CHAPTER 3
IT’S ROUGH BEING A MAN
1
Prisoner.
Subaru gulped in massive confusion at that word.
“ ”
Subaru was a captive in a camp that seemed like a set built for a historical drama. There were dozens of tents set up, and a mixed army of humans and demi-humans were going about their business wearing armor, carrying weapons, and generally looking dangerous.
Subaru was sitting on the hard ground, in a place with a simple tent serving as a windbreak. His hands were tied behind his back, and his feet were bound, too.
However, what was more important to him than his lack of freedom was…
“Rem… There should have been a girl with me. What happened to her?” Subaru asked quietly.
“Oh—the first thing you’re worried about after finding out you’re a prisoner is a girl? I guess it would be safe to assume those girls are pretty important to you?”
The guy squatting in front of Subaru, who had bright-orange hair, raised an eyebrow. This was the same man who had stopped the violent guy from sticking his shoe in Subaru’s mouth.
He looked a little older than Subaru, and had an amiable sort of smile, but judging from his light armor and the sword at his waist, he was one of the warriors in the camp.
Not a knight, but a warrior.
After spending over a year in this world, Subaru could tell that much.
Knights were showy, while warriors were unrefined. Not in a bad sort of way. Just different.
A knight was expected to be skilled, but they also had to be composed and inspire the public. On that point, integrity and appearance were all important. Reinhard and Julius were good examples.
Meanwhile, a warrior only needed the strength to fight and win. The guy in front of him was no exception in that respect.
“…I’ll ask again. What about the girl who was with me?”
“You’re pretty stubborn… They’re both safe. A little too spirited, even.”
“Ngh, really?! Then tell me sooner, damn it! As long as the blue-haired girl is safe, that’s good enough.”
“That’s a pretty cruel thing to say!”
The guy scratched his cheek and flashed a wry smile as Subaru suddenly leaned forward.
Subaru had simply reacted honestly, but even if he explained the situation in detail, it wouldn’t make sense to the man. Either way, hearing Rem was safe was a relief. Now he had to get a handle on their situation.
“Being captured is a bit hard to swallow, but putting that aside for the moment… What about Re…the girls?”
“If you want to see them, I’ll let you. As long as you answer my questions honestly. To be clear, the two of them are locked up at the moment.”
“Locked up?! Why would you…guah!”
His immediate assumption was that Rem was in a terrible situation. But as he started to complain, a man with an eye patch stomped on his hands, which were tied behind his back, grinding against the broken fingers specifically.
Subaru gritted his teeth and groaned in pain.
“Shitstain,” the man with the eye patch grumbled. “Looks like you don’t understand what it means to be a prisoner. You should only talk when we ask a question!”
“Jamal, stop it! He’s gonna pass out again!”
The man stepping on Subaru’s hand had a wicked grin on his face.
“Let him learn a little. It’s fine as long as I don’t mess up his head, right? Hell, might as well just break the rest of—”
“Jamal.”
The younger man said his name again in a quiet voice. Jamal’s breath caught in his throat, and he reluctantly withdrew his foot.
“Fine, fine.”
“Gah, gh…”
“Tch. Be grateful to Todd. You piss me off.”
Jamal spat at Subaru and left, seemingly annoyed with everything. Subaru could finally breathe again now that his broken fingers were not being stepped on.
“Phew. Sorry about that. He’s short-tempered and on edge. It was his unit that found you at the edge of the water, but…”
“But…?”
“Apparently the girl who was with you put up quite the fight. Half of his squad got wrecked, and that doesn’t exactly reflect well on him as their leader.”
After Todd had delivered that explanation, Subaru understood Jamal’s anger a little better.
That must have happened after Subaru had climbed out of the river. Rem had woken up first and had then beaten the stuffing out of Jamal and his crew.
It made sense why Jamal would want to take out his anger on Subaru, who was that girl’s companion.
“Still, I hate that guy…”
“Ha-ha, what a coincidence. I don’t particularly like him, either.”
Todd shrugged with an easy smile. It was an answer that held no malice. It was not exactly what Subaru wanted to hear after his broken fingers had been stomped on, but enduring it for the moment, he exhaled.
And, clearing his head of the pain, he looked up at Todd, who seemed like someone who could be reasoned with.
“So you’re Todd, right?”
“Oh, good ears. That’s right, I’m Todd. And as for my questions…”
“Just answer honestly, right…? What do you want to know?”
I’m just an unimportant guy from another world. Just plain old Subaru Natsuki. I don’t know how to cross between worlds, and I’m not a specialist in any field like the protagonists in these kinds of stories usually are. Just lacking in every single way, and the more I delve into it, the more I want to cry.
“What can someone in my position even answer for you?”
“Where does that withering self-pity even come from? Anyway, I don’t really have my hopes up, but we’ll start with one thing I’d like to ask. Are you one of the Shudrak people?”
Todd asked the question kind of showily, but it was not a word Subaru had heard before.
“…‘Shudrak’…?”
“See, knew it.” Todd put his hand to his forehead. “I can already tell. You have no connection with them at all.”
“Okay, wait a sec. I haven’t even answered yet. Isn’t that a little quick—”
“Nope. There isn’t anyone who would lie about their clan if someone asked. And no one would fail to recognize the name of their own clan, either. No one would believe you if you tried to claim you were Shudrak after that.”
Todd said this with finality, and it didn’t sound like a bluff, either. His conviction was persuasive, and Subaru couldn’t really argue.
But in that case…
“So who are the Shudrak, then?”
“The people we’re looking for. They’re somewhere in that giant place…the Badheim Jungle.”
“Badheim Jungle.”
“This area we’re in is all jungle. It would take years to search the place.”
There was a tinge of annoyance in Todd’s voice, and following his gaze, Subaru could understand why.
It was a giant, enormous jungle, big enough to make anyone want to cry.
Looking at the camp where he was being held, the sea of green continued all the way to the horizon on both the left and right, and if a similar view extended behind him as well, then, just as he had thought over and over while traipsing through it earlier, this place really might be comparable to the Amazon.
Given its size, its harsh conditions, and the demon beasts and other unknown species populating it, the jungle was a veritable den of demons.
“…Searching for people here? To put it mildly, isn’t that impossible?”
“You think so, too? Yeah, this ain’t great. If I take years to get back, my fiancée is gonna leave me.”
The tragedy of a soldier sent away to the battlefield and separated from his lover. Sensing something along those lines in Todd’s voice, Subaru couldn’t help but sympathize.
But Subaru was also currently very far from people important to him, so his sympathy wouldn’t last forever.
“Hey, Todd. I think I’ve answered your questions honestly. So I’d appreciate it if you kept your word.”
“A guy’s telling you how he can’t see his fiancée, and you’re asking him to hook you up with your woman? Talk about a heart of stone.”
“I don’t want to hear that from a guy whose buddy just stomped on my broken fingers.”
“Ha-ha, yeah, you got me there.”
Subaru’s response was brazen, but instead of getting angry, Todd just laughed. And then he loosened the rope around Subaru’s ankles, giving him enough freedom to walk.
“You can manage small steps. I’ll take you to the cells.”
“Yeah, looks like it. Lead the way.”
“Bold. You a noble or something?”
Todd chuckled wryly and slapped Subaru on the back.
As he stepped out of the prisoner tent with mincing steps, Subaru could feel the men around him watching curiously.
It really does look like an army camp.
A hastily erected wooden fence surrounded the camp and some basic stables where he could see several slender land dragons tied up. There were tents of different colors all lined up, and it looked like more than a hundred people were milling about the camp.
It was a sizable group…but even so, there weren’t nearly enough of them to search the entire jungle. He could understand why Todd would groan at the thought of a never-ending job.
And just as Subaru was sympathizing with Todd and the fiancée he couldn’t meet…
“Ah, that reminds me… We found a knife in your stuff. Where’d you get that?”
Subaru’s eyebrows furrowed for a moment at the question, and then he realized what the man was referring to.
The knife he had gotten from the masked man in the jungle. The one that had done so much for him in helping him get through the jungle and break out of Rem’s traps. It was a bit late to think of it now, but maybe he was part of the Shudrak.
Would talking about the guy be betraying him?
“What is it?”
Subaru’s silence was making Todd dubious, which forced Subaru to make a difficult choice.
This man had treated Subaru fairly, albeit while still keeping him as a prisoner. It was hard to call theirs an amicable relationship.
Meanwhile, it was likely he would never meet the masked man again, but he had given Subaru useful advice in searching for Rem, and also given him that knife. A fairly high-level benefactor, in the balance of things.
Meaning…
“…It’s my family’s knife. A family heirloom.”
“Really? Damn, you must be something, then.”
“Eh?”
After thinking it through, Subaru decided to cover for his benefactor and lie.
But his response made Todd’s voice rise ever so slightly. Subaru couldn’t understand why, but Todd continued.
“I mean, it’s a knife with the swordwolf crest on it. From what I’ve heard, those are presented by the emperor directly to his retainers. That must mean you’re from some famous family.”
“…Wait a second.”
Hearing Todd’s voice change, Subaru gulped.
The history of the knife he had been given was surprising enough in its own right, but he had to set that aside for the moment.
The problem was the other words he’d said. The swordwolf crest and emperor.
“ ”
Pursing his lips, Subaru stopped and looked around again.
There were tents and campfires and men laughing at him, and a massive jungle—and beside a particularly large tent, flapping in the wind, was a blue flag.
—And in the middle of the blue flag was an image of a wolf’s head run through with swords.
“No way…”
Subaru had been in this world for more than a year now.
He had been introduced as Emilia’s knight on several occasions, and he couldn’t be an outsider forever, so he had been studying all sorts of things that were considered common knowledge in this world.
And thanks to that education, he recognized the emblem on the flag—the swordwolf crest.
“The Holy Volakian Empire.”
The crest of the empire on Lugunica’s southern border.
For the first time, Subaru realized they had been sent flying across the border all the way into another country.
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