Chapter 108 - The Old Marshal approaches Sagletius
While Vlad and Sofiya made their way back to Sagletius while using a more relaxed speed and still having some time to enjoy their night
Back home in the Sol District inside the secluded zone, Robert, who was sweaty from his training, was reading a letter written down in well-ordered calligraphy as if belonging to an educated nobleman.
'Tsk, you left me again to look after the rest.'
Thinking that, while reading the letter Vlad left, he nodded his head.
[ Little Robert. I will not bother you with your training since it will affect your progress, but when you notice and read this letter, know that Sofiya and I went to rescue some soldiers stuck in a difficult position.
We should be back by tomorrow. Until then, you can heat up the food from this morning and also share some with Aerius.
Don't butt heads and look after the home. If anything important happens, make sure you call Aldenis, or in case those Dark Union rats stumble upon you that you kill them if you can or hide.]
"Hey Robert, what's on the letter, Vlad left? Did he go again on a walk with Sofiya? Heh, he starts getting the taste of peaches." commented Aerius, who was still looking like a normal black cat that had an eagle head and four wings.
"That's not what big brother wrote down. He said that he will be away the entire night, there are some problems that require his assistance. So we two should be all alone for this night."
"Heh, this again? How many times we have been left alone by him while he was enjoying himself in those adventures?"
"That, probably many times. However, he took us once in a while around the nearest island of Picodras, Esvir, Lathast, and Calmaria."
"Sure, you are right, but I also want some adventure spirit, not just a place that I already know." added Aerius while jumping on the dining table and looking at Robert, a bit annoyed with his golden eyes.
"Not my problem. If big brother needs my help with navigating new locations, I will be there to help. Until then I'm preparing myself for my return back home."
"You mean back home, to the Autulum Kingdom?"
"Yes, my birthplace. I've been away from home for almost 2-3 years, I'm soon to be 15 years old."
"Right, I really want to see for myself this home of yours." added Aerius while looking at Robert, whose face turned a bit melancholic.
"Big brother said that we will make our way to the grand line in one year. After he ends the civil war and puts the nobles in their place and sets the kingdom on the right path. He should have plenty of time to journey out on the sea and explore."
When Aerius heard that, he looked with shocked eyes at Robert, who said that and commented a bit skeptical.
"He said that? That he will journey out on the sea and explore?"
"Yes, he said he will take big sister and explore the world before they took the crown from old Tius and ascend the throne."
"Doesn't that mean we will finally have to look around new places?"
"Yes, Aerius, but we'll still have to work hard and train. Haven't you seen that big brother is even stronger than before, and to add fire to my wounds, even big sister's growth is scary. She managed to learn what big brother taught her in such a fast manner."
"I know, she's very scary when things don't go her way. She also doesn't like to lose in an embarrassing manner which made her train like she was possessed by a banshee."
Robert saw Aerius' pained expression and also sighed to himself, saying to the black gryphon.
"We two brothers really suffered a lot in the face of those two monsters."
"That's right, friend. Don't worry I will teach them a good lesson when I grow back in my adult form. It's already been almost 3 years since this blasted curse lasted on me. Soon, soon I will grow. I hope."
"Thanks Aerius, I hope you remember what you said when you grow up. But if you don't, leave them to me, at least I will be able to win against sister Sofiya, but big brother? Depends if he stagnates, and it is unlikely that will happen."
Robert went to take some food and prepare a fire to heat it up, while Aerius also went down and took some branches and hay to start the fire using his beak.
Spewing the hay around the wooden pieces at the fireplace, Aerius asked Robert, who took some ceramic pots.
"Should we check on the old man?"
"Ohh, old Tius? Don't. He probably is asleep in his room at the orphanage building. He is an early sleeper. As for the other, Fay will tell me if some conflict between the new ones and the older guys happens."
"Fay will? Well, she's quite smart and talented, especially with her clothes. She's so nice that she wanted to sew something for me together with Elisabeth."
"Hmm, don't you want it?" asked Robert while looking at Aerius, looking at the pot full of food placed on the fire and also observing the flames.
"Obviously I want one, but I don't want to be a bother since it will be hard for them to sew something for my body. I have those inconvenient wings that will just destroy what she would sew for me."
"You don't have to think like that, Aerius. Fay and Alicia want to repay you too for the support and help you showed to them."
"Maybe I will ask them to make one for my adult form since it's unknown if I will keep being this small."
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As the two young gryphon and the young man talked while the fire was heating up, on another part of the forest, there was a group of 4 men walking from the forest using a red line around the tall trees of the forest.
One of them, who had a tall and thin-looking body, who had his chin slightly pointed along with a scar running around his cheek to his mouth, asked the one taking the lead.
"Teacher Nius, are you sure this is a good path?"
When that tall and thin middle-aged guy asked that, the person in the front turned his head slightly. It was an old man who had shoulder-length white hair and a big white beard covering his face.
His body was decently tall, being about 1,87 meters, however his body was covered by a black coat, but the overall feeling from his appearance was that the old man looked good for his age.
"This is a path I set in my youth to go without stumbling on the slumbering beast in the forest. Do you think I'm in the mood to fight a monster? Just shut up and follow me without question, Vem."
One of the other middle-aged guys, with his hair visible long held in a tied manner, and sporting a big black beard that covered a deep scar on his right cheek, who was following behind the old man along with the other three, asked a bit confused.
"Old man, why did you decide to move out of the camp this early? Don't we still have 5 months to train the rest of the soldiers before little Zagreus turns 17?"
"No, haven't you heard from Novio of little Vlad's endeavors inside Sagletius and Kaysang overall? He has in his grasp half of the kingdom, and did a great blow to those dirty parasites."
"Heck, that crazy boy even built an army for himself and I heard from the other new guards that they are actually strong. Holding themselves proudly wherever they went."
"Hmm, did Novio say that when he visited us? Vem?"
"That's right. Novio was hand-selected by little Vlad to be the administrator of Kalerna Mountain Mine after that retard Mayer fired him. Hehe, I still remember the news about that fat motherfucker getting killed by someone called Blood."
"I've seen that person bounty in the hands of the new guard recruits. His bounty dwarfs us Gif, Ramoth, at a staggering 145.000.000 bellies."
"Right, who is this Blood guy to have some beef with Mayer and nobles? Could it be?" stopped Gif while looking at Vem before Nius confirmed his thought.
"It is as you think Gif, Blood is little Vlad. He picked a good nickname I guess. It fits well with his powers."
"So this explains why they killed Mayer and even destroyed those rats lurking in the Lower District."
Ramoth, who had his great axe on his back, looked at Gif and Vem and commented while holding a slightly pissed tone.
"Those rats that were extorting the people, we should have ended them faster. Cursed rats, they liked to hide well from our royal guard's hands."
Nius kept quiet as his 3 officers talked with one another while following behind him and thought to himself with a slight smile on his old face.
'Little Vlad, I can't wait to see your progress and also meet you again. Hehe, it will be fun playing around with you like in the past. I even trained my chess skills just to pummel you down little brat.'
'Hmm, this path seems to be wrong, was this one in the past? Well, I don't remember exactly those small bits of the forest, but I should still be able to see the Wisdom Palace once I'm out of the forest.'
Thinking that in his head, Nius just kept following this new path. He didn't remember if he was the one to mark it or not.
Still, his 3 officers followed him without much fuss, each of them being armed with their respective weapons. Gif was wielding a broadsword, Vem had a spear on his back, and Ramoth was moving along with his Great Axe.
Nius also held a longsword covered in bandages at his waist, as if it was sealing something from the outside.
Walking forward this route inside their forest, they soon began spotting signs of settlement, with a decent-sized wooden house that had lights lit and smoke from the chimney going up, and not far from there a large building that seemed to have many rooms.
"What is this? There are people settled inside the Forbidden Forest? Are those guys stupid?" asked Gif when they stopped to look around this settlement.
"Who knows, maybe they don't know about the giant slumbering at the center of the forest and just build some houses. Let's go. I'm curious to see who is the one that settled down."
With the old man taking the lead, the group of 4 increased their speed and arrived at the large building that had many rooms. Nius checked on the structure of this building, and feeling its stability, he began scaling it to investigate the rooms.
'Hoh, this building is full of kids. Could it be this is an orphanage or something else? Human traffickers?'
Thinking that Nius still moved around to check different rooms, and observed that one of those rooms had its lights still on, and it was 3 girls, respectively 2 young girls who seemed to be around 13-14 years old and an older girl, that to his old eyes seemed to be her mid-twenties or late twenties.
'Listening to their conversation, this place really looks like an orphanage. The oldest girl seems to be their carer. Those kids also look like they are well maintained and fed, not suffering from malnourishment like how little Vlad was.'
Meanwhile, inside the room, Fay, who grew up and began turning even more like an untouchable flower, felt something and looked at the window with her purple eyes that made Elisabeth and Alicia look confused.
"Is something wrong little Fay?"
"Hmm, no big sister, I just felt that I heard something around the window. Let's get back to talking about the things big brother Vlad talked about. Those old-looking style clothes he asked us to make."
"Sure, sure. Let me get some sheet papers and start drawing them."
Back to Nius, who was listening with curiosity at the 3 girls' conversation, as if he was an old pervert, thought to himself.
'So this orphanage was built by little Vlad? Interesting. Now let's see what interesting lads there are here.'
As if Nius was a phantom, he climbed the wooden walls of the building like it was nothing, and while checking a little bit on the other orphans, he suddenly froze when he saw an old man that seemed to read a book at the light of an oil lamp.
He was around the same age as Nius and looked pretty well. Apart from shielding his old eyes with a pair of glasses, his hair looked maintained along with his beard.
'This person? Why is he so familiar? That style of reading and his face. Could it be that Vlad managed to find him and shield him from the rats of the Assassin Union? Is it you, Opheltius?'
Nius was thinking about entering or not, but finally, not holding back his desire, he opened the windows and made his way inside.
The old man inside the room looked up from the book he was reading and saw an old-looking man who had his body veiled using a dark clock.
"Who are you? Are you one of the assassins?" asked the old man when seeing Nius enter inside.
Hearing the old man's voice, bits of memories from his younger days flooded his eyes, and he just looked at the old man with a shocked expression.
"Brother Tius, you no longer remember me?"
In fact, the old man, Opheltius, when hearing Nius, also looked with a shocked expression and took a step toward the old marshal.
"You. Could it be? Nius? Is that you?" asked Opheltius, a bit skeptical about the real identity of this newcomer.
"That's right brother Tius, it is me, Galleot Nius. It really has been a long time. Look at both of us, we are now just decaying old bones."
"Little brother this really is an unexpected meeting. Have you by chance been followed by the assassins? I can't afford to endanger the little kids sleeping inside this building."
"Sigh, brother Tius, you really didn't change one bit. Still thinking about others. I really don't feel like kicking you around for what happened that day." said Nius as he approached Opheltius while taking his black clock and revealing some casual clothes and the longsword covered in bandages.
Moving toward Opheltius, he approached him and took him in a brotherly embrace.
"Nius, you really don't blame me for what happened back then?"
Hearing Opheltius, who seemed to shake slightly, Nius patted him on his back and commented calmly.
"Leave the past for the past brother. While the losses we suffered were devastating, losing dear people to us, this doesn't mean we will get stuck in the past."
Opheltius patted Nius and said with a saddened tone.
"Sigh, it's just like what little Vlad said, he expected that you would react like this when we would meet at one point."
"He said so? That's good, it means he didn't forget about this old man. Haha, come brother, tell me how have you been so far."
"First years were a nightmare. Seeing the loyal nobles step by step being threatened or even killed by those assassins. I couldn't even get out from the palace for fear those traitorous bastards would torture me."
"I know some information about what happened in your first years. Remember little Felicia? I trained that girl in her swordplay when she was just a teen."
Opheltius walked to grab a bottle of wine from a table along with two glasses, and as he did that, he commented with a remembering expression.
"Felicia? Ahh, yes I remember that little girl who began gathering out the scattered prostitutes and giving them a better condition. So those maids that have been kind to me were her people."
Nius, who took the empty glass in his hand and saw Opheltius fill it with wine, said while scratching his beard.
"I asked her to infiltrate some of her little girls to look after you and report to me. In the worst case, I would come at my fastest speed and get you out from the castle."
"That would be dangerous, little brother. But fortunately, I managed to escape the Royal District with the help of a little girl called Iris."
"Right. But how exactly did you escape from the grasp of the traitorous nobles and those Dark Union assassins and the palace, Tius?"
"How, you say? I used Lucius's escape route that he found while playing around when he was young and that I thought was sealed by him when he grew.
After a night of heavy drinking 4 years ago, I remembered that route and tried my best to reach it unseen by people. Surprisingly it was still open after all this time. I exited the palace but still had to pass the noble guard, and with that came the little girl Iris who helped me with some commoner's clothes and also using some makeup on my old face."
"Hah, like the ones those weird guys would use? The ones who like men?"
Asked Nius while drinking the glass of wine and listening to Opheltius's story, he was bothered to find out since he heard about his escape.
Opheltius downed a glass of wine and began laughing when remembering the disgusted faces of the guards.
"Yes, just like those weird ones. That little girl really did a good job in masking me. After that, I passed toward the commoner's district or how they call themselves now, Dawn District and masked myself as a beggar to avoid the search of the assassins and nobles."
"What about those mighty World Nobles, did they even took notice of your situation? You clearly asked for help right?"
"I did, little brother. Whatever you say, I tried. But it's as if those bastards forgot that I'm even part of the Royal Assembly chair. The so-called army that would protect the peace of the world and countries, the MARINE, never even bothered to see if I was fine, even though the situation in the kingdom is something similar to a continuous Civil War."
Opheltius turned angry when he remembered his helplessness in those moments.
"No need to consume yourself, brother. We're at the age that we can't afford to get emotional or our health will just deteriorate. I will take care of everything. My preparations are complete, and it seems that little Vlad also prepared himself to a crazy amount."
"Hah, that little guy. He's another specimen altogether, he didn't even get taught by a learned teacher in the most basic arts and even was an orphan and slave. Brother, whenever I look at what he managed to do in about 3 years, I feel like an incompetent ruler. All I can say is that he's a born ruler and once he wants me to pass the crown to him, I will do it without much fuss.
"That crown should be worn by his late father, my son.
Ending saying that Opheltius filled the glasses of wine again and stared at Nius, following up with a simple question.
"You tell me, little brother, after listening to how my days passed, how was it yours? I heard you were a miner? Go on, share it with me. This is a reunion night. Unfortunately, I only have some bottles of wine I took from a good cook in the district.
"Haha, it's fine. I'm okay with only some wine. Then let me share with you how I spent my time after that event."
Following that, Nius began filling Opheltius with his run-away while being wounded and looking after Gif, Vem and Ramoth.
Both of them were consumed a bit by anger, but Nius followed up to filling Opheltius about how he had to spend his time running from those gold-masked assassins who were on his tracks until he got to Kalerna Mountain Mines.
They talked until Nius suddenly stopped talking and rose on his feet, moving toward the windows after hearing the sound of weapons clashing.
"Who has the guts to attack those 3 guys at this hour?"
"Ohh, no. Your people are in danger, that little guy Robert is a promising youngster that was trained by Vlad himself."
Nius, who was at the windows, watched a youngster who seemed to be around 15 years old wielding a longsword and attacking Gif, Vem, and Ramoth with a serious tone while saying to the three.
"You seem like the assassin's big brother talked about, black clocks that hide the body. You are missing the masks, but it isn't uncommon for you to not wear them."
Using a strong strike, Robert managed to push Gif, who went to intercept Robert some steps. Seeing himself being pushed, he looked surprised at this youngster and also said his part.
"You aren't half bad kid. However, you are still a long way to go if you want to defeat me. State your name before I put you in your place."
"Hmph, why should I give you assassin's my name." replied Robert while looking at the three royal guards.
Vem, who listened closely to what Robert had to say, intervene while he also pulled out his spear, saying to Robert in a calm tone.
"Young man, there's something you are wrong about us. We aren't assassins."
Robert still looked doubtful at those 3, as anyone would do if encountering people they never meet before.
"Then who are you?"
Before the 3 royal guards even managed to say something, Nius, who looked down on this small sparked conflict, jumped down from the 3 floors of this wooden building and looked at Robert with a smile on his old face.
"Those are my soldiers, little Robert Voss."
"You. I remember you, you are the old man from the mines who fought against big brother Vlad." said Robert with a shocked expression on his face when seeing Nius appear in front of him from god knows where.
