Chapter 176

*

[How dare you treat a goddess like baggage! I cannot tolerate this rudeness! I am the goddess of the earth, and this earth is my life!]

Freya struggled while perched on Fernandez’s shoulder. Annoyed, Fernandez set her down on the ground. Her pale bare feet stepped onto the rough steel floor and sat down.

“It must be hot.”

[What do you think flows deep underground here? The blood of the earth is lava, so I am unaffected by the heat!]

Freya shouted confidently and then strode ahead. Hazart Ashin was an old, long-abandoned city, but thanks to the dwarves’ obsessive cleanliness, it had perfectly organized city blocks. Thus, aside from the occasional small pebbles or dust on the road, there were no major hazards.

Fernandez shrugged and followed behind her. So far, so good. Until they left the city.

*

[How dare you make a goddess walk on two legs! I can no longer bear this insolence! Until my carriage and ship are found, you must serve as my carriage!]

As they passed through the gates of Hazart Ashin and reached the abandoned mine, a northern wind swept in. The biting cold wind of the north howled through the mine. Freya, hiding behind Fernandez, panted and spoke.

Fernandez sighed and wrapped his cloak around her. He couldn’t tell if he was dealing with a child or if he had picked up a useful minor deity.

‘I want to leave her behind.’

-Information from the north is as valuable as gold; I can’t just abandon her.

‘That’s why I kept her. I regret it now.’

Fernandez carried the shivering goddess on his back, wrapped in his cloak. She proudly shouted from within the folds of his cloak.

[Yes! Learn to obey!]

“Do gods feel the cold?”

[I, I am the goddess of spring! Winter is my bane! And, and when I escaped from the Temple of the Gods, I had to take on a material body… It’s unavoidable! If I had remained in spirit form like that foolish clown, this wouldn’t have happened!]

“Should’ve done that.”

[Was that clown of any use?]

“…Not really.”

[Exactly. For a god to exert power in the material world, a material body is necessary. That clown was just a babbling, foolish specter. But I, the greatest among the Vanir, possess the eyes and ears of all things in the world!]

Freya declared proudly. As Fernandez walked, he suddenly stopped.

“You said the grass and flower buds are your eyes, and the breath of new life is your ears, right?”

[…Yes?]

Fernandez gazed at the snowstorm raging across the northern wilderness and fell into thought.

“In this season, grass and flower buds…?”

[Oops.]

So, he figured out the goddess’s secret! As soon as Freya exclaimed, Fernandez almost threw her off his back. He growled and whispered to her.

“You’ll have to prove your worth. Witch. I still don’t trust you, and I have a friend who knows how to extract divinity from gods.”

[Y-you dare threaten a god?]

“I’m just stating facts, take it as you will.”

[It’s not fear, but injustice! Fine, I’ll show you the power of a goddess!]

From his back, Freya shivered once, then raised her arms. The cloak fluttered and fell.

-Pop.

Flower buds burst forth in the middle of the snowy field. One, two… Like pink and yellow dots scattered across the white wilderness. A long dotted line of flowers appeared before his eyes.

[If I regain my full power, I could pave the entire path with flowers… But it’s winter!]

“…What exactly did you do?”

[I lit the way! Straight to where your southern comrades are gathered! Don’t worry about getting lost!]

“A compass that talks is just annoying.”

Fernandez grumbled as he adjusted Freya on his back. When planning operations and grand strategies, the most urgent resource is information. Even in this season, there must be land where new life is born. So, even if her information is incomplete, she’s not entirely useless.

But this annoyance was unavoidable. The goddess chattered away like a lively teenager.

“I don’t need a talking compass.”

[You rude man!]

Freya screamed and then clamped her mouth shut. In the welcomed silence, Fernandez followed the flower buds through the snow.

*

Ships were entering the ruined port of Hazart Palan. Four speedboats were docked nearby. The warriors of Hazart Palan, each gripping their weapons, glared at the incoming ships.

Life-and-death battles consume three times more stamina than regular activities. The warriors were exhausted, and the recent victory celebration had left them too relaxed to fight immediately.

Kirhas walked among them. The warriors instinctively obeyed her authority. The path cleared, and the approaching ships came into view.

“They’re not enemies.”

Kirhas quietly said to the man beside her. The man, who knew a bit of the southern common language, quickly shouted to his comrades. They’re not enemies! Not enemies! A mix of disbelief and relief swept through the warriors.

“No hostile intent, and there are old men and women among them. They look more like refugees.”

“Refugees… Escaping?”

“Yes, those who fled.”

The man stammered as he repeated Kirhas’s words to the warriors. The warriors finally lowered their weapons and sighed.

Now the ships were close enough to see the decks clearly. From afar, someone was waving their hand.

“Yar!!”

The warriors shouted in unison. Their Yar, Shieldmaiden Aeren, had arrived. Had she brought reinforcements from Hazart Turan? The warriors quickly rushed to help them disembark.

“Not help, but it seems they fled. Your Excellency will be disappointed.”

Kirhas coldly observed the scene. She couldn’t fully grasp Fernandez’s grand plan, but…








The grand strategy clearly starts with increasing our numbers.

It would be easier to rally the northern clans, just like when we united the Federation of Nobles in the Great Wilderness… But anyway, there’s a lack of information. The enemy’s scale, the locations of other clans that could potentially join us in the future.

“It’s going to be a long winter.”

“Are you worried?”

“…Abel.”

Kirhas looked at the approaching woman. Since using her as a rampart on the battlefield, Kirhas had been deliberately avoiding her. None of them were in a safe position, but it wasn’t something the commander, who had thrown her into the fiercest part of the frontline, closest to death, should say.

Objectively speaking, her tactics at the time weren’t that great. The infantry held their formation until the cavalry could strike the enemy’s rear.

It was a classic hammer and anvil strategy, but classics are always the hardest. To maintain the frontline even for a moment while leading an outnumbered and outmatched force, a powerful asymmetric force was needed.

What Kirhas proposed at the time was Abel’s active participation. An asymmetric force doesn’t just mean someone with exceptional combat skills; it means someone who can draw the enemy’s combat power, acting as a lightning rod to lower the attack density on other allies. And that meant pushing her to the brink.

It was a battle where one misstep could mean death for everyone. Though it was just a skirmish of a few hundred, it was by no means a safe fight. Yet Abel agreed without protest and fully performed her role.

So, Kirhas wanted to avoid Abel. The overwhelming sense of guilt only proved her sincerity and honesty.

*Thud.*

A hand landed on her hair. When she looked up, Abel was smiling warmly.

“Your heart is kind, Kirhas.”

“Abel…”

“But it’s excessive confusion, and it worries me. Look, you’ve never been defeated in battles involving thousands, and today’s battle wasn’t the most horrific battlefield of my life either.”

“But you, and I…”

We are not immortal. Kirhas bowed her head as she said this. At this moment, without the man who always became her compass and her lighthouse, without Kadán’s protection, without the elite soldiers of the Great Wilderness who worship her.

In a foreign land with a foreign language, among rough and strong warriors of a foreign nation, the pressure to keep them all alive and in step with her master.

That is the veil obscuring her vision. Abel stroked Kirhas’s hair and said,

“Yes, we are not immortal. We cannot advance by consuming lives as bargaining chips, nor are we fragile bodies easily wounded by blind swords and arrows. But Kirhas…”

Saruk, Abel’s hair fluttered before Kirhas’s eyes. Kirhas stared blankly at Abel’s deep blue eyes right in front of her.

“Humans shine because they are mortal. Do you know about the life of an immortal?”

“…No.”

“Immortals are beings stuck in time, rotting away as mere concepts. They can never shine on their own. Those who struggle to live, to survive, grasping the world and burning themselves—yes, mortals like humans—how beautifully they appear to us. The beauty of a flower bud in a garden lies in its destined fall, and the brilliance of a sunset is because it is but a fleeting moment.”

Abel pressed her forehead against Kirhas’s for a moment. A warm sensation calmly enveloped her head.

“And the reason I love this world at this moment is that I am not an immortal.”

“Abel…”

“So don’t worry. Fernandez and I believe in you.”

Kirhas nodded at her words. Abel smiled brightly, ruffled her hair once, and stepped forward.

Aeren, who had disembarked at the dock, was watching them. Beside her, a giant man with a double-headed axe slung over his shoulder was looking down at them with a crooked grin.

*

“Wahaha, so. They charged at us with those fools?”

“Don’t laugh like that. This child’s charge was perfectly timed.”

“From what I see, if it weren’t for those guys over there, our alliance would’ve been crushed already.”

The man laughed heartily and took a swig of rough mead.

“Alliance, huh? More like a coalition of remnants, right?”

“Hah, good. Counterattacks are more fun than overwhelming victories anyway.”

When Kirhas glared at him and spoke sharply, the man burst into laughter. Kirhas was slightly surprised that this bear-like man used advanced vocabulary of the southern common tongue so fluently.

Crossing the physical barrier of the ocean to learn another nation’s vocabulary, and using it so smoothly, meant that this man wasn’t just a big, dumb, barbaric northerner as he appeared.

“Alright, our southern foreign friends. Let’s call our alliance the Coalition of Remnants from now on.”

“That’s enough chit-chat, Gunnar.”

Aeren frowned and sipped her drink. The man made an exaggerated expression and hunched his shoulders.

“Oh, Shieldmaiden. There’s a mountain of things to celebrate, and we’re already getting to the point?”

“What we have to celebrate is that we’re fewer in number than our enemies.”

“Well, I’ll take that as a sign of glorious battles ahead. No one lives forever, after all.”

“True. No one lives forever.”

*Clink.* The two clinked their glasses. Abel tilted her head as she watched the scene. No matter how you looked at it, there was quite an age gap, weren’t they too casual?

“Are they quite close?”

“Hmm, it’s not easy for two Yarls to be of the same age. Haha.”

“Same… age?”

“Yeah, this Gunnar. A fiery nineteen-year-old youth. You, southern beauty, how old are you?”

“…Older than you think.”

Abel couldn’t hide her fluster as she sipped her tea. Gunnar laughed heartily, drank his mead, and suddenly his eyes gleamed.

“So, where is your Yarl?”

The previously jovial drinking session felt like a lie as his cold, sharp gaze turned serious. He had the eyes of a tribal chief representing and protecting his clan.

“No matter how I look, I don’t see a representative among you. Those guys sitting alone over there joined midway, and there’s no way you southerners who can’t speak a word of northern tongue convinced them.”

“Quite observant, aren’t you?”

Abel chuckled and nodded. This was why she couldn’t dislike humans. Such shining individuals appear out of nowhere and suddenly make their presence known.

“He’s coming.”

Fernandez headed straight for the enemy’s heart, and his struggle was by no means easier than the battles she had fought during the day, but she had no doubt he would return.