The open road of the Central Lands stretched ahead like a winding ribbon of dirt and crushed stone, cutting through rolling hills of vibrant green and ancient, whispering forests. It was the sort of idyllic countryside that invited quiet reflection, a classic setting for a legendary quest.
Naturally, the legendary quest was currently moving at the speed of a sun-baked snail.
"Frieren-sama," Fern said, her voice carrying a heavy, deeply practiced sigh as she stood over a massive patch of tangled briars. "We have been in this valley for three days. The road to the Northern Plateau is long, and we are currently harvesting blue-tinted moon-grass for an elderly herbalist who paid us with a book on how to remove rust from copper kitchenware."
Frieren, who was thoroughly buried waist-deep in the thicket, her white cloak catching on thorns without her seeming to care, didn't look up. "It's not just a book, Fern. It's a handwritten grimoire by a 400-year-old traveling mage from the southern regions. The diagrams are very precise. If we ever find a legendary copper kettle, we'll be glad we have it."
"We do not own a copper kettle, Frieren-sama. We own a steel pot and a broken frying pan," Fern replied, her arms crossed, her expression a flat wall of absolute, unchanging disapproval.
A few feet away, Stark was sitting on a mossy log, diligently sharpening his battleaxe with a whetstone. He looked over at their newest companion, who was standing atop a nearby boulder in a pose so perfectly dramatic it looked like it belonged on a marble monument.
Shamrock's navy coat fluttered gently in the midday breeze, the gold trim gleaming beneath the sunlight. His hand was resting confidently on the hilt of his sword, his messy green hair shifting as he looked out over the valley with an expression of intense, regal focus.
"Hey, Shamrock," Stark called out, pausing his sharpening. "Aren't you tired of this yet? I mean, since we left the fortress city, all we've done is dig up weird roots, fix a leaky tavern roof, and hunt down a pack of oversized wild boars that were tearing up a farmer's cabbage patch. Aren't you supposed to be a 'Knight King' seeking grand glory?"
Shamrock blinked, breaking his heroic posture to look down at Stark. For the first few days of their journey, he had indeed found Frieren's habit of accepting every mundane, seemingly pointless village request incredibly bizarre.
Back in the Magic City of Äußerst, mages took on grand, high-tier assignments sanctioned by the Continental Magic Association, earning massive rewards and prestigious titles. The idea of the legendary mage who defeated the Demon King spending her afternoon picking weeds for a copper-rust grimoire had initially short-circuited his young brain.
But as Shamrock looked from Stark to Fern, and finally to Frieren, who was currently struggling to untangle her silver pigtail from a particularly stubborn briar, a look of profound, sudden enlightenment washed over his face. His bright eyes flashed with absolute awe.
"Hah! You understand nothing, Friend Stark!" Shamrock declared proudly, leaping down from the boulder with a light, perfectly graceful thud.
He planted his hands on his hips, his chest puffing out dramatically. "Initially, my royal mind was clouded by the superficial standards of modern mercenary work! I, too, wondered why a mage of Lady Frieren's unparalleled majesty would spend her invaluable time chasing after trivial papers and useless grimoires!"
Fern glanced over, her eyes narrowing slightly. "Oh? And what ridiculous conclusion have you arrived at now, Shamrock-san?"
"It is not a conclusion, Miss Fern, it is the absolute truth of a true sovereign!" Shamrock pointed dramatically at Frieren. "Look closely at her methodology! If Lady Frieren were to demand gold, jewels, or high-tier magical artifacts from these humble villagers, she would ruin them! But more importantly, if she saved their lives and asked for nothing, she would burden them with a crushing, unpayable weight. The debt of a savior!"
Frieren stopped tugging on her hair. Her ears twitched slightly beneath her silver strands, and she slowly turned her head to look at the thirteen-year-old boy.
Shamrock continued, his voice ringing out with absolute conviction, his mana momentarily humming deep within his chest, expanding outward in a warm, subtle wave of pure belief. "A true hero does not leave a trail of indebted subjects in her wake! By accepting a completely useless grimoire, or a basket of stale bread, Lady Frieren balances the scales of exchange! She allows the villagers to look at her not as a terrifying, unreachable entity to whom they owe their lives, but as a eccentric, helpful traveler! They sleep soundly at night knowing the contract was fulfilled equally! It is the ultimate display of chivalric empathy and political grace!"
Silence settled over the valley.
Stark blinked, looking from Shamrock to Frieren. "Whoa… wait, really? Is that why you do it, Frieren?"
Frieren crawled entirely out of the briar patch, sitting on her knees in the dirt. Her expression remained characteristically flat, but her wide, green eyes were staring at Shamrock with a rare, genuine spark of surprise. She blinked once. Then twice.
In truth, she had never consciously thought about it in terms of 'political grace' or 'chivalric empathy.' She just liked weird magic spells. Himmel had been the one who taught her to accept small, strange rewards so the villagers could feel like they had truly participated in their own rescue, keeping the memories of their encounters warm and human rather than transactional.
But for this loud, overly dramatic thirteen-year-old boy to instantly decipher the deeper, emotional core of that philosophy, and dress it up in the language of kings was entirely unexpected.
"Shamrock," Frieren said quietly, tilting her head as she dusted off her knees. "You say some really weird things… but you're surprisingly perceptive."
Shamrock's face practically lit up with the radiance of a thousand suns. He struck a magnificent bow, sweeping his arm out with flawless knightly flair. "To receive praise from the great Lady Frieren is the highest honor a knight can achieve! Fear not, my comrades! I shall harvest this moon-grass with the fury of a tempest!"
Fern watched the boy sprint into the bushes, completely obliterating the weeds with rapid, enthusiastic slashes of his flat blade. She slowly let her arms drop to her sides, her face going slightly numb. "Frieren-sama… please do not encourage him. His ego is already a threat to the regional ecosystem."
"It's fine, Fern," Frieren murmured, a very faint, nostalgic smile touching her lips as she reached into her bag to secure her new copper-rust grimoire. "He's a good boy."
---
As the weeks bled into a steady rhythm of travel, Shamrock's presence completely transformed the typical daily grind of their journey to Aureole.
Where the party used to move in quiet, almost melancholic isolation, they now moved accompanied by a one-man theatrical troupe. Shamrock approached every single task, no matter how dirty or exhausting, with a level of theatrical elegance that boundaries on absolute absurdity.
When a small farming village requested aid in clearing a den of feral rock-wolves from a nearby cavern, Shamrock didn't just fight them. He stepped into the damp, dark cave with his navy coat pristine, his posture flawless, treating the terrifying monsters like unruly subjects in need of royal discipline.
"Halt, beasts of the crag!" Shamrock's voice would echo through the stone caverns. "You have disrupted the peaceful agriculture of the valley! Yield to the jurisdiction of the Knight King!"
The wolves, entirely unbothered by his speech, would lunged from the shadows with bared fangs.
But the moment the threat materialized, Shamrock's suppressed mana would explode outward in a blinding, radiant flash. His sword would slip from its sheath, coated in that brilliant, purifying silver-gold light. He moved like a streak of emerald through the dark, never using the edge of his blade against anything that didn't carry the pure malice of a demon.
With precise, lightning-fast pommel strikes, blade sweeps, and sweeping kicks, he would send the massive wolves tumbling over one another, systematically knocking them unconscious or driving them deep back into the wilderness without shedding a single drop of blood.
Stark would follow closely behind, his massive axe cleaving through rock formations to block off escape routes, a massive grin on his face. "Man, Shamrock! That turning kick was awesome! You gotta teach me how to balance like that!"
"A knight's balance comes from an unshakeable center of gravity, Friend Stark! And a strict core workout routine!" Shamrock would yell back, sheathing his sword with a perfectly timed, dramatic *click*.
Even when the jobs were entirely devoid of combat, Shamrock's "knightly grace" was on full display. When they helped a village rebuild a collapsed wooden bridge over a rushing river, Shamrock would carry massive timber logs over his shoulders, stepping across narrow ropes with the poise of a prince walking a red carpet.
The local villagers, accustomed to gruff, exhausted adventurers who demanded every copper coin, would gather along the riverbanks just to watch him.
Every time Shamrock would drop a log with a perfectly executed martial art stance, wipe his brow with a silk handkerchief, and deliver a grand, sweeping bow to the elderly townspeople, the village would beam with absolute laughter and happiness.
"Look at that lad!" an old farmer would chuckle, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. "He thinks he's commanding an imperial army, but he's just moving pine logs!"
"He's a darling," a village woman would laugh, tossing him an apple. "Eat up, young king! You're doing wonderful work!"
Shamrock would catch the apple out of the air without looking, taking a crisp bite and flashing a brilliant, confident grin. "The citizens are satisfied! The infrastructure of the realm is secured! Another glorious victory for the party!"
Fern would stand at the edge of the construction site, holding Frieren's staff while the older elf napped under a tree.
Fern's face was completely expressionless, but her eyes followed Shamrock's ridiculous movements. "He is completely exhausting," she muttered. "But… the villagers haven't smiled like that since the winter shortages."
"Mm," Frieren would murmur, cracking one green eye open from beneath her hat. "Himmel used to do things like that too. He spent an hour posing for a statue while a village was being attacked by a minor demon. He said if people don't see a hero smiling, they forget how to hope." She closed her eye again, her voice dropping to a comfortable hum. "Shamrock is a lot louder… but the color of his mana feels similar."
They slept in damp caves when the coin was low or the towns were far apart, huddled around small campfires. While Stark and Shamrock would stay up late eating travel rations and whispering about legendary weapons, Fern would quietly tend to the fire, and Frieren would gaze out at the stars, the presence of the young "Knight King" acting like a strange, warm hearth that kept the encroaching darkness of the northern lands at bay.
Days turned into weeks, and the scenery began to shift dramatically. The gentle, green valleys of the Central Lands slowly gave way to rugged, misty mountain passes. The air grew sharp and thin, carrying the crisp scent of pine and ancient, untamed stone.
Eventually, the winding mountain path leveled out, revealing a secluded, heavily fortified settlement nestled deep within a hidden basin. High stone walls, weathered by centuries of wind and snow, surrounded a cluster of dark timber longhouses. Tall watchtowers stood at the perimeter, manned by stoic warriors carrying heavily reinforced broadswords.
Frieren stopped at the crest of the hill, her white cloak catching the crisp mountain wind as her silver pigtails fluttered behind her. Her expression grew uncharacteristically quiet, a look of profound, historical reverence settling over her ancient features.
Fern and Stark stopped beside her, their eyes taking in the somber, guarded atmosphere of the settlement below. Shamrock stepped up to the front, his hand instinctively resting on the hilt of his blade, his messy green hair blowing across his face as his eyes scanned the defensive structures.
"This place…" Shamrock murmured, his tone losing its usual theatricality, replaced by the instinctual caution of a warrior. "The architecture is built entirely for siege defense. The guards carry themselves with the discipline of elite knights. This is no ordinary agrarian settlement."
"No, it isn't," Frieren said softly, her eyes reflecting the distant watchfires of the village. She lifted her staff, pointing it toward the central, largest longhouse, where a massive stone monument could be seen rising into the misty sky.
"This is the Village of the Sword," Frieren explained, her voice carrying the weight of decades of memories. "A remote, isolated sanctuary that has existed since ancient times. For thousands of years, their lineage has possessed a single, absolute purpose."
She looked over at Stark, then at Shamrock, her gaze steady and solemn.
"They protect the legendary Hero's Sword. The true blade meant to slay the Demon King."