〈 Chapter 306 〉 How to Face Death (5）
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Light bursts forth from the Holy Site.
Light beams soar into the sky.
The pillar of light is so immense that it can be seen from afar. Eryhal, who guarded the throne of White Night Castle, the warriors standing beside him, and Chloe, who stands before the Cursed Dragon… they all saw that light.
The brilliantly rising light captivates their gazes.
However, the two knights closest to the Holy Site do not even glance at the light. They only focus on the swords they hold.
Clang! Clang!
Swords clash against each other.
The two unbreakable swords intertwine noisily. The sound of metal striking metal resonates constantly. Even the snowflakes drifting endlessly do not linger near them.
Ganikalt, the Death’s Blade.
As the first hero and the first superhuman, he shows his utmost to his rival who appeared before him for the first time in centuries.
Kyle Toven, the strongest hero.
Known as the symbol of victory, he swings his sword at the catastrophe that once brought him to his knees multiple times. He trembles in fear but does not avert his eyes from the death looming before him, just as his master once did.
Techniques collide.
Now, Kyle swings his sword, betting everything for the first time in years, recalling a past event. When was that? The memories from that time have become a blank due to some reason, but…
It was the reason Kyle yearned for the sword(？).
Whether it was a dream or a glimpse of another’s memory through some sort of magical tool, he does not know. All he remembers is that there was a knight in that place.
Blood flows.
A lost eye.
A severed arm.
Kyle saw the back of someone who looks like they cannot even stand, let alone hold a sword. He saw the god(？) they were facing.
“I am ■■■■■ ■ ■■■■.”
He raised his sword.
The tip of the sword pointed at the twisted god who descended upon the world.
“Remember, you will be felled by the name of ■■■.”
He swung his sword.
All Kyle could see was the back, so he could not see the trajectory of the sword he wielded. He could not see it, but he understood.
Swish.
The tip of the sword reached the god.
He managed to cut the undying being.
Cha-cha-cha-cha-cha-cha!
As the sword swung once, the world was split apart. The surroundings were slashed diagonally, and the god’s flesh was also cleaved in half. The sky was torn, and the shadow that had blocked the sun was completely swept away.
A strike that could only be called a miracle.
‘Beautiful.’
Kyle thought so at that time.
Though all the landscapes he saw with his friend faded into obscurity and were forgotten… that strike remained unforgettable. It lingered in Kyle’s mind for a long time.
‘I too, wish to wield such a sword…’
He yearned for it.
He admired that brilliant strike.
He wished to be able to wield a sword like that knight in his memories. However, the stronger he became, the more Kyle realized how distant that realm was.
He became a hero.
He learned swordsmanship from a superhuman.
He was called the strongest hero.
Yet, that realm still feels unattainable.
Now, even memories are slowly fading away. He began to have doubts about whether he could wield such a sword. Still, Kyle continues to long for that sword.
If only he could mimic that swordsmanship.
If only he could evoke a similar strike.
If he could fulfill the trials given to him and carry out his contract. He could achieve great deeds. Therefore, Kyle used other means to try to imitate that sword.
Gathering starlight, accumulating it, and again…
“It’s futile.”
Kyle muttered unconcernedly.
“There’s no way to imitate it with that.”
The scenery disperses along with memories.
Time returns to reality. Before Kyle stands a knight. Ganikalt, the Death’s Blade. He assumes a certain stance.
His right arm feels limp as if it’s been severed, and with one eye closed, he grips his sword with his left hand.
It’s a stance he never learned from Kuntel.
However, Kyle knows that stance. He cannot help but know. It was the stance that knight took in his dreams countless times.
“Just as I thought.”
At this moment, Kyle is certain.
“It was you.”
Ganikalt looked at Kyle.
Kyle looked back at the knight before him.
‘■■■■■ ■ ■■■■.’
The name erased from memory.
The name forgotten by all.
Is it because the starlight has dimmed? Kyle faintly recalls the memory that had been erased by the stars.
“It was you, Ganikalt van Galatrick.”
Ganikalt does not respond.
He merely takes a step forward.
Boom!
The ground trembles.
The flow of the entire area is reversed. Realizing what technique Ganikalt is about to unveil, Kyle gasps.
‘It’s coming.’
Ganikalt’s left arm begins to move slowly.
It’s neither fast nor slow. It feels as if only Ganikalt’s sword moves in frozen time, tracing a bizarre path in silver-white light.
Tick, tick. Tiddly-tiddly-tick.
Everything that touches the sword is ripped apart.
As the tip of the sword passes, the space tears along its trajectory. A massive crack appears in the air. The tip of the sword approaches him, cutting through space.
Before the incoming sword, Kyle feels death.
He cannot evade. He cannot resist.
Thus, that is the Death’s Blade.
“…Ah.”
Before the death that is approaching, humanity cannot help but exclaim.
Without closing his eyes to the end, Kyle stares at the sword wielded by death. He engraves that infinitely beautiful yet terrifying strike in his mind.
And then, death struck Kyle.
Swish.
The scenery was diagonally cleaved.
2.
Swish.
The moment the sword swung, Raniel pulled out chains toward Kyle. Binding his body with the chains, she yanked him back.
She sensed it too.
There was no stopping it. It couldn’t be evaded.
Even an indestructible holy sword could be cleaved by that strike. That sense of certainty was proven right.
Cha-cha-cha-cha-cha-cha!
A massive crack formed in the air.
The scenery slashed diagonally.
Once severed, the shifting space does not return to its original form as before. It continues on in its distorted state. In that moment, Raniel felt the collapse of logic.
The sense of distance disappeared.
Common sense became worthless.
The laws of nature twisted.
Something that transcends common sense, something incomprehensible engulfed the ravine. The thought that they might have escaped the range was a delusion. The rushing pressure sent Raniel and Kyle soaring into the air.
Thud!
Even without the sword touching them, their bodies are shredded by the pressure alone. Kyle and Raniel roll on the ground, pouring out blood.
Gack! Cough!
Their vision turns red. Their bodies throb.
Raniel slowly lifted her head as she spat blood. What appeared in her view was a completely changed landscape than a moment ago.
The sky had split.
The ravine, now slanted and stuck, slowly crumbled. The ground shook with a rumble.
“Ha…”
Raniel let out a hollow laugh. Now, she couldn’t even grasp it. What on earth in the world was that?
Gag, cough.
Raniel glanced beside her.
There lay Kyle, spewing more blood than herself. He seemed like he could no longer stand.
“…”
Raniel slowly straightened her body.
Leaving behind the collapsed Kyle, she faces unavoidable death. In the end, all her plans have failed. Then…
‘There’s only one thing left.’
It was time to make a decision.
Rustle.
She rolled up her sleeve and extended her arm forward.
Before Raniel, the Balance appeared. For a moment she hesitated before placing her finger on the Balance.
“Offered…”
Just as she attempted to pronounce it.
Thud.
Kyle grabbed Raniel’s ankle.
“I told you.”
Kyle glared at Raniel with bloodshot eyes.
“Don’t use it.”
“If I don’t, we’ll all die.”
“Even if you do…”
“I know it can’t win.”
Raniel chuckled.
“Then act like back then and run, you fool.”
Kyle’s eyes trembled at her words.
Raniel took a step forward. Kyle ultimately lost his grip on Raniel’s ankle. The moment she took a few more steps.
Plop.
A sound of falling snow echoed from somewhere.
Raniel looked up to see where the sound came from. Someone was standing there.
“…Lac?”
3.
There exists a human named Grace.
He had a master, who to the orphaned boy was a brother and a father. He respected his master. He admired him. He envied the proud knight who always returned from achieving great deeds.
He learned from him.
Received much.
Grateful for that, as he grew into a young man, he sought to repay that favor. To which the master would only reply with a bittersweet smile.
“If I lose my pride, then awaken it for me.”
A true master’s response.
The young man nodded, yet he had his doubts. How could such a proud knight ever lose his pride? He couldn’t imagine that such a thing would ever happen.
Yet, it did.
The master was defeated.
The master was forgotten by all.
Somewhere along the line, he became known as a calamity.
Ganikalt, the Death’s Blade.
It was a name newly attached to the master, and people feared him, calling him a disaster. The master was no longer a hero. He was a calamity who killed people. The young man had to uphold the promise he made to the master.
But how?
He must kill his master.
He must free him from that suffering.
Yet, he lacked the strength to do so. Despite honing his skills for a lifetime, the young man never believed he could reach his master.
Humans think endlessly.
At the end of that thought process, humans arrive at one answer. That answer was given to him by an elf who was a companion of his master. Together with the elf, the human prepared one scheme.
“Connect.”
Connect and connect.
“To the next, and again to the next.”
For the day that will eventually come.
*
Lac leaps from the ravine.
He grasps nothing in his hands. Instead, steam billows from his body. It’s as if he’d heated to his limit.
Thud.
Landing on the ground, Lac approaches death. Death squints his eyes at Lac.
“You are.”
Death recognizes Lac.
It sees the blood coursing through his body.
“Are you Grace?”
“Lac von Grace.”
Clapping his teeth together, Lac states his name. He takes a step toward death. Death asks Lac.
“Are you a knight?”
To the question, Lac replies.
“I am a warrior.”
Lac approaches death with narrowed eyes. Although Raniel cries out, Lac does not hear her.
“I stand here to keep my promise.”
As he nears, blood begins to flow from Lac’s eyes.
His flesh begins to creak. However, Lac continues to speak.
“Pride promised.”
He extends his empty hand toward the air.
With his left hand, he grasps the air.
“Before death, the Grace shall show its pride.”
The moment he utters the words of the founding ancestor.
Light bursts forth from Lac’s palm. The erupted light forms the shape of a sword. Ganikalt’s eyes narrow upon seeing the completed sword shape.
The hero, Ganikalt van Galatrick.
The sword he wielded is now held in Lac’s hand.
Seeing the brilliant radiance, Raniel, who leaped forward to stop Lac, comes to a halt. With wide eyes, she watches as something appears behind Lac.
“I shall go, master.”
It is a memory and a specter of someone.
The trace of the human named Grace who once stood here overlaps with Lac. Lac takes a step forward toward death, adjusting his stance.
And then, tap.
Lac lightly touches the ground.
…There shall be no secrets handed down to the Grace clan.
They do not possess refined techniques.
Only destructive brawls wielded by instinct and raw strength exist. However, that was only because the descendants of Grace had not utilized their talents.
The founding ancestor, Grace.
The man dedicated his entire life to perfecting a single technique.
He devoted his life to one strike. A technique aimed to slay the respected master.
As time flows on, that technique is manifested through Lac’s hands. The moment he grips the sword, memories flood into Lac’s mind. They are the memories of the ancestor who challenged death multiple times.
The great warrior, Grace.
As Lac reproduces the strike he executed.
The starlight contained in the holy sword accelerates Lac’s body. In an instant, Lac’s eyes gleam a vivid red. The heat contained in his heated body erupts like an explosion.
Grace style, shapeless sword.
There are no forms, no predefined methods.
It doesn’t matter what is held in hand. If there’s something you want to cut, that suffices. Thus, the explanation of mental swordsmanship from the master was reinterpreted by Grace.
What Lac grasps in his hands is a greatsword.
However, at the moment it strikes, it is not a sword(？). It tears through space as if it were an axe, colliding with Ganikalt’s sword.
KA-BOOM!
Along with a great sound, starlight bursts forth.
The overflowing starlight is the lost pride of the Death’s Blade and half of the soul he had left behind in the past. The starlight stirs the fallen hero’s spirit.
Shadows and starlight intertwine.
In that moment, a twist of space is created.
Unable to withstand the distortion, Lac’s bones shatter completely. Ultimately, Lac loses hold of the sword.
Gak!
Coughing up blood, Lac rolls on the ground.
Despite not successfully executing the technique, that attempt was not in vain. The burst of starlight held onto the shadow escaping from Ganikalt’s body.
For a brief moment, Ganikalt cannot use the shadow.
Lac gazes at the sword he has dropped.
The greatsword hovers in the air, then pierces the ground. It is planted between Ganikalt, the Death’s Blade, and Kyle Toven, the hero.
The greatsword embedded in the snowy field.
Kyle stares at it vacantly.
Raniel also looks at the sword.
At this moment, both of their minds echo the same thought. Raniel twisted the Balance that emerged before her.
Not the Balance, but Offering.
Upon the swapped Balance, Raniel pressed all her ten fingers. Then, she stomped down on the remaining Circuit on the ground. A circuit prepared for any unforeseen variables. Now, it shimmers with radiant light.
Gak, spit.
Kyle also stands up spitting blood.
Having lost the holy sword, he is empty-handed. Without holding the holy sword, Kyle Toven is no longer a hero. The human, Kyle Toven stands beside Raniel.
“Hey, Kyle.”
Raniel says.
“Do you remember the black dragon hunt?”
“How could I forget?”
“Then, you know what I’m about to do.”
Kyle lets out a laugh.
“Of course, Raniel.”
Finally acknowledging it, you bastard.
Raniel chuckles as she cracks her fingers.
Shhhhhh!
The circuit glows, and chains to soar.
Countless chains fill the sky. Hundreds, thousands of strands. There’s no need to say the purpose of those chains. With a smirk, Raniel shouts.
“Go, Kyle.”
Kyle does not respond.
Instead of a response, he begins to dash forward, charging toward the planted holy sword in the snowy field.
*
