Spectre of the Sinner - Zetro Translation

POV: An Nguyễn, 1345 UTC +09:30, Vest Schëld, Mellanphalia Kingdom

“Welcome back, Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins]”, a city guard saluted the leading knight as the convoy arrived at the city gate before glancing at the carriages, “may his [Almighty] bless their soul. I’m sure that their bereaved families would be thankful for your hard work.”

Then the guard, a youth in his late teen, cast his gaze toward me, seemingly puzzled for a moment.

“By the way, Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins], may I ask about the identity of this… man?”

“First name [An], last name [Nguyễn],” I took off my helmet and pulled down my balaclava before letting the lady knight answer, startling the village-born young man, “I’m a foreigner who drifted to this land due to circumstances.”

While ignoring the still-stuttering sentry, I threw a verbal fastball at the knight officer to seek clarification about my status as I stood clear of the path, letting the carriages go through.

“My apologies, Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins], does this mean that for the time being…”

“What’s the matter here, Officer [von Wagner-Kukulins]? For his [Almighty’s] sake, why you’re still hanging around and wasting your time idling there like a gossipy hen? And who is this shady bastard that you’re being friendly with all of the sudden?”

Inadvertently frowning at the bellowing voice, I turned my head at the source of the shouting. From the other side of the gate, a cranky old-arse portly piece of coot marched intimidatingly toward us, his round face was wrinkled and dyed in an angry tomato shade while disdainfully barking orders toward the knights and adventurers. The poor city sentry could only fearfully offer us a pitying glance before scurrying away from the scene, while the lady knight could only roll her eyes briefly before hardening her facial muscle to meet the cantankerous fat geezer.

As I was sighing inwardly without letting either side know, the knight mustered as little emotion as possible in replying to the geezer.

“Sir, this man is the man who saved the chevalier [von Wagner] and had accompanied us to gather the remains of the knights who had committed the ultimate sacrifice…”

“Huh, so this shady piece of humanoid is THE alleged hero that saved the unfeminine brat right?”

His beady eyes squinted curiously at my appearance, probably gauging my usefulness to his various running schemes. After both sides spent an uncomfortably amount of time sizing each other up, the damn past-the-middle-age fatso snorted dismissively as he fixed the collar of his gaudy-arse setup.

“Fine then, just get the required paperwork done for this hero of a butastrangeiro done. I’ve wasted too much time standing here peering into this ugly-as-sin face already. And you, [Carolyn von Wagner-Kukulins], be careful next time. My [Timmy’s] not as magnanimous as I am, so watch whom you’re interacting with.”

“Yes sir,” the lady knight officer curtly replied, “I shan’t forget your words.”

After letting that fucking geezer beat his arse out of our sight, Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins] heaved an exhausted sigh as she took out her handkerchief to wipe her sweaty forehead.

“Oh my, that’s a rather nasty piece of work. My…”

“Thank you for your kind words, Mister [An],” with a wry smile on her lips, the knight beckoned at me to follow her, “please come this way with me, we will get the required paperwork done in no time.”

With my hand holding the helmet and my Kalashnikov in a sling carry position, we strolled at a leisurely pace along the main road, with the knight officer exchanging greetings with her fellow knights and citizens, wearing a relaxed light smile along the way. Occasionally, there would be small children practically swarming her in their never-ending quest for sisterly affection, grinding our steps to a slow crawl at times which earned a few exasperated scolding from their guardians. Sometimes, the town folks themselves would affectionately call the knight over for a freebie or a brief chat, forcing the knight to resist with all of her might lest delaying the work.

And of course, since I, a “shady bastard” according to the words of that damn black-hearted cranky-arse old coot, was trailing a few steps behind what I suspected to be the most beloved knight officer in this city, so naturally gossips from the citizens spread like an apocalyptic wildfire. Despite the darling knight’s best efforts to dispel the hearsays, her efforts went puff spectacularly once I entered the fray, for my simplistic light nod and hand waving sent the custodians scurrying away with their kids in tow. Having a war veteran version of the ever-infamous [Two-Face] is unsurprisingly unpopular with the children and the weak-hearted, right?

“It’s not your fault, Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins],” with a wry chuckle, I tried my very best to console the lady knight officer, “so please don’t beat yourself up too hard over this. Still, at least now we can get my business done, right?”

As I ended my words, we found ourselves standing in front of what could be called the town hall of the settlement, located at the heart of this settlement, while the [Guild] building could be seen toward my right side, in the 5 o’clock position. It seemed that I had to modify the ever-immortal phrase “Like father like son” into “Like owner like asset”, for its exterior appearance almost forced an expletive out of my mouth. Unnecessarily garish decorations adorned the building’s façade, irrevocably ruining its originally solemn, firm, yet down-to-earth character. As my lady guide pushed the gaudy-looking wooden doors open, I honestly thought that a flashbang had just gone off, forcing me to shut my eyes close.

“Don’t worry, Mister [An],” she returned the wry chuckle at me, “neither I nor the town folks have gotten used to it. Let’s say that this city’s mayor has a peculiar taste, and we’ll leave it at that.”

Offering a non-committing shrug at her words, my journey through hell began in earnest. Even for amateur, untrained eyes, this place reeked of odiousness, one where any modicum of respect for sensibility, beauty, and art was butchered mercilessly and crudely replaced by an unholy mess of vulgarity and gaudiness. Any attempts to salvage a tiny bit of properness were pathetically less than a drop in the ocean, for every piece of embellishments and ornament insisted by the owner of the place had already long overwhelmed any efforts to reclaim the rightful atmosphere of the building.

As we arrived at what I took to be the reception counter, we found a bored lady receptionist who was lazily checking her manicure. Even though the hall was practically deserted, and our footsteps were not the sneakiest in the world, the lady’s brazen attitude when beckoned by the knight officer was a sight to see. If this was a manga, I’d bet that the lady knight was popping a crossed vein on her forehead, for her face twitched momentarily at the green-haired office worker.

“Ah, welcome back, little [Carolyn],” while she snidely greeted Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins], the brainless beauty eyed me meaningfully, “a word of advice from this little old me: don’t let your dear [Timmy] and [Klaus] see…”

“Enough of that, Miss [Rachele],” the knight officer issued a chilly warning toward the disrespecting office lady, “I’m here for official business, so could you please hurry your little free-range pleasure hole? This gentleman here needs his paperwork done, fast.”

My, that was quite a spicy burn coming from the most beloved knight officer of this [Vest Schëld], as the insulted party’s face slowly contorted in a grimace, her ears reddened a shade of fury. Yet, [Rachele], the affronted clerk, could only swallow her wounded pride and obediently produced what looked like a numbered ticket. As much as I wanted to satisfy my curiosity, as I wasn’t an eternally hopelessly clueless Japanese novel protagonist, thus I followed the strawberry-blonde lady further in.

As we reached a line of counters, I inadvertently face-palmed at the dismal state of public service in this town. In the waiting area for the members of the public, the number of waiting people was pitifully next to nil, and the waiting ones were impatiently regretting their life choices as they waited for their turn to get their paperwork done. The civil servants were either unenthusiastically processing the form-filling, apathetically conducting an interview, or just plainly lazing around with empty gossip and whatnot.

The knight briefly offered a resigned shrug before heading toward an empty counter, which was being staffed by a bored-out-of-mind male clerk. Seeing that the town’s idol of a knight was advancing toward him, the office worker hastily cleared up his attitude in a fluster. While I was deeply impressed by the lad’s near-instantaneous change, Mistress [von Wagner-Kukulins] was instructing the bloke on a few details on the form, and soon it was my turn to fill in accordingly.