Hyakuren no Haou to Seiyaku no Valkyria - Volume 4 - Chapter Ep

Epilogue 

The night gave way to morning. 

The marshes of Náströnd were filled with the bodies of dead Panther Clan soldiers and horses, but the army itself had vanished. 

One could tell by looking just how heavy their losses had been. It seemed that they’d completely pulled out during the night, having judged that it was too dangerous to continue fighting here any longer. 

Yuuto cautiously advanced his troops to Myrkviðr and liberated the city, which the Panther Clan had completely abandoned. He and his retinue set up in the governor’s offices in the center of the city, resting and recovering from their string of hard-fought battles. 

“Hm, I’d like to take advantage of this momentum and keep pressing the attack all the way to Nóatún, but...” Yuuto stared up at the ceiling of a room in the governor’s office building, deliberating on his options. 

Just like with Sylgr, the city of Myrkviðr had sustained considerable damage and losses. The Panther Clan soldiers had been allowed to run rampant, and aside from most of the food being stolen, a substantial number of residents had been abducted as slaves, including women and children. 

And even with their victories in the field, the Wolf Clan itself had gained no new wealth or territory in the process. In fact, from a purely financial standpoint, this campaign had only resulted in huge losses so far. 

Even putting Yuuto’s personal motivations and feelings on the matter aside, as the ruler of his country, he would prefer to continue on so he could recoup that cost. However... 

“There are signs the Lightning Clan is raising an army again...” Yuuto muttered bitterly to himself, the missive from Iárnviðr clenched tightly in his fingers. 

The Lightning Clan had been made to suffer a bitter defeat at his hands in their previous war. With the Wolf Clan currently spending all of its resources on fighting the Panther Clan, they must have seen this as a good opportunity to strike and avenge that loss. 

“Urgh, this just had to happen now, of all times!” Yuuto shouted and slammed his fist against the wall in frustration. 

The majority of his mobilized troops had been deployed abroad on this campaign, leaving the Wolf Clan’s home territory relatively thinly defended. 

“If we moved immediately to advance on Nóatún, then captured it and returned as quickly as possible, we might make it just in... no, that logic’s already dangerous on its face.” Yuuto shook his head vigorously and tried to throw that line of thought from his mind. “That dancer girl might not even be in Nóatún.” 

As a military commander, basing his decisions on wishful thinking was a sure sign that he wasn’t thinking calmly, and he could tell that his own personal motives were too heavily mixed into his thought process to begin with. 

Furthermore, as a clan patriarch, Yuuto’s objective first and foremost was to protect the Wolf Clan. Whatever new territory or wealth he might capture abroad, allowing his nation’s homeland to be invaded would be putting the cart before the horse, to say the least. 

“If I tried to press onward at this rate, with my mind in such an ungrounded and restless state, I’m sure it’ll only end with Big Brother Loptr pulling the rug out from under me,” he muttered. 

Yuuto thought back to his confrontation with his former sworn brother, their first time meeting face-to-face in a year and a half, and recalled the wicked aura that had seemed to emanate powerfully from him. 

The man had shown no scruples about trampling over his own men with his horses to use them as stairs, a cold-hearted tactic that he had used without any hint of remorse. 

In addition to that, even though he held such a deep-seated resentment toward Yuuto and everything about him, he had been perfectly willing to make full use of Yuuto’s “cheats,” such as the stirrups and trebuchet. 

He’d even tried to cut down his own younger sister Felicia, with his full strength behind the blow. 

To put it bluntly, he had acted without a scrap of dignity or honor. 

His shamelessness was disgraceful, such a far cry from the older brother figure Yuuto had once looked up to. 

That was what was so terrifying about him. 

Perhaps he was unseemly. Perhaps he was unsightly. But the type of people who accomplish difficult, great things tended to be just that sort of person — someone with such a strong tenacity, even obsession, that they could act without regard for how others might view them. 

There was a good example from Chinese history, during the war known as the Chu-Han Contention at the end of the 3rd century B.C. The ruler of Western Chu, Xiang Yu, by insisting on maintaining honor and propriety in war, had met his defeat at the hands of the Han leader Liu Bang. Liu Bang had done whatever it took to win, including launching surprise attacks after a surrender or the signing of a peace treaty. 

Yuuto’s predecessor Fárbauti had also once said much the same thing. 

What separated success from failure, what determined life and death, wasn’t intelligence or brute strength, or authority or wealth. What won out over all of those in the end was determination, the firm resolve to follow through on all things, no matter what. 

“The resilience of a weed” was another way to put it. 

Before the events of a year and a half ago, Loptr hadn’t had that sort of strength. He had been an elite living his life on a successful career path, appointed to the prestigious position of a second-in-command despite his youth. 

That terrible incident had surely affected a great change in Loptr’s whole mindset, just as it had in Yuuto’s. 

“I’m ordering all troops to return home. We need to prepare ourselves for the Lightning Clan.” Yuuto passed along his command to Felicia, then sighed, his shoulders drooping. 

He’d finally regained his cool. And with that, he had also realized there was another harsh reality he had to confront. 

It was the sin he had committed, in terms of his role as patriarch. 

He was actually a bit unsettled that he hadn’t realized it until now. He must have really been flustered, to the point that he’d had mental blinders on. It looked like his decision to order a retreat had been the right call, after all. 

After entrusting Felicia with conveying the more detailed orders to his men, Yuuto whispered “All right...” to himself, lightly slapped both sides of his face with his palms to psych himself up, and left the office in search of a particular room. 

He hadn’t fully memorized the layout of the building yet, but after looking around for a bit, he was able to reach the room in question. 

He gulped once, a little nervous, but still opened the door without any hesitation. 

“How are you feeling, Assistant to the Second?” he called out to the owner of the room, who was busy sitting on his bed drinking alone. 

The Wolf Clan’s Assistant to the Second-in-Command, Skáviðr, had sustained a serious wound during the previous day’s battle, and was recuperating here. 

Skáviðr had protested that “a mere cut like this is nothing,” but the Wolf Clan couldn’t afford the risk of losing such a great warrior and general, so Yuuto had ordered him to rest. 

Noticing the alcohol, Yuuto was exasperated. “Oh good grief, don’t drink when you’re so injured. It’s gonna mess with your recovery, you know?” 

“Well, they say that liquor is the greatest medicine,” Skáviðr responded without missing a beat, and took another swig from his cup. 

He made a small sound, a grunt of discomfort. His injury was actually causing him a lot of pain, it seemed. The fact that he was drinking the night away like this despite that just went to show how much this man loved his alcohol. 

The cup in his hand was made of glass. Skáviðr had taken an immediate liking to using a glass cup for wine, remarking that its transparency let him enjoy the color and beauty of his drink. Despite his appearance, he was a man with refined tastes. 

Yuuto stood in front of Skáviðr and, with a serious expression, at last made his request. “Hey, Assistant to the Second. Could I get you to hit me? Hard. You don’t have to say anything.” 

“Master, what are you saying all of a sudden?” Skáviðr stared up at Yuuto, his eyes widened ever so slightly. This man was always the very picture of “cool and collected,” but even he couldn’t hide his surprise at what he’d just heard. 

“When the riders broke through our defense at the end, it was because of my poor judgment,” Yuuto explained. “We lost several men because of that. It’s why you have that wound. It’s all because in that moment I was too faint-hearted to be up to the task.” 

Yuuto finished speaking through tightly gritted teeth, looking Skáviðr in the eyes the whole time. 

Having reflected on what Loptr was like now, he keenly felt the greatest difference between them. 

Yuuto had shown in this campaign that he could outperform Loptr when it came to both strategy and tactics. However, in one specific area, he had completely lost: The strength of will and intent to defeat and kill one’s enemy, by any means possible. 

At the most critical moment, Yuuto hadn’t been able to stay cold-hearted and dispassionate. His mind had already been thrown into confusion by the prospect of a lead on how to get back home. And somewhere deep down, he hadn’t actually been able to rid himself of the hesitation that came from not wanting to kill his sworn older brother. 

When Loptr had launched his surprise attack, if Yuuto had given the order to fire, he might have been able to stop Loptr from breaking through into the formation. 

Of course, it was still possible that the outcome might have been the same even if he had given the order. But he couldn’t stop himself from dwelling on it. What if the fact that he hadn’t been tough enough to follow through had led to the loss of lives that could have been saved? 

The flame of a life, once extinguished, never burns again. Those soldiers surely had homes and families that were dear to them. The job of an army’s commander included seeing that as many soldiers as possible returned safely to their homes. 

It wasn’t that he felt that getting someone to punch him would absolve him for allowing those lives to be lost. This was war. He wasn’t deluded enough to think he could win without anyone dying. He also understood that it wasn’t realistic to expect a human being to avoid making any mistakes. 

But in this case, his failure had been due to his weak attitude. He hadn’t fully prepared himself for what needed to be done. In order that he not repeat that same mistake again, Yuuto wanted to knock some sense into himself so he could start anew. And the only person he could rely on to assist him in that was Skáviðr, a man who was always superficially polite but actually had no qualms about being frank with anyone, regardless of rank or position. 

Skáviðr took another sip from his wine glass, and then shrugged sardonically. “It’s true, I am the executioner of sentences for the clan. Still, against a force of ten thousand cavalry, an enemy unlike any we have ever faced, we killed two thousand of their men while only losing fewer than a hundred of our own. That was only thanks to your strategies, Master. What, exactly, is there to punish you for in those incredible results?” 

“Even so, I... I can’t forgive myself. I can’t forgive myself for my lack of resolve.” 

“Hm... I assume this has to do with the fact that the man in the iron mask was Loptr?” 

Yuuto was startled. “You figured it out?” 

“I realized it the moment I crossed spears with him. He got the better of me this time, but I will kill him next time.” Skáviðr spoke matter-of-factly, seemingly without any particular emotion regarding the issue. 

Considering that Loptr had been Skáviðr’s sworn brother in the clan, and his student in martial arts, it was pretty cold. But that cold detachment was something Yuuto found amazing, and it made him hate his current self even more by comparison. 

“I really am pitiful,” Yuuto berated. “I order my men to kill the enemies in front of them, I even made laws against cowardice in battle, and yet I’m like this. Once it came to war, I needed to cut myself off from any compassion for Big Brother Loptr, but...” 

“True, that is what needs to be done,” Skáviðr affirmed coolly, nodding. “In war, there is no place for compassion for the enemy. If you cannot be cold-hearted, you will not survive on the battlefield.” 

They were the words of a man who had made it home alive from countless battles, and they carried a great deal of weight. 

“Yeah...” Yuuto nodded, and hung his head low, sighing deeply. 

He’d known; of course he’d already known. But only in his head. He hadn’t truly felt it, because he hadn’t personally experienced the consequences. 

He felt his heart sink lower and lower as he reflected on his own uselessness. 

“But people will not follow someone who lacks any compassion,” Skáviðr went on. “I make for a good example.” 

“Huh?” Surprised, Yuuto raised his head to look at Skáviðr, who chuckled. He was wearing an uncharacteristically soft smile. 

“It is true that you have a soft heart, Master. But that kindness of yours has drawn a great many people to you, myself included. That is a fact. I would say that the current prosperity of the Wolf Clan is due in no small part to the strength of your character. They say that a man’s strengths and weaknesses are two sides of the same coin. Do not torment yourself so. Master, even if lives may have been lost because of your soft heart, they are far outnumbered by the number of people your kindness has saved.” 

Yuuto could tell that Skáviðr was kindly praising him, in his own way. But, truthfully, the words didn’t resonate with him. The Yuuto that Skáviðr was describing didn’t match at all with how Yuuto saw himself. 

Yuuto slowly shook his head. “I’m not a good person like you say I am, and I’m not kind, either. Actually, until just a few minutes ago, I hadn’t realized my mistake at all because I was so wrapped up in my own selfish issues. I’m an insensitive fool.” 

“And even so, you chose to confront your guilt over your mistake once you were aware of it,” Skáviðr said. “You did not turn your eyes away from it, nor did you make excuses. That isn’t something easily done. Normally, many of us push it from our minds, and pretend not to see it. ...Huh. Usually, it isn’t in my character to say these kinds of things.” 

With that, Skáviðr leaned on a cane for support to get to his feet, retrieved another glass from his belongings, and held it out to Yuuto. 

“Let us drink together, Master.” 

“Uh, no, I’m...” Yuuto was taken aback, and found himself unable to respond. 

There was no legal drinking age in the laws of the Wolf Clan. Of course, that was because Yuuto hadn’t used his position of authority to set one. Even so, alcohol was regarded as a drink for adults, and most people didn’t begin drinking until around at least age fifteen, after having been recognized as a grown-up by their peers, a sort of unspoken cultural rule. 

Yuuto didn’t have any intentions of bringing modern Japanese society’s rule of “don’t drink until you turn twenty” into his life here, but he also couldn’t come to like the way that alcohol clouded his mind. 

“Days like these are exactly when wine is called for, Master.” 

Skáviðr refused to back down, and with that declaration, he half-forcefully forced the glass cup into Yuuto’s hands, and poured wine into it. 

“I highly doubt that punching you will relieve you of your burdens,” Skáviðr went on, pouring some more wine into his own glass. “There are many problems in life that go unresolved, for which people cannot fully detach themselves from their regrets.” He raised his glass. “And, in times like those, people instead swallow everything along with a good drink.” 

Yuuto suddenly got a small sense of one of the reasons this man loved alcohol. 

He recalled a time back before they had gone to war with the Lightning Clan, when Skáviðr had cut down a man from the Wolf Clan who had committed an awful crime, and had boasted that he felt absolutely nothing. But of course, that wasn’t actually true after all. 

He had a sinister look to him, an appearance akin to the image of the grim reaper, but he was human, a person. For the sake of upholding justice and the law, he had to cut down his own fellow clansmen as their executioner, and had become a symbol of fear among the people of his homeland. There was no way he didn’t feel anything. 

Skáviðr was dealing with his own inner struggles. And, unable to truly fully detach himself from the emotions he felt, he was swallowing them along with his wine, and only showing others a cold mask that he wore. All because he believed that what he was doing was for a better future for the Wolf Clan. 

“......” Yuuto silently stared into the glass at the crimson liquid inside. 

It was the color of blood. No different from the blood of the men who had lost their lives because of him. 

He felt a sense of disgust well up within himself. Still, if he showed hesitation now, he felt like it would be as if he were turning his eyes away from his own accountability. 

Yuuto steeled himself, then downed the glass all at once. 

“...Ah! It’s sour, and... bitter, too.” 

Yuuto had always been perplexed at why adults loved to drink something like this, something that tasted unpleasant. Freshly squeezed fruit juice tasted miles better, for instance. 

But for some reason, right now he didn’t find the flavor to be all that bad. In fact, it was even a little comforting. 

“Heh, it’s only when he comes to know both the sweet and the bitter things in life that a boy becomes a man, Master.” 

With that, Skáviðr closed his eyes and tilted back his own glass. 

Epilogue II 

“It would seem that the Wolf Clan has begun to pull back their forces from abroad.” In a room of the central palace of the Lightning Clan capital Bilskírnir, a beautiful woman let out a deep sigh as she read the clay tablet message in her hands. 

The woman’s name was Röskva. Like her older brother Þjálfi, she served as one of Patriarch Steinðórr’s most trusted advisors, and her considerable talent was mainly directed towards the Lightning Clan’s domestic affairs. 

“I had wanted to be able to take this chance to reclaim a bit of what we lost, but...” Röskva sighed once more. “Well, no matter, we’ll back off quietly this time. Father is still far from fully recovered, anyway.” 

Her sworn father Steinðórr was currently still in recovery and receiving treatment for his many wounds. In the previous battle with the Wolf Clan, he’d been swept away by a violent flood and suffered broken bones in multiple places all over his body. 

However, true to his alias of Dólgþrasir, the Battle-Hungry Tiger of Vanaheimr, his body’s natural healing was beastly in its own right. 

Though he still felt pain in most of his joints, he was already walking freely around the palace grounds with his usual confident swagger, and at this pace, he would likely be fully ready for action again in less than a month. 

“Still, I’m amazed they were so easily able to repel an army of over ten thousand cavalry,” she said. “They have become far stronger than I anticipated. The growth of their domestic economy is also remarkable. At this rate, even were Father to return to the front lines, I have to say that it would be difficult for the Lightning Clan to take them on alone...” 

There was no denying that Steinðórr was invincible on the battlefield, the strongest hero in the land. But this Wolf Clan patriarch had also shown himself to be a freak of nature against whom common sense did not seem to apply. 

Steinðórr was the type of pure-spirited warrior who gained his life’s greatest joy from battling with powerful enemies, and the stronger his rival was, the more he enjoyed it. But for a woman like Röskva, the fact that men took pleasure in that sort of thing was incomprehensible. Her only objective was to ensure that her sworn father became the supreme ruler of all of Yggdrasil. 

She had taken upon herself the role of someone who supported him from behind the scenes, doing what she could to find the best method to make that goal a reality. 

The man sitting across from her chuckled. “Hmm, I see. Then I take it this means you will seriously consider our proposal?” 

He wore silken robes and carried himself with a certain graceful air, quite out of place here in the Lightning Clan, which was known for its brash and vulgar culture. 

Röskva smiled back at him. “Yes. I will find a way to persuade Father. I look forward to working with you, Lord Alexis.” 

“You can count on me. I will serve as mediator for Patriarch Steinðórr of the Lightning Clan and Patriarch Hveðrungr of the Panther Clan to exchange the Oath of the Sibling Chalice. I, Alexis, swear on my very life that I will make it succeed!”

To Be Continued