PATH OF THE STAR HUNTER

After a long and grueling battle in the city streets, Desmond and Cecilia’s group had finally made it to the emergency shelters. Lives were lost along the way, most of them being taken by Desmond’s hands or Xolei’s sword, but there were still a couple of losses on their side.

Contrary to Desmond’s expectations, the soldiers accompanying Xolei had a true sense of honor and responsibility, which led to them losing their lives while protecting the children from a sneak attack.

This is where the cliché mentioned above comes in. In situations like this, where the main character of a story finally manages to get out of a precarious position, it often happens that the place where thought safe stronghold was found ends up being attacked unexpectedly, thus forcing the protagonist into a desperate situation.

With six knight-class warriors, accompanied by almost forty elite soldiers, all surrounding the shelter Desmond and Cecilia were heading, this formation and numbers were enough to be considered a desperate situation.

But if there was one thing or person in the world powerful enough to counteract a cliché, that person was undoubtedly not Desmond, who had suffered at the hands of these fated events; no, the only thing ridiculous enough to nullify a cliché is another cliché.

All of the above, of course, was nothing more than a quick compilation of what went through Desmond’s mind when he saw the late entry of the true protagonists of this war.

People say the protagonist must always be late to save the day, and if there was a starring role to fill in this war, at least on Serith’s side, then that role would go to the ultimate weapons of the realm, the royal knights.

Clad in imposing regalia, armed with the best the realm had to offer, mighty, heroic, the royal knights embodied the true power of the kingdom, its trump card, and ultimate pride.

.....

For Desmond, who frankly didn’t give a shit about any related background, his joy at seeing the arrival of these Knights came from finally being able to take a break while he let the experts take care of everything.

Desmond was a pragmatist in many ways and didn’t feel any need to be the one who solved all the problems and became the protagonist. God knows if it were up to Desmond, he would throw most of his responsibilities on the shoulders of others.

Being able to spend all his time lazing around and flirting with the women at home seemed to be the ideal life from the young hunter’s perspective, and even if he got bored from too much quiet, all he would have to do was walk out of the house and kick someone ass to stretch his legs.

However, life was far from easy, something that Desmond had already learned the hard way, so although his hopes of leading a life of indulgence had long since vanished, Desmond still found it pleasant when someone else was dealing with his problems.

At the very least, seeing a small group of royal knights sweep the battlefield like it was their playground was quite satisfying from Desmond’s point of view.

Of course, not everyone shared such pragmatic and carefree views; at least, Xolei did not seem to enjoy the show at all. Without a doubt, jealousy makes people ugly; this was not just a famous phrase on earth. At the very least, Xolei had lost much of his beauty by having his face consumed by the envy and hatred he felt towards these royal knights.

And though Desmond despised such childlike sentiments and perspective, he could still understand where Xolei’s hatred and envy came from. It was hard not to have those feelings, especially when the knights looked like they were walking bloody treasure vaults with all the high-level gear they carried with them.

With his experience as a teacher, Desmond already had a rudimentary ability to judge the quality of equipment used by others without relying on the hunter’s book. He did this base mainly on the fluctuations of mana emitted by items.

If Desmond used the wealthiest person, he knew as a point of comparison. Then the group of royal knights fighting in front of him would collectively be rich enough to cause Kryzhsa, the self-proclaimed mountain goddess, to become a mountain bandit and rob them.

As for competing with the true fortune kept by Kryzsha? You had to be kidding me. That damn vain flying lizard had plundered the world with unparalleled power for who knows how many years; it was likely that not even the vault of an empire could compete with the fortune of Kryzhsa.

Perhaps the most annoying thing about Kryzsha’s fortune was that the beast didn’t even have an accurate notion of the value of items, only keeping and collecting them because they were so pretty or because she found some comfortable use for them. One had only to remember that Kryzsha had an entire bed made of just over a ton of one of the most valuable minerals in her world, just because it made her bed extra warm for her naps.

At that point where Desmond’s train of thought veered so far off track that it ended up crashing squarely into Kryzsha’s smug, arrogant face, you had to admit one could get pretty distracted when you let others do the dirty work while you watched from the sidelines.

At least, Desmond fell it as he snapped out of his daze to see how the battlefield had been swept clean and polished with the faces of invading soldiers at the hands of the royal knights.

The entrance of the royal knights was heroic, and their tyrannical power, without a doubt, to turn the scene into a story, is sure to capture the fascination of many, but there was something that stories of this type always used to leave out; how bloody these battles really were.

Cecilia might have been horrified by Desmond’s brutality in his previous battle, but the current scene wasn’t too different, though Desmond might have exaggerated a bit with his closing act, the sight of nearly a dozen people being instantly dismembered alive was too much for anyone.

There was also the way Desmond had ended the earth knight’s life. Cecilia had long ago understood Desmond’s intention; after all, Xolei’s sudden presence was more than enough for Cecilia to draw her own conclusions. Despite this, she still found the ease with which Desmond played disturbingly.

Fortunately, none of that mattered now; at least, it didn’t change her current situation at all. With the arrival of the royal knights, the shelter was secured once more, and although fire continued to rain down on the city, Cecilia’s group could now be considered to have made it to safety.

Help came quickly, and some people came out to help guide the children brought by Cecilia to a place inside the shelter. Meanwhile, the royal knights paid Cecilia a brief courtesy for her position as a holy priestess before hurrying away, probably looking for other places where their strength was needed.

Xolei was also finding a place to retrieve her forces before setting off once again, seeking to cooperate with the defensive parties, intending to score some merits on his behalf.

The sudden security and the intervention of the royal knights gave Xolei the impression that the scales of this invasion were about to tip in Serith’s favor, which gave the holy knight the courage to seek merit and wealth amid chaos.

Cecilia, for her part, entered the shelter with her ever-present and ever-dangerous self-proclaimed guardian. It was here that Cecilia beheld one of the aspects of war that she hated the most, those left behind, the wounded and starving people who had seen hell and lost everything in it.

With empty eyes, face full of dirt, ashes, or blood, and wounded trembling bodies, the people inside the shelter looked miserable to the extreme. There was no hope or sense of security on the faces of these people despite having reached a safe place; the only thing in them was the pain of what they had lost.

Cecilia’s unique way of perceiving the world left her exposed to these emotions; the darkness emanated from the hearts of these people, their pain, their loss, and the hate.

It was an overwhelming feeling; it was almost unbearable, clouding her mind and senses, making her steps unsteady, almost brittle. Cecilia might be different from an empath like Kyuru, who would find this environment worse than hell itself. However, Cecilia was still far more sensitive than most, and her mind was having trouble dealing with it.

“It’s cruel, isn’t it?” Though indifferent and calm as always, Desmond’s voice brought comfort to Cecilia’s troubled mind, snapping the girl out of that feeling of oppression that threatened to consume her.

Cecilia, however, still managed to hear Desmond’s question, and after a couple of breaths that the girl invested in calming her mood, she responded with another question.

“Why do you seem used to this?”

Desmond smiled sadly, and without turning around to face Cecilia, Desmond answered. “I’ve seen worse things.”