Chapter 27: A False Threat

The Ten Thousand Capes wanted Frondier’s ability to decipher the ancient language. In other words, if he deciphered something but did not relay its contents to them, he had no value.

If Frondier tried to conceal what the ancient language said, they were to extract it from him, even through threats. Those were Selena’s orders, just as they had been Hagley’s before her.

Show him the difference in strength. Correct Frondier’s arrogant delusion that he held the upper hand. When that time came, discard all respect and deference toward him.

'I have to... threaten this man...?'

Selena swallowed. She was the one making the threat, yet she was also the one who was afraid.

Before she knew Frondier, she had thought those orders would be easy to follow. The Frondier described in her intelligence reports was an utter piece of shit. In fact, she had looked forward to the day she could finally cast off the irritating honorifics and false modesty and threaten him.

But now, she felt cold sweat trickling down her back.

'Would threats even work on this man?'

With the tip of her needle pressed against Frondier’s throat, Selena held an overwhelming advantage. Yet his languid, indifferent eyes made that advantage feel nonexistent.

“Selena, put the needle away.”

“You’re hardly in a position to say that. Do you understand the situation—”

“You’re the one who doesn’t understand the situation.”

It was then that Selena felt Frondier’s mana stir. Nothing about his appearance changed, but he was clearly trying to do something.

“Whatever you’re trying to do, stop.”

“It would be faster to drive that needle in than to talk.”

“...”

Selena bit her lip. As she had thought, halfhearted threats would not work on this man.

Selena favored needles partly because they suited her techniques, but also because they were more effective for threats than blades or magic.

The easier a threat was to imagine, the better it worked. Just as the pain of a knife piercing the heart was easier to imagine than a bullet passing through the head, the pain of a needle digging beneath a fingernail was easier to imagine than a knife piercing the heart.

'I can’t kill this man.'

But a threat that did not work was no threat at all. An ordinary person would already be trembling and spilling everything they knew, even inventing things they didn’t. Frondier, however, knew his own value.

The order to make him talk, even through threats and torture, also meant that she must not kill him.

She could only threaten his life now because she had caught him by surprise. To torture him, she would first need to restrain him, and she was not confident she could do that in a head-on fight.

'Even so...'

Even so, she had to do it. Just as Frondier had no value if he refused to talk, she had no value if she could not make him talk. She did not know how long this standoff would last, but from here on, it was a battle of patience.

But then...

“... Very well, Selena.”

“What do you mean, very well? I will never—”

“I’ll tell you. What it said.”

Frondier said something strange.

“I value my life too, and it seems I really could end up dead at this rate.”

With that, Frondier raised both hands as though he were genuinely surrendering.

Selena closed her mouth, her expression rigid. Was he serious? Was the ancient-language text actually nothing important? Then why had he hidden it in the first place?

As questions tangled in her mind, Frondier spoke.

“The ancient-language text said this...”

Selena waited in silence for his next words.

“Selena. That is your name.”

“...?”

“The name your parents gave you themselves.”

At first, Selena did not understand what he was saying. But as his meaning dawned on her, her eyes blazed.

“H-how dare you spout such nonsense...!”

“Is that what it sounds like? While your parents were alive, they raised you wanting for nothing. Naturally. They were nobles—”

Selena abruptly seized Frondier by the collar. Throwing her weight into him, she knocked him over to the left. She did not know why he offered no resistance, but she straddled him and stared down with murderous eyes.

His eyes remained calm, as though this were nothing.

“If you don’t shut your mouth right now...!”

“Selena, your parents were nobles. Your family’s name was Vanier. Since they lived in the west, they would have used ‘de.’ Your name is Selena de Vanier. Does that name bring anything back?”

Bullshit.

She dismissed it as such. In her mind, she declared it with certainty. Yet her hands trembled uncontrollably.

Vanier.

It had been the same when Frondier first gave her the name Selena. She had felt a strange sense of familiarity. The sound of Selena was light, yet it resonated in a way she could not ignore.

And now, again.

Selena de Vanier.

It was too much to dismiss as mere bullshit. Her instincts—no, her soul—seemed to cry out, an unsettling feeling of recognition, an immense sense of déjà vu.

“... That,” Frondier said, ignoring Selena’s confusion, “is my translation of the ancient-language sentence.”

“...!”

Selena understood what he meant. Of course this was not a translation of the ancient language. But that sort of thing no longer mattered to her.

“If you have doubts, go to the Ten Thousand Capes and tell them what I said. See whether it’s true.”

* * *

Selena’s combat skills were impressive indeed. She had knocked me down in the blink of an eye. I had not intended to resist, but even if I had, the result would have been no different.

After I spoke, however, she froze completely. All she did was breathe hard and tremble.

I gently pushed Selena off me as she sat there shaking. Otherwise, she looked liable to keep trembling over me forever.

Even as I stood, dusted myself off, and straightened my clothes, she remained seated on the ground, her eyes darting about. She seemed to be racking her brains, but that would not bring her lost memories to light.

'Still, judging by her reaction, those memories aren’t completely gone.'

Everything I had said was true. I had seen it with Analysis. As I had suspected earlier, it required a considerable amount of mana. It was fortunate that I had amplified mine with the Dragon Heart.

In fact, I had withheld something. The last line I had seen about Selena through Analysis. That alone I had not mentioned.

—Selena’s father was murdered by the Ten Thousand Capes.

That single line.

I could not tell her that much. It would clearly only cost me her trust. Besides, there was no telling what she might do upon hearing it.

I mounted the Cassian and looked at Selena, who was still sitting on the ground.

“Get on. We’ve wasted too much time. I cannot simply overlook your holding a weapon to my throat and threatening me, but this is not the place to punish you.”

“... Yes.”

Selena nodded obediently and climbed on behind me.

The Cassian raced through the forest once more, and I sank into thought. What to do about Selena was a problem for later. Something more serious occupied my mind now.

—For the giant who will bring down a god.

I recalled the ancient-language sentence Merlin had shown me.

In the world of Etius, “giants” were ancient beings. Like the Titans of Greek mythology or the Jotunn of Norse mythology. Being a giant did not necessarily mean having a large body. In fact, for beings from ancient times, “size” itself could be considered meaningless.

... The problem was that giants had threatened the gods’ position. Put simply, they were something like the gods’ archenemies.

And yet, there was that sentence King Arthur had given Merlin.

'... Perhaps.'

Perhaps there was something I had misunderstood about this world. I had delved obsessively into the game Etius, but I might have been mistaken about something from the very beginning.

* * *

The troops at the wall were experiencing hell. They had thought they had been crawling along its very bottom all this time, but they had been wrong. Now, without Frondier, they were truly flailing in the jaws of hell.

“Aaaaargh!!!”

As they struggled to deal with the monsters around them, a comrade beside them was suddenly snatched into the air. Something resembling a pterosaur had pierced the soldier’s shoulders with its talons and soared high into the sky.

Far above, the monster released him, sending him into a merciless fall. Those left behind heard the falling soldier’s screams for a long time.

“Damn it...”

Sanders cursed as he surveyed the battlefield, now a scene of utter carnage. Even then, he kept checking the wall.

... It had not collapsed yet.

“Sanders! Eyes front! If the wall gives way, you’ll know whether you like it or not!”

“Yes, sir! Yes!”

Lidwe barked at Sanders. As head of the family, he had judged this was no time to retreat and taken to the battlefield himself.

He carried a long staff, and each swing sent lightning tearing through the monsters, splitting them in two. Its destructive power was considerable, but not enough to cope with the sheer number pouring in. Worse, some of the monsters from the Outside could withstand even that lightning.

“Urgh... Well, now... I really have gotten old...”

Lidwe wiped away what was trickling from his mouth. He thought it was saliva, but a casual glance revealed blood. He had not thought he was overdoing it, but his body did not lie.

BOOOOM!

The wall shook as though struck by an earthquake. Standing atop it, Lidwe tipped and staggered.

A massive monster was pounding the wall from the front. An ogre. The enormous brute was ramming its head into the wall. A vein bulged on Lidwe’s forehead.

“You great, all-purpose idiot...”

Lidwe’s hand moved to his staff. Sparks streamed from his eyes and fingertips.

KRAKOOM!

Lightning traced a savage path through the ogre’s head. Unfortunately, its body slowly toppled toward the wall.

“Oh, no—”

The ogre’s body pressed into the loosened section of the wall. Cracks spread through the already fractured masonry.

Just as it was about to crumble completely...

Ice Magic, Formula Three

Instant Cast, Area, Amplification Applied

Glacial Mist

CRACK!

The ogre froze solid where it stood. Even the collapsing sections of the wall were fused into a single mass.

“This is actually better. The wall is thicker now.”

It was Aten’s doing.

Lidwe saw her and chuckled. “Little imperial princess, putting on a brave face...” he muttered, though very quietly.

“Hah... hah...”

Meanwhile, behind the wall, Saibel gritted her teeth, struggling to rein in her ragged breathing. Broken blood vessels reddened her eyes, and hair soaked with sweat and blood clung to her beautiful face, leaving it a mess.

“... Saibel.”

“Ah, yes. I’m fine. Absolutely fine. Nothing wrong at all. So could you stop calling my name? It’s hard to answer.”

Saibel answered Aten’s worried tone with feigned composure.

Aten built the wall, and Saibel poured mana into it. Originally, they had intended to take turns supplying mana after constructing the wall, but that was no longer possible.

Parts of the wall had already been breached, and Aten had filled every gap with ice. By now, they had lost count of how many times the monsters had broken through even those ice walls.

Aten had to rebuild them each time, leaving the task of supplying mana entirely to Saibel. With no way to know when the wall might collapse, Aten could not afford to squander her magical power.

'Saibel is already at her limit.'

She had not merely reached her limit. She had already exceeded it. Aten felt a kind of awe that someone who was not even a mage had held on this long.

“Frondier... when you get here... you’re seriously dead...”

Saibel muttered the words looking as though she might die first. Only her eyes still blazed.

Aten asked, “Do you still believe it too, Saibel?”

“... Huh...?”

“Do you still believe Frondier will come?”

At Aten’s question, Saibel seemed to pause to catch her breath. Then she answered as though wondering why Aten would even ask.

“Of course. So do you.”