Some lives are determined from the moment of birth.

Born the child of a traitor, you must live your entire life branded a traitor yourself. Born among slaves, you will generally spend your whole life as a slave.

Yes. A life is determined at birth.

Dieta Arbenia learned that truth on her seventh birthday. She was the child of a maid and the head of the ducal House Arbenia. Naturally, no one looked kindly upon her.

There had been endless bullying.

But she thought it bearable.

That was what she thought until her mother hanged herself on Dieta's seventh birthday. Her mother's corpse was hideous, her face marked by burn scars. The immediate cause of death was the rope around her neck, but what had driven her to tie that rope was none other than those scars.

The scars on her face.

They had eaten away at her worth.

How could a mere maid have become involved with the head of the house and secured even a concubine's place? Through her exceptional beauty. Unlike his other wives, Dieta's mother had neither great wealth nor a prestigious family nor powerful backers.

Her appearance was her only worth.

And so she was destroyed all too easily.

A fire disguised as an accident. In its flames, her face burned. The priests who arrived too late bestowed blessings upon her, but could not erase every scar. Long burn marks remained across her face. Twisted skin.

The fire took her beauty.

It burned away the only worth she possessed.

The head of House Arbenia was a coldhearted man. He gave no further attention to a woman who had lost her worth. He no longer summoned her to his bedchamber, and began taking back, one by one, the things he had given her.

As though she had been nothing more than a diversion, he banished her and her daughter, Dieta, to an annex.

Her mother, who had once walked with her shoulders proudly squared, now hunched them. She wore a veil over her face, and the voice that had commanded her maids grew feeble. The woman whose shining worth had shattered the fate assigned to her at birth lost that worth and plummeted beneath the earth.

As was so often the case, her end was miserable.

Her mother's corpse, hanging by the neck. Gazing silently at it, Dieta was forced to understand. The fence that had sheltered her was shattered. All she had left was the beauty she had inherited from her mother, and the label of an abandoned child.

Worth. Worth. Worth.

The little girl faced reality.

Was it misfortune, or good fortune? The girl had talent. She had inherited her mother's beauty, but the eyes with which she measured worth came from her father.

The girl was a genius.

A genius, yet still a girl.

Her mind was not mature enough to accept the world, and she was too tender to withstand its venom and bullying. So she put on a mask. Behind that mask, she used her beauty to dress herself up.

Wearing that mask, the girl fawned, played the fool, and sometimes lived like the dead amid indifference. She knew that if she kept living that way, an opportunity would come.

On her fifteenth birthday.

On the day no one cared about her anymore.

Dieta fled her family. She fled and fled toward somewhere she could put her talent to use. The place she finally reached was none other than Cambria, the City of Opportunity. A place where anyone with talent could rise. Dieta spent five years in this city.

"Five years have passed since then."

Dieta leaned back in her chair.

Here was what she had built from nothing over those five years. A vast trading company, one of the city's three largest. It was her achievement.

"And only now..."

Dieta looked at the letter.

Her eyes wavered.

"Why, all of a sudden?"

When she fled. When she founded her trading company. When the company found its footing. They had never contacted her, never shown even the slightest interest. So why had they sent a letter so abruptly?

Dieta studied it.

It was lengthy, but its essence was simple.

「Come to the estate as soon as you receive this letter.」

「There is something we must discuss face-to-face.」

A letter scrawled by Duke Arbenia himself.

It was a summons. Dieta slowly exhaled as she looked at the words on the page. In the end, she had no grounds to refuse it.

Refusing would mean setting herself against them.

And the ducal House Arbenia was not a family the Dieta Trading Company could afford to challenge in its present state. Knowing that, Dieta rose with a sigh.

"Pasion. Make preparations."

"... Understood."

Leaving Pasion to prepare the carriage with a rigid expression, Dieta stood before the mirror and studied her face. The happy, relaxed smile she had worn while talking with Najin a short while ago was nowhere to be found.

The stiff corners of her mouth.

Touching them, Dieta smiled bitterly. The same mocking smile as always, the same smile tinged with resignation.

2.

A summons from the Central Guild.

Najin arrived at the guild in a lighthearted mood, only to be greeted by examiners waiting with stern faces at the counter reserved for high-ranking adventurers. He tilted his head at the sight.

"Green-rank adventurer Ivan."

The examiners spoke.

"In recognition of your accomplishments, we wish to conduct an assessment for your promotion to Red rank. Do you consent?"

A Red-rank promotion assessment out of nowhere.

Najin blinked. Of course he did.

"... I've never applied for a promotion assessment."

He had never applied for one.

* * *

Ivan, the twenty-eight-year-old adventurer who had reached Green rank just two months after setting foot in the city. Cambria's Central Guild had been keeping an eye on him. His growth was extraordinary.

He had single-handedly slain a Bloodred Troll, a monster with a Red-rank threat rating, and set a new all-time score in the Dochenberg Forest Clearance Operation.

Those were just his major commissions. His performance on smaller jobs was no less remarkable. Client satisfaction was sky-high, and everyone left reviews along the lines of, "He gets the job done quickly and neatly."

Satisfaction was particularly high for his bounty commissions. He was fast and efficient, and above all, he even recovered every piece of jewelry the criminals had stolen.

'I certainly thought he was worth watching.'

The examiner, Juberoa, looked at the man seated before her. It felt like only yesterday that she had put him on the watch list because none other than Roselin Ascalo had taken an interest in him...

Yet he had already gone and done something unbelievable again.

The leading figure in the defeat of Berheigen, the Demon Knight.

Before the shock of his single-handed victory over the Bloodred Troll and his two-rank promotion had even faded, the young man before her had sent another shock wave through the city of adventurers. At this point, the Central Guild could not stand idly by.

Anyone could see that the adventurer named Ivan possessed skills far beyond Green rank.

Of course, Red rank, the next rank above Green, was no trifling position. These adventurers were effectively the finest personnel the Central Guild could deploy, representatives of the city whose abilities the guild guaranteed.

As such, promotion was notoriously difficult and demanding, but...

"In light of the exceptional nature of the commissions you have completed, and our high assessment of your performance, we wish to grant you a special exemption to take the promotion examination."

The man before her had to be granted that exemption.

"Baron Orvais, Viscount Traam, Viscount Toscanelli, Viscount Epister, Count Ternien..."

The campaign against the Demon Knight.

As its leading figure, the adventurer before her had effectively completed numerous nobles' commissions in one stroke. There had been more than seven commissions from nobles for Berheigen's head alone.

'The Atanga Knight Order hasn't said anything, but... '

Even out of regard for the reputation of the Atanga Knight Order and the many nobles involved, the Central Guild had to grant this man an exemption.

"And above all, Marquis Edelmar of House Trevache has strongly recommended you. He sent a letter personally, so you should be grateful for his favor."

Najin listened quietly and nodded.

"Of course, the Red-rank promotion examination will be conducted according to extremely demanding and rigorous standards. It will span three days, and the first test will be supervised by me, Juberoa."

Any objections?

Najin nodded his assent to the question.

"Then let us go."

Najin followed Juberoa as she rose. As they walked, she began explaining the test she would supervise.

"I will assess your split-second judgment, your ability to subdue targets, and your escort skills. From this point onward, you must escort me to our destination. However, we will proceed at my walking pace, and you will lose points the moment you touch me. Keep that in mind."

She glanced at Najin as she walked.

He nodded silently at her explanation.

"Furthermore, inflicting a critical injury on any adventurer assigned to act as an 'attacker' targeting me will also result in a deduction. Remember that your task is to subdue them."

Having finished her explanation, Juberoa clapped her hands. As the clap rang out, she spoke.

"The examination will now begin."

Juberoa set off along the route she had specified beforehand. Walking behind her, Najin narrowed his eyes. He sensed people nearby.

He reflexively placed a hand on his sword hilt, then lowered it. She had said inflicting injury was forbidden. Better not to use his sword. With that thought, he followed Juberoa for a few more steps.

TAP.

With the sound of a foot pushing off a wall, someone leaped down from a rooftop, lunging at Juberoa. Presumably, this was one of the hired adventurers she had mentioned.

'One, two... '

Two adventurers were charging toward Juberoa.

One of them was targeting Najin rather than her. Watching their movements, Najin took a step forward.

The adventurer swung a wooden sword as he descended. Even its edge had been blunted, so catching it barehanded would pose no problem... but this was a test meant to simulate actual combat.

Reading the movement with his eyes, Najin reached forward. His hand closed around the adventurer's wrist. The moment he caught it, the wooden sword stopped dead. The man's surprise at that grip lasted only an instant.

WHOOSH!

Najin yanked his wrist. Thrown off balance in midair, the man was dragged past Najin and flung behind him. When the adventurer rolled across the ground and got to his feet, all that greeted him was the sight of his companion caught in Najin's grasp.

"Ghk, ack! Gah!"

The adventurer choked in Najin's grip around his neck. Only when he dropped his wooden sword and slapped Najin's arm a couple of times did Najin loosen his hold. A little more pressure would have easily rendered him unconscious, but that did not seem necessary.

One subdued.

Najin turned to look behind him. The adventurer he had thrown earlier was there. Though he looked somewhat incredulous, he made a quick hand signal.

At once, a series of sharp taps rang out.

The adventurers assigned to play the attackers in this test charged Najin and Juberoa simultaneously.

3.

The adventurers the guild had hired to play the attackers belonged to Pavlet, a small-to-medium-sized mercenary company. Their individual ranks were a mix of Blue and Green, but their extensive experience working together on countless commissions had earned the company an effective Red-rank rating.

That was why its members had been somewhat puzzled when they accepted this commission.

'However famous this adventurer has become lately, aren't these conditions excessive?'

Protect the escort target. Subdue the attackers without seriously injuring them. He even had to react instantly to ambushes. Naturally, that meant he could not use sword aura. With all those restrictions piled on him, would he even be able to put up a proper fight?

They began their assignment with that concern in mind.

And now, three minutes after the ambush began, the commander of the Pavlet Mercenary Company could only laugh in disbelief.

"Unbelievable."

Eight members of the company. It had taken just three minutes to subdue them all. The commander mulled over what had just happened.

Two had attacked to test the waters.

The moment one of them was subdued with absurd ease, he gave orders at once. Attack from all sides, with the remaining two providing support from behind. And so the mercenaries had rushed Najin from every direction...

One had been seized by the arm and thrown.

One had been kicked into a wall.

Another, just as he was about to swing his club, had taken a kick to his weapon hand that sent the club flying... before being grabbed and hurled backward.

Four had been subdued in an instant. He did not even know how the rest had been taken down. They had been certain they were attacking from his blind spots, yet the next moment, their vision flipped and they were driven into the ground.

THUD.

Seeing Najin drag in the two who had hidden at the rear to provide covering attacks, each held by the scruff of the neck—how had he even found them?—the commander raised both arms with a disbelieving laugh.

"We surrender, we surrender. This isn't going to work, Examiner."

Seated on the ground, he laughed incredulously.

"I think we'd struggle even with real swords instead of clubs and wooden ones. Are you really a Sword Expert? Not a Sword Seeker?"

"I'm an Expert."

"Hah. You look young, too. Impressive. With skills like that, couldn't you aim to become the youngest Sword Seeker?"

"I'm twenty-eight."

"..."

The commander turned to the examiner.

His look asked whether that was true. No matter how he looked at him, the young man before him did not seem to be in his late twenties.

"... According to his registered identity, yes."

"Huh..."

Pretending to sigh, the commander swung his arm.

He threw a dagger the instant Najin looked away. It precisely exploited an opening. A dagger Najin should not have been able to catch, since he had not seen it.

SNAP.

But Najin casually swept a hand out and snatched the dagger from the air. Of course, it was only a blunt-edged dagger made for tests like this.

"No, look at that. Those reflexes aren't normal. How the hell did you catch that?"

The commander spoke incredulously as Najin effortlessly caught a dagger thrown from his blind spot. Examiner Juberoa was just as taken aback. Najin's movements were utterly flawless.

Clean, economical movements. He had met every condition precisely, leaving no grounds for a deduction. His split-second judgment and reaction speed were equally beyond reproach.

Escort and subdual.

These were among the more difficult commissions, and this was also considered the most important test in the promotion assessment.

'The conditions are so demanding that this test has failed countless adventurers... '

Examiner Juberoa fell silent.

The hired mercenary company had not been incompetent. The adventurer named Ivan was simply exceptional. Before the test began, she had certainly resolved to assess him strictly and thoroughly...

But at this point, she had no choice but to acknowledge it.

"We will conclude the first day's examination early."

There was only one assessment she could write on the paper.

Perfect score. Flawless.

Juberoa let out a disbelieving laugh. She could not remember how long it had been since she had last left a sheet like this free of deductions.