Battlefield of the Stars (1)
Beneath the feet of the two Sword Masters who had set foot upon the earth, the sky tore open lengthwise. This was no metaphor—the sky truly split apart. Beyond the rent heavens, countless stars shone.
Yuel and Kirchhoff were only the beginning.
The Revelry Emperor was a constellation of ten stars, regarded as the strongest in this Outer Land save for the Round Table itself. There was no way the hyenas would miss a situation in which such a constellation had exposed her weakness.
Flash!
Stars blazed as countless constellations attempted to descend upon this land. Even those of ranks so low they would normally never manage a descent set foot here, drawn toward the path the Martyr of the Bramble had opened.
The Martyr of the Bramble, principal deity of the Holy Blood Church, was a constellation who had ascended long ago and thus could not descend to this earth. The process was far too complex and time-consuming. Yet she could open a passage by expending the starlight she had gathered over centuries in the form of faith.
A passage for the stars to travel.
A justification for the stars to descend upon this land.
Beneath the beacon she had raised, the constellations gathered. Not all of them were heroes, nor did all of them carry noble purpose. A few true heroes might be mixed among them, but most were crows coveting the Revelry Emperor’s stars.
Even so, it was fine.
Whatever the purpose of those who attempted descent through the path she had made, the Martyr of the Bramble paid it no mind. A thousand years ago, three hundred years ago, and even now, her purpose had never changed.
Kill the demons.
Slaughter every last demon upon this earth.
If the goal was to kill demons, then it did not matter who you were. They would all be comrades united in a single will.
Whoosh!
Dozens of constellations rose across the sky that had been stained by the Revelry Emperor’s paints. Dozens of constellations descended upon this land to kill her. As those colossal beings arrived, the space of the entire region began to creak and groan.
Dozens of constellations gathered with the two Sword Masters at their head.
The pressure they generated defied description. A force capable of erasing an entire nation without a trace. Beings whose mere presence made space itself groan leveled the tips of their blades at the Revelry Emperor.
Dozens of spears, swords, bowstrings, staves… weapons and stars of every kind shone among them.
Faced with all of it, the Revelry Emperor’s response was simple.
Ha… hahaha… hahahahaha!
She laughed. A ridiculous, raucous laugh like a clown’s. Still laughing, she tilted her head to the side and raised both arms. Then she clapped her slanted palms together with a sharp crack.
In that instant, silence fell.
The laughter cut off. The jesters’ performance ended. The voices of the constellations who had descended upon this land vanished, and even their breathing subsided. No one could break that unnatural stillness.
Flutter.
In the silence, a vast curtain descended across the sky. A curtain separating audience from stage. A black drape veiled the heavens.
Thud.
In that moment the connection between the stars above and the constellations who had set foot upon the earth was severed. Cut off from their stars, they plummeted from constellation status to mere humans of great power. As the constellations reeled from the sudden fall, the Revelry Emperor clapped once more.
A long, ringing crack of applause.
The halted performance began again. The jesters danced once more and laughed hard enough to set the world adrift. The laughter was louder than before, more raucous still.
Flash.
And the Revelry Emperor’s star shone.
Flash, flash, flash…
In the artificial night sky she had created—the black curtain—stars were embedded. Stars she had collected, stars that had chosen to live in her shadow. The jesters who danced for her alone answered their master’s call.
To face dozens of constellations.
Hundreds of jesters set foot upon the earth.
Leading them was Quixote, the Star of Contempt. Bursting through the weakened boundary of the Forbidden Territory, Quixote appeared with Bernstein’s head impaled upon his spear.
Even as his entire body burned in the flames Bernstein had ignited at the cost of his own life, Quixote never stopped laughing.
“Let’s go, Sancho.”
Lighting his spear, Quixote charged.
Hundreds of jesters followed at his heels.
Because every one of them was bound to the Revelry Emperor, they too were not free of the Forbidden Territory’s nature. Even as their souls and bodies eroded, they charged.
To protect their master, their lady, their princess, their royal highness, their liege, their knight, their lover, their captain, their wife, their child, their conviction—they willingly walked into the jaws of death.
To the jesters, the Revelry Emperor was literally everything. To them she was the most precious existence, one they would not trade for anything, one for whom they would offer even their own lives. Those so thoroughly brainwashed gladly burned their lives at a single gesture of her hand.
Hahahahaha.
The Revelry Emperor laughed and laughed again.
As if the jesters sacrificing their lives for her were absurd, as if their pathetic figures were utterly delightful, she did not spare her mockery toward her own jesters.
For that was the highest praise they could receive.
Nourished by their master’s scorn, the jesters marched on.
Originally the Revelry Emperor never left her domain. She was a being who schemed from behind the stage, not one who stepped onto it.
That Revelry Emperor had now climbed onto the stage.
She had stepped onto a stage that was not her domain, a stage disadvantageous to her, with her weakness fully exposed. Countless constellations swarmed like moths to a flame to exploit that weakness… yet there was one thing they had overlooked.
Even weakened, even with her vulnerability laid bare, the Revelry Emperor was still the Revelry Emperor. The fact that she was a constellation of ten stars remained unchanged.
Hahaha.
The laughter never ceased, and neither did the jesters’ march. The jesters were swept away by the attacks of the transcendent ones, only to spring back up and charge at them once more.
The jesters were already beings close to the eroded dead.
One cannot kill again those who have already died once.
Drinking in the Revelry Emperor’s starlight and resurrecting again and again, the jesters mocked the constellations. If you mean to face us with numbers, that is a foolish thought. From the moment the black curtain fell across the sky, this place had become a single stage.
A single play with the Revelry Emperor as the lead.
In that play, the dozens of constellations were nothing more than supporting roles. Even if dozens of supporting actors gathered, they could never match a single line of the protagonist’s dialogue, a single monologue.
“Kill him!”
“No, start from this side first…”
“We have to clear the curtain in the sky first!”
“Fuck, we have to go for that bastard, I told you! As long as he’s alive he’ll keep—”
“Ah, for real!”
“Everyone get out of the way over there! I am fire, the battlefield—”
“Aaaaaaaagh!”
“Quixote, it’s Quixote! Fuck, the Star of Contempt!”
“Is he really weakened?”
“You said he was weakened? How the hell does this look—”
“Ah, aaaaah!”
“Where’s the Holy Blood Church’s great warrior? We need to link up that way first—”
“My head, my head? Ah?”
“Fuck, it’s broken through! This side, this side first!”
On this stage they could not even manage supporting roles. They were bit players, or mere props dressing the stage. The constellations’ cries degraded into nothing but noise.
Perhaps they had originally spoken more noble and dignified lines. But a bit player exists only to make the lead shine. Upon the stage the Revelry Emperor had created, their lines echoed back distorted.
“I shall open the path myself. Follow me.”
One constellation had said as much.
“Run, run! Fuck, I told you we can’t win!”
The voice that emerged carried an entirely different meaning. The constellations could not distinguish which was truth and which was falsehood. With dozens of people each going their own way, the advantage of numbers became as good as nonexistent.
“It hit!”
“Huh?”
“But why…”
“Wait, did it actually connect? The star is rising again—”
“Crazy.”
“Fuck, I told you that shit doesn’t work!”
Even if by some luck their strikes reached the Revelry Emperor, she simply plucked off one of her stars and handed it to them. Even after giving one away she still possessed hundreds. She needed only to swap them out.
There was no such thing as a lead who met death at the hands of a bit player, and so their spears and blades never dealt the Revelry Emperor a fatal wound.
“….”
Yet not everyone was like that.
There were constellations who had not fallen to bit-player status. Unlike the opportunists who had descended solely to claim the Revelry Emperor’s stars, these were ones who had entered this battlefield with a firm sense of self. Ones who had a reason they must kill the Revelry Emperor.
Such ones kept their mouths shut and silently cleared away the jesters. They carved a path toward the Revelry Emperor. They were supporting roles who had surpassed mere bit players. The supporting roles opened the way.
Along that path, figures who might become the true leads of this stage began to run.
The Heavenly Slaughter Star, Yuel Razian.
The ■■ Star, Kirchhoff.
Their stars were not veiled by the Revelry Emperor’s black curtain. Without losing their light they swept the jesters aside and raced forward. Stamping the earth hard, Kirchhoff’s eyes flew wide. Blue sword aura surged over his blade.
Slash.
The moment Kirchhoff brought his sword down, the sky tore soundlessly. A corner of the black curtain the Revelry Emperor had cast was sliced away, and the stars that had been hidden shone upon the earth once more. As the constellations reconnected to their stars ran wild, Kirchhoff continued to swing his sword.
Every time he swung, the battlefield was dyed blue. Kirchhoff’s sword aura resembled blue flower petals. With every stroke, blue flowers bloomed across the field. Amid the blossoming flowers Kirchhoff cried out.
“Look at me, Revelry Emperor.”
He spat the words as if chewing them. At the tip of his blade bloomed the blue national flower of Rondinel.
“Rondinel stands here. Rondinel has not been forgotten. At the tip of my blade, Rondinel lives and breathes.”
The Revelry Emperor could not distort that line.
He possessed the right.
The Revelry Emperor’s gaze turned to Kirchhoff and to Yuel Razian raging beside him.
Six stars, and one star.
By number of stars alone, Yuel and Kirchhoff were not particularly great constellations. Yet stars do not necessarily signify absolute strength.
Of course it was true that more stars made a constellation stronger, and that a constellation with many stars could wield many authorities and thus hold the advantage in battle. But battle was always relative.
This world held many powerhouses who ignored the count of stars. Kirchhoff was one. Yuel Razian was one. Caron was one. Gerd was one. Most of the constellations called heroes were examples of the same.
Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!
A sword cry like a human scream erased the jesters’ laughter and went further still, burying even the Revelry Emperor’s laughter. Sword aura that crossed the battlefield grazed the Revelry Emperor’s mask.
Crack.
A fragment of the mask fell away. Beneath the broken piece, the Revelry Emperor’s mouth was not smiling.
Sitting on the ground, Najin stared blankly at the battlefield. Not because his will to fight had broken, but because there was nothing he could do right now.
A battlefield of stars, a battlefield of the transcendent.
On this stage, Najin—who had not yet reached transcendence—could not even be a lead, a supporting role, a bit player, or a prop dressing the stage. Najin was nothing more than an audience member.
A being who could not even climb onto the stage.
A being who could only watch helplessly.
The rage that had painted his mind pure white had subsided. What remained was burnt ash. Najin laughed. The laugh that slipped from his lips was hollow. He could not tell whether he was laughing or crying.
His master had been humiliated. His master’s end had been defiled. The cause of it all stood right before him, and still there was nothing Najin could do.
Grind.
Najin ground his teeth. Head bowed, he clenched his fists until they trembled.
…
Merlin looked down at that Najin.
Gazing at the boy sitting on the ground, Merlin bit her lip hard. She too shared the emotions Najin felt. She wanted nothing more than to descend to this place at once, tear off that jester’s head, and set it before Najin… yet Merlin knew that would not be the right answer.
Najin.
Merlin called his name.
Najin slowly raised his head. Merlin bent at the waist until their eyes met and stretched out her hand.
Stand up.
There was nothing he could do.
But he must not remain sitting.
Whether you plan for what comes next or find something you can do here, anything is fine. Do what you want to do.
Merlin said.
I’ll help you.
Najin opened and closed his mouth repeatedly.
Then, suddenly, his gaze caught Alderan kneeling at the Revelry Emperor’s side. The Revelry Emperor gripped Alderan’s helmet and whispered something into his ear.
Najin did not know what that whisper was. He did not know the meaning of the act either. Yet even in this desperate situation the Revelry Emperor, protected by Quixote, never stopped whispering into Alderan’s ear.
Najin found what he had to do.
He rose slowly to his feet.
Merlin.
Yeah, speak.
Did you see where my sword fell?
Merlin nodded.
She pointed in a direction. Najin staggered toward it. Then he seized the sword he had dropped.
…
Merlin realized what Najin intended. She squeezed her eyes shut, then let out a long breath.
You’re going to try?
Yes.
Can you see?
Not very well.
Of course not.
Can you tell me the direction?
Yeah. That’s a guide’s job, after all.
Merlin wrapped her hand around Najin’s, which held the sword. In place of his eyes she pointed the direction the blade must swing. Najin slowly raised the sword.
His wounds split open and blood burst forth like a flood. Najin’s face went pale, yet he did not stop.
He lifted the sword and took his stance.
With hazy eyes Najin did not look at reality. He looked inward, at the direction Merlin indicated.
What he called forth was the Imperial First Horn, Alderan Basaglia.
Among the stars of the transcendent that filled the night sky, Najin’s star shone. Few in number, yet possessing a light that did not yield to theirs, Najin’s star glittered pure white. For a single moment the gazes of every constellation and jester turned toward him.
Even the Revelry Emperor herself stopped whispering into Alderan’s helmet and looked at Najin.
The starlight created by a worthless boy drew the constellations. They saw it. A boy who had not yet reached transcendence mimicking transcendence itself.
First Horn.
The sword raised high enough to pierce the heavens.
Triumph.
Najin brought the pure-white shining blade down.