The Sword Saint Arrives
The Sword Saint came.
“Was it really Leon Arden’s younger brother?”
A silver-haired woman standing at the door asked.
I was momentarily speechless.
It wasn’t because of her appearance.
Of course, she was strikingly beautiful.
Silver-white hair.
Faint blue-gray eyes.
Silver armor visible beneath her travel cloak.
It wasn’t much different from the image I had seen at the victory ceremony.
The issue was something else.
‘…What is this?’
My ability sensed something off about her state.
I could immediately tell she wasn’t in good condition.
But it wasn’t just simple fatigue.
It felt like something long-suppressed remained inside her.
Just standing close made my breathing feel heavy.
“Evan?”
Liana called from behind me.
“Yeah.”
“Why are you spacing out?”
“No.”
I snapped back to attention.
“Correct.”
Cecilia’s gaze lingered briefly on my face.
Eyes.
Head.
Jawline.
Checking each one.
It wasn’t strange.
We were brothers.
Evan and Leon resembled each other quite a bit.
Rather, what was concerning was Cecilia’s side.
Faint shadows under her eyes.
Slightly dry lips.
Dust clinging to the hem of her cloak.
If she had ridden here, she must have been tired.
It hadn’t been long since the war ended.
On top of that, her brother had suddenly disappeared.
That alone was reason enough for her not to be in good shape.
“Please, come in.”
Cecilia hesitated for a moment.
“Coming all this way unannounced is unforgivable.”
“You came all the way to the door, so leaving you outside would be stranger.”
“I didn’t make an appointment.”
“It’s fine. There aren’t many guests here anyway.”
Liana said from behind.
“Why are you boasting about that?”
“Because it’s true.”
Cecilia’s gaze shifted to Liana.
I stepped aside.
“Please, come in.”
“I’ll be imposing on you.”
Cecilia entered the house.
The moment she passed, there was a faint metallic clink.
Clack.
It was the armor.
I asked casually.
“You’ve been wearing armor the entire journey?”
Cecilia looked at me.
“Yes.”
“It must have taken about four days to get here.”
“It was that much.”
“Doesn’t it get uncomfortable?”
“It’s familiar.”
Liana poked my side from the side.
“Why?”
“As soon as the guest comes in, you check the armor first?”
“Just curious.”
“It’s not like your face.”
Got caught.
I kept my mouth shut.
The words ‘familiar’ and ‘okay’ seemed different.
For now, I decided to let it go.
“I’ll bring the tea.”
Liana said.
Cecilia lowered her head.
“I appreciate it.”
I led Cecilia to the living room.
She didn’t sit immediately.
Old sofa.
Small landscape painting on the wall.
Flower pot by the window.
Display cabinet.
She slowly scanned the room.
“This is where Leon grew up.”
“Yes.”
“Since birth?”
“Almost.”
“Have you been to the capital?”
“Sometimes. Still, the time spent here is much longer.”
Cecilia nodded quietly.
Her demeanor relaxed a little.
It was less suffocating than when she stood at the door.
‘Does this house itself help?’
I didn’t know if it was because it was related to my brother.
Cecilia went to the display cabinet.
Inside was an old wooden sword.
“What is this?”
I went over.
“This is the one my brother first used.”
Cecilia stared at the sword for a long time.
It was small.
It would look like a toy in Leon’s hands now.
“Did Leon really use this?”
“It wasn’t this big from the beginning.”
Cecilia was silent for a moment.
“…Of course.”
Her finger traced the sword through the glass.
“It seems odd.”
“What?”
“The Leon I know was already an adult.”
I understood a bit.
Cecilia had met the grown Leon, the hero.
He wielded the sword well.
Led people.
Fought the Demon King’s army.
The child who ran around with this sword was unknown to her.
I opened the display cabinet and took out the sword.
“Would you like to see it?”
Cecilia hesitated briefly before taking it.
When I put it in her hand, it looked even smaller.
She examined the handle.
“Any scratches here?”
“Scratches?”
I looked closer.
There were marks like bite marks.
“Ah.”
Memories came back faintly.
“It seemed like Leon asked about it.”
Cecilia raised her head.
“The sword?”
“It’s not a real sword, right?”
“Is that important?”
“It is.”
Liana, who had brought the tea, jumped in.
“Evan tried to take it.”
I looked at Liana.
“Me?”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t remember?”
“Leon-ssi was holding it saying he was practicing, and you pulled it saying it’s your turn.”
“So that’s why Leon asked?”
“To not be taken away.”
“I couldn’t have just stood there if I couldn’t take it.”
Liana laughed.
“So both of you got scolded by Father.”
“That’s memorable.”
“You remember selectively.”
“You only remember important things.”
“The things you got right are important, and the things I tried to stop aren’t?”
I was silent for a moment.
“Did I get it right?”
“See? You don’t remember that either.”
“Then it wasn’t that important.”
“Truly amazing memory.”
Cecilia looked down at the sword.
The corners of her mouth lifted slightly.
“Leon bit the sword.”
“Yeah.”
“That Leon.”
Liana laughed and set down the teacup.
“Both of them were kids.”
Cecilia said quietly.
“I know.”
She stared at the sword for a while.
“But I can’t imagine it well.”
The voice was a bit softer than before.
It seemed like talking about my brother helped.
I put the sword back in the display cabinet.
“Please sit.”
Cecilia sat down.
Liana served the tea.
“Here you go.”
“Thank you.”
Cecilia took a sip.
I asked.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Tea.”
Cecilia looked at me briefly.
“…Tea is fine too.”
Liana laughed.
“Evan has been staring at your condition since earlier.”
“It wasn’t that.”
“Right.”
Cecilia looked at her teacup.
“It’s a bit different from the tea in the North.”
I asked.
“Do you drink a lot of tea in the North too?”
“I drink more alcohol than tea.”
I looked at Cecilia.
“Your image changed suddenly.”
“Why?”
“I thought you’d only drink tea.”
Liana said immediately.
“What do you think people are made of.”
Cecilia smiled very faintly.
“Winters are long. Sometimes it’s faster to drink strong alcohol than to sip warm things slowly.”
“The Sword Saint drinks alcohol too?”
“The Sword Saint isn’t a person?”
“It wasn’t that.”
Liana giggled.
“Evan is sometimes really weird.”
Cecilia took another sip of tea.
It was a very trivial conversation.
It was actually easier than before.
A bit later.
Cecilia said.
“I heard you two are engaged.”
Liana laughed immediately.
“Yes.”
“Leon mentioned it.”
I frowned.
“What did my brother say?”
“The younger brother keeps following only the childhood friend.”
“Opposite.”
Liana looked at me.
“What?”
“Brother followed me.”
“My memory is different.”
“I’m the younger brother.”
“I saw both of you.”
“That is.”
Cecilia’s eyes softened a little.
“You seem to remember Leon’s childhood better than Evan.”
Liana laughed.
“Because we spent more time together.”
“Indeed.”
Cecilia’s gaze briefly went between the two of us.
There was no deeper meaning.
Just confirming the old relationship.
Cecilia asked again.
“Was Leon similar even when he was young?”
“In what way?”
“Not being able to just pass by people.”
I thought for a moment.
“It was similar.”
“He was unnecessarily kind.”
Liana laughed.
“If you say it like that, it sounds bad.”
“It’s true.”
Cecilia asked.
“Specifically?”
“I fell into a pond in winter.”
“Leon?”
Reaction came immediately.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Wanting to save a puppy.”
Liana set down her teacup.
“It was a real mess that day.”
Cecilia looked at her.
“You were there too?”
“Yes. The three of us were together.”
I looked at Liana.
“Three?”
“See? You got it wrong already.”
“It’s not important.”
“If I wasn’t there, you would have fallen into the pond too. Not important?”
“You wouldn’t have fallen.”
“You were trying to get in.”
“You don’t remember.”
“So that’s why I don’t trust your memory.”
Cecilia looked back and forth between the two of us.
“So what happened?”
This time Liana answered.
“Leon-ssi pulled out the puppy first, and Evan said he wanted to get in too, so I held him back.”
I tried to recall.
“Really me?”
“Yeah.”
“I liked my brother more than I thought when I was young.”
“You still do.”
“That’s aside.”
Cecilia smiled faintly.
Liana continued.
“Eventually, the adults came and pulled Leon-ssi out, but Leon-ssi said he’s fine and asked to dry the puppy first.”
“Lips blue and trembling.”
I added.
Cecilia lowered her head for a moment.
“Leon-like.”
At that moment, her demeanor relaxed a bit more.
When it came to stories about my brother, it was clear.
I could only know to that extent.
I didn’t need to conclude why now.
Cecilia was silent for a moment then asked.
“Any other stories?”
I looked at Liana.
Liana said.
“Now it’s starting.”
“What?”
“Evan’s brother’s black history.”
“It’s not my black history.”
“Brother’s black history is shared.”
Strange logic.
I thought for a moment.
“The time I was fifteen and confessed and ran away.”
Liana immediately put her hand to her forehead.
“Finally saying that.”
Cecilia’s eyes widened a bit.
“Confession?”
“Yeah.”
“Who?”
“A village girl.”
“Did Leon do it first?”
“No way.”
Liana answered too quickly.
I looked at her.
“Too much for my brother.”
“You said it first.”
Cecilia looked back and forth between the two of us.
“At that time, was Leon not interested in romance?”
I tried to recall.
“It wasn’t that he wasn’t interested.”
Liana said instead.
“He was clueless.”
“Right.”
Cecilia brushed the edge of her teacup with her finger for a moment.
“Even during the war.”
I looked at her.
This time it wasn’t a question.
Cecilia was the first to bring out her own memory.
“Brother?”
“Yeah.”
The corners of her mouth lifted very faintly.
“There were times when I couldn’t notice even if kindness was shown right in front of me.”
Liana giggled.
“That’s the same as when we were young.”
I laughed too.
“How much was it?”
This time I asked.
Cecilia thought for a moment.
“When visiting the village, I received flowers.”
“Brother?”
“Yeah.”
“To a girl?”
“Probably.”
“Probably what?”
“Leon thought it was a thank you for sharing food.”
I put my hand to my forehead.
“That’s a bit harsh.”
Liana looked at me.
“You’re similar.”
“I’m not.”
“Who was the person who saw the flowers as herbs?”
“That was after drying.”
Cecilia smiled faintly while looking at the two of us.
This time the smile was a bit longer.
Only then did I continue with the story I originally wanted to tell.
“Even when Leon was fifteen, he was similar.”
“How?”
“A girl invited us to talk alone at the festival, and I really thought it was for counseling and followed.”
“Counseling?”
“She said she thought there was a problem in the village.”
Cecilia was silent for a moment.
Liana laughed.
“After being confessed to, he was still spacing out for a while.”
I continued.
“He came running to me saying he didn’t know what to say.”
“That woman?”
“Left her there.”
“…Alone?”
“Yeah.”
Cecilia covered her mouth.
The laughter leaked out again.
“Truly unchanged.”
There was a slightly different temperature in that word.
It seemed like the young Leon and the Leon she knew were finally connecting.
The atmosphere in the living room became much lighter than before.
But when the story ended, Cecilia’s demeanor slowly sank again.
It was like the thing she had forgotten while laughing was coming back up.
‘It’s not like this happened because of just one brother in a few days.’
She hadn’t taken off her armor.
She came all the way here on horseback and didn’t seem to want to rest properly.
The teacup in her hand wasn’t nearly empty.
It seemed like something had been accumulating since the war.
It might be close to the final thing on top of the pile after Leon disappeared.
Of course, it was still speculation.
Cecilia set down her teacup.
“Is this room where Leon used to be?”
“It’s not here.”
I pointed to the ceiling.
“The upper floor.”
Cecilia hesitated for a moment.
“May I see?”
“My brother’s room?”
“If it’s rude, it’s fine.”
Liana looked at me.
“It’s not a big deal?”
“True.”
I stood up.
“Let’s go.”
We went upstairs.
After Leon left for the capital, the room was almost the same.
Bed.
Desk.
Small bookshelf.
The wardrobe was mostly empty.
Even though I opened the door, Cecilia didn’t enter immediately.
She stood at the threshold and looked inside for a while.
I went in first.
“Nothing special, right?”
“…Indeed.”
Cecilia slowly entered the room.
“It seems more ordinary than I thought.”
“Brother’s room was always boring.”
Liana said from behind.
“Cleaner than Evan’s room.”
“That’s still true.”
“It’s not boasting.”
Cecilia stood in front of the bookshelf.
She took out an old fairy tale book.
“What is this?”
“This is a book my brother liked.”
“Did Leon read fairy tales?”
“When he was young, he read everything.”
“What is it about?”
I looked at the cover.
“The story of the hero saving the princess.”
Cecilia’s hand stopped for a moment.
Liana laughed softly.
“Eventually, he became a real hero.”
“At that time, he didn’t know he would become himself.”
Cecilia stroked the book cover with her fingertips.
“Read it often?”
“Probably.”
Liana shook her head.
“Extremely often.”
“How do you know?”
“You always brought it to Leon-ssi saying you wanted me to read it.”
I stopped.
“Me?”
“Yeah.”
“Why do I keep having memories of the past that I don’t remember?”
“Your memory is bad.”
Cecilia looked at me.
“Did Leon read it?”
“Yeah.”
Liana answered instead.
“Many times.”
“Would you accept it?”
“Because it was Leon-ssi.”
I took the book once for fun.
“This boring thing.”
Liana said.
“You liked it.”
“You don’t like it now.”
Cecilia took the book again.
“What part did Leon like?”
“I don’t know.”
Liana thought for a moment.
“It seemed like the last part.”
“Last?”
“The part where the hero finishes and returns to his hometown.”
Cecilia’s hand stopped.
She stared at the book cover for a while.
“…Hometown.”
Low voice.
I looked at somewhere else unnecessarily.
Liana also kept her mouth shut.
A while later, Cecilia asked.
“Did you like stories like that when you were young too?”
There seemed to be a slightly different meaning in this question than before.
I couldn’t tell exactly what.
“Probably.”
I answered.
“If you kept reading that book.”
Cecilia didn’t ask more.
Her demeanor sank for a moment.
I changed the atmosphere a bit and looked through the desk.
“Ah. This is here too.”
A small stone came out.
Cecilia raised her head.
“A stone?”
“Yeah.”
“Why on the desk?”
“Brother picked it up.”
“Why?”
“Because it was pretty.”
Cecilia looked back and forth between the stone and me.
“Leon?”
“Brother was a kid too when he was young.”
Liana interjected.
“That one Evan gave.”
“Again me?”
“We picked it up together in the forest.”
“Why don’t I remember anything?”
“What do you remember?”
“Brother falling into the pond.”
“That’s something you remember because you teased me all the time.”
Cecilia put the stone in her hand.
It was an ordinary gray stone.
Still, she stared at it for a long time.
“It really is ordinary.”
Cecilia said.
“What?”
“Leon too.”
A moment of silence.
“Before meeting you.”
I didn’t answer specifically.
Seeing the childhood of a person I met during the war late might lead to such thoughts.
After that, I looked around the room a bit more.
When Cecilia asked, most were stories about Leon.
Whether he liked swords from childhood.
How he got along with friends.
Whether he had disliked foods.
Whether he got angry and it lasted long.
In between, Liana supplemented the memories.
If I said something wrong, she corrected me immediately.
But in between questions, Cecilia also brought out a bit of the Leon she knew.
“During the war, I didn’t eat sweets much.”
“Brother loved honey bread a lot when he was young.”
“Really?”
“I secretly ate it and got caught by Mother.”
“That’s something Evan ate too.”
“Let’s exclude my story.”
Again.
“I didn’t get angry for long.”
Cecilia said.
“I just didn’t speak much once I got angry.”
Liana looked at me.
“That’s similar.”
“To you and me?”
“You and me.”
“I’m not.”
“You really get angry and go into the room.”
“To think.”
“You call that angry?”
The conversation went like this.
Most were trivial things.
Things where Father scolded.
Breaking a window while practicing swordsmanship.
Mother hiding snacks and brother sharing them.
But Cecilia didn’t get bored at all.
Rather, it seemed like she was matching the Leon in her memory with the young Leon one by one.
The reason she came here might be understood a bit.
Cecilia’s curiosity wasn’t just for the current hero Leon.
It was for the Leon she hadn’t seen.
Since she couldn’t ask him now.
When the outside became quite dark, we went back downstairs.
Cecilia looked out the window.
“You’ve been here too long.”
“It’s fine.”
“You drank a lot of tea too.”
Liana said.
“Next time, I’ll prepare more embarrassing stories about Leon-ssi.”
“Liana.”
“Why?”
“You said you protect my brother’s honor.”
“Evan said it first.”
Cecilia smiled very faintly.
“Thank you.”
“It’s nothing.”
Cecilia didn’t answer for a moment.
Then she said.
“It was something to me.”
After that word, it was quiet for a moment.
I didn’t say anything more unnecessarily.
Cecilia stood up first.
“I’m going now.”
“Where will you stay tonight?”
“Village inn.”
“Will you return tomorrow right away?”
The answer was a bit late.
“Probably.”
Her demeanor sank slowly again.
I didn’t pinpoint the cause.
It might be because when I leave this house, there will be more time to think alone.
Or when I return to the North, there might be things to do.
The fatigue of riding for days might be surfacing now.
“You can come again next time.”
Cecilia looked at me.
“Even if it’s okay?”
“You haven’t finished all the stories today.”
Liana asked.
“Still?”
“How many black histories does my brother have.”
“Don’t talk about that like it’s something to boast.”
Cecilia smiled a bit more comfortably this time.
“Then.”
She paused for a moment.
“Perhaps one day I’ll ask again.”
“Anytime.”
We saw her off to the entrance.
Cecilia picked up the sword leaning against the wall.
At that moment.
Clink.
The metal decoration on the sword sheath made a very faint sound.
At first, I thought it was the wind.
No.
Right hand.
The fingertips holding the sword sheath trembled very slightly.
I narrowed my eyes.
Thumb.
Little finger.
Very small.
When holding the sword, it was fine.
Since she was applying force, was she suppressing it?
Cecilia noticed my gaze.
Immediately, she hid her right hand inside the cloak.
“Then, I’ll be going.”
“Just a moment.”
Cecilia stopped.
“Why?”
I looked at her face once.
And the right hand hidden under the cloak.
“Right hand.”
Her expression hardened for the first time.
“…What?”
“Show me.”
