Chapter 3: Promise and the Girl

Inside Nordanlon, in the execution square.

A gorgeously dressed, overweight young noble sat on a chair, watching his subordinates beat a young man who was suspended by his hands from a hanging rope.

The young man’s entire body was black and blue, and blood was constantly flowing from his mouth.

“What do you say? Still not talking?”

“…”

The lack of a reply seemed to anger the noble.

“Beat him, keep going, beat him until he talks,” the noble said, then closed his eyes to rest.

The guards had no choice but to continue striking me with wooden clubs.

The crowd of commoners grew larger and larger.

People kept rushing over, and those who knew me started pointing and discussing.

“Oh my, how tragic.”

“Indeed, I wonder whose child angered these demons.”

“Shh! Keep your voice down, do you have a death wish? If they hear you, you’ll be the one hanging up there.”

The person who had spoken of demons quickly covered their mouth, terrified that the noble sitting in the square would hear.

The young noble seemed to grow annoyed by the noise around him.

He coughed once, and the previously chattering crowd immediately fell silent, afraid of angering this noble and becoming the second person to be strung up.

The young noble seemed quite satisfied with this effect and closed his eyes to rest again.

After a while of beating, the captain of the guards looked at me, who was on the verge of losing consciousness.

He walked up to the young noble and said:

“Young Master, this person is about to faint. If we keep hitting him, he’ll die.”

“Hm?”

The young noble stood up.

He walked over to my side, looking at me with disgust:

“Why bother? How about this, you tell me where that girl is, and I’ll let you go. There’s no need to lose your life over a girl.”

“….”

I opened my mouth, wanting to say something. The young noble thought I was about to tell him the girl’s whereabouts and excitedly leaned his ear closer.

The moment I saw his ear near my mouth, I opened my mouth and bit down on it, hard.

“Ah… ah… my ear… you beast… hit him, beat him to death!”

Under the guards’ beating, I released my bite.

The noble clutched his blood-soaked ear, trembling in pain.

Then he glared at me viciously.

“Hit him hard! I’m going to beat this beast to death right here today!”

“Young Master…”

“Shut up! He’s just a commoner. How dare he bite me? Keep hitting him!”

“Haha… ha… ha… cough cough… cough…”

Looking at the young noble whose ear I had bitten, now dripping with blood, I burst into laughter.

Blood kept gushing from my mouth, filling my windpipe and oral cavity.

A good amount of it flowed into my windpipe, causing me to cough violently.

After receiving the order, the guards continued to beat me with their wooden clubs.

But I felt no pain at all; my entire body had gone numb from the beating.

“Stop!”

With a soft shout, the guards stopped swinging their clubs at me.

I managed to lift my head and, along with the crowd, looked towards the source of the voice.

It was a young elf woman with fiery red hair, a tall figure, and fair skin.

What left the strongest impression was the 36D pair on her chest.

This young woman was holding the hand of a cute little girl—it was Aisilis.

“Aisilis, didn’t I tell you to run? What are you doing back here? Run… cough cough… cough…”

Seeing Aisilis here, I endured the pain wracking my entire body and shouted with all my might.

“Brother…”

Aisilis saw me hanging there and wanted to cry out, but the murmuring of the crowd completely robbed her of her courage.

“Hey, is that an elf?”

“Yeah… it’s my first time seeing one.”

“So that’s what elves look like. They don’t seem much different from us, just with pointier ears.”

“I saw an elf being auctioned at a market in another city last time, and she looked just like this.”

“…” “…” “…”

The young noble paid no mind to the crowd’s discussion.

After getting a clear look at the young girl next to the elf, he completely ignored the tall elf maiden and burst into laughter, his eyes gleaming at Aisilis.

“I was just wondering where you ran off to, and now you’ve delivered yourself right to my door.”

Following the young noble’s gaze, the others also looked at Aisilis.

Feeling the people’s stares, Aisilis fearfully hid behind Komia, but upon seeing me hanging there, she forced herself to stand forward again.

Aisilis looked at the gorgeously dressed, bloated fatty before her. She knew this person was a so-called noble, a vampire in the mouths of the people, a ruler of Nordanlon.

“Please, can you let my brother go?”

“Let him go? Hahaha!”

As if he had heard the funniest joke, the young noble burst out laughing.

“Alright, you want me to let your brother go? Then you’ll have to trade yourself for him.”

Aisilis hesitated for a moment before asking:

“Will you really let my brother go?”

“Of course, I, this young master, always keep my word.”

“Okay then, I’ll trade myself for my brother.”

As if having made a monumental decision, Aisilis was about to walk over but was stopped by Komia.

“My dear little angel, you don’t need to go over there. Big sister will rescue your brother very soon~”

“Really? Big sister, you can save my brother?”

Hearing Komia’s words, Aisilis halted her steps.

Seeing the duck that was almost in his grasp fly away, the young noble’s anger flared.

“Hey! You ugly woman, don’t you ruin my business! Get lost! If I’m in a good mood, I might even spare your life.”

“Ugly woman? … Hehe… he… he… hehehe, ugly woman. Very good. Kid, you’ve successfully provoked my anger. Get your coffin ready, and tell your family to come collect your corpse.”

“Well, damn it, this is the first time I’ve seen someone so arrogant. I’d like to see who’s collecting whose corpse! Men, take care of her! You can have the big one, leave the little one for me.”

With a wave of the young noble’s hand, the guards around him drew their weapons and began to approach Komia.

A dozen or so guards stared greedily at Komia, some of them even drooling.

The onlookers felt that things were taking a bad turn, and most of them had already left, leaving only a few of the bolder ones.

Aisilis was completely terrified, hiding behind Komia.

And I, tied up as I was, could do nothing but shout:

“You should go! You can’t beat them! Take Aisilis and go!”

Facing the surrounding guards, Komia seemed to ignore my words, giving a disdainful smile and closing her eyes, beginning to chant something.

“O, slumbering spirits of the wind, reveal your form before the world! Sword of Wind!”

As she finished speaking, Komia clenched her right hand in the air, and a colorless greatsword made of wind appeared in her grasp.

“A swordsman! This person is a swordsman!”

“Holy crap, what’s the point of fighting? Run!”

“I don’t want to die here!”

“I still have my elderly mother at home!”

“Help!!!”

With the appearance of the great wind sword, the guards and the remaining onlookers started screaming and shouting, then scattered in a panic.

The scene was chaotic for a moment.

A moment later, besides the young noble who had been knocked over while trying to escape, Aisilis hiding behind Komia, and me still hanging there (a male protagonist who gets hung up and beaten, I’m probably the first, right?), there was no one else left in the square.

“Hehe~ Ugly woman.”

Komia laughed, and under the sunlight, her red hair combined with her enchanting face looked devilishly beautiful.

“Heh~ Little boy, you can eat whatever you want, but you can’t say whatever you want.”

The young noble looked at the colorless greatsword in Komia’s hand, his entire body trembling.

He knelt on the ground, snot and tears streaming down his face, and kowtowed to Komia.

“Please, spare me, Lord Swordsman! It was my fault for not recognizing your greatness. You are a magnanimous person, please spare me. I can give you money… a lot of money. I’ll give you anything you want, just please spare me.”

“Spare you? Hehe~ Too late. The moment you uttered the words ‘ugly woman,’ your name was already on the Grim Reaper’s list. And you even dared to have ideas about my little angel. Unforgivable. Go repent in hell.”

“Wait, you can’t kill me, I am…”

Before the pathetic young noble could even finish his sentence, he was beheaded by Komia in a single strike.

After dispatching this noble, whose name was never even mentioned from beginning to end, Komia relaxed her right hand, and the greatsword in her hand vanished.

At that moment, Aisilis, seeing the beheaded noble, fought back the urge to vomit, rushed to my side, and helped me untie the ropes.

She then threw herself into my arms and began to cry.

“Brother… brother… brother.”

“Hiss… it’s alright, it’s alright now, Aisilis.”

I hissed in pain while comforting her, then glanced at the beheaded noble.

A wave of nausea washed over me, but the pain from Aisilis’s tight embrace made my wounds throb, which helped to distract me.

“Thank goodness, brother, you’re okay. I thought I would never see you again.”

Aisilis said while shedding tears.

I endured the pain and slowly raised my hands to wipe away her tears.

“Aisilis, didn’t I tell you to run away? Why did you come back?”

“Without brother, Aisilis won’t go anywhere.”

With that, she threw herself into my arms again.

Looking at these two people showing affection in front of her as if no one else was there, Komia let out a loud cough to announce her presence and dissatisfaction, then looked at me with disdain, her eyes filled with the flames of jealousy.

‘How dare he hold my angel like that, that b*stard! I really want to stab him twice. But I’m so envious. When will my angel hold me like that? I’d be willing to die for it.’

Right now, Komia just wanted to quickly take Aisilis away from me, whom she had labeled a b*stard, and return to the academy.

“Alright, the person has been rescued. Let’s go quickly. The guards will be here soon. Although I’m not afraid, it’s still troublesome.”

“Mhm. Brother, let’s go. Let’s leave this place. Brother, you saw how strong big sister is. She’ll take us away from here.”

“Oh, not at all!! Ah, being praised by my little angel, I feel like my whole life has been worthwhile,” Komia said, cupping her blushing face with both hands and stomping her feet joyfully.

Then, as if remembering something, she said apologetically to Aisilis:

“Sorry, Aisilis, I forgot to tell you. You can leave with me, but he can’t.”

“Eh?” “Why?”

“Because the Academy Head only instructed me to bring you back alone. He never mentioned you had an older brother.”

“Er… well, I’m not actually Aisilis’s biological brother,” I explained.

“Oh!!! I knew it! How could such a cute angel have a brother like this? So you’re not blood-related. Hmph hmph hmph, that makes things easier.”

Hearing this news, Komia suddenly became cheerful and turned to Aisilis, saying:

“Aisilis, I can give your brother a sum of money and then take him to a safe place. Then you can leave with me. How does that sound?”

“No, if brother isn’t with me, I’m not going anywhere.”

Aisilis said with a very firm attitude.

“Aisilis…”

Just as Komia was about to say more, I interrupted her.

“Aisilis, go with this… big sister. Leave this place, don’t worry about me.”

“No! Didn’t brother say you’d always be with me, for a lifetime? Are you abandoning Aisilis now?”

Aisilis looked at me with her watery eyes, tears welling up and swirling in their sockets.

“That’s not it, brother isn’t abandoning you, and I don’t want to be separated from Aisilis either. But, brother doesn’t have the ability to protect Aisilis. Just like now, brother couldn’t protect you at all. If it weren’t for this big sister, maybe Aisilis would never have seen me again. So, I want Aisilis to become strong. Then, in the future, I might need Aisilis to protect me.”

“Protect brother…”

As if Aisilis had discovered something, a light suddenly flickered in her eyes.

Noticing this, I quickly said:

“Mhm, protect me. So, Aisilis, can you do that?”

After thinking for a moment, Aisilis said with great solemnity:

“I will do it! I’ll become strong and protect brother, and then we’ll be together forever. Brother must wait for me. And, brother, you absolutely cannot run off with another girl! Just wait here for me to come back!”

“Don’t worry, I’ll wait for you. This is… our promise.”

Aisilis raised her tear-filled eyes and stared at me intently, as if to engrave my face into her heart.

Then she gave me a kiss on the lips.

“I’ve taken brother’s first kiss.”

‘Although Miss Komia looked at me like an enemy when she left, she’ll take good care of Aisilis, right? We’re people from different worlds now. This should be the last time we see each other, Aisilis.’

A child’s promise is forgotten after a short while.

Watching Aisilis leave, I thought to myself.

That was indeed what I thought at the time, completely unaware of what would happen in the future.