9th Grade Civil Servant In Another World Chapter 207 - Damier (2)

“Come aboard!”

“We’re departing soon!”

The small train station at the Eastern Front’s rear base was in chaos.

Actually, it barely qualified as a station. There was nothing more than a simple waiting room with a roof over it at the end of the train tracks.

Ralph Brandt boarded the train.

The backpack slung over his shoulder kept sliding to one side, and as he fumbled to pull it back up, a military policeman urged him on by pushing his back. He stumbled as he found his seat, and the empty left sleeve of his military uniform fluttered about.

The sensation of having lost his left arm never got easier to adapt to. He could only console himself with the self-deprecating thought that it was better than losing his right arm.

When he tried to scratch the itchy, scab-covered feeling, that spot was empty. This happened several times a day, to the point where he had considered whether he might be discharged not for physical disability but for depression.

The interior of the train was extremely crowded.

As he sat blankly in his seat, soldiers began flooding into even the aisles, packing in tight.

There were rumors that after the recent defeat, fierce fighting was still ongoing, and unless you had limb amputation or serious mental illness, they weren’t easily discharging anyone.

Somehow, the train was full of soldiers who had lost arms or legs, screamed incoherently at all hours, or alternated between giggling and sobbing.

Something crawled toward Ralph in his cramped seat. It was a soldier who had lost both legs.

“……”

The man looked up at him with desperate eyes. Ralph, who had been averting his gaze, finally sighed and got up from his seat. With difficulty using one hand, he lifted the soldier and helped him sit down.

“Thank you.”

The soldier muttered in a voice no louder than a mosquito. Ralph quietly nodded and moved through the bustling crowd to find another car.

The number of military police seemed extremely insufficient compared to the number of soldiers on the train. Maybe the rumors about military police being deployed to combat were true. The train lurched and departed, and no one stopped Ralph from wandering around freely.

He moved forward car by car looking for any space where he could fit his body, but no such place was to be found. When Ralph realized he had somehow reached just before the engine room, he gave up and simply sat down.

This passage between cars had no passengers, perhaps due to the severe vibrations. Why there were no military police here either, he couldn’t tell.

He leaned against his backpack and sat at an angle, quietly closing his eyes. How many days would it take to get home like this?

He must have fallen asleep at some point.

When the swaying of the train car woke him and he opened his eyes slightly, it was already dark all around. Perhaps to conserve mana stones, all the wall lights were turned off, with only dim moonlight filtering through the small windows in the night.

Why had he suddenly woken up? He wondered briefly.

Bang!

Then he heard a faint gunshot near his ear. It had definitely happened just a moment ago too. Both times from the direction of the engine room.

“Ahh! You, what are you—, urgh!”

A short scream, and a thudding vibration as if something had been slammed to the train floor.

Ralph crouched and froze in place. He had no idea what was happening.

The engine room door was thick. If it hadn’t been such a quiet night, it might have been buried in the noise. At least he was certain he was the only one who had heard the gunshot. So if he just pretended not to know and stayed put, it would be fine, wouldn’t it? That’s how he rationalized his escape from fear.

Then the door to the opposite passenger car opened and a man dressed as military police walked out. Ralph instinctively squeezed his eyes shut, pretending to be fast asleep.

After the footsteps passed, he opened his eyes again and his heart felt like it dropped. The man was crouching right in front of him.

“Hyaaaah, mmph!”

The man covered Ralph’s mouth as he started to scream in surprise.

‘Be quiet.’

He mouthed the words silently. When Ralph nodded, he removed his hand. Ralph gasped, struck by a strange sense of déjà vu.

“Damier… sir?”

It was the man who had saved him when he was dying.

Damier tilted his head slightly, then made an “ah” sound.

“Ten days ago.”

“Yes, I’m Ralph Brandt. I was grateful back then.”

It was a somewhat awkward greeting given the current situation.

Actually, he sometimes wondered if it might have been better to just die there. Though that wasn’t something he should say in front of his savior.

“……”

“I didn’t know you were military police. Back then you were definitely wearing knight’s attire, Ferint……”

Ralph whispered whatever came to mind while looking at Damier’s expressionless face. He caught sight of the dagger in the man’s hand at the edge of his vision.

Ralph didn’t know why Damier was on this train or why he was wearing military police clothing.

Was it some secret mission? It must be for reasons beyond his imagination. Was it related to the commotion in the engine room? Maybe not. He didn’t know that either.

But one thing was certain. With a flash of realization, he understood. The man before him was definitely the type who could stab and kill the life he had saved without hesitation.

Someone who could perform good deeds for trivial reasons and commit evil acts for trivial reasons. Someone who felt no difference between good and evil.

Ralph had seen such people on the battlefield—no, people who were ‘becoming like that.’ Those empty eyes definitely resembled the comrades who killed enemies emotionlessly.

“I, I don’t know anything. I’ll keep my eyes closed until the train stops, so please…!”

Tears of fear flowed down his face.

He had survived such a horrific hell, thinking death would be better several times a day. But when death actually loomed before him, his mind went numb and he found himself desperately clinging to survival.

“Shh.”

Damier withdrew the blade that had been touching Ralph’s neck. Then he quietly disappeared toward the engine room.

“Huk… huuk, hu…”

Ralph covered his bleeding neck with his one remaining hand and quietly sobbed.

The feeling of finding life again was truly overwhelming.

***

Damier left that Ralph-something, one-armed discharged soldier, and moved forward.

He couldn’t understand why he had spared him. The man had already recognized him, so he would obviously just be in the way.

But if he thought about it that way, rescuing him from the blood-covered snowfield after the battle didn’t make sense in the first place. Because he was the only human alive there—what a ridiculous excuse.

‘My brain is getting stranger.’

Damier felt doubts about his own condition but didn’t delve deeper. Thinking wasn’t his specialty.

When he entered the engine room, a cold sensation touched his temple with lightning speed.

“I knew you’d come.”

A familiar voice was heard. The man sitting at the controls looked at him leisurely. Johann Werner, or whatever his name was. He had thought the man had disappeared.

While being threatened at gunpoint, Damier quickly surveyed the engine room interior.

The front window was broken with cold air rushing in, and the engineer and assistant engineer appeared to be knocked unconscious, bound and lying face-down on the floor.

Johann Werner and his subordinate had clearly hijacked the train. For whatever purpose.

“First Lieutenant Decker.”

At Johann’s command, First Lieutenant Philip Decker pressed his gun barrel firmly against Damier’s temple. Damier was pushed by his force until he sat down in a nearby folding chair.

“……”

“I knew you’d be on board. After you killed a military policeman and went into hiding, it caused quite an uproar among the Ferint on the Eastern Front. So it wasn’t really an infiltration mission after all.”

Johann spoke leisurely while operating the controls.

“I thought Ossel had been disbanded.”

“Did you think all the intelligence assets would just disappear into nothing?”

He sneered.

“Ferint is collapsing. Casualties are pouring in and they’ve lost control. You must know that too. With even desertion happening, extracting information is easy work.”

That made sense too. Damier agreed inwardly.

“What are you planning to do, deserter? Will you eliminate First Lieutenant Decker and me?”

Johann seemed relaxed. As if he had noticed that Damier lacked any real motivation.

“Nothing. I just heard gunshots.”

“Ferint have developed senses, so naturally. Then sit quietly and leave when you’re done.”

“That’s what I intend to do.”

Fierce wind mixed with snowflakes swirled about. Johann, who had handed train operation over to Philip, was reading what appeared to be official documents.

“What is that?”

“A report from Eastern Front Command to the Supreme Leader.”

“There’s telegraph, so why…”

“First Lieutenant Decker and I destroyed the facilities, so they have no choice but to use a messenger.”

Johann showed a displeased smile.

“Want to see it?”

“……”

Damier didn’t answer, but Johann handed him the documents anyway.

The report’s contents were simple. Stripped of all the flowery rhetoric, it could be summarized as follows,

「To His Excellency the Esteemed Supreme Leader.

Personnel and supplies are severely lacking, and our troops’ morale has hit rock bottom. Further combat operations are impossible. Please consider armistice or ceasefire negotiations.」

Truly advice given while prepared to lose one’s head.

“Why are you showing me this?”

“Because it’s information that’s better the more widely it spreads.”

“I don’t spread rumors.”

“Right, in Ossel surveillance reports you were always summarized in one phrase. A human without free will. An appendage of Ferint. But why would such a person disobey superior orders and desert?”

Johann countered Damier’s question with another question. Damier answered obediently.

“I am dying. Before I die, there’s someone I want to meet—”

“Nonsense.”

Johann twisted his lips in a mocking smile.

“Lucas Redan?”

“That’s correct.”

“He’s been imprisoned.”

“I’ll meet him somehow.”

“What a pitiful life. Dying and the last person you see is just Lucas Redan.”

Damier tilted his head. Who else could there be?

“I lost my parents and grew up in the Supreme Leader’s residence. So there’s no one else I want to see.”

At those words, Johann stared intently at Damier. With a look of complete disbelief and contempt.

“As expected, Ferint have never heard how they came to be born. How stupidly.”

“What do you mean?”

“First Lieutenant Decker.”

At his gesture, Philip pulled something from his coat and handed it to Damier. Unlike the thin report from earlier, this was quite a thick bundle of documents.

A sentence written like graffiti on the first page caught his eye.

「I have failed.」

Damier read the entire truth.

Sitting obediently in the folding chair without moving. And he understood everything.

By dawn, the train reached its destination.

A rural station in southern Schufaben.

After Johann and Philip untied the unconscious engineer and assistant engineer and put them back in their seats, they exited the train. Damier, who had followed them off, grabbed Johann and asked.

“Why did you tell me? What’s your reason for shaking me up?”

No matter how he thought about it, Johann’s movements were clear.

Johann had known that the deserter Damier was hiding on the train. He lured him to the engine room and skillfully guided the conversation. To make him bring up the topic of Ferint. And then he showed him research logs that described Ferint’s birth process in detailed, even explicit terms.

But why?

Johann brushed off his sleeve with displeasure and sneered coldly.

“Because it would benefit us if you became angry.”

The two walked away along the snow-covered tracks.

Though the military police who came out in confusion when the train stopped belatedly discovered the night’s incident and ran around frantically, Damier paid no attention.

He simply hid in the empty, deserted waiting room and mulled over his thoughts.

Am I angry?

After thinking and thinking, Damier’s answer was: I don’t know.

***

The atmosphere in Lüdelheim was similar to when he had left.

People’s gazes were a bit more unsettled, there were a few more protesters, and police suppressed them with slightly more violence.

Passing through all those scenes, Damier reached the aerial fortress. Without even reporting to the Supreme Leader, he went to find a secluded building in a corner of the castle.

“What’s wrong? The mission shouldn’t be finished yet.”

The knight commander greeted him without showing the slightest surprise.

Ferint’s movements were immediately reported to the commander. Naturally, he already knew that Damier had deserted and returned to the Supreme Leader’s residence.

Rather than immediately reporting him or punishing him, asking about the situation first—could this be called the last courtesy to a subordinate?

“……”

Damier looked into the emotionless eyes of Knight Commander Michael, exactly like his own.

“I learned what Dr. Moritz Riepen researched.”

“I see.”

“Is it true that Ferint are artificially created beings? That His Excellency the Supreme Leader ordered the cultivation of combat weapons? That Dr. Riepen failed while trying to create a second test subject based on our information?”

“Yes.”

Michael answered bluntly without surprise or anger.

“It’s all true. But is that important? Are you dissatisfied with your existence?”

“No.”

“Do you resent His Excellency the Supreme Leader who gave birth to us?”

“No.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“I just wanted to confirm the facts. Now that I’ve heard the answer, that’s sufficient.”

“Good.”

The commander lightly patted his shoulder. As if giving praise.

“Where did you hear it?”

“The Ossel agents who hijacked the train captured me and told me. They said chaos would be advantageous for them.”

“So it was them after all.”

The commander showed no sign of surprise again.

“You’ve worked hard. And you know the punishment for insubordination, right? When the punishment is over, you’ll return to escort duty.”

“I shall comply.”

Damier saluted Knight Commander Michael and left the room.

Beyond the window, the beautiful scenery of the aerial fortress spread out. While it was winter on the ground, here it was warm spring.

Looking at the vast flower gardens, Damier thought,

‘I didn’t want to be born.’

He hadn’t chosen life. He hadn’t chosen the form of life. However.

‘I want to die as I choose.’

Death alone. The form of death alone—he should be able to choose that.