Chapter 94: Resolve

I chewed on my lips. Asking Mayer the reason would be the surest way to find out, but it was memorial day for the Green Spirits; the timing wasn’t good. There would be a chance to ask later since he would want to find out how I knew about the changed dungeons. With that thought, I wet my parched lips with liquor. Mayer poured another glass for himself too, filling it up with an air of self-mockery.

With him, you could always drink at your own pace. Yet, despite that freedom, the downside was that it was difficult to hold back. Mayer had already exceeded his drinking limit, from what I had measured from the last time we drank. Any more than that wouldn’t be good, so I reached for his glass to make him stop. “You’ve had too much.”

Mayer smiled bitterly but kept a firm grip on his glass. “I can still go. I feel I can have some more with the idle thoughts in my head.”

Unable to budge him physically, I resorted to words. “If you’re getting idle thoughts, then talk instead. Isn’t that why you called me to drink? To keep you company instead of your thoughts?”

Mayer’s whiskey-honey eyes wavered with bewilderment. It was as if he had never considered being able to share his anxieties with another person. “You have… a talent for bringing out wishes I did not even know I had.”

“It’s because you’re too strict with yourself, Captain. You set too many standards for yourself. Others can’t belittle you, you can’t show your feelings, can’t acknowledge your sadness… In the end, you end up going in circles, unable to see what you actually want for yourself.” He stared at me in silence and I added, “So, what’s bugging you?”

Mayer hesitated, seemingly having trouble answering me. I didn’t know what it was, but I knew that he was 100% going to brood over the matter if he kept it to himself. In the past, I wouldn’t have worried much about it. I would trust that his steely heart couldn’t possibly be shaken by mere guilt. But the Mayer Knox I’d observed while being by his side was different from the Mayer I knew. In reality, he wasn’t irresponsible enough to shake off the guilt growing in his heart. His indifferent appearance was nothing but a kind of self-defense mechanism. If he truly was heartless, he would never have reflected over the Blue Flames incident nor warned me about Nova.

Most likely, Mayer defined that sense of responsibility and kindness as a weakness, thinking that they mustn’t be shown to others. So long as he thought that way, it would be very difficult to get him to speak his mind, but I still had to. No good would come from piling negativity in his heart, especially when it was unknown how or when that’d explode. I tried persuading him again. “Better to brood together than alone, Captain. Maybe two heads can solve whatever it is a little quicker.”

“There is no need for a solution. The matter is already over.”

“But my words might make you feel better, even if only a little.”

“Or you may simply end up with a ruined mood,” he retorted.

“I’d rather hear you out and get a bad mood than to keep feeling uncomfortable in the dark.”

“How extreme,” Mayer remarked in exasperation. He didn’t look that displeased, though.

I shrugged. “I tend to prefer certain pain over uncertain hope.”

“And yet you chose me over Fabian.”

“Perhaps it’s because I saw certain pain in you, Captain.”

“Won’t lose a single word, will you,” he sighed softly.

“Just because I’m weak doesn’t mean I have a hobby of losing. And I’ve got no reason to let myself lose to you.”

“…Right. I find myself fond of that unreserved attitude of yours.” Mayer nodded in satisfaction even though my retorts must’ve come across as insolent. The man was tolerant, that was for sure. I supposed that was why he thought of making me vice-captain. Before we knew it, the bitterness on his lips was gone. He was silent for a long while, touching his glass instead of drinking, before speaking again. “What I did for the Green Spirits… Could it be that my actions pushed them into a greater hell?”

“It’s thanks to your support that they cleared the dungeon, Captain.”

“But they must have struggled amidst suffering for months. And the end they met was a meaningless death.” I couldn’t reply to that, and so he went on. “It is a horrible thing to endure for months in a dungeon. Your nerves will burn out from being on constant guard, so much so that you will wish for death.”

“So what, you’re saying that it would’ve been better for the Green Spirits to have been wiped out early like in the first playthrough, is that it?” I asked.

Mayer only smiled faintly instead of answering. The curve on his lips felt somehow gloomy, even hollow. “Everything I am doing to change the future… may end up for the worse, like with the Green Spirits. Even so, will you still trust and follow me?”

He gazed at me with his emotions plain on his face. The man was burdened by the guilt he felt toward the Green Spirits and afraid of not being able to change the future. Mayer Knox was a man of steel, strong and firm, unwavering and unyielding, which was why everyone put their complete faith in him—myself included.