8. Unknown Expert
I quietly drew my sword.
Behind me, my subordinates sat frozen stiff, their legs giving out beneath them.
[Run, brat! That’s not something you fix by drinking a potion, you reckless fool!]
‘Can I win?’
An opponent I’d never fought head-on. It was three times my size, and having slept for over four days, it was starving.
But I lacked stamina. Even if I somehow survived, my subordinates would be caught and killed.
I tightened my grip on the hilt with my left hand.
‘How did I drag them all the way here?’
I couldn’t give up now.
One step forward.
No, two steps remained.
Until the restoration of House Abanas, just two steps. For that, I needed even these motley subordinates.
I swiftly slipped my right hand inside my coat and whispered.
“Fall… back.”
I wasn’t putting on a bluff because they were watching.
It was simply that none of them could stand against even a single ogre head-on.
A giant with a bald, savage face.
Long fangs reminiscent of a saber-toothed tiger protruded past its lips.
Hot white breath poured from its nose.
“Kuaaaar!!”
The ogre roared at us like a lion.
It walked slowly, shaking its head left and right while making a hair-raising sound, as if bursting into laughter.
“C… C, Cap……!”
“C… Captain! We…!”
The subordinates began slowly stepping back.
But behind us, outside the forest, the tide of battle had turned long ago.
Escaping meant jumping right into the heart of the enemy forces.
We had to break through the ogre.
I quickly took a flask from my potion belt and poured it on my sword.
Then I took a flint from the adjacent pocket and scraped it across the blade with a shwick.
Flames ignited along the liquid soaking the blade.
A sort of liquid ignition agent.
The moment I created flames burning along the blade with practiced speed, the ogre that had been about to charge flinched and widened the distance.
While the ogre warily watched the burning sword, I moved sideways to distance myself from my subordinates.
If I fought here, they would get hurt.
‘They’re chess pieces I obtained with great difficulty. I can’t lose them like this.’
Fortunately, perhaps because its gaze was drawn to the fire, the ogre turned its head and body toward me.
White breath billowing in the darkness and blood-red eyes were fixed on the burning tip of the blade.
“Huu…”
It was my first time facing an ogre.
I had never learned how to fight an ogre from Maise either. At best, I had learned how to deal with common goblins, orcs, and gnolls.
Only through study did I know their habits and weaknesses.
While signaling to my subordinates.
“Kuaaaaar!”
Now seemingly accustomed to the flames, the creature charged.
Each time it stepped left and right, the ground and trees shook with thunderous booms.
‘I’m barely withstanding the pressure of just this one.’
Thinking of the knight who had dispatched three ogres in an instant, I threw my body to the side.
The ogre’s heavy arm sliced through the wind with a swoosh.
In an instant, its arm swept through where my head had been.
Boom! Crack…
A thin tree toppled from a single punch.
‘In this opening… kuk!’
Before I could even rise, the ogre’s foot flew at me.
Wham!
I barely blocked it with my sword. But the recoil sent me flying backward, and I crashed into a tree.
“Kuk! Keog… kuk.”
Fortunately, the ogre’s eyes were on me.
Enduring the pain, I immediately rose to my feet.
Through my blurred vision, I saw the ogre slowly approaching.
Its relaxed attitude, as if playing with its prey, was revolting.
Pain as if my spine would snap.
But I steadied my breathing, took out a painkiller potion, and poured it into my mouth.
‘I can’t… die here.’
And I took out another potion. A forbidden potion kept in the deepest inner pocket of my coat.
A potential amplification potion that even I had never properly ingested.
Moreover, since the aftereffects of other drugs still lingered in my body, it was an even more dangerous gamble.
‘The effect lasts up to ten minutes. But considering I’m already exhausted… about two minutes.’
When the effect kicked in, it would literally draw out all the energy in my body to the extreme, amplifying and then exhausting it. Dynamic vision, reaction speed, and strength would increase by leaps and bounds.
But afterward, the backlash would leave me unable to even lift a sword.
One mistake, and death would follow immediately.
‘Gulp…’
The moment the scalding liquid that felt like it would burn my esophagus went down, my heart thumped.
In that instant, the approaching ogre’s movements slowed.
The sword in my hands felt light as a feather.
The fatigue crushing my muscles was gone.
A fist approached right before my eyes, yet it looked so terribly slow.
I slowly stared at the ogre, then walked forward.
I could feel the air splitting.
I let the fist slide past me to the side and drew close.
I placed my sword on its arm.
Riding up its arm, I pushed lightly.
Shwaaaaak!
Th… thud.
That was the end.
Half of the ogre’s neck was severed in an instant.
“Kueol… krk… keuk…”
Thud…
Its massive body collapsed forward, falling to the ground.
Blood continuously spurted from its neck.
I felt somewhat languid.
I planted my sword in the ground and leaned on the hilt.
Then,
a dizzying, spinning vertigo swirled up.
The ground heaved. The surrounding trees seemed to sway and dance.
“…Urk!”
The flames still flickering on the blade should have felt hot, but whether from the aftereffects of the potential amplification potion, I could no longer feel any temperature at all.
It was simply difficult to keep my balance. Even though it wasn’t cold, white breath burst rapidly from my mouth.
While waiting for my body’s senses to return, supporting myself on my sword,
the sound of applause came from behind.
“Splendid.”
I pulled my blade from the ground and turned around simultaneously.
Shwack-!
An unfamiliar voice came from the direction of the battlefield.
“Hey there, greenhorn. Taking down an ogre alone is all well and good, but is your business urgent? What’s with the getup?”
A taunt casually thrown to seize the initiative.
But I was at my limit just standing still.
I immediately knew who it was.
The enemy knight who had slaughtered three ogres in an instant.
“There’s a massacre happening right over there. You’d best run away too, if you want to live.”
An unreadable show of goodwill.
He continued, then furrowed his eyes and showed both palms, as if to indicate he had no intention of attacking.
“Whoa, that’s a murderous look. Calm down. I’m done with work now. I don’t particularly want to see your blood either.”
‘Done with work? Was he a hired knight? A wandering knight?’
I could roughly understand the situation, but I didn’t let my guard down. Fortunately, my body’s senses were gradually returning.
Though swinging a sword was still out of the question.
“A hired wandering knight?”
“That’s right. Came to the battlefield for money… An ogre popped out so I was a bit flustered, but well, it’s me. Wasn’t difficult.”
He held up a pouch. He showed no intention of drawing his sword.
I nodded and sheathed my sword as well.
[Arhan… that one is dangerous.]
[I know, Elder.]
“As expected, fellow mercenaries understand each other.”
“What business do you have?”
“Why so cold? I was just going my way when I sensed an ogre’s presence… and saw something like a burning sword, so I stopped by out of curiosity, that’s all.”
I understood, but there was no reason to give him any leeway.
I asked, walking toward my subordinates.
Having noticed the sounds dying down in the distance, the subordinates were cautiously approaching.
“Why were you just watching?”
“The moment I thought about helping, you killed it, so what?”
It was a pointless answer.
Having no intention to talk with him further, the moment I tried to turn completely away.
“But, you… let me ask one thing.”
My body stiffened at the killing intent in his voice.
“That potion you drank earlier. What is it? That. Is it alchemy?”
His voice sounded light, but I swallowed hard at the killing intent beneath it.
‘From that far away… he figured it out?’
“That’s right. Alchemy.”
Having confirmed the ogre had fallen, my subordinates began running toward me with bright faces.
“Boss! Are you alright!”
But.
I gauged the mysterious knight’s mood. He seemed to be thinking something over.
‘This is ominous.’
I quickened my steps and approached my subordinates.
But I made sure not to look like I was hurrying.
“I’ll be going—”
“That drug. Where did you get it?”
A chilling malice weighed down even more heavily. …My spine ran cold.
I turned back toward the knight.
One of the knight’s hands rested on his sword hilt.
“Tell me. Where you got it. Did you get it from the south?”
The knight began slowly moving his right hand over the scabbard.
The subordinates also seemed to sense something unusual and hesitated.
Fighting him while protecting my subordinates and retreating was impossible.
I commanded Pako, who had approached closest, in a low voice.
“Run.”
Then Pako, a seasoned veteran of the bandit group, either having understood or simply being that kind of man, began running without looking back.
Once the lieutenant started running, the others immediately took to their heels.
But the stranger knight didn’t seem to care about the fleeing subordinates at all.
That was a small mercy.
“Well… I don’t intend to kill you… I won’t stop you if you insist on running, but. I am Camallon of Selbric. I’d like you to reveal your name and the source of the drug.”
An atmosphere so oppressive it weighed down the very air around us.
He hadn’t even drawn his sword yet, but the mere feeling of his hand on the hilt was like a blade already pressed to my throat.
He was definitely an Aura user.
A very high-level one, at that.
‘There is no chance of beating him.’
Though my entire body trembled from the stacked potions’ aftereffects, I answered calmly.
“I am Arhan of Tuirop.”
“Tuirop? Why would someone from Tuirop come all the way out to this far east? You, don’t tell me…”
“……”
“No, it can’t be. Hmm. You couldn’t have made that potion yourself, right? Where did you get it? If you just tell me that, I’ll back down nicely.”
Damn. Was alchemy his goal from the start?
Selbric was one of the minor houses in the southeast.
Though it had already fallen.
I hesitated to answer.
He seemed hostile to alchemy itself; I wondered if it was safe to reveal that I had made it.
Even if I lied, what would happen if he found out?
My exhausted mind couldn’t produce a proper answer.
What was Camallon’s reason for being hostile to alchemy?
I had heard that in some regions, alchemists were treated like black mages or witches.
‘Maybe… I can survive.’
“I… made it.”
After gulping.
A confession forced out with difficulty.
Then, Camallon nodded and sheathed his sword.
The killing intent that had bound me from all sides like a vise withdrew in an instant.
“If you didn’t buy it somewhere, you should have said so earlier, alchemist. You don’t seem to be my target. My apologies.”
Camallon turned his back, walked a step or two, stopped, and warned.
“Ah. If you ever sell drug-like alchemy potions, I’ll be the first to come cut your throat, so be careful of that too.”
[D-Did that bastard just see us as some fake greenhorn alchemist right now! Me, Isaac Newton! How dare he! Compare me to a petty drug dealer?]
With those words, as Camallon moved away.
I finally sank to the ground.
The moment my tension released, the aftermath of the overdosed potions crashed over me. After retching up bile, I caught my breath while enduring the dizziness.
I felt the cowards who had been hiding in the distance cautiously approaching me.
The fools hadn’t gone far and had been lurking around nearby.
All my strength drained away.
“You guys… what were you doing instead of running?”
“H-How could we just leave the boss! You saved us twice!”
I let out a hollow laugh and lay flat on the ground.
Pako walked out, scratching the back of his head awkwardly.
The men who huddled around me rested once more.
I lay there blankly for some time. My cheek stung; when I brushed it with my hand, faint blood smeared across it.
A shallow wound that wouldn’t even bleed.
‘It seems he’s tracking some underground organization selling alchemy… I should be careful.’
Folk remedies, leather processing, and the like—alchemy was knowledge that had been passed down to varying degrees depending on the culture and scholarship.
But there were certainly people who harbored ill feelings toward alchemy in that process.
Even paralyzing agents used in medicine, if their hallucinogenic components were increased slightly, could serve as low-side-effect narcotics.
I shook my head, brushed off unnecessary thoughts, raised my upper body, and checked on my subordinates.
Now I had to take responsibility and lead them.
Eyes clouded like a pack of lost wolves. Haggard faces from fatigue and fear, bodies covered in blood.
But beneath those gaunt faces, a desire for survival that couldn’t be hidden.
They exuded a raw, tenacious vitality.
Though they had survived through thievery, they were vagrants who had survived until now in this turbulent era.
They were so accustomed to violence that they had grown numb to it, but the overwhelming violence of war had drained their spirits.
I let out a short laugh and gestured.
What had to be done from now on was clear.
It had been tough, but there was no more time to lie around.
I grabbed my trembling knees and stood up.
“Let’s go, you bastards. It’s time to go to Gereon.”
Now, only one step remained.