Chapter 532 - With the Crushing Sword

"I knew you would go far, but was the Demon Killer really you?"

Sir Jamal. A knight who would not easily lose even to Varnas Hurrier in single combat. And once before, he had tried and failed to cut down the black-haired, blue-eyed man standing before him.

He had acted under an oath to Abnaire, but the encounter had left a deep impression on him. How could it not?

'That was a heavy blow.'

He had knocked it aside with his vibrating blade, but that strike had been far from light. It had burned itself into his memory. Back then, Jamal had not expected his opponent to withstand his sword. No, saying he had never imagined it possible would be more accurate.

The conversation afterward had been just as memorable. His opponent had called it a privilege, spoken of honor, and said opportunities to face a knight's sword were rare.

"A shame."

Jamal clicked his tongue. He did feel a little regret at meeting him again here, under these circumstances.

"You know him?"

The Frog general beside him asked. Jamal nodded lightly, and the Frog studied their opponent.

Some things stayed with you for life, and Frogs remembered human faces well. Especially beautiful ones. The man looked familiar to the Frog general, too.

"I wondered where I'd seen you."

The Frog general muttered. That familiar face was in his memory. This man had killed a soldier he had been training. The general had joined that battle for amusement, tried to kill him, and let him slip away.

But this fellow was the Demon Killer? Frogs had a gift for reading talent, and the general was no exception. When he had seen this man, he had hardly been worth a glance. The gray-haired fellow with the axe had been far more threatening. He remembered withdrawing because he could not be certain of victory on that battlefield.

Brief though the encounter had been, the Frog general had assessed the man who had killed his soldier. The fellow he had sent flying with a kick. He had been certain then: keep sending this one onto battlefields, and he would soon be dead.

Yet that same man had withstood Sir Jamal's sword, and was now said to be Aspen's most dangerous enemy.

"Something doesn't add up."

The Frog general muttered, then raised three blunt, white-tipped fingers.

Some Frogs pursued impossible dreams of becoming artisans with those same fingers, but this one had made the most of his natural strengths. He was a frontline fighter. Though he had not reached a knight's level, he stood at the level of a proto knight, and his ability to command troops had earned recognition.

Those who saw his fingers spread to either side, their eyes fierce. Twenty soldiers carrying crossbows formed a semicircle around Encrid and aimed their loaded weapons at him.

It was a spectacle: twenty crossbows trained on one man, and that man gazing back as though it were nothing.

The clearing was a reasonable size. Or rather, it was an artificial clearing made by deliberately felling trees. The Frog general disliked fighting anywhere the enemy knew even slightly better than his own troops. After entering the Penn-Hanil Mountains, he had cut down trees to secure advantageous ground.

He had created a clearing known only to his own forces in a place the enemy had never seen. In short, he had done something they would not predict. Entering the mountains ahead of them had made these preparations possible.

Then had the enemy come without any preparations at all? The Frog general had kept his scouts constantly on patrol, watching the surrounding area in teams of five. His conclusion:

'Their commander is an idiot.'

That assessment could be said to be directed at Krais. The enemy had prepared no other tricks nearby.

Encrid was alone. With his right hand resting at his waist and his left hanging loosely at his side, he glanced left and right.

"You're serious about this?"

He asked abruptly.

"Serious? What are you talking about? You came here to fight."

The Frog was adept at psychological warfare, too. He answered Encrid with practiced ease.

Meanwhile, two squads moved behind Encrid, assembled their pikes, and leveled them at him. Twenty crossbows ahead, twenty pikes behind. And in front stood another twenty soldiers armed with swords and shields. Every one of them was an elite soldier the general had trained himself.

GRIND.

Several soldiers ground their molars.

They had volunteered knowing the operation was dangerous. Former members of the Gray Hounds, they were filled with hatred. Hatred for a man called Encrid of Border Guard.

"I am Encrid of Border Guard."

At that very moment, their enemy gave his name.

"We know."

The Frog general answered, setting his hands on the two Loop Swords at his hips. Those two unusually heavy, thick-bladed swords were his weapons.

"Are you really serious?"

Encrid asked again, and the Frog general answered again.

"Is spouting nonsense when you come to fight your specialty? Are you frightened, perhaps? That's understandable. I understand."

His voice sounded utterly calm. The voice of someone who already had victory in his grasp. The general knew exactly how that would sound to his soldiers.

"Strike."

At the general's word, the twenty crossbowmen aimed at Encrid and feigned firing. Even then, Encrid did not move.

"Really?"

He merely asked again.

"This bastard."

One of the crossbowmen ground his teeth at Encrid, but they did not fire.

Instead, twenty pikes stabbed at him from behind. For their length, the stabs were remarkably fast. Like the stab of the soldier he had met on the day he first began repeating today. In fact, the Frog general had trained these men using the same method.

The general expected Encrid to dodge sideways. Anticipating this, the crossbowmen shifted their aim to either side in advance. Against someone at a knight's level, waiting to see a movement before reacting was too slow. Knowing that, they had trained. Now they did as they had trained.

But Encrid did not leap aside. Standing where he was, he brought his sword down on three of the twenty spearheads. More than swift, it was heavy, like a massive boulder being lifted and slammed down. Even the Frog general could follow its speed.

Encrid forced those three shafts down until their spearheads buried themselves in the earth. Of the dozen-odd remaining blades, he dodged those he needed to and casually knocked the others aside with the leather guard around his wrist.

Easy to say, but it was an unbelievable feat even when witnessed at close range. Dodging and deflecting incoming spearheads while swinging a sword? With twenty blades whirling in at him, was such a thing possible?

It could be, if he read the timing of every attack and possessed overwhelmingly superior strength and speed. Even a grown man might panic if four-year-olds rushed him with twenty sticks. Yet Encrid casually knocked aside the rain of spearheads, dodging and striking as though this were no feat at all.

And not a single person had died.

The Frog general's cheeks swelled. Even the shafts struck by Encrid's sword had not broken. Instead, the three soldiers whose pikes had stabbed the ground began trembling at the knees, then sank down onto them.

"Hah."

Jamal let out a breath of pure admiration. He alone understood what had just happened.

"Again!"

The Frog general shouted. Though he said again, this called for a different tactic.

"Raaaaah!"

The sword-and-shield soldiers roared, and the crossbowmen on either flank opened fire.

THRUM-THRUM-THRUM-THRUM!

Neither Abnaire, nor Varnas Hurrier, nor the Frog general expected these troops to kill a knight or inflict serious injury. A mere scratch, anything that distracted the enemy even slightly, would help their own knight win. That was why they had made this move. In short, these men were sacrifices.

Even so, the general had not expected them to be so utterly helpless.

'Was I arrogant?'

What was a knight? A calamity, they said. And the man before him was exactly that.

He brought his sword down three times. Its paths lingered before the general's eyes like afterimages. Those slashes had clearly seemed slower than the incoming bolts, yet the bolts aimed at him pattered to the ground.

CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!

The sound followed a moment later.

"How?"

The general muttered. This was beyond his understanding.

The pikemen stabbed again. This time, Encrid's descending sword broke four shafts outright. The well-oiled birch shafts snapped like reeds, their broken middles jagged as a predator's teeth.

Encrid casually swept them aside with his sword. When another volley came, he brought it down again, sweeping the bolts away as though crushing them. Then the sword-and-shield suicide squad charged, heedless of their lives.

Their jaw muscles stood taut beneath their helmets. They were prepared to throw their lives away merely to tear the hem of his trousers. If nothing else, they meant to make him expend a secondary weapon.

A sword descended upon them. Every soldier within its reach raised his shield. The blade dropped at a speed that seemed deliberately adjusted to let them block.

The result was the same as before. Heavy as a boulder, the sword crushed down on their shields.

"Ghk!"

"Urk!"

Several soldiers dropped to their knees. Their shields shattered, blood spurted from their arms, and several others failed to absorb the impact and went tumbling across the ground.

"Aaargh!"

One unlucky soldier screamed as his arm broke.

"The Crushing Sword?"

Jamal spoke almost to himself. Encrid nodded.

"Ha!"

Jamal gave another exclamation of admiration. Now he was certain. He had said the man would go far, but had never expected him to return as an actual knight. Yet he had truly returned greater than before.

"You've become an interesting fellow."

Against newly awakened knights who had experienced their limits but were still unseasoned, yes, such a crude suicide-squad tactic might work. Even a scratch would be a gain. More importantly, the mere presence of well-trained troops could weigh on an opponent's mind.

If fighting the enemy left you without the strength to lift a finger, could you really call it a victory? You would be unable to stop a crossbow bolt fired at that moment. Even if you won, only death would await. And the instant such doubt took root, wouldn't the blade forged in your heart grow dull?

Such trifles could decide a battle between knights. Meticulous as he was, Abnaire had aimed for even that. He had assumed that any knights Naurilia possessed would have awakened recently and therefore lacked experience. His prediction was only half right.

Encrid had become a knight only recently, but he already possessed experience. He was even skilled enough at controlling a battle to provoke his opponent with deeds rather than words.

He had never paid the likes of the Frog general any attention to begin with. The proof was plain: when the Frog swung both swords, hadn't Encrid broken his weapons with a single downward stroke and kicked him out of the way?

The suicide squad's charge, the pikemen's interference, the crossbowmen's volleys—all were useless. Their opponent was a knight.

"Good. Very good."

Jamal spoke almost in a shout without realizing it. This fellow had a gift for making a man's blood boil.

The Crushing Sword. The strike that had once blocked his own sword. He had asked then what it was that had stopped his blade.

["The Crushing Sword."]

That had been the answer.

Why had he used that single technique against the entire force? To call Jamal out. Jamal made his decision and stepped forward. That alone sent refined Will pouring out of him, becoming intimidation that pressed down on Encrid. Encrid rejected it as naturally as breathing.

"I never liked Abnaire's methods to begin with," Jamal said.

There were things more important than victory in a battle between knights. When speaking of conviction and honor, why must one's heart be free of the slightest shame? Because an upright heart was itself the proof of the martial might a knight could wield.

"Sir Jamal?"

The Frog general called to him as he picked up his fallen sword.

"Withdraw. From this point on, merely being nearby could kill you."

Jamal spoke, then looked at his opponent. Only then did Encrid show something resembling a smile.

Encrid had found the enemy and seen Jamal. The memories had risen naturally. There had been a today when that man's sword killed him. There had been a Ragna who died by that man's blade.

There was a sword that brought back a today that had made him wish for death. That sword was now before his eyes, within reach.

"Are you ready to die?"

Encrid asked.

"Ha. Arrogant bastard."

Jamal smiled at him. No, they both smiled.

Would they be evenly matched? Or would this not even be a worthy contest? Was victory for Jamal, a veteran knight whose specialty had fully matured, the ordinary and inevitable outcome?

Encrid had already forgotten all about victory and defeat. Instead, exhilaration blazed through his heart like a hot flame, warming his entire body.

"This will be fun, won't it?"

The anticipation in his question was no different from a madman's, but for a knight, this much was only natural.

Jamal, too, had once run wild with madness. Encrid's presence was so stimulating that it suddenly brought those days back to him.

"It will."

Jamal answered with certainty.

In an instant, they folded the distance between them and crossed swords.

HUM.

Jamal struck with his blade vibrating. Encrid met it with an upward stroke of his gladius rather than his Valeri steel sword.

CLANG!

Two pieces of steel, each with a clear purpose, met in a burst of harmony. Encrid and Jamal exchanged a blow as they passed each other, then turned. They faced one another again, their positions reversed.

"That didn't work?"

Jamal spoke. His vibrating sword had just been blocked, yet he showed no sign of dismay. Naturally. This was not his specialty.