Until the Heart Beats (5)

Clothing one's body in Sword River was, by any common sense, absurd.

Why else were there so few fighters who went bare-handed, meeting the enemy with nothing but the body, the way martial artists did? Because they could not wrap themselves in a power like Sword Ki. The density of that energy was more than frail human skin could bear, and so putting energy around a fist or a foot was a thing one only imagined, never practiced. Do it, and the body might melt. Or burst.

But Lee Han's body—

Fwoooosh!

"My body's tougher than decent armor or a greatsword, isn't it? So who cares!"

Boom!

He charged. He spared no thought for the earth and sand threatening to bury him. Crackle! Every time it struck him, it was shaved away—no, evaporated was the better word. Crunch. Grind. He drove on, as if proving with his own body that a thing of this degree could not touch him. He pulverized it. He smashed it apart. A charge without the slightest hesitation, without even a dodge.

Hoooooo—!!

But it was not only the overturning earth that hunted him. A waterspout surged up as well: a tornado that wrapped snow instead of seawater and swept the whole field. Common sense said that if he struck that, even Lee Han, clothed in Body-Guarding Gang Qi, would be blown away—

I won't be blown away!

He believed in his Body-Guarding Gang Qi. He believed in the crystallization of his own effort. He would not be so arrogant as to claim he could blast that colossal waterspout apart, or erase it. He still lacked far too much for that. But if he dared to say it, his strength—!

━━!

"He... he broke through...?"

The stunned murmur of a mage who had somehow survived the thunderbolt. Hateful as the enemy was, loathsome beyond bearing, the knight had forced a gasp of admiration out of him. He had broken the waterspout at last. He had not erased it, yet like a deep-rooted tree he had not been blown away. He had pierced it—with nothing but the potential of a body infinitely frail beside great nature. Not a knight who had defeated the tornado, but one who had overcome it. It was the birth of a deed that no one would believe, even if a poem of martial merit were written to record it.

"——."

Lee Han, however, had little interest in having overcome a waterspout, or in having achieved a feat that would remain in history. He simply clenched his teeth and sprinted at a terrifying pace. What mattered to him now was not the exploit he had stacked up, but that he had finally come face to face with the monster he had been aiming for.

Crackle-crackle!

He seized the axe tight and leapt high into the sky, then spun his body forward as if turning a somersault, stacking ever more force into the blow.

"—It reaches."

Declaring his will, he swung the axe at the monster.

Kwoooong!

Thud!

And that will, at last, blew the monster's arm away.

......For a moment, silence fell.

"Huh? ...Huh... huuuh...... huh?"

They say that when people meet something too unreal to accept, they turn into fools and their language fails them. The mages of the Magic Tower were, at this moment, losing their language without limit. What had just happened was that impossible to believe.

"Th-the Tower ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Lord's a-arm!?"

"It... it got cut off...?"

"...Th-this is a dream. Th-this can't not be a dream—."

The prelude to panic. They tore at their hair, and even their eyes went bloodshot.

Tur was a madman, a man who slaughtered them without rhyme or reason, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠unfit to lead any organization at all. But he was an Archmage—an Archmage who had stood at the apex of the Central Continent for the last four centuries. In a sense he had been the king of mages, and within the Magic Tower a being like a god. And that man's arm had been severed.

Was this what a citizen felt, watching blasphemy and the fall of a nation with both eyes? No. It might have been worse. That the mages could not believe reality was only natural. This was none other than Tur de Seigan. The king of magic, who unfolded impossible spells as easily as breathing! And that king of magic had been wounded.

...No. He had lost an arm.

The king of magic losing an arm was a thing that must not exist, and must not occur. In a way, it was only the natural course that his devotees should fall into panic.

...And yet.

"Amazing. Really. This is the first crisis like this I've ever had!"

The king and god of the mages looked at his own severed arm and wore nothing but a bright, clear smile. Even he ought to have found the pain hard to bear.

"Ah, I remodeled my body all sorts of ways ages ago, so I can't feel pain. If I feel anything, it's a little ticklish, or it stings? So yeah, I'm actually in danger. This isn't regenerating either, haha! ...Hmm. Is it because that destructive energy soaked into my arm? What a headache..."

Feeling nothing though his arm had been cut away, merely finding the situation curious—at a glance, Tur almost seemed to carry the air of a sage. But the knight facing him knew better.

"Gone so mad you can't even feel what's real, huh?"

"That's right. Live four hundred years and your emotions, your memories, your senses—all of it breaks down. Did you know? Almost none of what makes up most of my body was originally mine. Except the brain, I transplanted pretty much all of it! Side effect was, I got a little younger too!"

"......"

"Hm? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"......"

"Come on, talk to me a little."

...This was not the air of a sage. He reacted this way because he was already not human.

Boom!

The knight—Lee Han—saw no value in conversing with this monster. What was there to say to a bastard who coveted other people's flesh and then boasted of it? No need at all. So in the time talk would take, he had to carve even a little more of the bastard's body. If he could—

The head and the neck!

He meant to crush one of the two until it was pulp. So thoroughly that it could not even regenerate. Lee Han charged again.

Body-Guarding Gang Qi. The strongest shield and the strongest spear, which had at last pierced the monster's Mana Barrier, drove at the monster once more.

This time, not the arm. This time he would turn the head to pulp.

However—

With a heavy kwoong!, the attack was stopped cold.

"...Unbelievable. You're going to punch through a hundred of them by yourself?"

Several hundred defensive spells rose against him all at once, and something like a colossal labyrinth took shape around Lee Han.

Chrrrrrk!

A prison of death, where countless traps and defensive spells were stirred together, and from which one could not escape even by trying. It could not have been unlike the labyrinth of Daedalus in the ancient myths, the one that had sealed the cursed prince, the Minotaur.

"You're too dangerous."

Tur let his guard down no longer. Perspective Manipulation had already been solved, and even if he brought out his other powerful spells, he would not be able to bring that knight down. So he chose.

"I'm going to seal you."

Whoosh!

He drove every one of the tens of thousands of defensive spells spread over his body into the labyrinth. Facing that dangerous knight was not the wise course. Sealing him like this was.

"Destroy yourself."

However strong he might be, he could not break a labyrinth of tens of thousands of overlapping defensive spells by himself. So long as Tur lived, the labyrinth's magic would keep restoring itself, and so long as that held, getting out would remain a distant hope.

A Seal, in the literal sense.

"A shame. I originally prepared this method to catch the Ghost King..."

The king of the trolls, who had lived a thousand years. A hidden trump, made to capture a Demon-King Grade monster and turn it into a test subject. Unfortunately, it seemed he would have to give up on the troll king.

"...So. What are you going to do now?"

"......"

"Hmm. Wondered what you were up to, and you've killed all the old ones? Nasty hobby, hehe."

"They stood in my way. Of course I did."

Drip. Drop.

Blood ran down Rak's short staff. Not his blood—the blood of the three mages he had beaten to death. More precisely, the blood of those who bore the title of Archmage. While Lee Han contended with Tur, they had struggled with everything they had to keep anyone from interfering, but they had been nowhere near enough to stop Rak wreathed in crimson flame. Rak had shown the feat of erasing three Archmages alone.

With that, all five of the Archmages the Magic Tower had possessed met their end, as of this day.

"Hmm..."

Tur cocked his head.

The Castle in the Sky, collapsed. The Bronze Giants, guardian deities of the Magic Tower, annihilated. More than eighty-five percent of the Tower's mages, Archmages included, dead. In truth, the Magic Tower had been brought to the point of annihilation.

But.

"Aigoo, when am I supposed to restore all this?"

Tur was only a little annoyed, dismissing the damage just listed as nothing of consequence.

"Well, squeeze the Empire for about three years and it ought to be fine."

"......"

The certainty that so long as he existed, the Magic Tower could be restored as often as he liked, and could hold power beyond even its prime. Tur had that. And then there was the vast wealth sleeping inside the Tower—not material wealth, gold and jewels, but the intellectual property accumulated across long ages. That was the Tower's overwhelming advantage, and its greatest asset. With that alone, mages could be replenished without end. So long as a mage instinctively hungered for forbidden knowledge, the breed called mage had no choice but to gather at the Magic Tower.

"Once I deal with you, it'll be nothing but work for a while. Aigoo, my luck. At this age, what kind of hardship is this."

"...Don't talk shit."

"Hehe, I tried talking like I was a little old. How was it? Good acting?"

"......"

"Come on, let's stop, you and me. I know you're dangerous too, but you can't take my neck either. An eye or an arm, at best?"

Rak settled into his stance again. Tur waved a hand. He would underestimate them no longer. Especially that red crimson flame. With that, the man might well smash his Mana Barrier to pieces—but even so, he could not kill him. Tur still had more than several thousand kinds of magic left.

Well, methods that can kill that knight for certain... five, at most.

Thinking of it was absurd. To be driven this far by knights so much younger than himself.

"Looks like I'm turning into a has-been too, hehe."

To someone else it might have sounded like self-mockery, but Rak knew. It was just something he was saying. The proof was that the bastard still looked as if he were enjoying himself.

And then—

"You lot are the Knights of Pendragon, aren't you?"

He inferred their identity. No—he grew certain of it.

"No. It has to be Pendragon. In this age, the only ones who can still keep knights of this level are that Pendragon. A kingdom overflowing with Mystery, loved by dragons and fairies. Haa, I'm really jealous. The Empire and the other continents are all hated by Mystery, you know."

Pendragon. Their name had been famous for four hundred years, and they had always held strong knights. How many times had the Empire tried to conquer them, only to be defeated instead? Too many to count. And among the causes of those defeats...

"There's still an Aura User in this age, isn't there? That Superhuman who transcends cognition? ...Incredible. How can a creature like that exist? Stranger still—in the whole history of the continent, Pendragon has never once failed to produce an Aura User. Truly curious."

"......"

"If Aura Users hadn't been hated by the gods of the Central Continent, they would have come for my neck any number of times. Thinking of that, even the gods are useful now and then."

Kuhehe. Letting out a laugh with something rancid in it, Tur looked at Rak.

"Mm, I've decided! Earlier I was just going to let you go, but I'll correct that! I'm simply going to kill you. You're too dangerous. And I'll order the Empire to go to war with Pendragon. After that, I'll haul in a huge batch of Pendragon's knights as slaves! Among them there are bound to be people with the same possibility as you. Bound to be."

Tur's eyes could see it. The knights called Lee Han and Rak were among those who had obtained the possibility—the qualification—to become Aura Users. Of course, that was only barely meeting two or three of more than several dozen conditions. But men who had obtained merely those two or three had dealt him this much damage, so they were dangerous enough. Safer, then, to bring back as slaves the ones who were a little less dangerous, who merely possessed the potential. If he played around the way he had today and something like this happened again, that wouldn't do either, would it?

"Horrible, isn't it? Because of you, Pendragon and the Empire are going to war! Of course they can't win. There's an Aura User, haha!"

Even so, the blow would not be light, and Tur would be able to lay his hands on whatever he wanted—on test subjects—to his heart's content. His purpose would be accomplished without his ever having to step forward. He laughed, looking forward to the days ahead, as if he could already savor everything that was about to—

"—You know the Ghost King is dead."

"...Hm?"

"As I thought. You don't. That alone shows how little you've crawled out of the Magic Tower. Like ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a cockroach."

"What died...?"

Tur lost a little of his smile, blinked, and asked again, wondering if he had heard right. But Rak spoke only the facts.

"He's dead. Killed by that knight you sealed."

"Th-that can't be. Even so..."

He knew well enough how strong that knight was. Even so, not to the point of killing the Ghost King. To kill the Ghost King, one would have to annihilate him without missing a single scrap of a cell. And that knight had not seemed to possess such a trick. So how...?

Tap. Tap.

"A knight's strength isn't force alone."

"??"

Rak rapped his own head. Yes—for a knight, one's own martial power certainly mattered. One had to use a sword well, and fight well, and there was no denying the need to become something like a human weapon. But a knight's root was a soldier: a commander, the sort of rank that directed a battlefield. Thus there were, now and then, men who became knights by strategy alone, though chronic illness left them with no combat power whatsoever. And what that meant was that a man called a knight was also a man who used his head, at least to a point.

"That scoundrel may look like that, but he's a cunning bastard."

It had been the same when he caught the Ghost King. Rak had not seen it himself, but even an investigation built on the witnesses' testimony said the man had fought in the ground most advantageous to himself, with the goal of holding his position to the very end until reinforcements arrived. It was the same now.

"Thank you. For staying arrogant to the end. For looking down on us to the end."

"...?"

For the first time, Rak offered Tur gratitude instead of contempt, and Tur meant to spend a moment puzzling out what the words meant—

"......"

...He understood, soon enough, why Rak had thanked him.

Flare.

Shedding an aurora as she went, some girl was brightening everything around her with a lovely laugh, and Tur's eyes flew wide as he looked up at the sky.

For the first time, a smile drew itself across Rak's lips. The sealed Spring Fairy had descended.

They had done it.

Fssssst....

"I-I think I'm gonna die..."

"......"

"Y-young master? Y-you're not dead, are you?"

"......Not dead."

As if to announce how fierce the fight had been, two young men, one young woman, and a golem lay sprawled in a complete wreck, and fallen mages with them. But the ones still standing were the knight's disciples, and the ones defeated were the mages. The core of the Magic Tower had been destroyed just like that, and the three of them, protesting that they didn't even have the strength to lift a hand, simply collapsed where they sat.

Covered in sweat, blood, and dust, they felt filthy, and they hurt, and yet—

"At least the instructor won't tear into us."

"That much is true."

"Hehe, think he'll praise us?"

Satisfaction crept into their faces, and they held bright, unburdened smiles.