Chapter 15

If you were to ask any villager for their opinion on Karil's parents, they would all say the same thing:

"They were a pair who should never have had children."

Karil himself agreed with this sentiment.

However, unfortunately, Karil was born to those very parents.

Moreover, Karil had never seen his father's face.

By the time he was old enough to understand, he was already living with his mother in the village.

While many parents told their children heroic tales and folk stories as bedtime stories, Karil's mother would tell him about the various foods, crafts, landscapes, and festivals she had seen on her travels, her eyes shining with excitement.

And she would always conclude her travel stories with the same words:

"If it weren't for Karil, we could have gone to so many more places."

It was said that Karil's mother had run away from the village with his father and returned pregnant.

Raising a child alone in a remote village was difficult.

However, thanks to the rare herbs she had brought back from her travels and the knitting techniques and special embroidery patterns she had learned, she managed to earn enough to live, as long as they didn't indulge in luxuries.

Perhaps because her life was more rooted in her travels than in the village, Karil's mother's interests always leaned outward.

This was likely the reason for her frequent remark that if Karil hadn't been born, she wouldn't have needed to return to the village.

Karil heard this every day.

Karil first held a sword when he was five years old.

Determined even as a child, Karil declared to his mother with a wooden practice sword in hand:

"I'll become strong enough to take you on a journey!"

If he was the reason they had to return to the village, then he would take the responsibility to take her on a journey.

It might take time, but he was determined to do it.

His mother smiled wryly and, perhaps unconsciously, dismissed him.

"It wouldn't mean anything without that man."

From the beginning, there was nothing Karil could do.

He was born with the sin of ending his parents' travels and was never asked for anything.

Still, Karil continued to swing his sword. Even if he wasn't needed, he thought his mother still longed for the journey itself.

On the day he turned ten, Karil, who was picking mountain vegetables, was called by the village chief.

"Your father has returned. You might think it's too late, but it's better to meet him. You can hit him, and we won't say a word."

It was a shock to learn that his father, whom he thought was dead, was alive, and even more shocking that he had returned to the village after so long.

Karil had never heard anything about his father from his mother.

Carrying a half-filled basket of mountain vegetables, Karil ran down the mountain and returned home with all his might, only to find a single letter left in the empty house.

"Since his business has finally taken off, I'm going with him. You can do what you like with the things in this house."

Watching the village chief and others, who were furious upon hearing the situation from Karil, Karil felt oddly resigned.

From beginning to end, he had been a presence of no interest to his parents, someone who could be there or not, and didn't need to be taken along.

To his parents, Karil was the same as the village.

Calming the village chief and others, who were urging him to chase after and hang his parents, Karil sold the household items and started going to the town's dojo.

His parents didn't matter to him.

However, he wanted to leave a mark that he had lived, even if he was a presence that could be there or not.

He wanted to leave evidence that he had existed, and so he swung his sword.

He wanted to serve a lord someday and have his name listed among the knights.

Earning a living as an adventurer and forming a party with Furlau and others, Karil realized he had no talent for the sword.

Fifteen years after he first held a sword, at the age of twenty, Karil was anxious.

Junior adventurers were surpassing them and reaching B-rank. Some were even reaching A-rank.

Furlau and the others, understanding that not everyone had talent, saw adventuring as a means to earn money, but Karil didn't give up.

If he gave up on the fifteen years he had spent with a sword, those fifteen years would become fifteen years of nothing.

Desperate, Karil wandered through various dojo, hoping to find a sword style that suited him.

On days when he had no adventuring requests, he would train at a dojo, and if he was refused entry, he would break in as a dojo challenger. No matter how many times he was knocked down, he would steal their techniques.

Twenty years of holding a sword, and the wall of talent remained unbroken. At the age of thirty, after twenty-five years, Karil lost his arm on a mission.

—Twenty-five years were wasted.

*

Facing Ryo in a proper stance, Karil responded with a low stance, holding a bottle of alcohol in his left hand.

"I'm not saying you should quit the sword. I'm saying you should look at other things. If you know you don't have talent, you should focus on other fields and hone your skills now."

Ignoring Karil's words, Ryo took a step back to create distance.

Observing Ryo, who was still in a stance, Karil clicked his tongue.

Ryo's eyes, which tried to take in Karil's entire body and catch the slightest movement, reminded him of himself when he was a dojo challenger.

"You have a nasty look in your eyes..."

Karil muttered and instantly lifted his right foot off the ground, stepping forward and shifting his center of gravity to the front of his body. Just as a light footstep was about to sound, the bottle in Karil's left hand struck Ryo's wooden sword from below.

A powerful strike that made Ryo stagger. Ryo's eyes widened at the fact that it was delivered with one arm.

However, Ryo's recovery was quick, thanks to his footwork practice. He deflected the sword with wrist flexibility and quickly retreated to prepare for a counterattack, moving to a forty-five-degree angle from Karil's front.

But Ryo's unrefined movements were just clever.

Karil bent his knees and pointed the bottom of the bottle at Ryo.

"There's no way you can steal a powerful strike."

He concentrated the momentum of his lunge into the bottom of the bottle. Ryo tried to knock it away with his wooden sword, but the unstable stance and lack of strength in his wooden sword were easily deflected.

Karil stopped the bottle just in front of Ryo's nose.

"Got it, Ryo? You only have enough strength to be deflected by a one-armed strike. Against small beasts, maybe, but against large beasts, your blade won't even cut. Don't waste all your time on the sword; look for other paths."

Without flinching at the bottle pointed at him, Ryo glared at Karil and said clearly:

"Karil, you're really miserable."

"I know. That's why I'm playing the villain to prevent you from making the same mistake."

"No, you're making the same mistake right now. If you want to comfort yourself, do it alone. It's embarrassing."

"…What?"

Still don't get it? Karil looked at Ryo as if he were a disobedient child, and his strong gaze made him flinch.

Just as Karil looked at Ryo as if he were a disobedient child, Ryo looked at Karil as if he were a failed adult.

"Because you don't have talent, right? I never thought about mastering the sword techniques I have now. I just enjoy creating sword techniques to protect myself. Karil, you just want someone to share your pain of giving up the sword because you lack talent. You discourage people's efforts and tell them to look for other paths, but you should create a sword that can be wielded with one arm before you say that, half-assed person!"

After his tirade, Ryo turned his gaze away from Karil, as if he had lost interest, and resumed his practice with the wooden sword.

Karil, taken aback, stared at Ryo's back with his mouth slightly open.

Ryo had shown him a way to bypass the wall that Karil had spent twenty-five years trying to overcome.

Karil lowered his left hand, which held the bottle.

He didn't think his twenty-five years were half-assed.

But when he lost his arm and gave up the path of the sword, Karil became a half-assed person.

If he had taken up the sword to leave evidence that he existed, even with one arm, the path of the sword was not cut off.

If he could hold a bottle, he could hold a sword.

He looked at Ryo.

Why did he think Ryo had a nasty look in his eyes?

Because he reminded him of his past self?

No. The look in Ryo's eyes, which sought ways to compensate for a lack of talent, was pushing Karil to realize he could still wield a sword.

Ryo suddenly stopped swinging his sword and turned to Karil.

"You said you didn't have talent for the sword, but maybe you have a talent for observing people who wield swords. Your advice to me was always reasonable."

"…But you didn't take the advice to quit the sword, right?"

"You're talking about quitting the kind of sword techniques you practice at the dojo, right?"

Saying this casually, Ryo resumed his practice.

Seeing Ryo's figure, Karil let out a deep sigh and called out to him.

"I'll give you some advice. If you want to be a half-assed person, that is."

"Didn't you just graduate from being a half-assed person?"

Ryo, who was spouting off, had Karil's left elbow placed on his head.

"You're cheeky, sword technique fool."