2
Eighty-four people had gathered at the Fou settlement in total.
The women and young folk crowded around the edges of the plaza as best they could, while the men were standing in the center. With the amount of space on offer compared to the number of people around, it felt like we were dealing with an even denser crowd than when a hundred people gathered at the Ruu settlement.
“The fact that we are here to see this day arrive is something for us all to celebrate. Never before have clans unrelated by blood come together to feast like this, but we are all children of the forest and comrades here at the forest’s edge. As the Fou clan head, I greatly hope this event shall further strengthen the bonds between the Fa, Deen, Liddo, Sudra, Fou, and Ran,” Baadu Fou, the head of the Fou clan, said to welcome us. The older hunter was slim, bony, and nearly 180 centimeters tall. He was calm and composed by nature and deeply loyal, which made him well suited for managing everything. “And to oversee this momentous day, we also have visitors from the leading clans and the Beim in attendance. However, they are only guests and will not be participating in the contests of strength or dinner, but they will be watching over us as fellow people of the forest’s edge all the same.”
At that, five people standing at a bit of a distance silently nodded. Dari Sauti was the only man among them, since the rest of the hunters were all busy with work at this time of day. The other four were women: Reina Ruu, Sufira Zaza, Fei Beim, and a Sauti woman.
“Well then, time is moving onward, so I would like to begin our ritual contests of strength. The first contest shall be archery.”
With those words from Baadu Fou, the crowd moved farther into the settlement. The archery contest was to be held at the outskirts of the forest.
There were thirty-three hunters taking part. With thirty-five chefs, sixteen young folk, and five guests watching them, the hunters lined up along the edge of the forest. Some young boys who looked fairly close to thirteen years old stepped out in front of them, cradling a large number of bows and arrows.
“Excuse me, I would like to make a request,” Ai Fa suddenly interjected. “I’m terribly sorry to ask, but could I get in a bit of practice with the bow before the contest?”
“Bow practice?” several of the hunters questioned dubiously.
“Indeed. I have not handled a bow since losing my father. I felt there was no need for such a thing when hunting on my own, and since my bow was lost along with my father, I have not had a chance to touch one again until today.”
“Oh...? But it has been years since your father’s passing, has it not?”
“I lost my father two and a half years ago.”
“After two and a half years without touching a bow, I cannot imagine how a little practice would make any difference.”
“If you could just allow me to fire two or three arrows, that would be plenty. That should be enough to regain the feel for drawing a bow.”
Baadu Fou gave a small nod, then signaled one of the boys with his eyes.
“You have my thanks,” Ai Fa replied, bowing, then swiftly nocked an arrow.
Her form was so beautiful that it was hard to believe it had been such a long time since she’d done this. Still, the arrow she fired toward the forest disappeared into the brush without hitting any target.
Remaining in place, Ai Fa nocked her second arrow. This time around, it stuck right in the center of a large tree’s trunk. She then immediately fired a third, which landed right alongside the second one.
“My apologies for making you all wait. That should be plenty.”
Ai Fa returned the bow and quiver to the youth, while another boy took off running over to the edge of the forest to retrieve the arrows.
“Well then, let us begin the archery contest. The wooden boards dangling there shall be your targets.”
Looking in the direction Baadu Fou had pointed, I saw that sure enough, there were wooden boards dangling from the branches of some small trees on vines roughly thirty centimeters long. They were square, about ten centimeters on a side, with a black mark drawn in their center. Three targets hung from each branch, and four sets had been prepared, spaced roughly two meters apart.
“We are short on time, so we set things up so that four hunters could compete at once. Once the targets are swinging, I will give a signal, after which you are to shoot three arrows within a count of ten. The winner will be whoever manages to score the most hits on the black marks. If multiple people score the same number of hits on both the marks and the target boards as a whole, the contest will go on to a second round.”
He then indicated a line drawn on the ground ten meters away from where we were standing. They would be firing three arrows at moving targets from that distance. Considering that they had to do it in about ten seconds, it would be quite a difficult task.
“It would be best to have those who are not related compete together as much as possible to begin with. Could we have one each from the Deen, Liddo, Fou, and Ran go first, as they have larger numbers?”
The contests of strength were finally getting started, and a stir of excitement started running through the crowd of women around me. Any of them who had feelings for one of the men must have had their hearts beating pretty quickly by now.
The four hunters shouldered their quivers, took a bow in hand, and stood before the line. Two boys with long grigee poles were standing by between the four trees.
“These youths will make the targets twist and swing with their poles. After they move to a safe distance, I shall shout out a signal, at which point you may begin shooting arrows. Are all of you ready too?”
Multiple energetic voices called out, “Yeah!” from the ground next to Baadu Fou’s feet. At some point, several little children had gathered around him. It looked like they were all less than ten years old, judging from the one-shouldered attire they were wearing.
“All right. Strike the targets!”
The boys split off to the left and right and used their grigee poles to get the targets swinging about while running out of the line of fire. Once they had hit the final targets and made it five meters away, Baadu Fou shouted out, “Begin!”
The four hunters reached for their quivers, and at the same time the young children started counting, “One! Two!” Apparently, they were acting as timekeepers. They were really adorable, loudly calling out numbers with huge grins on their faces.
The hunters looked deadly serious. Having to fire off three arrows within ten seconds meant you only got around three seconds to fire each one. It seemed like a really tight time limit, considering they had to draw the arrows, nock their bows, take aim, and then fire.
On top of all that, the targets were moving, and since they’d been set into motion by just whacking them with a pole, the targets could end up completely sideways if the hunters’ timing was poor. It would take extraordinary skill to hit the center under these conditions.
With a fwoosh, the arrows tore through the air. Some of them hit the targets, while others vanished into the thicket.
“Nine! Ten!”
With that, the kids stopped chanting, and the boys and girls over ten went to check the targets and collect the arrows.
“This one had one arrow hit the mark!”
“This one didn’t hit any!”
“One over here too!”
Apparently, only arrows that landed on the marks mattered. Just hitting the board didn’t count unless two people hit the marks the same number of times. Based on those rules, a Fou man was the one to be declared the winner of the first group. Apparently, the Fou and Ran always held archery contests like this one, so perhaps they had something of an advantage over the Deen and Liddo hunters.
“That was amazing. There’s no way I’d even be able to scratch one of those targets. But then, it’s not like I’ve ever handled a bow before...” I said.
Toor Deen broke out in a bashful smile beside me. “You’re a chef, so that’s only natural. I’ve never touched a bow before either.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s true.”
Still, I was the only male chef here watching. Even the younger boys were helping out here and there with the contest, so all the observers surrounding me were women. Well, I guess it’s the same for Ai Fa. At times like these, it becomes real clear just how unusual a female hunter and a male chef are, here at the forest’s edge. Still, there was no point in worrying about that now. As a member of the Fa clan, I just had to keep wishing Ai Fa good luck.
From there, the archery contest steadily continued on, with the Sudra hunters repeatedly achieving the best results. Cheem Sudra in particular was able to land three arrows, with two of them hitting the small mark. Many of the hunters who were doing the best seemed to be on the small side. Thinking about it more, Ludo Ruu and Jeeda were both smaller than average, and they also excelled with bows. Perhaps smaller men were more often tasked with handling bows and arrows.
And then, Ai Fa’s turn finally rolled around. She was up against men from the Fou, Deen, and Liddo clans. Astonishingly, all three of her arrows hit the targets, with one striking the center of the mark. One of the men also hit the mark, but none of the others had hit the targets with all three, so Ai Fa secured her victory. A number of hunters made sounds of admiration, and many of the women got all excited. Now that I thought about it, Ai Fa was pretty popular among the young women. When Gilulu first came to our house and she had started gallantly riding the totos around, they had all greeted her with high-pitched cheers.
“That was amazing. Ai Fa won the match, even though she hasn’t touched a bow in more than two years,” Yun Sudra remarked, looking a bit excited.
“Yeah, but the Sudra men all won too. Cheem Sudra was especially amazing.”
“Yup. At the Sudra contests of strength, Cheem always wins the archery contests. I don’t think he’s lost even once in the past two years.”
From what I could remember, Cheem Sudra was fifteen years old, so that meant he had never lost since he started participating in contests of strength as a hunter in training at the age of thirteen. Even if the Sudra clan only had four hunters, those were still results to be proud of.
I’m sure if Ludo Ruu heard that, he’d probably want to challenge Cheem Sudra to a match. That sounds pretty amusing, actually.
While I was thinking that, the first round came to a close. There were thirty-three hunters participating in total, so there had been seven matches with four each, and then one with three and one with two, meaning nine of them continued on to the semifinals. They included four from the Sudra, two from the Ran, and one each from the Fa, Fou, and Deen. The only clan heads among them were Ai Fa and Raielfam Sudra. Baadu Fou had a very strong presence to him, and the Liddo clan head was a very experienced hunter, but neither specialized in the bow. And again, those who won the initial matches seemed to generally be on the small side.
“We have nine hunters remaining, so we will do the rest in groups of three.”
The first group of three included Ai Fa and a Sudra and Ran man. It ended up being a fierce fight, with all three hitting the targets with three arrows. They also all hit a center mark once, which led to a rematch.
Ai Fa and the Ran man got the same results once again, leading to another go with just the two of them. The six arrows they unleashed once again all hit the targets.
“One hit the mark on this side!”
“Two hit over here!”
That caused a light stir to arise. It was the Ran man who had proved victorious. It seemed there had been a general feeling that Ai Fa was going to pull off a win. The young man she had gone up against had a medium build, and had a rather soft-looking face for a hunter of the forest’s edge.
“Looks like I lost. You’re quite skilled with a bow,” Ai Fa called out.
The Ran man offered her a kind smile. “I’m not very good at handling a blade, so I put a lot of effort into mastering the bow. Still, I feel quite honored to have won against a hunter as skilled as you.”
“I haven’t touched a bow in over two years. If you wish to be proud of your skills, then you should win the next match,” Ai Fa said, turning away and heading back toward the crowd.
Something about the way she was acting caught my attention, so I called out to her. “Good work, Ai Fa. Do you know that Ran man?”
Ai Fa shot me a frightening glare for some reason. “My ties with the Fou and Ran might have been severed over two years ago, but we interacted normally before that. With our houses so close, it should hardly be surprising that I would have an acquaintance or two.”
“Well, I guess that’s true. I just thought it was unusual to see you talk to another man like that.”
“Hmph!” Ai Fa snorted, and then she left. As I stood there, not understanding what had happened, Saris Ran Fou called out to me from behind.
“Asuta, that was Masa Fou Ran just now. He’s a childhood friend of mine, and of Ai Fa’s.”
“Oh, I see. He’s a Fou man who married into the Ran family, then?”
So it was the opposite of Saris Ran Fou, who had married into the Fou clan from the Ran clan. She looked somewhat nostalgic as she narrowed her eyes and smiled.
“I’ve mentioned this before, but...Masa Fou Ran was the man I originally agreed to marry. However, since he fell for Ai Fa, I ended up marrying his younger brother instead.” As I was left at a loss for words, she smiled at me once more. “In order to take responsibility for breaking his word, Masa Fou Ran then married another Ran woman. This all happened over two years ago...but I’m sure Ai Fa and Masa Fou Ran haven’t spoken to each other even once in all that time.”
The Fou and Ran had severed ties with the Fa because they had feared the Suun. However, Saris Ran Fou had been estranged from Ai Fa even before that, and the cause had been none other than that man.
“And considering Ai Fa’s position, she likely still has no desire to talk to him.”
As far as I knew, Ai Fa was closest to Saris Ran Fou out of everyone living nearby. Having the man who had promised to marry her friend fall for her instead and ruin their relationship must have hurt her greatly.
“Still, I’m happy with things as they are now. The youngest son of the Fou who became my husband loves me dearly, and now I have been blessed with Aimu as well. Plus, I was able to mend my bond with Ai Fa, so I have been given all the happiness I could possibly ask for.”
“I see...”
All of that had happened before I had come here to the forest’s edge, and any negative feelings that had cropped up between Ai Fa and Saris Ran Fou were gone now, so there was no point in me getting angry at that Masa Fou Ran guy now. There’s no way to stop yourself from liking someone. And in the end, his feelings toward Ai Fa never amounted to anything.
Eventually, I was able to set aside the ambiguous feelings I had in my chest to be sorted out later.
In the meantime, the second match of the semifinals wrapped up, with Cheem Sudra beating a Sudra and Fou man to continue on. The last match was between Raielfam Sudra and one man each from the Ran and Deen. Next to me, Toor Deen was staring at them as if she were praying.
“So, someone from the Deen clan made it this far? The Sudra clan head’s going to be a tough opponent, but I hope he gives it his all.”
“Yes... That’s actually my dad.”
“Oh, really? In that case, we’ve got to cheer him on even harder.”
This was the first time I had been able to get a good look at Toor Deen’s father. He was a slim man and not especially tall, around the age of thirty. His face made him look tough and composed, a lot like Ryada Ruu’s.
Meanwhile, Raielfam Sudra was a little guy who had a really unusual, heavily wrinkled face with sunken cheeks. He was less than 150 centimeters tall, and his limbs looked just as thin as always.
As for the third participant, the Ran man, his appearance didn’t really stand out in any particular way. He appeared to be rather young, perhaps even younger than I was. Still, he was fairly tall, with a toned body, and had long dark-brown hair. The expression on his face made him look unflappable, and he seemed to be quite a man.
What’s up with this guy? He’s got a really dignified air about him, kind of like the hunters from the Ruu clan. Is it the way he seems abnormally confident...? He doesn’t seem to be just any old hunter.
Naturally, I didn’t have much skill at evaluating a hunter’s abilities. However, my intuition had hit the mark for once here. He actually beat Raielfam Sudra and Toor Deen’s father in the match, and a number of the women started cheering for him.
“He seems to be quite popular. Is he the eldest son of the main Ran house or something?” I asked Saris Ran Fou.
However, her answer was, “No. That’s Jou Ran, the eldest son of a Ran branch house. He’s the child of my mother’s younger brother.” Meaning he was Saris Ran Fou’s cousin. She tilted her head a bit. “I haven’t had much interaction with him since marrying into the Fou family...but he seems to have gained quite a bit of strength as a hunter. I don’t believe he did nearly this well in archery at the previous festival of the hunt.”
“I see. How old is he?”
“I believe he just turned sixteen.”
Which meant he was still in the process of growing up. Growing boys, and all that.
If he’s sixteen, that makes him the same age as Shin Ruu and Geol Zaza. I’ve been getting acquainted with a lot of folks that age lately.
At any rate, the archery contest was now entering its final rounds. The participants would be Cheem Sudra, Masa Fou Ran, and Jou Ran.
The first round once again ended in a three-way tie. Then in the next one, Masa Fou Ran dropped out as one of his arrows missed the targets. For the third round, neither participant missed a single shot, and both even managed to land two arrows on the center marks. And in the fourth round, both amazingly hit their marks with all three arrows.
Not just the women, but even the men were voicing their admiration now. To be sure, it was no easy feat to hit the marks every time under such conditions.
In the fifth round, both of them hit the mark twice, and neither of their third arrows missed the targets. As for the sixth round...Jou Ran missed the targets for the first time. He ultimately hit the targets twice, while Cheem Sudra hit them three times. The youths who went to check the results turned toward us in excitement.
“Two of Jou Ran’s arrows hit the mark!”
“Two of Cheem Sudra’s arrows hit the mark!”
Cheem Sudra had claimed victory by a narrow margin. The small 160-centimeter-tall youth wiped the sweat from his brow and looked up at the sky. Meanwhile, Jou Ran walked over to him with a cool and unruffled smile.
“Splendidly done. It’s vexing, but it seems I’ve lost.”
“No, the swaying of the targets determined the match. It wouldn’t have been surprising if it had gone the other way instead.”
“Then the results come down to the forest’s guidance.”
Everyone cheered and applauded the fierce battle between the youths.
Once we finally settled down, Baadu Fou stepped forward.
“The winner of the archery contest is Cheem Sudra of the Sudra clan. Next up, we shall hold the weight-pulling contest.”
Weight pulling was a competition that emphasized arm strength. It required one to move something heavy using the pulling boards we transported water jugs with.
Pulling boards were big and sturdy, and had protective fur stretched along their undersides. They were around a meter square and had a number of fibaha vines attached to them. Those vines in turn had a handle attached to them, allowing you to pull the boards along to transport things.
In this case, the weights they were using were the young children of the clans. Two or three kids got on each pulling board, and each contestant had to try to run and pull them about fifty meters. This event also had four hunters competing at a time.
“Even if the number of children is different, their total weight ought to be about the same, so this should be fair regardless of who is chosen.”
Naturally, there weren’t any scales at the forest’s edge, but a seesaw-like tool was used to divide them into even lots. Among them was a large twelve-year-old boy holding a five-year-old. When there was a group of three kids around seven or eight years old, the one in front held on to the base of the fibaha vines, while the other two grabbed the waist of the kid in front of them. It was adorable.
Still, even kids who are that small should weigh around twenty-five kilos or so. With three of them, that’d be seventy-five kilos. It’ll be pretty tough running fifty meters pulling a weight like that.
Even so, we were talking hunters of the forest’s edge here. Once the match kicked off, they started moving across the plaza incredibly fast. Even though they were essentially pulling a large fully grown man behind them, they were still going faster than I could have if I were running at full speed unencumbered. The hunters of the forest’s edge really did possess extraordinary muscle strength.
It’ll be tough for Ai Fa to win like this.
Ai Fa was a skilled enough hunter to make it into the top eight of a contest of strength held by the Ruu clan. However, that had been a combat competition. She would be at a clear disadvantage in a fight based purely on muscular strength.
Even so, luck and determination were enough to earn her a narrow victory in the first round. She was up against a bunch of smaller hunters like Cheem Sudra and a young Fou man, so she won by the skin of her teeth. However, most of those who made it to the semifinals were unsurprisingly the more burly hunters.
Among the smaller clans, there weren’t many hunters who really stood out in terms of having exceptionally large builds. Most of them were skinny even if they were tall, or short even if they were wide. That was proof of the harsh conditions they had lived under for generations. Those who were comparatively well-built within that framework were the ones who found victory this time. It was like the exact opposite of the archery competition.
The finals came down to Baadu Fou, the Liddo clan head, and the Deen clan head. Among the three of them, the Liddo clan head was particularly eye-catching, being around 180 centimeters tall and looking to weigh around a hundred kilos or so. Plus, he seemed to be an exceptionally skilled runner in spite of his large frame. It reminded me of how surprisingly swift Dan Rutim was despite his potbelly.
“The Liddo clan head was widely known for his exceptional skill back when the Suun were still the leading clan. That strength was what allowed them to become a subordinate clan of the Suun,” Toor Deen explained.
There were no upsets here at the end, and the Liddo clan head was crowned the victor. Baadu Fou, meanwhile, took second.
“These matches have all been amazing. Honestly, it’s a lot easier for me to relax and watch competitions like these than the combat ones.”
“Yes, I feel the same way,” Toor Deen replied with a happy smile.
Her father had been defeated by the Liddo clan head in the second round, but even if victory was seen as a point of pride in contests between hunters, losing was not anything to be ashamed of. They had all shown exceptional skill in both the archery and weight pulling contests, so I figured that was the right way to think about it.
“Looks like you’ve had two tough competitions in a row today, Ai Fa. Just make sure to keep giving it your all in the back half,” I casually called out to my clan head as she passed by, only to be met with another frightening glare. Then she beckoned to me with her hand, pulling me away from the crowd.
“You seem to be rather enjoying yourself, Asuta.”
“Huh? Well, to be honest, I guess I am.”
That seemed to make Ai Fa even angrier, and she whispered to me, “It’s one thing to enjoy a banquet, but doesn’t it irritate you at least a little to see me lose again and again?”
“Huh? They were competitions you weren’t well suited for, so I don’t think it’s anything to feel that frustrated over,” I started to say, but then I thought back. When she had narrowly lost to Dan Rutim at the Ruu contest of strength, she had looked incredibly frustrated. “I see. I guess you hate losing more than I thought, huh? You must have a lot of jealousy in you, feeling that way over competitions like archery and weight pulling.”
“You cannot grow without feeling frustration. You get upset about losing in cooking competitions, don’t you?”
“Hmm. I’m sure you already know this, but when it comes to something I’m not good at, like making sweets, losing doesn’t actually frustrate me,” I replied honestly, as it would have been taboo to speak a falsehood. Unfortunately, my words ended up putting Ai Fa into a major sulk. If not for all the people around us, she might well have started rubbing her head up against me.
“Your attitude is quite different from how out of sorts you were at the swordsmanship tournament.”
“Huh? At the tournament?”
“You shouted out to cheer for Shin Ruu, so it’s strange that you won’t do the same for me,” Ai Fa quietly grumbled, breaking out in a frown that was as deep as any I could possibly imagine. She looked so sad that I would have started patting her head if people weren’t looking.
“Sorry about that. I got all worked up then because those were combat matches. But cut me some slack. I was cheering for you as loud as I could inside my head.”
My clan head just kept on frowning.
“Maybe you didn’t notice it, but I ended up shouting without thinking during your match with Dan Rutim too.”
Ai Fa deeply furrowed her brow. Then, she finally lost control and gave me a single headbutt to the cheek. “As if I could ever fail to hear your voice, you fool.” And then she started moving away from me without turning around.
Scratching my head, I walked back over to Toor Deen and the others. When I got there, I found something truly unexpected waiting for me: beside Saris Ran Fou was the young hunter, Jou Ran.
“This is our first proper meeting, isn’t it? I am Jou Ran of the Ran clan, Asuta of the Fa clan.”
“Ah, it’s my pleasure. You did really well with that archery competition earlier.”
“Thank you... But you don’t have to be so polite to someone as young as me. Please, speak freely,” Jou Ran replied with a smile. He looked to be around five centimeters taller than I was, and his drooping eyes made him look like a really kind person.
“It looked like Ai Fa shoved you. Did you have some sort of quarrel?”
“Ah, no, not really... It’s always like that, so there’s no need to worry about it,” I replied, intentionally shifting my tone away from the polite one I usually used when first meeting someone. It was incredibly embarrassing that he had seen that exchange, though.
“I’m glad to hear that. The Fa clan is extremely important to us, so it would make me sad if you two were to quarrel.” He really seemed to be as kind and gentle as he appeared, and he was also the politest man I had spoken to, aside from Gazraan Rutim. “Well then, I’ll be heading back. I’m looking forward to enjoying the food you all prepare.”
With that, Jou Ran headed back to Baadu Fou. It seemed they were getting preparations underway for the third competition over there.
“He seemed a little odd to me. Did you talk with him, Saris Ran Fou?”
“Yes. Since we haven’t seen each other in a while, he came over to greet me,” Saris Ran Fou said, her expression looking kind of complicated. “I’m not completely certain of this, but...it seems to me that Jou Ran is rather fixated on Ai Fa.”
“On Ai Fa? What do you mean?”
“Well, how should I put it...? He said he wasn’t proud of beating Ai Fa at something she wasn’t skilled at, but that he was looking forward to seeing how the remaining three contests would go, as they seem to be her specialties.”
I didn’t really understand, but, well, it did seem to be true that he was paying a lot of attention to Ai Fa.
“What’s that about? Ai Fa’s strength should be well-known throughout the neighboring clans, so maybe he sees her as a goal to try to beat?”
“Perhaps so. At the very least, he didn’t seem to have any ill will toward Ai Fa.”
In that case, I felt like there was no need to worry. Saris Ran Fou’s calm nature seemed to be rubbing off on me, honestly. The young man’s hard-to-grasp aura might have been contributing to that impression too.
Well, there are all sorts of folks out there, even among the people of the forest’s edge. So long as we get along, I’ll be able to find out what kind of guy he is naturally.
At any rate, there were three competitions left. Under Baadu Fou’s orders, we went ahead and moved toward the arena for the next one.
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