Discord (1)
"What are the Atanga Knights, old man?"
The boy asked out of nowhere.
Hogel looked up from his hammering and glanced at Najin. He'd called the boy to the forge to check his build and the way he gripped a sword before finishing the blade, though the work itself was still incomplete.
I've already taken every measurement. He should just leave instead of hanging around making conversation.
His expression soured at the interruption of his work, but the boy's question had contained a name he hadn't heard in a long time, so Hogel set the hammer down for a moment.
The Atanga Knights.
Stories of those noble knights were worth setting the hammer aside for. After wetting his throat with a glass of water, Hogel spoke. The old man knew a great deal after living so many years, and he had never been stingy about sharing those stories with others.
"Atanga. A nostalgic name. Why—did Ivan mention Atanga?"
Najin nodded.
Hogel clicked his tongue inwardly. It was rare for Ivan to speak that name aloud.
"So what is Atanga? Some famous family name?"
"Atanga isn't a family name, brat."
Hogel snorted a laugh.
"Most knights belong to a house and introduce themselves by their family name… but those who belong to Atanga are different. Atanga is a kind of martial order—a knightly order."
The Atanga Knights.
"A knight is one who upholds honor and pride. Without honor and pride, a knight cannot exist—and must not exist."
Those who kept the ancient knightly code.
"Hundreds of years have passed since the Age of Heroes, and the meaning of the word 'knight' has changed a great deal. Anyone with power can become a knight now, whether they know honor or pride."
It's an age where the weight of a knight's name has grown light.
Muttering that, Hogel spoke with force.
"The Atanga Knights stand in direct defiance of that age. They declare that those who do not uphold pride and honor cannot be called knights, and they restore the definition of knighthood by living the old code."
Some called Atanga idealists. Others said it was a place only knights among knights could join.
"They're rigid, upright, stiff as boards—and sometimes downright foolish. But that's exactly why you can't hate them."
"You talk like you've met a lot of them."
"I have. I forged more than a few of their swords."
The old man's eyes grew distant with past glory. A faint smile touched Hogel's lips as he sank into memory.
"Well, that's what Atanga is. Men who live and die by pride and honor. Knights straight out of a fairy tale."
"That sounds pretty cool."
"They are cool—when they're talking about their honor and pride, at least."
Though they look foolish more often than not. Muttering that, Hogel picked his hammer back up.
"Your sword should be ready in three or four days. Come back then. If you need something to use in the meantime…"
"Ah, that's fine."
Najin cut him off. Rising from his seat, he tapped his hip.
"I can use this for now."
He pointed to Ivan's sword hanging at his waist—a masterpiece Hogel had forged over a decade ago. Seeing Ivan's blade on Najin instead of at Ivan's side, Hogel's eyes widened in mild surprise.
Ivan almost never entrusted his sword to anyone else. That he had given it away—Hogel wasn't so blind he couldn't grasp what that meant.
"Well…"
Hogel laughed.
"Looks like you've earned Ivan's approval."
"I am pretty impressive, you know."
"Cocky little bastard."
Watching Najin leave the forge with a parting joke, Hogel laughed—a clear, open laugh he hadn't made in a long time.
"So what did you do?"
Oppen's question, missing its object.
Ivan's hands paused briefly as he tended his sword. Then he continued working the blade as he answered—he'd understood what Oppen was asking.
"I decided to teach him."
"That's unusual. Why? Did you see something?"
"I did. Probably the same thing you saw."
Ivan grinned. Oppen shrugged as if he'd expected as much. Anyone who'd walked the path of the sword would recognize Najin's talent.
A radiance that shouldn't be buried in this city.
Ivan had clearly faced that light as well. With an expression mixing bitterness, joy, and excitement, he spoke.
"I was thinking of cutting his shoulder so he couldn't hold a sword for a while—then the brat drew aura. He drew aura and blocked my sword. Even pushed it back."
The clash had ended when the blade shattered, but for a moment, Ivan had been driven back by Najin's force.
"Crazy bastard. Drew something I never even taught him."
"Fragments of aura at eighteen."
"Youngest ever. Even Sir Caron, the Sword Saint they called a once-in-a-generation genius, is said to have drawn aura at twenty-three."
Which meant, put another way—
"If word gets out, the surface will turn upside down."
"Right. A genius like that isn't supposed to come out of an underground city like this."
It also meant Najin had become a clear danger. If he'd been born elsewhere, he might have been hailed as a once-in-a-generation genius and showered with support.
But Najin had been born in the underground city. And everyone born in this underground city was a sinner.
Heretics who had reached for things they shouldn't—filth cursed by Kamran, same as those unclean things. If it became known that such a heretic possessed brilliant light, the surface… especially the Church… would certainly try to bury Najin.
"So," Ivan said, "we'll have to make him valuable enough that they can't bury him—valuable enough they can't cover him up."
A Sword Expert could be quietly buried if the surface set its mind to it. He wouldn't be able to resist. But if Najin reached the next realm?
Sword Seeker.
The strong who stood between Sword Expert and Master, between human and transcendent. Seekers of the sword searching for the path to transcendence. If Najin reached a realm that only a tiny fraction of Sword Experts ever attained…
Even the surface wouldn't be able to quietly bury him.
Burying a Sword Seeker-level fighter would require massive force. If they were willing to take that loss, noise would inevitably follow—someone would notice. Quiet handling would become impossible.
"If he gets that far," Ivan said, tending the sword he'd wielded in his knightly days, "we'll be able to negotiate with the surface. They'll have no choice but to listen to us."
And at that negotiation table, Ivan and Oppen would sit as the masters who had raised Najin—not as trash who'd fallen to the underground city for their sins, but as a knight and a mercenary.
"Not an easy task."
"Hard, but not impossible."
"Succeed and we climb back up. Fail and we die. Quite the flashy gamble."
"But one worth taking."
Ivan grinned.
"A brat who drew aura without anyone teaching him. Isn't that enough possibility to bet on?"
A completely different attitude from the tavern last night. Oppen let out a hollow laugh at the change.
"Not like you. You never used to take gambles like this."
"I didn't—not after losing an eye and falling all the way down here."
But, Ivan said—
"What am I supposed to do after seeing that?"
The radiance the boy carried. A light far too beautiful to rot away in an underground city like this. That light was enough to reawaken the dream Ivan had once abandoned.
"Who wouldn't feel their heart race after seeing something like that? Shit, cocky little brat."
Ivan had once been a swordsman who dreamed of the peak, a knight who yearned for the stars. And the radiance Najin had shown him was like the starlight he'd forgotten since falling to the underground city.
Remembering that light, Ivan smiled. What settled on his lips wasn't the murky smile of a ruler who held sway over the underground city—it was the clear smile of a knight who had once chased the stars.
"You're still the same."
Oppen smiled bitterly at the sight of him.
So it came to this after all.
When he'd first faced Najin's radiance, Oppen had pitied the boy's fate. He'd felt sorry for Najin, who would have to rot in this city for the rest of his life. That was why he'd thrown out that suggestion to Ivan over drinks—why not take a chance on Najin?
A proposal made on impulse with no plan behind it. Born from pity for a damned kid.
Ivan had accepted it. He'd begun fleshing out the suggestion into a plan. Watching him, Oppen felt like he was seeing Ivan from his knightly days. A sight both unfamiliar and deeply missed.
"Haa…"
A faint smile on his face, Oppen let out a long breath. It wasn't the alcohol-soaked breath of usual. Fully sober now, he rested a hand on the hilt at his waist—his beloved blade from his mercenary days, the one he'd swung without end.
"Looks like we're going to be busy."
"We will. We'll need to figure out how to teach him, too."
"Well, that too, but."
Oppen flicked the drawn blade.
"Let's figure out what to do about that first."
Where Oppen's tip pointed lay the entrance into Horce's territory. Not the front door of Hogel's forge, but a back way in through the tunnels.
Naturally, there were guards at the rear entrance.
Ivan's gaze sharpened as he erased the knight's smile and narrowed his eyes. After checking their gait and the condition of their gear, he touched his hilt.
"Four grunts and one officer-level."
"That one strong? Never met him."
"Not really. He can handle mana, but he's not Expert-class. Probably the Fourth Leg or so."
"Traps?"
"Nothing visible right now."
"Good enough."
Oppen jerked his chin.
"I'll take the three on the right."
"Then I'll handle the officer."
The conversation ended there.
Looking down on the tunnel entrance from the hilltop, the two of them kicked off the ground as one. Yet no footsteps sounded.
Oppen had carried out countless commissions as a mercenary. Ivan had been deployed on countless operations as a knight. They might fall short of Rangers who specialized in stealth and assassination, but both had done more than their fill of infiltration and target elimination. They hadn't reached Sword Expert by swinging at walls. Their combat experience was overflowing.
Thud.
By the time footsteps rang out, Ivan and Oppen were already right in front of the guards. The moment the men's eyes flew wide and they tried to shout, Oppen's blade cut a throat.
Blood sprayed. Oppen's sword shot through the flying blood like an awl.
"Ghk…"
Another guard's neck was pierced through.
Pulling the blade free from the throat of the guard choking on blood, Oppen took a large step forward. Toward the mouth of the guard who'd belatedly sensed them and spun around, Oppen thrust his hand.
Clench.
He clamped the mouth shut and slit the throat.
Three dead without a single scream. Having finished three in an instant, Oppen exhaled and looked back.
"Ghk, ghhk…"
There, the officer crawled across the ground, clutching his throat. That didn't last long either. Ivan brought his sword down on the spine of the crawling officer.
A brief spasm.
The officer stopped moving.
Cut the throat first so they can't scream, then finish them. Drawing his blade from the corpse, Ivan pointed deeper into the tunnel. A signal to go in.
Thud.
The two of them stepped toward the darkness-filled tunnel.
Late afternoon, Najin patrolled the streets.
Only a handful of organization members knew Ivan was away, and nothing much should happen from him being gone a few days at most…
But there's always a just in case.
The atmosphere in the underground city had been ugly lately. Uncaught spies from Horce's side might try something. So he was patrolling the streets—though nothing seemed amiss.
"…"
Patrolling the streets, he found himself near the plaza before he knew it. Najin glanced at the soldiers guarding the plaza's center for no particular reason. Come to think of it, wasn't Excalibur supposed to disappear at midnight tonight?
The Trial of the Stars lasted only thirteen days.
And today was the thirteenth day.
Najin had loitered around the plaza for the past thirteen days hoping for a glimpse of the sword, but after the first day he hadn't even seen the light it radiated, let alone the blade itself.
Just got a good look at the armor on the soldiers guarding it, that's all.
Najin smiled wryly.
Still, he wouldn't need to hang around the plaza anymore. Tomorrow the holy sword would vanish, and once it was gone, this voice ringing in his ears would disappear too.
Draw the sword. You can draw it.
Chewing over a sentence he was almost growing fond of, Najin forced his reluctant feet to move. Just as he was about to leave the plaza—
"Najin!"
Someone called his name.
Najin turned. An organization member was running toward him—one of the few who knew Ivan was away.
Tax collector Jeck.
Aside from Oppen and Najin, he held the highest rank in Ivan's organization.
"What's going on, Jeck?"
"Huff, hahh… well, you see."
"Catch your breath first. What is it?"
Jeck was breathing hard from the run. After a long exhale, he spoke.
"Right now, a Trap-spider guy is causing a scene in front of Daisy Tavern. He's demanding we bring Ivan immediately. Says he has something to tell him."
"…What?"
Najin blinked.
"Is he insane? In someone else's territory? Just tie him up and wait for Ivan—"
"Can't tie him up."
Jeck cut him off.
"We've got about fifteen guys on him right now, but they won't last long. He's an officer. The First Leg, Arnold. You need to get over there."
Trap-spider's First Leg, Arnold.
The strongest of the eight legs, and according to Ivan, a fighter approaching Sword Expert. Najin's eyes narrowed at Jeck's words.
"Let's go. I'll head there first—follow me."
"Got it. Just need to catch my breath and I'll be right behind you."
Najin started running toward the tavern where the First Leg was raising hell. He was heading there, but he couldn't shake the sense of wrongness.
Why the hell?
The question circled his mind.
Arnold the First Leg was called the second-in-command of Trap-spider Horce's organization. Why would someone like that enter Ivan's territory and cause a scene?
Did he catch on that Ivan was about to strike first?
No—too many things didn't add up for that.
If he'd realized Ivan was making the first move, shouldn't he be protecting Horce in their own territory? He certainly wouldn't come all the way here demanding Ivan and screaming that he had something to say.
That strange sense of unease.
And more than anything—
"…"
The air in the streets felt different from usual.
Najin rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. The stench mixed into the air made him frown. He'd smelled it somewhere before. But he couldn't remember exactly when.
"…bring him here!"
And a voice rang in his ears.
He'd arrived at the tavern. There stood Arnold, the First Leg, shouting as he threw off the organization members rushing him.
"Bring me Ivan! I have to tell him!"
He roared.
"That Horce and I—we were both just being used!"
Arnold's eyes, screaming until his throat tore, were bloodshot red.
As if he were high on drugs.