Chapter 14 (2/2)

Love between the common people was more free. Ernst had also witnessed this with his own eyes in those few months he had spent at the villa. There were male companions, female companions, and also lovers for only a few days.

That’s right, those people had all freely loved, and Ernst had also become just as free as everyone else.

Freedom, what a great word that was. Ernst looked out the window of his office.

Here, there was no tall fence to obstruct his view, and he could see the enormous forest spread out over the distance. If Ernst wanted to do so, he could even go and run over to that forest as he pleased.

Even now, Ernst had never gone running before. Once spring came and the snow melted, he wanted to try running up to that forest. It was an idea that made his heart thump with excitement.

Aah, no, wait. He had a much more urgent problem to think about than spring.

That was, ‘falling in love’.

What was it that the man had said? Right, he’d said that he wanted to stay by Ernst’s side.

Ernst had been happy. There was someone who had said to him that they wanted to stay with him.

Was this what it meant to be in love, he wondered.

No, that wasn’t right, was it. Ernst recalled his memories of those faces that he would be able to recognize, even now.

If those three hunters had told him that they wanted to stay with him, he would also be happy. If the villa’s butlers and maids said it, that would also make him happy. This feeling wasn’t how it felt to be in love.

At some point, it became time for lunch. He blankly ate the same thing he had eaten in the morning.

He kept thinking it over until his head felt like it was going to burst. He wished he could separate it from the neck up and just leave it somewhere.

There was nothing he could do cooped up in his office, so he went to take a walk inside the manor. On second glance, it was a shabby mansion. Bare stone walls without any wallpaper spanned the corridors. Here and there, the eaves of the roof were broken, letting some snow blow inside. Couldn’t they fix it? Even though he was inside the mansion, Ernst wore a heavy cloak as he walked.

Had it always been this lacking, or had it only been dirt before? This shabby mansion’s only benefit was its spaciousness. Even after walking for a long time, Ernst hadn’t come across any butlers or maids working here. It seemed like they had limited the areas where they worked.

The servants in Meissen were extraordinarily pragmatic, he found.

A fine, authoritative voice drifted over on the wind. Ernst walked down the corridor, then looked out a window.

The militiamen were training. No, to be more precise, the stern-eyed commanding officer and that Dunbertian were sparring.

As expected of the leader of the militia, the officer’s movements looked sharp and fast to Ernst’s eyes. But he wasn’t a match for a natural-born warrior, and the Dunbertian easily sidestepped him.

Soon after, the other militiamen who had been watching from the sidelines stood, and they turned their swords on the Dunbertian. Though the commanding officer tried to stop them, they didn’t hear his order, and a large number of people dashed forward.

Without even realizing it, Ernst rushed toward him. All he could think was that even if the man was Dunbertian, there was no way he wouldn’t be hurt when fighting against that many people.

But then, the way the Dunbertian held himself changed – just as that thought passed through Ernst’s head, the Dunbertian evaded all of the swords pointing toward him, and he stood in the place the militiamen had just left. Some of the militiamen let out sounds of amazement.

Ernst was so relieved that he carelessly patted his chest and gazed at the man in admiration. That enormous body was capable of making such vivid movements.

After that, the frustrated militiamen who wanted to fight again, along with the militiamen who thought it would be amusing and pulled out their swords, together formed twelve opponents who faced the Dunbertian. Yet in the end, not a single person was able to land a hit on him.

Amidst the exhausted Kleber who collapsed to the ground, the Dunbertian alone stood without losing a single breath.

[1] This hasn’t been apparent in the translation, but all this time, whenever Ernst refers directly to another person (usually his servants), he uses the word 者 (mono) rather than 人 (hito). Though both words mean ‘person’, 者 is also a homonym of 物 (mono), which means ‘thing’. 者 is used mainly in formal situations; it seems to denote a lowered status, so people may use 者 to refer to themselves in order to be polite/humble, while a superior may call others 者 to show they have higher rank. In this particular sentence, Ernst says “人はモノ” or ‘[In the royal palace,] People are things’. It’s implied that he now understands that people are living and breathing beings that he can feel connected to. After leaving the royal palace, he has learned that others aren’t ‘things’, they are ‘people’.