Who Am I? (1)
Free Knight.
A knight bound by nothing.
Najin had succeeded in earning the title of Free Knight — a rank once held only by the knights who had ridden beside Arthur a thousand years ago. From now on, wherever he went, he could introduce himself with his shoulders squared and his head held high: not as a squire, not as so-and-so's attendant, but as a Free Knight.
Who am I?
Najin put the question to himself as he tended his sword. Then he held the polished blade up like a mirror, caught his own reflection in the gleaming steel, and grinned as he answered inwardly.
The youngest Free Knight.
It was the kind of thing that would have been mortifying to say out loud — but so what? Who was going to overhear a mutter that never left his own head? Unless, of course, there happened to be a constellation nested inside his mindscape.
—Kyaaaaaaaaaaah!
Of course, Najin had a constellation nested inside his mindscape.
Merlin, settled deep in his inner world, shrieked and seized him by the collar, shaking him hard. She had already watched Najin use his sword blade as a mirror and ask Who am I? ten times today, and the secondhand embarrassment was enough to kill her.
—Stop it! Just stop already!
Who am I?
—You're doing this on purpose. You are, aren't you?!
Youngest Sword Seeker. Youngest holder of one star, two stars, three stars, four stars. And on top of that, the youngest Free—
Merlin's face flushed scarlet with pure secondhand cringe. Truth be told, somewhere around the halfway mark Najin had started repeating the monologue purely to torment her.
"What? It's true, isn't it?"
—······.
Merlin cursed him with her eyes. Najin shrugged and rose to his feet. Argo had long since returned to the Continent, and Najin was traveling the Outer Land alone.
Well — alone, more or less. There was one companion who kept sighing and fanning her own face, but still.
"Who am I?"
—You, stop—
When Merlin's eyes went ice-cold, Najin simply pointed at the standing stone in front of him.
"It's written right there, isn't it?"
The sentence carved into what looked like a gravestone.
Najin read it aloud.
"Who… am I?"
Najin looked around.
It was a ruin swallowed by greenery. Trees grew wild in every direction, and collapsed or soot-stained buildings lay buried beneath the undergrowth.
At a glance, the place looked as though it had been abandoned for centuries at the very least.
The Outer Land was littered with the remnants of fallen nations and dead cities, so stumbling across ruins like these was hardly rare. He had found similar sites often enough when he had traveled these lands with the Helmeted Knight.
"······."
Not common, exactly — but not uncommon either.
What had brought Najin to a halt before this particular ruin was the standing stone raised at its very heart. It looked like a gravestone, and as gravestones tend to do, it bore a brief introduction to the deceased.
Hero of the Kingdom of Kassel, Viola Oldina.
She who defended her nation from the Wicked Dragon,
and fought bravely to the very end.
Three lines, carved in elegant script. But what snared Najin's eye was the sentence that followed.
Who am I?
Neither neat nor ornate.
The words had been cut in a rough, clumsy hand. There was no answer beneath them. Only that single questioning line: Who am I?
—It's a tomb.
I can see that.
—Ah. Not enough context. It's a Star's Tomb.
Merlin said it while studying the gravestone.
Najin tilted his head.
"A Star's Tomb? It feels different from the place I saw when I dueled the Horned Star."
—That was a Star's Tomb too, in its way. This one is just a little more literal.
Merlin pointed at the stone.
—I told you before, didn't I? Sometimes a sanctuary remains even after a star dies.
You did.
—It's uncommon, but there are cases where the sanctuary itself becomes the star's tomb. There are a few reasons, but usually it's because the star wants it that way…
She flicked her fingers from high to low, mimicking a falling star.
—Instead of hanging their star in the sky above, they bury it in their own sanctuary. And then they dream forever — inside the paradise they built, their own sanctuary.
"They dream?"
—Yeah. They're as good as dead, really. A little better off than a Fallen Star, but… hmm…
Merlin let the sentence trail off.
She glanced at Najin.
—Curious?
"A little."
—Then go in and see.
"What?"
Najin blinked.
Go in? How? Versatile as he was, slipping into someone else's dream was not a trick in his repertoire. He looked at Merlin, baffled — but she was only pointing at the gravestone.
—It's the same as entering another constellation's sanctuary. That stone is the entrance. Try it if you want. It varies from tomb to tomb, but this one doesn't seem particularly interested in keeping people out.
"It looks extremely dangerous."
—It probably is. Judging by the star buried here, I'd put her at around six stars or so.
Even so, Merlin went on.
—Your next destination is a Star's Tomb too. A little practice beforehand wouldn't hurt, would it?
Najin hesitated.
His gaze drifted to the blank space beneath the question on the stone. That empty stretch under Who am I? nagged at him more than it had any right to.
"What do you think, Merlin?"
—Me? I think experiencing it once wouldn't be so bad. And the owner of this stone seems fairly mild, besides.
When Najin asked how she could tell, Merlin explained as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world.
—A truly dangerous star doesn't leave itself sitting out like this. Step anywhere nearby and it drags you into its dream by force — or bars entry altogether. Sometimes it lets you in and never lets you out.
But to leave it abandoned like this?
Merlin waggled her fingers.
—It means, I don't care who comes. It doesn't matter. The conditions for entering the dream and leaving it are both ridiculously simple. Put your hand on the stone, and that's it.
A dream too loosely guarded to be a trap, free to come and go.
—How about going in once…?
Merlin gave his back a not-so-subtle shove.
Najin was a little suspicious of her enthusiasm, but he couldn't believe she would push him into something that would truly harm him. In the end he reached for the stone.
As Merlin said — experiencing it once didn't seem like such a bad idea.
Thok.
The instant Najin's fingers touched the gravestone, time began to run backward.
The overgrown forest rewound. The high-reaching branches of ancient trees shrank. Thick trunks thinned. The trees dwindled in height and girth, collapsed into saplings, then slipped entirely beneath the earth.
Clack-clack-clack-clack.
Where brush and timber had been, tiles spread across the ground. Pure white marble. Toppled pillars found their places again; collapsed buildings rose into their original shapes. In the rushing rewind of time, Najin slowly closed his eyes, then opened them.
Blink.
When Najin opened his eyes—
"Did you see the new fish that came into the market today?"
"Filthy huge, and filthy expensive. Paying that much for a single meal? I couldn't even dream of it."
"Fresh bread! Warm bread, just out of the oven! One copper a loaf!"
"Hey now — yesterday it was two for a copper."
"Flour prices went up. Nothing I can do about it."
"Hah. So only your flour doubled in price, is that it?"
Najin was standing in the middle of a street thronged with people.
Najin blinked blankly.
What on earth was this? People walked past him in every direction — ordinary folk who looked as though they had never so much as swung a sword, let alone reached the rank of Sword Seeker. The sight left him more than a little shaken.
Wasn't this supposed to be the heart of the Outer Land?
But the thought didn't last. Warm sunlight was pouring down on him. When he lifted his head, he did not see a pitch-black night sky scattered with stars. A blue sky and a sun hung above him instead.
Merlin, what in the world is—
He muttered the words inwardly, but no answer came. Najin frowned. He couldn't sense Merlin at all — and she was supposed to be inside him.
"…Merlin?"
"Yeah. What is it?"
The voice came from close by.
It was not the clear, transparent voice that usually cut straight through to him, unobstructed by anything. Merlin's voice now blended naturally into the chatter of the people moving through the street.
Najin looked toward the sound.
Merlin was standing there. A little shorter than he was, she tipped her face up and blinked at him.
"······Merlin?"
"I said, why are you calling me."
Merlin flashed a mischievous grin.
Then she caught his hand — as if to prove she was no illusion. Najin felt the warmth in his palm and his eyes went wide.
"How? Merlin, don't tell me you descended—"
"You think I descended? If I had, this whole dream would have shattered."
"Then what?"
"Setting foot in a dream is the same as entering a constellation's inner world. You've seen something like this before, haven't you?"
He had. And very recently, at that.
"It's similar to me taking up residence in your mindscape. So in this dream, I can walk around with you. With an actual body, no less!"
She looked strangely — no, openly — thrilled. She drew in a deep breath and let it out again, then lifted one foot and stamped the ground for no reason at all.
"Moving a body after so long almost makes me feel alive. So this is what it feels like to stand on solid ground, huh? And the air's so clean. Nice."
She exhaled a long breath and glanced at Najin. Her blue eyes sparkled more than usual.
"Well? Feel safer already? Doesn't seem dangerous in the slightest, does it?"
"So that's why you recommended it. You said 'try it once' because nothing here felt dangerous to you."
"Well, not entirely. I'm bound to you, so I can only use power on your level."
Even so, Merlin shrugged.
"That doesn't mean the knowledge of a great archmage goes anywhere. For this trip, at least, you can lean on me."
She thumped her chest with both fists and wore a look of pure confidence — not a shred of a constellation's dignity to be found. Najin couldn't help laughing.
"What? Why are you laughing? You think I'm a pushover?"
"I didn't say that."
"I'm in a good mood, so I'll let it slide just this once. All right — shall we start gathering information?"
Buoyant Merlin seized his arm and tugged him along.
As he walked the street in her grip, Najin suddenly looked up toward the high point of the city. He had felt a gaze from there.
A great cathedral built into the cliff face.
A woman sat perched on its railing.
Long black hair spilled down her back. In stark contrast, her face was pale to the point of bloodlessness. Eyes as black as her hair stared straight at Najin.
A woman who looked steeped in gloom.
She watched him for a time, then turned her gaze away as if he were of no particular interest. Najin knew, by pure instinct.
That woman was the master of this dream.
Having looked away from Najin, she slowly rose. Her black hair swayed with the motion — and it was not only her hair that moved. The moment she stood, the great cathedral's bells stirred.
Dong. Donggg. Dong…
The peal rolled out across the city. Citizens' eyes turned, as if by reflex, toward the woman standing at the cathedral's edge. Some prayed as they looked at her. Some bowed their heads. Others lifted their voices in praise.
"Honor to the hero."
"Glory to Oldina."
A rain of praise. Reverence. Salutes.
And yet the face of the woman receiving it all was nothing but bleak. Without so much as a glance at the people below, she vanished into the cathedral.
As if she could not stand the sight of any of it.
As if she were sick of it — and could not bear another moment.