Abandoned by my Childhood Friend, I Became a War Hero chapter 31

31 – The Future of the Empire #2

A long-forgotten knowledge flashes through my mind.

A conversation with the coachman on the way to Jedo Island. What Daisy said at the Red Bear Inn.

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That a racist group that calls itself ‘the future of the empire’ is rapidly increasing its numbers.

A few days ago, it seemed to be spreading covertly, but has it already grown to the point of openly protesting like this?

Irate protesters cross the market street chanting slogans in furious voices.

The commotion they cause in District 8 is getting bigger and bigger.

“Go away, you grub!”

“Oh no! Why are you like this!”

Some of the protesters kicked and knocked down the shelves of the dwarven arms dealer. The carefully crafted swords and armor tumbled across the floor and were stained with dirt.

“Because grubs like you come up above the ground! We didn’t lose our jobs!”

“What kind of nonsense is that!? I was born in the Empire! My family has been doing business here for generations!”

To the Dwarves, who were simply making and selling weapons, the protesters’ words were absurd, but unfortunately, the demonstrators were in no state of reason or logic.

They kicked the dwarf with angry faces instead of giving a logical rebuttal to the dwarf’s words.

“Shut up! On the subject of non-humans!”

“Oops! Oops….”

Similar things were happening all over the market streets.

There were even protesters who intentionally overturned the sacks of black-skinned merchants who sold spices, broke pottery of oriental merchants, and lynched hand-in-law cats who passed by, calling them dirty drug dealers.

It was truly a scene of madness.

I quickly approached the students. Oznia and Titania witnessed the protesters’ rampage up close and their eyes widened in shock.

Especially, Titania had a bright smile just a moment ago, but her expression was suddenly filled with confusion and fear.

“Follow me, both of you. Get out of here And Titania.”

“Yes?”

I took off her instructor uniform and covered her head.

“Cover your ears for the time being.”

“Ah, yes….”

Titania is an elf. And the racial characteristics of elves are very distinct. Eyes are naturally drawn to them not only because of their long ears, but also because of their beautiful face, which is rarely found in humans.

Titania watched the riots of the protesters with shaking eyes as she grabbed my clothes.

“Why are they doing that? Aren’t they all from the same Empire?”

Oznia was the one who answered that. Instead of her usual loose, dazed face, she said with a hardened expression.

“Titania. Humans often cannot accept other human beings simply because they look different.”

“I can’t….”

To Titania, who grew up only in the forest, human malice may have been unfamiliar. But she didn’t have time to be in shock. Because the protesters were getting closer and closer to this place.

The market is completely confused. People forgot order and were struggling to get as far away from the protesters as possible.

I grabbed Oznia and Titania by the shoulders so as not to lose them in the crowd. Titania carefully grabbed my sleeve.

“Are you leaving those people alone?”

Titania’s eyes were not on the riotous demonstrators, but on the foreign people and the different races who suffered from their misdeeds.

I spoke in a calm yet firm tone.

“Anyway, the systemic military police will come soon. The safety of the students is of the utmost importance to me.”

The protest is so overheated that even the market guards can’t do anything about it, but since they’re making such an open fuss, the systemic gendarmes will arrive in a few minutes anyway, unless they’re all scarecrows.

Despite my words, Titania still couldn’t take her eyes off her merchants with a confused expression on her face, but she didn’t insist on helping them at least.

I took the two of us and made our way through the crowd to the station.

Meanwhile, the demonstrators were shouting slogans more aggressively.

“Immigrants go away! Execute the non-humans!”

“Burn the cancer of the Empire!”

Now that the war is over, strange things are happening.

Human beings tend to attribute most of their difficulties to external causes. During the war, all you had to do was to resent the demon king and his tribe, but when the war ended and he could no longer express his anger to the demon king, he looked for another scapegoat to replace him.

To them, it just became a foreign race and a different race.

“Ouch! Get out of the way, go away!”

“Don’t push! Don’t push!”

It’s a big deal. The people were in complete panic and the roads were blocked.

To make matters worse, it was noticeable that the systemic military police dispatched from far away were blocked from approaching the protesters by the fleeing crowd.

If you don’t, you could be crushed to death by being crushed by a crowd. It would be easy to get out if you climbed onto the roof of the building, but it was difficult to do because this place was mostly covered by tents.

“I can’t do that. Change the way.”

It’s better to go back even if you get a little closer to the protesters.

Oznia and Titania also agreed with a small nod.

We turned around and found another way.

The protesters started on the eastern street and were getting closer to the main street, and we tried to go south and head to the tram stop, but this side was blocked because the road was blocked.

North is the opposite direction from the tram stop, so we had to take the west street here.

We made our way back through the crowd.

Most of the people in the market were running away from the riot-level protesters, but some thought it was time to steal things that were not owned, or joined the protesters in their march.

Of course, the merchants did not stand still. Some merchants tried to fight the protesters to protect their property. All such merchants were indiscriminately assaulted by protesters.

No one seemed to be dead yet, but it seemed clear that serious accidents would soon occur if the situation continued.

Titania opened her mouth in a voice almost crying.

“Why? What did these people do wrong….”

“… ….”

Instead of explaining to the confused Titania that humans were originally that kind of race, I just silently pressed on.

It was then. One of the fleeing merchants bumped into Titania’s shoulders, carrying a load of her own wares.

“Get out of the way!”

“Kyaaak!”

The merchant almost pushed her on the shoulder, but thanks to my holding on to Titania, I barely managed to fall. But the robe she was putting on her head fell to the floor.

One of the protesters must have witnessed the situation, and someone shouted.

“Uh, huh? It’s an elf! There is an elf over there!”

“What? An elf?”

“Elf? If you’re an elf, you’re a servant of the demon king!”

In the last war, there were also elves who belonged to the demon king’s army and confronted mankind.

Most of them were dark elf tribes, and the story of one elf warlock destroying a kingdom was very famous. However, they were a tiny minority compared to the total population of elves.

Titania retorted in a quivering voice, her eyes wide open as if to reproach her nonsense.

“No! Elves are absolutely like servants of the Demon King-“

What else is he replying to?

“Run away.”

I grabbed the two of them by the waist and kicked the ground at once. My vision rose in an instant, and I stepped on the walls and roofs of buildings and sprinted into the nearest alleyway.

“Wow!”

“Ah… !”

Titania and Oznia clung to me with their eyes tightly closed as if it was difficult to adapt to the too fast movements.

“Huh? Run away!”

“What are you doing! Follow me!”

“Jjoo, follow me? Why?”

“Why! Because you run away! And you’re an elf!”

A few impetuous demonstrators, seeing that I was fleeing into a back alley, follow us into a back alley.

Actually, I wanted to go up on the roof, but when I just jumped up, I checked briefly and found that the ground was quite unstable because the buildings were old, probably because it was a back alley.

It wouldn’t have been difficult if I had been alone, but running with the weight of two people on my back was risky. In addition, the buildings were not very tall, which could inadvertently attract more attention from the demonstrators.

And, these narrow alleys were much better to deal with quietly.

Even though I ran quite a bit, there was still the presence of people following me.

No matter how much I was hugging two people and it was difficult to speed because of the narrow alleyway, even though I was running at a fairly high speed, the fact that they were following me meant that they were not just ordinary civilians.

Something was strange. My senses, rolling and rolling on the battlefield for decades, had been telling me that.

I could have completely outrun the pursuer by increasing my speed.

However, I deliberately slowed down after running a little further down the alleyway.

“Instructor Ion… ?”

At last, I came to a complete stop and put the two of them on the floor.

“Oznia, Titania. Get behind me.”

“No.”

A purple electric current jumped up on Osnia’s small palm.

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“I can fight too.”

I shook my head quietly.

Oznia made an expression that was hard to understand. But from my point of view, I can’t put a student in more danger.

And anyway, it wasn’t even that dangerous.

Soon after, five men arrived and showed up.

“Whoa… I finally caught up.”

They were breathing lightly, but they didn’t look very tired.

I watched the men with my eyes narrowed.

Walking, standing posture, developed muscles, and an atmosphere distinctly different from that of civilians… They were not mere demonstrators, they were trained in combat.

The moment they were about to rush at us without a word, I jumped first and took out my ID card from my chest.

“Stop. Can you see what this is?”

“Huh? What is that?”

“I am Captain Ion Graham of the Imperial Army Task Force. You are now attempting to inflict violence on Imperial soldiers, which is a serious violation of Imperial law. We demand that you immediately stop threatening and step down.”

“… The imperial army?”

While the men panicked and couldn’t move right away, one of them, a man with a long scar across his cheek, came forward and spoke carefully.

“Hey, soldier. I won’t do it badly. All we have to do is the elf girl there. If she gives up only that woman, we will quietly back off.”

I crossed my arms and said in a low voice.

“What if I can’t do that?”

“… If you really want to see blood.”

The man drew a knife from his waistband and pointed it at me.

Even though it was revealed that this is a soldier, there is no sign of backing down.

“You were aiming for Titania from the beginning.”

“If you noticed that, I couldn’t let you live.”

They exchanged glances with each other and drew their weapons with nervous expressions.

I didn’t intend to see blood here.

What… Because I tried

I straightened my arms and stanceed.

“It’s been a while since I’ve had a knife fight.”