Chapter 615: If the Mind is Light, the Will is Also Light
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 615: If the Mind is Light, the Will is Also Light
“And what do you stand to gain?” Encrid countered.
“To become the next Commander of the Holy Knights.”
It was a clear, singular ambition. Desire burned vividly in the man's eyes. It was precisely because he was that kind of person that he stood here now.
Of course, not everyone within the ranks of the Gray Divine Army shared his greed.
Azratic, for one, was an exception—a man who had unleashed a brilliant white flash of true power. There were also martyrs among them, souls who had mistaken a false belief for genuine conviction.
What Mull had started was blatant folly. A new god? It was the logic of an apostate, fit only for the spawn of a ghoul. After all, any ordinary believer would say:
“The Gray God? Do you wish to become a fallen heretic? Am I the strange one for thinking this sounds like befriending cultists?”
Therefore, those who gathered under Mull’s banner should have been of a similar mind, but that was not entirely the case.
Even for those who believed in God, lived in temples, and stayed within the boundaries of the Holy Church, the world was still a place where people lived, influenced one another, and leaned on each other to survive. Some had simply been swept up in the atmosphere or dragged along by those around them. Furthermore, those who spent their entire lives training their minds or tempering their bodies often knew little of the world.
And because they were ignorant, they were easily deceived.
Some had stepped forward simply because they believed it was the right thing to do. They weren't serving the Gray God; rather, they had swallowed Mull's lies that these events were merely a revelation from God in a different form.
Mull had deceived them with such falsehoods.
But was that wrong? Who would punish her? Had the bishops of the past not done the same? Had every Pope in history been perfectly clean? Even if they weren't, there were always those who supported them. Even Prophet Overdear, who had recently risen to prominence, had served the most corrupt Pope in the world during his youth, hadn't he?
Of course, the man standing before Encrid had stepped forward solely for his own gain. One could tell just by listening to him.
“I have already surpassed Sir Azratic and every other Holy Knight here. I am the strongest in this place.”
He was arrogant, too. He hadn't even offered his name. The smirk on his face suggested his victory was already a foregone conclusion. Perhaps he liked the sound of his own voice, for he had rambled on quite a bit, but now even that was over.
He lowered his halberd. The fact that he could support the full weight of the heavy weapon with a single hand was proof enough of his formidable strength. The spear tip, protruding above the axe-like blade, pointed directly at Encrid's chest. That alone exerted an intangible pressure that weighed heavily on his shoulders, but Encrid brushed it off with ease.
The first manifestation of Will he had mastered was Rejection. Afterward, through his battles with Rem, he had naturally learned the characteristics of the sorcery Rem wielded. Since Will was an invisible, intangible force, he had practiced visualizing it as something physical and striking it away—a practice that proved effective once again.
The opponent's spear attempted to bind him like chains, but Encrid severed the pressure with the sword of his mind. It was a brief clash—an exchange of offense and defense without a single physical movement of hands or feet. It was a feat possible only for those who had awakened their Will and could wield it at their leisure.
What the opponent meant when he lowered his halberd was clear. He was claiming to be the best fighter here. And that was indeed the truth. He had defeated Azratic, a fact acknowledged by every Holy Knight present.
From Encrid's perspective, he was an unexpectedly powerful foe. And that was exactly why he was glad.
“I suppose I'm rather lucky,” Encrid replied. He meant it.
“Fool.”
The Holy Knight sneered. The moment the word left his mouth, he closed the distance as if folding space itself. It was incredibly agile footwork for someone wielding such a heavy weapon, but it could hardly be called a surprise attack.
The movement was glaringly obvious.
Encrid swung the Truesilver sword given to him by Eitri. The blade flew in a sharp diagonal slash.
Clang!
The blade struck the shaft just below the head of the halberd. Instead of snapping the wood, a powerful recoil reverberated through Encrid's grip. It was definitely an imprinted weapon; its durability was on another level. Yet, for some reason, the force of Will imbued within the weapon felt strangely lackluster.
Encrid was intrigued by the arrival of a formidable foe, but that didn't mean he intended to make this a desperate struggle.
Deflecting the spear, Encrid naturally split his Will to reinforce his strike. If he could unleash his Will in an explosive burst, splitting it was even easier. It had required ceaseless effort to master, but it was something he could do now.
He added speed to his Truesilver sword. Moving his feet, he demonstrated everything he had mastered, occasionally mixing in the Valen-style Mercenary Sword.
“Such petty tricks!”
The opponent fell for his deceptive breathing, veins bulging on his forehead. When Encrid gasped for air as if cornered and struggling, the man immediately lunged, eager to seize a quick victory.
Because of that, the flow of Divine Power coursing through the opponent's body was slightly disrupted.
The man was far from experienced. His methods and techniques for using Divine Power were outstanding, but that was all. He was inferior to Rem, inferior to Ragna, and comparing him to Oara felt like an insult to her. Even compared to the knights Encrid had faced during the Battle of Azpen, his current opponent seemed light.
To be honest, if he had faced this man before meeting the Walking Fire, he wouldn't have been confident in an easy victory based on raw skill alone, but his intuition told him otherwise now.
Even if I had met him back then, I don't think I would have lost.
“Try and block this!”
The opponent unleashed his specialty. It was a heavy strike, his entire body twisting to bring the weapon down. It was his hidden trump card. While ordinary Holy Knights preferred a battle of attrition over a single overwhelming blow, he launched an attack that defied such common sense.
The axe of the halberd plunged down in a semi-circle from outside Encrid's perception—swinging from behind the opponent's own back. It felt as though a bolt of lightning were striking down.
Yet, even before the opponent shouted, Encrid had already anticipated the strike. Before the man could even yell, his body had already betrayed his intention to settle the match in a single blow. His steps, the contraction of his muscles, the grip of his hands, the angle of his arms, and the position of his weapon—all fell within the scope of Encrid's insight, allowing him to read the immediate future.
On top of that, Single-Point Focus activated, and his thoughts accelerated. Within that split second, Encrid knew exactly what he had to do.
Since Will was an intangible force, it was not bound by physical speed. Because he already knew how to pour out his Will in an instant, he could truly do so. It was difficult before he realized the trick, but now, it was as simple as knowing that one could empty a cup of water all at once by dumping it out instead of pouring it slowly.
Zzzing.
The sword crafted by Eitri resonated. The vibration traveled up Encrid's hand and spread throughout his entire body. Even though it was not an imprinted weapon, it felt as if the sword were displaying its own will. It seemed to tell him to cut—to not lose to such a thing.
He stepped forward with his left foot, lowered his knees, and then straightened them. There would be no evasion. He did not disregard the opponent's skill just because the man spoke of personal gain rather than a grand cause, but the weight carried by their respective weapons was undeniably different.
On the surface, the halberd looked several times heavier, but the Truesilver sword Encrid swung was far weightier. Though his movements appeared light and agile, the weight contained within them was on a different scale.
Crash! Screeech!
The rising blade split the descending axe-head of the halberd. With a sudden burst of ingenuity, Encrid shifted his foot forward and executed Oara's Linking Sword.
The silver flash did not stop at splitting the axe-head; it surged forward, slicing through the crown of the opponent's head. Because it was an extended slash executed with precise footwork, its reach was longer than the halberd's striking range.
As a result, the man, whose skull had been sliced open, trembled. Blood and brain matter trickled down his forehead and temples. Beyond the diagonally severed skull, things that should never be seen were exposed.
Gathering his final breath, the opponent spoke. “What... is this?”
Without even blinking, the man stared directly at his own condition. He was dying. His senses, honed as a knight, told him so.
“I spent my entire life training... Is it so wrong to want something like this in return?”
As death approached, a sense of injustice welled up within him. Living like a monk did not guarantee one would become pure. Nor did becoming a knight mean everyone harbored noble ambitions. Becoming a knight was, after all, a complex mixture of talent, effort, and luck.
But wasn't it only natural? If the mind is light, the Will is also light.
Encrid thought so. Though they were both knights, the difference in the weight of their Will was stark.
Tilting forward, the body—now as light as his resolve—collapsed. For an opponent who was a knight, it had been somewhat easy. Or so Encrid thought.
*
Rem observed that Encrid was remarkably good at finding his own opponents. He also thought that every single person around him was a madman. What was so great about fighting that they all did it with smiles on their faces?
“Hey, crazy axe-man, what are you smiling at?”
As Rem fell into a brief thought, the opponent beneath his feet spoke to him.
“Was I smiling?” Rem asked back.
“Crazy bastard.”
Those were the opponent's final words. He was a man who had held on even as his entrails spilled out. He had even been self-healing with the gray Holy Light. Divine Power was inherently a force suited for endurance, and Rem's opponent had done exactly that. He was supposedly someone who had inherited the name of one of the Apostles of Abundance. He had even claimed his nickname was "The One Who Cannot Be Killed."
His tactic had been to wear down his opponent by defending while clad in Holy Armor, healing any minor wounds with Holy Light.
“Yeah, thanks for the compliment.”
Rem picked up his axe. It had been a while since he had summoned spirit possession, so his body felt stiff. The Holy Knight, who had tried to endure again and again, ultimately could not withstand the sudden torrent of Rem's axe blade.
Looking around, the overall direction of the battle had been decided quickly. The clash with the knights had ended in an overwhelming victory. In the midst of it, Rem also watched Audin fight.
That bastard.
Now that Audin had truly become a luminescent stone—which was how Rem referred to Divine Power—dealing with him would be no easy task. Not that Rem thought he would lose, though.
It was around the time the sun in the sky began to tilt.
“What in the world...” Mull was too stunned for words.
“What should we do?” her adjutant and apprentice asked.
His Divine Power was pathetic, but he had always acted like the tongue in her mouth, anticipating her every whim. She had kept him around because he was quick-witted, but now, in his panic, he asked without even reading Mull's mood.
Mull's eyes fell upon the woman standing before the wooden palisade. She was a witch clad in nothing but a single black robe despite the freezing cold. Mull herself was quite knowledgeable in magic, but she dared not even attempt to replicate what that woman had done. This was the reason Mull had not clumsily tried to assist with the magic of the priests under her command.
The entire unit had ground to a halt from the terror instilled by the man wielding the greatsword, and the Holy Knights they had relied upon were falling one by one. Although the reputation of the Order of Madness had spread across the entire continent, the full extent of their strength was not yet known. It was something one could only realize by experiencing it firsthand. Mull was realizing that very fact now.
Why is a force of this caliber just wandering around like this?
Her mind was in a tangle.
“Apostle!” the apprentice called out to her again. She had told him to call her Pope, but his old title for her slipped out.
“All forces, advance,” Mull muttered.
“Advance! Advance!”
Mull's muttering grew into a shout. She decided to add a divine spell—one she had prepared just in case.
Those who had fought against the Theocracy in the past spoke with one voice: the most terrifying aspect of the Holy Army lay in their fanaticism, charging forward even with severed limbs. It was, in essence, an army of berserkers who had forgotten fear. It was a frenzy spell that made the enemy appear as demons to the believers. Once the spell was cast, they would instantly become an army of martyrs willing to die for God.
“O Lord, I borrow Your power. I borrow Your power...”
Just as Mull began to cry out with desperate fervor, two groups slowly approached from different directions. Because they had been drawing near from afar, Sachsen, Sinar, and the others were already aware of them. Encrid, having finished his fight, knew as well, and some of the soldiers had also noticed.
Mull and those at the center of her forces also belatedly spotted the two armies.
Both were of military scale. Their banners were visible; one bore the symbol of the Theocracy—a winged spear, the banner used by the Holy Army when taking the field for total annihilation. The Gray Divine Army had been carrying a hastily made banner depicting a gray spear, but now the original had appeared.
The other banner was black with diagonal slashes.
The Unnamed Crusader from Noah's Monastery had said that even if they won, nothing would be left. He had warned that even if they triumphed in battle, they might be branded as those possessed by demons. Although Encrid did not care about such things, he could not help but remain wary of an army that might instantly become an enemy.
Mull also saw the two armies approaching. She stopped her spell.
From both groups, individuals suddenly dashed forward. The person from the Theocracy was a familiar face. The other was someone the Unnamed Crusader recognized immediately.
“Why is the Leader...?” he muttered in surprise.
Of the two banners, the one with the diagonal slashes belonged to the Heresy Purging Priests. In other words, they were the comrades of the Unnamed Crusader. Perhaps they had come to punish one who had betrayed his duty.
“Halt!” The one who stepped forward from the Heresy Purging Priests shouted repeatedly as he ran.
“You're a bit late!”
“Leader!” the Unnamed Crusader greeted him.
The moment Encrid saw the man, he felt a weight that was incomparable to the knight he had just faced. He was a man whose forehead and cheeks were covered in scars.
The representative from the Theocracy also arrived on the battlefield. And who else could the familiar face be but Prophet Overdear?
Leaving behind the armies facing off against the small order of knights, the two representing their respective factions approached and came to a halt.
Encrid had already decided he didn't care whether they labeled him a demon or not; if they attacked, he would simply fight back. It was exactly as he had resolved from the very beginning.
As everyone stared at one another, Overdear was the first to speak.
“You absolute halfwits.”
His tone was dripping with rage.