"This is the previous generation's burden."

"Your Highness...?"

"Surely the previous Hero's Party cannot pass its responsibilities on to the Hero of this age?"

Gilles Vert gave a hearty laugh as he looked at Isabelle. Maximilien's daughter. At those eyes, so astonishingly like his.

He had been bitterly jealous. Time and again, of an ability he could never match, however hard he chased after it. Yet even then, he had raised his shield and risked his life to protect the man. A sense of inferiority could never outweigh duty and justice.

Reading Isabelle's stance and the resolve she radiated with her sword drawn, Gilles Vert could not help chuckling. She had grown up well. Her extraordinary father had never taught her anything, yet she resembled him so closely. Frighteningly so.

There was no jealousy left now. Maximilien had shone far too brightly for him to envy. What a relief it had been to realize that.

After learning of the Demon King's curse, he had sworn that he would at least protect the man's daughter. Seeing Isabelle suddenly all grown up, how could he do anything but smile?

"Walk the path of a Hero. Go where your help is needed."

"Your Highness... No, Uncle."

"Bella. And all of you. I entrust the work of this age to its Hero. Go. Save Saint Matilene and protect this country. I ask this not as your predecessor, but as Lord Protector."

Gilles Vert readily bowed his head. Flustered, the entire party tried to stop him. Nonetheless, he continued in a deep voice.

"Protecting this country is my task, but I dare to entrust my duty to the Hero of this age. Will you please accept this mission?"

"Uncle... Yes, gladly..."

"Thank you, Hero."

Gilles Vert stroked Isabelle's head, then turned to his son. Oscar was staring at the ground, biting his lip, his face on the verge of tears.

"My son."

"Yes, Father."

"This is the sword of Etakrich. All military command in Saint Matilene answers to its authority. You must carry it now."

"It is... too great an honor... for me..."

"A duty."

Gilles Vert stroked his son's cheek. Oscar looked up at him with tear-filled eyes.

"Not an honor. There is no honor in it. Only duty. Wield this and save the people. Save your country and your king. And protect your mother and your younger sibling."

"... Yes, Father."

"You are now a knight initiate of the Eastern Order. Go, knight of the Hero. Stand firm before death and protect your Hero. Be faithful to your duty, defend the weak, and always act so that your conscience may remain clear."

"Yes, Father."

The previous generation's burden to the previous generation. This generation's duty to this generation.

After giving them the best horses left in camp, Gilles Vert turned away once more. Following brief farewells, the party rode down the mountain.

* * *

"Am I too late?"

Ivan reached the summit, steadying his ragged breathing.

No. Not yet.

The Eastern Order was still intact. Despite some losses, it had the strength to keep fighting. The Capital Defense Force, however, could all but be considered annihilated. Fewer than a thousand remained.

And Gilles Vert...

The Duke of Etakrich stood atop a dragon's corpse, a banner in one hand, gasping for breath.

"Gilles Vert!!"

"Ivan."

Gilles Vert turned toward the approaching Ivan and grinned beneath his helmet.

"How many did you kill?"

"Three."

"Ha! I killed five. I win. Again!"

"... I'll join you."

Gilles Vert quietly shook his head as Ivan approached. The dragons' assault had eased, but it was not over. Those that had taken to the sky were keeping their distance, appalled by the fighting prowess of Gilles Vert and the Eastern Order.

Instead, nearly all the forests of the Bernina Mountains had burned away.

Ash drifted through the air. Whenever a sudden wind swept over the bare, ashen waste, the powder swirled aside like dispersing mist. Beneath it lay an enormous fissure.

Gilles Vert stood before the fissure and raised his spear.

"Do you remember the dungeon I said was beneath this mountain?"

"Mm."

"It wasn't a dungeon. A temple, to be precise."

"... A temple."

"A temple of dragons."

Ivan stood beside Gilles Vert and looked down at the same sight. A prickling sensation rose from beneath the fissure. A dragon's presence, multiplied into a seething mass, welled up from below.

How many dragons had slept down there?

How in the world? And since when? Such questions were meaningless.

Dragons had slumbered beneath this temple dating from some distant age. The demons had discovered that fact, and the three great counts had used their information to create this trap.

In story terms, it was the starting point of an episode: Thilles on the Brink of Destruction.

A system astonishingly similar to the underground temple beneath Krasilof, where an ancient god had been sealed. The kind that suggested a certain malice.

The kind that would one day awaken and burn the country, without anyone in that country knowing of it beforehand.

That must be why this age, too, needed a new Hero. An age was coming when nations would fall, new evil would arrive, and the evils of old would roam the world again.

How many more such things remained? This world had to contend not only with the surviving Seven Dragon Generals, but with things like these. With unseen time bombs buried beneath its nations.

Ivan sighed. Gilles Vert laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Leave."

"Do you intend to die here?"

"Of course not."

Gilles Vert laughed heartily.

"Didn't we overcome more than enough hardships like this in the old days? Could mere flying lizards dare bring down the Knight of the Iron Mountain?"

"... All bluster."

"That reminds me of something you said."

Gilles Vert shrugged as though nothing were wrong and continued.

"You grumbled once that you were a hunting hound whose leash was simply changed."

When had he said that? Probably when he first joined the Hero's Party, and when he left it.

Ivan had left the party on its final journey toward the Demon King's castle. The war had been nearing its end.

He had gone to serve at the royal family's command, supporting Krasilof's Northern Corps on the front the Hero's Party had advanced by killing the Seven Dragon Generals.

As he left the party, he had grumbled to Enrique that they certainly knew how to get their use out of him, swapping one leash for another.

The fate of a hunting hound, one might say. A self-deprecating joke.

Considering what happened afterward, it was more than a joke. Once the hunt was over, they had been boiled in the pot. And hadn't the Extermination Unit been an exceptionally capable hunting hound?

Gilles Vert broke into Ivan's thoughts, amusement on his face.

"Would the prey see any difference between the hunter and the hound?"

"..."

"To the prey, both are simply natural enemies. Aren't they?"

"What are you trying to say?"

"If the Hero is the demons' natural enemy, then so are you."

Gilles Vert removed his helmet, tucked it beneath his arm, and extended a hand.

"I'm not part of the Hero's Party."

"Speaking for the previous generation... Well. I think you were the only one who thought that."

He gripped Ivan's forearm firmly. The salute of their old days.

Ivan gripped his arm in return. Meeting his eyes, Gilles Vert continued with a smile.

"And speaking for this generation, the same holds true. Ivan Petrovich Yeremov. Then and now, you remain a member of the Hero's Party."

"Gilles Vert."

"So damned timid. Have some confidence. You're making me nervous about entrusting the children to you."

Chuckling, Gilles Vert gave Ivan's arm a single shake. Their hands parted. Gilles Vert put his helmet back on and said,

"The previous generation will bear its own burden. Scout of this age's Hero, leave that burden behind and carry on our duty. Light the path before this generation."

As uncle to this age's Hero, father to this age's knight, and friend to this age's scout.

"Don't talk as though you're going to die."

Ivan barely managed to part his dry lips to speak. At the sound of his voice, Gilles Vert burst into hearty laughter.

"All right. We'll meet again alive. In Saint Matilene."

"Fortune in battle."

"Fortune in battle."

Once Ivan had left, Gilles Vert turned back. He exhaled deeply inside his helmet. His breath echoed, trapped beneath the visor.

Through the slit in his visor, he saw the deep chasm. Countless yellow eyes glared up at him from below.

He laughed.

"Come."

He raised his spear. Thankfully, it still felt light. He thrust it toward the sky, toward the dark night shrouded in smoke.

"You stand before this country's Lord Protector."

The sky split. The Morning Star shone. Beneath it, the Eastern Order gathered. The survivors of the Capital Defense Force rallied, each raising a spear or sword.

Toward that symbol of hope. Willingly.

Not for their own hope, but for the hopes that remained in this country.

The banners fluttered. The seal of Etakrich and the Eastern Order's banner billowed like a wall.

BWOOOOOO!!

The Lord Protector's horn rang out once more across the land.