Master (1)
"I swear, I've seen it all in this line of work."
The coachman grumbled as he drove the carriage.
He was a coachman I'd grown close to after hiring his carriage several times near the academy.
"The Bamboo Forest this time? Why on earth are you heading to a pathless wilderness when you can't even see?"
His relentless grumbling made it impossible to catch even a brief nap. Giving up on sleep, I spoke to him in a gentle tone.
"...My master resides there. I have an item I need to retrieve."
"Your name was Zeto, right? I don't know who this master of yours is, but you should tell them to move somewhere else."
"...Well, that's no longer possible. Haha..."
Calling it a 'residence' wasn't entirely wrong, but since it was the place where she had died, 'grave' was probably more accurate.
"Tsk, fine."
The coachman clicked his tongue and focused on driving the carriage in silence.
...What is Kaen up to?
Since I spotted her the other day, Kaen hadn't made any suspicious moves.
Occasionally, I thought I caught a glimpse of pink hair hiding in the bushes, but I preferred to think it was just my imagination.
I had absolutely no idea what she was planning. This was something that had never happened in the game.
Something that never happened in the game...
Eisel, and now Kaen.
Watching the characters' paths diverge one after another, I couldn't help but think that the future might have been warped long before now.
Eisel, in particular...
She was different.
Different from the game.
Yet, she wasn't a completely different person either.
What if...
A sudden, ominous premonition flashed through my mind.
"Sigh..."
I let out a deep sigh, trying my best to ignore the feeling.
My knowledge and information of the past remained unchanged... I had to take comfort in that and keep moving forward.
If I stopped, it would all end there.
Thanks to the talkative coachman finally shutting up, I managed to fall into a light slumber.
Thud, thud.
A sudden knocking on the carriage woke me, and I stretched my stiff body as I sat up.
"We're here. You can get off now."
The coachman's voice drifted in from the front.
I opened the carriage door and stepped down.
The moment I stepped out, a vast expanse of towering bamboo greeted me.
Perhaps because it was night, the atmosphere was incredibly eerie.
"Is this the Bamboo Forest?"
"Aye. Have I ever taken you to the wrong place?"
As I exchanged idle chatter with the coachman, a sharp gust of wind blew through, causing the forest to rustle chillingly.
"...Judging by the sound of the wind, this is indeed the place."
"So... should I wait here like you asked earlier?"
The coachman looked at me, double-checking the request I had made earlier.
Before boarding, I had paid him an extra fee to wait for me at the destination.
This area was rarely visited by people, so if I didn't have a carriage waiting, I would have to walk a long distance to find another one.
"Yes. It won't take very long. But as I mentioned before, if I don't return after a long while, you may leave without me."
"Good grief, I don't know how you're going to find your way in there..."
"You don't need to worry. My master is the one who taught me how to navigate such places."
"Just be careful out there."
I gave the coachman a wry smile to reassure him as much as possible.
All I had to do was retrieve the item. I knew the general location, so it would be over quickly.
I left the carriage behind and slowly walked into the bamboo forest.
The Bamboo Forest.
Located a fair distance from Innocence Academy, this vast bamboo forest was notoriously labyrinthine.
Looking around, I saw nothing but dense bamboo packing every inch of the landscape.
Truthfully, there wasn't even a proper path to speak of.
But...
'She'—the soul I would seal into my Demon Blade, and whom I referred to as my master to others—had chosen this place for her secluded training.
That was how secluded and untouched by human feet this place was.
There must be a cave where she stayed somewhere in this forest.
I pushed my way through the countless stalks of bamboo, forging a path.
To prepare for my return, I occasionally tore strips of white cloth I had brought and tied them around the bamboo stalks in conspicuous places.
Since there was no one around, I didn't need to pretend to be blind.
In the game, there was a single hint to find the cave.
Deep within this vast bamboo forest lay a massive waterfall. The cave where she had lived was hidden behind the cascading water.
It was a classic, almost cliché location for a hidden cave, but finding the waterfall itself was the real challenge.
Fortunately, I had a method to locate it without wasting too much time.
After walking aimlessly for a bit, I decided I had gone far enough and paused to listen to the surrounding sounds.
Swoosh...
The distinct sound of the wind blowing through the bamboo forest reached my ears.
The rustling of bamboo leaves.
The occasional clacking of bamboo stalks knocking against one another.
Relying on my superior sensory skills, I focused all my attention on my hearing.
Then...
Rumble...
I detected the faint, distant sound of rushing water.
Since it was a massive waterfall, I figured my current stats would allow me to pick up the sound, and I was right.
I walked in the direction of the sound.
Rumble...
As I kept walking, the sound grew progressively louder.
And finally...
Crash!
I found the waterfall.
I followed the stream and approached the waterfall.
"Hmm..."
There was no path to bypass it from the side, so getting my clothes wet was unavoidable.
I lunged straight through the violently cascading torrent.
Thud.
My feet found solid ground.
As expected, the cave was right behind the waterfall.
However, without a single light source, it was pitch black inside.
I don't sense any presence inside... do I?
I pulled a small, portable lamp from the backpack slung over my shoulder.
A blind man lighting a lamp because it's too dark...
A dry chuckle escaped me at the sheer irony of the situation, but since there was no one around to see me, I didn't care.
As I walked deeper into the cave, traces of her presence began to appear.
How many years did they say she spent in this cave again?
Her secluded training had lasted a very long time.
Why had it gone on for so long?
The Sword Saint.
It was to create a swordsmanship style capable of defeating just one man.
Having suffered countless defeats at the hands of the Sword Saint, she had chosen seclusion to hone her ultimate technique.
As I ventured deeper, more signs of her life here revealed themselves.
Miscellaneous items of unknown purpose lay scattered about, along with tattered scraps of cloth.
How many years has it been since she died?
Even by a rough estimate, at least ten to twenty years had passed.
Since she had trained in seclusion until her final breath, there was a significant gap in time for me to claim she had taken me in as her disciple.
Because she had told no one of her seclusion, her tragic death went entirely unnoticed by the world. But I, at least, knew of her passing.
In the game, the souls that could be sealed into a Demon Blade—an essential tool for Ghost Swordsmanship—were strictly limited.
Though each soul differed, most of them had been formidable swordsmen in life.
To die of a chronic illness right before her secluded training was complete...
Moreover, many of them had suffered unjust or tragic deaths, much like her.
Because they were so powerful, their souls became vengeful spirits, unable to leave the mortal realm and lingering in the places where they died.
The question is, what is the soul bound to?
Just like in the game, mana existed within the bodies of everyone in this world.
Normally, when a person dies, a corpse is left behind, and even after the flesh decomposes, the skeleton remains.
Of course, if buried in the earth for a long time, even the bones eventually turn to dust...
But mana played a unique role here.
In this world, the residual mana left in a deceased person's bones would eventually dissolve the bones themselves.
The game lore stated that within five years, a corpse would vanish without a trace.
This was a bit of trivia I had picked up while playing a Ghost Swordsman character.
Before that, I had never cared about what happened to corpses in the game, nor was there much information about it.
Of course, graves still existed.
Even if the physical body vanished completely, people still needed a place to commemorate the dead.
But the question remained.
Where did these powerful spirits, destined to be sealed for Ghost Swordsmanship, linger?
There were no corpses or skeletons left.
Nor did they simply haunt the spot where they died.
The answer was the object with which the deceased shared the deepest connection.
In the game, these were items categorized as 'Cherished Keepsakes.'
Lost in thought about the item, I eventually reached the very end of the cave.
I saw various unrecognizable items and crude pieces of furniture that looked as though they had been fashioned by hand from bamboo.
She had been a swordsman in life.
So, wouldn't her most cherished object be her sword?
But it wasn't.
It was the object lying right here before me.
I picked it up.
...Is it because it harbors a soul? The moment I picked it up, a chilling sensation washed over me.
Goosebumps immediately broke out all over my body, but considering what the item was, I shrugged it off.
I examined the object closely.
As if to prove its extraordinary nature, it was neither rusted nor worn despite the passage of time.
A necklace with a gemstone that still looked brand new. The gem was one thing, but even the chain of the necklace didn't have a single speck of rust.
It was the pendant she had worn around her neck her entire life—and now, it was the vessel for her soul.
Sierra's Pendant.
When crafting a Demon Blade, using this pendant would bind her soul to the weapon, creating the demonic sword.
After that, by completely sealing the soul within the Demon Blade and forming a contract to keep it from running wild, the true Demon Blade would be complete.
I searched the ground a bit more, found a journal she had written, packed it into my backpack, and tucked the pendant into my breast pocket.
"Hmm..."
Even as I made my way out of the cave, the eerie energy lingering around me didn't dissipate.
In the game, the line 'A spine-chilling dread washed over you' was just text on a screen, so I hadn't felt it. But experiencing it in reality was a different story.
This is actually pretty terrifying...
Surely, it was just my imagination.
I reached the waterfall that served as the cave's entrance. I stowed the lamp back in my bag and leapt through the curtain of water.
Thud.
My feet landed solidly on the ground, just as before.
Finally, this ordeal is over.
With that thought, I raised my head, but...
...I suddenly saw something impossible.
A 'person' was staring at me, their face mere inches from mine.
It was a woman.
Long, flowing hair as dark as ink.
Mystical purple eyes were staring intently at me.
Her dress, which revealed a deep cleavage, appeared to be of Eastern design.
But looking closer, her body was semi-transparent.
In fact, her lower half was almost entirely translucent.
She was clearly not a living human.
At last, the woman who had been silently observing me parted her lips.
"Why... do you seek to take... the precious possession of the deceased...?"
Her voice, delivered in a somewhat hesitant tone, did not come from the space in front of me. Instead, it echoed directly inside my head.
The white bandage covering my eyes, the Blindfold That Pierces the Truth...
...seemed to have literally pierced through a boundary that should never have been crossed.
Her name was Sierra.
She looked exactly as she had in life.
My 'fake' master, and the very soul destined to be sealed within my Demon Blade.