by Kumo Kagyu
Arc Mage didn’t tell him where they were going. And Goblin Slayer didn’t ask. There were goblins at her destination, and his job was to get rid of them. It didn’t matter where they were headed. He didn’t need to know anything except exactly what was required to do battle.
“Tell me, don’t you ever get hot in that costume?” Arc Mage loosened the collar of her own shirt—deliberately, it seemed—and fanned at her cleavage. Of course, as far as Goblin Slayer could see, there wasn’t a drop of sweat on her. The slight flush in her cheeks must have been from the alcohol. And even that was normal for her.
“No,” Goblin Slayer responded briefly, then looked up at the sky.
The sunlight was strong, so bright it threatened to blind him. Summer must be nearly here. It would only get hotter.
“I think it’s about time we found a place to camp for the night,” Goblin Slayer said. Arc Mage nodded.
“Can’t count on the wind in summer, can you?”
It was nearly the end of the second day since they’d left town.
§
“In the end, my quest for you is goblin slaying,” Arc Mage said with a smile. It was night, and she was sitting by the bonfire Goblin Slayer had made. To avoid any risk of starting a wildfire, he had cut down nearby grass, then gathered up dry branches and grass and used them for fuel.
“Is that so?” Goblin Slayer replied as he put a skewer of cheese-covered sausage on the fire.
When the cheese had started to melt, Arc Mage pulled it back off, muttering “hot, hot, hot!” as she bit into it. “Mmmm…!” By the way the edges of her mouth turned up in pleasure, she seemed to like it.
Goblin Slayer, who had purchased the food almost at random, let out a small breath of relief.
“This comes from that farm, doesn’t it? Did you do that on purpose?”
“The farm.” Goblin Slayer looked down once more at the skewer in his hand. It was well cooked now—did they make this sort of thing on the farm? He bit into it, and the cheese was sweet, the sausage salted just right. One bite, then two, disappeared into his steel helmet. “I hadn’t noticed.”
“…Are you that type? The type that just wants to fill their stomachs and get some nutrition and doesn’t care about anything else?” Arc Mage made a face that said, I can’t believe it, but he shook his head slowly from side to side.
“I am not picky, but my master taught me that if you want to stay alive, eat things that are warm and fatty.”
“Ho,” Arc Mage said, sounding impressed this time. “A personage of wide experience, it seems. Yes, I agree. If you have warm, fatty things, you can live.”
“He was a rhea.”
“Makes sense.” Arc Mage nodded and put her lips to the opening of the bottle of cider as if it were the mouth of a lover. Then she licked up the droplets and gestured at him with the hand holding the bottle. “That’s where we get the will to live. You eat what you want to eat.”
“…What I want to eat?”
“Damn straight. No need to deny yourself.” Arc Mage took a swallow of alcohol and a big bite of sausage as if to illustrate her point. “In that sense, I do wonder about the goblins.”
“…”
Goblin Slayer didn’t say anything, but picked up a good-sized stick and stirred the fire. When he looked closer, he saw that the stick was forked at the end. If one were to tie a rock there with some rope, it could be an excellent club.
“Are goblins happy, unhappy—? It must be easy, being completely ignorant, never thinking about anything.”
“…”
“But then again, look how thin they are, how wasted with hunger. Their appetites are never satisfied. They’re never full.”
“I don’t care,” Goblin Slayer said. He almost spat the words. “The issue is what decisions they will make, how they will act. Not how they think about what’s around them.”
“Yes, indeed. You’re absolutely right.” Arc Mage tilted the bottle of alcohol toward her, loath to waste a single drop.
The fire crackled. Goblin Slayer stirred it again.
“That’s why— Well, that’s why I don’t think it’s wrong of you to decide not to write a book about goblins.”
That was likely the reason he managed not to miss the last of her whispers. And it was probably to blame for why he couldn’t see her expression, either.
“The pursuit of knowledge isn’t a happy one. It takes such effort. First to obtain it, and then to live with it.
“And most people don’t even want it in the first place,” she added.
“People don’t want dry histories of heroes—they want romantic ballads.”
Goblin Slayer nodded. He had a sense of what she meant. He remembered, back in his own village, hearing a number of stories of heroes. Each had probably been mangled by the bard who sang it. But he had believed them and dreamed he would become an adventurer—or at least, that he wanted to be.
But he never could be. It simply wasn’t possible.
“Even the Monster Manual is like that. Look how hard we’re working, eh? And we’re hardly the only ones.”
Learning, researching, writing, editing. Arc Mage’s words seemed to dance through the night air.
Collating, binding, transport, delivery, reception, and storage…
The knowledge of how to do all those things was itself the great precondition to the production of the book.
“And that knowledge”—Arc Mage spoke with the mercilessness of someone cutting open the belly of a living thing out of absolute necessity—“we have no obligation to share for free with some kid who runs away from his village, can’t even read, and gets himself killed hunting goblins.”
Even if they were told, they wouldn’t have either the inclination or the capacity to understand what they were hearing.
That’s learning for you.
“So you won’t write a goblin book? Purely from the perspective of cost versus benefit, you’re absolutely right.”
Goblin Slayer thought for a moment. There had been a temple of the God of Knowledge in his village. A small one, but still… Looking back now, he wished he had gone to it more often. As it stood, he had no education other than the basic letters his sister had taught him.
“…I thought adherents of the God of Knowledge were passionate about spreading learning and study.”
“Yes, about gaining and sharing it. Their ideal world would be bounteous and kind and peaceful and sounds wonderful.”
Goblin Slayer thought again. A world where anyone and everyone had access to knowledge. He couldn’t imagine it. Reading and writing were one thing, but knowledge wasn’t something one was simply given.
Neither simply given, nor simply gained, he thought.
“But our world isn’t ideal, not by a long shot. It’s the gods’ tabletop, overflowing with fate and chance.”
I’ve got no sympathy for people who go ignorantly to their deaths. Not when I don’t even know their faces.
Thus, Arc Mage murmured—maybe she didn’t even especially intend for him to hear—and then once again put her lips lovingly to her cider bottle.
“The light of knowledge is thin, and the darkness of ignorance still o’erweening.”
“…”
“Your own knowledge might be one spark against that darkness.”
The words caused Goblin Slayer to move his helmet slightly, to look in her direction. In between the darkness of the night and the glow of the fire, he thought he could just see her eyes brimming.
Maybe it was an illusion. “Then,” he asked, “what about yours?”
She didn’t answer…except for the hint of an ambiguous smile that he caught just beyond the flames.
§
“And so we’ve come to a corner,” she said as they reached the edge of the field. The brush thinned out beneath their feet, bare earth becoming visible.
There was a wilderness ahead. A wasteland. The earth here was a dirty red color, as if seared by a flame; some said it was the afterm
ath of a great battle from the Age of the Gods.
That didn’t interest Goblin Slayer. He said only, “I see.”
“About one out of every four directions will yield one, in broad terms. Of course, it doesn’t have to be four.”
And once again, he repeated, “I see.” He did, however, add, “Is that our destination?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes.
“For example,” she said, giving a shake of her hand. She produced a die, the flourish unnatural, as if she were doing magic.
The die sparkled like the fang of a beast, or like a treasure. It caught the red light of the sun and scattered it everywhere.
“How many corners does this die have?”
“Eight.”
“Excellent. And faces?”
“Six.”
“Another superb answer.”
Now… Arc Mage gave an alluring smile, as if to an especially talented student. “If you come to one of those corners, what do you see?”
“…” Goblin Slayer thought for a second. Then he stated a simple fact. “Three faces, I suppose.”
“Indubitably!” Arc Mage smiled as if he had guessed exactly what she was thinking.
She didn’t appear to be aware of any danger, even though she was walking backward. Goblin Slayer adjusted the load on his shoulders and walked behind her, which was to say, in front of her.
“When you aspire to reach the top of a mountain, is the summit your true destination? Or the view? Or what’s beyond? That’s the question.”
“I see,” Goblin Slayer said for the third time. “So there are goblins there.”
“We finally found it, and look. It’s enough to make a girl’s heart break.”
Have a look.
Arc Mage spoke almost as if she could see behind herself, then turned around with a smile.
Goblin Slayer hadn’t noticed until she called his attention to it.
A dark tower. A great, looming shadow in the gloom.
It stood tall over the wasteland, reaching up to the sky.
He blinked behind his visor. Then he grunted. “…I missed it.”
“Not surprising. Only people who know about it can see it.”
Goblin Slayer nodded disinterestedly, then crouched down and looked closely at the tower’s entrance.
Yes, there they are.
Goblins moved like stains of ink against the shadows. Guards, most likely. They carried short spears and stood vacantly at their posts, looking tired.
“Thinking alone won’t tell us what in the world they’re doing here,” a voice whispered in his ear. He caught the faint whiff of cider and medicine.
Behind his visor, Goblin Slayer dropped his eyes, taking in Arc Mage where she leaned on his shoulder.
“I wonder if there was some kind of battle to the east. To bring the shades of the goblins’ deaths all the way out here.”
“Shades…?” He didn’t know this word very well.
Noticing his uncertainty, Arc Mage simply said, “I’ll explain later,” and laughed. “The easy way would be to climb the outer walls or fly through the air to make for the top, but I guess we can’t do that.”
“Climb the outer walls,” he echoed softly.
I see. That’s one possibility.
“…So we will go through the inside?”
“Yep. C’mon.”
Arc Mage twisted as if pulling out of a man’s grasp, coming off his shoulder. She still had the same pregnant grin on her face as always. She asked him, “What will you do?”
He answered. There was only one answer. No need to hesitate.
“I will kill all the goblins.”
It was clear what had to be done.
And where.
The only question…was how.
§
With the tower looming before them, the adventurer and his quest giver watched and waited for their chance.
Goblins grunted and growled at the entrance. There were no trees around the tower; the guards would be able to see for quite a distance.
There was just a single rosebush, large enough for two people to conceal themselves. Once they got past it, the goblins were sure to notice them.
“…There’s no shadow,” Goblin Slayer said softly. The sinking sun was falling behind the tower, wreathing it in darkness, but the tower itself cast no shadow. It should have been impossible unless the sun were at its zenith—no, even then.
“So it will be difficult for us to hide as we approach.”
Naturally, Goblin Slayer wasn’t concerned with such trivial details for their own sake. Then too, since goblins could see in the dark, he didn’t know whether hiding in the shadows really helped. Regardless, a full frontal assault without so much as an attempt at something better bothered him.
“Look close. The goblins don’t cast shadows either, right?” Arc Mage’s voice was fast and high-pitched; she made no effort to hide her excitement. “That’s because it’s all shadows. Shades can’t cast shadows. It only makes sense. See what I’m saying?”
“No,” he said bluntly. It came out as a soft grunt. “I don’t understand what these shades are that you keep talking about.”
“They’re what spell casters chase.” Arc Mage grinned, although Goblin Slayer saw nothing funny and remained silent. “I told you. Thinking about it won’t get you anywhere. They’ve respawned from some battle somewhere.”
“…”
“Meaning, just like the tower, the shades of those goblins are being cast from somewhere. For example…” She gave Goblin Slayer a pointed glance. “That green moon you talked about, say.”
“…So can we kill them?”
Arc Mage gave him an amorous wink. Then she chuckled, like when a child manages to correctly guess the answer; she sounded quite amused. “Things with no shadows lack something in life force. They’re flat, front and back the same. I won’t say there’s no way you can kill a shadow.”
“So we can kill them.” Goblin Slayer focused on the only part of that speech he understood, and this was the conclusion he drew from it. Otherwise, there would have been no point in his quest giver dragging him all this way out here.
Yes. Arc Mage nodded. “You know how we say ‘to shadow’? To imitate? It cuts both ways. What we do to the shade affects the thing that casts it. We can take advantage of the identification with the true tower…”
Then Arc Mage murmured, “I guess there’s no real point in discussing this,” and smiled.
“Well, think of it like a hex. Step on a goblin’s shadow, and he’ll die. It’s the same logic.”
“I understand,” Goblin Slayer said. He didn’t know anything about hexes. “That will do, then.”
There was only one thing that mattered.
He couldn’t understand this tower that had appeared out of nowhere, nor the goblins Arc Mage called shades.
“What you are saying is, those goblins can be killed.”
His next actions were swift as the wind. Once he knew what to do, there was no reason to hesitate.
Goblin Slayer picked up some small stones lying in the wasteland, choosing the most well formed of them.
“Here I go.”
Even as he spoke, he was flinging the stone, then drawing his sword and rushing in.
The goblin guard spotted him kicking his way out of the rosebush and opened his mouth.
The stone flew toward him as if it had been waiting for this moment, smacking him in the brain stem and throwing him backward before he could shout.
“GOROBBG?!”
“One…!”
The other guard tried to raise his spear, but Goblin Slayer slammed full into him.
“GBB! GROBG!!”
He deflected the crude spear tip with his shield, then slashed across the throat with his sword.
“GRBBO?!”
A dim geyser of blood arced through the twilight, staining the steel helmet.
“That’s two.”
He pulled out his sword and shook off th
e blood, drove it into the throat of the other, still-twitching, goblin, and said, “…If they bleed, then I agree. We can kill them.”
Everything about them, right up to the way they felt under his blade, was like real goblins. And the corpses didn’t vanish, either. Being shades or shadows or whatever else seemed to make scant difference, and that was just as well. A goblin was a goblin.
He wiped the blood and fat on one of the monsters’ loincloths, then picked up a short spear. Again, be it a shadow or whatever, as long as this weapon was real enough, it was no inconvenience to him.
“We’ll go inside before we’re noticed. Come on.”
“Sheesh, always in a hurry, you are… Ooh, wait just a second.”
At his summons, Arc Mage tried to stand up from her place among the roses, making the bush rustle. Jogging carefully so as not to tread on the flowers, she came over and reached out to one of the goblin corpses.
He thought she was about to pull out that curved knife, but he was wrong.
“No time here. This will have to do for a disguise.” She chuckled and doused her fingers in the blood, smearing it onto her face in complicated patterns that looked like letters. When Goblin Slayer caught a whiff, it smelled to him like fresh ink.
“Is that some kind of spell?”
“Call it Flavor Text. Come on, let’s go!”
Goblin Slayer nodded, and they passed through the entrance to the dark tower.
§
I’ve never seen anything like it, but it just seems to repeat itself, Goblin Slayer thought as they worked their way through the tessellated tunnel with an item whose purpose he didn’t understand.
Inside, the tower was like an especially convoluted maze. Was it made of metal? The passages went on and on seamlessly, no windows, barely large enough for the two of them to walk abreast.
Before they had entered, he had thought they might need a torch, but although there was no visible source of light, it was surprisingly easy to see inside. For some reason, though, everything always faded into darkness at a set distance ahead of them. He had tried lobbing a lit torch into the gloom, but nothing changed, so he simply accepted that this was the way things worked here.