The Horn-Blowing Star (1)
On the way to subjugate a Fallen Star, a question rose in Najin's mind. What exactly did the word "constellation" describe? He had heard the term countless times, yet never truly grasped its meaning.
What was a constellation?
And what was the difference between someone who merely possessed stars and a constellation itself?
Fortunately, right beside him stood someone who could answer. A constellation among constellations—the self-proclaimed Great Constellation who held eleven stars—Merlin opened her mouth.
"There's not that big a gap between someone who just has stars and a constellation. At most, it's about the number. You become a constellation when you don't stop at raising stars, but connect them into a constellation pattern."
Connect stars into a constellation.
When Najin asked if there was a set minimum, Merlin shook her head.
"Nothing's fixed. You can make a constellation with just three stars, but I've only ever seen one person do that… and that kid was a special case. Normally you become a constellation once you've gathered four or five."
"Arthur and I both became constellations around that point."
As she spoke, Merlin flicked a finger. Glittering stars at her fingertips linked together and formed a constellation.
"There are concepts like Ascension and Authorities too, but I can explain those later… What you're really curious about right now is that, isn't it? What a Fallen Star is. What a Forgotten Star is."
Najin nodded. Merlin drew her finger from top to bottom. A glittering star plummeted downward.
"Even constellations aren't eternal. There are times when they lose their stars. Every time you lose one, it delivers a massive shock to the mind—so what happens when you go through that back to back?"
You go mad. You can't endure it with a sane mind.
Her tone suggested she had lived it herself. Merlin shook her head as if she didn't even want to imagine it.
"The more stars a constellation holds, the higher its rank, the greater the shock. When you take that kind of blow one after another… and then lose every last star, you can no longer maintain yourself."
"What does it mean, not being able to maintain yourself?"
"It means becoming one of the undead."
A constellation that fell and forgot itself.
A Fallen Star, and a Forgotten Star.
A star that had become one of the undead—that was how Merlin put it.
"And originally, constellations are beings that transcend the human body. If such beings become undead… well. They're not going to fall under the category of 'human' as you know it."
Najin pressed deeper into the Outer Land with the Helmet Knight. The farther they went, the more often the Helmet Knight warned him: "Don't cross that line. Beyond it is a constellation's domain."
A place dense with star domains.
A place where the territories of constellations truly began to appear.
Pushing on from there, the Helmet Knight took a sloping path downward. He descended a sheer cliff, and then farther down still. Following him for days, Najin at last arrived at a vast wasteland.
Forests, grasslands, snowy peaks, open fields—the Outer Land was a chaos of jumbled terrain. But the place Najin had reached held none of that mixture. A single landscape stretched unbroken to the horizon.
A colossal wasteland.
A blighted earth where not a living thing could be found.
All that existed upon it were weapons jammed haphazardly into the ground and enormous stones driven deep into the soil. They were not merely large stones. Starlight leaked from them, and that light reached all the way into the sky above.
Stones that had fallen, still trailing the tails of stars.
A landscape that inevitably called fallen stars to mind.
Overwhelmed by the sight, Najin fell silent for a moment. The Helmet Knight was the one who broke it. He looked out over the endless wasteland and gave a scornful laugh.
"Outsiders call the Outer Land the Battlefield of Stars, I hear."
But, he said—
"The stars who live in the Outer Land call it this."
He pointed across the vast wasteland.
He pointed at the fallen stars.
"The Graveyard of Stars."
"…"
"This is where stars come down. A place full of stars that were once heroes, once brilliant lights—until they finally fell."
He shrugged and jerked his chin at Najin.
"Any heroes you know? Ones the Continent claims died 'honorably.'"
"Quite a few."
"Name a few. Roughly three or four hundred years back."
"Guardian of the Sacred Tree, Arta Trigardian."
The war hero Arta Trigardian.
The Guardian of the Sacred Tree who founded the swordsmanship used by the knight-commander of House Arvenia. After a few seconds of thought, the Helmet Knight answered.
"Guardian of the Thorn Tree. Fell a hundred and seventy years ago. Became a Forgotten Star. Kirchhoff put him down."
"…What?"
"Not known on the Continent? Fair enough. Any other names?"
"Kinburga Algen."
"Guardian Kinburga. A star that fell two hundred years ago. Devoured by demons. Sitting in some demon's belly by now, I'd wager."
"…Safia."
"Safia of the White Blossom. The Revelry Emperor brought her down. Fairly recent—about a hundred years."
"Rekdir."
"Rekdir the Conqueror? He fell to the Revelry Emperor too. He's one of her jesters now. On display in her palace with both arms and legs cut off."
Every time Najin named a hero, the Helmet Knight gave much the same answer. Only after more than ten names, then more than twenty, did he once reply, "Ah, that one actually did die honorably. Probably died on the Continent."
"That's how it is. On the Continent they dress it up—died with honor, martyred themselves. But how could a death in the Outer Land ever be honorable?"
The Helmet Knight gestured across the wasteland.
"They're all buried here, in the Graveyard of Stars. Or they're still wandering as Forgotten Stars. Or they became jesters of the Revelry Emperor. Failing that, they were eaten by demons or by beasts that hunger for stars."
The Graveyard of Stars.
"A land heroes set out for. A battlefield of stars. A place where new stars are born… No matter how grandly you dress it up, peel back one layer and there's nowhere more horrific. This is the underworld where those who transcended humanity and fled from death finally arrive."
An underworld prepared for stars—and a hell.
"Well then. Shall we go hunt the undead wandering that underworld?"
The Helmet Knight took the lead. Following behind, Najin walked in silence for a long while before he finally spoke.
"The Silent Knight. Kruenbel, you said?"
"Yeah. The one we're going to catch."
"I've never heard the name."
"You wouldn't have."
The Helmet Knight spoke flatly.
"He took the Mist of Oblivion head-on. There's nothing more cursed in this land than the Authority of Oblivion. Whether others forget you or you forget yourself, either way you erode at a terrifying rate."
"Was it the work of the constellation that erased Rondinel?"
"That one, yes. The Constellation of Incineration and Oblivion."
He clearly had no wish to talk further about that constellation, so Najin changed the subject. There was something he needed to confirm.
"You said the knight Kruenbel held six stars?"
"That's right. Six. Why, nervous?"
It would have been a lie to say no.
Six stars.
On the Continent, the Sword Saint Caron and the Executioner Yuel Razian each held six. Recalling the heights those two had reached, Najin did not think his current self could stand against them.
"I can more or less guess what you're thinking, but he won't be that strong. Losing stars means growing weaker. It also means being stripped of transcendence."
"Stars and transcendence aren't related, are they? Transcendents do tend to hold many stars, but…"
"Well, there's no direct link. But what's the basic premise of a transcendent? Certainty in oneself. Losing stars means losing the self. When you can no longer be sure of yourself, transcendence is stripped away."
The Helmet Knight pointed at himself.
"So that Kruenbel fellow—he'll be about on my level."
"Then it should be doable."
The Helmet Knight stopped mid-step, pride clearly stung, and turned to look at Najin.
"Don't tell me you think I went all-out when I fought you."
"I wasn't at full strength either."
"Listen. The spear isn't my main weapon. The sword is. You lost to me when I wasn't even using a sword, and now you're clicking your tongue…"
"This isn't my main weapon either."
"What, you got some weapon stashed away somewhere? A proper knight shouldn't depend on his weapon."
A strange little war of nerves hung between them. The Helmet Knight clicked his tongue.
"You wouldn't talk like that if you ever saw me use a sword."
"Why don't you use it, then?"
Najin pointed at the sword bound at the Helmet Knight's hip. Blade and scabbard alike were wrapped tightly in iron chains.
"Because I mustn't."
"So… why?"
"There's a reason. For me to use this would mean I myself… Forget it. Anyway, there's a reason I can't."
How long did they walk while talking?
"Stop."
The Helmet Knight thrust out a hand and held Najin back.
Then he jerked his chin forward. Najin looked where he indicated.
Countless spear shafts stood driven into the ground. Or were they even spears? They were closer to stakes. Some looked like carelessly whittled branches. Blunt poles had been jammed into the earth as if any shape would do so long as it could pierce something.
Shapes of every kind. Weapons of every kind.
Yet they all shared one thing in common: a person was impaled on each tip. Regardless of the weapon, every shaft driven into the ground had a body skewered upon it.
Bannerless flag-spears used corpses for banners. Long spears missing their blades used human hands for points. Headless war-hammers used human heads in their place.
Dozens of bodies. Hundreds.
Ground decorated with corpses run through on stakes.
This, it seemed, was the star domain of the constellation they had come to face.
But Najin could not see the domain's master. Wherever he looked, there were only corpses.
"So where is this Silent Knight?"
"Where do you think? Right there."
Najin blinked at the spot the Helmet Knight pointed to. What was he pointing at? There was nothing but corpses. The Helmet Knight was indicating a body standing among the spear shafts. Every other corpse was impaled on a stake—but that one alone stood with its feet on the ground.
A corpse standing upright is a bit strange, sure…
Najin had no other word for a human form with nothing above the neck. As he stood blinking—
Clank.
The corpse moved. In that instant Najin nearly stepped back without thinking. Why was it moving? Had he misseen?
Clank.
He had not misseen. Najin had seen correctly. A corpse with nothing above the neck—a headless body—was moving. With every step, its armor rattled and clanked.
It turned toward Najin and the Helmet Knight.
Though it had no head, Najin felt their gazes meet. It was instinct, and Najin's instincts were usually right. This moment was no exception.
Th-th-th-th-th-th-thud.
The headless knight's body began to vibrate.
Najin found himself staring at the armor it wore. Headless though it was, the knight still "wore" helms. One did not normally say a person "wore" a helmet that way, but here the phrase fit. Having lost its head and thus the ability to don a helm, the knight had hung several helms from its armor and shoulders. The effect was of a knight wearing helms all over.
Th-th-thud…
The vibrating body suddenly stilled. Then, with a series of clicks, every helm-visor the knight wore snapped open at once—like beasts opening their jaws.
Crack.
Black filth stretched like drool between the gaping helms. The helms began to tremble. The horn trumpets thrust between them trembled with them.
Bwooooooooooo————.
Horn blasts echoed. In place of its vanished head, the knight blew the horns through the heads of the corpses. The grand, rolling notes of the horns resounded across the wasteland.
"Oh, hell."
The Helmet Knight groaned.
"Looks like our friend is in a foul mood today."
Then, without warning, he seized Najin by the scruff of the neck and hurled him skyward. Almost in the same instant, the horn blast that had seemed as if it would sound forever cut off.
What took its place was—
—————————!
—the howl of the undead.
A bestial roar beyond language made Najin scowl. Blood leaked from his ears. Suspended in midair, he watched the roaring knight. Black light burst from its body and gathered where its head should have been.
As if replacing the missing head, black light flared where a head belonged—shaped uncannily like a star in the night sky.
A Forgotten Star—a star that forgot itself and turned black.
The emblem of a constellation that had become one of the undead.
Najin soon understood why the Helmet Knight had thrown him into the air. Still roaring, the Silent Knight ripped a spear shaft from the ground nearby. A body was already skewered on its tip; as if meaning to add one more, the knight hurled the shaft at the Helmet Knight.
Whhhhhhhhhhhish!
The spear tore through the air. The ground along its path was gouged open. The moment the Helmet Knight caught and deflected it, his own body was flung into the air. With a crack like splitting stone, the earth fissured outward from the point of impact. The corpse hanging from the shaft could not withstand the force and burst apart.
"This is insane."
The Helmet Knight, sailing far away, waved a hand toward Najin. The hand flopped rather badly.
"No good. I need a moment to patch up. Caught that spear wrong. Think the wrist's broken."
"What?"
"Meet me farther back. There's a rock good for hiding behind."
"Hey—"
"I'm going first."
The Helmet Knight rolled, came up running, and took off with a rapid thud-thud-thud! of footfalls. As when he had raided the giant's larder, his form was flawless.
Oh, for fuck's sake.
The instant Najin landed, he sprinted after the Helmet Knight. Behind them the Silent Knight shrieked and kept hurling spears, but—mercifully—it did not leave its own star domain. Under that violent send-off, Najin fled.
No—a knight does not flee.
It was a strategic withdrawal.
"You said he was a little weaker than you. In what world does that look weaker?"
"I am pretty strong."
"You ran away."
"Strategic withdrawal."
The Helmet Knight set his flopping wrist with a sigh.
"Looks like our friend is in an especially foul mood today. Tch. Still, there was a time when he'd at least answer a greeting."
"Answer a greeting? That thing?"
"He used to."
Najin found the image hard to picture. More than that, he was still in a state of shock. The scene had been beyond ordinary sense.
No—how does something move with its neck cut off?
Moving headless was astonishing enough, but the posture the Silent Knight had shown when throwing the spear was not a movement a human body could produce. Motion that far exceeded any joint's range. Movement that, even watching with his own eyes, he could not begin to imitate.
"Same as ever—reckless bastard. Doesn't even recognize his own superior."
The Helmet Knight clicked his tongue.
Najin, who had been half-listening, tilted his head.
"What was that?"
"What? That he's reckless?"
"No. After that. Superior?"
"Ah. Did I not mention it?"
With a sharp crack, the Helmet Knight set his wrist and spoke with casual nonchalance.
"That friend used to be my subordinate."
"…Excuse me?"
"Vice-commander of the Golden Horn Knights. Second strongest in the order after me."
The Horn-blowing Star.
The Silent Knight, Kruenbel.
And vice-commander of the Golden Horn Knights.
"You remember the technique I used before? When I was explaining it, I said, 'There's someone who uses it better than I do'—remember that?"
"…I remember."
"That someone is him."
The Helmet Knight pointed at the Silent Knight still roaming far off. The spear shaft in its hand shone with a grim light.
"He's filthy good with a spear. Reached the level of a Master with the spear alone. And…"
The Helmet Knight indicated the cross-star spear planted beside him.
"He's also the original owner of this spear I carry."
"Don't tell me you stole it."
"Hey—stole? I took it when he became one of the undead. More precisely, he entrusted it to me."
"Sounds like you stole it."
"I'm telling you I didn't."
The Helmet Knight's gaze slid away.
It seemed fairly certain he had stolen it.
