Undying Berserker
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Chapter 51 - Fist Democracy (Thank you, CAPTAINCAEL!)
🕑 Added 2025-01-26 13:42:16 +0000 UTCReina's words cut deep… Heirina was aware that things were very troublesome in the capital. Hei even told her that if she had the choice, she had to avoid politics as much as possible since the problems caused by politics couldn’t be solved by a single person’s sword. In the capital, they fight a different kind of war, one that people from the clans aren’t very good at… the war of deception.
“... All right, we accept the job. We just have to deliver her the gift, right?”
“Directly on her hands. It will be ready in the morning the day after tomorrow. Until then, you can rest and relax here. The capital will be closer if all cross the mountains, so my people will help you reach the halfway point.”
Only the halfway point… that seemed like a problem, but they couldn’t complain since the client was essentially helping them do the job with more ease. In any case, Reina eventually got up and then lead the group to her house that a few hundred meters away from the tower. They didn’t receive many visitors and all the buildings had a purpose, so they didn’t have inns or similar things. Fortunately, Reina's house had plenty of rooms for them and the food eventually arrived. Without wasting time, Zelos began to fill his belly.
“Since you guys accepted the job, I can give you all some extra details about the situation there.”
“You sure like to give pieces of information very slowly, huh?”
Reina studied Zelos for a moment. He had a point, but no one said that to Reina before. She wondered if her people were just that tolerant or if Zelos was just too impatient.
“Never mind him. We are listening, Reina. We need to learn as much as possible before we reach the capital.”
“Well, first of all, the place is filled with scheming people. The emperor is sick, and a bunch of people who are claiming to be illegitimate sons of the emperor want to take his place once he dies, and those with power want to support their own candidates to gain influence.”
That wasn’t surprising… Still, Zelos doesn’t like that since he doesn’t want to get involved in politics. The battlefield was much better, a good sword swing was enough to solve most problems and if it wasn’t solving them, then he just needed to use more force. In any case, for Reina to send them instead of using whatever methods she used before, it made Zelos connect the dots.
“Are you giving her something that will help her survive this kind of political struggle?”
“... I can’t tell that.”
“I guess the answer is yes. If you are that afraid that we will steal the gift, then you are making the wrong decision by doing this kind of job for you in the first place. I guess your people have a bad history with the people of the plains since you think that we are all thieves.”
“Please, do forgive this idiot. Don’t mind his words. Since he doesn’t show much emotion, he doesn’t care about the feelings of the others either. Please, continue.”
“There isn’t much that I can say aside from don’t trust anyone. I send her gifts, but we can’t maintain contact, after all.”
“If you value her friendship that much, then why don’t you help her?”
“Zelos… who died and made you the captain of the team?”
“I am asking things because you don’t have the courage to ask out of fear of being disrespectful. We are being paid to do this job, but our lives are still on the line. The least she can do is to give us some answers.”
Heirina grunted since she couldn’t say anything about that… it was annoying how come Zelos could say the right thing in the most annoying way possible. Regardless, Reina studied him for a moment before giving her an answer.
“She is a friend, but I have the responsibility of looking after my people. I can’t risk their safety in a conflict that can make us become the enemies of the whole nation.”
“See? That didn’t hurt.”
“Putting that aside, that is your main mission. Go to the capital and give Liry my gift. Once you find her, you will have the chance to accept the secondary mission that I might pay you guys if you accept it. Help her for a few weeks, and then I will add something nice as your extra payment.”
Zelos had a hard time not rolling his eyes… it was clear that Reina wanted them to get involved in a very messy situation that had the added bonus of messy politics. He didn’t know why she would go that far, but the offer was too tempting. The natives were a force that couldn’t be ignored on any battlefield and a lot of things about them were still unknown, so staying on their good side would certainly be very beneficial. Not only to them, but to the whole country.
Everyone aside from Zelos looked at Heirina and they had many things to ask. She knew what they wanted to ask, and while it was troublesome, she decided to voice it.
“Why are you being so roundabout about this? Why don’t you tell us to help her directly? Are you testing us or something?”
“I guess I am.”
Heirina studied Reina silently for a short while and then eventually sighed. Reina couldn’t trust them completely, but she was willing to test them and see them show their worth. Maybe it was because they were part of a new generation of warriors or something similar. Either way, it was clear that Reina didn’t want to let things continue as they were.
“That is enough for today. Feel free to eat as much as you want and rest here.”
“You might regret these words later.”
Reina didn’t understand the meaning of those words, but soon she had a fair idea about their meaning as she saw Zelos resuming his meal and it didn’t look like he was going to stop anytime soon.
The next day, the group woke up and had breakfast with Reina, and soon, they found themselves with a lot of free time. Zelos was fine just doing some training to kill time, but it seemed that the others wanted to move around the base to see what was there. That seemed interesting as well, and Zelos also decided to pick on that when Reina offered to take them around their base. Still, he had some questions; the others had to, but they didn’t want to ask them out loud as usual.
“Are you sure you want to show us how you and your people live around here?”
“I can’t see any way showing you our lifestyle would cause us problems in the long run.”
“What about in the short term?”
“I can see that if you end up picking a fight with one of us. As long as you don’t point your weapons at anyone, no one will take offense here. This is how we challenge each other.”
“Interesting.”
The group left Reina’s house, and soon, many people began to greet her. Since she didn’t have time for a talk, she just nodded at them. Before anything, she took them back to the tower, where the rooms were opened, and a bunch of kids were training in the rooms.
“All of our kids train here their minds and bodies. Although not all of us follow the martial path, it is important to know how to defend ourselves since we might ourselves in difficult situations thanks to our heritage.”
Heirina glared at Zelos, already imagining that he would ask what happened in the past for her to say something like that. Still, one didn’t have to be a genius to imagine that some people tried to capture them in order to get their very rare traits. It also wasn’t hard to imagine that they unleashed hell on those who did that.
Speaking of extremely rare traits, Zelos wondered if Kaitrine’s ancestors came from there; it seemed like the thing they would have there. Kaitrine mentioned a few times that her father was once a bandit who terrorized the so-called bad merchants and stole a lot of their stuff, as for the past of her bloodline beyond there, she said that it was hard to know… since they were heading to the capital, they might learn something there.
Regardless, after watching things in the tower for a bit, they left and then headed to some fields that they had at the base of the mountains around. People with special traits could make food grow faster there in a very hard way to understand. That was why they had so many people and still kept growing despite the limited amount of land on their hands. They still had the gifts of the mountains and a lot of food could be found there.
The group thought that there wasn’t much to see aside from a rural and perhaps archaic society, but soon they changed their minds about the natives. There was something that they called a bathhouse in which people would go there in groups to soak in a warm and long bath to get rid of the day’s fatigue.
They also had some windmills in which they used to process grains. They also have a bunch of shops for weapons, food, and tools. Their style was very different from the products outside, but the quality was most of the time higher. It made sense since they had to compete with each other and they didn’t sell their things outside.
After seeing all that, their last stop was on a large and weird round building. The place was empty now, but it was completely open. Reina guided them beyond the entrance and soon they found a round stone ring. It was clearly a place where people would fight each other.
“This is our arena. We use this place quite often for ceremonies and entertainment. If you guys had arrived a bit later, you would have had the chance to see some events here.”
“I dare say that you just broke your Pacific image of some people in our group.”
Heirina sighed… Zelos and his big mouth. He was always saying too much, but he wasn’t wrong, per se. Everyone in the groups thought that the natives wouldn’t do things like fighting for sport or entertainment. However, after thinking for a bit, they realized that they would have become excellent warriors by competing against each other. Competition is what brings progress, after all. Zelos suddenly had this idea.
“Do you guys decide your leaders are here too?”
“I am surprised that you thought of that. It is a part of the progress. We fight here from the time to time to decide who can be the leader of our people. But once the leader is decided, they have to face as many challenges as people want. If anyone has anything against you, they can come here and stop you from becoming the leader.”
“I guess that is as democratic by using one’s fists as it could be.”
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CAPTAINCAEL
am not the first am i?
