The successful parry freed up his other hand, and he immediately used it to throw out a projectile. Cain jerked himself out of its path and evaded it, his motion optimally minimal, before sending a kick into Sain’s gut.
“Oomph!”
Sain stumbled back a few steps, groaning as the air left his lungs. He forced himself to fight through it; whatever happened, he couldn’t afford to lose sight of Cain. Before he managed to even draw another breath, he already had his sword up in a defensive stance.
Cain watched him with a questioning look.
“Why do you seek to befriend me?”
“Because you...” said Sain as he wiped some sand from his face. “Are trying to kill yourself.”
He took a moment to catch his breath before continuing.
“Let me make this very clear. The only reason you’ve survived until now... is because you were lucky. Keep this up, and it’ll cost you. Dearly . One day, you’ll trip up, and you’re going to die for it. Why am I trying to befriend you, you ask? Because you need friends. Without them, there’s no one to save you from your own self-destructive tendencies.”
His assertion earned him a narrow-eyed glare from Cain.
“A baseless claim... How can you possibly know?”
“I know because my maid was the same,” replied Sain with absolute certainty. “I already heard from your vice-president. You took a serious beating on the last day of the field exercises, didn’t you? I assume it’s starting to sink in, but in case you really are that dense, let me spell it out for you. Chaos is not an enemy you can handle alone.”
Put in words, the statement was so obvious that it seemed redundant. If Chaos was the kind of thing an ordinary person could easily fight off, its existence would hardly need to be a closely-guarded secret, and the unique powers of the holy knight and dark knight would never have been conferred. Deep down, Cain probably understood this. Against the colossal threat of Chaos, there was a limit to what one person could do on their own. They were creatures so dangerous that the two gods had kept them sealed away since ancient times. A single human could do little in the face of such a foe.
Sain knew all this, and that was why he was concerned. To him, Cain was a person teetering on the brink of self-destruction. Just like how Melia had been when they first met, it was likely that Cain’s actions were not grounded in reason. It was hatred that drove him, and he’d stop at nothing to satisfy his desire for revenge, even if it cost him his life. Considering he’d lived like this since he was a child and continued to do so, it was an absolute miracle that he was still alive. It was, of course, also the source of his strength. Having miraculously survived scenario after deadly scenario, he had experience and grit on a level incomparable to his peers.
He was strong, make no mistake. But it was a perverse strength, cursed to endanger those around him.
“All right... I see what you’re trying to say, holy knight,” he said, blond hair bristling as he strained to hold his anger at bay, “and it is profoundly infuriating. Your assumptions and arguments are all predicated on one thing — that you are stronger than me.”
It was, Sain realized, a fair point. He wasn’t trying to preach, but it probably came across that way. As someone who’d fought Chaos by himself on countless occasions and lived to tell the tale, Cain had a right to an ego. Empty warnings of future defeat weren’t going to shake his beliefs. In fact, his absolute confidence in himself was probably the very reason he was still alive.
“You said you won’t use the power of the holy knight. Very well. I’ll force you to,” Cain said as he sheathed his sword. “I’m going to make you use that power, and defeat you when you do so.”
A massive amount of light magical energy began gathering in front of him. Seeing that he was shifting to a magic-based approach, Sain sheathed his sword as well and began running.
“Great torrent of light, blind the land with an argent sea — Velle Vright. ”
A river of pure light rushed toward Sain, bathing the whole arena in its golden glow. Being light magic, however, he was intimately familiar with the spell and could predict its movement with his eyes closed. Velle Vright had a large area of effect, but it could be evaded by leaping over it. He fought down the fear of facing down a massive flood of light and jumped as high as he could. As he left the ground, Cain calmly pointed his palm toward him.
“Vright. ”
“Dardia! ”
Sain had his spell ready to go before he’d even jumped, and the two of them launched their orbs almost simultaneously. Unlike the first clash between Darku and Lighto , this time, the two spells proved equal in power and canceled each other out.
“Lighto Shot. ”
Not missing a beat, Cain followed up with a flurry of light pellets. Sain responded in kind.
“Darku Shot! ”
Flurry met flurry, and a noise like the pitter-patter of rain except amplified many times in volume ensued. The burst kicked up a cloud of dust.
Cain tsked in annoyance as Sain landed on his feet, stumbling a step but quickly regaining his balance.
“Shooting down that entire barrage, huh... I see you have some knowledge. Like attendant, like master... though I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, holy knight ,” Cain muttered. “A dark mage who knows more about light magic than anyone else, huh... I hate to admit it, but you might actually be a light mage’s worst nightmare.”
“Hah, did it only occur to you just now?”
Sain showed him a bold grin. As the holy knight, his understanding of light magic was unparalleled in the world, as knowledge of all light magic had already been conferred upon him. He knew how to use every spell and therefore also how to counter every spell. Melia had taken advantage of this knowledge during the third round, but Sain also had access to its polar opposite — dark magic. As a fivekind, Melia had no way of defending herself against Cain’s spells; she could only avoid them. With dark magic, however, Sain had the choice to stand his ground and neutralize the approaching threat.