Chapter 200 : Hey! Get On!

I slid on the ice, holding Hud in my arms.

And then I looked down at Hud, who was surprisingly docile in my arms.

I was planning on having a big fight, but if she's caught this easily, it takes the fun out of it.

I said, just in case.

"Hey, noble lady. I'm saying this just in case you misunderstand. This is a kidnapping. Are you going to be kidnapped so obediently? Aren't you going to resist fiercely?"

Hud, who had been looking behind her until then, raised her head and looked at me.

"Should I? Resist?"

"Yes."

Hud looked at me blankly for a moment, and then she shook her head.

"I won't."

"Why?"

"Just because. It's my choice."

"No, if you were going to do this, you should have just gone with me when I said let's go back, instead of being a nuisance."

When I grumbled, Hud reached out and pinched my cheek.

"Oh, you. Are you going to keep talking back to a noble lady?"

"Lady, my ass."

Hud let go of the cheek she had been pinching and said.

"...You understand. A lady's heart is like a reed."

"Lady, do you want to be tied up with reeds?"

Hud smiled faintly.

"That might not be so bad."

"...Ugh."

I got goosebumps.

"Lady, I want to throw you. Into a cliff or a fiery pit."

"If you throw me, you die."

I didn't want to die, so I carried her and pushed through the crowd in the square.

Perhaps because the commotion had started on the other side, the people here were still standing around blankly instead of running away.

And then, when I suddenly appeared as an ice god, they were busy running away.

"Get back!"

"He's taking the young lady!"

"Be calm! Form an encirclement!"

Anyway, their goal was the safe recovery of the noble lady in my arms, so they didn't just chase me, but formed an encirclement from a distance and slowly closed in.

The Heavenly Demon praised them.

[They're smart. They're well-trained.]

Just from that, I could guess that these Richtiello guys were different from other trashy nobles.

Under the command of the knights, the soldiers pushed the people back and slowly began to close the encirclement.

"Hmm."

I took in the scene and stopped going in a straight line, and switched to a curve.

I slowly turned and began to draw a large circle.

Hud asked.

"Why aren't you running away right away?"

"I'm going to get away in one go."

"How?"

"Just watch quietly."

I can't use my hands because I'm holding the noble lady with both hands.

Since there's a restriction, I can't just knock them down and get away.

I have to change the plan.

But if I run away with them in tow, it's going to be annoying.

I have to create a large gap. In one go.

As the encirclement gradually tightened, I drew a smaller and smaller circle.

As I was elegantly sliding on the white frozen ice rink, drawing several circles...

I found a kid who hadn't been able to run away, standing there blankly and looking at me.

The guy muttered as he looked at me.

"...Ashuban of the Half-Sword?"

Has my fame already spread this far?

A smile appeared on my face out of pride.

I threw the noble lady I was holding up high.

"You're going to dieeeeeee!"

Hud's threatening cry stretched out long and soared high into the sky.

"Young lady!"

"Th-th-that...! That crazy guy dares to touch the young lady!"

"I'll catch her! You guys catch him!"

I could hear the surprised shouts of the loyal soldiers and the command of the loyal knight.

Whatever.

I confirmed that the noble lady was flying in the trajectory I had planned, and then I grinned at the kid.

It was a refreshing smile, even if I do say so myself.

"Nice to meet you, boy. I'm called the Cool Storm."

As soon as those words were finished, a knight pulled the kid back, wrapping his arm around him as if to evacuate him, and almost at the same time, spears flew in from all directions.

I jumped up and lightly dodged them.

Clang!

Sharp spears crossed in a circle where I had been.

As I jumped up, I created the Floating Step and instantly wrapped my whole body in the wind.

When I twisted my body in the air and spun once, the wind became even stronger.

I spun quickly like that, and then I put the rotational force into the strengthened wind and jumped up into the air, stepping on the crossed spears below.

"Hahaha!"

The ground quickly moved away, and the sky got closer.

My heart turned blue.

I flew up to the sky and caught Hud, who had just reached her maximum height, in my arms like a princess.

At the same time, I gave the noble lady a blue smile.

"Hello, lady. The air is a bit cold."

The angry Hud pinched my cheek hard.

"I told you not to throw me out!"

"Gyaaaak!"

I ran on the roof of the building like a storm, using my lightness skill, while the noble lady, whose hands were spicy, tore at my cheek.

Maybe because my cheek was being torn, I seemed to have gotten faster?

The soldiers, who had been forming an encirclement, couldn't follow me right away because they had just regrouped in a circle.

Thanks to that, we easily shook off the soldiers and ran on the roofs of the city, escaping the city.

I, who had become a successful kidnapper, smiled with satisfaction.

"Kidnapping successful."

Hud glared at me.

"You're so great."

"I'm a little hungry. What do you want to eat for dinner?"

"Where is there a kidnapper who asks so kindly?"

"That's right. I'm a revolutionary kidnapper. What if a revolution in the kidnapping world starts with this case?"

Hud let out a small laugh and rubbed her eyes.

"My tears have stopped."

I used my lightness skill and asked.

"Where to, my lady?"

The lady smiled quietly and said.

"To Sherwood, please."

***

After leaving the city, we joined up with Shushruta and Linda, who had gone out first.

We all rode on the dark blue tiger spirit.

On the way, I explained my journey in the Blake Kingdom to Hud in more detail.

In the middle, Shushruta and Linda's testimonies followed.

Perhaps because she had seen my martial arts and lightness skill, she seemed to be listening more carefully than before.

But she often tilted her head as if she couldn't believe it easily.

After finishing the story, I asked what I had been curious about all along.

"I have a question."

"What is it?"

"Your original name was Richtiello. Where did the name Everett come from?"

"...."

Hud kept her mouth shut for a moment.

I, who was a hundred dan in reading people, quickly realized the answer.

"Don't tell me you made it up? No wonder, the feel of it is so—"

"It's my deceased mother's name."

"...It's so good that it will shine brightly in my heart forever."

I barely managed to escape the crisis.

When I looked behind me, Shushruta and Linda were giving me a thumbs up.

No one can match my ability to improvise.

[You pathetic fool.]

I left the quiet Hud alone and got lost in thought.

Everett is her deceased mother's name.

I don't know the details, but I think this one also had a bumpy life.

Not all nobles are the same.

Just like me, she must have been living while hiding one or two pains from the past.

'Everyone has a name buried in their heart.'

Just like Tina was to me.

Hud had Everett.

Looking at it this way, everyone here was a guy with a winding life story.

A back-alley orphan who had never seen his parents' faces, a beast girl who was abandoned in the mountains and grew up with wolves, a madwoman who was kidnapped and forcibly injected with poison, and a noble lady who had left her family for some unknown reason.

It's a gathering of similar lives.

Suddenly, I remembered what the leader had said.

'Do you know why I made the mercenary corps?'

'Why?'

'I just... wanted to live well with the insignificant guys. That's all.'

I looked at the back of Hud's head, who had become quiet, and muttered softly.

"...So that's what it was."

They say that the position makes the man.

Now that I've taken the leader's position, I'm starting to see the things he saw.

***

We talked a lot while moving to Milestone, where the Sherwood hideout was.

In the process, Hud also became quite close with the guys.

Linda seemed a little wary at first, but when Hud showed her various tricks with her spirit art, she was quickly captivated and lost her heart.

...She's not a kid.

As for Shushruta, the romantic phantom thief who steals people's hearts, she started a conversation with topics like 'What's your favorite food? I like dried fruit,' and then she also lost her mind to Hud's spirit art and asked a flood of questions about spirits with sparkling eyes.

...She said she was going to steal hearts, but isn't she the one who's getting her heart stolen?

Well, does it matter?

Because her theory was that you have to give your heart first to get the other person's heart.

We moved while talking a lot.

Of course, it wasn't a distance that could be covered in a day, so we camped in the middle.

Camping became very easy when the spirit user joined.

Because the spirits did the work that people would normally do.

The spirit user gathered firewood, made a fire, and prepared a place to sleep with just a few words.

Shushruta and Linda fell asleep first, and I sat with my old comrade with the bonfire in the middle.

It was adult time.

Since adults are not very talkative, we just stared at the crackling bonfire for a long time without saying anything.

Of course, it wasn't just the two of us.

All sorts of spirits that had followed Hud were divided into two groups and clung to me and Hud.

There was the Hud faction and the Ashuban faction.

Even if I chased them away, they kept clinging to me, so I had reached the stage of just giving up.

I let them do as they pleased.

I gave my bosom to the spirits and watched the bonfire, surrounded by them.

Now that I looked, there was also a spirit in the bonfire.

It was a guy that looked like a lizard, and it was sleeping soundly in the fire as if it were cozy.

As I was watching the guy sleep with fascination, I suddenly raised my head.

I met Hud's eyes, who was looking at me blankly.

Hud looked at me silently... and then she burst into tears again.

I sighed.

"Stop crying. Are you Viola the crybaby?"

"...But. I really thought you were dead."

When Hud cried, the spirits licked her or rubbed their heads against her as if to comfort her.

I looked at the sobbing Hud and then shifted my gaze to the bonfire.

"Have you heard any news about the other guys?"

Hud rubbed her eyes and answered.

"I heard Hatz and Sorrow are making a fuss in the north."

"I heard that too. It seems that multi-personality guy is going to be making a fuss there until winter comes."

"Is he waiting for the monster wave?"

"I don't know. Anyway, I'm going to go and get him when he calms down. What about the rest?"

Hud shook her head.

"I've been buried in paperwork, so I haven't heard anything."

Crackle— Crackle—

I looked at the bonfire for a moment and then asked in a low voice.

"...Any news about Siri?"

"I haven't seen Siri since then either. I haven't heard anything either."

"When was the last time you saw her?"

"When? When we were setting up your tombstone next to that girl named Tina in Schirnberg. She was hugging the tombstone and crying in the rain, that was the last time."

It wasn't hard to imagine Siri crying sadly in the rain.

"...Is that so?"

I vaguely remembered a conversation I had with the guy a long time ago.

—Brother! Where are you going?

—I'm going to smash a magical beast's head.

—Wow! Let's go together!

I seemed to hear her innocent voice faintly in my ears.

'...Siri. Where did you go?'

I found her smile in the flickering flames.

***

I'm back.

To Milestone.

Hud looked around the streets of Milestone with a surprised face.

"Why is it so empty? There are no people."

But this was actually an increase compared to when I first came.

It seemed that people were slowly gathering at the news that Sherwood was back.

"It will get more and more crowded."

I took Hud, who was looking around the streets with a new sense of wonder, to the hideout.

Hud asked.

"Is Sven still here?"

"Of course. He's doing well. Shall we go and eat there for dinner?"

"That's good. What about you guys?"

Shushruta answered in an excited tone.

"Good. Pig's feet are always welcome."

Linda asked with a dumbfounded face.

"What are pig's feet?"

Come to think of it, it was Linda's first time here.

Shushruta glared at her as if she were pathetic.

"You don't even know what pig's feet are?"

...She didn't know until a while ago either.

Linda became dejected at Shushruta's scolding.

"I've never heard of it before."

Shushruta explained about pig's feet to Linda with a proud expression, as if she were teaching her a lesson.

"Pig's feet are..."

I couldn't help but laugh at Linda, who was listening intently.

I let out a small laugh and then walked to the hideout.

And so we arrived at the Sherwood hideout.

"What, what's going on?"

For some reason, soldiers in armor were lined up in front of the hideout with a fierce momentum.

People were whispering, wondering what was going on.

When I looked closely, I could hear sharp shouts coming from inside the hideout.

Wondering what was going on, I hurried to the hideout, and a knight blocked my way.

"Halt."

"...?"

"The Baroness of Montgomery is visiting. Do you have business?"

"What are you talking about?"

"If you do, you must first get permission—"

Slap—

A clear sound echoed in the street.

...Thud.

The knight who had been speaking solemnly fell unconscious with a single slap.

The soldiers blinked their eyes at the sudden situation.

"It's my house, what permission do I need?"

I grumbled and strode towards the hideout.

Hud followed me with a small laugh.

"Your personality is still the same."

(End of Chapter)

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