Chapter 55: Effort
Hans led his remaining guards toward the gates of the Lord's Mansion, his chest puffed out with the confidence of a man about to close the deal of a lifetime.
A Ghoul stood at the entrance, motionless as a statue, its jaw hanging slightly agape.
Hans was a master of the "social arts." He knew that in any world, a little grease made the gears turn faster. He reached into his tunic and pulled out a river pebble he had found earlier. It was polished to a mirror sheen and reflected the sunlight beautifully.
He sidled up to the Ghoul, surreptitiously pressing the stone into its cold hand.
"Friend," Hans whispered with a conspiratorial wink. "How about a little professional courtesy? Lead me to your Lord, and there's plenty more where that came from."
The Ghoul's fingers curled shut, stowing the stone into a pocket on its armor. Then, it returned to standing perfectly still.
The smile on Hans's face froze.
One second.
Two seconds.
Ten seconds.
Hans forced his grin wider, his voice dropping to a strained hiss. "Friend, you're being a bit uncool right now."
The Ghoul gave him a brief, sideways glance before turning its head back to stare at the sky, as if performing an intensive study on the migratory patterns of clouds.
Hans felt his blood pressure spike. He suppressed his rising fury, staring dead at the Ghoul before extending his hand.
"Give me back my stone."
The Ghoul spoke, its voice raspy and slow. "What stone?"
"The one I just gave you!"
"I have no memory of this."
Hans's brain let out a visible ping.
A scam.
He had just been scammed by a member of the walking dead. His pride as a merchant had never been so thoroughly insulted. A wave of white-hot rage rushed to his head.
"You! This is fraud! I'll have you know that private property is sacred and inviolable!"
Hans rolled up his sleeves, ready to lunge and perhaps turn the Ghoul into a late-afternoon snack. Before he could commit social suicide, his Guard Captain tackled him from behind, pinning his arms.
"Boss! Calm down! Be reasonable, Boss! You can't win this fight!"
Another guard rushed in to help pull him back. "He's right, Boss! His bicep is thicker than your damn thigh!"
Under the combined weight of his guards, Hans eventually deflated. He straightened his expensive, now-wrinkled suit and let out a heavy, indignant huff. Then, he walked to the side of the gate and sat down right on the dirt.
"Fine. I'm not leaving."
Hans decided to play the long game. He didn't believe for a second that the Lord of this mansion could stay inside forever.
And so, the standoff began: a human merchant, a group of tired guards, and an apathetic Ghoul sentry.
Hans glared at the Ghoul.
The Ghoul stared at the sky.
The sun rose in the east and dipped in the west. By evening, Hans's guards had reached their limit. They found a clean patch of ground, rolled out their blankets, and fell into a deep sleep, their snoring echoing through the quiet streets. Hans, however, wrapped himself in a quilt, his teeth chattering from the night chill.
He watched the Ghoul, who hadn't shifted its weight by so much as a millimeter. He spent the night mentally cursing the creature's entire lineage back to the first pile of rot.
By dawn the next day, Hans—now sporting two dark circles under his eyes—couldn't take it anymore. He stood up, wobbled over to the Ghoul, and spoke in a voice that sounded half-dead.
"Does your Lord ever come out? Or are you just guarding an empty house?"
Perhaps the Ghoul felt that taking the stone without providing service was indeed "uncool" by the Master's standards. It finally stopped studying the clouds and looked down at Hans.
"That Personage is not currently within the walls of Iron Fortress."
Hans stood frozen for three full seconds. Then, he ripped the warming quilt off his shoulders and slammed it into the dirt.
"DAMN IT! Why didn't you say that yesterday?!"
The Ghoul's response lacked even a shred of apology. It was pure, unadulterated apathy. "You didn't ask yesterday."
Hans forgot to breathe for a moment, nearly fainting on the spot. He leaned against the stone wall for support, gasping for air until his heart stopped hammering.
"Then where is he?!"
The Ghoul ignored him. It turned its head back to the horizon, resuming its watch over the morning mist.
To hell with this.
Hans gave up on communicating with the undead. But he hadn't given up on finding the Lord. His observations over the past few days hadn't been in vain. He had noticed that Iron Fortress only had three high-spec roads. One was the road they had arrived on. One led to Jade Territory. The third led into the deep unknown, and he had no idea how to access it.
Hans made a decision. He would start where he came from.
He turned to his weary guards. "Our contract is concluded. You're dismissed."
"Boss? What about our final payment?" the Captain asked.
"The toll fees I paid for your lives count as your severance. I literally bought your continued existence. Don't mention it."
The guards looked at each other. It was true that they hadn't had ten gold coins to their names when they hit the checkpoint. Without the "Boss" handling the trouble, they'd be "radishes" by now. As for where the trouble came from... they decided not to dwell on it.
Hans, now alone, shouldered his pack and stepped back onto the Great Road. He didn't know how long he would be walking, or if he had enough coin to cover the "tolls" along the way. But he had to go. This was a gamble for his soul.
He walked for a full day. By the time the sun rose on the second day, he found himself at the edge of a great forest. The wide stone road simply... ended.
A Skeleton Knight and two Toxic Archers stood silently at the forest entrance. The Knight raised a gauntleted hand, barring the way.
"Present your permit."
Hans stared, his eyes bulging. "Permit? What permit? I'm just looking for your Lord!"
The Skeleton Knight ignored his plea, repeating the requirement with the mechanical precision of a clock. "Present your permit."
Hans felt like he was being driven insane by the bureaucracy of the dead. He decided to try a different approach. He stepped off the road and plunged into the thickets, intending to find a side path around the "Ghost Sheriff."
He spent hours crawling through thorny bushes, getting scratched and covered in grime, only to realize he was hopelessly lost. Thirsty and exhausted, he followed the sound of rushing water until he found a small river. He collapsed by the bank, prepared to dunk his head in.
Then, he saw a figure.
A skeleton was sitting on a large rock on the opposite bank. It held a fishing rod in its hand, staring intently at a line that hung limply in the water. The float didn't move an inch.
Hans's heart skipped a beat. Fishing required patience and intellect. He immediately deduced that this skeleton must be high-ranking.
He had found his opening.
Hans straightened his disheveled clothes, waded across the shallow river, and crept up cautiously.
Kaito had noticed him the moment he stepped out of the bushes. But Kaito only spared him a glance; seeing that the human didn't even possess Tier 1 strength, he didn't bother wasting his attention. The fish weren't biting today, and it was making Kaito very irritable.
Hans pulled out his very last "shiny stone"—a smooth piece of quartz—and offered it.
"Friend, excuse me. Could you tell me where I might find the Lord of this land?"
Kaito's gaze drifted from the water to the human, then to the stone in his hand. "What do you want with that Personage?"
There's hope! Hans's spirit surged. "My name is Hans. I'm a merchant. I've come here to discuss a transaction with your Lord. A deal that would be... mutually beneficial of course."
Kaito shifted the fishing rod to his other hand, his Soul Fire fixed on the still water. "That Personage isn't some human Necromancer. He is the genuine article—an Undead King. Aren't you afraid you won't make it back?"
Hans didn't flinch. Instead, he sat down on the rock right next to Kaito.
"I'm just a commoner who grew up without parents," Hans said, looking at the water. "But I learned one truth very early on. If you try, you might fail. But if you never try, success is a literal impossibility."
He laced his hands behind his skull—well, his head—and leaned back, looking at the clouds. "If I let fear chase me away, it would be a tragedy. Because as long as you believe in your dreams, they come true."
Kaito looked at the babbling human, then at his motionless fishing line. He muttered a curse at the river. Then, he stood up.
"You're missing a step," Kaito said. "It's only when you believe and never stop putting in the effort that dreams come true. That's the correct version."
Kaito reached into a gap in his own ribs and pulled something out, tossing it to Hans. It was a metal medal engraved with a simple, almost... cute-looking skull.
"Take that into the forest," Kaito said. "They won't stop you anymore."
Without another word, Kaito turned and walked away, his silhouette blurring and vanishing into a ripple of distorted light.
Hans was left alone by the river, clutching the "chibi-skull" medal. His mind was a total blank. He had no idea he had just been talking to the King of the Dead.
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