginable method? What made them think it possible? And who had devised the plan? Perhaps it was Alexander's handiwork. Indeed, the odds were high. Allying with demons and goading nobles into rebellion was precisely his style.

Perhaps this thread would lead him to Alexander. Perhaps he would be able to do something utterly meaningless. That meaningless act called revenge. Something infinitely lighter and more worthless than a single flower laid at the graves of the dead.

Ivan climbed the mountainside, surveying his surroundings with satisfaction.

* * *

Mister had someone he liked?

Isabelle sat brooding in the saddle. She bit her lip, her body swaying gently to the clatter of hoofbeats. Elpihera and Esidisi beside her looked little different. All three stared blankly at Ivan's back as though their souls had left their bodies.

Being parted by death was cheating. It left a presence that could never be forgotten or erased. One that never faded. No matter how hard they tried, even if they won a place at his side, this was a rival in love they could never defeat as long as they lived.

Was that why? Why he had never once looked their way, whatever they tried?

While the three women languished in dejection, Oscar's eyes quietly shone.

'A paragon of chivalry.'

Fidelity to a departed lover. So that was why a man of such ability remained unmoved, despite the advances of so many women, advances so aggressive even Oscar could recognize them.

The three evangelical counsels of obedience, chastity, and poverty were not solely for priests. Knights on their wandering pilgrimages were seekers of faith, little different from clergymen. That was especially true of the Eastern Order, which pursued chivalry in the old way. Only after swearing vows of loyalty, duty, chastity, and poverty was one permitted to join.

As a formally invested knight of the Eastern Order, Oscar regarded Ivan in a new light.

'Kids, this isn't the time to worry about that.'

Eugene looked at them and sighed. It was nice to see them acting just like kids around twenty, but they stood no chance like this. Astonishingly, if they wanted a place at Boss's side, they had to prove their 'usefulness.'

He had no idea what kind of person thought that way, but for now...

'Time to make myself useful.'

With one heavy sigh after another, Eugene opened his Status window and adjusted it so that the profiles of anyone approaching nearby could pop up at any time. He could give these youngsters some pointers later. Work came first.

If a spy or watcher approached as Boss had said, the Status window would find them faster than human eyes could. As he had reflected before, Eugene's Status window was nothing short of the ultimate early-warning system.