THE EMPIRE VETERAN’S FINAL HOURS
I decided to join the anti-human-trafficking task force out of a personal grudge.
My son and his wife finally had a child, and the sword-king’s first child was born around the same time, so the entire empire seemed to be in a celebratory mood.
In retrospect, I’m sure that I must have been, too.
Perhaps that is why I didn’t stop my son and his family from going out without a security detail, a decision I regret to this day.
I never would have let my guard down like that during the war with the demons.
“Guards? There’s no need for that. Do you think your own son so weak that I can’t even protect myself?”
Why didn’t I push back against my son’s confident words?
In fact, I even remember being impressed with him.
If only I had warned him then that such pride would be the death of him, perhaps the future would have been different.
My son and his family never returned and were found dead the next day.
A carriage accident…or so it was made to look like.
In reality, my son, his wife, and their child were all assassinated by an unknown culprit.
I searched for the perpetrator like a man possessed, using any means available to me to gather every last clue connected to the crime.
My son was not weak, just as he proudly pointed out to me.
Since he was born after the demons quieted down, he didn’t have much battle experience, but he was still my pride and joy.
He was strong, enough to be a match for most men, save for experienced old souls like me.
Among his peers, youths who never experienced war, he was certainly one of the strongest.
But someone killed my son with incredibly practiced ease.
Given the methods and strength that must have taken, no doubt there was a bigger scheme at work.
And at the same time, the disappearances that were likely kidnappings began.
It didn’t take long to connect the two, nor to determine that there was a large organization behind them.
My only miscalculation was the sheer size of that organization.
I never imagined the same kidnappings were taking place all over the world, not just in the empire. While I knew it was large, I’d assumed it was limited to this area, but it far surpassed my expectations.
If the organization was only in the empire, I could have chased them down myself.
But now that the search had to expand to other countries, it was too much for even me to handle on my own.
Perhaps it would have been feasible were it only the empire and our neighboring allies, but the scope of the organization transcended even the continent, in places where the empire would hold no authority.
Even in the lands of our allies, it would be difficult to investigate without the proper justification, and a great deal of preparation and paperwork would be involved.
By the time I was nearly done crushing the organization within the empire, there was already little else I could do.
But then I received the news.
The Holy Kingdom of Alleius was forming a special task force that would transcend all borders, in order to hunt down the human-trafficking organization on a massive scale.
And since I was already fighting the organization within our empire, I was invited to participate.
Of course, I agreed without a moment’s hesitation.
If I joined the force, I could legally investigate and weed out the organization’s branches in other lands.
I had no doubt that the Holy Kingdom of Alleius had its own motivations for creating the force, having recently failed to take over Sariella, but that mattered little to me.
My motivations for joining the force were not anything noble, like protecting other families from becoming victims. I joined with the sole intention of avenging my son and his family.
Of course, I was also determined to save the children who were kidnapped in the empire, especially Buirimus’s daughter.
But my deep-seated grudge was the greatest deciding factor.
I would destroy the organization and take revenge for my son, his wife, and my grandchild.
I do acknowledge I did the great sword-king wrong by leaving.
Temporary or not, my absence left a considerable hole in the empire. For whatever reason, I hold strong influence over the military there.
The sword-king already has many enemies, so my absence likely put him in a precarious situation.
He probably placed me in charge of raising his son for that very reason, in the hopes of keeping me in the empire, but my reasons for hunting the organization were simply too strong.
Thus, I joined the special task force to hunt down the traffickers.
I was given the role of deputy to the high commander: the second-in-command over the entire force.
But since the actual commander was the young hero, I essentially stood at the top.
I used this position to devote myself to rooting out the organization.
Investigating every nation, determining which bases were the most important and which would be the most effective to attack.
I made all these decisions and successfully guided the force.
The force is a mishmash of soldiers from many different regions.
Individually, they’re all elite fighters, but it’s difficult to rein them all in under a clear chain of command.
Whenever we discussed our next course of action, each of the commanders would insist on their own wishes, making progress difficult.
But I managed to push through and used my position as deputy high commander to have the final word on these long debates and move things forward.
I wonder how many of them noticed that I was really just forcing my own intentions on them.
But I know that I was choosing the strategies that would be most effective for crushing the human-trafficking organization, which is the goal of the force, so I doubt anyone would complain even if they did realize it.
Though I felt for the hero, who was forced to be purely a figurehead in his role as high commander, I intended to let it be a life lesson to him and continue on this way.
Sir Hero is still so young.
I thought that if he experienced this kind of dissatisfactory situation early on, he would be better equipped to deal with it later in life.
The role of hero comes with many adult obligations.
So he ought to get used to such restraints and learn when to abide by them, when to shake them off, and when to use them to his own advantage.
For better or worse, the members of the force are soldiers, not crafty politicians.
They’re all fighting for the safety of their homes, so I was confident that with enough time, they would be won over by the hero’s sincerity and character.
The force would be a perfect training ground for Sir Hero to learn to deal with adults before inevitably facing the slyest of them in the future, a major opportunity for his growth.
No doubt the ever-calculating Word of God pontiff considered all this when he appointed the young hero to the role.
Yes, at first, I watched over the hero like a parent might monitor their child’s growth.
But I was still greatly underestimating the hero.
I was always working intently to destroy the human-trafficking organization—there’s no doubt in my mind about that.
But Sir Hero’s goal was something far more important.
From the very start, he had his eyes on the people.
And the goal of peace.
The young hero thought more intently than any of us about how to reduce the number of the organization’s victims, and he worked hard to put that into action.
We adults and our petty problems were just background noise for him.
What Sir Hero cares about most of all is whether he can save people or not, and keeping pace with us would be nothing more than a hindrance to his goals.
I thought I was encouraging the hero’s growth?
What a ridiculous, shameful misunderstanding that was.
The hero attains that role only because he is worthy of it.
Our Sir Hero’s spirit is far past any opportunities for growth I might try to offer him.
No doubt he would sound naive to some, but his determination to strive for justice against all odds may be one of his greatest strengths.
As soon as I realized my own hubris, I immediately started taking action to correct it.
So that the force wouldn’t hold Sir Hero back.
For the sake of saving people, not my personal grudge.
First, I needed the commanders to realize that they were only hindering Sir Hero.
At the same time, I put him on the front lines as he wished.
Sir Hero is meant to protect others, not to be protected himself.
Therefore, it would be pointless to deny him the chance to engage in life-and-death battles.
Yes, I regretted not sending guards with my son and his family.
But ultimately, my son, too, was a person meant to protect others.
He fought to protect his wife and son, even if he was regrettably unsuccessful.
As I watched Sir Hero, I began to realize that perhaps I should have been proud of my son for fighting rather than tormenting myself with regrets.
As the force made more progress, the men began to see Sir Hero with new eyes.
They looked at him as a warrior to be respected, not a child to be protected.
As they should.
All of us had been taking the hero too lightly, myself included.
And I would soon learn that there was one other person I was still underestimating.
The Word of God pontiff.
He created this force purely as a place for Sir Hero to grow.
Not just so that he could experience clashing with adults, as I had thought at first.
So that he could experience real, physical battles.
And what’s more, so that he could grow accustomed to taking the lives of others.
Prior generations of heroes were naturally exposed to fighting due to the war with the demons.
But now that the demons have stopped attacking, most people have less experience with that sort of combat.
Even the empire’s soldiers are largely inexperienced, so of course a young boy like Sir Hero would never have fought in a real battle against his fellow man.
Whether one has killed before is very important in this sort of battle.
Even the most thoroughly trained soldier will hesitate to take a life for the first time. Very often, that moment of hesitation leads to their own deaths.
Demons look virtually indistinguishable from humans, but they are far stronger.
They’re not a foe one can afford to hesitate against, even for the hero.
In order to battle demons, it’s vital to have experience with taking the lives of other humans first.
The members of the human-trafficking organization make for a perfect opponent for Sir Hero to build up experience against, since felling them should cause little pain to the conscience.
Thus, Sir Hero must learn to kill, even at his young age.
If he is ever to fight demons, it will be a crucial strength for him.
So it is with some horror that I realize the pontiff must have factored all of this in his calculations.
I have no doubt that there are even more horrifying hidden truths behind the human-trafficking organization, which is shrouded in mystery.
The Word of God Church has designated it thus, as a “human-trafficking organization,” but in reality, there are few instances of the captured victims being sold into slavery.
We know that some of the victims were actually bought and taken away somewhere, but we have no idea what happens to them.
Some have indeed been sold into slavery or even placed with new guardians, but given the total amount of vanished individuals, such instances represent a tiny minority.
The fate of the majority of the victims is unknown, and no bodies have been found.
Where in the world have these stolen victims been taken?
The state of the organization’s hideouts varies greatly.
Some are on a vast scale, while others hide out in caves with very few members.
Common thugs kidnap people, and someone from the organization pays for them and takes them away.
In other words, what we generally deal with are bands of common criminals, not the human-trafficking organization itself.
We’ve yet to capture any actual members of the human-trafficking organization.
Their actions are bold and obvious, yet too skillful to leave any traces behind.
Considering how much space it would require to hold all these prisoners captive, there’s no doubt that some nation or other is directly involved.
I suspected Sariella and did some investigating on my own, but I came up empty-handed.
Aside from the bases in Sariella, where we are not allowed to tread, we’ve crushed most of the organization’s hideouts, yet we still don’t have a full picture of the organization itself.
If Sariella was not behind it, I suspected the demons, but it was doubtful that the empire would let them take so many captives across the border so easily.
Considering the huge number of victims, it would be impossible to transport them without being noticed at some point.
Since the empire keeps a close eye on the border with the demon realm, I cannot imagine that anyone would miss something so obvious.
So we continue to crush the last of the bandits who have already been cut off from the organization, still devoid of any clues as to their greater identity.
If we finish crushing all of these criminal hideouts, I doubt we’ll be able to chase down the organization any further.
There must be something, some important clue I’m missing.
But I have no idea what that might be.
I suspect that the pontiff knows, but of course he will not deign to tell us.
There must be something bigger at work here.
Something far beyond our understanding.
The day Sir Hero traveled back to his homeland, I was making preparations for our attack on the next human-trafficking-organization base.
Morale in the force was high.
Inspired by Sir Hero, the troops were determined to defeat the organization in order to protect innocent people.
Even without his presence, the others had the mettle to take the initiative and try to keep moving, something I never could have imagined when the force was first formed.
Sir Hero spoke of this as if it was all my doing, but the only thing I did was remove the obstacles hindering him, myself and the other leaders included.
All of this was thanks to Sir Hero’s influence.
He hesitated over whether to go home, but I learned that it was for his younger siblings’ Appraisal ceremony.
Given his strong sense of responsibility, I was sure he felt reluctant to take his leave while the rest of us are still working, but there was no need for him to worry about such things.
Even the most hardened warriors need a break occasionally, and he should be present for such a momentous family occasion.
…Especially since you never know when your family might be taken from you.
I felt that he should spend time with them as much as possible and create plenty of memories in the event that one of them might someday perish.
After losing my son and his family, I couldn’t help dwelling on whether I could have made more time for them while they were still alive, so I do not want Sir Hero or his family to have the same regrets.
Not that I intend to let him die, of course.
But just like my son, there may come a day when the hero is defeated somewhere out of my reach.
Since he has chosen the battlefield, he has to live with the ever-present possibility of that fate.
“Sir Tiva.”
As we prepared to attack, one of my subordinates ran up to me, the one generally in charge of gathering information.
“What is it?”
“Well, we’ve located an organization hideout nearby.”
“Pardon?”
I could scarcely believe my ears.
Who would expect the human-trafficking organization to have a hideout so near the capital of the Holy Kingdom of Alleius, the seat of the Word of God religion?
To set themselves up right underneath the nose of our force’s home base was brazen in the extreme.
But perhaps that was why we didn’t find it sooner?
“How large?”
“It’s hard to say, since we’ve only just found it, but most likely on the small side.”
“I’m impressed you were able to locate it.”
“Well, a citizen happened to witness a child being taken away in the immediate vicinity and contacted us.”
“What?”
Did that mean the child was still being held in this base?
“When did this happen?”
“Earlier today, I’m told.”
The human-trafficking organization was quick to retrieve kidnapped victims.
We didn’t know what means they used to arrive so soon after the bandits captured someone.
Even the criminals themselves didn’t seem to know how the organization representatives kept such a close eye on their activities.
Since the common criminals had no means of contacting the organization, we’d never been able to catch wind of their scent, but perhaps this was a one-in-a-million chance.
If we were lucky, we might be able to capture the organization member who came to retrieve the child.
Or at the very least, perhaps we could save the victim.
“We have twenty or so men who can move immediately.”
If the hideout was a small one, then that should be more than enough to take care of it.
“Hmm…we don’t have enough time to get permission. We’re just going to have to act.”
Even with a force that transcends borders, we aren’t allowed to simply go on the attack in another nation without permission.
But this was an emergency situation, so they’d have to accept it.
If I went through the proper channels, we might not make it in time, even if we could have otherwise.
“Dispatch a messenger anyway.”
“Yes, sir.”
If we at least sent out an explanation right away, hopefully that would minimize the trouble later.
With that, I gathered all the men who were ready for immediate action, and we hurried to the newly located hideout.
This new hideout was one of the cavern types.
There were generally two types of hideouts that the criminals used: either areas like ghost towns and deserted houses or caverns like these.
The latter can be divided into two subcategories: natural caverns or caverns that were once home to monsters.
There are some monsters that dig holes and create subterranean burrows to live in.
These caves are usually considered nests or even small mazelike dungeons created by monsters.
Most likely, this particular cavern was created by monsters. Since it was an abrupt downward-slanting hole not far from a human settlement, I doubted it formed naturally.
The danger of these former monster nests was that it was impossible to know how large they were inside, and they often had complicated structures.
Monsters tended to make complex tunnels to fend off outside attackers.
And since they’re underground caverns, they’re generally too narrow to move in large groups easily.
“Is this the only entrance?”
“We believe so. We searched the surrounding area but didn’t find anything else.”
If this was truly the only entrance, then our targets couldn’t escape as long as we kept it tightly locked down.
“We’ll have seven men stay here. If anything happens, one of you should be ready to run with the message at a moment’s notice.”
There were twenty-two of us here, myself included.
I decided to leave a third of the group to watch the entrance and explore the cavern with the rest.
“Hmm?”
Suddenly, I turned around, feeling as though I was being watched.
But there was nobody there save for a small white bug.
Perhaps I was just on edge because of what we were about to do.
“Be sure to leave some space between yourselves and proceed so we don’t hinder one another’s movements.”
As I gave these orders, I stepped into the cavern.
It was more spacious inside than I thought, so tight quarters shouldn’t be a problem.
But if it was this large, I worried that there might be more criminals here than I’d expected.
We mustn’t let our guards down.
But contrary to my expectations, we didn’t run into a single soul as we proceeded deeper into the cavern. And there was only one long path, not a maze of tunnels.
Of course, fifteen fully equipped soldiers were bound to make noise, no matter how carefully we were proceeding.
Surely, they would have heard us, yet there was no sign of anyone coming to intercept us.
Had they run away?
Was there an exit that we didn’t find?
Or were they gone before we even arrived?
As these thoughts raced through my mind, I suddenly felt as if my body had grown heavy.
And at the same time, a bright light flashed wildly from deeper in the cavern.
There was an ear-piercing sound, and I fell to the ground with no idea of what had happened.
“Nnngh!”
What in blazes was that?!
Looking forward, I saw that the soldiers in front of me had all fallen, too.
The ones farther ahead appeared to have died almost instantly.
Blood splattered everywhere, and in some cases, even a few limbs had gone flying.
The groans around me indicated that there were a few survivors, but not a one was unharmed.
“Hrm?”
As I took all this in, a lone man walked toward us, tilting his head curiously.
He held something long and black—not a sword but some new kind of weapon?
Was that what had annihilated our group in a matter of seconds?
“Knowing that man, I expected a clever trap or two. Perhaps I was overthinking it?”
The man murmured to himself in a level, emotionless voice.
How strange.
My hearing seemed much worse than usual.
And my wounds were taking far longer to heal.
Most disturbing of all, despite my Pain Mitigation skill, I was assaulted by such agony that I nearly writhed around on the ground.
What in the world was going on?
“I put up an Anti-Technique Barrier and used valuable bullets, yet there seem to be nothing but small fry here. What a waste.”
The man scowled as he spoke.
Walking up to one of the wounded who lay still, groaning on the ground, he raised his foot and swiftly brought it down on the poor fellow’s head.
As if he was squashing a bug.
He repeated this with each soldier as he moved through the group.
I knew I had to move, but my wounded body wouldn’t obey me.
And as I struggled, soon it was my turn next.
I looked up at the man, who now stood almost directly over me.
His ears were longer and pointier than ours.
“An elf?”
A cold shock hit me like an avalanche.
The masterminds behind the human-trafficking organization, the mysterious nation, the location of the many disappeared victims that we could never find.
It all made sense.
I had ruled them out from the beginning, but there was one nation, one race that could make all of that happen.
The elves.
A race shrouded in mystery, who lived in a place known as the elf village, where humans were forbidden to trespass.
It’s said that the entire elf race lives there, but they’ve been known to appear suddenly and unexpectedly in places all over the world, then disappear just as quickly.
If they were using those same methods to bring the captives to the elf village, that would explain everything.
And humans cannot enter the village, so of course we couldn’t investigate.
And yet, the place must be large enough to host an entire race.
They could have easily hidden all the kidnapped victims there.
Who would have suspected that the elves were behind the human-trafficking organization?!
The nature-loving elves, who strive for world peace and lend their strength to charitable efforts?!
And the entire race was involved, at that!
“Lord Potimas Harrifenas. So you were behind all this?!”
“Hmm?”
I’ve seen this elf man before.
He’s visited the empire as a delegate of the elves several times.
“…Ah. I recognize that face. You’re from the empire…though I’ve forgotten your name.”
Though I remember him well, Potimas doesn’t recall exactly who I am. As if I was too trivial to be worth remembering.
I felt a tremor of humiliation.
“You were a man of some import, as I recall, but I can hardly let you live now that you’ve seen my face here.”
As if he intended to let any of us live anyway!
With the last trace of my strength, I grabbed Potimas’s leg.
“Damn you…damn you!”
I screamed at him, barely able to form a coherent sentence.
Without a doubt, this man was responsible for the deaths of my son and his family.
Not only that, but he was the cause of countless kidnappings and tragedies the whole world over.
He cannot be allowed to live.
If he does, he would surely only bring about even greater calamities.
And then Sir Hero would be in danger.
I tightened my grip on his leg as best I could.
But I could do no more and could only watch as Potimas looked down at me disinterestedly and raised his other foot.
Then the boot plunged down toward me.
Sir Hero.
My final thoughts were of my son and his family and the young hero’s face.
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