By Zephyria 
An entrance to an unknown world. Leonardo gazed at the end of it without answering. Within the unnaturally placed Spatiotemporal Distortion, refracted light—the kind one would typically see at the entrance of a Portal—was leaking out.
Despite having no information on where it led, he felt neither fear nor repulsion. He hesitated for a moment because of the child’s voice, which sounded as if asking for a great resolve, but… since he had come this far, deliberation was unnecessary.
Having made up his mind, he answered simply.
“I’ll go. I wouldn’t have followed you if I intended to quit.”
At that, the child nodded.
“Right. You had so many footnotes that I thought you were being indecisive, but you’re quite decisive at times like this. Now, take this.”
The child threw one of the items she had been holding in her arms toward Leonardo. Catching it lightly, he rotated his wrist to examine the object. It was the gold bracelet he had entrusted to the child’s emotions.
The very gold bracelet he had happened upon at Grimbleton’s magic shop, which had glowed brilliantly before he entered the Castle of Romance.
When Leonardo looked at her with a gaze that asked, ‘Why this?’, the child added:
“That will also help ensure you aren’t swept away by the flow of time. It was made a very long time ago, and it will remember its former owner.”
Former owner? Leonardo reflexively asked back and looked at the bracelet again. This bracelet was an object that had been quite perplexing, as it kept popping out whenever he tried to put it into an Artifact. While being questioned at the border, he had shoved it onto his wrist to avoid the suspicious gaze of an inspector doubting its origin, and it had fit perfectly as if it were his own, allowing him to get away by luck.
‘Was that because I was the owner of the bracelet?’
When she had said she saw his image in the residual thoughts attached to the bracelet and ring, he hadn’t been able to understand or accept it immediately due to the sudden rush of information. However, putting all the stories together so far…
‘The old man definitely… didn’t he say someone bestowed a bracelet upon a knight?’
Leonardo blinked with a stunned expression. Just then, the child stretched out both arms and gave him a commanding instruction.
“If you’re ready, move me quickly. I can’t cross over alone in this body.”
Confused by the sudden remark, Leonardo barely managed to tear his eyes away from the bracelet. The sight he faced upon turning his head was so bizarre that his brow furrowed instinctively.
Despite having the eyes of an old soul, her expression was that of a quintessential prim little girl, looking up at him with a gesture that essentially meant ‘Hold me.’
Setting aside the incongruity, it was quite flustering.
Unconsciously taking a step back, Leonardo asked with a deeply serious face.
“Move… what?”
“Can’t you tell by looking? My arms are going to fall off.”
She fidgeted with her legs and arms as if pestering him.
As if facing a creature he didn’t want to touch, Leonardo pulled his neck back. He looked back and forth between the child and the window hanging to the left. Comparing it to where the top of her head reached, it was certainly not a height a child could cross alone. But… still. A brat who acted like a full-grown adult—to the point where he already viewed her through a ‘grandmother filter’—was showing a mischievous side, leaving him momentarily unable to judge how to act.
But that was only for a moment. After slipping the bracelet onto his wrist, Leonardo approached the child, though he wore an expression of reluctance. As if accustomed to it, he wrapped his arm under her knees and supported her back, which was small enough to be covered by a single span of his hand. The child then perched on his forearm and naturally wrapped both hands around his neck.
Only after confirming the posture was stable did Leonardo lift her effortlessly with one arm. At his skilled movement, the child asked him:
“You seem to be good with children.”
Leonardo shrugged without a particular answer. He felt a prick of guilt internally, but fortunately, it seemed this person didn’t see through everything.
As he stared at her from a close distance in that state, the child gave the final order.
“Let’s go.”
Pointing forward and nudging him with her foot, it felt somehow like she was treating him as a horse or a servant. Suddenly reduced to a means of transportation, Leonardo rolled his eyes upward with a sigh. Nevertheless, he adjusted his hold on the child once more and leaped nimbly through the window as commanded.
“Why aren’t you moving faster? If the sun sets while you’re dawdling, it’s over!”
A rough and blunt man’s voice rang out loudly. Besides the thick voice hammering into his ears, the surroundings were extremely noisy.
“We have to storm Perman by tomorrow, so shove all the supplies into the northern granary. Once you’ve finished maintaining your weapons, teach the rookies how to hold a spear. Hey, you two slackers over there—get your asses to the blacksmith’s forge right now. The old blacksmith is complaining that he has no slaves to work the bellows.”
“The blacksmith’s forge, sir?”
“Yeah. I heard the guys coming over from Olga got ambushed in the forest like idiots and had an arm ripped off each. They didn’t die, though, so don’t be scared; just go carry some charcoal and chop some firewood.”
“Yes, sir!”
Sharp metal clashed loudly, and steam mixed with acrid dust erupted from the heated molten iron. Occasionally, the groans of the wounded, the neighing of horses, and the creaking of rolling wagons pierced his eardrums vividly.
The muddy ground, the foul smell of excrement, and the rank scent of sweat-soaked leather. He could vaguely guess where this was without even checking.
Beyond the soldiers moving busily, wooden fences with sharpened tips were driven densely into the ground. Beside the temporary fence made this way, there was a makeshift watchtower constructed from stacked logs and a ladder. On one side, tents covered with old blankets were lined up.
This place was likely a battlefield—a field camp being reorganized ahead of a decisive battle.
Of course, it looked much older, shabbier, and more crude than the battlefields he remembered.
“Hey, you there!”
Just as he was looking around to grasp the situation, the shout of the man who had been commanding earlier reached him. Simultaneously, his shoulder was pushed back, and his entire body lurched violently. There was no time to react.
‘…?’
Nearly falling over, Leonardo barely regained his balance with his excellent reflexes. However, contrary to his mind, which thought he had planted both feet firmly, his vision unfortunately began to tilt. His body, falling backward in an instant, finally hit the ground with a thud. Consequently, he lost his grip on the spear shaft he was holding and rolled pathetically through the mud.
The man picked up the spear shaft and slammed it down once, hard, between the sprawled Leonardo’s legs.
“Look at this bastard. Why are you the only one standing stiffly?”
Perhaps because the ground was soft and many footprints had passed through, it sank quite deep. He wasn’t pierced, but any man would have felt a chill run down his spine. As his face turned pale, the man threatened him.
“Don’t you see the others rolling around like beasts? If you want to keep food in your mouth, I told you to hurry up and move those!”
The man’s fingertip pointed toward the wagons that had just arrived and were creating a bottleneck at the entrance. There, sacks of grain, hard rye bread, and sprouted potatoes were piled high. Beside them, essential field supplies such as iron pots, axes, arrowheads, and twine were arriving in a steady stream on new wagons.
Leonardo was extremely confused.
‘…Wasn’t I just supposed to watch?’
He clearly remembered leaping into a place called the ‘Backyard’ with the child, so he had never imagined he would suddenly be swept into an experiential recollection. He looked up at the man, his lips barely trembling.
Just then, someone from behind grabbed his arm and forced him to stand up.
“I’m sorry, this fellow is a bit slow because he injured his leg during a fight earlier. I’ll drag him along and educate him.”
“What, you know him? Ha, when even the healthy ones are on their last legs… Fine, you pick up this space-out. You’ll have to slap him across the face to fill his eyes with venom, or he’ll barely save his own life tomorrow instead of becoming monster food.”
The man said this, cleared his throat with a rasp, and spat phlegm onto the ground. After glaring at Leonardo until the end, he turned away with heavy steps. Seeing him immediately point and raise his voice elsewhere, he seemed to be in a fairly high position.
“Get up quickly. I’ll make some excuses, so pretend to move the sacks and stay in the warehouse. Get your head straight and come out at ration time.”
The man who helped Leonardo up whispered softly while brushing off his clothes. Leonardo bowed his head to him and tried to ask where this was, but—
“Thank you.”
A lifeless greeting popped out regardless of his will. Then, before he could do anything, his body snatched up the spear stuck in the ground and dashed away.
In that moment, Leonardo realized two facts.
One was that this body’s legs were intact and uninjured. And the other was…
‘Could I have… been a knight?’