Chapter 97

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Faith. Faith in God. Faith in other people. And faith in oneself. Whatever its object, human beings ultimately lived by faith.

And faith was forever being tested, forever wavering.

For Ice, who had been indoctrinated almost from birth, escaping those fetters was no easy thing.

What was true faith, and what was false? Anxiety and doubt seemed to infest his mind like worms.

They had met at the academy, awkward with one another at first. At some point, they had begun fighting back-to-back and sharing peaceful days together. Nearly four years had passed since then.

Until only recently, they had been overcoming trials and hardships together, easing one another's sorrows and sharing their joys.

The sword points Boribori and Ice aimed at each other trembled like aspen leaves. Were they truly going to thrust? Could they kill? Was this what they had honed their swordsmanship for?

It was an agonizing moment.

Then the church's priest spoke.

"What we do must seem horrific and cruel to you. But do you know where it all came from? That old monster, the Count Palatine of Kelbron. These are all things he used to do."

"Liar."

Marie rejected the accusation. She did not like her great-great-great-grandfather on her mother's side, but she had no wish to slander him.

"He's over a hundred years old. He was doing all manner of things long before any of you were born. The only reason he stopped was inefficiency. It cost too much and produced too little. He barely cared when we stole his techniques, either. Once he discards something, his indifference to it is downright cruel. Avenging the late Emperor? That's nothing but a pretext."

His words were cunningly chosen. Even if they were true, bringing them up now was plainly meant to sow doubt and division. As one might expect of an expert in brainwashing, he spoke with a devil's tongue.

Fortunately, neither Boribori nor Marie was the sort to be swayed by that drivel. They had not come here out of loyalty in the first place. They were simply here to do a job.

All the while, Boribori and Ice remained squared off. Holding the phantom sword in one hand, Boribori clenched his teeth and attacked first.

Shifting his weight onto his left foot, he swept his blade from left to right in one of his distinctive calligraphic strokes. Ice retreated out of its path, and Boribori pursued him with the next stroke.

CLANG!

Black and white mana mingled, splashing together like paint.

Would he continue the stroke or begin a new character? Seemingly in control of the offensive, Boribori pressed boldly forward.

As brushstrokes turned smooth or rough with the style of script, his attacks flowed from softness into ferocity, then back again. Those subtle qualities did not stand apart but blended into one—a master's work.

But would such swordsmanship serve him equally well in defense? Ice's movements were so precise they might have been measured with a ruler.

He retreated and evaded, slipping in sharp counterattacks. Then, with uncanny precision, he found an opening in Boribori's fixation on strokes and dots.

CLANG!

As Boribori faltered backward, Ice drove his assault harder, swinging his sword with deadly ferocity.

CLANG! CLANG! SKRRAAK! WHOOSH!

The lightning-swift attacks were almost dazzling. Black and white afterimages painted the air like a picture.

They were evenly matched. Yet as Marie watched with her heart in her throat, she realized neither was aiming for the other's vital points.

It was almost a sparring match with live blades—something that was not quite sparring at all. Sensing what they felt, she found tears running down her cheeks.

But no one understood that better than Boribori and Ice themselves.

Did they truly have to strike to kill? Truly? Why did it have to be this way? Why did they have to do this?

Life and death. Wanting to kill, and wanting the other to live. Caught on that boundary, Boribori cried out.

"Snap out of it!"

CLAAANG!

Ice's blade was severed and flew away, landing on the floor with a clatter.

Black mana billowed over Boribori's blade, resembling the cosmos itself.

Tragically, it was at this very moment that he blossomed into a Sword Master.

With his defeat beyond doubt, Ice let the broken sword fall from his hand and closed his eyes. He had lost. Yes, it was over now. Thank goodness he had lost.

"Hah, hah, hah, hah..."

It seemed only the finishing blow remained, but Boribori could not bring himself to hurt him.

"Please, just come to your senses... Please..."

Becoming a Sword Master brought him no joy at all. His face twisted, tears dripping from his eyes. Then he heard the voice of Ricard, whom he had thought asleep.

"What are you guys doing?"

Everyone there whipped around to look at him.

Bracing himself on the sword he had taken from an enemy, Ricard struggled to his feet. He staggered over to Ice, placed the sword in his hand, and spoke with a smile.

"I told you I wouldn't abandon you even if you abandoned me, didn't I? Is this the third time I've said it? You choose. Choose God or choose me. I won't hold it against you. Oh, and killing yourself isn't an option. That's running away. You know that, right?"

In this tragic moment, Ricard alone was smiling. Looking at his face, Ice felt his heart shatter.

Breaking free of indoctrination was terribly hard. Anyone who had not experienced it could never understand.

The pain was like cutting off one's own arms and legs. It meant throwing everything one had believed without question onto the ground and trampling it.

Ice squeezed his eyes shut, gritted his teeth, and gripped the hilt so tightly that he shook. Yes. Rather than kill Riki, he would gladly cut off his own limbs.

Even if it meant condemning himself to eternal torment, he could not kill Riki. With that resolve, he opened his eyes and swung.

Marie and Boribori flinched as they watched anxiously. But it was the priest who gave a twitch, his head sliding off to one side.

A white aura like snowflakes was now shining from Ice's sword as well. Its afterimage drifted beautifully, like falling snow.

"I'm telling you, if he's a god, he'll compensate you for everything you've been through."

Ricard repeated the joke he had made before. Ice laughed through his tears.

Overwhelmed by drowsiness, with his flank still unhealed and his lungs in poor condition, Ricard could barely remain standing.

He gripped Ice's shoulder to keep himself upright. Marie and Boribori came over to support him on either side.

"I'm a wreck, but let's go now. Let's finish this. If I take a nap first, that god or whatever it is might resurrect."

As they started down the magnificent corridor, Daisy spoke from the corner where she had been watching in anguish.

"You'll die if you go..."

Ricard stopped briefly and looked back. Daisy spoke through hiccupping sobs.

"I don't care if you don't love me. But I don't want you to die, Riki... You all love him, don't you? Then you should keep him alive..."

Ricard thought for a moment, then answered with heartfelt sincerity.

"If what's going to happen will happen anyway, what good would avoiding it do? We're not that kind of people, Daisy."

The four of them went forward together. For the first time, Daisy prayed to God. She begged for forgiveness. Forgiveness for her lack of faith all this time. And please, just let Riki live.

Then she staggered after them, perhaps wishing to share their end.

Light shone at the end of the grand corridor, like a gateway to heaven. When they finally reached it, what lay beyond was far from heavenly.

The sky was clear, the sun blazing. A dark, dingy sword stood embedded atop a tall, square-based pyramid. Hatred and resentment clung thickly to it like bark.

Around it stood shriveled, hardened figures shaped like people. Or were they not sculptures at all, but actual people who had withered and died?

They had wondered where all the church's followers had gone. Here they were, bowing toward the altar, murmuring, "Please close your eyes. Please close your eyes."

Sisters of Prophecy in white veils sang an aria composed of a single note. Their voices were so beautiful that merely listening seemed to fill one with a sense of holiness.

Yet something grotesque and horrifying was taking place as well. Helauman and the adventurers under him had already arrived, and were walking among the worshippers with weapons drawn, stabbing them as they bowed.

Even as people died beside them, the faithful did nothing but bow toward the altar. What the hell was this?

Ricard freed his arms from his companions' support and approached Helauman. The old man's eyes rounded at the sight of the group.

"Oh? You made it here remarkably quickly. Or should I say, just as expected?"

"Your Excellency, I don't think this is right."

"Hm? What isn't? Wasn't extermination the plan from the beginning?"

Ricard had no answer. As Helauman said, he had joined the operation knowing exactly that. He understood. They all had to die. Yet it was still difficult to accept.

"There are children here who haven't even learned to speak."

"Listen, young lord Ricard. That sort of complacency is what brought us to this pass. Dither about, and these cockroaches will lay more eggs. Then we may have to kill even more of them later. This is a time for resolve, not mercy."

"But you brought this on yourself!"

Marie suddenly stepped forward and shouted. Her face was flushed red, and something seemed to boil inside her.

Helauman glanced at his fifth-generation descendant. When their eyes met, she trembled like an aspen leaf. But she had to say what needed saying.

"You abducted people and experimented on them, manipulated them from the shadows, then threw them away and washed your hands of them when things didn't work out. That's how this happened. You brought it on yourself. You did it to me, too!"

"... And?"

Helauman spoke without a trace of emotion. Had he scolded her instead, it would have been less shocking. Marie was struck speechless.

"The calculations were done long ago. To raise a single Sword Master, you must gather and train a thousand talented children. Of those, perhaps ten will be geniuses. Gather another thousand such geniuses, and you may or may not produce one. Do you consider that feasible? Naturally, one looks for a more efficient method. Take children of middling ability and castrate their minds, and they can at least make their blades emit light. I simply didn't know they would break down like that. Once they did, they were useless, weren't they? So I discarded them. Steiner the Mad Dog was probably the last. Thank you for disposing of him, young lord Ricard. He was becoming a headache."

His thinking was so different that it was impossible to guess where, or when, it had parted ways with common sense. He was a monster who bred monsters.

Helauman turned back to Marie.

"Acquire more and greater military power to protect the Empire. And protect our family as well. Do you consider that wrong? Enough whining. I have no need of you now, but you, too, must become an obedient dog. Martellia."

Marie stared in devastation at the man who was terror itself to her, the presence that crushed her life beneath its weight. Then she realized something. As long as he lived, she would never be free.

So she drew her sword.

"Sorry, Riki."

As she drew, Boribori and Ice drew their swords in perfect accord. Purple, black, and white light streamed forth.

To their surprise, Helauman looked intrigued, then beamed like a child.

"A pity, but a dog that bites its master must be put down. I have never broken that rule."

But Ricard had no sword now. Only a single dagger.

He was confident in hand-to-hand combat, but it would be useless against that old man. He knew with absolute clarity that he would die before he could get close.

And his body was in no condition to fight. Drowsiness overwhelmed him, his flank was far from healed, and he was growing increasingly short of breath.

Helauman drew his sword with a cruel smile. A deep blue shaft of light flowed along the blade. Without a moment's hesitation, he attacked first.

He was taking on no fewer than three Sword Masters by himself.

CLAAANG! CLANG! CLANG!

Ricard, whose eye for combat surpassed anyone else's, knew they could not win this fight.

Boribori, Ice, and Marie tried to coordinate their attacks, but instead found themselves driven back. All they could do was interfere to keep their friends from being injured or killed.

It was hard to believe a human being could be so strong.

A fight with live blades could end at any moment. Losing a head or a limb in the blink of an eye was nothing unusual—especially when Sword Masters were involved.

Ricard searched for a fallen weapon, but of course there were none. He wanted to borrow one from another adventurer, but they were all watching from a safe distance.

In desperation, he started up the altar without a plan. He had to do something. His battered body struggled for every step, and he barely managed the climb.

The malevolent energies accumulated around the sword over countless years surged at him, crushing him from all sides. Breathing was not merely difficult—it was impossible. It felt like wading into viscous water.

The closer he came to the sword, the more he felt his skin being sliced. Blood actually ran from it.

Even so, Ricard reached out and gripped the hilt. At that moment, a round shadow began to cover the sun from top to bottom.

Daisy froze at the sight, stunned to her core. Surely not. Surely not!

Ricard's unexpected action drew the adventurers' eyes. The faithful, too, stopped bowing for a moment and looked up at him from their knees.

The shadow covered more and more of the sun. Then, once more than half of it was hidden, darkness abruptly fell. Only then did Helauman and the other three stop fighting and look toward the top of the altar.

Ricard stood at the very center of an intersection of friendship with friendship, love with love, and resentment with resentment.

Time seemed to stop. Within that frozen time, he felt every sound in the world cut off. He could not hear even his own breathing or heartbeat.

In that darkness-like silence, someone spoke to him. It was the voice of the boy who had tended sheep in the fields of Heiden. At his purest.

'I've been waiting a long time, Riki.'

'For me?'

'Yeah. Off for another fun round of butchering?'

'Fun round of butchering?'

'Come on, you loved it. Killing people.'

'... That can't be true.'

'Have you forgotten? How could you have shown such talent if you hadn't enjoyed it so much? You're a born killer.'

'...'

'People define you and judge you however they please, using you as an excuse. But you're no different, Riki.'

'What do you mean?'

'Hatred and rage. They're really just excuses, aren't they?'

At last, a truth hidden in the deepest abyss, unknown even to Ricard himself, came to light. All he had wanted was a reason that made it permissible to kill. Hatred or anything else would have served.

He felt ashamed, even wretched. But he could neither look away from the truth before him nor flee it.

'Not... anymore.'

'Why?'

'I've learned things I didn't know back then.'

Ricard recalled his memories. His childhood. His family's love. The salvation of the Nameless. The vampire's penance. His friends' friendship. And his lover. People.

There was no need to speak. It all passed between them just as it was.

'I see... You've met a lot of good people. I'm jealous. But you still kill sometimes, right?'

'When there's something I have to fight for.'

'Good. That's enough. There'll be plenty to fight for anyway.'

Riki, from the days when he had been at his purest, answered with innocent cheer.

Ricard closed his eyes. Tears flowed. Whether in repentance or simply sorrow, a quiet tear fell like a prayer—like mourning clothes of white rather than black, like the morning sun rising over a dawn of anguish.

At last, his previous life and his present one became not two, but one. A wind blew within him. Not a stream coursing through his veins, but simply wind. It lightly swept away the poison that had accumulated in his lungs and sent his drowsiness flying.

At last, the sun was entirely hidden. It was midday, yet the world was night. Ricard was shrouded in pitch-black shadow, and behind his head a ring of radiance blazed like a halo.

The bark-like encrustations of resentment on the sword cracked apart. Golden flames rose through the gaps, blazing in the heart of the eclipse's darkness. Like a star shining alone in the cosmos.

Ricard slowly drew the sword that had stood embedded there for a hundred years. Its crust fell away in a shower.

He slowly opened his eyes. Golden flames blazed within them as well. Turning his head, he looked below the altar. All manner of people stared up at him, every face equally blank.

Daisy was so shocked she nearly fainted. Her body trembled too violently for her to stand properly. Dear God, she had only needed to accept the prophecy as it was! She had only needed to believe in God! To obey!

A holy, heart-rending revelation struck her. Though she had seen the future, she had seen nothing.

At last, she understood. She had been fated never to be chosen. Everything had been shown to her, yet she had refused to see.

A shudder ran through Helauman. At last, he was once again witnessing the ultimate sword he had pursued throughout his life of more than a hundred years. Behold the one who races across the infinite horizon.

Now he understood the source of the familiarity he had always felt when watching Ricard. How it was possible did not matter. Now, he could cross swords with him.

As though entranced, he climbed the altar toward Ricard. Yet even he, the strongest man in the Empire, seemed no more than a firefly beneath the sun.

He faced Ricard briefly, then poured a lifetime's power into a single killing thrust.

Ricard's movement was neither slow nor fast, as though he were swimming through frozen time. Only the ending came like lightning.

DOOONG!

An incongruous sound rang through the eclipse's darkness, like a bell—or a hammer striking an anvil.

Before the sound came, a straight line of golden light passed through Helauman. His sword broke, and his body split in two like firewood. A tremendous flood of blood and entrails spilled onto the altar.

The overwhelming sight seemed to stop the spectators' breath. It made the worship of a mere human as a god almost understandable.

Ricard slowly turned his head. It was not over yet. Now it was time to break this chain of evil. And time for the people to face the truth: the god they wanted had never existed.

Or perhaps it was time for judgment in the truest sense, though not in the form they desired.

Those who met his burning eyes felt they might faint from that alone. Whether from the deepest terror or rapture, they could not tell.

If one could cut people down in rage and hatred, could one also cut them down out of compassion? Perhaps that was a heart truly akin to a god's.

This was no realm that training could bring one to. It was a single masterpiece wrought by two destinies over the course of two lives.

No one knew by what standard he chose, but few in the sanctuary survived.

And so every prophecy was fulfilled. They had seen, yet failed to see.

The sun, as though its eye had been closed, slowly began to open it again. Its holy gaze fell upon the sanctuary drenched in blood.

Chapter 19 – The Brightest Star. End.