The Chosen One (1)
"W-why is this here…?"
Kenis stared at the violet sword in her hands, her expression dazed. Had none of it been a dream? That vast being of light, the inn—had all of it been real?
Bang!
The door slammed open and someone burst inside.
"Trainee Holy Knight Kenis!"
Demonic strode toward her, his silver hair whipping wildly behind him.
"Trainee Holy Knight Kenis! Are you with us? Your body is all right, I trust? Do you recognize me?"
He seized her by the shoulders and poured out the words without pause. Kenis could only look up at him, still half-bewildered.
"…Huh? Uh, y-yes…? Paladin Demonic?"
"Yes, it's me. Thank the gods you know who I am! Is there any part of you that won't move?"
Only then did Demonic notice the priests waiting awkwardly behind him. He stepped back from Kenis at once.
"…Ahem. Forgive me. Attend to your business."
He cleared his throat and fixed his gaze on the ceiling. Kenis thought his face looked a little red—though that might have been her imagination.
"Yes, of course…. Er, Trainee Holy Knight Kenis? But that sword…?"
"Ah—this one?"
The priest approaching her pointed at the blade. A bedridden patient holding a greatsword, and no one had noticed until now. Demonic's fussing had stolen everyone's attention.
"This is… a sword the god Himself gave me, when I met Him in a dream."
Kenis lifted the blade carefully as she answered. A critically injured patient raising a greatsword as tall as herself with one hand, as if it weighed nothing.
"What? From the god?"
"Ohhh!! Given by the god Himself! Then it is nothing less than a divine sword!!"
Demonic, who had been standing in the corner, hurried back to Kenis and examined the weapon. A massive blade that caught the light and shone with violet radiance. The sheer holy power saturating every inch of it made it almost absurd that no one had recognized it at a glance.
The sword itself is pouring out tremendous holy power…. Is something like this even possible?
Demonic had served as a paladin long enough to encounter many of the Pantheon's sacred relics. But a holy relic that radiated holy power of its own… he had never seen one.
A treasure of this caliber…
Everyone who looked upon the sword understood at once. This was a blade bestowed by a god—and the god they had been searching for had not abandoned the earth.
"He is… worried for the world below, thrown into chaos by evil."
Kenis spoke calmly. Every person in the room hung on her words. To hear the god's own message from one who had stood before Him—it was the honor of a lifetime.
"He took pity on this troubled world and descended from the heavens to the earth, to watch over us. And He said He would choose His own representatives and send them forth upon the land. I am the first of those representatives."
"Ahh! What a glorious thing! Ahhh!"
"Such a blessed occasion! We pray, we give praise!"
The priests dropped to their knees, tracing the holy sign and praying in a frenzy. Demonic, too, made the sign and murmured a prayer under his breath.
Not a soul doubted Kenis's words. Anyone with eyes and ears would have known the truth the moment they saw her sword.
It was a truly sacred divine blade—and Kenis was the hero chosen by a god.
Once the commotion settled, Demonic sat facing Kenis. The atmosphere had grown heavy. Both of them knew what the other was about to say… but beginnings are always the hardest part.
"…Um, Paladin Demonic? M-may I ask you something?"
Kenis kept her eyes on the floor, her voice trembling. Demonic answered with steady calm.
"Of course. What do you wish to know?"
"…Hah. Senior Cale and Mister Hans, who went into the dungeon with me…. What happened to them?"
Demonic looked into the golden eyes raised toward him—eyes still clinging to a sliver of hope. He found himself looking away as he answered.
"Those two… have been transferred to Civitas, where the Pantheon stands. The Lich's energy… sank in rather deep. They still look the same as when we found them."
For Kenis's sake, Demonic softened the truth as much as he could—that they were still frozen solid. Kenis's pupils trembled. She already knew the answer.
"Ah… then c-can they… w-wake up…?"
"I cannot say for certain. But a letter analyzing their condition should arrive from the Pantheon soon enough, so don't worry. There will be some way."
"I-I see…. It's a relief that a letter is coming from the Pantheon…."
Kenis let out a breath—then suddenly wondered why a letter would already be on its way.
"By any chance… how long have I been lying here…?"
"Hmm. Counting today, roughly eight days."
"What?! Eight whole days? Th-that can't be."
It had felt as though she had woken almost at once. She had closed her eyes and opened them eight days later. Kenis stared up at Demonic, unable to hide her shock.
"Ahem. Trainee Holy Knight Kenis. Do you know what condition you're in?"
"Pardon? You mean my physical condition?"
"No—not your body. You don't seem to know. Excuse me a moment."
Demonic reached behind the seated Kenis and carefully took hold of her hair.
"Huh?!"
Her hair had once burned a vivid red—but the tips were dyed blue, as if only the ends had frozen solid.
"P-Paladin Demonic. W-what on earth is this…!!"
Kenis was a trainee holy knight, stronger and more devout than most her age. But in the end, she was still a girl in the flower of her youth. To a girl, her hair was life itself.
She rubbed the blue-tinted strands between her fingers, her whole body trembling.
"Th-th-this is—what is this!!"
"Calm yourself, Trainee Holy Knight Kenis. Calm down."
"Hss—haah. Hss—haah…. I-I'm all right now."
Kenis could say without hesitation that she had never been so flustered in her life—except for the time she had watched someone crack a monster's skull open with a rock-hard frozen loaf of bread up north.
"You were exposed directly to the Lich's mana, and your hair changed as a result. You should count yourself extraordinarily lucky that it stopped at this."
"That can't be…."
"Even if you cut it, the ends will turn the same color again. The mana affected your body directly, so cutting it off will do no good."
"A-ahh—!"
A death sentence delivered to a despairing Kenis.
"Kyaaaaaaaah——!!"
"Hmm. I'll take my leave. Recover well."
Demonic left the room with the despairing girl's scream at his back. Kenis had met a god in person, received a sword, and been named His representative. This was no mere trace of the divine—the god Himself had been confirmed.
He would need to move quickly if he was going to write the report for the Pantheon.
At the scream still ringing behind him, Demonic allowed himself a faint smile.
Heh. That part of her is just like her mother.
She usually carried herself like a man, bold and brash—who would have guessed she fretted so much over her appearance? Honestly, who did she take after?
Demonic walked toward his office, old memories drifting faintly to the surface.
For a while after that, Kenis was forced to stay in bed without so much as twitching. She felt perfectly fine—why was everyone so worried?
Her hands had been itching to swing that sword the whole time, so the moment she could, she sprang out of bed.
"Kenis! Take it easy! You promised, remember?"
"Yes, I'll only do a little—don't worry!"
The attending priest's scolding trailed after her as she bolted out. Kenis answered halfheartedly, grabbed her sword, and ran for the training grounds.
Under the sunlight, the violet divine blade was as massive as Kenis herself—yet she could swing it without the slightest difficulty.
This, too, must be a miracle of the god.
She cut through the empty air a few times, feeling out the balance and the reach of the blade.
Whoosh—
Swish!
A strike that sliced the air clean. The sound was anything but ordinary.
"Mm. About like this, then?"
Kenis nodded and turned to face a training dummy set against one side of the grounds.
"Hup!"
Whoooom
She fed a light thread of holy power into the blade—and the divine sword blazed with dazzling light.
"Huh? What?"
Startled, Kenis instinctively cut off the flow. She had poured in a grain of holy power, and the entire sword had been engulfed. The amplification was absurd.
"Paladin Demonic said the sword itself produces holy power…. Is this related to that?"
Amplifying holy power this much. A mischievous idea suddenly struck her.
What if I pour in all of my holy power?
Kenis was not one to leave a curiosity untested. She acted at once.
"Hup!"
She poured every last drop of her holy power into the sword.
Whoooom—
The blade shuddered and shook violently, growing brighter and brighter, taking on a look that was far from ordinary. Still Kenis forced more power into it, and—
Woom—! Woom—! Woom—!
The light around the sword flickered madly, swelling larger and larger. The beam stretching forward began to flash with a dangerous brilliance.
"W-wait?! Why is it doing this!!"
Only then did Kenis sense that something was badly wrong. She cut the holy power at once—but the blade kept lengthening, showing no sign of stopping.
Fear seized her. Instinctively she turned the tip toward the sky, and the holy power that had slipped free of all control went wild.
Whoooooom——
KRAAAAAAASH——!!!
A pillar of light erupted from Kenis's hands. The sword, which had received every grain of her holy power without waste and amplified it, fired a dazzling column of light skyward along its edge.
"…"
The double-helix pillar of light punched through the clouds and climbed—and then,
KRAAAAAAASH——!!
As if it meant to burst the sun itself, it exploded in midair into a sphere of searing light. For a moment two suns seemed to hang in the sky, blazing.
Clang-clang-clang-clang!!
"Kyaaak!!"
"Enemy attack!!"
"It came from the direction of the temple! Everyone move!"
"Mama!! Mama!!"
The city erupted into chaos at the sudden, colossal explosion.
"Ha… ha…."
Kenis looked down at the sword with the expression of someone whose soul had left her body, and let out a hollow laugh. In the distance, Paladin Demonic and the priests were already running toward her. Armed soldiers were pouring in from the city.
I'm dead….
Watching them come, Kenis finally
stopped thinking altogether.