That night, Rojan stepped out of the grand hall where he’d just spent several hours conversing with the Krohan emperor.
With a sigh, he made his way back to the guest house, grabbed his hammer, and left
A few minutes later, he walked out of the imperial estate, headed into the main city.
Back in the grand hall, the chief advisor stood behind the emperor as the latter stared out into the distance.
“He’s leaving.”
“Yes, he is.”
“Would you like for me to send troops after him?” The chief advisor questioned the emperor.
“That depends. Tell me what you think of him.”
“I’m… not sure.”
Upon hearing this, the emperor started. “You’re not sure?”
“A part of me tells me he’s a threat, but the other part of me tells me he’s just a normal person. It’s quite frustrating,
actually
. I can’t get a read on him. Actually, Karen couldn’t either”
“
Hmm
.” The emperor pondered for
a bit
, then decided. He hadn’t ascended to his current status by being benevolent - so why start now?
“Send men, but make sure they get the job done. If a man like him survives our ambush, he’ll come back for our heads one day. But...not
them
. I don’t want to lose any of them”
“Understood, my lord.”
…
On the outskirts of the city was a large stable filled with horses, varying from show horses, to fast horses, to even war horses. Earlier, Rojan had led his old carriage to a pawn shop of sorts in the city and had sold the decorative carriage for a few hundred gold coins.
So, he was here to trade in his horse for a new one. And, perhaps, upgrade a little.
“Come on, the horse is worth at least ten gold coins! It’s a little old, but you can tell it’s got great genes! At the
very
least, you can use it to breed your next generation of horses, yes?”
“5.” The shopkeeper had long grown tired of Rojan’s antics. At the beginning, he’d been willing to offer three gold coins, but by now he would do whatever it took to get this vermin out of his face.
To console his heart, he stared at the horse Rojan had agreed to buy. It was one of his finest and fastest, and the money from this transaction would buy his family a year or two of comfort.
Yet, he understood just how precious
each and
every gold coin was. Just because he’d made a big sale today didn’t mean he could relax and throw money away.
After a few more minutes of haggling, Rojan
finally
let go of his old horse, and handed over the money for the stable-owner’s horse.
The horse was brown, with a reddish tint, with clearly defined muscles. To Rojan, however, the most important factor was that despite its years in captivity, it still held a proud, arrogant light in its eyes.
A fine horse.
After purchasing all the necessities for the horse, Rojan
quickly
mounted it and made his way to the city gates.
Although the sun had set long ago, the gates of the city
usually
never closed - as the city was far in the territory of the Krohan Empire, and was home to tens of thousands of the empire’s best soldiers, it was considered a very safe city. Safe enough for the gates to be left open at all times.
Although guards manned every entrance to the city, it was more of a formality to check for spies and the like, and not a means to stop invaders.
So, when Rojan saw that the guards were preparing to close the gates, his pulse quickened. Although he’d expected the emperor to try to prevent his leaving, he’d estimated that he’d have at least a few minutes longer.
That old bastard had really made up his mind quick, huh.
“Yah!” He kicked the side of his new horse, urging it
to gallop
forward. Unfortunately, this also drew the attention of the guards. Strangely enough, however, they made no attempt to stop him.
As soon as Rojan sped through the gates, he quickly saw why.
Over two thousand mounted soldiers had surrounded the gate in a semicircle, blocking the way out.
Rojan cast an eye over these soldiers, then addressed the officer in charge.
“What’s the meaning of this?”
“Rojan Cheru, it appears that your antics from earlier today have angered his imperial highness. Drop your weapon now, and you may be given a quick death yet!”
“How about a duel, hm? Would you
dare
to duel me?”
The commander smiled. “Alright, let’s duel. If you win, you can leave.”
Then, he laughed. “Did you really expect me to say that? No, no. No tricks, no ways out, Rojan. Surrender now, or face the full force of my cavalry.”
Rojan looked at the commander, then chuckled. “I’d been hoping to get out of this the easy way, but you should know, I always prepare ahead of time.”
He turned to the right, then waved his hammers toward a section of the cavalry surrounding him. “Now, friends! Open a way for me!”
“Ah?” Those in the section he’d waved raised their weapons, then glanced each other. Were there traitors amongst them?
“Stop! He’s trying to distract us! We’re two thousand of the emperor’s best soldiers, how could there be traitors among us? Focus!” The commander yelled at his forces, but the damage was done.
With their focus temporarily off of him, Rojan had charged the rightmost edge of the semicircle, aiming for the space between the rightmost horse and the wall.
When he’d almost reached the rightmost edge, the horseman guarding the edge swung his spear toward Rojan.
With no other way to dodge the spear, Rojan jumped up from his horse, turned sideways, and briefly used his pre-existing momentum to run horizontally along the wall. As soon as the spear whizzed past, he landed himself back into the saddle and rode on.
Time to see just how just fast his new horse was.
After a brief moment of disbelief, the commander came back to his senses, and yelled at his troops. “What the fuck are you guys doing? Chase him!”
Standing upon the city walls, the emperor and his chief strategist stared at Rojan’s back as he rode into the distance, their cavalry in hot pursuit.
“I told you two thousand men was too little.” The emperor admonished the advisor.
“Hmm...
We were unable to scramble together too many troops in this short while. Commander Dieg’s cavalry were the only ones able to make their way over in such fashion. This is my fault - I will develop a method for our soldiers to be more quickly informed of such troubles in the future, as well as a system for mobilizing them in a more efficient manner.
“Besides that, one positive note we can take from this is that he isn’t unpredictable. We were able to accurately determine which gate he would attempt to escape from, as well as act before he’d expected it.
“To be outdone with in two realms of estimation, it can be said that this Rojan doesn’t seem to be as impressive as we’d initially thought.”
Hearing this, the emperor scratched his chin. “For a giant, a small difference does not an ant make. Have wanted posters set up throughout the empire. Set the reward as high as possible - it would be fortunate if we are able to apprehend him before he leaves our domain. If not, though, that’s still fine. We are not short on talent, ourselves.”
“Understood.”