Outing
The high autumn sky and the leaves dyed in brilliant colors.
There was not much time left before they all fell and became a blanket covering the ground.
It was late autumn.
Beautiful.
Looking up at a scene she had gazed down upon thousands of times felt strangely refreshing.
Perhaps that was why Valdrova could not take another step.
The sensation of becoming part of that scenery felt far too precious.
An outing...
Not a march to slaughter monsters, but a simple outing for the sake of enjoyment.
It was nothing remarkable, yet she could not calm her pounding heart.
What if she made a mistake?
She must not make a mistake...
Repeating that to herself, she took a deep breath and finally began to walk.
I wonder what the village Ferda built looks like.
After centuries of seclusion, Valdrova encountered a human settlement for the first time.
It was the village being constructed below Valdrova Castle.
This is... a village?
In Valdrova's last memories, houses had been built from stone, mud, and wood.
Then what were these?
There were only tents.
People had gathered around them and were busily working.
Human civilization has regressed terribly in the meantime.
Valdrova could not hide her dismay.
Luri had clearly told her that the territory was prospering...
Had she lied so Valdrova would not worry?
"Hey, you there. Who are you?"
As she stared blankly at the settlement, someone approached her.
Valdrova flinched and turned her head.
He was a rough-looking man in his thirties who appeared to have spent years being battered by hard living.
Valdrova found herself overwhelmed by him.
It was not simply because he looked intimidating.
A human spoke to me.
It was merely a symptom of her fear of people.
A human other than Ferda had casually approached her and asked who she was.
For a moment, Valdrova felt as though time itself had stopped.
What should she say?
Should she run away?
"What is it? Why aren't you saying anything? Did you take a vow of silence or something?"
A vow of silence?
She had no idea what that meant, but Valdrova nodded for the time being.
The man accepted it without asking any further questions.
"Ah, I see. So you're a knight who swore an oath to Alte. Are you wandering around hoping to earn a knighthood at Valdrova Castle?"
She shook her head.
"No? Then I suppose you're from a knightly family and became an adventurer... Still, I think you've come a little too early. We're right in the middle of building the village. We need to get the houses up quickly, but this is a mess..."
The man clicked his tongue.
Valdrova tilted her head and pointed at the tents.
She was asking whether those were not already houses.
"Huh? What are you talking about? Those are just temporary places to stay until the village is finished. They're not houses!"
Oh.
So those were not houses.
Valdrova awkwardly scratched her head.
"You really don't know much about the world, do you? Well, I suppose that happens. Those are temporary tents. What we need now are communal barracks. Proper buildings that can block the winter wind and let people warm their hands by a fire. We need to hurry if we want everyone to stay warm before winter arrives."
"They said they posted recruitment notices throughout the Empire to bring in more workers, but we haven't heard that a single person applied. Do you know why?"
Valdrova shook her head.
"It's because no one wants to be dragged off to the front lines. I probably would've felt the same way. Life inside the barrier is hard enough, so what do you think the world outside it must be like? Young people these days would rather tremble in fear and die inside the Empire. No spirit. No spirit at all."
"..."
"Which brings me to this, friend. Are you strong?"
Strong.
Strength was all she possessed.
That was why she was known as the Dragon who embodied fire and power.
Valdrova nodded without much confidence.
"We've got a few others like you around here. I'm the foreman for this construction project. Since you look strong, how about giving us a hand? I won't stop you if you have somewhere else to be, but if you plan on working in the Far East, we need to finish this place as quickly as possible, don't we?"
The man offered Valdrova a laboring job.
She appeared to be a knight or an adventurer, but he was so desperate for workers that he did not hesitate.
Valdrova looked around again after hearing the offer.
The people living in the tents wore padded clothing, but they still hunched over whenever the cold wind struck them.
They must be very cold.
It would be even colder sleeping inside those tents.
In that case, what I can do is...
After considering it, Valdrova nodded.
"That's what I like about adventurers... Wait, you're actually agreeing to do it?"
Nod, nod.
"Huh."
The man stared at her with wide eyes as though she were some rare oddity.
The foreman had made the same suggestion to several adventurers before, but she was the first to accept.
Who would willingly choose to perform such hard manual labor?
"All right. I'll inform the administrator. My name's Hanson. You can just call me Foreman... Ah, right. You took a vow of silence. I'll give you a whistle later, so use that to call for me whenever you need something."
Nod, nod.
"Before you start working... how about taking off that armor?"
The armor?
This?
Valdrova pointed at her helmet.
"Yes, the armor."
Clatter!
Valdrova jolted and shook her head violently.
"How are you supposed to work while wearing something like that?"
Shake, shake!
"You're not worried about appearances between men, are you? Is there some reason you can't show your face?"
Nod, nod!
"Huh. You can't show your face, and you've taken a vow of silence. You're quite the mysterious fellow."
Hanson told her several more times to remove it before finally giving up.
What did clothing matter?
As long as she was strong, that was all that counted.
Hanson immediately put her to work.
He led Valdrova toward a pile of logs.
"See those logs over there? We need to move every one of them in front of the men sawing timber on the other side. Simple enough, right?"
Nod, nod.
"Then go stand at the other end. We'll have to lift them together and load them onto the cart one by one. All right. One, two—hnng...!?"
Something was wrong.
He had braced himself and stood up, but there was strangely no resistance.
Unless the timber had somehow been made from bundles of feathers, this should have been impossible.
Hanson lowered his gaze in disbelief.
The log was floating in the air.
The knight standing at the opposite end had lifted it alone.
With one hand.
As though it weighed nothing at all.
The helmeted knight stared silently at the foreman.
"Where should I put this?"
"Uh, you can put it over there... sir."
The casual way Hanson had addressed her vanished, replaced by sudden politeness.
Valdrova began moving the log exactly as she had been told, carrying it by one end.
Even someone known for their strength would not be able to hold a log that way without losing balance.
"Isn't it heavy?"
Valdrova shook her head.
Seeing that she appeared completely unbothered, Hanson asked cautiously,
"Could you perhaps carry two at once?"
Valdrova nodded and effortlessly lifted two logs.
With one hand, just as before.
"Then... how many more do you think you can carry?"
Valdrova tilted her head.
She did not know either.
But there was no reason she could not find out now.
She continued adding logs one at a time until she was holding a stack of ten.
She was carrying enough timber to fill two carts all by herself.
Hanson stared at the sight with his mouth hanging open.
He was not the only one astonished by the display of strength.
"What the hell is that?"
"He's carrying all of those by himself?"
The workers nearby naturally began turning their attention toward her.
A knight in full armor was carrying ten logs at once, so whispers quickly spread through the construction site.
Was I not supposed to do that?
The attention frightened Valdrova, and she hurriedly set the logs back down.
Hanson snapped out of his daze and shouted at the others.
"What are you all staring at?! Get back to work!"
After he growled at them threateningly, the workers returned to their stations.
Hanson approached Valdrova and tried to reassure her.
"Now, now, Sir Knight. Don't worry. Anyone who treats you like some kind of spectacle will have their head personally straightened out by Hanson himself!"
He made chopping motions with the edge of his hand while producing swishing sounds with his mouth.
To Hanson, Valdrova was an invaluable, top-class worker.
After being coaxed and reassured, she resumed working.
Though even if he had not said any of that, she had intended to continue anyway.
They need to build the houses quickly.
She wanted to help them sleep in warm homes before the northern cold descended upon the land.
At the very least, she wanted them to be able to sleep without worry.
It was the best someone as simple-minded as her could do.
"That should be enough for today. Excellent work, Sir Knight!"
Valdrova followed the foreman's gaze and looked up at the sky.
The sun was already sinking toward the west.
She thought there was still time left and tried to continue working, but Hanson stopped her.
"Ah, that's enough. The sun is setting, isn't it? Once it gets dark, we sleep and leave the rest for tomorrow. Everyone is exhausted."
Oh.
So that was how it worked.
Valdrova nodded.
Hanson headed toward an area where people had gathered.
The workers returned their tokens there and collected their daily wages.
Hanson submitted Valdrova's token as well and received her payment for her.
He returned carrying a pouch of money and grumbled,
"Those damned bastards. You completed in one day what four people would've needed a whole week to finish, but they said they could only pay you the wages of ten workers instead of fifteen. Aren't they shameless?"
Valdrova had no idea.
So she nodded anyway.
"The people above us are always the problem. That regent named Ferda must've ordered them to do it! He's still young, but he's already acting like a miserly little—hup!"
Hanson abruptly shut his mouth.
From beyond the shadow of the helmet, he felt a gaze drilling into him.
"Ah, forgive me. You're a knight, after all. I suppose it was improper to insult a noble in front of you. Please understand. I'm just a middle-aged man with nothing to his name, letting off some steam."
"..."
"I'd give you more from my own pocket if I could, but please accept this for now. In return, I'll become one of your connections and help you greatly in the future. How does that sound?"
Had Valdrova known even the slightest thing about the adventuring profession, she would have understood how useless that promise was.
But she had no idea what the man was talking about.
So she simply nodded again.
"Ha! I knew you were a generous man! Here you are."
Hanson held out a heavy pouch.
The jingling sound from within was familiar.
It sounds like the gold coins piled inside my treasury.
It was similar to the sound they made whenever she lightly tapped the pile with one of her claws.
Valdrova accepted the pouch.
"Come to think of it, Sir Knight, this is your first time here. Do you have somewhere to stay? If not, I could arrange a cot for you..."
Experiencing life among humans was enjoyable, but she could not stay there overnight.
Valdrova nodded, then absentmindedly pointed toward the Lonely Mountain.
Realizing her mistake, she quickly pointed in the opposite direction instead.
"Are you leaving this place for good?"
Hanson asked with a troubled expression.
Valdrova shook her head, and relief returned to his face.
"Ah, so you're merely staying somewhere else. Understood. Come back whenever you'd like to help with the construction. Having someone like you around makes us feel incredibly secure!"
Unable to answer him, Valdrova repeatedly nodded.
She needed to leave quickly.
With that thought, she turned around.
"Sir Knight?"
"You said you were going home. Where are you going?"
Valdrova's feet had begun carrying her toward the Lonely Mountain.
Oh.
That was not the direction she had pointed.
Looking embarrassed, Valdrova turned around and began walking the other way.
Hanson burst out laughing at the sight.
"Take care on your way back! And don't run into any monsters!"
After exchanging farewells, she left the village behind.
Once it was no longer visible to the naked eye, Valdrova made a wide circle and headed back toward her lair.
It took her only three seconds to return.
She pushed open the enormous iron gate, entered her home, and lay down.
Still wearing her armor, she stared up at the pitch-black ceiling.
"What was that?"
It had been a strange day.
The entire day had passed in the blink of an eye.
She was not tired, but she did not really understand what had happened either.
She had simply continued moving things, and the people had admired her.
Did I... help them?
The realization that merely doing that had been enough left her dazed.
Valdrova opened the pouch resting on her chest.
Ten copper coins per worker.
One hundred coins in total—the wages of ten people.
She carefully stacked them and stared down at the small pile.
Money given to her by humans.
Money they gave me because they were grateful.
They had thanked her.
They told me to come back tomorrow.
Their faces appeared clearly in Valdrova's mind.
Not trembling in fear, but smiling brightly.
Humans want me there.
She did not know how to express the emotion swelling inside her.
She wanted to share this joy that felt as though it might burst from her chest.
"Luri..."
The first person who came to mind was the girl who knew her best.
The kindhearted girl who had served her faithfully for so many years.
"...I can't tell her."
Valdrova instinctively covered her mouth.
Luri was loyal, but when she became angry, she was more frightening than anyone.
She would undoubtedly lecture Valdrova about the dignity of a dragon or something equally troublesome.
It would only make both of them worry, so she decided to keep it secret.
She needed someone else with whom she could share it.
"Then... Ferda?"
The kind man.
She had always needed a subject to discuss with him.
This was an especially good one.
Her heart tickled pleasantly.
A foolish smile spread across her face, and her body shifted restlessly as though it did not know what to do with itself.
She wished Ferda were there to soothe that feeling.
No. Not yet.
Valdrova hugged the pouch of copper coins tightly.
She wanted to tell Ferda, but now was not the right time.
This village was being built according to Ferda's will.
She wanted to save the coins one by one and eventually present him with a gift that would truly surprise him.
Someday, when the village prospered, she wanted to tell him that she had helped raise its foundations.
That she had built it with her own hands.
That destruction was not the only thing she was capable of.
She wanted to see the expression he would make.
She wanted to hear how he would praise her.
And so, she decided to keep it carefully hidden.
Even so, the feeling was too precious to keep entirely inside her chest, and his name slipped unconsciously from her lips.
"Ferda..."
Valdrova uttered the name with tender affection.
"I... helped you, Ferda."
That was the first step Valdrova had taken.
The beginning of a small change.
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