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THE meeting of the Hundred in Laslei was more approachable than I had expected. The spot in the forest was close to the city, and there weren’t too many monsters around, so even ordinary people could come and watch—and it was packed with sightseers.
In the center of it all, the Hundred’s members fought while spectators shouted at them.
“Hey, pull yourself together!”
“Fight harder!”
“I’ve got a lot of money riding on you!”
My eyes went wide when I realized people were already betting on the fights at this early stage. The fights were in the style of the arena, but overall, the place was a bit shady. When I looked more closely, I saw that many of the fighters had tattoos, and I got the strong sense that they were on the wrong side of the law.
I was taken aback; this was quite different from the Hundred in Farune. For one thing, they were only maybe a bit stronger than the average knight. My party members could have easily beaten them.
I guess if I’m gathering information, it’d be fastest to join one of the fights, but…
“Kylan, if you want information, what if you try joining in?” I said. “Darion could do it too. I think you’re actually all strong enough to win.”
Personally, I wanted to know who had created the Hundred in Laslei. Like in Vulcan, it was probably one of the guys who called themselves Million.
“Huh? Us? You’re not going to fight, Marcus?” Kylan replied. Both he and Darion seemed surprised for some reason.
“I’m a wizard, you know,” I said. “As a rule, the Hundred is a gathering of warriors. I’ve heard that there are some wizards in Farune’s Hundred, but they’re mainly expected to join Frau’s Mages’ Guild instead. Basically, the Hundred is for knights and warriors. So, you guys should go.”
“Well, you might call yourself a wizard…” Kylan started before suddenly clamming up.
“Yeah, you don’t quite fit the mold. Or…something.” Darion also sounded like his words were laced with implications.
“If a wizard wins, they’ll just end up standing out, right?” I said. “Isn’t this a confidential request? Don’t worry about it, you guys. Just give it your best shot.”
On my urging, Kylan and Darion reluctantly went to where the fights were being held. When they drew near, the man in charge questioned them.
“What do you want?” he demanded. With his short black hair and dark skin, he looked like a typical Lasleian. He was around average height, and his torso was bare, showing off his impressively chiseled muscles to everyone around him. On his back, there was a large tattoo of a black lion. He had a curious sex appeal about him—rather than being handsome, his features would best have been described as macho. He was probably popular with both men and women.
“We’re here because we heard the rumors. They say you can get into some crazy fights here,” Kylan replied smoothly.
“Hey, you guys hear that?!” the short-haired man shouted. “There are rumors about this place!”
The spectators and fighters laughed together. The place was an open secret, so they probably thought it was only natural that there were rumors.
“This isn’t a joke!” The man clocked one of the laughing spectators hard enough to knock him out, leaving him sprawled on the ground. The mood completely flipped, and everyone fell silent.
“Did you forget what I said? The first rule of the Hundred is: you do not talk about the Hundred. The second rule of the Hundred is: you DO NOT talk about the Hundred. These rules are ironclad, so we can keep doing our own thing. And when you don’t follow the rules, bastards like these will get the wrong idea and come from all over the place wanting to join. You think this is some sort of party? For whatever riff-raff wanders in off the street?”
By the sound of it, the short-haired man wasn’t in a very good mood today. But I didn’t see how this could ever have hoped to stay a secret, with so many people fighting and betting. The man himself had just admitted out loud that this was the Hundred.
The man meticulously surveyed the faces of the silent people around him, then loudly clicked his tongue in irritation. “Well, whatever,” he said. “I’m a forgiving guy. If you want to give it a try, I’ll let you. But you can eat the meat, right? And I’m not talking about a few worthless scraps. I mean the strong stuff, the stuff that can kill a man.”
Kylan and Darion were clearly thoroughly intimidated, but they nodded.
“Yeah, we’re eating Bloodbear meat,” Kylan said.
“Bear, so you’re eating bear, huh?!” The short-haired man placed a hand on his chin and began to walk in a circle around them. “All right, bear isn’t bad. It’s a powerful animal. You guys might have it in you to fight.” He pointed at a warrior. “Fiftieth. You take them.”
“You got it, First,” the warrior replied.
Fiftieth seemed to be one of the lower-ranking members of the Hundred there. And, just as I had suspected, the short-haired man was number one. In Farune, everyone just used names now, but when the Hundred had been an underground organization, we had called each other by our ranks in order to keep our names secret. Because of that, it was still common for them to call me Zero.
The match between Kylan and Fiftieth soon began. There were no unnecessary preludes. It was a simple fight of sword against sword. Fiftieth wasn’t all that strong; he was outmatched by Kylan, and the fight was quickly over—with a sword pointed at him, Fiftieth admitted defeat. Kylan was clearly relieved.
“That’s bear power. Not bad,” First praised Kylan, and Kylan broke into a smile. But the man’s next words froze that smile on his face. “Next up is Forty-ninth. Good luck.”
Before Kylan had a chance to say anything, his next opponent stepped forward. Again, the fight began right away. The sound of blades clashing echoed around the forest. Kylan won this fight as well, but number forty-eight challenged him to a match soon after. This repeated several times, and once Kylan was finished going up against number forty-five, his stamina was spent. He plopped down on the ground, his shoulders heaving as he took ragged breaths.
“Next,” First said, mercilessly showing Forty-fourth into the ring.
“Hold on, Kylan can’t take any more!” Darion protested, unable to stand by and watch.
“All right then, you fight in his place. You’re the ones who challenged us. I won’t let you say you didn’t know what you were getting into.”
First’s dark eyes gleamed as he peered at Darion.