And as a relative of the royal family, Zweit had to accept any request for single combat, whether he wanted to or not.
His lineage could really make things hard for him.
“Anyway... At this rate, we’re gonna have nothing to do here before long, huh?” Zweit said. “I was interested in seeing an ancient city, but when its defenses are this perfect...”
Diio gave an awkward laugh. “Yeah... There are only so many ways you can attack or defend a place. And that’s extra true here, since the city’s so specialized in defense.”
“Wonder if there’s somewhere we can do some training, at least... Huh?”
Just as Zweit unfurled a map of the city and was about to head somewhere else, he spotted Eromura and Anzu walking together.
They made quite an odd pair. What was more, they’d been hired as guards, so going off on their own without permission was a breach of contract.
That was doubly true for Eromura. While he’d received a pardon for his crimes, he had been an accomplice in an attempted assassination. And while he hadn’t had much choice in that—having been a criminal slave at the time—it was his own stupid crime that had reduced him to that status to begin with.
Long story short, his circumstances made it especially important for him to get permission from Zweit before going out and about.
“Hey,” Zweit called out. “Where do you two think you’re going?”
“Yo, comrade!” Eromura greeted him. “We were thinking of doing a bit of exploring. There might be a big tunnel up ahead. One that no one else has found yet. Who knows—we might even get a chance to fight a bit!”
“Wha— Is that true?!” Zweit exclaimed.
“Mmm... Just Eromura’s guess,” Anzu clarified. “That’s why we’re going. To find out if he’s right.”
“A-Anzu?! I thought you said you wanted to check it out too! Can you not pin it all on me?!” Eromura said.
Eromura and Anzu were both reincarnators, meaning they knew Isa Lante from Swords & Sorceries. They were looking for a very specific place to determine what, if anything, was different between this version of the city and the version they were familiar with. They’d been on their way there when they’d run into Zweit, who’d latched onto the idea more than they’d expected him to.
While Zweit and Diio did joint training with the Order of Knights, they also didn’t neglect their own training routines.
And any opportunity for realistic combat training would strengthen not only the students but also the knights at the garrison.
Zweit was still a little worried about the idea of Eromura, of all people, conducting this exploration. But having Anzu there to keep the thoughtless horndog in check made him a little more optimistic, at least.
“Well, we might be off the mark, so don’t get your hopes up too much, all right?” Eromura said.
“I’ll try not to,” Zweit replied. “Where exactly are you going, though? And shouldn’t you have checked with me first?”
“Sorry, sorry. My bad. Anyway...here.” Eromura pointed to a spot on the map where an enormous pillar stretched up to the ceiling above. “This is where we’re headed.”
“Why that one pillar?” Zweit asked. “Isn’t it just there to supply mana to the outside of the city?”
“Actually, you can go through it to get to the surface,” Eromura said. “If I’m right, that is. There should be both stairs and an elevator inside. I just hope they haven’t been destroyed.”
“You sound like you know a lot about this,” Zweit said. “Even we haven’t heard about any of that...”
And what’s an “elevator,” anyway?
“I bet the Destroyer’d know more than us. It’s not like we know that much about this place.”
“Say... Who exactly are you two? Where’d you learn all this?”
Only now was Zweit beginning to notice what an anomaly Eromura was.
Isa Lante was a lost undercity that had been rediscovered just recently, yet Eromura not only knew about the city—he also knew about some staircase hidden inside a specific pillar.
Even Croesus, who managed to somehow get his hands on all sorts of information about ancient ruins, knew nothing about the internal structure of these pillars. And this was the first time Zweit had heard anything about a staircase leading to the surface.
What was more, if Zelos did indeed know even more about the place, then he had to be even more of an anomaly. Both Zelos and Eromura knew too many things no one else knew.
“I mean... I guess you could say we’re in the same boat as that old guy.” Eromura shrugged.
“Ignorance is bliss,” Anzu mumbled. “Curiosity killed the infernal greatcat. Try not to worry about it...”
“Look, you can’t just drop the name of a legendary monster like that,” Zweit retorted. “Speaking of which, we’d just be dead if we ever ran into one of those, right?”
“Mmm... You’ll be fine,” Anzu said. “You won’t die. I’ll protect you.”
“That’s pretty rich coming from the guard who abandoned me to go out exploring, don’t you think?” Zweit replied.
“Aww, c’mon, comrade. Don’t sweat the small stuff,” Eromura said. “Don’t wanna go bald from stress, do ya?”
“I’m not going bald! Oh, whatever,” Zweit sighed. “Just tell me if you find anything, okay?”
Zweit decided to relent for today. He got the feeling Eromura and Anzu weren’t about to tell him anything more just yet.
“Sure thing! Leave it to me!” Eromura said, giving him a parting wave.
“There’s...something strange about those two, don’t you think?” Diio mused.
“Yeah. Eromura said they’re ‘in the same boat’ as Teach, but those two aren’t mages. So what do they have in common?”
“Why don’t you ask that teacher of yours?”
“I can ask, but I don’t know whether he’d give me an honest answer. He gets evasive about the weirdest things.”
Not knowing what Zelos and the others really were gave Zweit a sense of discomfort, like there was a lump in his throat.
Just thinking about it wasn’t going to get him anywhere, though, so he gave up on pursuing it for now.
He believed that, if the time ever came when he needed to know, Zelos would tell him everything.