Chapter 159 - <2>
Ritz awoke to a cold sensation, stunned to find himself sleeping on the floor of a stone building. For a moment, he had no idea where he was. The light hitting his face was a sterile white, not yet tinged with warmth, telling him only that it was sometime in the morning.
As he slowly pushed himself upright, a stabbing pain shot through his temple. He touched it, but there was no external wound; the source of the agony was inside his head. In other words, it wasn't an injury, but a headache.
He recognized this pain. It was distinctly different from a hangover. He had probably been drugged with something.
It was only after thinking this far that Ritz finally noticed the object clutched in his hand. He stared intently at the hard, cold sensation and the dark-brown metal that seemed to be coated in something.
It was a dagger of a kind he had never seen before. And clinging to it was the familiar, metallic scent of rust.
It was, without a doubt, human blood.
And the palm of the hand gripping it was also covered in blackish-red blood that was starting to congeal. The lukewarm sensation reminded him of the battlefield, and he instinctively dropped the dagger and stared at his own palm.
"…What is this."
As the words escaped him, he scanned the room and saw a human hand dangling limply from the covers of a bed shoved against the wall. A sense of dread washed over him. Pressing a hand to his throbbing temple, he walked to the bedside and ripped the sheets away in one motion.
Just as he'd imagined, there was a corpse. It was a man on the cusp of old age, with a wound in his chest that was clearly from a blade. The blood that had flowed from it had already clotted. Naturally, he had no memory of the man at all.
"…This is a bad joke."
Ritz roughly pulled the sheet back over the body, staggering a step as he muttered with a bitter smile. Alone with a corpse, a blood-stained dagger in hand. This would be one thing on a battlefield, but in the peaceful city of the Wind Clan, the Birdfolk, this situation was extremely bad. Worse still, Ritz's profession was that of a mercenary who killed for a living. This was a profoundly dangerous situation, practically begging to be viewed with suspicion.
Looking around, he saw that the room's only exit, a door, was barred from the inside. It was a simple wooden latch that dropped into a metal bracket. Did that mean no one had left the room? That would mean the only ones here had been himself and the murdered man.
In other words, Ritz would undoubtedly be seen as the murderer. Even if he had no memory of it, any rational person would conclude that Ritz was the culprit.
He had no idea who had put him in this situation, or why, or what their goal was. The only thing he knew for certain was that someone had placed him here to frame him for murder.
But… who?
This was Ritz's first time in this city; he didn't know a soul. Even if someone wanted to frame him, he had no idea what their relationship to him could possibly be.
He turned his gaze to the window, which had been the sole source of light. From it, he could see the country's characteristic landmark and holy site, the Twin Towers. Below them were three triangular roofs, also quite distinctive, lined up in a row. He remembered this view from outside the window. It had been a nightscape, so he couldn't be certain, but he seemed to recall seeing something like the Twin Towers and the triangular roofs from the window of the place he was last night.
Pressing his throbbing temple, Ritz desperately tried to recall the previous night's memories.
He had arrived in this city, Tashkur, the day before yesterday. The city was built on a slope and had a constantly strong wind blowing through it, which was said to keep the climate cool year-round. Indeed, now that autumn was deepening, the wind blowing up from below was chilly, giving the impression that the season was a step further along than in the surrounding areas.
The city accepted tourists and had a proper immigration check. It was the first time he had undergone a formal inspection with travel documents in a demi-human territory. He had been impressed by the process, which felt like entering a neighboring country rather than just leaving the Sarnia Federation.
At that time, he had been asked to explain his purpose in detail, and for the first time on this journey, he had submitted a formal request for an audience with the central holy site in the name of Grand Duke Edward of Yuresla.
Everyone had been surprised that there was a clan for whom such formal, diplomatic procedures were the norm, but they were relieved that all they had to do was wait for a response. Not having to rack their brains to get into the holy land was quite a carefree situation.
After that, Anil, who had guided them from the town at the foot of the mountain, introduced them to an inn where they settled in, and they spent until yesterday evening sightseeing. With Anil, who was also staying in the city for a while, as their guide, they toured historical buildings and walked around eating dishes that featured the highland's unique dairy products.
In his role as a guide, Anil was first-rate. His polite demeanor and commentary, brimming with pride for his homeland, left everyone satisfied and impressed.
And it was through his explanations that the party first learned about the nature of the Wind Clan, the Birdfolk, who lived in this city.
Like many other demi-human races, they were long-lived, with a lifespan of about four hundred to five hundred years. Ironically, however, their lifespan varied depending on their strength; the weaker ones could not live as long.
Ritz thought it was enviable compared to having a pointlessly long life, but from the Birdfolk's perspective, such individuals were apparently pitiable, weak beings.
As their name suggested, almost all of the pure-blooded Birdfolk living in the city could apparently fly from the bottom of the city to the top using the winds that blew through it. They could also send small items like letters by throwing them out a window and having spirits carry them.
On top of that, they could do the same thing Ritz's father, Karl, did: unify their vision with a wind spirit to view the city or project their voices over long distances. Someone with the power of the clan chief could apparently view the entire country using wind spirits.
Because of this, it seemed that during the old eras of war, this clan had a history of being conscripted onto the battlefield as the Clan of Far-Sight.
The city's complex and labyrinthine structure was apparently no trouble at all for the Birdfolk, who could fly, and there had never been a single large-scale rezoning effort like in human cities. That was likely why the old streets remained preserved in their original form.
But for the party, who could not fly, going up and down the intricate streets for sightseeing was quite arduous, and it was particularly hard work for Franz. Naturally, Anna enjoyed the sightseeing as she always did, completely untired.
After a day and a half of such sightseeing, Ritz had dinner with his companions and then, as usual, wandered out into the night city. He had been a bit frustrated since they hadn't been able to relax on their hurried journey. He walked through the city, feeling a sense of his own helplessness—that even though he was overjoyed to be with Anna, he couldn't feel normal without his womanizing.
Tashkur's entertainment district became more chaotic the further one went down the slope. Within the district, there were taverns for tourists, inns exclusively for tourists, small, cheap theaters, and even a red-light district. For Ritz, who had assumed there would be no such places deep in the mountains, it was an unexpectedly welcome situation.
As dusk fell, he strolled through the bustling streets, enjoying the noisy atmosphere. By the time he opened the door to a nice-looking tavern in the entertainment district, the night had grown late.
While sipping a glass and making idle small talk with the tavern's master—a man who said he had come as a tourist and ended up settling in the city—he looked around and noticed that despite being in a Birdfolk city, Birdfolk customers were sparse, and the establishment was mostly filled with humans.
When he asked the master, he was told that this time of year, the city was overflowing with merchants who had come to sell goods for the coming snowbound winter. Apparently, it was not uncommon for people who came as merchants to fall in love with Tashkur's beautiful scenery and peaceful lifestyle and put down roots. As a result, the immigrant population in the city was on the rise.
Although the city's layout was inconvenient for humans, the environment, the beauty of the city, and the leisurely lifestyle of its people were probably easier to live with than other cities in the Sarnia Federation, which demanded a rigid lifestyle governed by form and law, even from the common folk.
But as one would expect, such human immigrants could not live near the holy land, the city's center, and instead settled in cheap inns and rental rooms at the foot of Tashkur. Their main job, it seemed, was to act as guides from the town below.
"Well, some of the Birdfolk don't like this situation, you know. It's rare to find a Birdfolk who'd want to be a guide."
The master said with a wry smile as he served a warm, lemon-scented scotch. But Ritz tilted his head at those words.
"The guy who guided us was a Birdfolk."
"A Birdfolk guide? Oh, you must mean Anil."
The master said this nonchalantly and went back to preparing an order for another customer.
"There's a faction of Birdfolk who think this city should be made one of the states of the Sarnia Federation. Thanks to them, we humans are able to live here at the foot of the mountain."
"Huh…"
It seemed the Birdfolk were not a monolith. On the contrary, Ritz was honestly surprised, though he didn't let it show, that there was a group that wanted to make this special autonomous region a state, on equal footing with humans. It was something utterly unthinkable for the Clan of Light in Ciedena.
"Well, various problems have been cropping up. I guess the biggest is… the matter of mixed-blood children."
"Mixed-blood children?"
Ritz saw the master's face cloud over for a moment, and his interest was piqued. He was about to lean toward the master. It was rare to hear about mixed blood among other races, so it caught his interest. His own issues aside, information about mixed-blood children with humans was important for Anna, who was searching for her parents.
But his body was gently pulled back by someone.
"What the?"
He turned to find a woman there. She had brown skin but not the silver hair characteristic of the Birdfolk. Instead, she had straight, dark walnut-colored hair. She looked to be in her mid-twenties, probably one of the mixed-blood children they were just talking about, or a woman from somewhere else in Sarnia. The Sarnia Federation, fundamentally different in ethnicity from the Yuresla Kingdom, had many people with dark skin.
"Are you an official from the Sarnia Federation?"
The woman smiled as she spoke. Her lustrous lips and gaze, the aura she exuded, gave him a sense of her profession. She was likely a woman of the social trade who worked in this area.
"Nah. Just a tourist. If you were hoping to snag an official, you're out of luck."
"That's not it. I asked first because I'd rather not deal with stuffy officials, you know."
"Oh. So, since I'm not an official, I've caught your eye?"
"Well…"
Saying that, the woman looked Ritz up and down, as if appraising him, then gave him a coy smile from under her lashes.
"Not bad."
From her conversation and demeanor, it became clear that this woman's profession was that of a prostitute who looked for clients in taverns and on the streets. The master's story about mixed-blood children was interesting, but he figured he could hear it again during his stay, so he turned his attention to the woman sipping a clear-colored cocktail.
Right now, a woman was more important than gathering information. She wore a flowing, ethnic-style outfit, common in the city, that billowed with the wind, yet the smoothness of her brown skin peeking through here and there, along with her well-proportioned figure, was sensual and quite to his liking. Her brown eyes, unlike those of many women in her line of work, were not murky or clouded; they were as clear as the cocktail in her hand.
After drinking with the woman for a while, he left the tavern with her and, after a short walk, went to her room and spent some time there. That was as far as his memory of last night went.
But he hadn't drunk enough to black out last night, so it was certain that he had been drugged afterward.
"What the hell is going on?"
Clutching his aching head, he took a closer look and realized that the room's appearance was different. The bed, table, chest, and all the decorative items that had been in the woman's room were nowhere to be found. Instead, the walls were all exposed stonework, giving a heavy, somber impression. Could it be that that room and this room were different places?
Confused, he sank into a simple chair that was by the wall. Just then, the sound of someone violently slamming against the door echoed through the room. Someone was here and trying to open the door. In this situation, there was no doubt he would be made out to be the murderer.
The faces of his companions flashed through his mind, and he instinctively stood up and looked out the window. It was a considerable height, and even for Ritz with his well-developed athleticism, he would have to be prepared for at least a broken bone. Besides, if he escaped and it was discovered that he had been here, he would truly have no room for excuses.
On the contrary, if he had been framed, there was no guarantee that his companions wouldn't be harmed in some way. If Edward were the only one here, he could ask him to handle things and make a run for it, but with Anna and Franz here, and their business with the holy land, escape was not an option.
In that case, his only choice was to have his companions, who would surely believe in his innocence, investigate the trapper's intentions and find the real culprit. And have them prove his innocence.
As he steeled his resolve and sat down in the chair, the wooden-barred door burst open with a violent impact, and a crowd of Birdfolk men rushed in.
Pushing through the Birdfolk men, a woman burst into the room. Without hesitation, she ran to the bed and swiftly pulled off the sheet that was covering it. The pure white sheet billowed and danced in the wind from the window.
"Father, Father!"
The woman trembled violently as she touched the man, and the moment she understood he was dead, she let out a scream.
"Aaaaaah! Father!"
A man supported the woman as she collapsed, calling her name.
"Kamala! Hey, someone, go get Anil!"
"…Anil…?"
As Ritz slightly cocked his head at the familiar name, the men formed a line in front of him. He subconsciously reached for his waist and gave a wry smile at not having his sword. Oh well, he had left his own conspicuous sword behind and borrowed one from Edward; looked like he'd end up having to pay for it. And it was a high-class item with the royal family's crest, too.
…Assuming my innocence is proven and I actually get out of here, that is.
"Did you do this!?"
Faced with the men's expressions filled with hatred, disgust, and fear, Ritz gave a small shake of his head. It was a feeling he hadn't been on the receiving end of since his days on the battlefield.
"No. It wasn't me."
"In this situation, who else could have committed the murder!"
"I don't know either, but it wasn't me."
Knowing that the more he resisted, the worse things would get, he muttered with a sigh. It wouldn't be difficult to break free and escape, but he was well aware that it would solve nothing.
"You're under arrest on suspicion of murder."
As the men ganged up to bind the unresisting Ritz, he watched the unconscious woman as if it were happening to someone else. Something, something was wrong. Unable to pinpoint the cause of the unease he had felt since a moment ago, Ritz gave a small shake of his head.
"Come on!"
As the men led him away, Ritz left the room. The moment he did, the feeling of wrongness intensified. He had felt that the room was different from where he had been with the woman, but that feeling grew stronger the moment he stepped into the hallway.
The hallway of the building where the woman's room was located had been somewhat dilapidated and noticeably dirty. But this hallway was swept clean and tidy. The moment he stepped outside the building, Ritz's feeling of wrongness transformed into a clear recognition of reality: the building he had been in before and the one he was in now were different.
"This is wrong."
He couldn't help but stop and mutter the words.
"What's wrong?"
"The building. This isn't where I was."
"…What are you talking about?"
The men, who had been glaring at Ritz with fear and loathing, asked him as if he were some creepy entity. In response, Ritz asked them in a perfectly serious tone.
"Where is this place?"
Ritz, who was supposed to have spent the night with a street prostitute in the lowest level of the city, had been apprehended on suspicion of murder in a building far removed from there, near the holy land, in the residential district of the Birdfolk, higher up than the middle of Tashkur's cityscape.