Chapter 103 - Unwelcome Guests (2)

The 「Arena」, the circular stadium at the heart of the steel city of Perma, was unusually quiet. Ordinarily bustling with feverish excitement, it had closed without any announcement despite normally operating without a break. The residents of the steel city stared at its firmly locked doors in bewilderment. Why would a stadium that stayed open even during war suddenly close? Their imaginations ran wild. Perhaps it had offended the witches summoned there recently and suffered divine punishment. Or perhaps the 「Red Bank」 of the Black Archipelago had bought the stadium with its vast capital and was reorganizing it...

Baseless stories circulated among bards and drinkers. Though the rumors were utterly implausible, with no credibility and nothing anyone could believe, the residents never stopped talking about the stadium. What they wanted was not the truth, after all, but an entertaining topic to help them unwind after work. So the bards deliberately exercised their imaginations to concoct the most entertaining rumors possible. The more sensational and outlandish, the more popular they were.

As countless rumors spread throughout the steel city, only the insiders at the 「Arena」 knew the truth. Yet not one of them breathed a word of it outside. The residents found even that puzzling. Arena staff had long been called clowns. Every last one of them was obsessed with attention, a lunatic willing to sell out their own family just to be noticed.

Yet this time, not one of those attention seekers opened their mouth. Why?

Everyone wondered. Had the Arena issued a stern warning forbidding them from revealing the truth? But would people willing to sell out their own families obey their superiors so faithfully? Surely not. That silence probably only intensified the steel city's curiosity.

“What the hell happened?”

Amid all the rumors, the truth was more sensational than any of them. The Arena had not ordered its staff to keep silent. It had not even advised them to, let alone ordered it. It had said nothing at all. Even so, everyone kept their mouths shut. What had happened that day was simply too shocking—even those attention-crazed clowns had shut up, every last one of them.

“Ah, aaah, uh...”

The 「Arena」's staff quarters.

Similar groans rose throughout the quarters where the planners and hosts—the people who designed events and arranged the matches—stayed. None of them had ventured outside since that day. Huddled in their cramped rooms, they were afraid even to raise their heads. The 「Arena」's chief administrator, the greatest attention seeker in the entire stadium, was in a particularly grave state.

“Uh, uhhh. Please spare me, please spare me. I-I knew nothing about it. I knew nothing about it. I don't know anything. Anything.”

Since that day, the Arena's chief administrator had begun having fits at the mere sight of anything resembling a blade. Anything with even a slight edge brought that moment back.

“I-I don't know. I...”

A night so dark he could not see an inch ahead. A man who emerged soundlessly from the darkness, endlessly repeating the same words as he sought ‘the person at the top.’ The fighters stationed at the Arena and the mercenaries hired to keep outsiders away had reacted with hostility the instant they saw him. The man only repeated his question. Whenever he failed to receive the answer he wanted, he drew a small sword. Then a single flash of light would blaze in the darkness.

“I-I...”

With each flash, the bodies of every living thing nearby crumbled. The chief administrator remembered that moment vividly. That was no human being. It was closer to a natural disaster—a calamity that destroyed everything alive and moving. With every fighter in the stadium reduced to blood, the man walked steadily up to the chief administrator and asked the same question. The terror the administrator felt then defied description. It was as though an earthquake, a flood, or a typhoon had swept right up to him and begun to speak.

“I don't, anything, anything...”

The man asked.

He was looking for a fighter called Liam, the Sword Demon. He would spare the administrator's life if he told him where that fighter was. He offered nothing else in exchange. The chief administrator realized that unless he answered correctly, there would be no second question. But the Arena did not know its fighters' personal details. Fighters registered anonymously, and unless they revealed their own identities and disclosed information, there was no way to learn their whereabouts.

Strangely enough, however, that day there was a document among the chief administrator's papers containing information on the fighter Liam, the Sword Demon. It was even sitting on top of the pile, where it was easy to see. As though someone had put it there deliberately. So that even in his dazed state, he would notice it and read it. So that he could give the man that information at that very moment.

As though possessed, the chief administrator handed over the document.

The man kept his promise.

The instant he received the information on Liam, the Sword Demon, he vanished like smoke. Even after the man disappeared, the chief administrator remained slumped on the spot for a long time. Twenty hours passed before he recovered his senses. The shock had been so great that he had failed to notice things he ordinarily would have recognized. Only after coming to his senses did he manage to retrace his memories and realize two things.

First, the terrifying man who had come that day was Hugo Rhapsody: one of only five 「swordmasters」 on the continent, master of the six free cities, and head of the Rhapsody family. Terror had kept him from recognizing the man at the time, but in retrospect, the face was familiar. The face visible beneath that worn cloth had unmistakably belonged to Hugo Rhapsody.

And second.

That mysterious document, placed so conspicuously atop his papers that day. The writing on paper of oddly exquisite quality. The handwriting that detailed Liam the Sword Demon's information belonged to a member of the royal family of the Iron Kingdom of Chervil...

Connecting those two facts, which he had realized only much later, led to a single conclusion. Iron Prince Ian Chervil had devised a scheme, and Hugo Rhapsody had been drawn into it. Once he understood that, he could piece together what had happened and predict what would soon follow. He and the other Arena staff had been sacrificed to the scheme, used like tools, and the fighter Liam, the Sword Demon, would soon be caught up in it too.

But even knowing all that, the chief administrator could do nothing. No one on the continent could hold a swordmaster accountable. Nor could anyone living in the Iron Kingdom hold the Iron Prince accountable. There was only one thing the chief administrator could do: hide in his cramped room, gripped by terror, trembling in fear of the maelstrom that would soon descend. Pray desperately that he would not be swept up in it again...

“Please spare me. Please...”

Truly, desperately.

* * *

Master of the six free cities.

At first, I did not understand what that meant.

Only after hearing the explanation did I understand.

「It is a title used for Rhapsody.」

“Ah...”

Rhapsody.

One of The Great Families. Descendants of the Idler.

‘I laid a hand on Rhapsody?’

I had been involved with Rhapsody only once. The last fighter I faced in the recent Endless Duel. That bastard, with his overwhelming skill, had wielded the swordsmanship of 「Rhapsody」. If there was any connection between Rhapsody and me, that had to be it.

But...

“Laid a hand on him? Does the Rhapsody family call a fair duel fought after taking the fighter's oath ‘laying a hand’ on someone? Do they invade other people's estates to retaliate when they lose a duel, too?”

It was strange to describe my duel with the Rhapsody young master, whose face I had never seen, as ‘laying a hand’ on him. At my words, the knight unleashed a sharp murderous intent. It was terrifying enough to make my body tremble.

“A fair duel? You bastard, you've gone mad.”

“Aren't you the mad one? I won a fair duel. I even swore the fighter's oath to the goddess Lepri. Yet your family's knights attack my estate because he lost? You even killed an innocent guard and inflicted an indelible humiliation on another. Does the Rhapsody family have no honor? Does being one of the five families entitle you to this?”

I meant every word.

At my clearly spoken words, the knight began to growl like a wild beast.

“We do not believe that rubbish. We believe only our young master and our lord. Our lord said: Make the fighter Liam, the Sword Demon, know Rhapsody's wrath. Our young master said: Avenge me and my faithful butler Joseph.”

“...”

“Worthless fighter, you will now learn exactly whom you dared to lay a hand on.”

They had no intention of listening to me.

In the end, we had no choice but to draw our swords against each other.

The moment the conversation ended, the thirty-odd knights also took up their weapons. I sensed it instinctively. Every one of the dozens standing there was a 「sword runner」—the standard by which the continent judged the strong. The fighting spirit pouring from so many of them was immense. Merely facing them made me feel as though I would stop breathing. But I had no intention of retreating.

“You will regret this too.”

Injustice.

A world gone wrong.

I had taken up a sword to confront a world that offered grotesque answers. And now, utterly unjust violence stood before me. These arrogant knights, trampling the weak on the strength of their authority alone, were the very embodiment of that world gone wrong.

“You should have come straight to me. Not an innocent guard who didn't even know how to resist, who was only trying to do his duty. Me.”

I spoke with all my heart.

The instant I finished, their swords came rushing in. The foremost knight thrust his sword at me. Its trajectory was familiar—the swordsmanship the young master of 「Rhapsody」 had shown in the Endless Duel. But unlike the young master's sword, which moved like a living creature, the knight's was distinctly rigid.

CLANG!

The sound of clashing swords rang out.

It was not difficult to knock the knight's sword aside. Having recently grasped the subtleties of ‘connection,’ I had already been finding my sparring sessions with Seolyun easier. If I could not even follow a clumsy sword like this, I ought to give up swordsmanship altogether.

But...

“You bastard!”

There was more than one sword.

These men had no chivalry whatsoever.

No, on reflection, perhaps that was only natural. They had never declared a duel to begin with. All thirty-odd knights were charging at me. The moment I opened my eyes, I saw far too many 「paths」 in my world. Every one of those outstretched 「paths」 belonged to a 「sword runner」. Could I knock them all aside? Impossible. But I did have a weapon that could get me through this.

『My life was like a breath of wind.』

Gale. The instant a gust swept through, the 「paths」 rushing toward me began to twist and tangle together. Into utter chaos.