Abandoned by my Childhood Friend, I Became a War Hero

8 – Gwynn Triss

I left the tram stop and walked through District 21.

I was lost in thought as I walked along the cracked and cracked brick road, as if it had not been repaired for a long time. I don’t know if accepting the instructor position is still a good decision. However, the meeting with President Heinkel left a deep impression on me, and as Marquis Karlstein said, it was true that there was nothing special to do.

In the past, I also had goals. Aim to become a knight. Goal to be strong. Aim to end the war. If you think about it, these are all goals related to Ella and Charlotte. Now I decided to shake off the shadows of the two and live my own life, but I couldn’t figure out how to live that life.

From noble mtl dot com

After living on the battlefield for a long time, I got used to the battlefield, and life outside of the battlefield became difficult to live. The decision to accept the position of instructor was also part of getting a sense of a new life.

As I walked in silence, I arrived near the Red Bear Inn before I knew it. As I was about to enter the inn, I heard someone fighting in a nearby back alley. Just as he thought it was a fight between the gangsters in the neighborhood and tried to ignore it without much thought, his keener hearing sensed something different than a fight between the gangsters.

A messy, chaotic footstep sound. Screaming and yelling. The majority is the minority… No, it was the sound of fighting against one person.

“Hmm.”

After thinking for a while, I lightly kicked the ground and jumped up the wall. With just one step, I quickly climbed onto the roof of the building and then approached the source of the sound.

“Oops!”

“Aagh!”

Looking down the alley from the roof, I saw a black-haired boy with his hair tied in a ponytail beating up a group of thugs. The boy was wielding a club wrapped in cloth, but upon closer inspection, it looked like a sword. That is, the sword and scabbard were tightly wrapped in white cloth and he was swinging it like a club.

The group of thugs each brought their own tools, such as wooden poles or daggers, and swung at the boy, but the boy stood in one place like a solid rock, parrying all incoming attacks and counterattacking. The boy’s sharp sword attack, or rather, the club’s thugs swept away like autumn leaves. Contrary to the rather ridiculous appearance, I felt considerable skill.

It’s not acceptable to get involved in troublesome things, but depending on the situation, there was a willingness to help, but it seemed like it was a useless concern. I had seen enough, so the moment I was about to leave, my eyes met with one of the thugs below me by some coincidence. The savage-looking eyes were familiar as if I had seen them somewhere.

“What! You are my brother- Keuuk!”

This was the same gangster who had been crushed by my older brother at the Red Bear Inn and shouted at me to see him. He probably meant to say, ‘You’re the guy who took down your brother,’ but the boy below seemed to hear it differently.

The boy who had defeated all the thugs before he knew it pointed his club at me and said.

“Are you the brother of these people? It’s quite a classic appearance to show up on the roof.”

“… ….”

It seems like there was a misunderstanding, but I had a hunch that if I continued like this, it would become quite troublesome, so I opened my mouth to correct the misunderstanding.

“No, I-“

“No questions and answers!”

The boy cut off my words and grabbed a wooden stick lying around and threw it. He ducked to avoid the wooden planks flying in a circle, but the wooden timbers were a means to buy the boy time to jump onto the roof. The boy didn’t even check the lumber he threw, and he jumped straight up, kicked off the fence and window frame, and jumped onto the roof like a cat.

And he came right away brandishing a club.

“The wicked will be punished!”

“Haa….”

The boy’s attacks were fierce, but I didn’t feel his murderous intent, so I decided to take a stab at him as well. The stick he wielded with all his strength was fast and powerful, but the trajectory was as honest as that. It was easy enough for him to dodge the attack, as the intent to target and incapacitate his limbs was obvious.

I pulled my right leg back and avoided the swinging stick by a single margin. It was a minute interval about the thickness of her hair. The boy was obviously embarrassed when he couldn’t feel the touch of the attack he thought would be right.

Then, with the palm of his hand, he put a long hit into the chest of the boy, who had a gap in the attack. Empty! The boy, pushed back with a groan, realized that nothing was touching his feet.

“Huh!”

The boy fell down the roof with a shrieking scream. His voice was high and sharp for a man. He glanced down and saw that the boy had safely landed on the ground and was looking up at him with a blank expression.

“You, who the hell are you… ?”

I fell lightly down the roof. There was no need to take a fall at this height. Seeing that, the boy swallowed his dry saliva with a more nervous expression.

“That noble martial art. He seems like an unusually talented person, but… Why are you acting like a knave who persecutes others?”

“I am not a bully.”

“Yes? That, then….”

I looked around lightly. The gangsters scattered here and there by the boy were groaning obnoxiously, clutching their broken limbs. Not a good place to have a conversation.

“I’ll move my seat first.”

***

“I am very sorry!!”

The boy lowered his head to the extent that everyone who saw it was embarrassed. As he was doing that in the middle of the street, he could feel the stares of the passersby staring at him, but the boy didn’t care and kept his head down.

“Wielding a weapon against an innocent person is a disgrace to a warrior! I don’t know how to pay for this sin! Would you be able to forgive him by getting on his knees and apologizing!?”

Looks like a young face that makes you want to become an adult. If I let it go any longer, I was really ready to kneel on the floor, so I thought I made a mistake because I was still young and decided to stop at that point.

“Okay. Next time, don’t misunderstand who you’re aiming your sword at.”

“Yes! Thank you for your forgiveness!”

The boy lifted his head and smiled broadly as if he was glad he had been forgiven. He was very energetic because he was young. He’s cleared up the misunderstanding anyway, so he’ll have no more business. Just as he was about to part without regret, the boy hesitantly opened his mouth.

“I… If you don’t mind, may I ask for your name?”

“Name?”

“Yes! I want to know the name of a master I met for the first time in a distant country. Oh, my name is Gwynn Triss! I have just arrived in the Empire from far away Han. They have different names in their home countries, but you can just call them Gwynn.”

When it comes to ‘Han’, it is an eastern country located at the eastern end of the continent. It’s far from the empire, so I know that only very limited trade comes and goes, but did you come all the way from that distance? Come to think of it, the clothes he was wearing were also Eastern style.

I nodded and said.

“This is Ion Graham. But why was the guy from Han fighting a gangster in a back alley like this?”

“Ah… ! Actually, as I was walking down the street, I saw those people flocking to the inn in groups. At first glance, it was not a good atmosphere, so I tried to listen to the situation, but I had no choice but to use my hand.”

The inn Gwynn pointed to was the Red Bear Inn. Only then did I understand the situation. The guys who had been hurt by me in the morning were going to lead a gang to enter the inn for revenge, and ran into this boy.

In a sense, Gwynn was as if she was caught up in my circumstances. He also took care of my cleanup, so I was a little thankful that he relieved me of troublesome work. Instead, other annoying things happened.

At that time, Gwynn cautiously opened his mouth.

“Me, Mr. Ion. No matter how much I think about it, it makes me very uncomfortable to just move on to apology. I will be in the Empire for a while, so if you need my help, please come to Fillion Academy anytime.”

“…… Fillion Academy?”

“Yes. I came to the empire to practice samurai. Then I’m busy on my way, so excuse me!”

Gwynn left the seat with a fist-to-palm fist-to-palm greeting, the so-called hug. It was a fairly hasty step, as if he was serious when he said that he was busy on the way. He looked at the back of the boy as he walked away, lost in thought for a moment.

The swordsmanship the boy demonstrated. Although it was spread out with a club, the swordsmanship that sticks to one place like a thousand-year-old rock and counterattacks like a rock is very familiar.

In the middle of a battlefield where countless humans and monsters intertwined to create a living hell, the heavy, straight sword of an old man walking alone on the battlefield overlapped with the boy’s swordsmanship, reflecting both the past and the future.

“He must have been the successor of the rock.”

I calmly opened and closed my palms once or twice. When I pushed Gwynn’s chest, the feeling I felt in my palm was definitely… I decided to just think about that.

I had a feeling that I would meet that girl again.