“Hakkeyoi!” Floortje raised her war fan.
After my opponent and I had a literal head-on collision, we immediately grappled each other. My right hand went for the inspector’s mawashi, as did his for mine. We were locked up. I pushed and pushed—pushing sumo is the basic element of this martial art. You use all of your strength to push the opponent in front of you until they’re close to the edge of the ring, then you push them out. Those are the basics of sumo bouts.
Managing to push my opponent a little bit, I poured all my strength forward. This is the way to go. Utilizing what I had learned to be correct from all my training, I moved forwards and pushed the inspector. Joseph tightened his arms under my armpits, pulled up my mawashi, and lowered his own center of mass, but it wasn’t enough to stop my very slow but gradual advance. Apparently, when you manage to push your opponent straight out of the ring without letting them use any techniques in retaliation, it’s called “railroading,” presumably because it invokes the image of twin lines in the ground, similar to those which some vehicle called a “train” requires to move. And my railroad was seeing slow but steady movement.
“My good friend died because of you,” Joseph whispered in my ear. “His name was Edmé Mathieu. He was slain by the king’s guards during the kidnapping.”
Edmé? I remembered him. A cheerful subordinate of mine. I saw him smiling often. He was looking forward to marrying his well-behaved fiancée come autumn. Thump! I felt a shock spread through my chest, and Joseph managed to push me one step back. I had put Edmé under Ove’s command for that kidnapping. Edmé had cut down that guardsman, but ended up dying as well.
“Edmé trusted you. He always told me how great a man you were.”
Edmé smiled in my memory. It was a radiant memory that nonetheless evoked the smell of impending doom. What had become of his fiancée? Thump! Another shock, and another bit of ground lost. I must focus on the bout right now.
“You let a good man die believing it was to make the world a better place, and you still get to live and do sumo?”
I... I... There was nothing I could say to that. The deaths of everyone who’d fallen in that rebellion were on me. It was I who had deceived Jaromíra and Prince Jonas, and no one else.
My leg touched a bale on the edge of the ring. I had been pushed that far already. My breathing was rough; I couldn’t get much strength out. Was this it? Was I going to lose? Just like when I had lost to Floortje, was I going to end up on the ground again? All my sins had come streaming back to my mind, robbing me of strength. Joseph strained his shoulder muscles.
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, you criminal scum!”
Thump! An even stronger shock rippled through my chest.
I stopped it. I had lost on the emotional level, and yet I stopped it. Regret was ripping through my strength, and yet I stopped it. There shouldn’t have been a logical reason why I managed to stop Joseph’s overwhelming advance, and yet I did.
“Erhard!!! Believe in your sumo!”
When I heard Maxim’s shout, my world changed colors. Something creaked deep in my heart. As the cage around it began to crumble and scatter, that something ever so slowly came back to life, moved by an unbelievable force summoned from the void. The spirit of sumo. Was that what this was? I felt the level of omnipotence one would expect from a god of the underworld lending you their power. Unlimited strength flowed through my body, filling me to the brim.
I pushed. Joseph tried to stop me, a pained look on his face, to no avail. I pushed. That was all there was to it. I would cast aside my past regrets, my present anguish, my anxiety about the future, and become a mere sumo wrestler. For that is the way of sumo.
“Damn it, how can a criminal like you...”
“Words.”
“What?!”
“There’s no place for words here, Joseph.”
Human emotions, my past transgressions, how much I had trained—none of that mattered anymore. I was sumo. I was the tip of a mighty force surging for the heavens. No words can do it justice. No intelligence can help grasp it. It’s not good or evil. You refine your technique through training, build muscles, and do whatever you can till the moment you enter the ring. Once in the ring, you let the gods decide the outcome. There is no winning or losing—it’s all about two cultivated forces coming into contact with each other. That is sumo.
I pushed farther and farther. Joseph tried to trip me, but my pushing served to protect me from it.
“You can do it, Erhard!”
“Erhard!!!”
I heard Maxim and Lotta cheer for me. And not just them, but other villagers too.
“Give it all you’ve got!”
My pushing was straightforward and clumsy, but it worked. It didn’t matter whether I had a teppo pole or Joseph in front of me. I charged up my sumo spirit as much as I could, and it poured strength into my limbs in return. In a moment that felt like an eternity, the inspector’s left leg stepped outside the ring.
“Erhard!” Floortje raised her war fan to the east.
I...won? I realized I was panting. Joseph’s breathing was rough too as he sat on the ground outside the ring. I offered him a hand. With a puff, he took it and got up. The grim look in his eyes was gone.
“As agreed upon, Erhard shall be allowed to continue his sumo training. Any objections, Inspector?”
“No, Your Highness.”
“If you have any other problems with Erhard, train here together with him until they can be resolved.”
I could train with Joseph? That was going to be a big help: it was sure to let my sumo reach new heights. His ability would allow it.
“Yes, Your Highness.” Joseph bowed to Floortje.
“Heh heh heh! Man, sumo is great!” spoke Phalaris, beaming.
“Erhard.”
“Yes?”
“Your pushing sumo was splendid. That must be thanks to your training.”
“Yes.”
Joy spread through my chest. I had earned Floortje’s recognition, an outcome gratifying enough to make me shiver.
“You have seven years left. Train hard and return to the sumo hall when it’s time. I’ll be waiting.”
“I’ll be there.”
Seven more years, and I would be allowed back into the royal capital. Allowed to participate in bouts at the sumo hall. Would I ever be able to best Floortje? I was looking forward to it already.
When I turned to look at the ring, there were tracks on it left by my feet. Twin lines that stretched from the edge, unbending. A “railroad.” I felt as if it led to the Aryakan Kokugikan, far beyond the horizon.