At the princess's appearance, our status was immediately elevated to that of honored guests.

Of course, the Sherwood members and I were also receiving a tremendous welcome, but as soon as the princess appeared, we were pushed to the background.

It felt like we had gone from being heroes who had rushed to protect Tundra from the disaster of magical beasts to simply being the princess's entourage in an instant.

Immediately, men who appeared to be vassals of the ducal family rushed out of the castle gate to greet the princess.

It was quite a lavish treatment.

Was it only natural?

From what I had heard, this northern region of Tundra was a very independent place.

It was so isolated from the rest of the Maia Kingdom that many considered it an independent kingdom, and its relationship with the royal family was not very good. As a result, I had heard that not a few people called the duke the king of the north...

But still, it seemed a princess was a princess.

I didn't know what they were thinking on the inside, but it felt like they were at least giving her the royal treatment.

The news of the grand entrance of the Sherwood Mercenary Corps into Tundra seemed to have been buried.

'All the better.'

None of us, including myself, liked a fuss.

We were immediately guided to a drawing-room in the duke's residence.

"I have sent word to His Grace the Duke, so he will be down shortly."

"Isn't His Grace busy protecting the northern wall? He doesn't have to come down just for me."

"It is not yet time for the monster wave to arrive, so it is fine."

"Aha. I see."

"You must be weary from your long journey. Please rest comfortably for a while. A servant is waiting outside, so if you need anything, please feel free to ask at any time."

"Yes. Thank you for your consideration."

"Not at all. Please rest comfortably."

The ducal vassal brought warm tea and refreshments and then left the drawing-room.

Once we were left alone in the room, Sir Monde, who had been standing behind the princess all this time, showing the true demeanor of a guardian knight for a change, let out a sigh and his shoulders slumped as if the air had been let out of him. He then plopped down next to the princess.

Princess Lilia patted Sir Monde's shoulder.

"Good work, Sir Monde."

Sir Monde, who was slumped in his chair in a rather delinquent-like posture, replied in a groaning voice.

"This is harder for me than fighting, Princess. Just tell me to fight instead."

"Oh, what are you making a fuss about? You're quite used to it now, aren't you?"

"Being used to it isn't the same as being comfortable with it..."

I stared blankly at the princess, who had returned to her usual self, and our eyes met.

Lilia smiled gently and brought the steaming teacup to her lips with a graceful hand movement.

"Don't look at me like that. Everyone has a time when they have to wear a mask, don't they? It's just that those times are more frequent for us than for other people."

"You mean you've accepted acting as a part of your life."

"Something like that."

"It must be tiring."

"But what can I do? Complaining won't change anything. It is our destiny. Ouch, hot!"

"..."

The princess spoke elegantly and brought the teacup to her lips, only to burn her tongue.

I stared blankly at the princess, who was sticking her tongue out, then turned my head to the side.

Linda, as if overwhelmed by the cozy atmosphere of the drawing-room, had snuggled into a plush chair covered in the hides of some unknown magical beasts and fallen asleep.

Schmidt was busy devouring the refreshments on the table.

Dofang was restlessly looking around the spacious drawing-room.

[Isn't that guy stealing something?]

"...He might be."

Even if I told him not to steal, he was the type to not listen, so I left him alone.

It wasn't like I could tell if he stole something anyway.

I decided to spend my time my own way until the duke arrived.

I touched the magical beast hide covering the chair and tried to guess its identity, then jumped up and down on the chair to test its elasticity and softness. I got off the chair and doodled on the carpet on the floor with my finger, then imitated the princess and tasted the refreshments. I joined Dofang, who was wandering around the drawing-room, and chatted with him. I had a staring contest with the deer head decoration on the wall...

[Just stay still. You're being distracting.]

"..."

After getting an earful from the Heavenly Demon, I sat back down in my seat.

The duke was taking his sweet time.

The tea on the table had already cooled to a lukewarm temperature.

"Hey, why isn't he coming?"

The Heavenly Demon chided me.

[Only a quarter of an hour has passed. You restless and impatient fool.]

"Ah, is that so?"

Still, I was so bored I couldn't stand it.

This was because I was a man like the wind, with a natural wanderlust.

When I suddenly stood up from my seat, Princess Lilia, who was nibbling on a cookie, looked at me.

"Ashuban. Where are you going?"

"I'm going to the restroom."

"Okay."

I walked over to the door and opened it. A maid was waiting outside.

She asked politely.

"Is there anything you need?"

"Of course, there is."

"Please just say the word. I will bring it to you."

"No. It is of a nature that cannot be brought."

"...?"

"It is something very important, but I don't know if it's here."

Even at my nonsense, the maid replied politely.

"If you tell me what you need, I will do my best to help you."

"What I am looking for is not an ordinary thing. At first glance, it is dirty, but it is essential for living. When you are looking for it, you are desperate, but once you find it, you don't give it a second glance. Do you know what it is?"

The maid stared at me blankly for a moment before answering.

"The restroom?"

Snap!

I snapped my fingers.

"Bingo!"

"..."

The maid looked at me as if I were a madman.

Then, she slowly walked ahead and said.

"...Follow me."

"I will."

I followed the maid and looked around the residence as we walked through the complex corridors of the ducal mansion.

The overall atmosphere was antique.

It was a place where the traces of time could be felt.

As I followed the maid down the corridor... I suddenly threw myself out of an open window.

There was no particular reason.

Just that the outside air looked cool.

A dizzying sense of falling, and then the refreshing northern wind immediately greeted me.

It shook my hair as if asking where I had been.

Only then did my head feel a little clearer in the crisp air from the snowy mountains.

"Hahaha!"

A laugh burst out of me from the unbearable joy.

As I fell toward the ground, I wrapped the cold northern wind around my body.

There was no sense of incongruity because we had become quite close on the carriage ride over.

I immediately became one with the northern wind, kicked off the outer wall of the mansion, and soared into the air.

"Kya-reuk!"

A girlish laugh escaped my lips.

Did I have a girlish sensibility within me as well?

I ran over the pointed roofs of the mansion, dancing with the wind, and then headed for the street beyond the residence.

I landed like the wind in a deserted alley, then instantly transformed into a calm man and walked out onto the street.

It was an unexpected journey.

"This too is the guidance of fate."

The Heavenly Demon clicked his tongue.

[Truly, there is no other madman. You mean to say you ran away because you couldn't wait for that short while?]

"What's the big deal? This is better than being cooped up in a stuffy room, wasting time. Weren't you also yawning constantly out of boredom, Master?"

[That is true.]

The Heavenly Demon admitted it cleanly.

The Heavenly Demon was a man who admitted things cleanly, like a true man.

I walked the streets of Tundra, chatting with the manly Heavenly Demon.

I watched the people and the buildings.

Perhaps because the weather was cold, it was impressive to see everyone, men and women alike, wrapped in long fur coats like robes.

Their expressions were mostly stoic, like the guard Ted.

Was it related to the cold?

The overall atmosphere wasn't lively, but it wasn't gloomy either.

Was it because all the people who were going to leave had already left?

Those who remained were living their daily lives quite bravely.

"Hmm. It's not as cold as I thought. The wind isn't blowing much either."

[It seems to be because of that wall over there.]

You could see it from anywhere in the city.

It was a single, massive barrier.

It looked less like an artificial structure built by human hands and more like a part of the natural landscape, grown alongside the snowy mountains next to it.

It was as if a mountain had risen in the shape of a wall.

It was so high that the blue northern sky was half-hidden by the wall.

My steps, which had been wandering the city streets, naturally headed toward the barrier rising behind it.

And so I arrived at the massive barrier.

Seeing it up close, it was indescribably grand.

Just facing it was overwhelming.

I had the illusion of witnessing a magnificent miracle of a god.

"Wow... it's just as amazing seeing it again."

It grew between the rugged mountain ranges, filling the gap, and was too massive to have been made by human hands.

How on earth was such a huge structure built?

I was curious, so I had once asked my all-knowing older sister.

She said it was a wall built with ancient magic.

That ancient magic still pulsed faintly within the wall.

Once people built the basic, normal-sized wall, the constantly blowing blizzard did the rest.

Over a long time, snow piled up on the wall in layers, and then it froze solid, and the wall grew.

The only thing people did was occasionally trim the overall shape and workmanship of the wall.

And so it had come to this.

This wall before me, so hard, thick, and high that it was hard to believe it was made by human hands, was the massive wall called the Northern Wall by the people of the south, and the Barrier here in the north.

I looked up at the pure white, frozen wall until my neck ached.

"...Looking at it from right in front, you can't even see the end."

As high as it was, if you fell, you would die instantly.

Meaning, one misstep would lead directly to death.

Outsiders were strictly forbidden from climbing the wall, so I had never been able to go up before.

Come to think of it, how did other people get up?

As I was looking up at the wall, a good idea crossed my mind.

'Should I try climbing it?'

Looking closely, the wall was slightly sloped.

It was only natural that the foundation had to be strong for it to be so high.

As a wall made of accumulated snow, it was structured to be pointed at the top and wider at the bottom.

'I might not be able to climb the Mist Cliff, but I think I can climb a cliff of this level.'

I was certain.

Certain that I could climb it.

If I fell while climbing, it wouldn't just end with a little pain, but I was confident.

Confident that I could climb it.

While resting in Milgard, and on the carriage ride over.

I had not let go of my deep contemplation of the Black Immortal Steps, a technique created by mixing the Night Sky of the Night Sky Star and Moon Art and the wind's movement art, the Fleeting Shadow Steps.

As a result, through repeated research and training... I had finally succeeded in improving the Black Immortal Steps.

This was a good practical test to open a new chapter in movement arts.

I grinned and said.

"What do you think, Master."

The Heavenly Demon also raised one corner of his mouth slightly and answered.

[Not bad. Training is completed through practice.]

"Alright. The Black Immortal goes."

The hesitation was short.

I immediately wrapped my whole body in wind and rushed toward the magnificent barrier that was looking down at me.

* * *

Whoooosh—

Life on the barrier was a series of boredom.

Of course, one misstep and you would fall to the dizzying depths below and not escape instant death, but humans were creatures of adaptation.

Now, after walking on it every day, eating on it, at some point it felt as familiar as home, and because it felt familiar, sometimes my mind would relax and I would feel drowsy.

Of course, with the worst monster wave in history predicted, the alert level was currently at its maximum, but.

Drowsiness, a primal human instinct born from familiarity, was hard to shake off.

"Ugh, I'm so sleepy I could die. Let's just hold on until the shift change."

Hank, a soldier on guard duty on the barrier, peeked his head over the wall to wake himself up.

Whooosh—

The updraft of the chilly north wind climbing up the wall immediately slapped his cheek, and the dizzying sight below him snapped him awake.

It was a sight he never got used to, no matter how many times he saw it.

"This is the best cure for sleepiness."

Hank, having chased away his sleepiness, was gently shaking his head and pulling it back when.

"Oh, so this is what it looks like up here."

A strange voice came from behind him.

Hank flinched and immediately turned around, spear in hand.

"Who's there!"

At the end of his pointed spear was a strange man.

Black hair fluttering in the wind.

Blood-red eyes.

A fierce smile on his lips.

The man glanced at the sharp spearhead aimed at him, then pulled out something shiny from his clothes.

"I'm not a suspicious person. Here, my identification."

"..."

"I said, check it."

Hank looked back and forth between the identification he held out and the man for a moment, then, with his spear still aimed, carefully checked his identification.

Soon, his eyes widened.

"...Ashuban Sherwood?"

"That's me."

"Are you Ashuban of the Half-Sword, the new captain of the revived Sherwood Mercenary Corps?"

The man grinned.

"That's also me."

Hank's face lit up.

"Have you, by any chance, come to help Tundra?"

"Isn't that obvious?"

"Ooooh...!"

Hank, who had been looking thrilled, had a bewildered expression on his face the next moment.

"But how did you get up here? It's not a place anyone can just climb up. Did they send you up with the lift from below?"

Ashuban blinked.

"Lift? What's that?"

"A magical device that can go up and down the barrier."

"Aha."

"...? You didn't take it?"

"I didn't."

"Then how...?"

"I walked up."

"...?"

Hank, who had been staring blankly at Ashuban for a moment, laughed heartily.

"You have a talent for joking."

"It's true."

"Ah, come to think of it, I heard you were gathering the Sherwood members again. Is that right?"

"That's right."

"There's a man here in Tundra who used to be in Sherwood. Have you met him?"

"Not yet. It hasn't been long since I arrived."

"Aha."

"Do you know where I can meet him?"

At that, Hank pointed to the north, where a blizzard was blowing, with the spear he was holding and said.

"He probably went out beyond the barrier to hunt magical beasts again today."

"Beyond the barrier..."

Ashuban followed his gaze and stared beyond the all-white barrier.

The blizzard was howling and blowing fiercely.

"He'll be back before the sun sets, so you can meet him then and talk."

At that, Ashuban grinned.

"No. I can't wait that long."

Ashuban put one leg on the railing with an ominous smile.

Hank had a bad feeling.

'No way.'

That 'no way' was right.

Without giving him a chance to stop him, Ashuban kicked off the railing and threw himself over the wall.

"What!"

Hank immediately stuck his head over the railing.

But Ashuban was not below.

'Huh?'

When Hank raised his head, he saw Ashuban's back as he ran lightly through the air.

Black mist scattered with every step he took.

It was like watching ink drops fall onto a white canvas.

The black dots that started from his feet were spreading across the white world.

"What in the world..."

Hank stared, mesmerized, at the back of the black immortal who was dotting the pure white world with his own color.

(End of Chapter)