First Meeting (9)
The training grounds inside the mansion had originally been prepared for Yuki, but the one who had brought us here today was certainly not acting on her wishes.
Silver hair whipping behind her, Duchess Elena strode forward with steps so heavy the floor tiles seemed to scream beneath her boots.
Yuki, trailing behind her, already looked half out of her mind.
“Ian… have you lost your mind? Why would you say something like that? Mother… Mother really will cut you down!”
“My lady, the stage is already set. Stop worrying about me and focus on breathing properly.”
I answered calmly and rolled up my shirt sleeves.
Behind us, Kara, Mili, and even the mansion’s maids had gathered into a massive crowd of spectators.
At the center of the training grounds, Duchess Elena tossed two wooden training swords onto the ground.
“Pick it up. I will personally confirm exactly what this ‘strength’ you spoke of truly is.”
I slowly reached down and lifted one of the wooden swords. My movements were no longer the limp, swaying gestures I usually showed.
The moment my fingers closed around the hilt, every joint and muscle in my body aligned into perfect lines of efficiency.
“Oh?”
Elena’s eyes narrowed. She had seen it. The instant I gripped the sword, the spacing of my feet and the perfect centering of my balance.
With nothing more than a change in posture, she realized the boy before her was no longer some madman.
BOOM—!
Elena kicked off the ground and shot forward. The very spot she had launched from caved inward with a violent crack.
It was a simple straight-line charge, yet the sound of air being torn apart echoed across the entire training grounds.
Even though it was only a training sword, the noise it made slicing through the air was sharper than any real blade.
Shhhk—!
The speed was too fast for an ordinary person to even track with their eyes.
Just as Kara was about to scream—
I tilted my head ever so slightly, letting her blade pass by.
“…!!”
A hair’s breadth.
The tip of Elena’s sword brushed past my cheek, whipping up a fierce gust of wind.
Her follow-up horizontal slash came immediately after. I raised my wooden sword and let her blade slide off mine as I retreated.
Clang—!
A clear, ringing impact echoed through the air.
“……?!”
Everyone present froze on the spot. Just now, Ian had clearly blocked the sword of an Imperial hero. No—more accurately, he had evaded it.
“What… the hell…”
Kara’s jaw dropped. Mili completely dropped the handkerchief she had been clutching.
“Ian… blocked the Duchess’s attack? That Ian? That flimsy paper-thin kid?”
“Ian—!!”
Yuki’s cry, laced with relief, rang across the training grounds.
“……You read it?”
Surprise flickered in Elena’s eyes.
I gently massaged my slightly numb wrist.
Even though it had only been wood striking wood, the heavy impact that traveled up my arm felt like being hit by a hammer.
I had deflected it, yet it still nearly shattered my bones. And moreover…
The lines drawn by the Duchess’s sword were not just one.
It was as if dozens of trajectories branched out from a single line.
If I had been even a fraction of a second slower in finding the final line, I would have been cut for certain.
“…Hah.”
A short sigh settled heavily over the training grounds.
Elena von Kastel stood still, staring down at the tip of her wooden sword.
Along the blade, a faint friction mark followed the exact path where I had deflected her strike.
That single exchange.
Even though it had been a training sword, her swing had carried the clear intent to kill.
Her blade had already carved its way through countless battlefields where thousands of demons had fallen.
It was a sword art meant to sever the lives of enemies, fundamentally unsuited for sparring.
And yet, an unnamed village boy had read its trajectory and deflected it.
“Interesting.”
“It was… merely luck.”
“No. You clearly read the endpoint of my sword path and twisted your body to avoid it.”
I hid my trembling wrist behind my back as I answered. Sweat dripped from my chin and soaked the ground.
“The Kastel sword style is one of domination. It does not evade or block. It crushes and destroys.”
Duchess Elena’s voice dropped low.
“You called it luck? The moment you read the first move of my sword art and deflected it, that word no longer applies.”
Elena adjusted her grip on the wooden sword.
The moment she changed her stance, the entire atmosphere of the training grounds shifted.
If before it had been the calm before a storm, now it felt like an entire mountain range was collapsing down onto my head.
A thin smile formed on Elena’s lips.
It was the cruel and ecstatic smile of a predator who had encountered a new prey after surviving countless battlefields.
“Yuki, I finally understand why you have been summoning this boy every night.”
“M-Mother… that’s…”
Yuki couldn’t continue.
The most shaken of all was Yuki herself. She had known Ian was strong.
She knew he possessed the insight and skill to teach her. But she had never imagined it would be to this degree. To cross blades with her mother, the hero of the Empire.
So what he had been teaching me… was only the tip of the iceberg?
She watched us with a complicated expression, unable to tell whether she was terrified by the situation or delighted that her teacher’s ability was being acknowledged by her mother.
“I’m coming again, boy. This time I will not treat you like a mere foot soldier.”
Elena lowered her stance.
In that instant, it felt as though the temperature of the training grounds had plummeted.
The aura she radiated took shape, surging toward me like the phantom of a massive wolf.
KWAAAANG—!
The floor tiles screamed as fragments exploded outward.
This charge was on an entirely different level from the previous one. Elena’s figure vanished from my sight.
I instinctively swung my wooden sword behind me.
Crack—!
Sparks flew from behind my back.
Somehow Elena had already circled behind me, her sword aimed at the back of my head.
I used the recoil to spin my body and thrust toward her abdomen.
Shortest distance. Minimal movement. The only line I could draw was visible.
But Elena sneered, swatting the tip of my sword aside and closing in.
“Excellent senses. But your experience is lacking!”
Her shoulder slammed into my chest.
Urk!
The breath was knocked out of me as my body lifted into the air.
I desperately tried to create distance with a mid-air roll, but Elena stuck to me like a shadow, right in front of my face.
The spectators filling the training grounds could no longer even scream.
Kara stood with her mouth agape, while Mili clutched both hands tightly, trembling violently.
Clack! Clack-clack! Clack—!
The sound of wooden swords clashing filled the air. My wrists had already gone completely numb.
The raw strength of an Imperial hero was nothing short of catastrophic.
Even when I tried to deflect her blows with technique, the destructive power beneath them crushed against my fragile bones.
I can’t hold on anymore.
I swallowed the blood pooling in my mouth.
A peaceful daily life? That ship had already sailed.
The only thing I could do now was land at least one solid blow on this woman.
The fragments rolling across the training ground floor passed through my vision in slow motion.
Elena von Kastel.
She was a massive tidal wave, and I was nothing more than a rickety raft desperately trying to stay afloat before it.
But even a raft knows how to ride the waves.
The moment I dove into her range, Elena’s pupils widened dramatically.
It was the most efficient and brutal mutual destruction tactic one could see on a battlefield—aiming for the opponent’s vital point even while knowing your own bones would shatter.
“Suicidal fool!”
Elena’s cold rebuke struck my ears.
The hero of the Empire showed no mercy.
She twisted her upper body to the side, then used the momentum to swing her pivoting leg.
THUD—!
A heavy impact slammed into my abdomen. My upper body folded as my mouth flew open.
With a dull sound, my body crumpled forward.
“Urgh—!”
Right before I was sent flying, my folded upper body brought me close to her ribcage.
The tip of my wooden sword drew the shortest straight line toward Elena’s heart.
To draw this momentary line, I had chosen death.
At the same time, my body was sent flying like a sheet of paper, tumbling across the training ground floor.
Roll, roll.
The cold, hard sensation of the floor tiles spread through my entire body. My vision shook, and the metallic stench of blood filled my mouth.
“Ian—!!”
Yuki’s scream tore through the training grounds.
As the cloud of dust slowly cleared, I was revealed leaning against the wall, gasping for breath.
The wooden sword in my hand had already shattered, leaving only the hilt.
“……Complete defeat.”
I muttered weakly. As expected, winning against an Imperial hero had been impossible. No, from the very beginning, the difference in weight class had been too vast.
But Elena was not wearing the expression of a victor.
“……?!”
Elena’s eyes widened in shock. The Duchess stood frozen in place, staring down at her own chest.
She remained completely still, gazing at the exact spot where the tip of Ian’s wooden sword had grazed past.
Tiny wooden shavings from the training sword clung faintly to her white ceremonial uniform.
…The tip of the wooden sword had brushed her collar.
If it had been a real blade, and if the boy had possessed even slightly more physical strength, a shallow cut would have been left on her chest.
“That’s enough.”
With Elena’s quiet declaration, the storm over the training grounds finally ceased.
“……”
Elena slowly raised her head and looked at me leaning against the wall. Both of my arms were trembling uncontrollably.
“Ian! Ian, snap out of it!”
Yuki was the first to rush over and support me. The moment her hands grabbed my shoulders, I could feel her violent trembling.
Yuki was shaking.
Not from fear of her mother, but from the terror that I might have actually died.
Idiot.
“My lady… I’ll send the bill for the clothes later…”
“Stop saying stupid things! Is that really what you’re worried about right now?!”
Tears welled up in Yuki’s eyes. Behind her, Kara and Mili approached with completely dazed expressions.
“……”
Elena’s gaze remained fixed on the shattered fragments of the wooden sword scattered across the floor and on me, battered and leaning against the wall.
“Move aside, Yuki.”
At Elena’s low command, Yuki flinched and hugged me even tighter.
“Mother. Ian… Ian did nothing wrong! I was the one who forced him!”
“I said move.”
Unable to resist her mother’s aura, Yuki reluctantly stepped aside.
The hero of the Empire approached until she stood right in front of me. She lightly kicked one of the broken pieces of the wooden sword on the ground.
“Yuki. Just how much did you know about this boy’s true ability?”
“That’s… I knew he was much stronger than me, but…”
“No. It is not at that level.”
Elena slowly walked toward me.
Ah, I really can’t hold on any longer.
“In that fleeting instant, you were not a commoner boy. You were a shura trying to cut me down. That strike you delivered even while accepting the shattering of your own ribs—it was the kind of gamble one only sees on the battlefield.”
“I simply didn’t want to get hit, so I dodged. My body moved on its own because I thought I was going to die.”
“Boy. No… Ian. Where did you learn the sword? Whose disciple are you? That efficient footwork and those perfectly economical trajectories do not belong to any school in the Empire.”
“…You may not believe me, but I am self-taught. Really. I swear.”
Elena picked up the shattered hilt of my wooden sword and let out a small chuckle.
“You are weak. Your physical strength, your mana reserves, and your bodily condition are all below average. However, your technique—and the way you apply that technique in real combat—has already reached the realm of a master.”
She slowly rose to her feet and glanced at the spectators gathered at the edge of the training grounds. Kara and Mili had frozen solid like statues.
“Carry Ian to the inner quarters. Call the family’s personal healer and give him the best treatment until he fully recovers. And furthermore…”
Ah, I really can’t hold on anymore. I’m done for.
“…I-Ian!!”
I wonder if Mili will be the one to prepare the flowers for my funeral.