Chapter 289: Dragons (6)

Manus Persion and Peid Neil – they were people that got to know each other through a war. While Roan Lancephil was busy with the war for the throne, The Byron Kingdom had allied with the Istel Kingdom to attack the Persion Kingdom.

At that time, the commander of the Byron Kingdom’s army was the hero of the nation, Noel Kyword, while the commander of the Istel Kingdom’s armies was the Fox of the Battlefields, Peid Neil.

Everyone had expected the victory of the Byron and the Istel Kingdoms but then, Manus who had appeared like a comet had saved the Persion Kingdom. Manus who had been a no-name until then was able to achieve victory after completely defeating the respective heroes of the two kingdoms.

‘I had heard rumours that the first prince Reitas Persion was relatively talented but there were no rumours that he had a talented brother ever.’

Peid wore a bitter smile.

‘It was a shock.’

Because it was an unexpected great defeat, the results were massive. In addition back then, the Istel Kingdom had been paying immense reparations of the war to the Rinse Kingdom on top of the reduced production of wheat and were in the midst of a horrible lack of food.

With the war reparations on the Persion Kingdom added on top of that, the kingdom had reached a dangerous point that could lead to ruin. Due to that, Peid and his direct subordinates had to shoulder all the blame for the loss and were either fired or sent away to the countryside.

‘Those were horrible and boring days.’

But thanks to making several achievements with his great skills, Peid had succeeded in coming back up. Besides, during the founding of the Amaranth Kingdom, they had supported Roan Lancephil instead of the Byron Kingdom and the North Rinse Kingdom and were able to have their war reparations zeroed out, while also retrieving many farmlands within the nation. This had immediately resulted in curing their might as a country, and was a miraculous turn of events.

‘A person that had dropped me from the summit to the ground.’

Peid stared silently at Manus’ eyes.

‘But thanks to that, I was able to learn many things.’

In the first place, he had been the attacker and couldn’t put the blame on Manus. Or rather, now wasn’t the time to care about that.

‘Now’s not the time to worry about fights between nations.’

Sitting down on the seat, he held up the glass.

“Sir Prince. Are you headed to the Amaranth Kingdom?”

“That’s right.”

Manus nodded his head as there was nothing to hide about it. It was easy to deduce just from the direction they were headed to. But more importantly, thought Manus as he met Peid’s eyes from the front.

“Did you say that the important thing was not the Persion Kingdom just then?”

He was asking for the reason behind those words and in response, Peid made a faint smile.

“Yes, that’s what I said. The important thing right now is not the Persion Kingdom.”

Turning his head over, he stared at Aerea Britz to which she nodded before opening her lips.

“The villagers in the villages near the borders are disappearing.”

Those were sudden words, and Manus frowned.

‘Villagers disappearing?’

It wasn’t something to scoff over but he couldn’t understand why they were telling him that. Without any hesitation, Aerea continued her words.

“When we realised what was happening, almost 20 villages had already lost their people. Even now, it’s continuing and is in a very serious situation.”

With an awkward smile, Manus waved his hands.

“No, but why are you telling me that…”

It was then that Peid who had been silent interjected.

“This is not just the problem of our Istel Kingdom. Persion Kingdom meeting our borders is also having villagers disappear.”

“Sorry?”

Manus’ eyes became wide open as Peid continued his words.

“According to our information, the number of villagers that disappeared is more on the Persion Kingdom’s side.”

As soon as he finished,

“That’s impossible.”

Manus shook his head. It was something he had never heard of himself.

“It’s true. Even our Istel Kingdom had no idea of it.”

Just looking at the military might, the Istel Kingdom was a lot stronger than the Persion Kingdom.

“It happened in small villages in rural areas and even small temporary villages of refugees and the villages of the slash-and-burn farmers were included. I know that Prince cared a lot about not just the Capital but also the several areas around but even then, it would’ve been impossible to care about all the villages in detail.”

“Mhmm.”

Manus let out a low mutter.

‘I wasn’t even able to expect the betrayal of the nobles that had been my hands and feet…’

It made no sense that he was aware of everything happening in small villages. Even if he had been aware, it had reached a situation where he had no way of checking whether they were right or wrong. Manus stared at Peid and Aerea.

“I understand the reason behind you saying this, but as you can see, I’m a mere runaway right now. It would be better to talk to Brother Reitas…”

When his words reached there,

“We have already requested but…”

Peid opened his words and,

“We were directly rejected.”

Aerea finished it. Manus opened his eyes wide in response.

“R, rejected?”

It was hard to believe. Although Reitas was an ambitious individual, he had the talents to back it up and knew how to care for the citizens.

‘That brother is ignoring the disappearance of the citizens?’

He couldn’t understand, as it was way too different from the Reitas he knew.

“Things are too unstable and there are too many things to look out for both inside and outside the country; we will take care of our things ourselves – those were the replies by Prince Reitas.”

“Ah…”

With a stiff expression, Manus let out a short sigh with his face filled with disappointment. He was more angry and upset than when he had his country taken away. After staring silently at Manus, Peid started off with a low voice.

“So we’re wishing Prince Manus to help us.”

Getting rid of other thoughts, Manus made a bitter smile.

“Would I be of any help?”

As soon as he finished, Aerea pushed off the table and pushed her face out. The pretty face was right before Manus’ eyes.

“Of course!”

The bold, proud voice tickled his ears and while calming her down, Peid gave a nod.

“According to our investigations, the south of the Persion Kingdom, the Eviance area is very suspicious.”

“By Eviance, you mean the mountainous area huh. Although there are no tall mountains, the landscape is rough and the forests are dense.”

Peid once again nodded at Manus’ words.

“Right. The landscape is too rugged and since it is in the lands of the Persion Kingdom, we can’t move carelessly ourselves.”

“Mhmm.”

Along with a short mutter, Manus gave a nod. He could understand the reason why Peid had asked Reitas for help, as well as why he had asked himself after getting rejected. Observing his mood, Peid carefully continued his words.

“We have formed a special force with the elite knights and soldiers. Could you head off to the Eviance area with them?”

Manus couldn’t reply easily as it was definitely not something that could be casually decided on.

‘It might appear like I was riding on the Istel Kingdom’s back to attack the Persion Kingdom.’

That was exactly why Peid’s expression wasn’t very positive either – he knew clearly how difficult of a request that was. It was then that Aerea who had been sitting still slammed on the table while standing up.

Kwang.

The heavy noise attacked the eardrums. Not to mention Manus, even Peid had a surprised gaze as they stared at her. Wrinkling one of her eyes, she shook her head.

“Why think so much about it? We’re not trying to find treasures or gold veins here.”

With an excessively bold and proud expression, she continued.

“We’re going there to find the missing citizens.”

Aerea blinked her wide eyes, with an expression asking what else was there to worry about.

“Puph.”

Unable to hold back, Manus broke out into laughter.

‘Right, the very act of contemplating is laughable.’

Standing up from his seat, he gave a nod.

“Good. I’ll accept your offer.”

Manus threw his hand out towards Peid.

“I’ll head off to the Eviance area.”

“Thank you for making such a difficult decision.”

With a bright smile, Peid was about to grab Manus’ hands, but then,

“Well thought!”

With a sharp voice, a soft hand protruded out. It was Aerea’s hand, and before Peid could, she grabbed onto Manus’ hand.

“Thank you in advance!”

Incomprehensible words. With a confused expression, Manus pointed his gaze at Peid, and feeling that gaze, Peid made an awkward smile.

“Uh, the thing is…”

His eyes pointed at Aerea.

“The leader of that special troop is none other than Miss Aerea.”

“Ah…”

In an instant, Manus let out a short murmur unconsciously. It was a mutter filled with countless emotions but with the same bright expression, Aerea stared directly at Manus.

A strange light flashed past her eyes.

***

The advancing speed of Roan, Aily, the elven warriors and the soldiers of the Western Army was relatively slow. It was because the number of injured soldiers were too many that he didn’t dare to raise the speed too much, and to make sure the soldiers didn’t feel uncomfortable, Roan intentionally acted leisurous.

As if he was on a stroll, he watched the scenery and walked before resting and repeated that process. At the same time, he shared many conversations with Aily and talked about the things that had happened during the times they had been separated, spending happy and joyous days.

Of course, Roan didn’t forget about teaching Beryn several things and having her train in the midst of all that.

Shriieeek! Bam!

After a screeching noise, a heavy piercing sound followed. One arrow pierced through a branch the size of an arm and landed on a beautiful tree behind it.

Wing~

As if it was still overflowing with power, the arrow quivered its end strongly.

“Well done.”

Roan showed his thumb at Beryn, and with a blank expression she gave a nod.

‘The power of mana is really amazing…’

Right now, she was training on how to use the Amaranth Laws of mana to shoot an arrow. By relying on mana, it was possible to send the arrow to a faraway distance that was impossible with just the muscles. Of course, the further away it was, the harder it would be to hit the target accurately.

‘I need to train more, more, and more.’

Beryn didn’t find her skills satisfactory. It felt like the ends of her arrows were strangely being tilted. Once again, she pulled the strings back and seeing that from the side, Roan was quite baffled inside.

‘Amazing. I knew she had the talents but to think it was to this level…’

Unlike Beryn who was dissatisfied by her skills, Roan was in admiration of her talents and passion over and over again.

‘When she first started using mana to shoot arrows, it was all over the place.’

There was not a single arrow that had hit the target, but that mess had only continued for half a day.

‘It definitely was embarrassing to see in the morning and yet…’

Around the time of sunset, she was skilled enough to hit 8 out of 10 arrows on the target. It was something definitely impossible for normal people.

‘Talents are scary indeed.’

With a faint smile, Roan stepped back, planning on leaving to have Beryn focus solely on the training, but it was then,

‘Mhmm?’

A strange feeling touched his sharp senses.

Paat!

He hastily raised her left hand and bellowed in a low voice.

“Align yourselves! A group is approaching!”

In that instant,

Pabababat!

The elven warriors as well as the soldiers of the Western Army moved quickly to stand in lines and Aily, who had been caring for the injured, quickly took her weapon before approaching Roan.

“Is it an enemy?”

With a serious expression, Roan shook his head.

“I don’t know yet, but their pressure and aura are astounding.”

Closing his eyes slightly, he pulled out all the mana within his body. It was hard to tell the exact numbers of the group that was approaching at a rapid speed, but they were giving off an aura enough to prick at the skins.

‘This much of a force and pressure would mean it’s at least above a corps in size.’

Opening his two eyes, Roan bit on his lower lips.

It was strange.

‘Despite the aura and pressure, the sound, smell and vibrations are extremely weak.’

It was an extremely difficult situation to understand and his face turned rigid. Seeing such a Roan, Aily also made a slightly tense expression and also felt the suppressive feeling slightly later. Their eyes pointed at the dense forests in front of them and soon from the dark forests appeared a group.

“Mhmm?”

Along with low murmurs, Roan and Aily gave frowns and in their eyes were signs of puzzlement. That couldn’t be helped because what had appeared was not a large group.

‘Just two people?’

The group which he thought was more than at least a corps from the pressure and aura was merely two men, and besides, one of the two men was someone he knew very well.

“Pierce?”

Roan’s voice was carried by the wind over to the forest. One of the men that had appeared from the forest was none other than Pierce.

“Your Majesty!”

Bellowing from his heart, Pierce kicked off the ground.

Pabat!

At an immense speed, he shortened the distance running towards Roan and seeing that, the other youth broke out into laughter. After running like that, Pierce hugged Roan with a teary expression.

“Pierce, why are you here? Or more like, what’s going on?”

Watching Pierce hugging himself and his jumping shoulders, Roan tilted his head and it was apparent that Aily who was nearby was also at a loss. It was then that Pierce raised his head slightly to stare directly at Roan.

“Your Majesty.”

His voice was wet, and with a teary expression, he barely continued his words.

“You must live longer than me this time at least.”

Strange words came out. The people around him including Aily all wore frowns and shrugged their shoulders, clueless to what Pierce was saying, but Roan made a startled expression with circular eyes.

“Pierce, you, you, you, don’t tell me…”

He couldn’t continue his words easily but Pierce replied instead with a nod. Then,

“We have finally met.”

A humoured voice etched into the ears, and the youth that had appeared with Pierce was right before them before anyone realised.

“Ah…”

Aily who had casually turned her head over to the youth let out a low murmur. Power left her body immediately, and collapsing down, she lowered her head.

‘W, why am I like this…?’

Even she had no idea what was happening to herself.

“Aily are you alright?”

Roan reached his hand out with worry, and gazing over that, the youth made a bright smile.

“Oi, Roan Lancephil.”

It was a voice daring to casually call the monarch of a country, but there was no-one who stopped that or broke out into a rage – they couldn’t. His appearance in doing that was all too natural.

Roan turned his head over to face the youth, and the youth made a brighter smile and said as he pointed at his own eyes.

“How is it? Are my tears useful?”

His voice was still casual.

<Dragons (6)> End.

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