He Who Could Not Take Up the Sword
The first memory etched into my mind was my father's stern face.
He sat me, fresh off my first wobbly steps, upon his knee and said:
"You shall become the most noble knight in the Empire."
The most noble knight. It was a phrase that described me—and our family as well.
"As a knight of Aramis, you will take up the sword and guard His Majesty the Emperor and the Empire. That is the destiny we must bear for all eternity, and our rightful duty."
Successor of the Sword Saint. Progenitor of all knights. An ancient and storied noble house. A duchy standing above all men save one—the Sword of the Empire.
Beyond these, the titles that adorned our house were as long and illustrious as its fame. And just as my father had said in my childhood, every last one of them was a destiny I was meant to shoulder as a matter of course.
Then, at the age of eight, I set foot in the family vault for the very first time.
"This is our duty."
At the heart of the vault, driven point-down into an altar, stood an old sword that seemed steeped in the passage of centuries.
Amid mountains of treasure and hoarded gold and silver, the blade's plainness stood out all the more starkly. At a glance, it looked like any battered longsword one might dig out of a common smithy.
And yet I found myself captivated by it, if only for a moment.
The jewels I had been gaping at mere moments before were already forgotten. To dismiss it as nothing more than a dilapidated old sword—how could that possibly be all it was?
The sacred heirloom passed down through generations of the house since the age of the Sword Saint. A holy relic feared even by the demons of Hell—a Divine Relic that burned away corruption and shifted its form at will, a sacred blade wreathed in flames that never extinguished, even in the deepest abyss.
Prominence, the Brightest Flame.
That was the sword's name.
"Every man of our house has taken up this sword at the age of fourteen."
Beyond my stunned, unblinking stare at the blade, I could hear the pride spilling rich and thick from my father's voice.
"I did, and my father before me, and his fathers before him. In such a way did we crush evil, bring order to the world, and shake the far reaches of the continent with the name of Aramis."
My father chuckled as he watched me, unable to tear my eyes from the altar. Then he stroked my head gently and said:
"You, too, shall do the same. Of course you will."
Even the famed legendary blades of the world were mere kitchen knives before Prominence.
Only one who inherited the sword had any right to be called heir of Aramis, yet not a single soul in the family considered this harsh in the slightest.
As my father said, every man of the house had inherited the sword at fourteen. That my turn would come next was a certainty so obvious it needed no voicing—the natural order of things.
What followed was a grueling stretch of days devoted to training upon training.
Even as a child, I rose before the sun and did not set the sword down until long after it had set, and as heir to a great house, I was schooled in every refinement besides. Save for the hours I slept or knelt in prayer to the Lord, I did not permit myself a moment's true rest for years on end.
That said, it would be a lie to claim the arrogance peculiar to a noble young heir—one who took wealth and glory as his natural due—played no part in it.
More than anything, back then I was laying my destiny at my own feet as though it were nothing more than my birthright.
But I could swear upon my life that not once, not for a single instant, did I ever slack in my efforts to prove myself worthy of becoming the Sword's Successor.
And as though to reward that effort, I was achieving faster results than any heir the family had ever produced.
"A genius unlike any Aramis has seen in generations."
Even the most celebrated sword masters of the Imperial Capital soon found themselves hard-pressed to match me. The family's knights, renowned for their valor, would click their tongues in weary resignation after crossing blades with me.
"I daresay, my lord, that even the Sword Saint never achieved so much at your age."
For a man like the Duke of Aramis, distinguishing flattery from sincerity was an effortless task.
Day after day, the awe-struck praise kept coming, and each time, my father's face grew a little more pleased.
The servants of the house would chorus songs praising the young lord of Aramis. My mother, a luminary of the Imperial Capital's high society, shrieked with delight over the marriage proposals that flooded in for me daily.
Her joy reached its zenith the day the imperial letter arrived, bearing a proposal of betrothal to the Imperial Princess.
Disturbing tidings had been mounting day after day beyond the capital and along the frontier, but within the walls of the duchy, at least, everyone was happy.
They believed, without a shadow of doubt, that the new Successor of Prominence would soon rise to quell all evil and restore peace to the Empire.
And time flowed ever faster, until at last my fourteenth birthday arrived.
"Young master—the day is finally here."
I had just finished the ritual purification bath before the Succession Ceremony of Prominence.
Old Konrad, the head butler and the most trusted retainer of the house, approached with a warm chuckle and offered his words.
"This old servant believes, with all his heart, that the young master shall become a great knight whose name will resound across the entire continent."
It wasn't only Konrad—everyone in the house thought the same.
The lowliest guard at the gate thought so, and I, naturally, thought so too.
I drained the warmed wine the butler handed me with a flourish and made straight for the family vault.
Seeing the Divine Relic for the first time in six years, it still stood guard over its altar, magnificent and aloof.
The moment I thought that sword would soon be in my hand, pride and ambition swelled to fill my chest to bursting. I could already picture it—myself swinging the blade wreathed in sacred flame, valiantly cleaving through demon beasts and fiends alike.
And then, with my father watching, I began at last to climb the steps of the altar where Prominence waited.
That great sword, heaped with legend and glory since the age of the Sword Saint, was now before my very eyes. Straining to contain my pounding heart, I reached out a trembling hand.
But the sword did not leave the altar.
-Crack!
"Ah…?"
A dazed groan escaped my lips. An unpleasant numbness crawled up from my fingertips, stirring a nameless dread.
It did not take me long to understand: Prominence had refused my succession.
A thick, suffocating silence settled over the room. Then came my father's voice, heavy with unmistakable disappointment, boring into my ears.
"…The ceremony will be postponed by one month. Train harder."
-Boom!
With the thunder of the massive iron doors closing, I was left utterly alone in the vault.
I had never once imagined a situation like this, not even in my dreams. Faced with the first setback of my life, my head sank helplessly toward the floor.
But I soon clenched my teeth and forced myself upright again.
I would be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed, but this was no trial severe enough to break me. Something must have been lacking—no, perhaps I had been too perfect, and therein lay the flaw.
If I tempered myself further through the remaining month, then surely, surely the sword would choose me.
With that resolve, I steeled myself and turned to leave—but not before casting one last glance at Prominence atop the altar.
The sword simply stood there, proud and unmoved, exactly where it had always been.
***
Regrettably, the moment I had envisioned never came.
The second ceremony, held a month later, produced precisely the same result as the first.
Once again, the sword had rejected me.
"What, in God's name, have you been doing all this while? I told you plainly to train harder—"
Even in my father's rebuke, I could now detect the faintest flicker of anger smoldering beneath the surface.
"The ceremony is postponed another two months. I have allowed you twice the time as before. Steady your heart, and see this done."
"…"
My head sank even lower than before. It took many times the effort to gather my resolve again.
And two months later, nothing had changed.
"Why—why in the world—!"
Forget the glory of succession; the only thing I gained was my father's furious roar.
"…I will grant you half a year. The succession must not, on any account, pass beyond this year. You will carve your father's words into your heart and obey. Do you understand me?"
Time flowed with excruciating slowness. Only after carving away two more seasons of bone-deep effort could I stand before the altar again.
But the sword rejected me still.
"So you would drag the name of our house through the mud!! Have you truly been training at all? For if not—!"
The rage of the first year.
"O Sword Saint, watch over your descendants, I beg of you…"
The desolation of the second year.
"…There will be no next time."
And within a father's voice stripped down to pure resignation, I found myself facing the third year, having still failed to inherit the sword.
"This is the last chance you will be given. Know that well."
My father's voice, empty of both anger and expectation, was somehow the most terrifying of all. In the centuries of Aramis history, I was the only one who had reached this age without inheriting the blade.
The arrogance and confidence of the beginning had long since vanished. All the glory and destiny I had once taken for granted had receded into the far distance.
Now they merely shimmered on the other side of a gulf no outstretched hand could ever cross.
What tormented me above all was that I could not even begin to fathom why I was being rejected.
I drank rare elixirs like water at every meal and swung the sword without a trace of laziness. I sacrificed sleep to commit the scriptures to memory, and I prayed daily for forgiveness of sins I could not even remember committing.
And still, Prominence kept pushing me away. Only one fact was certain:
That I was a perfect, utter failure—one step away from hitting rock bottom.
And at last, the final ceremony my father had sworn upon arrived.
"It will be all right, young master. This time, for certain—"
The old butler's hollow comfort merely circled my ears and scattered. I forced a smile for him and dragged my heavy feet toward the vault.
The once bright, lively air of the household was now thick with dark, brooding clouds.
"Y-young master."
The maids I passed in the corridor bowed their heads deep and scurried past, busily whispering among themselves.
The admiration they'd once held for the young master with such a bright future, the praise that had once made them blush—it had long since curdled into something resembling wary distaste.
It wasn't that I couldn't understand them.
The world was desperate for the birth of a hero.
Evil of every kind was running rampant on all sides, growing bolder with each passing day, and the only hope capable of quelling that darkness was Prominence.
And that hope had foundered before it was ever born.
"…"
I forced myself to ignore the murmurs and turned away, gritting out a vow to myself: this time, without fail, I would be chosen by the sword—I would flatten their noses and make them all pay for daring to look down on their master.
And as inevitably as night follows day, the sword refused me once more.
***
That night, a violent storm broke over the estate. Having disgraced myself at the succession yet again, I was nonetheless running through my mechanical training drills the very same day.
Thus it was that I found myself trudging down a dark corridor, my body battered and spent as always.
A faint murmur of voices stopped me in my tracks.
Dim light leaked from the narrow gap of my parents' bedchamber door. As though spellbound, I drifted silently toward it and peered inside.
"That is not my son."
Even over the pounding rain, their voices carried with terrible clarity.
"This can't be happening. This cannot be…!"
My father sat slumped in his chair, head bowed low, clawing at his hair with both hands as he groaned the words out.
"If he were truly my son, this could not be happening. How can the heir of Aramis be seventeen years of age and still unable to draw the sword…!"
"Are you saying I was unfaithful, then?!"
"Not once in all of history has a successor been rejected by Prominence!! He should have drawn the sword long ago and announced the succession to the whole world! Unless God himself has forsaken us, how could—!"
"…"
It felt as though a stone had lodged itself in my chest. I couldn't breathe.
My father's anguished cries, my mother's tear-soaked screams—all of it stemmed from me. Even the tenderness between those two, once so devoted to each other, was being torn apart by my doing.
"…There is nothing more to be done. Three years have passed. Concealing it any longer is impossible."
My father heaved a heavy sigh after his outburst and continued in an exhausted voice.
"We can only silence the servants for so long. Next year is when that child enters the Imperial Academy. By then, the entire Empire will know that the heir of Aramis failed to inherit Prominence."
"And what of it? You say it as though it were some new catastrophe."
"You truly don't see? All of our wealth, our honor, our glory—every last bit of it flows from that sword. What happens when our situation is exposed to the world? When it becomes known that the heir of our house was cast aside by Prominence itself?"
At his mother's murmured indifference, the Duke pressed on, his voice hardening.
"Do you imagine our rivals are few? The prestige of Aramis would plummet beyond all recovery. The betrothal to the royal family would be the least of our losses—we could forfeit our very standing, forever…!"
Only then did the color drain from my mother's face.
She had wavered somewhat of late amid the rumors surrounding me, but she remained one of the most powerful figures in the capital's high society. For a woman who relished being the center of every eye, my father's words amounted to a death sentence.
Then he lowered his voice even further.
"…I recently visited the slums."
There was something strange threaded through his voice—a resolve, a grim determination. In that instant, a shadow of foreboding coiled around my whole body. Something that must never, ever happen was happening, right now, through his mouth.
The urge to cover my ears surged up, and I bit down hard on my tongue to smother it. Praying my instinct was wrong, I waited, desperately, for my father's next words.
But sadly, sad premonitions are never wrong.
"There, I happened upon a child with a compatible aptitude. And a considerable one, at that. If we were to bring that child here and raise them up as the Successor of Prominence—!"
My eyes squeezed shut of their own accord. Then came my mother's scream, piercing straight through my eardrums.
"Have you lost your mind?! Then what of my own child—!"
"It is the only way! We have but a few months left! Are you truly prepared to throw away everything you hold in your hands?"
My father pressed her, his voice rising.
"Can you not see? This is providence. God has sent down the final lifeline to save our house."
"B-but…"
"Think of the future of our house, my lady. I beg you."
What had crashed down upon me, without warning, was a nightmare far too cruel for a boy of sixteen to bear. The only thing left for me to cling to was the last remaining thread of my mother's tenderness.
My mother, who had been gnawing at her lip, finally spoke in a trembling voice.
"Then… what of our child?"
"…It will be hard on him, I imagine."
My father stared into empty space for a long moment before murmuring the words, hollow and distant.
"It was a glory that should have been his by rights. To watch with clear eyes as all of it passes into another's hands… no one in this world could bear it."
His head dropped toward the floor. From between his tightly clenched teeth came a voice, halting and broken.
"If the succession succeeds by this method… then at the very least, I will see to it that the end is painless…"
"Ah…"
My mother staggered and collapsed onto the sofa, burying her face in her hands. She sobbed into her palms for a long while before finally forcing out the words in a voice worn down to nothing.
"…Do as you must."
It was the moment the last of my hopes crumbled to dust. At the very end of it all, my parents had chosen the family's glory over their own child.
I could no longer hear their conversation. That boy of the past, exhausted beyond all endurance, no longer had any strength left to endure what he was hearing.
Before I knew it, I had turned on my heel and was running down the corridor I had come by, silent as the dead. Even at the corridor's end, my flight did not stop.
Casting aside every destiny and duty given to me, I fled the house of Aramis forever.
On the night of my sixteenth birthday, beneath pouring rain and splitting lightning.