120. What Does Death Leave Behind?
120. What Does Death Leave Behind?
-Ti-ri-ling~
The sound of music drifted through the air.
A beautiful melody, the kind no one would expect to hear in a moment like this.
-Kyaaaaaak! Aaaaak!!
But even that grew faint in the chaos.
The enemy army still surged below the mountain where the troops had taken position, and as their numbers swelled, they cut off the escape routes one by one.
Perhaps if they broke through recklessly and shook off the pursuit, a few survivors could return to inform humanity of what had happened. Yet, what meaning would that hold now? Even if they held out, a far greater despair would inevitably follow.
How could anyone march forward believing hope still existed in this world, when even someone born with the destiny of a Hero had rejected humanity and become an enemy?
'...Then why.'
So maybe it was the right choice to follow the soldier from the start and throw their bodies away here, rather than dragging things out. The reason they had not followed the first soldier who charged ahead, even after reaching that realization, was because there was still someone throwing himself into the fray to fight her at this very moment.
'Then why is that man fighting?'
He was a memorable figure.
A man taken on as a disciple by one of his own old comrades-in-arms—someone they had sought to raise as the successor to the hero they all admired.
The power and techniques he wielded now were hers, and the reason he appeared here alone to clash with her must be because he had inherited her heroic spirit as well.
'Jang Cleo, you bastard...'
But he had seen the bitter end of the path such efforts led to. Yet, why wasn't he giving up like the rest of them? Why was he fighting against the lingering grudge of a Hero disappointed by the world?
He, too, must have known her. He must have understood her suffering better than Marcus himself.
'Are you still holding onto hope? Do you believe hope exists even in a world like this, raising that man as a hero?'
He tried to ponder such questions alone, but soon Marcus lowered his head and chose to erase the thoughts from his mind.
'...I don't know.'
Even if he thought about it alone, there was no way he could ever know.
His life had never offered him a single clear answer, and every hope he had placed in effort had been repaid with betrayal.
'Now... I just want to rest...'
Utterly weary of such a world, Marcus decided to stop questioning himself and placed his hand on the sword at his waist.
Yes, right now, all he wanted was to be true to his feelings.
-Ti-ri-ling, ti-ring~♬
Listening to the music that grew gradually deeper, he wanted nothing more than to be true to what he felt.
"General, what are you..."
"Those who will fight, follow me."
What left his lips was not even an order, but a lament born of despair, honest to his own feelings. Still, as a matter of form, he sought to adorn his final moments with the image of a Legion Commander.
"...Sir?"
"Those who will fight with me, descend below and draw the enemy's attention. If we can reduce their numbers even a little, at least a small party can escape from here."
There was no sense of honor or righteousness in it. He simply wanted to be honest to his feelings now, and he was playing the role most familiar to him to express that state of mind.
"Whether you fight or leave... I will not blame anyone for either choice. I leave what comes after to each of your own wills."
"General, please wait...!"
By the time the soldier's protest followed, it was already too late.
Already descending the hill, he drew his sword and charged toward the enemies alone.
The Aura shimmering on that blade was the result of training he had never neglected a single day since the death of the one he admired. Though his role as a commander had reduced the times he swung a sword, he had never slacked in his discipline, striving to embody that sensation even with his aging body.
-Craaack!!
A blade encapsulating such a lifetime needed only an instant to cleave through the enemies in front of him.
But no matter how sharp the edge, there was a limit to the enemies one man could face alone.
-Thunk, slash!
The soldiers pressing in from all sides possessed the same strength, and they exerted a will even fiercer than his own to hack away at his flesh. Their ferocity was extraordinary because they were not ordinary dead—they were manifestations of the most madness-filled era. His aging body, unable to counter all their relentless attacks, was collapsing at a rapid pace with every step forward.
'The sword I devoted my life to is shattering into nothing.'
The armor was torn open by countless attacks. Even a slight shift in posture impeded the flow of power, and even when he managed a successful block, his bones sustained cracks under the brute force.
'The body that has run endlessly is crumbling miserably.'
His breath grew ragged, and even that was hard to exhale, making him clearly sense his consciousness fading. He felt a sense of injustice at the helplessness born from those limits, but still, he grit his teeth and pushed his body forward.
'Was my life so utterly meaningless?'
Even his fingers gripping the sword trembled now, but still, he did not fall and tried to aim his blade at the enemies surrounding him.
'Was it because we simply turned away from the truth of this world, that we have struggled so wretchedly?'
The moment when even that blade's edge dulled and broke off against the intensified enemy onslaught, causing his very Aura to waver.
-Crunch, crack.
The wraiths of the old era seized the gap and rushed in, prying into the cracks of his armor, tearing his flesh and drawing spurts of blood over and over.
The blood that burst forth made for a fine beverage to quench the thirst of the war-maddened wraiths.
As blood drained from him, cold enveloped him, and even the pain subsided. He could clearly feel his heart stopping.
'But still... if only...'
Yes, this was death.
Feeling that final sensation, the old soldier moved the hand still holding the sword and stirred his own lips.
'Even after I vanish, if the world continues on...'
What seeped from his gaping mouth could only be called an attachment he himself was unaware of.
But he would never know if those words were ever conveyed.
Death meant feeling nothing anymore.
It meant laying down all you had achieved in life and leaving with your corpse...
****
"General... sir."
Yet, he did not collapse. He remained rooted to the spot, sword still in hand.
The attacks of the enemies swarming around him had subsided for a while.
More reinforcements would soon flood in, but still he stood there, raising his broken sword.
-Griind, craack.
Even with his skin and organs completely ruined. Even as a white skeleton slicked with blood, he moved and sought to hold that ground.
"General! The General's alive! We must rescue him immediately...!!"
"Are you mad?! The enemy will swarm us again!!"
"But the General...!!"
"Look properly! It's already too late!!"
The skin on his face was entirely stripped away, exposing the bone, and everything that had filled his insides had long since poured out through his mouth and other wounds during the fierce battle.
All that remained was a cracked, aged skull, shaped by his toil and devoid of even his form.
-Clatter, clatter.
The reason it moved was that an unclean power dwelling within his body was trying to move him based on the records left in his flesh.
The General they had followed all along had already become an Undead.
That was the cruel end met by the man who spent his life strengthening the army meant to protect humanity.
"A-Ahh. General..."
Why did he fight at the very end?
If it was out of mere despair, it would have sufficed to just throw his body away without clinging to life.
Why did he fight so fiercely as to destroy his body so terribly?
-Bzzzzzzzt!!
A red current of energy then began to crash down before the mourning soldiers.
A crimson light welled up from the corpse, grotesquely twisting the body and turning its direction toward them.
It was the authority of the Red Knight: the power to revive all who die in her domain and add them to her forces.
No matter their life, a corpse consumed by that power becomes a pawn of the strong, turning into an enemy of humanity.
-Bang!!
The declaration of that despair began to break apart in a clash with the Hero confronting the Red Knight.
Right after, his head, which had been trying to turn back to them, halted abruptly, and the tip of his blade was also withdrawn from them.
The moment the superior entity's control was cut off.
The Undead, regaining autonomy, was driven by the residual power in its body, seeking to be true to its own instincts.
"Cha..."
If only the desire to live remained, it would chase the Living, craving their warmth and vitality.
Conversely, if something surpassed even that,
if a distinct, unfulfilled regret from life remained clearly even after death...
"Cha... Charge..."
Yes, he had a regret.
A regret that transcended mere obsession with the Living, blossoming through an ego that had dimly awakened. It moved his tattered body forward.
"Charge... for the Hero..."
The direction he marched was not toward the soldiers he once led, but toward the enemies swarming them.
And as he fixed his gaze on the Hero still fighting the Red Knight even now.
"Protect... the Hero."
The voice that finally leaked out began to resonate, however faintly, among the soldiers positioned behind him.
"General, what is..."
"Protect the Hero. Protect the Hero..."
It began with admiration for a Hero. The death of the admired one he faced at the end came to him as both a realization and a calling, telling him she died not because she was powerless, but because she had shouldered too much alone.
"Army, charge...!"
That was why he had always thought:
If ever those called Heroes appeared before him again,
if an existence truly called humanity's hope appeared once more, he would not just watch their back, but raise an army to fight alongside them.
"Prootect... the Heeroooo...!"
That lingering regret was moving his corpse in this moment.
He sought to prove to everyone that even a despairing end that comes equally to all holds meaning in the life that led to it.
"So that humanity's hope... does not crumble..."
If, indeed, this world continued on even after he died, he carried a faith that what was left behind by him would bring about some change in this world.
"Protect humanity's hope... with our own hands...!!!"
A body bearing that faith still advanced toward the battlefield. To protect the Hero. To protect the one who could overturn this hopeless situation, even if he himself did not realize it.
"...General... sir."
They knew.
They, who had fought corpses, knew well that the Undead were nothing more than replicas of the Living's most intense moments.
-Ti-ri-ling~♬
But in that lament, they found hope.
They understood that his will to protect the Hero even in death was directed toward that man.
-Ti-ri-ling, ti-ring~♪
And what resonated among them now was a melody that stirred their emotions.
Emotions pulled up from the deep unconsciousness they themselves had not been aware of now surged up, carried by the music.
"...Charge."
Inebriated by that feeling, a soldier drew his sword.
On a mere temporary whim. Drunk on an emotion that wasn't even true courage, but recklessness.
"Charge."
Yet at least for this moment, they chose to be true to their feelings, using it as a painkiller for the brutal future that ultimately awaited them. It was merely a matter of fast or slow. Even knowing that a despairing end waited equally for them all, they realized that how they walked the path to it was their choice.
"Chaaaarge!! Soldiers!!"
"Follow the General!!"
The emotions that had stayed in their subconscious finally became a reality. The wails that burst forth at the end transformed into a battle cry, as they threw themselves into the calamity born of humanity's original sin.
No matter how brilliant or wretched their lives had been, no matter if their end was nothing more than a piece of meat...
"Chaaarge...!"
"Protect our hope!"
Just as the one who went before them had done, they burned their bodies, firmly believing that they too could rise up.
"Do not let the General's sacrifice... nor the sacrifices of those who fell before us be in vain!!"
"This world shall remember my final stand!!"
A battlefield where the Living gradually vanished and the Dead overflowed. Still, the direction they charged in remained unwavering. The battlefield created by the intertwining of those marching forward and those following was itself a symbol of humanity's madness.
"Protect humanity's hope with our own hands!!!!"
A madness that craved hope even in a hopeless world,
a madness that could only exist by believing that what it found at the end of its search was indeed hope.
*****
-Claaang!!
At the end of a war swirling with such madness, the moment the tide turned finally arrived.
Because an impossible thing that had never happened before was unfolding—not just the Living, but even the Dead who had slipped her control were joining the battle...
"Why on earth..."
Of course, she could bring even them under control if she exerted more power, but the one standing before her was thwarting her at every turn. A mere Hero, whom she could crush and break anytime if she fought him properly.
A brat who could at best only mimic her techniques, barely grasping the power she held at her prime.
"...Why on earth, am I being pushed back...?"
But why, in this one-on-one fight, was she being ever so slightly overwhelmed by his power?
Even if the swarming troops and his interference left her no time to exercise her absolute command, her own power should have easily overwhelmed him without the need for soldiers.
"My power should have even surpassed a dragon's! So why, by a worm like you...!!"
-Boom!!
A magical explosion erupted from the balance broken by that impatience.
As the Red Knight felt her body, struck by a throwing spear, tilt for the first time, her eyes flew open wide in shock. Meanwhile, her opponent, raising the shaft of his spear, caught his breath and began to form a faint smile.
"Looks like you're losing your composure. You've even dropped the formal speech all of a sudden."
"What..."
"Well, you're more influenced by your memories as a mercenary rather than a Hero right now. So maybe this is only obvious."
Yes, the reason she had become a calamity surpassing a dragon in the first place was due to the infinite production of troops.
Since it was still the early stage of her awakening that power, the troops were at a level that the humanity gathered here could barely manage; and if you excluded those soldiers, all that remained was her own individual strength.
And the period when her lingering regret was strongest was during her time as a 'mercenary' who experienced the Age of War.
While she may have been the strongest among humanity back then, it could not be considered the peak of her personal martial power compared to when she faced a dragon.
"Pushing through with numbers might let you surpass even a dragon..."
On the other hand, this side had inherited all the lives that Tachia Piloi had lived through.
From the Age of War to facing the dragon, and even the lingering will left after meeting death at the end... he had accepted it all into his body.
"But if it's just you alone, you're not an opponent I can't beat right now."
In the moment he realized that difference, hope sprouted within his heart.
A hope that this hopeless battle could be won.