Chapter 7
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 7
Blood poured from Claude's ruined face, his head impaled on the spear. Though his brain was already dead, his body still shuddered—driven by residual signals, like the last flickering thoughts of a dying mind.
There was no time to mourn him.
Hummmm.
The spear buried in Claude's skull glowed once more. That light was Force Aura. A thin thread of it connected the weapon to the knight's outstretched hand. Encased entirely in armor, there was no way to tell what served as the man's catalyst for channeling Force.
The Holy Knight's spear dissolved into light, slipping free from Claude's ruined head.
Whoosh!
The light sliced through the air. Regaining its physical form in an instant, the spear flew back into the knight's waiting palm.
Whir, whir.
A sharp headache throbbed behind my temples. My right cybernetic eye booted into combat mode, straining to calculate the spear's trajectory—only to flood my vision with a cascade of error messages.
It was impossible. The Force defied the laws of physics. This Holy Knight of the Kora Holy Nation could bend space itself, transmuting solid steel into pure light at will.
Stop these useless calculations.
I overrode the system and killed the trajectory predictor. I'd have to rely on instinct now—not some machine's processing power.
Bang!
Gunfire erupted. The cadets who'd been covering Claude and me opened fire, trying to close the distance while shooting on the move.
We were trained soldiers, sure. But a fully armored Holy Knight was in an entirely different league. His combat prowess rivaled that of an Imperial Guardsman wielding a Legion.
Running wouldn't save us—we could never outrun him. Our only option was to fight, buy time, and pray.
The Imperial Guardsman will back us up.
The guardsman monitoring our unit had to be en route already. Ten seconds, maybe. But those ten seconds stretched on like an eternity.
Hummmm!
The Holy Knight's spear hummed with light again. Even staring straight at it, I couldn't predict the exact moment it would strike. But hesitation meant death.
I coiled my legs, dropped low, and threw myself into a desperate roll to the side.
Whoosh!
The spear materialized exactly where my head had been a split second earlier, a trailing streak of Force light chasing after it like some hungry phantom.
I wanted to track the knight's next move, but simply dodging the spear snapping at my heels took everything I had.
Clack!
The floating spear spun midair, reversing course. Its tip locked onto me again. I wouldn't dodge it a second time. I was next in line after Claude.
...That had been my mistake. I'd accepted defeat before the fight even began. Convinced I stood no chance, I'd done nothing but run—and cornered myself in the process. I was acting like a pig led willingly to slaughter.
If the enemy swings a blade, you swing back. That's the only way anyone survives a battlefield. Turn your back, and all you do is invite a bullet to the skull.
I gripped my sword hilt with both hands. Beneath my artificial skin, the circuits of my prosthetic arm flared crimson, like burning veins. I pushed the output to its absolute limit.
Before the spear can vanish... I strike first.
Clang!
I lashed forward, bringing my blade down hard on the floating spear just before the Force light could fully envelop it again.
Boom!
My interference triggered a violent backlash. Stripped of its guiding energy, the spear spun wildly through the air before slamming into the dirt.
Crackle, spark.
The artificial skin on my prosthetic arm peeled away in charred, blackened strips. Caught in the blast, my fingers snapped, bending at unnatural angles into a mangled ruin. Sparks spat from the exposed wiring beneath.
The spear's neutralized. For now.
The connection between the knight and his weapon seemed severed. I snapped my head around to face him.
Shring.
Drawing a sword to replace the lost spear, the Holy Knight dragged the blade downward. Brilliant light began to coat the steel.
Swish!
He slashed the air in rapid succession. Following the path of his blade, the light coalesced into three crescent arcs of pure energy. The instant they solidified, they tore through the earth, hurtling forward.
My eyes widened. These, at least, I could read. I could dodge them.
But I wasn't his target. The crescents swept past me and slammed straight into the cadets who'd been covering my retreat. Muffled groans and sharp screams erupted behind me. I couldn't tell how many had been hit—or how many were already dead.
All of this had unfolded in under ten seconds. Yet every single tick of the clock felt agonizingly drawn out, stretched thin like wire about to snap.
Just as the shadow of defeat settled fully over us, our long-awaited savior finally arrived.
Boom!
An explosion detonated right beside the Holy Knight's head, kicking up a thick cloud of acrid smoke.
Whir, click.
My eyes darted toward the sound. A pair of crimson optics gleamed through the parting underbrush.
An Imperial Guardsman clad in a full Legion armor-prosthetic stepped into the ruins. A being who had purged every weak, unnecessary biological organ from his body, transforming himself into a living weapon. The armor looked as though it had come alive on its own.
My right eye scanned the newcomer, flashing data across my vision.
Imperial Guard standard-issue Legion full-armor prosthetic. Model name: Hector. The pinnacle of the Empire's cutting-edge war technology had arrived.
Flutter.
The cloak shrouding his chassis billowed in the wind. His limbs were long and slender, his waist narrow. He had no digestive tract—and naturally, no mouth.
Lacking a human face, the armor-prosthetic was incapable of expression, betraying not even a flicker of emotion. It had none of the parts, none of the functions required for eating, sleeping, or reproducing.
Designed solely for war, with zero regard for human needs, the Legion exuded a savage, feral energy—as if the only trait it had left was a raw, undiluted instinct for violence. A weapon of slaughter engineered purely for practicality and efficiency.
Thud!
The guardsman raised his arm and pulled the trigger. He held a massive, blocky revolver—classified as a pistol, technically, though its caliber and destructive power belonged to something closer to a hand-cannon.
Boom!
Heavy rounds slammed into the Holy Knight in rapid succession. He didn't even flinch. With each detonation, a translucent Force shield flared to life, leaving his blue-and-white armor without so much as a scorch mark.
Clack.
Tossing the spent weapon aside, the guardsman reached behind his back.
Whirrr!
The mount slid open, revealing a massive halberd that had been hidden beneath his cloak. He swung the weapon—as large as his own body—with effortless ease.
Thud!
Letting the heavy blade drag along the ground, the guardsman strode purposefully toward the Holy Knight.
Hummmm!
Sword in hand, the knight advanced to meet him. Though he stood a full head shorter than the towering guardsman, the sheer pressure radiating from his Force Aura made him seem every bit as massive.
Neither monster said a word. They moved with the cold certainty that they were mortal enemies, and that ending the other's life was the only natural outcome. Only raw malice hung suspended in the air between them.
Clang!
The halberd clashed against the sword. Halos of blue light and showers of red sparks erupted from the impact. Their weapons and limbs moved faster than the human eye could track, creating a jarring disconnect between the sound of each blow and the motion producing it.
Crunch!
The halberd struck home, shattering the knight's shoulder armor.
Screech!
The knight's blade slashed across the guardsman's chest, tearing through metal plating like fabric.
Screeech!
Halberd and sword locked together, launching a brutal contest of raw strength.
Groan!
Shifting his grip to one hand, the guardsman began overpowering the knight. The Holy Knight's body bent backward under the crushing pressure. In terms of raw physical strength, the cybernetic guardsman clearly held the advantage.
Crunch!
The guardsman's free hand clamped onto the knight's face. Metal groaned and buckled beneath his grip. He looked ready to crush the helmet whole and squeeze the brain inside it to paste.
On the surface, the guardsman had the upper hand. But then the knight released one hand from his sword hilt. And somehow, even gripping his blade with only one hand, he held his ground.
The knight, who'd been losing ground with both hands on his weapon, was now resisting with just one. Something was wrong.
Is this a trap?
The thought flashed through my mind.
The Holy Knight was feigning weakness—willing to sacrifice his own head just to land one decisive, unexpected blow. The two of them were so evenly matched that neither could win without gambling everything.
Flick!
The knight gestured with his free hand, fingers twitching, weaving his Force Aura back toward the discarded spear. If he reestablished the connection, the weapon would dissolve into light once more.
I had to stop him from reclaiming it.
I reached for my sword—but my shattered fingers refused to cooperate.
Hummmm!
While I hesitated, the spear buried in the dirt shuddered and rose into the air, its light intensifying. It was about to drive straight through the guardsman's skull.
...Today was really turning out to be a spectacularly terrible day. A desperate, reckless idea flashed through my mind.
The only functional parts I had left were my legs. There wasn't even time to sigh. I kicked off the ground, launching myself into a spin.
Mid-rotation, I brought my heel down hard on the shaft of the rising spear.
Screech!
My desperate strike knocked it off balance. But the light wrapping the weapon surged up my foot like a plague, cracks of radiant energy spreading rapidly up my leg.
It felt like my leg was about to detonate.
Flash!
The light-wrapped spear vanished. The resulting backlash exploded, sending me tumbling across the dirt. Sickening cracks echoed from somewhere inside my body.
Sprawled on the ground, all I could do was roll my eyes frantically, trying to see what had happened.
Did it work?
The spear had grazed past the guardsman's head, missing its mark. My desperate gamble had paid off.
Crunch! Crunch!
The Holy Knight's helmet, still caught in the guardsman's iron grip, buckled and collapsed to half its size. Crimson blood poured from the seams. Victory was within the guardsman's grasp.
Hummmm!
The light radiating from the knight's armor began to dim. In its place, however, Force light concentrated in his left hand, flaring with sudden, blinding intensity.
He thrust his glowing hand toward the side of the guardsman's head. The guardsman tried to jerk back—but the explosion was faster.
BOOM!
The point-blank blast was devastating enough to consume the knight along with his target. A literal suicide attack—a desperate bid to drag his enemy down into death with him.
The ground shuddered as a dense cloud of dust and smoke billowed upward.
Clang! Crunch!
Even before the smoke could clear, the sounds of metal clashing and buckling echoed through the haze.
"Ah..."
As the dust settled, the scene snapped into focus. My mouth hung open, pooling with blood, as I stared at the bizarre spectacle before me.
The Holy Knight's left arm had been completely vaporized up to the shoulder by his own blast.
Then my gaze locked onto the Imperial Guardsman. At first, my mind simply refused to process what I was seeing.
Thud! Thud!
The guardsman was straddling the knight, ruthlessly pounding his fist into the ruined helmet—already flattened like a plate. Shards of skull and mangled flesh clung to his fist, squelching like wet dough with every impact.
It wasn't the brutality that shocked me. The reason I couldn't tear my eyes away lay elsewhere.
The guardsman's head is gone...?
The Imperial Guardsman's head had been completely obliterated by the Force explosion. Only his neck and a fragment of his lower jaw remained. His brain—his last surviving biological organ—was simply gone. Which meant, biologically speaking, the guardsman was already dead.
And yet the Legion kept moving.
Aaaaaah...
A hollow roar of victory echoed from the vocal synthesizer buried in his throat. Even brainless, the guardsman refused to stop fighting.
Whirrr!
The guardsman rose to his feet.
Cybernetic prosthetics were known to twitch, to move briefly on residual signals even after the brain died. But this wasn't residual signal. This was something else entirely.
Clack, clack.
The Legion full-armor prosthetic began to walk. Lacking a human brain to coordinate its systems, its limbs moved with a jerky, broken gait—yet undeniably driven by some lingering, stubborn will.
A deep, visceral revulsion welled up inside me. The sight was utterly sickening.
It didn't look like a human master commanding a machine anymore. It looked as though the human brain had only ever been a spare part—one more component in a larger machine.
The guardsman came to a halt beside where I lay. He reached down, extending a hand as if to help me up. He didn't seem to realize he was dead. If ghosts were real, I thought, they'd look exactly like this.
I didn't take his hand. Instead, I said something I never should have spoken aloud.
"...Are you actually still alive, in that state?"
The guardsman froze. Slowly, he raised his hand, reaching to touch his own head.
Whoosh. Whoosh.
His fingers clawed through empty air.
Only then did he seem to understand his head was gone. He clawed frantically at the space above his neck, then let out a silent shriek.
Urrgghhh...
With his vocal cords destroyed, only a dry, rasping hiss escaped the metal pipe of his throat.
Thud!
The guardsman collapsed to his knees beside me. He'd lost the very last piece of his original flesh. The moment he became aware of that fact, true death finally claimed him. Every signal from the auxiliary computing units keeping the prosthetic moving simply went dark.
"Is this..." I muttered, staring up at the headless guardsman from where I lay in the dirt.
"...is this the kind of monster I've been trying to become?"
Full-body mechanization. Being granted a Legion—the ultimate symbol of the Imperial Guard. It had been the sole purpose of my entire existence. But for the first time in my life, a seed of doubt took root and refused to let go.
Perhaps the Legion wasn't liberation from a frail, failing body.
Perhaps it was a prison for the mind.
A dangerous thought indeed, Luka.