Min-Maxing My TRPG Build in Another World - Volume 5 - Chapter 7

Late Winter of the Fourteenth Year

Road Events

Random happenings may stop a party on their way from one place to another in order to prevent movement from becoming a boring scene change. The introduction of uncertainty may manifest in a peaceful journey, a bandit attack, or even the fortunate discovery of treasure. While many systems provide their own list of possibilities, these are oftentimes derided as “boards of doom” for how intense the outcomes of each encounter can be.

Organizing the contents of the letters she’d sent and the replies she’d received in her mind, Agrippina made her final judgment: the last of the candidates for the purge had been selected.

After sending out a great deal of notices to the residents of her county that she intended to inspect the premises come spring, she’d gotten quite a few different reactions. Some were plainly disgruntled, others asked for her to reschedule to give them time to prepare—whatever might they need to prepare, she would have liked to ask—and others still welcomed her cordially.

With everyone gathered in the capital for the social season, some had even gone out of their way to inquire at Agrippina’s Berylin residence. However, she had yet to so much as set foot in the mansion, since she did all of her work from the palace and her atelier; they invariably went home with nothing but discouragement to show for their efforts.

Agrippina, you see, refused every private meeting. Knowing that their objective—namely, bribing her—would be impossible in public spaces, she left them to squirm and fret as they waited for the day of reckoning. Her torturous message was as clear as it was wordless: I will not accept foul play.

Her little golden servant wasn’t around; he was busy frantically running around and making last-minute preparations for their tour of the territory. But if one were to get ahold of him, he would have likened the situation to an endless rerun of the last day of summer wherein none of his homework was completed.

At any rate, the conclusion was that a few dozen people were sure to be hanged in the coming weeks and months.

Those who fudged the numbers on their taxes, buttered up government officials, or treated a handful of cantons as their own personal property weren’t all that bad. These were wrongdoings that could be found in any region, and crimes this minor were practically a part of the job; nothing would ever get done if one tried to police these.

However, the flagrant avoidance of taxes, brazen sale of classified information, and unofficial toll checkpoints were unforgivable. Worse still, some had engaged in the expressly outlawed business of human trafficking, and had set up illegal mining operations in the area.

Agrippina couldn’t overlook these: her image as their ruler would crumble. This matter required austerity, and she was prepared to callously trim off the fat without the slightest pang of guilt.

Nobility were expected to be ever noble, and the imperial code of justice spake thusly: Let every penalty atone for one hundred sins.

“But to think,” Agrippina mused with a smile. “I’m impressed that earnestness can survive in a place like this.”

Taking one letter from the stack of papers, the count looked over the critical intelligence given to her by a man who’d taken a drastic leap of faith to do so. His name was Baron Moritz Jan Pitt Erftstadt. In the depths of the corruption and rot that dominated the Ubiorum county, he was a rare fellow, untainted by its evils.

While Agrippina had received many requests for an audience, his alone had been of a different zeal: he humbly requested a moment of her time so that he might personally report an important matter with evidence in hand.

The Erftstadt barony was just as old as the county itself. Before being ennobled, the original Ubiorum had taken in the first Erftstadt as a vassal, and had implored the Emperor of Creation to honor his faithful subject’s service; the two houses had entered the imperial bulwark together.

Although the descendants of Count Ubiorum had fallen to darkness, the virtuous souls of House Erftstadt had held fast to their primordial integrity until this very day. Convinced that the region had life left in it yet, their dutiful service continued, generation after generation.

At long last, the time had come for the baron to call a new master his own. In one hand he held an abundance of hope; in the other he carried the culmination of enduring his peers’ unwithering evil for years upon years while conspiring against them in secret. The final dossier he’d submitted had been passed down from his father, and his father before him: the man’s grandfather had begun collecting proof of his neighbors’ wrongdoings to be delivered “when the good count returns.” Each Erftstadt had swallowed their bile to greet the traitorous rats around them with a smile, and their great suffering had produced evidence to match.

Agrippina had meant to get to this eventually, and now she had a solid few generations’ worth of a head start on her work. Loyalty wrought reward: the new count had a task of the highest distinction to assign to her patriotic baron.

The lady of the county was going to inspect her territory this end-of-winter, and the Erftstadt estate would be her lodging—and this was what had driven her servant to near expiry.

After all, the bulk of Ubiorum’s resident landowners were praying for Agrippina’s death. Being the harbinger of ruin that she was, housing her invited untold dangers; nobody wanted that responsibility. The risks certainly wouldn’t stop at harmless pranks: these rogues would do anything to keep the messenger of their reckoning away. Lighting the mansion on fire was an expected opener; assassins were practically a welcoming envoy; if anyone was feeling particularly skittish, they might raise an army to surround the barony.

The new lord hid nothing. Her appointment was an overt proclamation: I shall use you as bait to sweep away more of the rot at once—are you willing to prove your loyalty?

The baron’s answer was unwavering: Yes, my lord.

His answer was the epitome of a steadfast vassal’s, worthy of praise to the end of time; pleased, Agrippina had set the current plan in stone with a weighty nod.

Her luggage was totally packed, and the blanket of snow covering the capital was thinning every day. Behind-the-scenes negotiations were all done, and what few preparations remained would be finished soon. All that remained was to wait and see how her enemies would react.

“Not that I expect to be surprised,” Agrippina scoffed to herself, tossing the letter into an unearthly pocket of space.

Since the dawn of time, those who found themselves on the back foot of machinations beyond their control had only one hope to escape: if the mastermind and their people died, the matter would be solved. Forever.

Agrippina may have been the daughter of an important foreign noble, but there were ways to remove her without incident. She simply needed to pass on in a way that would involve no legal hearings, by some means emphatic enough to leave no room for debate. And then, no matter how powerful her family was, they would have no means of uncovering an elaborately concealed truth that took place far from home; even the strongest arcane barriers paled in comparison to the protection provided by time and space.

A stray thought brought Agrippina back to an incident report she’d read many years ago: a tale of assassination so absurd that it had gone on to spawn a theatrical comedy. While recalling the details called for more effort than she wished to spare, she remembered that the story had chronicled the death of some count whose enemies had lured a dragon into his territory to blow him away, estate and all. Young or old, every member of his bloodline had been killed.

As tempting as it was to decry the account as a deus ex machina better fit for a tale set in the Age of Gods, the meticulous scheming and believability of the plot had made for a compelling story. Gratifying to watch unfold and utterly unique, the scheme was inherently impossible to litigate, allowing the conspirators to get away with their thrilling revenge story.

That had been the end to a play, of course, but that wasn’t to say there weren’t ways of reducing everything to ash in her own situation.

“I do look forward to seeing what they have in store. I can only hope they stray from the most banal of scripts.”

Gently exhaling a puff of smoke, the methuselah decided to sleep. Her kind could live without it, but the soul was ever in need of sustenance when battle drew near.

[Tips] Aristocrats given the right to manage human resources are allowed full discretion over matters of life and death, so long as their decisions are proven to be rational and lawful. Whether such decisions take the form of rope around a neck or poisoned cups offered in exchange for honor is a topic that goes unquestioned.

The snow had gone, but the chill it left on the earth continued to crawl up my legs as we set off from the capital.

“Mm... Is this really how people manage?”

“It really is.”

There was no lavish carriage to be found, no multiman guard detail. Our journey would be made in the plainest travel wear, and on the backs of Castor and Polydeukes alone.

“This is—how shall I say—horribly uncomfortable. I can’t imagine this is good for my skin.”

“You were the one who told me to prepare travel gear that’d let us pass for commoners.”

“I know...”

The woman dribbling complaints like a leaky faucet was who else but Lady Agrippina, but she looked nothing like I’d ever seen before. Her hair was magically dyed—using the official release of the product Mika had gotten a prototype of—a dull shade of brown, and a pair of mystic glasses made her eyes appear a similar hue.

On top of that, her polished blue-blooded fashion was gone, replaced with hemp travel clothes I’d purchased for cheap from a thrift store. Her rustic top, thick pants, and large mantle had been designed with only sturdiness in mind; each was packed tight with cotton to retain as much warmth as possible. I was wearing the same thing: this was a necessity to keep ourselves safe on the road.

“Are you sure there isn’t anything better? I can already imagine how sore my inner thighs will be if I ride in these.”

“A commoner’s skin is hard and tough. I’ll have to ask that you make do with the magic you’re so talented with—any better than this, and we’ll have to change our story.”

We weren’t role-playing as retired daimyo—although if we had one more, I was ready to be Kaku-san—but rather hiding Count Agrippina von Ubiorum’s identity to avoid any prickly situations that might arise. Plenty of people benefited from Lady Agrippina drawing breath right now, but just as many would have preferred her a trifle more inert; as bothersome as it was, this was our means of evading assassinations and assaults on our way to the territory.

That, and we had a lot of body doubles.

I don’t know what kind of sublime mastery she’d displayed in her negotiations, but the madam had managed to squeeze every penny and every last drop of authority she could out of the Emperor; our decoys were the imperial guard. Each unit revolved around a jager who specialized in disguises or a hexenkrieger who’d mystically altered their appearance placed inside a carriage. Surrounded by a convoy of knights each, our distractions had left the capital a few days prior.

Frankly, I’d failed to see in what universe we’d need to worry about Lady Agrippina being assassinated, but it turned out that this was more a trap to sniff out her enemies than a guarantee of her safety; it clearly wasn’t my place to get smart. From what I could surmise, she’d probably leaked fake intel to suspicious actors to see which of them would bite.

Because otherwise, I couldn’t see any reason she wouldn’t just send a messenger with a location marker for her to warp to, skipping the tedium of travel and the risk of assassination. I felt for the GM, and could see why space-bending magic had been reduced to a lost art. If just anyone could hop around through tears in space like the madam, then something like eighty percent of all problems that might arise in a campaign could be solved before they became issues at all.

Getting back on track, the perpetrator of any attack on our decoys could easily be discerned. The information she’d leaked had assuredly been carefully tailored to make sure she could trace the flow of information back via factors like location and name of inn.

As for us, we were quietly slipping out of the city after all the other teams had left to make sure we didn’t have any turncoats closer to home. According to Lady Agrippina, the list of people who knew of this plan was extremely limited: a select few nobles from the newly formed faction surrounding her, a handful of high-ranking imperial guardsmen in charge of coordinating the decoys, and me and Elisa.

So we should be good! is perhaps what I would have thought if I knew nothing of my own bad luck or my employer’s talent for drawing heat. I already knew that all this planning wouldn’t mean anything, and something was bound to happen—absolutely guaranteed.

Ugh, I hate this. It took a particularly awful set of circumstances to make me wish I were traveling by myself instead. This was worse than being at a bar or baseball game alone with my old boss.

“I’m trying to keep my arcane footprint to a minimum,” Lady Agrippina grumbled.

“Isn’t that a bit much to hope for when your plan includes opening a portal back home to sleep every night so that you can avoid the inns?”

“Please. My arrangements on that front are airtight. I had some Polar Night scholars seal our tent with an order-made barrier. As it turns out, an imperial order and a blank check are motivation enough to make a remarkable product.”

“That sure is something... Just how remarkable is it, exactly?”

“If you stood inside and used your entire mystic arsenal without reserve, I wouldn’t be able to notice from just outside.”

That’s pretty fucking remarkable.

That finally gave me some perspective: she’d ordered me to leave the low quarter without her, lead the horses to some lonely woods, and set up the tent here in the middle of nowhere...only for her to scare me silly when she opened it from the inside and appeared.

Oh, and I’d neglected to mention this, but I was also in costume. My public image had become that of the madam’s sworn retainer; if I stayed in the capital while Lady Agrippina “left,” only to depart on my own at a later date, everything would fall apart. The imperial guard had moaned about how hard it’d been to scrounge up a team of combat-ready mensch with my build and height, but I was willing to chalk that up to the stress talking and move on.

My hair and eyes had been alchemically dyed to match Lady Agrippina’s—to the great displeasure of the alfar—and I could probably fit in perfectly with my brothers and father now. In the past, I’d been mistaken for an adoptee when my mother wasn’t around, seeing as how Elisa and I were the only ones to take after her. Seeing myself like this in the mirror had been a new and refreshing experience.

I bet they’d be surprised to see me like this too.

Alas, Ubiorum county was months away from Konigstuhl on horseback, so I didn’t have any hope of taking a quick detour on the way.

“Hm,” the madam mused, “I suppose I’ll put up an ultrathin barrier on the inside of my clothes—agh, but that’s just a different form of discomfort in and of itself.”

“Then perhaps the best solution would be to make the trip as quickly as possible.”

“You’ve grown quite the mouth—do you know that? Well, whatever. Let’s be off.”

Lady Agrippina nimbly hopped onto Castor without the slightest hint of her usual listlessness. Not wanting to be left behind, I jumped on Polydeukes and followed after her.

“I suppose this marks the beginning of my journey...with this brat of a brother.”

“...Indeed it does, Sister Dearest.”

Ahh, of course. I’d done my best to keep it out of mind, but however could I forget this vital part of our backstory? The two of us were apprentices in the capital who’d just been given leave to visit home: the older sister Julia and the younger brother Alfred.

Funny, isn’t it?

Hide her trademark ears, and the methuselah was easy to take as a mensch; on a purely cosmetic level, maybe calling it easy was understating it. But what this pretext failed to account for was that I would have to refer to her as “Sister Dearest” without wincing in pain or choking on my own laughter—a true challenge indeed.

[Tips] The use of body doubles in times of peace is part of imperial aristocratic culture, but the truth remains that not all nobles need them for all outings. For most, their usage depends on circumstance.

The point-to-point distance from the capital of vanity to the Ubiorum county’s capital city of Kolnia was roughly four hundred kilometers; it was closer to six hundred and fifty along the linchpin highway. The trip was comparable to the journey from Konigstuhl to Berylin, meaning that we could’ve finished it in a few hours on a twenty-first-century Japanese bullet train but instead had to settle for a few months on horseback.

Beasts of burden tasked with ferrying along people and their luggage could usually manage twenty to forty kilometers a day—maybe sixty on a really good day. On top of that, they needed to rest every four to six days of walking, so a solid estimate was around two or three hundred kilometers of progress every ten days...if the conditions were right.

Unlike cars, the restrictions on when horses could perform at their potential were plentiful enough to forget about any semblance of steady, regular progress. Their horseshoes could fall off, their hooves could crack, and they could even come down with a stomachache; the troubles of living could manifest themselves in our very alive mode of transportation. Taking care of our steeds’ health was just as important to our progress as taking care of our own.

Other than that, poor weather could limit our range of travel on any given day; given that we had to keep track of both our supplies and the distance to the next place to stay, this could mean we’d be stuck in one place for days at a time. Combined, these factors meant a one-way journey took three months to complete.

As an aside, a traveler with a particularly high-held nose, picky about their choice of inn and insistent on a large security detail, would need an extra month or two. Not only would the greater number of people slow the operation down, but hotels that could accommodate a giant party of guards, servants, and their horses were few and far between; such journeys were doomed to even more obnoxious routing issues.

An emergency courier swapping out horses at every stop could make the trip in a month, and a drake rider could shorten that into a handful of days, but we had the misfortune of dressing up as normal travelers trying to get by.

Instead, we’d trotted along for the past month without much to note. It had been a peaceful journey thus far. Though the heavens sometimes sprinkled us with snow as if they had suddenly remembered the season or whisked away all sight with fog too thick to see my own nose, these obstructions had been well within our calculations. At our current pace, we’d make it to the Ubiorum territory by our promised date.

We were currently checking into a hotel just before the major city of Braunschweig—a rather foreboding name, I thought—located in the center region of the Empire. The inn’s name was The Golden Birdie, and it was the sort of place a regular worker might barely be able to afford. Instead of being protected by a random bouncer, the guard was a real fighter worthy of his title; the stables were nice and secure.

We’d borrowed a room for two, but Lady Agrippina had quickly slipped into the safety of the tent’s barrier and retired to comfort. I couldn’t really blame her. Mastery of space-bending magic meant that she didn’t have to sleep in this dingy—though I found it rather luxurious—room and could relax in her personal laboratory; why wouldn’t she go back?

“Man, I’m tired!”

Falling backward into bed, I could feel the stiffness built up over a long day on the saddle melt off my muscles. For one sweet second, everything felt worth it—this had to be one of the best parts of any journey. Sans getting home, that is: the eventual return was out of the running on account of being locked up in the hall of fame.

The bedding was wonderful: there wasn’t any question that it had been cleaned since the last guest had left, and the stuffing smelled fresh enough to assume that the owners regularly changed it out. Few things in this world could command as much gratitude as a bed free of fleas and lice.

One night in this room, along with a meal, bath, and use of the stables, cost one libra and twenty-five assarii. Different people would have different opinions on whether that was a good or bad deal, but personally, I thought it was a low price for what they offered. Real scams made me want to grab the innkeep by the collar for being audacious enough to take money for the “services” they provided.

Lady Agrippina went home every night anyway; the only thing that mattered to her was having proof we stayed in an inn, wherever it was. As a result, she had no qualms about settling for a mangy establishment if it was the only one around, and gods, did I suffer.

Ticks, fleas, and crab lice were par for the course, not to mention the time a crowd of those unspeakable vermin scattered out of sight as soon as I opened the door. That night, I’d realized that camping outside would be much nicer, and had sneaked out in the dead of the night to pitch my own tent. Living in the capital, I’d forgotten that four walls and a roof weren’t always better than the great outdoors; I understood that I was the only one who had to deal with the rooms, but would it have killed her to be a bit more considerate?

“Shoot, I can’t kick back all day.”

As tempting as it was to continue snuggling with the bedsheets, I had to clean up. I took apart the madam’s teleportation tent and then stuffed the other bed with some spare cloth to make it seem like someone was sleeping. In the unlikely case that someone came in, I had to make sure our story kept up.

With my forgery done, I decided it was a good time for a bath. The folks running the inn would bring up our supper on their own later, so I wanted to clean off some of the grime of traveling before then. Well, at least, as much as I could in a steam bath without a tub of water.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” I said to the proprietress. “Is the bath ready to use?”

“Oh, of course. But you know, with how slow business was today, I was this close to not lighting the fires.”

Happy day! Not many people traveled at this time of year; real traffic only began to spring up once it got a bit warmer. Readying a large sauna for the few workers who lived here on days without guests was probably a tremendous waste of money, so I really lucked out.

“Will your sister be bathing as well? The facilities flip between being open for men and women every other hour.”

“Uh... She said she was tired and went to bed, so I think she’ll probably pass.”

I flashed an empty smile and walked away from the front desk. As much as I still hated it, I’d grown used to pretending like that creature was a sibling. Still, I did not appreciate how she’d started having fun with our assumed identities by giving me shit in a manner befitting an older sister, fakeness notwithstanding. Seriously, what was the point of going out of her way to fix my clothes or hair in public, or to wipe my mouth like an actual caretaker? No, wait, I’ll answer that: she was killing time by watching my reactions.

Putting that out of my mind, I headed toward the bath and stripped down in the changing room. Inside, I found a sauna that was much more nicely kept than the price would suggest. The failings of lesser businesses were absent: no slimy floors due to insufficient cleaning, no benches that creaked and snapped at the lightest touch, and no filthy water that made me want to jump in a wild creek instead.

Praise be. In a world where money couldn’t buy honest service, places like these were true godsends. I tossed some water on the red-hot stones on the stove, filling the air with steam. When a white cloud of fog set into the room, I finally felt like I was taking a real bath.

Ahh... This is wonderful. If I had to nitpick, I would’ve liked for it to be a degree or two hotter, but I knew I shouldn’t add more firewood of my own accord, and heating it with magic was out of the question. I’d have to live with it; but hey, the missing heat could always be made up for with a longer stay. After that, the only thing left would be to hit the sack: no caring for the madam meant a nice, leisurely night awaited.

I had spent a while rubbing myself with a birch branch to improve my circulation and scrub out any dirt that came out of my pores when I noticed some other customers arrive at the bath. I heard the door to the room before this one open, and a series of footsteps...

Hm? But there was a distinct lack of rustling clothes. I waited with ears on full alert, and made out that they hadn’t even taken off their shoes in the changing room.

Letting my instincts take the wheel, I crouched down by the entrance with my towel in one hand. I didn’t so much as breathe for the next twenty seconds, totally erasing my presence...until some unmannerly buffoon violently kicked the door open.

Oh, I see. So that’s how you want to play it.

Then I guess I don’t have any reason to hold back.

On the other side of the doorway, the most obvious pack of goons I’d met yet awaited. But before they could bring their guard back up from breaking down the door, I swung my towel straight with all my might, landing a hit squarely in an intruder’s face.

“Gah?!”

Of course, it wasn’t just a wet towel: I’d folded it in two to cradle a burning-hot stone, fresh from the stove. Swinging my makeshift blackjack with a reversed grip, I caved in his hooded face with superheated pain. Judging from the crunch, it was clear that I’d broken more than just a nose.

The combination of scalding heat and forceful impact caused him to collapse, and the ink-dyed short sword in his hand went loose. Snatching it out of the air, I bolted into the changing room—to find two more attackers. Fair enough, I supposed; backup was more than expected.

They wore darkened leather armor and gloomy cloaks that covered their entire bodies. Furthermore, their hoods had been enchanted to hide their faces no matter the angle. These weren’t your everyday robbers: they were career wetworkers, accustomed to swinging blades in the shadows.

Still, the task of taking out an unarmed, unclothed kid lazing about in the bath must have had them feeling safe, because their reactions were several beats too slow. I understood the shock of seeing their companion’s skull rearranged, but this was hardly professional behavior.

“You little—hrgh!”

“What theaaugh?!”

With a quick turn of the stolen sword, I sliced at two hands: one holding a dagger, and the other reaching for a strange crossbow I’d never seen before. These sorts were liable to keep fighting so long as they could move, so I forwent mercy and chopped straight through their wrists. Any hand being used to kill an innocent little boy didn’t deserve to be attached to a person anyway.

As the two of them gripped at their wounds, I bashed in their heads with the back of my sword; just for good measure, I went over to the guy cradling his face and kicked his head like a soccer ball to add three tallies to my score. Unlike the capital’s guards, I could do whatever I wanted to these guys so long as I didn’t kill them.

“Huh. That was a letdown.”

To be blunt, these guys were chumps. After my run-ins with magia and the imperial guard, I’d been trembling over what a nobleman’s assassins might look like. But if this was all they had to offer, then the sauna would be a faster way of working up a sweat. Wasn’t this a bit too easy? I’d prepared all sorts of stuff to counter specialized killers, but it seemed it was all for naught—though I did have to admit I hadn’t expected them to jump me in the bath.

“Hm... Yeah, no, I don’t recognize any of them.”

I tore the hoods off the unconscious men—I made sure to stop their bleeding since it would be a pain to have them die on me—and, as expected, recognized none of them. The dagger-wielder was a werewolf, the backup crossbowman was a mensch, and the first guy...was too mangled to figure out, so I gave up.

Thankfully, it didn’t matter whether I knew them or not. All I had to do was tie them up, and Lady Agrippina would take a little peek into their heads for the rest. The only ways to hide something from her would be to use the same Sympathetic Barriers I and other magia used, or to have unbelievable levels of grit; neither seemed likely.

“...Wait, shit!”

After tying the three of them up, I realized I’d missed something critical: I knew that the madam wasn’t in our room, but they didn’t. And if they weren’t afraid to kill anyone they came across...

I threw on my pants and shoved both feet into my boots without so much as putting on my socks first, then bolted out into the cold. Sprinting back to the main lodge, I realized that my fears had been well-founded.

I had been too late.

“You rotten bastards!”

Inside, the innkeeper and her guard were dead. The proprietress’s body was at the front desk, her face buried in the hotel ledger with blood running down to the floor; her neck must have been cut from behind. On the other hand, the guard had fallen out of the chair by the entrance. His hand was still holding his sword, despite the crossbow bolt buried in his neck. He’d probably risen as soon as the owner was attacked, and had gotten shot for his troubles.

Rage threatened to reduce my vision to a boiling sea of reds and blacks, but I forced it down and ran for our room. As much as I wanted to go over and close the victims’ eyes, the clock was ticking.

On the way there, I passed two wide-open doors. Quiet and lifeless, it seemed those rooms had contained guests who’d met similar fates to the innkeeper. In fact, I suspected the same had happened on the third floor, where the husband of the operation was sure to be resting.

I turned the corner into our hall—There they are!

A group of four shadowy figures dressed exactly like the ones at the bath was huddled around our room. One was fiddling with the lock, so it seemed like I’d caught them just as they were preparing to strike.

You’re not getting away with this. Sure, the room was empty, but I could search every corner of my heart and I wouldn’t find it in me to let them go for what they’d done.

“Huh?! Who are you?!”

One of them noticed me, but I didn’t care; I just hurled the short sword I’d stolen. My Hybrid Sword Arts training included impromptu throwing, and the blade sank into the frontmost enemy as if guided to him by a magnetic pull. Nice and full of oxygen, the resulting geyser of blood was a pure scarlet, sputtering far to coat the well-kept floors in its filth.

Apparently, my attempt to contain the fury in my heart had failed. My aim was slightly off, and the sword had landed right between his head and shoulders, all but decapitating him as it cleaved deep into the trunk of his neck.

Shit—that guy’s dead. I cursed myself for letting him off with a quick death; what was I going to do if he was the one in charge?

But for now, I needed to pull myself together and deal with the remaining threats. These assassins were a cut above ordinary bandits, moving to intercept without delay: no expletives, no surprise, and no care for their fallen friend.

One came at me with a one-handed sword, well suited in length for indoor combat; another carried a smaller dagger made for stabbing. Behind them both, the last maintained his position by the door, pulling out a wand.

You have a mage?! How fucking nice!

Although Hybrid Sword Arts did highlight the ability to fight unarmed, trying to tackle this situation without a weapon was going to be rough. I could tell from their postures and gaits that these were experienced fighters: whatever style of combat they employed, I was convinced they were at least VII: Virtuosic in their mastery. A hotel hallway was practically no distance at all against a savvy opponent. I needed my next weapon, and fast.

So I called for it—the horrific blade who crawled to my bedside every night to sing her twisted songs of love.

“—!”

Crying out in an ecstasy that brought reality itself to the brink of shattering, her wordless delirium was the backdrop to a swift uppercut. In one stroke, an arm was severed, leaving a trail of misty blood in its wake—naturally, it wasn’t mine.

“Graaah?!”

I’d aimed for the slim opening in the vanguard’s armor to cut straight through his right elbow; not even the hardened killer could stay silent after that. He cradled his wound and stumbled head over heels. I bet he couldn’t believe it: I was some half-naked brat who’d foolishly thrown away his only weapon, so why was there a sword in my hands?

The ear-shattering joyful yelps sounding in my mind were of gratitude, for the Craving Blade knew no greater happiness than for a swordsman to need her as a sword.

But the weapon was too heavy to be swung from below—and more importantly, it was too long. The unwieldy zweihander required both hands, and should have been impossible to use properly in a cramped corridor.

“Good girl.”

Her pitch-black blade was as dark as ever, and the illegible ancient writing carved into its sides was no less ominous; yet as the last vestiges of daylight beamed through the window and reflected back as an obsidian glow, the image produced was clearly of a sword that was shorter than before.

More precisely, about the same size as Schutzwolfe.

Let me clarify that this wasn’t a sudden idea I’d come up with on the spot. I’d taken the Craving Blade out for a bit of practice one day—but also because her nagging at night became particularly insufferable if I neglected her—only for her inarticulate screaming to take the vague form of a meditation on love.

If love could only be earned with love, she conveyed, then she’d failed me. But she wanted mine; then it was only right that she demonstrated her passion.

Before I knew it, this accursed blade of mine had learned to fit any form I desired. By failing me, I assumed she was referring to my mortal combat against the masked nobleman. Her claim was that, had I wielded the weapon best suited for me, every cut could have been deeper, closer to being lethal. But none had done the job, and I’d nearly died because of it.

So the sword, in the depths of its adoration, had decided that songs were not enough; actions were needed to prove her devotion. Ever since, she had begun to morph in both length and width.

Nowadays, she could become anything I desired, so long as the final form could be considered a “sword.” Anything from a short sword barely bigger than a dagger to her original, nigh unusable heft was fair game. I’d thought her like a woman changing her wardrobe to suit a new lover’s palate, but who was I to deny that that was indeed an expression of love? Wanting to draw every last drop of attention from your chosen soulmate is a natural wish.

Besides, men were prone to styling up in clean suits and reaching deep into wallets to do the same. Having someone willing to dedicate everything to me in the name of love was a good feeling, and that was no different even coming from a blighted sword that chipped away at my sanity.

The second ruffian pushed past his fallen comrade to thrust his dagger forward, but he was too late. I ducked under his attack, slicing at the back of his knee to capitalize on his overextended leg; hard tactile feedback told me I’d cut through muscles and tendons to reach bone. All his weight had been resting on this leg, and he went flying forward as soon as I rendered it useless.

Letting all that momentum dissipate on impact with the ground would be wasteful of me; I extended my foot ever so slightly to catch his face. Despite not putting any force into it, I could feel the shock of a gnarly collision. My boots had metal plates on the bottoms and tops to prevent damage from traps and stomping, equipping my kicks with a real blunt weapon.

Ouch, that’s a bad angle. He’d lost an eye at best, and might have had his socket pulverized at worst. He wouldn’t be getting up any time soon.

“Cotton embrace—pinch of lily—a stem of rose, freed from thorn...”

But I didn’t have any time to spare. The mage in the back had his wand in one hand, a catalyst in the other, and was even chanting an incantation. Though he didn’t seem like a magus, those three supplements combined would surely bend reality in unthinkable ways.

So I just need to stop him before it goes off!

I leapt with all my force, closing the distance in a single breath. While I hadn’t touched my Agility in a long time, it was more than enough to cover distances this short.

“...lead these souls to a gentle graaagh?!”

And an attack made with a sword that could grow midswing was sure to reach. The Craving Blade reclaimed her original form, the tip of her edge cutting through the hood and across the mage’s mouth before he could give his spell any more verbal structure. The tiny white fragments riding the wave of blood were the last hurrah of his teeth, and the small chunk of flesh belonged to his tongue.

Only half-constructed, the spell had lost both its caster’s attention and the support of incantation in one fell swoop; it exploded. I jumped away on reaction, only to see a cloud of white smoke envelop the assassin.

I’d covered my face and made sure not to breathe it in, just to be safe. The incantation sounded like it was borrowing a line from a lullaby, so it seemed plausible that he’d been trying to cast a sleepfog—a terrifying spell that put enemies to sleep if they failed a resistance check. It was so broken that GMs concerned with game balance tended to treat it like a lost art, but my old tablemates had been the sorts to use anything in the toolbox; I had experience on both ends of its effects.

These guys sure used some awful tricks. If I dozed off, all my training would cease to matter. The story would be different if I had someone to watch my back, but I would be doomed by myself. Hadn’t anyone told them that it was bad manners to use crowd control on a hero without a party?

Admittedly, there was a chance that my Sympathetic Barrier would have blocked its effects, since it was a spell that affected my state of consciousness. Either way, I was still happy to prevent it from going off at all.

Thinking about it, this was probably how they’d managed to clean out the building without causing a scene. I wasn’t exactly the most sensitive listener ever, but not even I would have idly lounged in the sauna had I heard screams coming from the main building.

Dammit. I might’ve been able to save some of them if I had sharper ears...

But my frustrations and regrets would have to wait; there could still be more assailants lurking around. For now, I would need to apprehend these rogues and lug up the three I’d left in the changing room. Once Lady Agrippina was done pulling intel out of them, we could turn these crooks in to the local magistrate—their deaths wouldn’t come easily.

After finishing the knot binding the assassins together, I figured I should head back into our room. I’d left my Voice Transfer transmitter in my luggage, and wanted to put some clothes back on.

But just as I got up, something came flying through the hallway’s window without a sound.

I didn’t spend a single moment trying to process what the round object was before I tossed it right back out with an Unseen Hand. Immediately after, I shouldered my way into our room, hitting the floor with my hands on my ears and my mouth open.

A few seconds later, an explosion shook me so violently that I could feel my brain shake despite covering my ears. I didn’t know whether it was chemical or magical, but that thing had been a bomb. Isn’t that a bit extreme?!

As it turned out, my hunch that I hadn’t finished off the last of them had been right—and whoever was left was skilled enough to evade my Presence Detection to boot.

“Argh, you bastards! Give me a break!”

I couldn’t tell if the grenade was supposed to kill me or silence the failures for dropping the ball, but if they wanted a fight, I was happy to give them one. This was already a train wreck; what was another twenty or thirty goons? In fact, I’d just been thinking that all the poor innocent folks they’d killed might need some company to lead them back to the gods’ laps!

Pulling my cloak off the wall with a Hand, I slid into it and ran back out into the hall, summoning another invisible appendage to toss the goons into our room. With one foot on the windowsill, I looked around and saw nothing... So they’re above!

“Lottie, boost me!”

“Wha?! Um, ’kay!”

I twirled into the air and called the name of an alf sure to be loitering around somewhere or another. Despite her surprise at the sudden request, she managed to pull it off spectacularly.

Charlotte the sylphid could heed my call wherever the wind blew, and she summoned a gale as powerful as it was gentle to lift me onto the roof. A natural gust strong enough to carry a person would have come with an entire tornado behind it, but her physics-bending fey whirlwind carried me softly upward.

Perhaps that was why I managed to react to the dagger zooming my way.

As soon as I got up, I had to jump to the side to avoid the projectile precisely placed to send me falling back down. It had been a twitch reaction based solely on the dilute, yet palpable bloodlust tickling my senses. A flurry of shingles scattered as I broke my fall and instantly bounced myself to my left with an Unseen Hand—no sooner had I evaded the first round than another callous clump of steel barreled my way.

The follow-up attack split the air as it rained down on me: a rod-shaped dagger specially made for throwing. Had I let myself get comfortable after dodging the first, I would have paid the price now. While a weapon this small wouldn’t have spelled death, I would’ve sustained a serious injury.

My opponent was a genuine threat. Their presence and intent were so thin that I could hardly get a read on them; they were leagues above the oafs I’d mopped up downstairs.

Noticing that they were trying to sweep my landing, I held the Craving Blade close to my frame to block the hit, using the force of impact to buy myself some space. The attack had been so powerful that trying to stand my ground would’ve been suicide: while my sword could take the abuse, my body was better off rolling away the momentum over two or three somersaults.

Come to think of it, getting to take a movement action on a successful reaction made me a really annoying enemy to fight, huh?

Quips aside, I used the excess energy to regain my footing. Turning with the Craving Blade at the ready, I finally got my first good look at who I was fighting, and man, were they hard to describe at a glance.

The profile of their upper body was obscured by a hooded cloak, but the long trunk extending from below was anything but mensch-like. The army of thin legs propping them up pointed to a demihuman—probably either a millipede or centipede.

As the careening sun said its final goodbyes and the divine Father reclaimed His gift of sight, it became nearly impossible to make out even the broad strokes. What little sunset remained only served to cast a backlit shadow, and the only thing I could confirm was that an endless array of legs was poking through the cloth wrapping around their trunk.

This person was cautious enough to keep even their gender ambiguous, but the massive pole they carried was plainly visible. It was every bit as long as their wriggling trunk, and they twirled it around with great elegance as they sized me up for dodging their initial offensive.

This was...problematic. Their arms were long and flexible, and their weapon of choice was longer than anything a humanfolk could wield on our stubby legs. But most vexing of all...

“Hm?!”

...was their unreadable footwork!

Advancing on an abundant set of skittering appendages, my opponent maneuvered in ways that were far harder to anticipate than a fighter resting their weight on two. Legs were the foundation of movement, and usually, watching them and the chest was enough to get an understanding of how a fighter’s arms would move; together, that would suffice to scope out the angle of entry. But here, I had no idea how they’d approach.

Not only did their unorthodox gait free them from having to commit weight in any direction, but I was stuck floundering at how to best dodge or block, putting me on the back foot. Worse still, they stood up tall, flexing their trunk to extend their already-obnoxious reach into something that enabled wide arcs of attack from above.

The unstable footing of the roof didn’t help either: while they scurried up, down, left, and right with ease, I was struggling to take solid steps on the poorly cemented shingles. Every one of their deft steps felt like a mockery of my efforts.

But perhaps their most damnable trait was the raw power their giant frame provided. This utter monster could probably plow through a squadron of regular soldiers with ease.

Shit! You’re telling me a freak this strong was just waiting here in case the first group fucked up?! Gods, it would’ve been easier if they’d just come at me indoors!

The polearm whipped around at rapid speeds, engraving the air with a series of short arcs; but for as flashy as it seemed, their movements were delicacy incarnate. Drawn by the hefty metal spinning around, each curve of motion was simultaneously an attack and an invisible barrier barring my entry. As if their elegance in footwork weren’t enough, they were now skillfully eliminating any potential opening.

I knew we were opposed, but I couldn’t help but be impressed. This was a style of combat that betrayed a keen awareness of their physical boons, and I would’ve asked to see their character sheet for reference had I come across them over the table.

The precision of their attacks was just marvelous. For us on two legs, the great tragedy of offense was that every step introduced brief moments of instability; freed from such struggles, they carefully selected where to place their strikes, always finding the spot that would cause me the most trouble.

They were a genius, deserving of a more splendid stage than the shadows of assassination.

Since the centrifugal force bolstering their swings could crash straight through a half-assed defense, I opted for evasion as I stepped forward and eyed for an opening. Gripping my blade in reverse with both hands, I redirected a diagonal strike aimed for my shoulder. I’d used the same trick when dealing with the batons and spears wielded by the guards of Berylin; instead of suffering recoil in an attempt to knock the weapon away, it was better to gently guide it off its course. Sir Lambert had distilled years of fighting polearms on the battlefield into our lessons, and that pain was hard to forget.

I could tell this attempt had been particularly successful from the resistance against my hands, and I sensed an expression of surprise flash across my opponent’s hidden face. I bet they hardly felt the collision at all.

Now it was my turn to attack. Weapons with reach excelled at controlling space, but they suddenly turned into a weakness if I could get up close. Plus, unlike a lamia, this demihuman’s segmented legs couldn’t curve in every direction: they didn’t have the option of flinging their trunk forward as a whip. And while they could run backward at tremendous speeds, it wouldn’t be enough to shake me off.

Considering the skill of those I’d fought, this person was almost definitely in charge. I wasn’t going to let the biggest archive of intel get away. But just as I began considering whether a severed thumb would suffice, a terrible omen zipped across my neck.

I raised the Craving Blade on reflex. I heard the sharp clang of metal bouncing off metal...and felt the dull pain of something sinking into my gut. Swallowing back a groan, I made full use of my Lightning Reflexes to observe the first projectile gliding through the air: a throwing knife, painted in ash to obscure its form in the dark of night. Just like the first short sword I’d stolen, it was a tool of the trade, tailored for hushed kills.

But my opponent had thrown two.

By layering the second attack into the shadow of the first, they’d managed to hide its course. I’d seen such feats in manga, but never thought I’d see someone actually pull it off, and while wielding a polearm, to boot. The technique had been facilitated by the second set of arms peeking out that had thrown the projectiles while the main pair handled the battlestaff.

Ah, shit. I should’ve known. Had I given it some thought, I would’ve realized that they’d begun this encounter with both daggers and a pole swipe. Since the rod was too long to be wielded with one hand, I should’ve suspected another limb from the very start.

Boy, was I glad I’d grabbed my cloak. Despite its humble appearance, the inside of this mantle was actually lined with Lady Agrippina’s own defensive formulae, making it tougher than a two-bit set of armor. I’d been forced to keep my equipment down to the bare minimum for our trip, and this had been her way of making up for my loss in safety.

AC was prone to being ignored or written off with all sorts of poorly explained excuses, but it was vital to survival. Without this, I might’ve been screwed: from the angle it had hit me at, it could very well have hit my liver for an instant kill.

But just because I’d blocked it didn’t mean that this hurtling clump of steel in my gut didn’t hurt. So, figuring I’d pay back some of the pain, I turned up the engines and began hacking and slashing at full gear; I should’ve known from the start that this wasn’t a foe I could afford to go easy on.

I needed to do my absolute damnedest to kill them, and if they ended up alive after that, then that was a lucky break. Trying to secure anything more would just end badly for me.

The assassin toiled to block with their staff and pulled out more daggers at every turn, but two more attacks just meant two more opportunities to roll for counter actions.

And I, too, had cards hidden up my sleeve.

Trying to put themselves back in optimal range, my opponent desperately pedaled backward, but I stuck fast. Reaching a Hand into the pocket of my cloak, I pulled out the catalyst for my mystic flashbang. I’d hidden a few instances all over; knowing something like this would happen eventually, I wasn’t going to go around unprepared!

But I wasn’t done: passing the dagger that had hit me to another Unseen Hand, I thrust it forward. I mean, they’d gone out of their way to deliver me a new weapon. Wouldn’t it be rude not to make use of it?

The extending Hand was both more precise and more powerful than something soaring through open air. My promptly regifted present returned to its sender by lodging itself deep inside their shoulder. I did unto them as they had done unto me; I wasn’t necessarily trying to copy them, but admittedly ended up stealing their moves— Whoa?! That was close!

Unbelievably, the assassin used the inertia of being stabbed to tilt over backward and whip their legs at me in a kick—though the term felt strangely inaccurate—akin to a cracking whip.

No, actually, the maneuver had been more of an acrobatic trick, making full use of their physique to open a path toward escape. I hadn’t expected that at all.

Not wanting to get slammed with the equivalent of a swinging log, I ducked low and dodged. Their rampant flailing kicked up a minor tornado, ripping out both the shingles and the base roofing they were built on to twist through the air. With power like that, a clean hit could’ve torn out half my rib cage whole.

The assassin had gone prone so that they could let their lower half go wild, and maintained that posture as they zipped off so quickly that I let out a shocked, “Hwha?!”

This was absurd; we’d been at point-blank range. I’d landed a flashbang that should’ve totally blinded them! My surprise was so great that it took a few moments for me to rise to my feet; by the time I did, my assailant had skittered off the rooftop and disappeared to the wall below. Despite dashing over to the edge in a hurry, they were nowhere to be found by the time I got there.

“Aw, dammit! Get it together, man! Who the fuck cares if I’ve never fought someone with a build like that?! I let them get away with way too much!”

“...Wanna chase?” Lottie gingerly landed on my head. “I can have a look-see if you want.”

“I don’t have the speed to chase them down even if you find them,” I sighed, angrily kicking a shingle off the roof. “Shit, I screwed up at the end.”

I’d been so confident that I’d gotten their eyes and ears...but how could I forget that insectoid demihumans often had different sensory organs from mensch? The fact that millipedes and centipedes could use touch and smell to get around had completely slipped my mind.

Also, their movements had been so intertwined with their multilegged anatomy. It rekindled long-untouched memories of my childhood companion when she was on the hunt. Though she couldn’t keep it up for long, Margit had displayed alacrity that was similarly impossible to catch when she got serious.

Most of our enemies were dead and I’d secured a source of intel, but I had failed to win a decisive victory. At most, this was a draw with losses on both sides; I bet other reinforcements had managed to recover the assassins in the changing room while I was preoccupied here.

Whatever the case, we’d caused too big a scene. The building was completely trashed, and the locals were panicking from the sound of a bomb going off. If I didn’t hurry up and get my noble lady on the scene, there was a real chance I would be the one getting tied up. Someone checking in on the commotion was sure to find the dead innkeeper and her guard, and the assassins I’d captured would mean little without an authority backing up my claims.

Ugh, gods, why did this have to happen everywhere I went? They’d let us enjoy a leisurely month on the road, so couldn’t they have waited two more?

“Oww... This better not have broken a rib.”

Curling up my cloak, I looked over my wound as I dropped through the giant hole in the ceiling that we’d made during our fight. My stomach stung when I landed; I knew it was far lighter a pain than what the poor innocents here had endured, but it still hurt all the same. Seeing as I could breathe without spasms, it looked like I hadn’t broken anything, but I was probably best off bracing myself for a fracture at least.

Ah, crap. I gotta put some clothes on before I call the madam.

The last warmth of my pleasant bath was no longer detectable. If nothing else, I could only hope I wouldn’t catch a cold.

[Tips] Personal spats within city limits, cantons, inns, or any other location geared toward daily life can be punished with a minimum ten-libra fine or a half year of community service. If weapons are drawn, the fine jumps to a drachma or more with arrest and imprisonment on the table. Finally, attempted assassination carries the absolute sentence of execution, for both those who carry it out and those who plan it.

In a wood a short ways off from the scene of the attack, a band clad in midnight garb assembled in the trees.

Had anyone been present to witness their deep-navy silhouettes, they surely would have struggled to believe there were only four people in the canopy: each boasted a giant body two to three times the size of a mensch, coiling around branches to gain a most alien purchase. An infinite array of legs found footing where anything on two would struggle to stay upright; the group was composed entirely of sepa.

“How is your injury?”

One of the tree-dwellers removed his hood, exposing a wrinkled face and a head of snow-white hair that told a story of many moons gone by. His composure as a seasoned spy could be seen in how still his lips were as he spoke—but perhaps was better illustrated by the cold, unflinching eyes he fixed on his wounded comrade.

In turn, the agent removed her own hood. Though it was just barely agitated, she took a moment to catch her breath before answering with a similar expression.

“I’m fine. It didn’t hit any vital arteries.”

Burning orange hair, amethyst eyes, and olive skin with the faintest trace of blush; she was the same girl that had called out to Erich in the servants’ room of the palace. A cylindrical throwing knife was wedged deep in her shoulder, but as she reached to pull it out, the old man grabbed her hand to stop her.

“Recklessly tear it out, and you risk damaging important veins and muscles in the area. Leave it until we return to safety.”

“Understood.” The girl nodded, but her poker face wavered: years of disciplined training had sealed her mouth shut, but now it was ajar, her inner jaw visibly chittering in irritation. “And you have my apologies. I even returned wounded.”

“Calm yourself,” the old man said. “She who carries the blood of our lord should not allow emotion to command her lips.”

“But Elder,” one of the others responded, “the young lady has never suffered damage in the field before.”

“She’s still young,” the last concurred. “I don’t think we can blame her for feeling frustrated.”

Though they remained hooded, the other two sounded relatively youthful from their tones of voice, and they came to the girl’s aid. They, too, understood the pain of taking one’s first hit outside training. Every mistake in a real fight could lead to death, and yet the girl had let the enemy go while suffering an injury. Returning after failing a mission like this left an indescribably bitter taste on the tongue.

That was all the more true for the clan’s beloved prodigy—for a girl who’d finished mission after mission without once knowing defeat. And of course, though secretive as their ties would remain, falling short of her father’s expectations piled onto the mental burdens weighing her psyche down.

“Hmph,” the elder grunted. “I understand—I understand all too well. But I’m telling you to hold that grief back regardless. Do you think this is behavior fit to serve our lord?”

“You’re as harsh as ever, sir.”

“More importantly, what’s our next move? Would you like us to resume the operation? If the two of us occupy the swordsman, I’m sure we’ll be able to take care of the remaining assassins.”

The elder thought the suggestion over with folded arms, but shook his head after a brief pause. The swordsman in question had injured their fledgling genius—he was no normal opponent. By now, the sepa surmised, he’d probably dragged the remaining captives to a windowless room to funnel any attack to a single avenue of entry. It was unlikely they’d be able to bring him down, even with all four of them...

At least, not when they weren’t fully prepared.

“Our first order of business is to do what we know we can,” the old man said. “After that, we’ll wait for orders. We need to question those we’ve captured.”

Although he made no indication of singling her out, the girl with the fiery hair nodded and began her descent. She was to interrogate the spies waiting in the forest’s shadows, whom they’d secured from the bathhouse’s changing room.

“You two cover our tracks and prepare a messenger pigeon. Our foe is no mere child.”

“Yes, sir,” the young pair answered.

Seeing the others off, the elder followed after the youngest of the bunch and climbed down to the ground. Her twisted expression betrayed her unabated frustration. He patted her on the shoulder, his hand conveying a kindness and sympathy that was absent on his face.

“Your chance at redemption will come. Show me your best then.”

“...I swear it.”

With one last chirp of her mandibles, the girl assumed her usual emotionless demeanor, cogs dropping and shifting in the workings of her mind to bear the work ahead. But still, one thought clouded her mind: He was the first man other than grandfather to land a clean hit...

[Tips] Sepa are much lighter than their bodies suggest, allowing them to perch in tree branches with a bit of finesse. Further, their flat trunks allow them to squeeze into crevices, giving them surprising stealth for their massive size.

Here was a room full of the most splendiferous works of art, fit in every way to be an aristocrat’s personal chamber, but something was missing. Save for a single chair, not a single article of furniture was tailored for the comfort of the room’s resident.

It was a methuselah’s bedroom, you see, and quite a stereotypical one at that. Born free from the need for sleep, many of their kind considered the activity an unnecessary luxury. To more reasonable forms of life, their personal quarters resembled a distorted parody of human habitation.

But where the common person would struggle to relax, Marquis Donnersmarck sat leisurely in his chair. He was still soothing his soul in the realm of paintings when a pigeon entered through a tiny window; gently raising his arm, he extended his hand for it to perch.

“Welcome back. Is something the matter?”

Strangely enough, he began to speak to the little bird.

“The world shall come to he who waits.”

And even more strangely, the pigeon answered with a low growl of a voice. It had recited a long-standing Rhinian adage praising patience—but also one that spoke to the frightful nature of methuselah. While magecraft had the means to convert a familiar into a telephone, it lacked the ability to replicate the quality of one’s voice; these call signs were imperative to identify the speaker, both from other operators and any bad actors who may have gotten their hands on this means of communication.

“Ah, Nakeisha. Your mark was B-1, as Wit recall. Has something happened?”

“I have two matters to report. First, you have my sincerest apologies, my lord. I have failed you.”

“Oh? A rare statement, coming from you. Tell me what happened.”

The man employed swaths of spies strewn across the lands, but at present, most of them were out on this Ubiorum business. Split into countless squadrons, his people were keeping tabs on every crew of travelers that might be the count’s, even knowing that most of them were simply decoys—and one of them had sounded the alarm.

Nobles were, by their very nature, prone to proceeding along politically motivated paths. They had peers that absolutely required an audience should they be in the area; they had enemies who would endanger their lives if they dared cross their territory. The course of a single trip was often enough to betray the details of one’s identity.

As such, the schemer had spared no effort, investigating every lead in order to find something about his mysterious and powerful foe. Of those he’d marked, the codename Bedeutung-1 referred to a set of promising travelers that were highly likely to be the VIP. The suspicion had arisen from an agent noting that it would be odd for the target to forgo the horses she’d used since rising to professorship, and thus they’d begun pursuing those with similar steeds. On the surface, the brother-and-sister pair looked perfectly normal; the spies stalking them had simply funneled years of experience into a keen intuition that had told them they were on the right track.

“The mark was attacked by a third party of assassins. They slipped past us just as our squadron was changing watch, and...we failed to stop them.”

“That is certainly a stroke of misfortune. Then what of B-1? Are they safe?”

“Mark B-1-a remained unseen throughout. Mark B-1-b was alive and well—rather, he fought off most of the assassins alone.”

“What news! Then the other report must be...”

“Bedeutung-1-a is our person of interest, with B-1-b being her personal blade. He was fearsome in action.”

Nakeisha and her unit had allowed the hitmen to begin their assault due to a lapse in security while switching guard duties, but their response immediately after had been swift. There had been four enemy lookouts posted to allow the assassination to proceed without interference, but the sepa squadron had instantly incapacitated and captured them. Melting into the dark, they’d waited and watched: no matter what else occurred, they couldn’t let Count Ubiorum face any danger.

However, things took a turn for the unexpected. Unbelievably, the brunette brat managed to plow through the entire attacking party all on his lonesome—with refined swordplay and magic, at that.

This created a new problem: at this rate, the count would get her hands on a living font of information. While the sepa weren’t keen on letting them die here, these were undoubtedly killers hired by someone embroiled in the wrongdoings of the county; allowing even the slightest morsel of intel to reach enemy hands was dangerous.

Those who’d been left in the changing room were out of the boy’s reach and had been easy enough to retrieve. Yet the same couldn’t be said of the others, right under his nose.

Figuring the death of a bodyguard was hardly of note, Nakeisha made the call to clean house with an arcane bomb. Much to her surprise, not only did she fail, but the boy intercepted and even wounded her.

“Ah, that must have been an ordeal. Are your injuries severe?”

“Your worry is my greatest shame. My arm will move fine in half a month.”

The spy laid the whole of the situation bare, honestly reporting both her successes and especially her failures; the marquis did not scold or shout, but rather honored her efforts. This was the mark of the faith placed in his retainer. If they were skilled enough to slip past Nakeisha—she wasn’t fully equipped on account of the covert operation, but still—then the entry of these third-party assassins had been inevitable. Perhaps he would’ve lost his temper had she commanded twice the number of troops she did; as things stood, though, she had done as much as he could reasonably have expected of her.

To let fleeting emotions compel him into angry shouting was folly; the surest course of action was to calmly move to the next step in the plan.

“Say, have you had a moment to ‘chat’ with the assassins you apprehended?”

“Yes, sir. They were criminals-for-hire, willing to do anything from killing to snooping for the right price. One coughed up that the request came from an imperial knight by the name of Berckem.”

“Ah, then the culprit must be Viscount Liplar.” Sifting through the immense network of entangled parties, the man instantly named the source of the matter; he didn’t have a single doubt that his agents’ interrogation had produced reliable intel. “How impatient. Wit warned him not to act too hastily too.”

Marquis Donnersmarck was connected to Viscount Liplar: he was the conduit for the viscount’s illegal mining operation, after all. Had it been a simple iron or copper mine, or even a source of gems or stone, no fuss would be made. Alas, the Empire made it explicitly clear that all were duty bound to report the discovery of precious silver.

Silver was second only to gold in its value as liquid currency. Wanting greater control over the stability of the domestic economy and more resources for international trade, the state took matters regarding the sterling metal out of noble hands and into its own. Naturally, the owners of the mines saw a cut of the profits, but it amounted to less than a quarter of what they could expect if they settled the matter on their own terms.

Viscount Liplar had thought this to be a terrible waste. And so, instead of reporting the vein to the crown, he’d turned his silver mines into his own personal treasury.

However, distributing the goods in Rhine would draw the attention of financial commissioners with sharp eyes. To avoid their watchful gaze, the viscount’s business revolved around smithing products out of silver and smuggling them abroad to return absurdly high margins. Although Marquis Donnersmarck remained careful not to leave any trace of his involvement, he was perhaps the silver swindler’s greatest ally: he was the gateway to the outside world.

Having won so much wealth from their exchange, the methuselah found it a touch regrettable that the man would be hanged. When the viscount had come crying to him, pale as a sheet, the marquis had calmed him down by promising to sneak him out of the country should true danger rear its head. Alas, it seemed an unwritten oath hadn’t been enough to quell the fears bubbling in Viscount Liplar’s heart.

But while his illicit gains afforded him skilled assassins, the fool was far out of his depth.

For all the centuries under the marquis’s belt, Count Ubiorum was such a remarkable powerhouse that he knew a one-on-one fight between them would end in the magus’s outright victory. A handful of killers—and those who could be bought, no less—stood no chance. Even with an army hundreds of men strong, he suspected that stunning girl would wipe them away with a merry tune and a casual snap; it wasn’t even worth considering.

Ignorance truly was a terrifying thing. What else could possess a man to challenge a burly knight clad head to toe in armor, armed with nothing but a fork? If Viscount Liplar was going to be cowardly, then the caution to know his enemy’s true nature would have served him well.

“What an awful situation,” the marquis sighed. “Count Ubiorum has drawn quite the powerful card. Now the tables are truly against us; Wit suppose a—hmm, how best to put it... Let us say a less than elegant path forward is in order. Shall we have Viscount Liplar perform one last task?”

Lovingly petting the cooing pigeon, the marquis began to plot. He needed to soften the blow of Count Ubiorum’s next move, if for no other reason than to prevent uncertainty from stoking another idiot into actions that would obliterate his plans.

But in truth, this game had been unwinnable from the start. It was the equivalent of a bout of ehrengarde with an equally skilled opponent at eight-piece odds. Not even Marquis Donnersmarck could come out on top when his opponent had this great an advantage.

Of course, he’d meticulously set up his ploy so that even if all his pawns in the county were hanged and wrung dry for information, no lasting harm would come his way. But losing over a tenth of both his revenue and information network would sting harshly.

“Perhaps it is time for a wager,” he mused. “A job well done, Nakeisha. Wit shall send a replacement unit; remain on the scene until they arrive.”

“Are we withdrawing, sir?”

“Indeed. Wit have more important work for you. Rest easy and stand by in your best condition. You and your subordinates may go relax at a hot spring, if you’d like.”

After a short silence, the pigeon warbled, “As you will.”

Letting the bird go, the marquis picked up a bell and rang it. As he waited for a servant to bring him another pigeon, he sank into his machinations.

Now then, which of these units was closest to the Erftstadt barony?

[Tips] Despite the Trialist Empire’s strict enforcement of law, the existence of criminal organizations specializing in murder and kidnapping is undeniable.

A lone man worked away at a simple, functional office desk. Beginning to gray, the mensch was the living embodiment of robust sincerity. His jaw was defined and blocky, and he’d slicked back his short, ashen hair with a bit of oil. Altogether, Baron Moritz Jan Pitt Erftstadt personified austerity in every way; that was precisely why Agrippina had entrusted him with the responsibility of leading her few loyal retainers, and an ace in the hole to make sure he could.

“Like honeybees chasing their hive,” he sighed, scribbling through the towering mountain of papers on his desk. The paperwork flowing in and out of the county was thrice—no, five times the typical amount.

Swaths of corrupt lords and magistrates were groping in the dark, trying to find any lead on the new count’s plans before she arrived in the spring. Those whose crimes were relatively light had banded together and made themselves busy trying to justify their wrongdoings as clerical errors of the state, which would be belatedly “corrected” alongside an apology for their “mistake” in exchange for survival.

Meanwhile, the worst of the lot had also banded together, threatening to go on strike if their new lord dared to run around purging them from power. At present, they were in a mad frenzy, writing to any and every noble in the area to garner further support. Their hopes rode on the idea that if they stirred up enough chaos in the opening months of the new Ubiorum’s reign, then the Emperor might step in and dismiss her. However, Baron Erftstadt had seen the reality of the situation with his own two eyes, and considered their attempt an exercise in futility.

In all likelihood, His Majesty would gleefully round up the titles of those who abandoned their posts, handing them off to the second and third sons of his most trusted supporters. Though that would set off a few years of turmoil in the region, the drawn-out changing of the guard they were planning for could be cut from a quarter of a century to five-odd years. The Emperor would welcome their strike with open arms.

None of these fools had what it took to look ahead; suckling on nothing but sweet wines did the body no good. Many cursed their forefathers for setting off on the path of treachery, to be sure, but they easily forgot that complicity was yet another marker of guilt. Seeing them squirm with no mind for remorse was comedy gold.

Knowing the virtue tied to the Erftstadt name, the damned masses had come to him hoping that his aid would be enough to deliver them from immediate harm, but he was already sick of their pleas. The baron tied up a bundle of worthless letters, massaged his temples, and let out a heavy sigh.

This was a farce. Worded at its most glamorous, it was a life-and-death contest on the stage of politics; more aptly, a swarm of small fry was floundering around, desperate to slip free from the net it was in. While he knew that he needed only to persevere until Count Ubiorum could arrive and clean house, the wretchedness on display chipped at his faith in humanity. Soaking in the fate of the once-proud Ubiorum legacy was almost enough to draw tears out of the somber gentleman.

Upon finishing his paperwork, Baron Erftstadt set out to summon a retainer so that he might ask how the welcoming preparations were going. But just as he reached for the bell on his desk, he heard the faint sound of squeaking metal.

Darting his eyes over, he noticed the window had been opened. It seemed like a breeze had caused the hinges to creak, but when had it been opened in the first place? His attendants were all thoroughly trained, and they wouldn’t dare leave a lock haphazardly open.

Wait. Wind? Instantly, the baron shot up, reaching for his dagger. But while he’d managed to draw his weapon, it was already too late.

Two dirks pierced through the back of his seat; he narrowly managed to parry the one aiming for his neck, but the other stabbed him clean in the chest. His clothes were a family heirloom, enchanted by his forefathers to be as tough as armor. Alas, it failed to save him: either the assassin’s blade was a spell-breaker, or he was just that skilled.

Oriented horizontally to weave past his ribs, the dagger dug deep into the baron’s lung. Its walls burst, flooding with blood that backfilled into his mouth. Although he felt little pain, his strength was draining at an unstoppable pace.

He broke away and tried to catch himself on his desk, but failed and collapsed onto the floor. The distance allowed him to get a look at the instrument that had pierced his lung; judging from the amount of blood dripping from it—along with the pain that accompanied every breath—he didn’t have long.

The veteran had seen this scene all too many times on the battlefield. One clean hit in the chest, and any normal person was out for good. He had five minutes, tops; most got less than that before the lights went out.

“You—ack! Hrgh! You rat... Who—gah...sent you?!”

Despite his daggered glare, he couldn’t make out the details around the assassin, still hidden in the shadows. The silent hit man simply folded his arm, wiping the blood from his weapon with the pit of his elbow.

The baron knew from the killer’s cool demeanor that stalling for time would do him no favors. He was a straitlaced military man who’d survived a pit of corruption and depravity despite his well-known commitment to righteousness. Not a moment went by where he wasn’t ready for an attempt on his life, and he kept loyal counterspies in his employ. Recent goings-on had caused him to tighten up security around his room; that this assassin was here, and that no one had come to his aid already, were proof enough that their lives had been taken before his own.

In short, his enemies had overpowered him, plain and simple.

Having sheathed his blade, the assassin drew closer, callously grabbing the baron by the hair and pulling out a few gray strands. He tossed the sample into a small vial produced from his pocket and waited a few seconds for a reaction before downing the contents.

“Ugh!” The killer winced and grabbed his own face. In the next moment, he removed his head coverings to unveil the exact features of one Baron Erftstadt.

“Oh... So that’s—hngh—what you’re after...”

The baron had heard of this. Some inventor at the College had developed a disguise so perfect that it allowed one to assume another’s identity. The technology posed such a threat to the order of the Empire that knowledge of its existence was off-limits, let alone its manufacture.

Which meant whomever this lowlife worked for had the connections to procure forbidden goods of the highest degree.

Baron Erftstadt knew that, at this rate, the county was in danger; as much as it pained him to do so, he pulled out his trump card. He never wanted to do this—having his own lord at his beck and call was a tremendous slight on the honest man’s dignity. But he feigned clutching his chest in pain for the greater good, reaching into his inner pocket to snap a talisman.

“What did you just do?”

The crack of a thin wooden plate made hardly any noise, but the intruder took note. Being confronted by his own face and voice was a disturbing feeling, but the baron exercised his underused facial muscles to twist his lips into a smirk.

“My liege treats her subjects well.”

A dull snap rang out.

The assassin didn’t understand. He had come prepared with layer upon layer of arcane protection, and yet, for whatever reason, his head had been plucked off his shoulders without any chance to react. The remnants of his mystic preparation strung his consciousness along, but a head without a body could do little more than look around for the culprit and mouth soundless words upon finding them.

Ah, but he had no need to search: his killer made herself known. She hoisted what was left of him up by the hair, and oh-so-kindly brought him up to eye level.

“What a peculiar guest you’re entertaining, Baron Erftstadt. I take it this isn’t your twin coming to visit?”

The woman who’d picked him up was a methuselah in common travel wear. Her deep-brown eyes peered at him dubiously from behind a pair of glasses. Realizing that the mission was forfeit, the wetworker pulled out the final trick up his sleeve—though he hadn’t expected to use it, he showed no hesitation when the moment came.

“Eek!”

Crying out in a surprisingly human way, the methuselah tossed the severed head away. Black smoke was billowing from the neck, mouth, and ears; bubbling blood oozed from every pore, melting the structure of the skull.

“Tch. So the brain came with a failsafe.”

In his final moments, the assassin had activated a kill switch to eliminate any chance of an opsec leak. He’d had a mana stone surgically implanted inside his head as an unstoppable last resort, ready to boil his brain and deprive psychosorcerers of the secrets he took to the grave. Since the brain was one of the origins of internal mana, it was nigh impossible for an outside force to jam the activation in time. The device was the ultimate show of loyalty for those whose wills were iron enough to proactively kill themselves to atone for their mistakes.

“What a waste,” the methuselah sighed. “I suppose I shall count my blessings that I managed to save a loyal vassal. Are you... Well, I suppose I can see that you aren’t all right, now are you, Baron?”

“You have... Grgh, m-my—my sincerest... Blagh!”

“No need to push yourself. Losing someone as dependable as you would have been a far greater pain in my side. Oh, dear, wait a moment. This is a rather deep wound—and the blade had some sort of hex, as well. I won’t be able to fix this myself. Ah well, I’ll have to take you to the College to see an iatrurge.”

Before donning her travel gear and assuming her current identity, the methuselah had been known as Agrippina; the very same Agrippina who had rewarded Baron Erftstadt’s dutiful report with a protective charm.

It was a simple thing: break it, and the creator would know. The new count had handed it to her loyal vassal with strict orders to let her know if his life was in danger, and with a promise to find some way of sorting him out so long as his head remained intact.

Though the man’s lung had collapsed and his heart was a minute from failing, that was but a hiccup to be solved for the most experienced magia. All she had to do now was keep him alive, and her privileges as count palatine would see to the College accommodating him with its finest healers. He’d be back to full health in two weeks, if that.

Placing a hand on his chest, Agrippina had just begun her emergency treatment when epiphany struck.

“Say, Baron. How would you like being ‘gravely injured’ for half a year while enjoying a nice vacation with your family?”

[Tips] There are hushed whispers that speak of an arcane disguise so powerful that it can allow anyone to turn into anyone else—that not only does it change one’s appearance and voice, but it can even trick mystic barriers. But any time a magus is questioned on its existence, they laugh the matter off; whether yes or no, they lack the liberty to answer in definite terms.

When the madam came out of nowhere and declared that we were changing course, I nearly spat out my morning porridge.

It was the day after the gruesome attempt on her life, and just when I thought she was done settling matters—with every bit of authority vested in her, mind you—she’d vanished. I’d borrowed a room at a new inn to wait for her, and the first thing she said upon returning already threw me for a loop. Sure, I was well aware she was this sort of person, but I was really starting to get sick of it; the tastes of my past world had come to include being bossed around by gorgeous folks as part of its fetishistic canon, but this monster in human skin was a touch too broken inside to count.

“I thought we were going to visit Baron Erftstadt,” I said. “Weren’t we going to base our operations at his estate?”

“We were, but my plans have changed. Off we go to the Liplar viscounty.”

“Uh...huh.”

I’d heard of that name. It had shown up over and over on the letters I’d been tasked with, and my impression of the viscount was that he was the spitting image of a sycophant. He inquired about Lady Agrippina’s mood at every turn and sent great piles of silver and gems to her estate at the capital, but every time, the madam sent them back twofold.

We’d turned away all his offerings and kept correspondence to the bare minimum high society would let us get away with; he didn’t seem all that important from my perspective. The Liplar business was primarily in ironwork and mining, which wasn’t much to note. Combined with how relatively low the man’s title was, the viscounty seemed much too humble to serve as Count Ubiorum’s new destination.

But while we hadn’t paid him much mind until now—frankly, we’d actively pushed him away—heading his way on the morning after an assassination scare had to point to something more sinister.

From the madam’s perspective, Baron Erftstadt was a gentleman who wouldn’t think to betray her in a million years. We certainly weren’t changing course to avoid the mastermind of last night’s plot; thus, the reasonable conclusion was to think she wanted to jump into the lion’s jaws of her own accord and split its mouth open from the inside out.

I’d just suffered through a bloodbath last night—did she have to insist on inciting more violence? Sure, I’d trained up specifically to fight, but my strength was supposed to help me shine in heroic liberty, not fanatic servitude.

More to the point, who did this witch think I was? I wasn’t her personal knight, though you wouldn’t know it from how she treated me. While I’ll admit that I was the perfect frontline pawn for a magus like her, I was supposed to be a little indentured servant boy. Not that I’d ever pull the “Pwease, I’m just a weak widdle servant!” card, though, since she’d probably just laugh at me.

“Changing our destination is well and good, but what about our itinerary? Castor and Polydeukes are still worked up from yesterday’s attack, and I’d like to give them another day to calm down.”

“That’s fine. We may proceed as we had before. In fact, the Liplar viscounty is on the edge of Ubiorum territory, so we ought to arrive sooner than first anticipated.”

If you say so.

I knew all too well that trying to read my boss’s intentions was a fool’s errand; I didn’t have the brains to deal in backroom political games. A fundamental tenet of TRPGs was that specialists were better than generalists: if my build revolved around fights and chores, then I’d leave the bluffing and diplomacy to another PC.

Shutting off my brain and trusting her plans only worked because I was absolutely confident that she wouldn’t lose under any circumstances, but that wasn’t such a bad thing. It’s not like I could get away now, anyway. The clever thing to do was to take the path of least resistance until the current stopped pushing me around.

“Mm, at any rate, I have matters to settle in the capital, so I shall take a day’s leave. Feel free to do whatever you’d like.”

“I’m the central figure in last night’s chaos. I’ll be a pariah wherever I go.”

“Then why not lend a hand with the innkeepers’ funeral? If you’re as troubled as you seem, then I won’t mind you getting a bit involved.”

Man, I can feel my heart shriveling up. Not only was I stuck living out on the road, but I’d brought bloodshed with me.

I wanted to see Elisa, Mika, and Miss Celia again—to share trivial small talk, to play ehrengarde, to eat supper, and to go to the baths.

And the urge to see my family and Margit swelled ever greater.

One year, I told myself. One more year. But boy, is this gonna be a long one.

I wanna go home...

[Tips] When the last member of a common household passes away without any inheritors, the larger community they reside in usually reclaims the property. In these cases, the local magistrate will temporarily administer the affairs until more distant relatives can be contacted; if none exist, then the land is auctioned off to the highest bidder.