The chestnut-haired young girl was nothing more than a single person among the jostling crowd of countless onlookers. The fervor in the old town plaza felt like enough to crush Iska. No spectator seats had been set up, so she couldn’t really see Rosclay himself due to the heads of the people jostling to look. However, she had caught several glimpses of him through the gaps in the crowd. She saw Rosclay topple a tower with a single slash and press in on his enemy with a flurry of Force Arts. She saw him as he reclaimed a superior position over Soujirou in a momentary clash, as he been moving backward, as if driven into a corner by an invisible blade. “See, look, Rosclay did it! Soujirou’s only got one part of his fake leg left!” “You idiot, that’s cause he blocked the attack with his leg! Even still, I’ve thought this for a while, but Rosclay’s crazy strong, huh… Just barely left a scratch and look what he did.” “Hey, Dad, you went to watch the third match, right?! What sort of moves does Soujirou use?!” “No clue, but if Rosclay’s gotten him that close, then it’s over!” “Rosclay! Rosclaaaay! Over here!” …He was doing this the whole time, wasn’t he? Iska’s body wasn’t able to frequently make trips outside. She had never actually witnessed Rosclay fight for herself. Up until now, she had only been able to imagine how he fought based on Rosclay’s confessions, or the stories her mom would catch while out and about. Rosclay the Absolute was a scoundrel who tricked his enemies and deceived the people according to Rosclay, and a flawless, upright, and bold knight according to her mom. Even though she knew the dream would never come true, she still thought to herself—if Iska ever did have the chance to witness how he fought, what did Rosclay truly look like? He’s putting on a front. Watching Rosclay as a spectator, he did indeed look like the sort of strong and beautiful champion her mom had relayed to her. Even the Force Arts she briefly glimpsed were performed in a way that made it seem like his own technique, even as she knew the truth of it all, and Rosclay could have revealed the truth to everyone present, and it still would have been hard for anyone to accept. However, Iska could tell he was pushing himself far too hard, as well. This normal young man, the type that could be found anywhere, was fighting in order to remain a strong and beautiful champion. Frantic and desperate, without anyone knowing the wiser. Rosclay. The fact I’m feeling this…may all be a misconception on my part. She thought it was a misapprehension stemming from her knowledge of Rosclay the individual. But this misconception should just remain mine and mine alone. Iska loved Rosclay. She wished for a future together, just the two of them. However, as long as Rosclay the Absolute remained as Aureatia’s wonderful champion, he would continue to fight battles just like the one Iska saw. It’s okay. At this point, I’m not going to stop you or anything… Rosclay. If that was his wish, at the very least, she would watch over him here. Should things be as Rosclay the Absolute’s own words said, and the individual power of the people served as Rosclay’s strength—then, at the very least, Iska must have possessed the power of one person inside her. Soujirou the Willow-Sword didn’t particularly have much interest in Rosclay the Absolute. He was fine with letting someone else who wasn’t in the ring themselves offer him help. However, even if he did win the fight with these cheap tricks, was that actually enjoyable for Rosclay? Whatever happened, they were the ones who would die when they lost, so if they didn’t have the most fun battle to the death possible, to account for their lives being on the line, then ultimately, weren’t they just missing out? When it came to the man’s skills and abilities, while Soujirou agreed that Rosclay must have honed his body to the absolute limits of the minia form, that was basically all there was to him. He hadn’t reached the standards needed to properly cross swords with Soujirou whatsoever. That was how Soujirou thought of it. “I should be able to make quick work of ’im…” Soujirou scratched his head right in front of his foe. It appeared that Rosclay the Absolute wasn’t as weak of an enemy as Soujirou sensed he was. Soujirou should have seen a clear route to Rosclay’s life, but with Rosclay constantly enacting two or three schemes at once, he couldn’t reach the correct path forward. Soujirou was being outwitted. Rosclay was always ready with a card to play to bridge the gulf of their abilities. The clash with his enchanted swords just now had been exactly that. Much like it was impossible to distinguish between a visitor and the minia of this world based on appearances alone, he couldn’t judge whether something was an enchanted sword or not simply by looking at the blade itself. He been able to dodge the Blasting Blade because he had watched the intents of its wielder, Rosclay, instead. On top of it, simply by seeing through the first Blasting Blade attack, he ended up with the tables turned back against him. Rosclay the Absolute had even foreseen that Soujirou would break through it and kept the Magicked Blade secret. “All right…well, what’re you gonna do from there?” “Whatever it is, I’m sure the same move won’t work on you again.” “I mean, ’course not.” Repelling the first part with precision via the tremendous recoil from the Blasting Blade, Rosclay would find his prey with the Magicked Blade guaranteed initiative when Soujirou came flying down at him. It was logical, but still ultimately confined within the realm of logic. It was a move that was entirely composed under the premise that the enchanted blasting sword would score a hit. For Soujirou, he could simply evade it from the start and be fine. Soujirou lightly bent his left knee, and prepared to kick out left, right, up, down, front, back—in all directions at once. Rosclay, meanwhile, remained in the same stance as before. The Blasting Blade held out in front in his right hand, and the Magicked Blade in his left hand, held behind his back. He maintained his decorous smile as he spoke. “I’ll came at you with the same move.” “…Oh yeah?” “Ownopellal io arte.” (From Ownopellal to Arte sword.) Word Arts. Soujirou kicked the ground faster than his brain could think. The Magicked Blade was already being swung down at him. As if Rosclay had perfectly predicted the moment Soujirou would move. However, the truth was he hadn’t read Soujirou’s moves. The sword, merely swung down as fast as possible, exploded on the ground without hitting its mark. Something’s not right. The blast was bereft of bloodlust. It guided him to opened-up low ground. A distraction. Aural camouflage. Soujirou had instinctively stopped Alcuzari the enchanted hollow sword that he meant to follow through with. He felt an intensely heavy resistance. A rifle bullet had made contact with the sword blade. A sniper. Even before the shock could demolish his wrists, he deflected the bullet by rolling it with the flat of his sword in accordance with the bullet’s rotational direction. Rosclay’s response… Soujirou was paying attention to Rosclay’s left hand. “Yones hamsh. Rix te neshel.” (Left side of the mount. Crime-knowing curtain.) …is coming from here. Soujirou didn’t move. The Magicked Blade of Razhucort did. Soujirou knew that the blade of ultimate initiative had passed by right in front of his eyes. The enchanted sword, because of this guaranteed forestalling move, needed to be precisely aware of its opponent’s form and speed and placed along their trajectory to hit its target, or it was rendered meaningless. The blade flew, and right as the second attack, fastest of all, began, Soujirou responded with his own blade. The enchanted hollow sword entangled the tip of the Magicked Blade and wrested it from Rosclay’s hands with the same terrifying acceleration. If the wielder wasn’t a shura himself, then slaying an enchanted sword was simple. The Blasting Blade was still stuck into the ground. The Magicked Blade repelled down. Another half pace forward, and he was within lethal sword range. “Dis terda.” (String of dark tone.) “I saw it. That…” “Nim a.” (Become hollow.) “…life of yours.” A killing slash. “—” He felt his hands cut through air. Soujirou’s intuition had perceived a definite path of slaughter. However, Soujirou hadn’t reached his target. The sword blade had crumpled like dirt. Alcuzari the enchanted hollow sword, supposed to never break or chip. “Break open my defenses and get careless.” The Blasting Blade, pulled out with one hand, grazed Soujirou’s left elbow as he lifted it up. The impact nearly sent Soujiro’s tiny body sailing straight into the audience. “I said I’d come at with you the same move, didn’t I?” “Gwaugh, gahak!” The aberrant blade spit up blood as he laid on the ground. The problem was less that his left elbow had been blown away almost down to the bone, and stemmed more from one lung being crushed from the point-blank blast wave. Regardless, he was robbed of most of his faculties in one arm. …I got played! Rosclay the Absolute was weak. While he may not have been the absolutely weakest, when it came to pure fighting capabilities among the hero candidates, myriad freaks and demons all jumbled together, he was undoubtedly near the very bottom. Anyone would recognize him as such. …This guy’s strong. Strong—as long as visitors were themselves people… Then it was possible to deceive them, including by ensuring one’s strength was never shown. Alcuzari the enchanted hollow sword was, from the beginning, something he had received from someone else. “Gifting me…an enchanted sword. Haade, that bastard. Gwahk, hah hah, hyrk.” From the beginning, it had all been to make him use it here in this fight. All in case he won out against his first opponent, Ozonezma…and fought Rosclay in this match. “Y-you were…thinking up something awful after all!” It was impossible to distinguish whether a sword was an enchanted one just from looking at it. Even if it wasn’t an unbreakable enchanted sword, but instead from the very beginning one that was destined to break, destroyed with Craft Arts after waiting for a fatal opportunity—Soujirou’s technical prowess meant that he wouldn’t have broken the blade to begin with, even after parrying a rifle shot. A lie that was impossible to see through, presupposing the visitor’s supernatural gifts. Rosclay couldn’t allow Soujirou’s hand to grab onto any sword whatsoever. “Hey look, it’s Soujirou.” “No way… He got thrown away that far just from a single blast?” Behind him, the crowd stirred. “Rosclay even had his sword repelled.” “Hey, Soujirou, you okay? Give up yet?” “Stuff it, all of you…” As a result of getting blown far away, he was out of range of any follow-up attacks. In his current situation, with the crowd near, there was little chance of any Force Arts attacks or attacks from those tiny bugs. In order to pick himself up, Soujirou thrust his untouched right hand into the ground and felt something gross and wet. “…What the hell’s this?” A swarm, looking like metallic beetles melted together into a muddy mess, happened to lie dead exactly where Soujirou had fell. They were undoubtedly the bugs that the friend of Rosclay’s was using. Why were they dead, though…? “…Gaugh, hngh!” An intense pain began to rapidly spread from his right fingertips. Writhing, he scratched the ground with his right hand. His nails were easily peeled back, and there were several red lines drawn on the ground. The crowd screamed and backed off, circling wide around Soujirou. “Wh-what the…hell is this…?!” “Nectegio, the Ravenous Rot.” In the middle of the shrieks, Rosclay coldly murmured a reply, in a low whisper to make sure no one else would hear. What exactly had Rosclay done just now? What was going to happen to Soujirou? At the very least, Soujirou knew one thing for certain. I was wrong. My estimation was totally wrong. This man wasn’t the type of naïve opponent to give up on a follow-up attack for any halfhearted reasons like Soujirou being out of range, or the crowd standing nearby. Much more than that, he had driven Soujirou into the most effective follow-up attack of all. After one learned the truth behind the champion of Aureatia, they started to lose sight of an extremely simple fact that even the nameless city children knew very well. Rosclay the Absolute had slain all of Aureatia’s enemies. Including the Lucnoca the Winter. “You’re going to die. I’m not going to step in range of you any further.” Ever since Aureatia was first established, no one had been able to best him. Command headquarters. Jelky, in a state of complete exhaustion, listened to the sounds coming from the radzio with his head facedown on his desk. He couldn’t give in now. …Ekirehjy the Blood Fountain examined Nectegio on Rosclay’s orders and gathered its toxins… Did he manage to coordinate with Krafnir…? It was one of the trump cards they had prepared for emergencies, but they had deployed several of said trump cards in this fight already. Rosclay had prepared and accumulated them all. Antel the Alignment. Ownopellal the Bone Watcher. The enchanted swords for defending the palace. Dally the Coin Repeller. Ekirehjy the Blood Fountain. He had arranged to have as much fighting power present as possible. Jelky’s head was in terrible pain, and he had almost no sensation in his left arm. In addition to the daily, chronic overwork, the mental pressure and enormous amount of work that surged in one fell swoop that day was shortening Jelky’s lifespan. Everything I was able to do…all so Rosclay may win… He thought that, to be precise, this attachment he had wasn’t toward Rosclay. It was an attachment to the yet-unseen Aureatia. The Aureatia that would become a unified nation upon overcoming all the dangers that threated the world without killing the monarch or the people. Jelky may have lied this whole time, just as Hiroto the Paradox said. Even then, he didn’t believe that they had been mistaken in their methods. If they had progressed down a just path, free from any deception, it would have led to a great many more sacrifices than there were now. The true value of a nation wasn’t the approval rate of the people. It was guaranteeing the people’s safety and having the faculties to perpetually maintain it. “I should have…said that back to him…” The radzio call with the Gray-Haired Child had already ended. Jelky also hadn’t any energy to spare to counter back in the moment. First and foremost, he had needed to give all the effort he had to support Rosclay right away. “How frustrating…” His body was beginning to die. Defeat meant that there had been some part of Soujirou’s way of fighting that had been wrong. It wasn’t that he had come into the battle missing his right leg, nor was it that he hadn’t been suspicious of Alcuzari the enchanted hollow sword. It was that, despite wanting his match against Rosclay, he hadn’t been able to slash at him at the start. The guy who avoids fighting is the stronger one? If he hadn’t given Rosclay time to prepare, he wouldn’t have been ground down by the sheer amount of reinforcement he was getting like this. In that regard, Rosclay the Absolute was terrifyingly brilliant. Presuming he would fight in the castle garden theater, this match should have been under the worst possible conditions for Rosclay, egged on by the crowd and forced to fight on the spot. However, when faced with the worst possible conditions, he had immediately found himself weapons—the vague start for the match, and the need to let the people escape the area. Back then, Rosclay had observed the surrounding terrain as he moved about the plaza and bought time to give him the greatest possible advantage. Even someone who seemed inferior in strength to Soujirou had areas in which they excelled compared to himself. If Soujirou could obtain that strength for his own— “That…ain’t…right…!” He wriggled and struggled as he got up. It wasn’t about next time. It was now. Right now, he had to close the distance and kill Rosclay, or it would be over. He would die first. His left leg amputated, and his prosthetic broken. Explosive trauma to his left elbow. His right hand was soaked in lethal poison. “What the hell’re you running away for! Champion, my ass…!” “Soujirou the Willow-Sword! I do not wish to slay a swordsman of your caliber! The blood loss from your elbow must be quite severe. Should you move, it will only put you in even greater danger. You can be saved if we attend to your wounds immediately. I ask you to rest there and wait for a doctor to arrive!” That wasn’t it. The harsh pain in his right hand was beginning to reach his wrist. Rosclay was saying that Soujirou had to move, or the poison would circulate through him and he would die. Rosclay the Absolute wanted to kill Soujirou more than anything. “I…can still…fight…” Mustering up the last of his strength, Soujirou tried to kick off from the ground. His shoulder was pulled back. “Huh?” It was an Aureatian citizen. A well-built Aureatian citizen had stepped forward and grabbed Soujirou. “Whoa now, buddy… You can’t push yourself so hard in a state like that.” “You okay?! We’ll take you to a clinic.” “That bastard…!” Rosclay hadn’t been calling out to Soujirou. It had been to the Aureatian citizens. More precisely, he had purposefully called out to create a situation where it would make sense for the Aureatian citizens to act this way. He had someone at the ready. Waited…for this worst possible second. Rosclay…you were this thorough?! Unable to waste a single second in his situation, Soujirou’s potential options were few. Just gotta go for it. With his destroyed left arm, he stole a knife from the citizen right next to him. Something he could manage. Soujirou just needed to cut off the fingers of the large man grabbing his shoulder and peel him off. The large man murmured, “Sorry, but…” Slash them— “You can’t cut me down.” The slash that was supposed to fly as fast as his nerves fired, stopped before he could move a single finger. It was none other but Soujirou himself who stopped it. “…Wha…what the hell’re you here for?” He recognized the large man’s voice. To blend in amongst the citizens, he wore a black hat and glasses to greatly alter his image, but Soujirou’s intuition for slaughter was the one thing that couldn’t be tricked. If he attacked this man, he would end up dead. “Fweh-heh-heh… Been a minute hasn’t it, Soujirou?” Kuze the Passing Disaster dug the fingers of both his hands even harder into Soujirou’s shoulders. “Ngh… Screw you…!” “But today’s going to be goodbye for good.” Kuze the Passing Disaster was an assassin. He needed to assassinate Queen Sephite. In order to save religious faith, he needed a crime heinous enough to pin all the Order’s notoriety on him. If he advanced to the second round, when the royal family would come to watch the matches, he could get his wish. To win and proceed on, he should have only needed to kill only one person, his opponent in the first round. That didn’t happen. Kuze killed Alus the Star Runner himself, as ordered by Aureatia. “Well…who do I need to kill next?” He was in the second borough of Aureatia’s Eastern Outer Ward, after it was struck by a conflagration—in a small shack along the canal. Kuze sat down on a wooden box in the room, looking fatigued. “Rosclay the Absolute. That must be what this is about, if you’ve called me out to a place like this.” “No one else knows about this conversation, even within the Aureatia Assembly. That’s why I needed to hide myself and meet you in person.” There was a man hidden under a robe inside the shack. His facial features were more well-sculpted than a theater actor, but when he wasn’t inside his glittering silver armor, Rosclay looked like a normal citizen, as if his usual impressive presence was a complete lie. “I see. Well, what is it, then?” “Let me make my thinking here clear. I can assist your organization in your goal.” “…!” Killing. The choice flickering in the back of his head brought him disgust, like his entrails were rotting, but he needed to steel himself. It wasn’t guaranteed that things would get to that point. “Fweh-heh-heh… Goal? Our goal, huh… If Rosclay himself is willing to help with restoring the Order, I’d accept the offer with open arms.” “Regrettably, restoring faith at this point will be impossible. Your organization thought that yourselves, yes? If those who lived a proper life are enterally left unrewarded, then you need to create someone to shoulder the blame for that—” “It’s the same thing that you lot are doing to us, isn’t it?” In the age of the True Demon King, there wasn’t a single person who had been saved by the teachings of the Wordmaker. The Order was rotten, exploiting the poor and destitute to eke out its survival. In exchange for forgetting their faith in the Wordmaker, the people of the world started to believe these stories instead. They didn’t want to believe that the tragedy and atrocities that befell them had all happened without any reason whatsoever. At this point, the Order was seen as necessary in order to serve as that reason. Kuze needed to detach the reason from the Order he needed to keep protected. “…How much do you know?” The plot to assassinate the Queen was something that not even the head of the Order Division in the government, Nophtok the Crepuscle Bell, knew about. If the plot was discovered, all the sacrifices up until now would be rendered meaningless. If it meant protecting the secret, Kuze would even manipulate Nastique of his own will. “I’ve already made my conclusion clear. I can assist you. You wish to take responsibility for assassinating the Queen and use it to prolong the life of the Order. Is that right?” “…” Kuze wasn’t so much preserving the silence on purpose, but was unable to answer. He simply thought that it showed Rosclay the Absolute’s extraordinary tenacity, to identify the truth all by himself. “Why do you think I’ve gone to these lengths?” “Good question. Trying to use me for yourself?” “The answer is similar, but a bit different. I don’t want to die.” Rosclay gave a fatigued smile. “The Order may teach that even when the body dies, Word Arts will be woven on eternally…but I don’t want to die. Simply imagining that I may lose myself forever is terrifying… That’s why I don’t want us to remain enemies.” Everyone must have felt that way. Since, even at that moment, Kuze could kill Rosclay with a thought. “You sure about this? If it comes out that you overlooked the Queen’s assassination, you’re not going to get by with just an execution.” “…In order to achieve our faction’s goals, it will mean abolishing the monarchy in the end anyway.” “…What?” “I’m sure your Order never even dreamed of it, did they? That we would both share the same goal of dethroning the Queen. We intend to use the symbol of the hero to convert Aureatia into a republic. The Sixways Exhibition event is for the sake of this reformation as well.” “Hah-hah-hah. Is that…really true? Hah-hah, hah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah.” Kuze laughed, but it wasn’t the sort of laugh that came out on purpose. What exactly was the point of all the killing he had done? His emotions were horribly dry, and empty. “Huh, I get it, sure, sure! Instead of dethroning her while she’s alive, it’ll make everything go along faster if she dies and the whole monarchy is broken instead…! Not only that, but the perpetrator is going to step up and admit it for himself. How ideal! You’d definitely be getting everything you wanted that way, wouldn’t you?” And with absolutely everything without hope. If it had to happen either way, that wouldn’t be too bad, either. Even when it came to the Gray-Haired Child who he was currently working with, Kuze intended to assassinate the Queen in the end and betray him. Even the Gray-Haired Child who he was currently working with intended to assassinate the Queen and betray him. Assassinate the Queen and take on the Order’s persecution. At this point, for Kuze the Passing Disaster, this was all he had left. Much as it was so for Nastique, he simply had to be the blade focused solely on achieving this singular goal. “Sure. To say thanks for giving me a good laugh, I’ll work with you. Who do I need to kill?” “Lucnoca the Winter,” Rosclay answered. “There are some who are making moves to use the beginning of the second round, the ninth match, to take down Lucnoca the Winter. I expect there will be a tremendous amount of military force deployed against her, but should even that be not enough, there is a chance she will attack Aureatia… I need you as a trump card.” A single one of Lucnoca the Winter’s Ice Arts breath attacks could easily annihilate all the areas of Aureatia at once. Which was exactly why Kuze the Passing Disaster could be called her natural enemy. As long as Kuze was included in the enormous radius of the attack, that alone would be enough for Nastique to kill the strongest of all dragons. “…So you’re not telling me to go out there directly and kill her?” “Yes. Making them exhaust themselves is part of the operation.” Whatever Rosclay the Absolute was planning was none of Kuze’s concern. However, in all likelihood, Rosclay the Absolute was another schemer like Maqure the Sky’s Lake Surface, able to think up ambitious, far-reaching plans. I wonder who’s stronger, you or the Gray-Haired Child. “Kuze. I’m sorry that I am unable to save your Order.” “…No worries. When the time comes, just let me know. At this point in the game…a little betrayal’s nothing at all.” The ninth match. Psianop the Inexhaustible Stagnation and Tuturi the Blue Violet Foam’s hard-fought and brave battle resulted in the death of Lucnoca the Winter. Rosclay the Absolute had preserved his trump card for later. Rosclay the Absolute was always fighting with stratagems meticulously laid out around him. Among them were tricks that were ultimately never used. When he stepped into the old town plaza, he had spread out a cautionary net of Krafnir the Hatch of Truth’s constructs, but normally even this couldn’t be called an entirely flawless defense. For example, it wouldn’t be guaranteed against arrows from Mele the Horizon’s Roar, or bombs from Mestelexil the Box of Desperate Knowledge. When facing attacks that would destroy the plaza in its entirety, keeping an eye out for onlookers would be meaningless. Therefore, having Kuze the Passing Disaster happen to be present there was significant, as a precaution against such attacks. He just needed to be on the scene—simply by having Kuze caught within the attack radius, he would serve as the ultimate shield of all, killing the attacker—before they attacked. Save for Soujirou, the fact Kuze the Passing Disaster and Rosclay the Absolute were connected was known to no one else. Even to Rosclay’s back-up support, looking in from the periphery, Kuze currently resembled any other Aureatian citizen. Furthermore, at this point, Soujirou was going to die, simply by being stuck where he was. “Damn…you…!” “Just pack it in. There’s no saving you at this point, even if I didn’t do anything here.” In the confusion earlier, Soujirou had grabbed a knife for himself. If Kuze was the only one to approach where he was standing, then he wouldn’t even carry this one weapon, but in a situation like this, crowd psychology meant that completely unrelated people also came to stop Soujirou. As long as Soujirou held it in his hand, the knife wasn’t simply a tool for fighting off the crowd. “Still…ain’t enough…! This much is…nothing! Ngh, gwauuugh!” “Eeeek!” “Eyaaaah!” His arm fell with a thud. Everyone in the crowd except Kuze screamed and backed off in terror. Soujirou had cut off his own right arm, which was infected with the lethal bacteria. “…!” Kuze, pinning Soujirou down, was forced to follow those around him and separate himself, too. He was a hero candidate, whose face was already well-known. Once all of the other citizens had put space between them, he couldn’t make any conspicuous moves of his own. “Wh-whoa now, what the heck’re you doing, buddy…?! Your arm may’ve been a mushy mess, but cut it off and the blood loss is going to knock you out of this fight way faster…!” “I don’t…wanna hear, any crap from a damn…bystander!” Turning to Rosclay, Soujirou began to walk, one step at a time. Most of the cells in his four limbs were dead. His right arm and left leg were lost, and most of his left elbow was beginning to get torn off. Since he wouldn’t be able to reach that far on his own, his only option was to make his enemy approach him. Soujirou needed to learn how Rosclay fought. A way of fighting where the weak could kill the strong. A battle using psychology and the environment to draw his enemy toward the battlefield he wanted. “Rosclay! You really cool with this, huh?!” “…” “Aureatia’s strongest knight, huh?! Say that after you’ve lobbed my head off! A real knight? They cross swords back ’n’ forth right up to the end! I’m not admitting defeat unless you’re the one to kill me!” He was closing in. Rosclay the Absolute lingered where he stood. …No. He was observing. He was watching and waiting like a coldhearted beast for Soujirou to die off. “I have a different set of values. I do not condone tormenting and killing an opponent who can barely stand… Please, I ask you to fall where you are and accept treatment.” Soujirou didn’t budge. In a battle of words, not swords, his enemy naturally surpassed him. Could Soujirou come up with the words capable of moving Rosclay from where he stood? If he didn’t, he would die. Fall and perish meaninglessly on the plaza ground, unable to do anything. He needed to fight until the end. “Rosclay! Finish him off!” “C’mon, Rosclay, give him the fight he wants!” “Just give it up! It’s too cruel to watch!” “Soujirou’s not right in the head!” “Rosclay! His head! Take his head!” Rosclay couldn’t keep running away forever. With an audience looking on, he was bound to move. From his now largely fuzzy consciousness, Soujirou spat out his words. “I’m Yagyuu…the Earth’s last Yagyuu. The strongest…swordsman…” That’s right—Yagyuu Shinkage-ryuu. The last. “Indeed. You fought brilliantly, worthy of your name. Soujirou the Willow-Sword, I will never forget you.” “…You could win now, y’know.” “…” Soujirou could tell, mostly through intuition, that there was a small change in Rosclay’s expression. “I’m saying that…even you can win in a fair…and honest fight.” Just how much further could the swordsman fight with a left hand that had its elbow blasted off? At the very least, for Rosclay, it would have been impossible. If the extensor carpi radialis longus muscle on the outer side of the elbow was lacerated, it would become extremely difficult to bend the wrist. His grip strength would weaken, and naturally, it would grow difficult to maintain his grasp on anything. The motions to throw a projectile were physically impossible. Even with all of that, Soujirou the Willow-Sword was the Beyond’s strongest blade master. If Rosclay waited for him to die, he would win. It was how Rosclay had fought to that point. “Rosclay! Rosclay!” “Rosclay! Soujirou’s serious here!” “This guy’s got some real spunk, huh?!” “Rosclay! Be careful!” “Please…stop! Just put him out of his misery!” …Looks like this is the limit. Judging by the air of the citizenry, Rosclay couldn’t drag out the conclusion to the fight any longer. Rosclay the Absolute’s matches couldn’t come to a cruel conclusion. Soujirou likely understood that and was thus advancing forward, challenging him. Rosclay looked one more time at the crowd. At each and every one of their faces. He took a deep breath. I’ve weakened him enough at this point. I’ll end it with a melee duel. After continuing this far, I need to carry it through to the end. Soujirou advanced forward one step at a time. Even as he was dying, each individual step was strong. Rosclay too began to walk—and then murmured. “…Krafnir.” Something was swarming toward Soujirou’s feet, out of view from the spectators. Rats, centipedes, spiders. Krafnir’s revenants. “HRN, YAAH!” A white afterimage remained chaotically behind. As if Soujirou could perceive each individual revenant in the swarm, they were all cut down before they could touch him. It was monstrous. Even now, after losing most of his limbs. We only gathered enough of Nectegio’s poison to use in the attack a few moments ago. This is about the maximum number of rats and bugs we can have attack him while still ensuring they are out of the audience’s sights. Nevertheless, there was no wavering in Rosclay’s eyes as he closed the distance. He was observing. Soujirou the Willow-Sword has been weakened to the absolute limit. Just what sort of response can he make in that state? How fast will he be? How much strength does he have? Is he truly weak enough for me to win on my own? Soujirou’s gait seemed not to have weakened at all. Had it really been possible for Rosclay to watch and wait for Soujirou’s blood loss, and the poison, to kill him? It seemed like Soujirou possessed the same deviant vitality as Lucnoca the Winter, that he could drive himself forward infinitely as long as it was to keep on battling. Rosclay readied his sword as if in response. He was an in extreme state of focus. Rosclay murmured all the information he was processing in his mind. “All right. Using Force Arts to send longswords flying isn’t the right move. While it’d be possible to launch a heavier saturation attack than with the revenants, there’s still the slim chance of giving him a sword to use…” “…?” “No sniper attacks. I would need to drown out the gunshot with the Blasting Blade at almost the same moment as the shot, and swinging it at this range would look unnatural, too. Then, if I use the last bit of strength to close the distance—” “Whoa!” Soujirou instinctively swept the air with his knife. There was a loud metallic clang. “—that was what you were thinking, wasn’t it?” This latest sniper attack didn’t come with any gunshot. It was a silenced sniper shot using a subsonic bullet. “If fair and honest is what you wish…” “…!” The exact moment Soujirou slashed away the bullet, Rosclay swooped in to close the distance like a bird of prey. “Then I shall battle you with my proper and just technique.” A sword stab. Soujirou swiped with the knife, diverting the blade. Even attacking his enemy in a completely unguarded moment, he still had aberrant reaction speed. Rosclay didn’t fight the momentum from the knife parry, and rotated his sword blade in a half-spin. Soujirou’s knife, having stopped the blade, was wrapped up by the spin and thrown from Soujirou’s hand. It also served to shift Rosclay to his next sword attack. A slash toward Soujirou’s amputated right-hand side. I can kill him. A kick of the prosthetic leg caught it. The blade dug into the last remaining support in the prosthetic. An explosion. Charijisuya the Blasting Blade. I can kill him. Soujirou held with this pivot foot through conditions that would have made a regular person crumble from the blast shockwave. However, Rosclay was stepping toward him with a kick to pin down his hip joint. Soujirou couldn’t physically maintain his balance. Rosclay kicked him to the ground. Each and every motion beautiful, the very exemplar of orthodox swordsmanship. Ah… I can do it. Even I can properly— He had defeated the Beyond’s strongest blade master with his orthodox and rightful blade. Rosclay swung the Blasting Blade down at Soujirou and— “…aw it. That life of yours.” “…?” His shoulder never lowered. Instead, a blood-drenched something had pierced him from inside his ribs. “Kwaugh!” There was a physical, coughing reaction. He spat out blood. Rosclay understood that right before he lowered the Blasting Blade, he had been stabbed by something. Yet, Soujirou should have lost all of his weapons at that point. His own thoughts were all that circulated at high speed. Soujirou…lifted his body up. What stabbed me?! We’re too close. Even if he concealed a weapon, he certainly didn’t have enough time to take it out. The third match…did he throw something up in the air, like during the third match, and hit me with it? No. There’s no way I would overlook an attack he had already used before! Rosclay was an ordinary man. Being wounded was enough for him to drop the Blasting Blade. Letting out a viscous splurt, the blade piercing Rosclay was pulled back out. A majority of the spectators couldn’t understand what happened, but a section of them let out a terrified scream. With the same dying breaths, Soujirou savagely laughed. That’s not it. He wasn’t hiding any weapons. This man… “Ngah, ngah… I didn’t…cut off my arm, to stop the infection…” The bloodstained blade was terrifyingly white. It was growing straight out from Soujirou’s arm itself. …made his own weapon. For a blade master of Soujirou’s skill, such a feat was possible. When he cut his right arm off as it was gnawed by disease, he had made a sharp cross section…as if the bones of the cross section themselves were blades.
Chapter 208
33 min read