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I fumbled with the lock, but it wouldn’t budge. An impatient man stood up and tried to punch the back of my head, but I stepped to the side. He fell forward, throwing his whole body into the punch, creating a hole through the door. He then struggled to climb through it, only to find he was on the floor again as I threw him off.

‘Was I really that slow in opening the door?’

It’s not hard to imagine the look on the innkeeper’s face behind me.

“They’ll pay for the door.”

The innkeeper nodded repeatedly. I don’t think he’ll awaken from his stupor for some time. I sighed and strode out of the inn. The adventurers about to enter froze in place, staring at the broken door and at me as I stepped outside.

(…It seems you secretly enjoy that type of thing…)

“…I suppose it’s fun to be an adventurer once in a while.”

As I walked by, the adventurers who entered the inn started screaming. I quickened my pace, hoping to get away cleanly.

The borderlands bordering all but the Holy Land were harsh places. As I moved away from the village center, I thought about the place I was going to.

“You’re in luck, asshole.”

“Fuck you. You haven’t gotten your ass handed to you yet, you snowflake.”

Every street here was a back alley. There was a fight every ten paces and a scuffle for requests or money between them. Among the few buildings with unbroken windows, the church was intact.

“What are the chances?”

(I suppose everyone needs some salvation.)

I laughed bitterly. The buildings continued sporadically, uninterrupted for a while, then faded away. In the middle of the road, there were many abandoned and deserted buildings. They looked like useful hiding places for fugitives and pursuers. I wondered if I should search them, but decided against it. I couldn’t imagine Arjen hiding in a place like that.

“It’s under control.”

After a while of walking in a daze, the guards stopped me. It was the border. Aside from me, there were few people in sight. I could see a few hoodlums milling around. When the soldiers glared at the approaching people, they turned and walked away, avoiding eye contact.

“Is this your first time here?”

One of the guards stopped me. I quickly showed him the pass the Queen had given me. He stared at the card for a long moment, checked its seal, and stepped back. It was the mark of a well-trained guard not to overreact. He ran over to the man he was on duty with, whispered something in his ear, and then turned back to me.

“Excuse me, sir, I’ll let you in immediately.”

“Is access restricted because of that man?”

He shrugged with a troubled look on his face. Beyond the guard’s window, a knight led a group of soldiers in a search.

“Several adventurers have recently been found dead in this passage. Savagely murdered without even putting up a decent fight.”

There was a sigh in the guard’s voice.

“We don’t know if it was the work of our most wanted criminals – no witnesses, no evidence left behind – but with the given evidence, no one else would do such a thing.”

The guard nodded toward the path behind me. The scouts, their eyes on the ground, didn’t look like they were genuinely looking for clues, just pretending to carry out their orders. Well, one could hardly blame them.

“Are you here to apprehend the wanted man?”

The guard recognized me as someone of high rank. There was no good in giving him information, so I ignored his question and took the pass back.

“Do you mind if I go in now?”

“Oh, yes. Excuse me, you may enter now.”

He sheathed his spear. I stepped onto the road, moving past the knights and soldiers searching unnoticed and into the depths of the borderlands.

There was no sign of humans. Not even a trace.

I frowned. There was no one here now.

“Arjen has long since moved on; I can’t feel anything.”

(Do you want to go back or cross the border?)

“…No, let’s do a quick scan. He could’ve covered his traces; if he is, it’s even more of an emergency. We need to find him, and fast.”

If he’s already in another country, it’s out of my hands. I stared down the long road in disbelief. What did Arjen want? Then again, I didn’t know his goals, why he betrayed the Bishop, or why he protected Bactins’ during the monster waves. I knew nothing.

(It’s not your responsibility, Elroy. There is no need to increase your burden.)

“It’s not a burden. I just haven’t paid enough attention to him.”

I wonder if I’m guilty of anything as a transmigrator if I’m guilty of taking the protagonist’s place and leaving him alone. If I could have changed him, I should have tried harder.

“I think we should stop by the site of the bounty hunters’ deaths. If there is nothing, I’ll head back to the border.”

It’s times like these that it’s nice to have someone to talk to while you collect your thoughts. Maybe they would have some ideas on tracking Arjen.

The terrain became increasingly complex. The borderlands are divided into strips of land about a kilometer wide. This is no man’s land. It was a naked wilderness where fugitives, pursuers, and monsters intermingled. But now, there was no sign of any of them.

(It seems that even the monsters are gone. He’s going on a rampage.)

“Or they’ve all moved on to other areas.”

I expanded my senses further and further. There was a fishy odor that tugged at the tip of my nose. I followed the scent. I felt like a hound dog. I’d never followed a smell before.

“Darkness.”

Suddenly, I remembered the Holy Sword’s words in my head.

(Have you found something?)

“You said it was a remnant of an evil god.”

(Although the Evil God has been sealed, its traces have not vanished from the world, so some seek them out and serve them as proof of God’s existence.)

“…The remnant spoke as if it knew Arjen well.”

I will meet ‘them’ soon enough. The Holy Sword was silent for a moment after hearing my words. I continued to follow the scent.

(There are no transcendents who control time. Even those who claim to be able to see into the future are merely bluffing; the gods of old, the heroes who became constellations, and so on, none of them can.)

The Holy Sword spoke cautiously.

(The way the gods give their prophecies is very subtle. With enough power, they can manipulate events. A word spoken of the future without any information becomes a prophecy. The gods use prophecy to sway people and gather faith, whether they are evil or good.”

“Frightening words.”

(There is no immortality, Elroy. Since there is a beginning, there must be an end.)

I frowned.

“That sounds like something a doomsday cultist would say.”

(Evil gods use the fear those words evoke. Every being fears their end.)

“Is it because they fear the end that they turn away from the unfolding now?”

(Some people can’t accept the truth and try to find a way to control it.)

“…So they were easily persuaded by an eternal peace.”

Was Arjen convinced? I couldn’t believe that he, who lived in the here and now more fiercely than anyone else, who was probably as wary of the Disasters as I was, had been persuaded by cultists to give up. It would be more likely to find him dead.

(We should investigate the scene first.)

There were bloodstains. And not just scattered, but spattered like hell. All ten of them must have died here. I could even see how they died. Blood stains on the jagged rocks. The spot where the sword had passed was clean. He hadn’t bothered to cover his tracks, and the bloodstain ran in a dotted line in one direction, accompanied by crimson tracks.

“It’s like he wants me to follow.”

I dropped to my knees and surveyed the trail of blood. The path was long, unbroken, and purposeful. Without hesitation, I started walking along the route. Perhaps the guards didn’t follow the trail, aware of the meticulous nature of their target. If Arjen were waiting at the end of it, it would be suicide.

“It’s like…you left it for me.”

What could be waiting at the end of the trail? Arjen himself? Unknown anxiety pressed against my heart. It felt like I was willingly walking into a trap.

The trail of blood led to a shrub. The thorny, bushy tree was dried up and twisted, looking like it had been burned at some point. I saw a piece of paper pinned to a stone before the shrub. Like a polar bear in the desert, the paper seemed to be there where it shouldn’t be.

“….”

Very slowly, I bent down and picked up the paper. The words were written on the other side. I brushed the dirt off it, revealing them. The message was short and concise.

「To the Hero who banished me.

I remembered. Everything. What you took from me, what I was. Now it’s time to find what I’ve lost.

Arjen Elmion.」