“-Why don’t you stay for dinner before you go, Student Irene.”
“E-excuse me?”
“It’s getting late, so I’d feel bad just sending you off like this. Especially since you brought all this.”
“I, I just prepared it because I wanted to...”
“We’re only human, after all. I can’t just let you leave empty-handed. Miss Leira.”
“Yes, sir!”
“Please warm up some beef stew and bread.”
“Yes, leave it to me!”
“...But don’t work too hard. Please, take your time.”
“??”
“I-I’ll help you.”
Irene was a quick-witted girl, and she approached Leira to help her with the preparations.
Seeing this, Lee Han let a satisfied expression slip as he casually grabbed two hand axes hanging on the wall.
“I’ll go chop some wood while you get things ready. Student Irene, please look after Miss Leira.”
“Y-yes, sir!”
Somehow, everything felt like it was progressing in a haphazard manner.
Irene found herself in a situation where she was unintentionally getting a free dinner, but she secretly considered it a relief that she wouldn’t have to eat alone.
Even if there was a ghost chattering endlessly inside her head, ghosts didn’t provide any warmth, after all.
‘Is he a very considerate person?’
Staring at his back as he walked out the door, Irene felt a budding anticipation that he might be a meticulous and caring man, quite contrary to his appearance.
─However, contrary to her expectations.
Creak.
“…….”
As he stepped out the door, his face was devoid of any warm affection, surrounded only by a chilling desolation.
* * *
Around the tranquil cabin.
It looked like nothing more than a peaceful landscape straight out of a fairy tale a storyteller would narrate to their audience. Yet, within that very scenery, Lee Han ruthlessly sensed a disturbance.
Gripping the two hand axes, he slowly walked forward.
“-Come out.”
-……….
“For the record, I only give two warnings.”
The moment Lee Han’s eyes gradually turned fierce and his killing intent condensed.
Swish.
‘They’ revealed themselves.
A suspicious group dressed in black.
There were easily over thirty of them, and looking at the black-clad group, Lee Han’s expression remained completely stiff.
At that moment.
“Calm yourself. We haven’t come here to threaten you.”
The one among the black-clad men whose aura stood out the most spoke up to offer an excuse.
“Hah, you say you’re not here to threaten us, yet you’re radiating such a dangerous aura?”
“…….”
“Anyone can see you’re a dangerous bunch.”
Excuses need to make at least some sense to be believable.
Who would believe you when you reek of blood like that?
However.
“The same could be said for you.”
“What?”
“If we’re talking about danger, you’re just as threatening, lowborn. How can we stay calm when a bastard like you is beside the Young Lady?”
“...Hah, will you look at this guy?”
The sheer audacity.
Seeing him act so brazenly made his head turn cold with rage.
Instead, his heartbeat pounded heavily, and Lee Han slowly.
Thud.
“This won’t do. I might let the others slide, but you need to be taught a lesson.”
“Nonsense.”
Lee Han tossed his axes to the ground and approached the black-clad man who rubbed him the wrong way the most. In response, the man too...
“I won’t kill you.”
Perhaps liking Lee Han’s proposal, he handed his sword to another member and walked straight toward him.
The next moment.
Thwack!
Boom!
Without any further conversation, the two men began trading blows.
...It was truly the start of an incredibly abrupt fistfight.
* * *
Lee Han’s fists—no, his entire body—was strong.
Simply having the troll genes made his physical strength extraordinary, but having trained this exceptional body without rest, his sheer physical prowess alone was enough to crush a knight effortlessly.
Proof of this lay in the vice-captain of the Pollet family’s knights, whom he had battered just the day before.
Therefore, once it came down to a fistfight, there were rarely any who could defeat Lee Han.
No, in the first place, they shouldn’t be fighting him barehanded.
And yet.
Thwack! Thwaack!
Bang!
Boom!
A fight was happening.
No, it was more than just a fight happening.
Crunch!
“...I’ll admit, you’ve got some heat.”
“Looks like you don’t just fight with words, huh?”
“Probably not.”
Bang!
Lee Han was being pushed back.
Lee Han had never lost once a fight devolved into a physical brawl, but at this very moment, he was being pushed back.
The black-clad man’s punches were swift and refined, showing that he had learned proper martial arts.
Considering that most knights solely focused on weapon techniques, it was an unusual trait, but that wasn’t their concern right now.
That was because.
Crunch!
Their only concern right now was ‘subduing’ the other.
Lee Han and the black-clad man’s fists collided.
At the clash of their heavy fists, the sound of bones breaking rang out for a moment, but what shattered wasn’t their bones, but the stones scattered beneath their feet.
Swish!
Lee Han fired off consecutive jabs like a boxer, and the sound they produced was terrifying.
His punches drew six trajectories; merely grazing one would tear the skin.
However, the black-clad man dodged and deflected all of Lee Han’s punches, instead weaving into his guard to kick his calf.
Though it lacked raw power, it possessed a piercing sharpness that seemed to drill into the bones.
Every now and then, there’s a guy like this.
While some put weight behind their strikes, others put a ‘blade’ behind theirs.
As if his entire body were a razor blade, the more strikes Lee Han allowed, the more his skin turned red.
But Lee Han’s strikes were nothing to scoff at either.
If his opponent’s strikes contained a blade, Lee Han’s strikes were like a blacksmith’s hammer.
Boom!
“...Alright, I’ll admit it, lowborn. I don’t know about anything else, but your fists have some heat.”
When Lee Han’s strike smashed into his stomach, fresh blood spilled from the black-clad man’s lips.
It was a blow that would have churned his insides; it wouldn’t have been strange if he collapsed right then and there.
Yet strangely, the man was perfectly fine, and Lee Han’s eyebrows twitched.
“Don’t you want to just drop already?”
“Your mouth is still running as always.”
Bang!
No more words were needed.
The exchange of blows continued, and each time, Lee Han and the black-clad man cast aside any notion of defense, merely repeating the cycle of taking each other’s fists and kicks head-on or deflecting them.
A battle of pride.
He didn’t know when it had devolved into this, but the two men’s fight had now abandoned defense entirely, transforming into a struggle solely focused on offense.
When hit, they took it. In return, they struck back twice as hard.
It was a brutal exchange of fists between two men who, at least in striking, would yield to no one. Every time their strikes swept across the yard, the sound of shattering air accompanied the destruction of everything around them.
Trees were pierced through, rocks crumbled like tofu, and the scattered debris around them was reduced to splinters.
“…….”
“…….”
Despite the immense pain they must have been in from taking hits, neither man let out a single scream as they struck each other again and again. At some point, their exchange incorporated far more than just striking techniques.
Swish!
Catch wrestling.
It was a form of wrestling that mixed joint locks and chokes, a style known for its gentlemanly adherence to dignity and etiquette.
However, the catch wrestling the black-clad man displayed was anything but gentlemanly; it was as threatening as a snake coiling around its prey.
‘This bastard, he’s a grappler!?’
The level of completion was so chilling it made his blood run cold.
Lee Han acknowledged it.
This guy had either spent his entire life training in a martial art that matched his physical abilities, or he was a monster born with insane talent and physical prowess.
Excluding anomalies like Balthazar, he was stronger than anyone he had ever met.
And that was...
‘...Fuck, why is this so fun?’
Lee Han began to get excited purely because he was enjoying this situation.
Even though he wasn’t some pervert who got off on meeting strong opponents.
And that was what...
Whoosh!
...caused him to throw off his restraints.
‘What kind of madman is this?’
‘There’s actually someone going toe-to-toe with Sir Lake...?’
‘...It’s absurd.’
Meanwhile, the other black-clad men watching the clash let out silent gasps of astonishment.
Who was Sir Lake?
A monster who had shown outstanding talent in the training grounds since childhood, whose skills were so undeniably recognized that even Duke Galahad had called him absurd.
Was he not the one bestowed with the name ‘Lake’, a title given only to the greatest knight of the Galahad family?
Yet that very Lake was being pushed back in a fight against an unnamed knight.
You might ask why they thought he was being pushed back when he was fighting so evenly?
‘The Sir has started using techniques.’
He was using grappling techniques.
That was a style he only employed when he felt his stamina waning during sparring sessions with the captain of the knights or their respected lord, Duke Galahad.
Because of that, the black-clad men thought it was over.
They knew how perfected his techniques were, and how terrifying they could be.
...But.
“...That crazy bastard?”
They were horrified once more.
It wasn’t just because he had traded blows evenly with Lake moments ago, but because they were now surprised for an entirely different reason.
Crrrack!!
“He’s standing up from that position? ...With pure strength?”
While caught in that technique, the knight named Lee Han had forced his body upright.
There was a risk of his arm and shoulder breaking simultaneously, and he was even being choked, yet he endured it all and stood up.
Even as the sounds of breaking echoed from his arm and shoulder.
“...He’s a madman.”
“It’ll heal over time anyway.”
“Want to test that?”
“Go ahead and try.”
Crack-!
The sound of breaking rang out even more severely, but Lee Han instead gripped the man’s body even tighter so he couldn’t escape.
Ensuring he absolutely couldn’t break free.
“Don’t let go. I’ll finish you off right there.”
“Bring it.”
Neither Lee Han nor Lake.
Neither had the slightest intention of losing, and their aura flared even higher.
Sacrificing flesh to break bones.
Yielding one’s flesh to take the enemy’s bone.
Even as his throat was crushed and his shoulder shattered, Lee Han prepared to slam his opponent down. Conversely, Lake applied force to somehow destroy Lee Han’s shoulder, but felt bewildered by the strange situation where it wouldn’t break anymore.
Just as the decisive conclusion of the two men’s life-or-death battle of pride was about to be reached.
[-Stop.]
“…….”
“…….”
An ‘irresistible third party’ commanded them to drop their pride.
[Enough of this. Lake, let go of his arm, and you, stop as well.]
“...If this bastard lets go first, then fine.”
“If the lowborn admits defeat, I will stop.”
[......Does this sound like a request?]
“…….”
“…….”
[On the count of three, you both let go. One, two, three-.]
Crack!
Thud!
“...Aren’t you letting go?”
“Look who’s talking.”
[......Sigh.]
They ultimately didn’t listen, and blood was spilled once more.
Yet, spurred on by their damn pride, the two men refused to end the fight. Watching them, the other man sighed.
Unlike the documents Lee Han had read, he appeared to be a normal man with little sign of madness.
The current master of House Galahad.
‘Blake Vivian de Galahad’
let out a deep sigh.
His head seemed to ache from watching these two hotheaded youths who couldn’t be reasoned with.