The Night of Knights and the Bonfire (4)
"—If the soul had slipped free, then the blood rotting is a plausible enough tale."
The words belonged to Ganok—a Mystery Being of the Spirit Eye bloodline, and the greatest spiritualist of the age—and they stood as testimony, bearing up what Lark had said.
"Blood has been a precious thing since ancient times, precious enough to serve as a reagent for sorcery and for magic alike. This age is no different. The reason is simple. Blood itself is the source that moves a living creature."
Blood was the power that moved every living thing. It was no exaggeration to call it a crystal in which pure life-force had gathered. In the language of sorcery, too, the claim that blood held the power of the soul was far from rare. And so the notion that the blood of a body whose soul had been transferred elsewhere would rot all at once was, indeed, a plausible hypothesis.
"Those frauds—the Blood Cross Army, or whatever they call themselves—I can more or less guess the means they use to move a soul."
"Is that truly so, Sir Ganok!"
"We are Mordred, after all. In matters of the soul, you will find no experts to match us. Rummage through Mordred's old records and similar cases will turn up, and with them the means to put this down. The best method of all, mind you, would be to travel in the company of those who possess the Spirit Eye."
"Haah!"
An unintended stroke of fortune—no, a solution—lay right here. Lionel and Galahad, who had been hunting the cult from every angle, had been under no small strain from that unheard-of method called soul-flight. Who would have thought Mordred was holding the answer...
"Why in the world did it never occur to us to ask Mordred for help."
The Galahad side was dumbfounded that they had suffered all that hardship merely because Mordred had never come to mind. Ganok shook his head and put a stop to their self-reproach.
"It could not be helped. So long as the curse of the great evil spirit—that wicked thing—endures, outsiders will find it difficult even to call Mordred to mind."
This affair was no different. Had they come meaning to aid Mordred itself, some incident would likely have arisen before they even set out for Wales, and they would have been forced to turn aside where they stood. And Mordred would have been annihilated, just like that.
In that sense—
Ganok looked at the young knight with warm eyes.
"You were really going to stab me over a little teasing? Vicious brat."
"Hmph. Your hide wouldn't shed a drop of blood to a spearpoint anyway, so what does it matter."
"That's true enough. Your spear still hurts, though."
"You complain too much. A lump of iron wearing the shape of a man."
"...Why can't I even deny it?"
Upon him, that is—still bickering away with the knight of Galahad.
Ho ho. An uncommon gathering of young men. The old knight found the sight a fascinating one. So the young knights who will lead this age have assembled.
Some already bore names that rang far and wide. Others did not. But one thing was certain: from among them, a knight fit to represent this age would surely emerge. The certainty rested on the intuition of one gifted as a medium, and the intuition of such a person was, as a rule—
Frighteningly accurate.
"Ho ho."
The old knight was in high spirits. Of late, there had simply been more to laugh about. More that put the spark back into living.
For a while they busied themselves with spoils and with the sharing of what they knew, but soon the knights turned to making camp. Leaving this place quickly would have set their minds more at ease. And yet—
Neeeigh...
"Yes. You've worked hard today as well. Rest well, comrade."
Every one of them had reached the limit of their strength. Not only the men. The horses, every last one.
Well, of course. The moment the messenger bird arrived they had ridden at full tilt all the way to Mordred, and the instant they got there they had thrown themselves into battle against hundreds of thousands of monsters. That their bodies were worn to the bone was only natural.
Even setting that aside.
"What could those people possibly have so much to talk about..."
"They're not talking. They're just fighting, aren't they?"
"Well. That's only to be expected."
A quarrel was underway inside a tent both vast and splendid, of a make no one could quite explain. A war of words, to be precise. Inside it sat the princess of this country, its dukes, a grand duke, a marquis, and more. Gathered there was more than half the power of Pendragon. To call it a grand council of the kingdom would hardly be an exaggeration.
And yet, for a gathering of that weight, nine-tenths of the council amounted to this.
"Out of the question."
"Hmph. A northern cat, through and through."
"Do you want a war, Blake?"
"I don't recall ever permitting you the use of my name."
"Both of you, do compose yourselves. Why are you so desperate to eat one another alive."
"You seem to have forgotten that you were the one who stoked this quarrel, Princess."
"Goodness. Whatever do you mean?"
"Ahaha!"
"...And why, Jenimia, have you done nothing but laugh since earlier?"
Quarreling, or sneering. That this was the greater part of it was a bleak business indeed. It seemed that in any world, once those in power sat down to council, productive talk was out of the question. They fell to bickering and wasted the hours, and it was much the same everywhere.
And so, even while a conversation lethal in every respect but its volume ran on, the knights pretended not to hear. No—they shrugged, as men long used to it. And why were they used to it? Because one had only to look in on the Noble Council to find them fighting worse than this, every single day.
"I only hope it doesn't end in a war..."
They might stand shoulder to shoulder today, and from tomorrow, because of that council, be forced to level blades at one another. Even knight orders on the worst of terms would sooner decline such a fate. They could only hope this council ended peaceably.
Then.
"What, those bastards are still at it? Sick to death of them, honestly..."
His mutter shattered the quiet in a single stroke. The silence had been so deep that it carried all the clearer.
"Mind your tongue, ruffian. Her Highness is not fighting. She is engaged in a solemn exchange."
"That?"
"..."
"Your conscience is really something. No—your blind devotion is."
"Rubbish."
And yet, for all that muttering, no one turned an openly displeased face his way. Was it respect for the feats he had shown, or respect for his strength? Whichever it was, there was no one now who would look down on him as lesser than the people in that tent. Walk through its door this very moment, and no one would have called it rude.
Lee Han clicked his tongue, making no effort to hide the disbelief on his face.
"Agh, forget it. I was going to say a quick goodbye and be on my way, but I can't even manage that."
"What do you mean?"
"What do I mean—you heard me. I was going to say goodbye and go."
"You're leaving?"
"Yeah. What am I still doing here?"
"..."
"See? Nothing. So I'm going. I've done what I came to do."
"...Unbelievable."
"What is?"
"And what are we supposed to do if you leave?"
"...Huh?"
"Acting exactly the way you look!"
"...And what's wrong with the way I look, you bastard!"
Was he picking a fight?
Tired as he was, Lee Han had no wish to keep squabbling. But being scraped raw over his face lit a fire in him of its own accord, and the fatigue blew away all at once.
Thud!
Wham!
Lee Han and Lark threw a blow in the same instant, neither waiting on the other.
Bang!
They struck with everything they had, hard enough to snap each other's heads back, and yet both faces were perfectly intact. One had simply endured, skin and bone that hard. The other had shed the force to perfection. And in that condition—
BOOOOM!
The two of them started swinging again. It was vicious beyond words. Every time a fist landed, the shock of torn air rang like dozens of enormous balloons bursting at once, and each blow carried force enough to kill a great boar in a single strike. Anyone watching would have thought they bore some killing grudge, or else wondered what in the world they were doing out of nowhere. And yet—
"If you leave, what meaning does that council even have!"
"It'll go on just fine without one!"
"Ignorant fool! Those people gathered because of you. Without you, they'd have no reason to be here at all—what nonsense are you spouting!"
"Oh, fuck off and fall over! What kind of bullshit is that!"
"The bullshit is what you're saying!"
To the two of them, a fistfight of this order was nothing more than a light conversation. Which was only natural. Had they been fighting in earnest, they would never have thrown blows fit merely to kill a boar. The fight was only one means of keeping the talk flowing. Working it out in words gave them a headache. Talking with their fists was far more comfortable.
Barbaric past the point of absurdity, viewed one way. And yet, viewed another—
"A truly manly way to hold a conversation. Ahaha!"
Rather than persuading a man with words, a clean punch thrown with one's whole heart might well be the fitter mode of speech between men. Maximus laughed, great and open, at the sight. And then—
"...This looks like fun."
KWAANG!
Maximus crashed into their conversation.
THUD!!
A single punch from Maximus, the very image of a giant's blow, shook the earth like a falling thunderbolt and came down over Lee Han and Lark.
CRACK!
"And what are you doing?"
"What is this?"
"Well, I wanted in on the conversation myself."
"What are you even saying?"
"Are you in your right mind?"
"Uahaha!"
"??"
The two of them turned aside the giant's sudden punch with ease, and Maximus—whatever had him so delighted—laughed like a madman, clenched his fists, and charged. Lee Han and Lark had no idea what kind of situation this was supposed to be, but their opinions came into agreement in the same instant.
First—
"Go insane in moderation, you maniac!"
"Madman!"
They would beat this madman down before anything else.
Fwoosh.
"...?"
KWAAAAANG!
KRAK-KRAK-KRAK!!
THOOM—!
...What in the world were they doing now?
The knights, who had only just kindled the bonfires for camp and finished raising their shelters, flocked toward the source of the sudden blows. And they saw it.
KWAAAAAANG!
Three men, fighting out of nowhere.
WHAM!
"What are they doing?"
A mutter escaped before anyone could stop it, the sight was that absurd. Their fight was preposterous to exactly that degree.
"The opponents keep changing."
"Is that two on one?"
The fight was a peculiar thing. At first it had clearly been two of them trying to put Sir Maximus down. Then, at some point, a different pair combined to flatten Sir Lark, and in the next moment yet another pair matched their blows and flattened Sir Lee Han. After that they settled back into fighting one against one, and then swung around to two against one again. It was disorder itself, and violent beyond measure.
"...Huh."
And yet what was more absurd still was that the knights could not stop them. No—the thought of stopping them never even arose. They were clearly fighting, and yet...
"A spar."
"It's not decent enough to call a spar. They're just... wild beasts, tangled up and playing."
"Ah. So that's what it is."
Yes. The quarrel was destructive and fierce enough that none of them could have stepped into it, and still it was impossible to believe the three were fighting in earnest. Yes. In a certain light, it was simply—
"Your Highness!?"
"Don't stand on ceremony. Come and watch with us. It isn't often we get a spectacle."
"..."
"Amusing, isn't it, Isis?"
"Do not speak to me, Uncle. I am in the middle of a rare bit of entertainment."
"Particular as ever."
When had they even come out of the tent? The powers of the realm had drawn a ring, just as the knights had, and were watching the fight.
A primitive fight. A fight of the utmost simplicity. And yet—
"Magnificent. Yes. That is what men are."
Men in the full heat of their blood cannot help themselves. Before their eyes stands a strong man they have no choice but to acknowledge—a man they do not wish to recognize, and yet cannot help but respect in the secret of their hearts. And so they close a fist.
It is instinct. The instinct males are born with.
An act endlessly savage, foolish beyond all measure, and pleasant beyond all measure. For was this not a fight in which nothing existed but purity—no politics, no weighing of profit and loss?
And it was truly—
Nothing less than a sight to set the chest afire and the heart too full. Enough that he could feel it: the passion of his youth, which he had thought the years had quietly taken from him, still lived inside him...!