Before the founding of the Empire. Back when Condor still clung to life.
He remembered that people of the time had called it an age of barbarism.
By then, the Condor imperial family had set governance aside and drowned themselves in pleasure.
The ministers and nobles around them swelled their power through every manner of revolting deed.
From the north and south, barbarians and pirates attacked almost daily.
Beneath them, the people of Condor had no choice but to wait for death each day.
If even the slightest thing displeased them, the nobles committed murder as they pleased.
The north and south were laid to waste, and even the inland regions felt the enemies’ claws.
It was the worst of times, when even the imperial capital had been ravaged twice by barbarians and pirates.
Even if one survived through that worst of calamities, it was not the end.
One might survive the blade, but there was no surviving taxes.
They plundered everything, leaving not a single grain behind, and many starved to death.
It was not much, but Ethan, too, had seen and experienced the tail end of that era firsthand.
So he had been rather confident that he knew what barbarism was.
But seeing the scene unfolding before him, another thought rose in his mind of its own accord.
—Crunch!
“Gaaah!”
—Crack!
“Guh!”
No matter how extraordinarily cruel the nobles had been in the days of Condor,
they had not proudly gone around slitting people’s throats in broad daylight like that.
In that regard, Ethan could understand how the officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs felt.
Anyone who saw such a sight would naturally think of the word “barbarism.”
The sight of them proudly cutting a man’s neck halfway through made the blood run cold.
When they first clashed, the Urrut warriors had been outnumbered.
This side had only eleven, even counting me. The other side, by contrast, had at least twenty.
But in skill and level, the Urrut tribe was overwhelming.
They were making up for a difference in numbers twice their own without much difficulty.
Rather, the warriors of the other tribe who had charged in were gradually being pushed back.
“Ghh! You stupid Urrut bastards! Do you not even have the pride of warriors of the plains? Father Wolf will weep! Mother Deer will lament!”
“Father Wolf and Mother Deer said to treat a friend as one treats family. You who spoke of cutting off the nose and ears of a friend of the Urrut must pay the price.”
Guests were important, but what mattered more was that they were guests who had been acknowledged.
On the plains, such people were called friends. And a friend was family.
One who did not protect the honor of friends and family was no warrior of the plains.
“Warriors of the Urrut. They dared attempt to harm a friend of the tribe whom the Beile acknowledged. Let us make them repay that sin with their deaths!”
“Waaaaah!!”
The warriors of the other tribe, who had been steadily pushed back, finally began to collapse.
Just as a small field of slaughter was about to unfold on the plains,
“Please stop for a moment!”
Ethan hurriedly spurred his horse over and cut in between them.
At that, both sides raised their voices, telling him to get out of the way at once.
The female warrior and the Urrut tribe said they had to protect honor.
The warriors of the other tribe said an Imperial had no right to interfere.
The pressure coming from the two forces was truly enormous.
But Ethan paid it no mind and continued speaking.
“Warriors of the Urrut. I ask you, who are my friends. On the plains, the most important thing is to protect honor. Is that not so?”
“That is so, Ethan. So hurry and…”
“Then I beg you to allow me to protect my own honor. They dared put into words that they would cut off my nose and ears, and I know well how great an insult that is.”
By Imperial standards, it was merely something barbaric.
But on the plains, it was a humiliation worse than death.
Naturally, they had thought he could not know that, and so they had tried to take revenge on his behalf.
As if he knew even that, Ethan now looked to the other side.
It meant he had something to say. In the end, the female warrior sheathed her blade and stood beside him.
They did not understand the Imperial language well, so she had to interpret for him.
“You have stained my honor. Accordingly, by the sacred law of the plains, I request a duel.”
When the warriors of the other tribe heard Ethan’s words interpreted for them, they burst into laughter.
An Imperial dared invoke the sacred law of the plains? A duel?
Several of them immediately shouted that he did not even have the right to request such a thing.
But Ethan did not shrink back in the slightest and conveyed his will.
“I was called a friend by the Urrut Beile. In the name of the blue wolf and white deer of the plains. If I have been acknowledged as the friend of a warrior of the plains, then I have the right to request a duel.”
“So an Imperial knows even that! Good! If that is your wish, we will accept! But you must know the law of this duel well! Even if you die fighting, no objection may be raised!”
“That is exactly what I want.”
At that, one warrior jumped down from his horse, saying he would step forward.
At a glance, he was no ordinary man. He looked to be quite strong.
Seeing his opponent, the female warrior grabbed Ethan’s arm and shook her head.
“What are you doing?”
“As you can see, I am going to reclaim the honor they damaged.”
“We can do it for you.”
“Do warriors of the plains recover their honor and pride by borrowing another’s hand?”
At those words, the female warrior, surprised, slightly loosened the strength in her grip.
Though he had been acknowledged by the Beile, she had thought him merely skilled in speech.
She had thought he did not understand anything of these plains deep in his heart.
But this Imperial named Ethan had far more guts and spirit than that.
In particular, his words that he would reclaim his honor himself left a deep impression.
“Take this.”
With admiration, the female warrior offered her curved blade to Ethan.
For a warrior to hand over their own weapon meant they were willing to place their trust in him.
Ethan thanked her, dismounted, and walked forward.
There were no grand self-introductions. They would simply prove themselves with their blades.
Since both had come to stand here of their own will, it meant they would fight to their hearts’ content.
As the duel began, the two men slowly circled each other.
A fierce probing exchange. The first to move was, as expected, the warrior.
He had likely judged Ethan to be nothing special.
After all, Ethan had merely stepped back and watched from the beginning of the fight.
He was an Imperial whom they had unconsciously looked down on as weak.
But soon, the warrior realized his judgment had been wrong.
The blade he swung with all his might cut nothing and cleaved only empty air.
He tried to pull it back in a hurry, but the problem was that he had put too much force into it.
Before he could even withdraw his arm, Ethan swiftly kicked his wrist.
From the powerful impact, the warrior lost his grip on his blade.
“Ghh!”
An unexpected, unforeseen blow. But he did not grow afraid or shrink back.
If he lost his weapon, he had to be able to continue fighting barehanded.
That was the mark of the tribe’s warriors. The qualification of a wolf racing across the plains.
The warrior closed in and was about to seize Ethan’s curved blade.
“I knew you would do this.”
Light flashed in Ethan’s eyes. He threw away the weapon that was his advantage.
With both hands, he gripped the clothes of the warrior who had carelessly come right up to him.
He hooked the opponent’s leg, destroyed his balance, and focused his weight.
Finally, he turned his body to gain speed and threw the warrior down as he was.
—Baaang!!
“Guh!”
The warrior, who had fallen back-first to the ground, writhed with a scream.
It had happened in an instant. A situation he had not dared anticipate.
He had trained to prepare for falls while riding horses, but even that was not enough.
He had been caught by a judo technique they knew nothing of: the diagonal pull-down throw.
“Grrgh!”
Even so, the warrior burned with fighting spirit and tried to stand again.
Still thinking he could win, he approached.
“Hup!”
Broken balance was good prey for Ethan, who had learned judo in his previous life.
When Ethan yielded slightly, the warrior reflexively put in strength and came forward.
From there, Ethan used a shoulder throw and slammed his opponent to the ground once more.
—Baaang!
“Ghhk!”
No matter how much leather clothing he wore, beneath him was bare earth, not a mat.
Having fallen on his back twice, the warrior could not easily rise.
In the meantime, Ethan placed the curved blade against the warrior’s neck and spoke.
The warrior, who had been trying to get up, sensed his own future and closed his eyes.
“The match is decided, warrior.”
“Kill me. The defeated do not beg pitifully for their lives.”
Through the female warrior’s interpretation, the warrior conveyed his meaning.
But Ethan smiled and quietly withdrew the curved blade.
Then, instead, he extended his other hand toward the warrior.
“…What are you doing?”
“As far as I know, on the plains, the victor holds all rights over the defeated. Whether taking his life, demanding ransom, or sparing him.”
The plains, no less than the Empire, valued honor and pride.
But what mattered even more than that was the right of the victor.
If the one who won wished to trample the one who lost, the loser had to be willingly trampled.
If the victor acknowledged the defeated and spared him, then he had to live.
“We fought a duel according to the law of the plains, and I will exercise the right of the victor.”
“…You are sparing me? When I said I would cut off your nose and ears?”
“The honor and pride wounded by that were repaid through my own skill and strength. On the plains, must a strong man who has already proven himself respond to every word spoken by the weak?”
It was no different from saying outright, in front of the warrior, that he was weak.
It would not have been strange if the other man had erupted in anger, but reality was different.
Instead, he let out a “Ha!” of admiration and suddenly burst into loud laughter.
“Hahahaha!! Impressive, Imperial! Yes! I lost, and you won! Therefore, I acknowledge the victor’s right! If you spare me, then I must live! How could a mere loser dare ask to be killed? Imperial! What is your name?”
“I am Ethan.”
“Ethan of the Empire! I thank you for not taking my life! If someday I can repay the grace I received today, there will be no greater joy!”
At that, the warriors of both sides, who had just been killing and trying to kill each other, rejoiced.
On the plains, fighting was as natural as hunting.
The dead had merely lacked strength and returned to the side of the wolf and the deer.
It had been a duel carried out according to the law, and no wicked trick had entered it.
Two men had clashed with all their might and determined victory or defeat through the strength of their bodies.
At moments like this, all became wolves and cheered for the victor.
“I thought all Imperials were cowards! Ethan of the Empire! I will remember your name! We are warriors of the Lungir tribe! If we meet someday, we will serve you meat and liquor!”
“I will look forward to it, warriors.”
The warriors of the Lungir tribe led away the horses they had brought and disappeared first.
As Ethan watched them go, the female warrior approached his side.
“As the victor, you could have taken his life. Why did you not?”
“Though they treated me carelessly, if one thinks about it, all tribes on the plains are the children of the blue wolf and white deer, are they not? I did not feel pleased at the thought of harming a friend’s family.”
Interpreted, it meant he had done so for the sake of the relationship between the Urrut tribe and their neighboring tribes.
As if she had guessed Ethan’s true intentions, a smile appeared on the female warrior’s lips.
“I thought that because you were an Imperial, you would simply be weak.”
“I have only learned a bit of simple self-defense.”
Simple self-defense? That could not be. The female warrior shook her head.
Even when his opponent charged at him with a blade, he had not been frightened in the slightest.
He had disarmed him in an instant and drawn him into a fight of bodily techniques.
Just as the warriors of the plains drove prey into the hunting ground!
‘I will look at you anew. Ethan of the Empire. Today was truly impressive.’
After that, no Urrut warrior recklessly passed ahead of Ethan.
It was the way of the plains, showing that they accepted him as a member of the wolf pack.