Chapter 26: Confrontation
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 26: Confrontation
In an era where walkie-talkies and telephones were already in use, a crystal ball might seem like an outdated relic. But such magic tools still had their uses—namely, they were untraceable.
The crystal ball, called ‘Clairvoyance’, that the prince and his Administrative Minister were peering into was surely being used for that very purpose.
“What do you plan to do, Your Highness?” Rad asked, munching on some nuts he had procured from somewhere. The fact that he could so casually watch Deathwish being overwhelmed by a squad of knights said a lot about his character.
Inside the crystal ball, Aiden stepped forward, shielding Katya behind him.
“I didn’t expect Lionheart’s husband to get involved,” the prince mused. “This makes things difficult.”
For someone claiming the situation was difficult, his tone was incredibly relaxed. Resting his chin on his hand, he watched the scene unfold, then cast a sidelong glance at his minister.
“You sound as if you expected this.”
“No. The situation itself is beyond my expectations,” Rad replied, leaning back comfortably in his chair. “I thought at least half the men we sent would be killed by Deathwish. Her resistance is much milder than I anticipated.”
“…”
“We need a justification to launch a political attack, but this ruins everything. I didn’t foresee this, either.”
The prince’s eyes narrowed. The “men” Rad referred to were the knights currently ganging up on Katya. Despite having dispatched them himself, he sounded deeply disappointed that there were no casualties. It was as if he had sent them to their deaths from the very beginning.
“You are more viper than strategist, Rad.”
“Thank you for the compliment. But no matter how excellent a strategist is, they ultimately don’t hold the power to make the final decision,” Rad said with a faint smile. “The decision is yours, Your Highness. I merely present the options.”
“…”
“So, tell me. What will you do about Lionheart’s husband?”
“I’ll hear your recommendation first.”
“We strike him.”
The prince stared at him in disbelief. “…If it’s the husband of Lionheart, the fallout will be impossible to handle if things go wrong.”
“Is that so?”
“You analyzed him yourself. While his ability to manipulate supernatural powers is bizarrely outstanding, his combat skills don’t even reach a beginner’s level. They’re atrocious.”
Pitting several knights against such a man was extreme overkill, especially for someone they couldn’t afford to seriously injure.
“As long as he isn’t too severely injured, shouldn’t it be fine? Besides, I don’t think he’ll go down that easily.”
“On what grounds?”
“We drew up a plan using a rare item like a Suppression Pillar, and yet it was completely derailed because of that man,” Rad stated. Though he couldn’t be sure, the atmosphere suggested that the reason Deathwish had become so docile was also because of him. He had even used a rare supernatural ability like shamanism to ensure no one could follow him, yet Aiden had caught up all by himself. Both reasons why Rad’s plan had been twisted from its foundation originated with that man.
Undoubtedly. He was a man hiding far more than meets the eye.
“…Are you saying we should be wary of him? That he might get in the way of our grand cause?”
“We aren’t at that stage yet,” Rad said, his voice dropping as he drew a flat conclusion. “In my personal opinion, that man is a fraud.”
That was the extent of Aiden Kellermain as analyzed by Rad. Ordinary. Someone who strived to be ordinary, who had never done a day of hard labor and had rarely been in a fight. A lucky commoner who had somehow stumbled into his current position.
“Then that doesn’t make sense. Why pay so much attention to a mere fraud?”
“Because there is a high probability we will have to pay attention to him in the future.” As he spoke, Rad’s gleaming blue eyes remained fixed on Aiden in the crystal ball. “…For someone who has lived an ordinary life, he wields a power that feels rather ‘undeserved.’”
Within his irises, a peculiar blue light swept over Aiden’s face.
“Against several knights… he certainly won’t be able to win. But surely he can show us something entertaining?”
* * *
Fight him?
Sir Levant received the order through the communication channel, his mind reeling. Attacking those around their targets was one thing, but he knew all too well that a direct assault on Lionheart’s husband carried an immense risk. He had already received the intelligence and knew the extent of his opponent’s strength.
Undoubtedly—
A multiple ability user who wielded several supernatural powers. It was a threatening and powerful trait. Indeed, the supernatural energy currently radiating from Aiden’s body was incredibly potent.
But.
His combat experience is practically non-existent.
He had heard the reports about this man’s performance during the exchange ceremony with the Tribal Alliance. He wielded a mysterious power, but his handling of it was utterly crude. Anyone who had ever honed their combat skills would agree.
With that in mind…
“—We have no intention of killing you. So do not resist in vain.” Sir Levant drew a bead-shaped ritual tool from his pocket and crushed it.
A translucent wave rippled outward, and instantly, all supernatural abilities within its range visibly weakened. The knights’ Qi, the Divine Power dwelling within Katya’s body, and every kind of supernatural energy Aiden was emitting—all of it dwindled.
“—”
Aiden’s eyes narrowed. His style of combat relied on high-output supernatural abilities. Although they hadn’t vanished completely, having their power drastically reduced was a massive penalty. On the other hand, even if the knights’ Qi was slightly diminished, the combat techniques they had spent their lives mastering remained fully intact.
Though the item was originally meant for Katya, its effects applied to Aiden just the same.
“Neither of us will benefit from a fight. Stay quiet,” Sir Levant warned.
“Is that so?”
“Yes. As I said, we have no intention of killing you.” It would be enough to injure him moderately, give him a thorough beating, and chase him away. If his opponent had a brain, he wouldn’t charge at this many knights now that his greatest strength had been neutralized.
“Do not think your status as Lionheart’s husband will guarantee your safety. Officially, we do not exist right now. And whatever happens here never happened.”
“For people ganging up with swords on someone who isn’t even resisting, you sure talk a lot.”
“…It is a necessity.”
“I’m sure it is.” The moment those words left his mouth, Aiden drew his sword and replied calmly, “Then, as a matter of necessity, you can just do the same to me, right?”
Hearing this, Katya, who had been sitting quietly behind him, widened her eyes in shock.
“—Wait, if you do that, you’ll—!”
“It’s fine.”
Beneath those words lay a sheer determination, with not a single trace of his usual easygoing demeanor. It was a voice filled with rage. A rage fueled by the absolute resolve to, at the very least, crush the skulls of these bastards.
“Why do you think I train, discipline myself, and go through hell to gather power?”
Come to think of it, the reason was obvious. Sure, gathering power for the Main Quest, growing stronger, and copying skills—that was all well and good. But fundamentally, why was he accumulating strength?
“I train so I can beat the crap out of guys like this.”
No matter who the opponent was, who pulled their strings, or what their goal was. Family, friends, acquaintances… it was to protect the people within his circle.
“What else are friends for?”
“What…?”
“Sometimes, you have to let someone else handle it.”
While Katya’s eyes widened even further, Sir Levant let out a scoff of disbelief. He was certain Aiden stood no chance. He gestured with his chin to the nearest knight.
“—You know what to do. Don’t kill him.”
Without his supernatural abilities, the man was a dead man walking. There was no need for tension. It would be over once they subdued him.
“Yes, sir.”
The surrounding knights raised their swords with indifferent expressions. They clearly shared the sentiment that deploying this much force against such a man was an absolute waste.
Soon, the knights lunged forward in unison. A coordinated onslaught, roaring like an avalanche, closed in from all directions.
And then…
“…?”
It was then that they felt it. A strange sense of wrongness. Anyone would have. Aiden, standing completely still, was an incomprehensible sight. He was rooted to the spot, as if frozen. As if he would be perfectly fine.
No matter how much his supernatural abilities were suppressed, the movements of knights who had dedicated their lives to combat easily surpassed human limits. Attacks that an ordinary person could never track were flying in from all sides.
Yet.
Aiden’s gaze… the eyes of a man rumored to have zero combat experience… were tracking every single thread of the tangled sword trajectories.
“…!”
Goosebumps broke out all over Sir Levant’s body.
Then.
“Since you said everything that happens here ‘never happened’…” Aiden’s voice was low. “—It doesn’t matter what happens to you either, right?”
In an instant, the bodies of the knights who had lunged at him were blown backward. The men who had charged in unison were scattered and sent tumbling like scraps of paper in the wind.
“…”
“…”
Amidst the heavy silence, Sir Levant blinked blankly, sprawled on the ground. The physical impact was one thing, but the mental shock was far greater.
…What just happened?
This many knights… subdued by a single person in an instant. It was a phenomenon that could only be explained by an astronomical gap in their capabilities.
Don’t make me laugh…!
He gritted his teeth and pushed himself up. He had never suffered such humiliation, not even as an apprentice. This was undoubtedly due to carelessness. If they coordinated properly one more time, there was no way their opponent could defend against it. That was how it should be.
Yet, strangely…
“You said it earlier, didn’t you? That you wouldn’t kill me.”
Looking at the man standing there with those sunken, dark eyes… that certainty suddenly vanished.
“Since you were so considerate, I’ll return the favor. I won’t kill you.”
“…There’s a limit to your arrogance—”
“But, you see, I know from personal experience,” Aiden muttered, his eyes unfocused. It was an expression that surfaced naturally as his reason slipped, triggered by terrible memories flashing through his mind. “—There are far more ways to be hurt so badly that you’d rather be dead than you bastards could ever imagine.”
Mostly by Mayer. Mostly in his dreams. When you get beaten to the brink of death over and over, you inevitably experience injuries that make you beg to be killed. In that particular field, Aiden was practically a master instructor.
“So, I’ll show each of you one of those ways. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be fair to me.”
The moment those words fell, the knights flinched and took a step back. The atmosphere shifted so abruptly it felt as if the very air had changed.
Seeing this, Sir Levant instinctively realized something. The evaluation he had heard, seen, and that everyone here had held of this man had to be discarded immediately.
What, non-existent combat experience? Crude techniques?
“What a load of absolute bullshit…!”
What stood before them now was a sheer, vicious intensity that only a veteran who had crossed the boundary of life and death countless times could exude. It was a pressure so suffocating that one could easily believe he had experienced death firsthand, over and over again…!
“Ugh…!”
Unable to withstand the pressure, one of the knights lunged, and the battle resumed.
The collective combat style of the Imperial Knights prioritized flawless coordination, with multiple members moving as a single body. It wasn’t just a matter of attacking simultaneously; it was a tight net that sealed off every angle to hunt the target down.
But once again…
—!
—!!
As a single sword arc swept through the air, the knights forming the encirclement collapsed all at once.
“W-What?”
“How on earth did he do that?!”
It was a technique so miraculous they blurted out the words, forgetting they were in the middle of a fight. Yet, the perpetrator of this feat seamlessly transitioned to his next move as if it were nothing.
“Seriously, if I don’t get to show off here, I’ll feel so cheated…” Gritting his teeth, he swung his sword while muttering with those unfocused eyes. In a situation that demanded pure ‘combat technique,’ the emotion he harbored deep inside was crystal clear.
How much hell had he gone through just to perform well in a moment like this? How many horrific things had he suffered at Mayer’s hands? Helplessness, pain, despair, and the resignation that no matter what he did, he could never escape the agony…!
So…!
“You guys should experience it too…!”
“…”
“It’s not fair if I’m the only one who suffers…!”
“…”
It was a somewhat misplaced resentment.
* * *
While the knights caught in his directionless rage screamed as they were smashed to pieces, the prince and Rad stared at the crystal ball, completely speechless.
“…Shall I be honest?” For once, the smile had vanished from Rad’s face. He tapped the crystal ball, his voice low. The image of Aiden swinging his sword with unfocused eyes was playing out. Yet, contrary to his somewhat dazed appearance, the results were more than enough to leave them dumbfounded.
“This is something only a veteran who has fought on the battlefield for at least ten years could pull off, right? Overwhelming multiple knights single-handedly?”
“…A veteran with an abundance of talent and experience,” the prince added, holding his forehead.
In truth, even for a highly talented and experienced veteran, it was questionable whether such a feat was possible. He, too, was a swordsman gifted with enough talent to be called a ‘genius’ in the Imperial Capital, which was why he understood just how absurd the scene was.
“…He’s copying them on the fly.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean Aiden is copying the movements of everyone there in real-time.”
Rad fell silent for a moment, unable to fully comprehend the sentence the prince had just uttered. “What on earth does that mean?”
“The techniques he’s using keep changing, so I can’t pinpoint them exactly, but…” the prince continued, his tone dizzy. Just then, the knights who had tried to coordinate another attack were swept away like autumn leaves.
“His footwork is the Wind Talker, a sword style from the Knight of the Storm… His lower body is using Floating Weed, a technique of the Spring Wanderer… The trajectory of his sword is the Quarter Moon, from the Twilight Assassin… He’s using all of those at the same time.”
“I understand those techniques exist, but what do you mean he copied them—”
“Those are the techniques the knights over there are using,” the prince cut in. “It’s not surprising for Imperial Knights to have learned different sword systems. Each school is formed by establishing theories, honing them in real combat, and distilling individual experiences into them.”
So, in the end, even for the same technique, the execution varies wildly from person to person. Unique traces, like fingerprints, are bound to remain. Movements that could be called ‘secret techniques,’ in which their entire swordsmanship, combat experience, theories, and know-how are concentrated.
“—And all of that is being ‘stolen.’ In an instant.”
Yet, the techniques Aiden was currently using… were the exact movements of the knights who had lunged at him. Effortlessly. He was ‘analyzing’ and ‘copying’ the achievements they had built over a lifetime.
It defied explanation. No matter what kind of skill he possessed, how was such a thing even possible? On top of that, the most absurd part lay elsewhere. Even displaying such miraculous combat techniques didn’t fully explain how he was achieving this. Was Aiden’s physical ability vastly superior to theirs? Was he faster? Stronger?
No. Although his supernatural abilities assisted his physical capabilities, even with that, he could be considered weak. In terms of physical specs alone, any single knight there could handle a truckload of men like Aiden.
Then why were those knights being unilaterally demolished without even grazing him?
…How?
The prince traced Aiden’s movements with eyes full of disbelief.
Every single move is the correct answer.
In the heat of battle, at the crossroads where life and death were decided in a fraction of a second, every judgment that man made was the ‘correct answer.’ He preemptively occupied the path of an incoming sword to dodge. He deflected coordinated attacks. He twisted, moved, countered, and subdued—at every single moment, he chose and executed the most efficient movement without a shred of hesitation. He seized the shortest path to ‘victory’ at every turn.
—No.
Watching Aiden’s movements closely, the prince immediately corrected his impression. There was no proactive drive toward victory. Rather, it was… something far more desperate.
Not victory. Survival.
Aiden Kellermain… was not fighting for victory. He was fighting in a way that avoided every single path leading to ‘death.’
As if he had already experienced it. As if his entire body had already learned that he would die if he didn’t move that exact way. The fear of ‘pain’ remembered by his nerves, engraved in his muscles, and carved into his soul instinctively drove him to choose those movements.
“—”
Just what… had that man experienced to approach combat in such a manner? The prince closed his eyes, momentarily lost for words. Soon, keeping them closed, he pressed his temples.
“…Rad.”
“Yes.”
“When we investigated that man, nothing came up, right?”
“…That’s correct.”
“Investigate him again.”
“…”
“There is no way he is a mere fraud. Absolutely not. It is highly likely he has been trained to a bone-shattering, flesh-tearing degree since childhood.”
“…My intelligence gathering has never been wrong.”
“Then this is the first time. It’s an order. Dig him up again, from start to finish.”
This time, it was Rad’s turn to fall silent. While he tapped his chin in deep thought with a rare, serious expression, the prince peered into the crystal ball with dark eyes.
…Just where on earth did this monster come from?
The emotion in his gaze was too complex for even he himself to explain.