Chapter 13: Memories

Gunsmith made a show of raising the bone gun and blowing across it. “You're going to die sooner or later anyway. Better one shot than death by a thousand cuts.”

He was no stickler for moral principles and generally acted as he pleased. So when Darkwater revealed his identity, Gunsmith's only thought was to kill him. Avenging John came second. He had a vague sense that allowing a creature like this to exist in the world was extremely dangerous.

He put away the bone gun, held the Eternal Core in his palm, and closed his eyes. As it glowed faintly blue-green, he began probing its structure and properties with Alchemy.

Within seconds, a vast expanse of stars appeared in his mind. The invisible forces of the universe took on colors and became visible to the naked eye, yet shifted in countless ways from one instant to the next, gathering and dispersing without pattern.

Gunsmith's consciousness was engulfed by another immense, unknown mental force. He could no longer sense his own existence, as though his flesh had crumbled into dust; time was an empty illusion; form was formlessness, the abstract was concrete. All the physics he had learned as a human became meaningless. That stuff was little more than a string of by-products of lower-dimensional creatures endlessly proposing absurd theories, then devising new ones to explain away the contradictions.

...

2084. A stretch of forested mountains east of the Urals, blanketed in windblown snow.

Two men in military greatcoats stood outside a small wooden cabin. One knocked. Before long, an old man opened the door. He appeared to be blind in his right eye, and a gruesome scar still marked his face.

Old Rohl was rather surprised to see these two strangers. Looking over their shoulders, the tall old man saw another seven or eight people. All rode ostrich-like, two-legged transport mechs and carried advanced firearms on their backs. One man stood out. He wore no regulation uniform and had a sword at his waist, which meant he was at least a nobleman. The sword's jeweled, showy, impractical hilt suggested a very wealthy nobleman of considerable standing.

“Can I help you, sir?” Old Rohl asked.

The soldier at the door replied, “His lordship the count came into the mountains to hunt today. As you can see, the weather's turned a little nasty. We need to requisition your cabin so he can rest.”

Old Rohl glanced behind them again with considerable disdain. By this time of day, real hunters should have been coming home laden with game, yet the count and his accompanying soldiers were all empty-handed. It looked as though the entire party had yet to bag a thing.

“Oh, the count would like to come in out of the wind and snow...” Old Rohl said. “All right, I think I can make a little room...”

But the answer was, “No. As I said, this isn't a request. It's a requisition. And the count doesn't like sharing a room with commoners. You'll have to stay outside until he leaves.”

“What?” Old Rohl was shocked and furious, but outnumbered and facing their guns, he could hardly afford to lose his temper. “But this is my home!”

“Then you should feel honored.” The soldier suddenly lowered his voice. “Old man, stop arguing. Hurry up and put a coat on. We all have to stand outside too...”

The man beside him spoke even more quietly, almost without moving his lips. “The count's in a very bad mood right now. Keep dawdling and God knows what he'll do. Don't drag us into it!”

Old Rohl could see their predicament too. He sighed. Oh well, he could only hope the count wouldn't sit by the fire until the middle of the night. But just as he turned around, a gunshot rang out.

The bullet passed through a soldier's shoulder and struck Old Rohl in the back. Blood blossomed outside the cabin door.

The soldier cried out in pain and fell to his knees, clutching his shoulder. His companion supported him, looking panicked but not daring to make a sound. As for Old Rohl, he never spoke another word. In less than half a minute, he stopped breathing.

“See? I told you I was a crack shot. I can hit a target even through an obstacle. That deer only got away earlier because I blinked.” The count treated the murder as though nothing had happened, boasting smugly, as if shooting a defenseless old man a little over ten meters away with a fine firearm were some great accomplishment.

The soldiers showed little sympathy or sorrow. They knew his lordship's temper very well. Silence and obedience were the only way to keep themselves safe and earn some extra pay from this nobleman.

But some distance away, a boy stood stunned by the scene. The game in his hands fell to the ground, and horror spread across his young face. He simply could not understand how any of this had happened. His grandfather, his only family in the world, had just been killed by someone he did not even know. Young Charles had happened to witness the very instant the shot was fired. He had not even had time to react.

Who was he? Could he be an enemy of Father's? How had they found their way into these remote mountains?

Eleven-year-old Gunsmith was like a frightened little animal. He dropped flat to the ground and hid, choking back sobs as his vision began to blur. But he quickly wiped away his tears. If they ran halfway down his cheeks, they would freeze, and pulling them off would hurt terribly.

Gunsmith's white fur coat concealed him well in the snow. He gradually drew closer to the cabin, his eyes fixed on the group. The count soon went inside alone, while the other seven remained outside. Two soldiers dragged Old Rohl's body into the nearby woods and hastily buried it in a shallow grave. At that depth, scavengers would dig him up and eat him within a day. Several of the others huddled together, apparently for warmth. The soldier with the wounded shoulder soon received treatment. The Empire's medical technology was excellent, and naturally, comprehensive preparations had been made to treat any injuries on the count's hunting trip.

Gunsmith slowly crawled forward through the snow. His hearing and eyesight had been keen since childhood, and from a little over a hundred meters away, he could already faintly hear the soldiers talking.

“Murderous pig. Ugh... Damn it, if that had gone through the bone, I'd be crippled.” The wounded soldier clutched his shoulder. The bleeding had stopped, but the terror of that instant still lingered.

“Stop complaining. If you'd been standing one step farther left, he wouldn't have hesitated to shoot through your neck.” An older veteran smoked as he spoke. “The count's shot a few fellows dead before. Then I have to file a report, make up some lie about an accidental discharge or whatever, and the count pays out some money. Just like that, a life is gone.”

Another soldier said, “Then what do we put in the report about this old man? He had two twigs sticking out of his head, so the count mistook him for a deer?”

“Hmph... What do we put?” the veteran replied. “We don't write one at all. This old man lived all the way out here. Even if the Empire has records on him, they won't have been updated in years. If we don't say anything, who's going to know whether he's alive or dead? So you should count yourself lucky. This month's bonus will be bigger than usual. That's hush money from the pig. If you don't know what's good for you and start talking, believe me, it won't be long before I'm writing a cause-of-death report for you. I'd rather that didn't happen.”

“Ah, if I didn't have a family to feed, I'd have quit this fucking bodyguard job ages ago. I didn't join the army to be some count's lackey.”

“That's all bullshit. If you're not his lackey, you'll be somebody else's. If you don't want to be a lackey, you've got to climb. Once you've got money and power, you can be the master. Then you can go around shooting people and stealing other men's wives like that pig, and nobody can arrest you either.”

While they smoked and chatted, Gunsmith had quietly crept to within thirty meters of them...

Inside the cabin, the count warmed himself by the fireplace, comfortably smoking a fine cigar. His foul mood after a whole day without bagging any game had eased a little. But his rest was brief. Only ten minutes or so had passed before someone opened the cabin door.

The count turned and began cursing. “Bastards! Who gave you permission to come in?” The words had barely left his mouth when he froze.

A boy stood in the doorway, only about 1.3 or 1.4 meters tall. He wore a white fur coat and held a hunting gun. He looked as though he had bathed in blood from head to foot. The warm blood had yet to dry or freeze, which meant it had only just splashed onto him.

The count's first reaction was to reach for his gun, but a bullet put an end to that plan the instant he raised his hand.

“Aaaah!!! Aaaah!!!” The count screamed frantically, far more shrilly than the soldier he had shot earlier. A bloody hole had been blown through his right palm.

Gunsmith watched his reaction without expression.

“You little bastard! What do you think you're doing? Do you know who I am?!” the count roared. But he dared not make any rash moves. The little bastard had a gun.

“Yes. You're the man who murdered my grandfather,” Gunsmith replied.

This plainly told the count that his title and status meant nothing to a child. Yet he went on, “You bastard! You lowborn scum! You dare injure a member of the noble Gilson family? That's an act of insubordination punishable by death! I'll kill your whole family! I'll tear your heart out and boil it!”

Cruelty and stupidity are both very dangerous qualities, and Count Gilson clearly possessed both. His reaction was practically the tolling of his own death knell.

“I didn't use a gun to kill the seven people outside.” Gunsmith brought a blood-drenched dagger out from behind his back. “Because I didn't want you to hear anything and have a chance to escape.”

The count felt his hair stand on end. This scrawny little child had silently finished off seven armed Imperial soldiers?

“I've always known I was a little different. Even though I hardly ever met anyone besides Grandfather, I knew I wasn't like normal people.” Gunsmith closed the door and advanced on the count with the dagger. “I can kill a six-hundred-kilogram brown bear with this dagger and cut it apart in a few minutes. I don't think an adult could do it any faster.” He paused. “I'd never killed anyone before, but I just killed a few people. Turns out that isn't very hard either.”

Count Gilson was clearly afraid. He could not intimidate this child with his status, and he probably had no advantage in a fight either. That left him only one option. “It... it was just an accident... My gun went off. Yes, that's right, I didn't mean it. Listen, if you'll just let me leave, I can give you a great deal of money. You can move to the city and never worry about food or clothing again. You won't have to hunt for a living out here in the mountains...”

“Those are your last words? A lie?” In the firelight, young Charles's still-childish face, his blood-soaked figure, and the weapon in his hand made an eerie, terrifying sight.

The count roared in fury and kicked at Gunsmith's face, but the sharp dagger met his kick. A flash of blood, and his foot went flying. The cut went clean through the bone below his calf.

People often say someone is “screaming like they're slaughtering a pig.” That isn't quite accurate. Count Gilson's screams at this moment were better described as “screaming like the pig being slaughtered.”

“Aaaah!!! You little bastard!! Aaah... Aah!! You lowborn son of a bitch! I'll kill you! I'll skin you alive! Let me tell you! That old bastard deserved to die!! You should be honored I even bothered to kill you lot!!! You...” He kept hurling abuse as blood poured from his wound. The bloated count rolled about on the floor in agony, his face flushed crimson, his features twisted with rage.

Gunsmith had raised his gun and aimed it at his enemy's head, but he did not pull the trigger. A few seconds later, he actually lowered it again.

Seeing this, the count thought he had changed his mind and immediately said, “What? You've come to your senses, have you, boy? That's right! Put down the gun! Let me go! My offer still stands!” A flicker of excitement crossed his twisted face, as though he had glimpsed hope in his desperate plight.

But Gunsmith's answer was, “You're not worthy.”

“What?” The count froze again.

“You're not worthy of dying by gunfire. Your blood would profane the sanctity of a bullet.” He stepped forward and pressed one hand to the count's forehead. The light suddenly left the count's eyes, and his body gradually turned black. When Gunsmith withdrew his hand, a mass of black residue crumbled and scattered across the floorboards.

Almost at the same instant, Gunsmith passed out too. It was the first time he had used Alchemy on a conscious living being, and to this day it remained the only time.

...

The burning pain in his hand brought Gunsmith out of his memories. Like someone holding a sweet potato fresh from the oven, he tossed the Eternal Core back and forth between his hands a few times. Then the blue-green fragment suddenly returned to room temperature.

He shook his head hard. Not only had he failed to learn anything about the Eternal Core, but his mind had nearly collapsed. Clearly, this was a very dangerous undertaking, and it would take a fair amount of time. Better to give it more careful thought.

Gunsmith put the Eternal Core in his pocket and decided to find a way out of these ruins first. Naturally, the first step was to look for any other mechanisms in the room. But out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that Darkwater's corpse had already undergone a drastic transformation.