HEO 7

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The face of the figure in the black robe was hidden beneath a deep hood. Their build was smaller than Red Eagle’s. They were slight for a Stohl person, but as a companion of the wolf man, their skill must be extraordinary. Regardless, he had to take this chance and quickly escape with the Prince…….

The men surrounded the wolf man and shouted toward them.

“We’ll handle this one! You guys take out the Prince!”

Once again, weapons were thrust toward Wolf. There was no time to flee.

“Die—!”

Four men lunged forward simultaneously.

“Wolf!”

Red Eagle let out a cry and tightly clung to one of Wolf’s legs. Wolf squeezed his eyes shut. I don’t want to die! But I’m going to.

…….

…….

Strange.

Why doesn’t it hurt?

Did my head fly off so fast that I couldn’t feel the pain? But I can still feel the vivid sensation of the Prince’s arm clinging to my leg…….

Wait, am I… not dead yet?

Wolf slowly opened his eyes. In the distance, the wolf man was entangled in a fight with several people. Clang, clang, screech— the sharp sounds of axes, swords, and spears colliding rang out.

The wolf man swung his axe and shouted at his companion.

“Silver! You idiot, what are you doing! Help out!”

“I already did. You’re on your own for the rest, Ice Armor Warrior.”

The figure in the black robe flicked a hand and began to walk. The attackers, preoccupied with dealing with the wolf man, seemed to have no strength left to challenge the black robe. Wolf looked down. The four men who had rushed toward him were sprawled out in a neat row. All of them had daggers embedded in their napes.

The black robe’s doing? How, from that distance…….

The black robe approached. The face beneath the hood remained invisible, obscured by the backlight.

The one who had thrown the daggers was indeed the black robe. In the fierce wind, the thick cloaks and hems of the other people’s clothes fluttered like linen handkerchiefs, but the black robe only swayed slightly at the bottom. It was likely because the robe had become heavy from the numerous daggers tucked inside.

As the black robe drew closer, Wolf became dazed. The darkness cast beneath the hood gradually faded, revealing that face…….

It was a boy. Platinum blonde. Alice-blue eyes. A loop-shaped tattoo stretching from above the right eye to the center of the cheek. It was a face as cold and sharp as a freshly honed blade. Yet, the moment his retinas were sliced by that blade, strangely, Wolf’s body grew hot as if burned. It felt as if someone had poured oil inside his body and lit a fire. Why… am I like this?

The boy stopped in front of the corpses. He was three or four steps away. His Alice-blue eyes swept across the surroundings before coming to a halt on Wolf’s face.

Their eyes met.

He did not look away.

He stared.

Wolf endured the awkward feeling and accepted the boy’s gaze. Even after a long time, the gaze did not break. It felt as if his face were being soaked in Alice-blue paint. Eventually, Wolf was the first to turn his head away.

Why is he staring like that? Is there a lot of blood on my face?

Is this how it feels when the sun doesn’t rise even after noon? The moment the boy’s face entered his vision, an indescribable sensation occupied Wolf’s body. Something that couldn’t be defined as heat, energy, or a shiver. Something so bizarre, like a black moon, that he couldn’t even find a name for it.

The changes in his body didn’t stop there. Dizziness. A pounding heart. A brain where all thought processes had ceased. It was as if he had been cast under a spell.

He didn’t know how much time had passed. With his head still turned, Wolf tentatively shifted his eyes back toward the boy. The boy was still staring at him.

Wolf hurriedly looked down. He was filled with nothing but questions. Why he wondered if the boy was still looking. Why, stubbornly, he had insisted on turning back to check. And why, the moment he confirmed the boy’s gaze still lingered on him, he was overwhelmed by a deep sense of relief……. Perhaps the boy felt the same. Did he want me to look at him?

Stop it. What kind of stupid thoughts are these.

Finally, the boy withdrew his gaze from Wolf. He leaned down and slowly pulled the daggers from the men’s napes one by one. His movements were indifferent, as if he were pulling carrots from a garden.

Blood trickled down the blades. The boy wiped the daggers on his forearm guards before tucking them back inside the robe. Just as Wolf had guessed, several daggers were fixed to the inner lining of the robe. He also wore a sword at his waist. Unusually, it was about one-third shorter than a standard sword.

Only then did a chill run through Wolf’s entire body. Though he was as beautiful as a spirit from a fairy tale, the boy was a killer. He was someone who belonged to a world—the so-called world of adventure—that was entirely different from his own.

After wiping the fourth dagger, the boy looked up.

“Hmm…….”

The boy tilted his head slightly. The dagger pointed toward Wolf.

“You. Are you the Brown Goose Prince?”

“Huh? What?”

Wolf asked back blankly. The boy frowned and spoke again.

“You. Are you the Purple Hen Prince?”

Wolf gasped. Though the pronunciation was awkward, the boy was undoubtedly speaking the common tongue of Atania.

“You can speak our language? Are you from Atania?”

“Me? Can’t you see this?”

The boy sneered, pointing with the dagger to the tattoo by his eye. Wolf’s face flushed, and he hunched his shoulders.

“Hey. Can you hear me? Are you the White Rooster Prince?”

“……I’m not the Prince. And the Prince’s name is Red Eagle. Prince, are you alright?”

Wolf helped Red Eagle to his feet. Red Eagle looked down at his own toes with a vacant expression. The boy pointed the dagger at Wolf again.

“Fine, whatever about the Red Pigeon Prince. What are you?”

“I’m an attendant. But why do you keep calling the Prince’s name wrong?”

“Because it’s fucking long, you shit. Even in the Stohl language, it’s Neudore—four letters. Honestly, you get confused too, don’t you, huh?”

“Yeah. Actually, I get confused often.”

Wolf played along to stay on the boy’s good side. He didn’t know who he was, but he was the benefactor who had saved them.

“Hmph, who cares what the name is. You know how to fight, right?”

“I don’t.”

“Don’t lie to me, you brat. I saw everything. You’ve got good eyes.”

The boy’s way of speaking was as rough as a corpse-cart driver’s. Wolf waved a hand.

“No, I really can’t fight. That was just luck. By the way, who is that warrior?”

He asked the thing he was most curious about first. The boy tapped his own cheek with the dagger.

“Didn’t you hear from the guy whose head got blown off? The Prince’s mother hired an Ice Armor Warrior as a bodyguard. He said he received gold coins in heaps like sheep’s wool in return.”

“If he’s an Ice Armor Warrior, then that warrior over there?”

Wolf pointed to the wolf man. Surprisingly, the wolf man had already finished off all his opponents and was shaking blood off his axe.

“It’s amazing that he took down so many people alone. What’s his name? Oh, is Ice Armor Warrior his real name?”

“No. That’s a nickname I gave him. That Ice Armor Warrior’s name is…….”

The boy stopped speaking and stared blankly into the air for a moment before shrugging.

“Well, it’s probably more than four letters. I just call him Ice Armor Warrior.”

He didn’t know about all Stohl people, but this boy seemed dim-witted. At the very least, his memory was certainly poor. Wolf pulled Red Eagle’s shoulder and shook him.

“Did you hear that, Prince? A reliable bodyguard is protecting us.”

“Ah, yeah.”

Red Eagle nodded, still wearing a vacant expression. The boy, looking back and forth between Wolf and Red Eagle, suddenly burst out laughing.

“Bwahahaha! Haha! Puhaha!”

“Why are you laughing?”

Wolf asked, bewildered. The boy made a motion of drawing a straight line across his forehead with the dagger.

“Your bangs. They’re fucking hilarious. Around here, only snot-nosed kids wear their hair like that.”

“What?”

Wolf flared up. In his eyes, the boy’s hairstyle looked like a beggar begging in front of a plaza statue. Since the hood was down, only the messy bangs were visible, but that alone was enough to make any Atanian mother say, ‘Don’t associate with a child like that.’

“We are people of Atania! Atanian boys all keep their hair neat! How dare you mock—”

“The Prince and you. You’re Stohl people.”

The boy cut Wolf off. Wolf paused, then spoke with strength in his voice.

“No! The Prince is a Stohl person, but I am from Atania.”

“Stop joking. You’re a Stohl person just by looking at you. From your features, you’re a typical Stohl man.”

8 – Hell Execution Order