Amidst a lush forest thick with trees, a fierce battle was unfolding. It was a fight between five armed humans and even more Goblins.
Resounding shouts and eerie shrieks that seemed to scrape against vocal cords vibrated in the surroundings.
“Hup!”
Allen exhaled sharply and thrust his long wooden staff. A dull impact sound rang out, and the Goblin struck in the chest tumbled backward with a sharp groan.
‘Got him!’
Eyes gleaming, Allen rushed in like a madman and brought his staff down. Even if he couldn’t finish it in one blow, he intended to break at least an arm or a leg.
Light as his body weight was and lacking as his strength might be, if he swung the long, heavy wooden staff with a wide grip, he could generate enough force to break a Goblin’s thin bones.
Thud! The following impact was fierce, yet at the same time, empty.
The reason being that the staff, swung with grim determination, had struck nothing but bare ground.
The Goblin, which had rolled across the dirt to evade the fatal attack, sprang to its feet and widened the distance. Rubbing its chest that had been jabbed by the staff, its murderous glare was brutally bloodthirsty.
However, contrary to his frail appearance, Allen was not one to scare easily. As he casually aimed his staff again, not a trace of fear lingered on his face.
‘Ah, I wish this were a spear after all.’
He merely felt inward regret as he looked at the Goblin, which seemed relatively unharmed. Because the wooden staff had a blunt end, its lethality was certainly lacking.
If the weapon in his hand had been a spear instead of a staff, he could have finished it with the first strike.
Of course, it wasn’t because he was a fool that he carried a staff instead of a spear.
‘What am I supposed to do when I have no money…’
A spear with an iron blade was naturally more expensive than a wooden staff.
He had even considered sharpening the end of the staff to make a wooden spear, but given his circumstances, it was extremely grating to put a blade to the oak wooden staff he had purchased for a considerable sum.
On top of that, it was a piece he had properly invested effort into, having repeatedly oiled and dried it, so a blade wouldn’t easily bite into it in the first place.
In the end, Allen had brought the wooden staff exactly as it was when first purchased, and the result of that was precisely this current standoff.
The Goblin, which had been thoroughly thrashed after charging in recklessly once, displayed unexpected caution. Whether with the intention of getting away from the tip of the staff aimed at it, it slowly swayed its body left and right while watching for an opening—a posture that was considerably threatening.
Because of this, Allen felt some pressure as well. Its intent to block or evade somehow, then close in to finish things in a single blow was plainly obvious, making it difficult to boldly thrust in first.
Moreover, the Goblin he faced was fairly well-armed. In its right hand, it held a heavy stone axe with a well-honed blade; in its left, a skewer made from sharpening an animal bone to a point.
The weapons could splinter Allen’s head—which was covered only in several layers of thin cloth—or pierce his body clad in a worn gambeson at any moment.
‘…Still, I can’t keep this up forever.’
Having made up his mind, Allen slowly began to move his feet. In any case, the right of first attack lay with him, who wielded the longer weapon.
An attack that went in deep all at once carried great risk, so he intended to break the fight open with quick hit-and-run feints.
Whether it read Allen’s intent, the Goblin facing him felt taut with tension. It was a hair-trigger situation.
Right then, a dark shadow pounced on the Goblin from behind. A cruelly curved blade flashed, reflecting the sunlight filtering through the branches.
“Kiiieek!”
A horrifying sound of tearing flesh rang out together with a shriek loud enough to burst one’s eardrums.
The right arm of the Goblin gripping the stone axe dropped off with a dull thud and rolled across the dirt. Blood spurted out like a fountain, scattering through the air.
“…Huh?”
Allen stood frozen in bewilderment.
Kicking away the Goblin writhing in pain from a distance, a youth with a sturdy build who appeared to be in his late teens revealed himself.
It was Devian, a Wooden-Tag mercenary undertaking the Goblin extermination request together with him. Holding a longsword with a blade reaching a meter in length, he looked at Allen with pitiful eyes.
“Hey, are you waging a life-or-death duel with a single Goblin over there? Is that thing your parents’ murderer or what? Huh? Hey! Don’t just stand there!”
In the middle of rebuking him, he suddenly stomped the ground and shouted furiously. The armless Goblin had gotten up in the meantime and was scrambling to flee.
“Huaaap!”
Devian closed the distance to the Goblin in an instant and swung his longsword with a resounding shout.
Though the motion was closer to a crude axe swing than a refined slash, it was more than enough for the Goblin that was already heavily wounded and showing its back.
Its back split apart with a wet sound, and blood splattered. For a moment, its pale spine was visible. As the Goblin collapsed with a final death throe, Allen groaned in dismay.
‘Ah, my money…’
Though it varied depending on the type of monster being exterminated, for lower monsters such as Goblins, it was customary to receive payment based on the number slain.
Since the amount for one Goblin was three copper nyang, he had essentially just thrown away three copper nyang.
“Tch.”
Allen clicked his tongue, but there was no time to dwell on money already beyond his grasp. He had no leisure to resent Devian, who wore a refreshed expression as he wiped the blood from his blade.
The battle with the Goblins was still ongoing. Rather than sparing concern for a matter without the slightest profit, it was time to move to earn even a single coin.
Allen gripped his oak wooden staff tightly and looked around.
In the fight unfolding in the heart of the dense forest, three more men were participating besides him and Devian.
“Kiyaak!”
A Goblin charged at the hulking man Balter, who wore a chain mail and an iron helmet with a nasal guard.
The way it kicked off the ground and leaped to swing its stone axe was no ordinary sight. It was the skill of one that had smashed human heads or objects of similar height more than a few times.
“Hmph!”
But Balter snorted and brought his weapon down. It was not a crude axe made by grinding stone. It was a real two-handed axe with a blade forged from steel.
Crunch! The axe blade struck like lightning and dug into the Goblin’s chest.
“Kkek!”
The Goblin pinned to the dirt ground let out a final death cry. Vitality rapidly drained from its trembling body.
As expected of a veteran Copper-Tag mercenary with thick bones in the industry, it was a sure and clean display of skill.
But Allen immediately turned his gaze elsewhere. Right now, his only concern was Goblins that could be exchanged for three copper nyang.
‘Even just one…’
He muttered anxiously and surveyed his surroundings continuously, but all that entered his eyes were already dead Goblins and Goblins on the verge of death.
“Kieeeek!”
A desperate Goblin charged with a wooden spear sharpened to a point at the forefront. In the direction it charged stood Gerolt, an Iron-Tag mercenary in his early-to-mid twenties.
Clad in the same type of gambeson as Allen, it was a situation that could prove dangerous for him.
A gambeson, made thick by stuffing cotton, wool, hemp cloth, and the like inside the garment, was good armor with fairly decent performance at a cheap price, but it was somewhat vulnerable to piercing attacks. No matter that the opponent was a Goblin, it was difficult to completely block a thrust where it threw its entire body behind the spear.
But what Gerolt trusted was not his armor. He skillfully deflected the fiercely thrusting spear with his shield and simultaneously swung the warhammer in his other hand to bash the Goblin’s head.
Thwack! The Goblin’s eyes rolled back white, and it staggered like a completely drunken sot. Though it was clear it would collapse on its own even if left alone, Gerolt deliberately swung his warhammer once more.
With a horrifying impact sound that sent shivers down the spine, crimson blood and colorless brain matter adorned the air.
‘That’s over there…’
Allen turned his eyes again. And he witnessed a deeply regrettable scene. The Goblin that was clearly the last one was falling forward with a knife stuck deep in the nape of its neck.
Standing before it was a middle-aged man with relatively light attire and a large bow slung across his back—Mark.
“Nngh. No, why… won’t this… come out?”
At the sight of him grunting and struggling to pull out the woodsman’s axe stuck fast in the Goblin’s corpse, a sigh escaped Allen unwittingly.
“Haa, damn it…”
Allen let out a groan and covered his face with his hand. To think he was being outdone even by the hunter who had accompanied them as a guide from the village that requested the Goblin extermination.
Of course, it was only natural that Mark, an experienced and veteran hunter, had the upper hand over Allen, who had only become a mercenary barely a month ago.
However, the problem was that Goblin extermination was strictly the job of the mercenaries including Allen, while Mark, who was in charge of guiding, was in a position where he had to look after himself to avoid getting hurt.
Yet even such a Mark had taken up a woodsman’s axe to dispatch one himself, while Allen had done nothing but stand idle, so he couldn’t help but feel utterly self-loathing.
‘At this rate, I’m really going to come back empty-handed…’
Allen muttered inwardly. Somehow, he had a very bad feeling.
After the battle ended, the mercenaries each cut off and kept the right ears of the Goblins they had slain. This was to present them as proof when they returned after completing the extermination request.
Occasionally, there were clients who wanted the Goblins’ heads brought back, but they were treated as fools who didn’t know how much a single head weighed.
The total number of Goblins killed in this battle was eight. Copper-Tag mercenary Balter had slain three, Iron-Tag mercenary Gerolt and Wooden-Tag mercenary Devian had two each, and hunter Mark had caught one.
In copper coins, the sum was twenty-four nyang, but Allen’s share thereof was not a single penny.
While the others busied themselves moving about, Allen merely stood there blankly. Since nothing of value came from Goblin corpses, there was nothing else for him to do.
Perhaps having seen that sight, Balter, who had collected his share, approached. Wearing a chain-mail vest over his dark-brown gambeson, he made clinking sounds wherever he moved.
“What are you doing? Don’t tell me you didn’t catch even one?”
“Yes. Somehow, it turned out that way.”
The brow of Balter’s eyes visible beneath his nasal helmet furrowed slightly.
“I told you clearly when we set out, but I don’t go easy on anyone just because they’re young. If you want to scrape together even a few coins, take care of your own share. Got it?”
“Yes.”
Allen answered nonchalantly. He hadn’t wanted any special consideration to begin with. Favor received from others was ultimately debt, and he truly hated owing debt.
Shortly after, the group moved to take a brief rest. It was a place not too far from the battlefield with the Goblins. An acrid smell of blood wafted on the wind blowing between the trees.
They each rested freely, some sitting down on piles of fallen leaves or leaning against tree trunks, but they did not sit in a circle. This was because they had to keep watch in all directions.
Allen also chose a suitable tree root to sit on. He looked his oak staff over this way and that, racking his brains over how to make use of it.
When he compared how Balter and Gerolt fought with himself, the answer came with disheartening ease.
‘…The problem wasn’t the weapon, but how I was using it.’
Wielding a weapon that should be swung utilizing its length and weight, yet trying to fight with thrusts ill-suited for it—how could that possibly work? And after all that, I even thought, ‘Ah, I wish this were a spear’?
‘Ugh. How embarrassing…’
It was around the time Allen was shuddering at his own stupidity that Devian approached with a smirk.
“Hey, were you acquainted with that Goblin from earlier by any chance?”
Allen wondered what nonsense he was getting at, but answered obediently for now.
“No, of course not.”
“Ah, really? I thought maybe you two were hometown friends or something, the way you were exchanging such heated glances.”
Devian burst into giggles. Allen sighed inwardly. It was a nonsensical remark as expected. Just as he was about to brush it off and let it go, Devian opened his mouth again.
“You looked so surprised when I cut that thing’s arm off, so I wondered. Then it’s fine if I take this, right?”
He tapped the cloth pouch hanging at his waist and smirked. Inside would be the three-copper-nyang ear cut from the dead Goblin.
‘Not a problem.’
Allen thought. To begin with, there was nothing particularly reproachable about Devian’s action of attacking the Goblin from behind while it was facing Allen.
Even if the opponent was a Goblin, it was a real battle with their one and only life on the line. In such a situation, arguing over yours and mine and lowering the efficiency of battle was considered taboo among mercenaries.
Those who asserted their share in such a manner and fomented discord quickly became notorious and found themselves in a position where they could hardly join any parties.
However, coming all the way over here just to provoke him like this was another matter entirely. He felt there was nothing to gain by engaging, but Allen’s mouth sometimes ran off on its own.
“That’s not why I was surprised, though.”
Devian tilted his head at the blunt remark.
“What?”
“I thought that Goblin was your little brother.”
Allen raised his palm in front of his face and waved it.
“Because you looked so alike.”
Devian’s face, which had worn a blank expression for a moment as if slow to understand, twisted abruptly.
Now that he looked again, they really did seem alike. It certainly wasn’t a face that would be called handsome.
Perhaps that was why. Devian’s reaction was quite violent.
“What did you say, punk?”
“Ah, was I wrong? That’s a relief then. I was so startled when you jumped out and cut off your own brother’s arm.”
Allen spoke with brazen nonchalance and shrugged his shoulders.
“Why you little—!”
Flying into a rage, Devian grabbed Allen by the collar. A sigh escaped him inwardly at how light and easily lifted his body was, but even then, Allen moved his lips with composure.
“If I’m wrong, I’m wrong. I don’t know why you’re so angry. You thought that Goblin was my hometown friend, and I thought it was your brother. We both misunderstood, so can’t we just call it even?”
“You shrimp, spouting nonsense!”
Devian, who had shouted in anger, pulled back his tightly clenched fist. Allen could feel his intent to mess up Allen’s face—which was rather delicately handsome—just like his own.
Of course, that was Allen’s one-sided impression.
< Chapter 1. The Frail Wooden-Tag Mercenary (1) > End
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