Ch.797Side Story) Number 742 (3)

742 was able to escape the great forest of Alvheim in just twenty days due to his own exceptional abilities—which surpassed even his expectations—combined with several miraculous strokes of luck.

The fairy he encountered and harmed during a casual stroll happened to be a merchant who collected trophies from other races.

Alvheim’s core forces—the Guardians and Patrollers—were concentrated on the northern and southern frontlines, so the pursuit teams chasing 742 consisted mostly of common soldiers who couldn’t even shoot spirit arrows.

And finally, when he encountered a Patroller after a long escape:

“Behold the consequences of your atrocities, inferior species. I heard you were well acquainted with ‘this’?”

When the fairy mocked him by throwing a familiar head at him, claiming all livestock from the 4th Human Farm had been culled, his rage transcended his limits and led him to a new realm.

Without all that luck, 742 would never have escaped the great forest to set foot on the grasslands.

—-

“How fortunate, a snack walking right into my path.”

The first being encountered by the fifteen-year-old boy who dreamed of freedom after escaping the fairies was a large beast walking on two legs.

A dog-headed Werebeast burying its muzzle in the naked corpses of a man and woman, tearing at their flesh. When 742 saw the predatory gaze looking down at its prey, he silently drew his sword and charged at the creature.

“GAAARK-! What are you…?!”

The Werebeast, the first such creature 742 had ever encountered, was as ferocious as its appearance suggested, but fortunately not that powerful.

At least, not compared to what 742 had become.

Something hot coursed through his muscles and blood vessels. The blessing called Karma, whose nature 742 couldn’t comprehend, was elevating his physical form to a higher realm.

However—

‘What is this monster? No matter how many times I cut it, it won’t die.’

Since the steel longsword 742 wielded couldn’t sever the Werebeast’s unique regenerative ability, the dog-like creature continued to scream and endure despite being one-sidedly slashed to pieces.

‘…It doesn’t matter. If I keep cutting, it will die eventually.’

If it were truly immortal, it wouldn’t fear being cut. The very fact that it tried to avoid his sword strikes was proof that the monster before him was no immortal.

“Haaaah!”

742 deflected and evaded all the Werebeast’s desperate attacks while repeatedly hacking its fur-covered body to pieces.

“How, how can a hairless monkey have such power…! Could those rumors about knights or whatever actually be true…?”

Until the Werebeast, denying the reality of being overwhelmingly defeated by a mere human, finally collapsed from exhaustion.

“Knight…?”

After cutting off the head of the exhausted Werebeast, 742 muttered the word it had spat out at the end.

Knight.

It was a word whose meaning he couldn’t understand.

How could 742, who didn’t even know that the creature at his feet was called a Werebeast, possibly know? How could he know that humans scattered across the continent who resisted the atrocities of other races called themselves knights?

‘No, more importantly.’

For 742, pondering the meaning of unfamiliar words wasn’t the most important thing right now. A question hundreds of times more crucial was arising in his mind.

‘Surely this entire land isn’t filled with monsters like this…?’

A chilling dawn breeze seeped into his chest, along with the foul stench emanating from the entrails of the corpses mauled by the Werebeast.

The longsword dripping with Werebeast blood trembled with its owner’s anxiety.

—-

Two months passed.

It was enough time for a boy who thought he knew everything but actually knew nothing to realize the truth of the world.

The truth that the green grasslands he finally reached after escaping Alvheim’s great forest were not the land of freedom he had dreamed of and longed for.

‘You might have been right, 2067. Freedom doesn’t exist anywhere. Not in the forest, not outside it.’

The land of freedom he sought was merely the naive hope of a precocious child.

There was no such thing as freedom in this world.

At least, not for humans.

‘Why must I, must we live like this…? Just why…!’

Overwhelmed by emotions that could be either despair or rage, 742 silently glared at the sky.

“Sir Knight, is something troubling you…?”

The voice of a middle-aged woman from behind broke the boy’s contemplation.

A voice clearly conveying reverence toward the mere fifteen-year-old boy. A middle-aged woman wearing crude animal hides bowed deeply, showing extreme respect to the knight who had saved them.

“…It’s nothing.”

The boy shook his head and forced a smile. Showing anxiety or anger would only lower their morale without helping in any way.

It had been two months since he left Alvheim and entered the grasslands.

After defeating Werebeasts and Orcs that attacked whenever encountered, and unable to abandon the people who were fortunate enough to still be alive, the boy found himself surrounded by nearly a hundred humans.

742 found them cumbersome, but he didn’t drive them away.

Was it because these weaklings, who couldn’t handle even a single Werebeast with ten grown men, would be hunted down and killed within days if abandoned?

Or was it because these people, unlike his fellow inmates who were little more than fairy livestock, were true “humans” who could lament their circumstances?

Though he couldn’t quite understand the reason himself, 742 saved them, protected them, and lived alongside them.

Although the gazes that looked at him like some savior were burdensome, it was the first time the boy, who had lived in isolation, anger, and resentment, felt a sense of kinship and comfort.

“Sir Knight, did you sleep well?”

“Sir Knight, the gathering team found some rare fruits.”

“Big brother Knight! I made this gift for you!”

“Thank you for saving us, Sir Knight…”

“Sir Knight! Please teach us how to fight!”

Sir Knight…

Sir Knight…

Sir Knight…

The livestock who escaped from the fairies’ cage. The boy wandering the grasslands in rags thus became their knight.

Along with the nickname given by the first family he saved—a name meaning “large man.”

Even the family who gave him the nickname called him “Sir Knight” to his face, but the boy liked the nickname they gave him so much that he adopted it as his own name.

Karl Große.

Karl Grosse.

That was the new name of the boy once called 742.

—-

Excessive happiness never lasts long. Four months later, when the number of humans following the sixteen-year-old knight Karl had grown to three hundred,

“Short-tusked weaklings! So many!”

“Kill all with weapons! Kill bearded ones too!”

The rulers of the grasslands who shared the fields with the Werebeasts—the barbarian Orcs—came crashing in like a wave.

The situation Karl had been worried about. The Orc warriors, unwilling to leave the growing number of humans alone, had finally found their settlement.

“AAAAHH!”

“Fight! Sir Knight is with us!”

“Evacuate the women!”

Screams and shouts, curses and wails echoed all around.

Men with spears and swords were torn apart by the Orcs’ blades and axes, children were kicked and crushed, the elderly had their heads ripped off.

Women fleeing the carnage were caught by pursuing Orcs and pinned beneath them, while the crudely built dwellings blazed with fire.

The human village that had struggled to maintain peace transformed into hell in an instant.

“UAAAAAAAH!”

Their knight, Karl, fought like a madman with blood-curdling screams, but his strength alone couldn’t stop the well-prepared Orc forces.

In the hellscape where all the men he had trained had been reduced to pieces of meat, Karl, surrounded by Orcs, exhausted the power of Karma coursing through his body and managed to defeat three Orc champions after a desperate struggle… but that was his limit.

“You. Strong. So kill!”

Six spear tips pierced the body of Karl, who stood alone on the sea of blood.

“Kuhak…!”

Pain shook his mind. Karl spat a fountain of blood and collapsed unsteadily.

‘No. I can’t fall here…!’

His vision darkened and his senses dulled. Though he gritted his teeth and tried to rise, not even a finger would move. Death was beckoning to him.

– BUUUUUUUUUNG!

A faint horn sound echoed in his closing ears. Was it the horn of the Celestial Palace the blue-eyed old man had told him about?

Karl thought with his fading consciousness.

If the warrior god’s Celestial Palace really existed, he would grab the master by the collar and punch him in the face the moment he entered.

How could a so-called god be putting on airs in such a place while humans suffered so much down below?

“All cavalry, prepare to charge-!”

Fortunately, it seemed the warrior god would not be punched by his invited warrior.

“Kill all the green-skinned monsters! The god of heaven and grace, Elpinel, protects us. We are his wrath and vengeance!”

The horn sound that reached the dying Karl’s ears was not the Valkyries of the Celestial Palace calling him, but the horn of humans who had pursued the Orc forces.

A hundred humans mounted on horses. The pure white spear blades in their hands mercilessly penetrated the formation of the surprised Orc warriors.