NRIAD 22

Chapter: 22

“It looks like the mercenaries on Big Bear’s side lost a tremendous amount of money. They were cursing like crazy as they left.”

“Even so, they’ll recover it soon enough. Varkal will probably make another move. Didn’t the fighters who seemed capable of competing with Big Bear disappear before they could even step into the arena?”

“True. We probably won’t even see this champion in the next match.”

It was the conversation Hayden had overheard in front of Lomd.

The ‘Varkal’ that Big Bear belonged to was a mercenary group Hayden also knew. Unlike the mercenary group Hayden belonged to, which mainly handled the protection of people and goods, they were the ones nobles with dirty business to take care of sought out first—people who handled things like kidnapping, confinement, and torture.

Apparently, they had gone after a few fighters before as well.

Would those men, who had even lost money, really leave the Bear Hunter alone?

As far as he had thought, Hayden suddenly raised his head.

He remembered that Chenny and Tom had left the room without even locking the door.

‘Even if he did beat Big Bear…… who knows who might come in?’

People downstairs were already talking about the Bear Hunter, yet they had been this careless.

But even if they locked the door, Hayden doubted that flimsy wooden door could protect Ellie from Varkal.

He disliked everything about this situation—the careless Chenny and Tom who couldn’t even secure a door properly, and the poorly guarded inn room.

“……Hey.”

Hayden casually spoke as he looked around the inn room.

There was a slight delay before Ellie answered, as though she had already begun falling asleep.

“Hmm.”

“You don’t have anyone else you keep around besides Chenny and Tom? Like guards or something.”

“No.”

“Then how about hiring some now?”

Ellie let out something resembling a hollow laugh before answering.

“Rather than hiring guards, I’d rather hire a pastry chef and take them around with me.”

A deep crease formed between Hayden’s brows.

Come to think of it, even when he had first met this guy, Ellie had tried to take on five or six grown men by himself.

Was he fearless, or simply thoughtless?

“You have plenty of money now. Hire a few people.”

“Would you like to be hired? Then I’ll think about it.”

“I’m not joking, so listen seriously. There are people targeting you. Big Bear belongs to a mercenary group called Varkal, and those guys, because of this match……”

“Varkal? I don’t like the name already.”

“No, the name isn’t important. They lost money because of you, so they’re going to seek revenge……”

“Even if a whole bunch of Big Bears came at me, I’d win.”

Hayden sighed.

There was simply no reasoning with this person.

He rubbed his temple and tried to explain calmly.

“You don’t seem to understand what kind of place Tobas is. Around here, even if one or two people die……”

“Die? Me?”

Ellie let out a hollow laugh and suddenly sat up.

“You’re looking down on me because I lost to you once?”

Then he said something strange.

“I told you, I let my guard down back then. If I had fought at my true ability, you wouldn’t have been able to touch my body even once with your sword.”

“What?”

“You fought me a hundred times and lost ninety-seven of them. How can you look down on me?”

“What are you talking about? When did I ever fight you?”

“Three years from now! The other three were draws. I didn’t lose!”

“What are you suddenly talking about, three years from now…… Ah, forget it. I’m the idiot for seriously listening to this nonsense.”

Ellie’s red eyes, barely visible, were still unfocused and hazy.

Hayden figured there was no point trying to have a conversation with someone who wasn’t in his right mind.

Just as he was about to get up from the chair, Ellie spoke.

“How do you think I knew you were a descendant of Marie Loxton?”

Hayden stopped and turned his head again.

“You like meat, right? You hate sweet things. And you have a long scar on your right side.”

Hayden’s eyes widened, and he instinctively covered his right side.

“How do you know that……? Did you spy on me while I was changing clothes?”

“Do you think that’s all? You can’t even ride a horse, but you love horses, so whenever I said I was going horseback riding, you insisted on coming along. And despite not looking like it, you also like opera.”

But at the rambling, dreamlike words that followed, Hayden narrowed his eyes.

“What are you talking about? I hate horses. I’ve never even seen an opera.”

“Oh, really? You always said you hated parties, yet you attended every time, didn’t you?”

Hayden had hated horses ever since he suffered a riding accident when he was young.

And unless he had gone insane, there was no way he would set foot in a party filled with nobles.

‘He really did spy on me.’

He had wondered about it because Ellie knew his tastes and his scar.

Hayden leaned back and glared at Ellie warily.

“You must have dragged me there by force.”

“By force? Who was the one who begged me to go whenever I got opera tickets? You were also the one who asked me to dance.”

“Do I go insane in the future? Why would I do something like that to you?”

“You can’t walk past someone who’s pitiful. You must have felt sorry for me because you were so arrogant. It’s funny that you worried about someone else without even knowing what your own future would be like.”

“Why would I…… No. Even if I felt sorry for someone, I wouldn’t do something like that.”

He hated horses, yet apparently claimed to enjoy horseback riding.

He had no interest in opera, yet he dutifully obtained opera tickets.

And he had asked Ellie to dance?

‘That isn’t pity……’

Hayden knew better than anyone what pity was, so he spoke sarcastically.

“Why don’t you just say I did it because I liked you? You sound exactly like an idiot who fell in love and threw himself at someone without thinking.”

At that moment, the answers that had been coming so readily suddenly stopped.

Of course, Hayden wasn’t an idiot, nor did he have any intention of falling in love with Ellie, whom he had only just discovered wasn’t a man.

This was all just the ramblings of someone who had lost his mind.

They say people dream about the things they usually think about.

‘Could it be that he wanted me to like him……?’

“It can’t be.”

At that moment, Ellie spoke as though he had read Hayden’s thoughts.

“You may be arrogant, but you weren’t that crazy.”

It was a firm voice that dispelled the suspicion Hayden had secretly entertained.

“There’s no way you liked me. Not after seeing everything I looked like.”

“……What did you look like?”

The question slipped out before Hayden could stop himself.

But Ellie seemed to have no intention of saying anything more. He lay down on the bed and turned his back.

Hayden watched for a moment as Ellie pulled the blanket that had been pushed down toward his feet over himself, then stood up from the chair.

“Yeah…… Stop talking nonsense and go to sleep now.”

For some reason, his steps felt heavy, but Hayden pushed aside his uneasiness and walked toward the door.

Only after grabbing the doorknob to leave the room did he remember what he had forgotten.

Big Bear and Varkal, who were probably sharpening their teeth against the Bear Hunter.

‘So what if they are? Why should I care about them?’

Yet his feet wouldn’t move.

Hayden frowned and glared at the crooked door, which looked as though it had been baked wrong, before reaching out and fastening the lock at the top.

Then he pulled on the door several times.

The flimsy lock rattled and shook.

It looked as though it would come right off if he applied even a little more force.

“This piece of crap is supposed to be a door……”

He was uneasy about leaving Ellie alone in a room like this.

Just as he considered calling Chenny and Tom from the dining area and having them guard the room, another thought occurred to him.

‘But do those two know that this guy is a woman?’

Hayden frowned.

Was it really all right to leave those two together with someone who wasn’t in his right mind?

“……”

It was a problem whether they knew or didn’t know.

After seriously pondering it, Hayden turned around, picked up the chair beside the bed, and wedged it beneath the doorknob.

Chenny and Tom wouldn’t be able to get in either, but that wasn’t his concern.

He had no interest in the suffering of two perfectly healthy adult men.

‘They’ll figure it out themselves.’

After securing the chair so it wouldn’t slide, Hayden went to the window on the opposite side.

Ellie’s room was on the second floor, but it wasn’t so high that he couldn’t jump down.

‘There’s no balcony, so it’ll be difficult for anyone to climb up.’

He had finally found something he liked about this inn.

Just as he placed one leg on the windowsill while judging where he would land, he heard a rustling sound beside him and turned his head.

The sack with hair sticking out of it had somehow gotten up and was looking at him.

“Why? What now?”

Hayden asked as though picking a fight, but Ellie didn’t respond.

He raised an eyebrow and turned his head away, then suddenly thought of something and looked back at her.

“But why are you suddenly staying at an inn?”

The answer came only much later.

“……Because I’m embarrassed.”

“What?”

“I’m embarrassed to go home after getting beaten up like that.”

Only then did Hayden understand why Ellie refused to take off the sack.

So for her, showing her bruises and dried blood was more embarrassing than walking around with that bloodstained sack over her head.

‘I thought she was hiding because she was worried I’d feel guilty if I saw her injuries.’

Apparently, he had been thinking far too sensibly.

He was simply too ordinary a person to guess what went on inside that crazy bastard’s head.

Suppressing a hollow laugh, Hayden turned his head.

“You’ve already been found out, so don’t waste money for nothing. Come home.”

And then he jumped down from the window.

Completely forgetting that, only a little while ago, he had been thinking he needed to throw her out of his house.