Honor, Pride, and the Stars (2)
Najin ran through the tunnel.
It was the path that led out of the underground city—the path Ivan had opened for him. As he ran, Najin clenched his teeth until they ached.
The boy was no fool.
He knew full well what resolve, what thoughts, had driven Ivan to open this way. He knew that if Ivan did not kill him, Ivan himself would die. He knew Ivan had had no other choice.
And still, Ivan had let him go.
That meant Ivan had accepted death.
The anguish on Ivan's face as he raised his sword. The trembling tip of his blade. The sight of him shoving Najin into the tunnel and planting himself across the mouth of it—all of it flashed before Najin's eyes. He bit down harder still.
He wanted to scream.
He wanted to ask Ivan why. Why make that choice? Why stake his life for him? Najin could not understand it. Sentiment alone would never have been enough for Ivan to send him away.
Honor and pride.
The boy still did not know their true weight.
He could not grasp what Ivan had wanted to remain, right to the end. He did not understand—but he remembered how Ivan's eyes had shone brighter than ever in the moment of that choice.
Climb to the highest place.
And from there, cry out.
That I, Ivan, knight of Atanga, once lived.
The image of a knight speaking of his dream with shining eyes settled deep in Najin's heart. It was the weight of a life.
Something that could never grow light.
Something that could never be forgotten.
Feeling that weight press down on his chest, Najin ran. The tunnel was dark and cold, and it stretched on without end. Even the glow of the ore-lamps had vanished. Through the pitch-black passage, Najin ran and ran.
A mercenary, and a knight who chased the stars.
Bearing the weight of those who had staked their lives for him, the boy looked upward. Still no stars were visible—but that no longer mattered.
In a place where no stars could be seen, the boy swore an oath.
That he would carve his own star into that night sky.
That he would hang his star in the highest place of all.
2.
One by one, the pursuers who had chased the starlight arrived.
There, an entrance led into an old, long-abandoned tunnel. Guessing that the boy had fled into it was no great difficulty. All that remained was the simple matter of entering and killing him.
And yet—
"…"
Not one of them dared move.
Someone stood guard at the tunnel mouth, and the presence he radiated was anything but ordinary. The pursuers knew, instinctively, that to enter that tunnel they would first have to bring him down.
Clang.
One by one, they drew their swords.
They leveled their blades at the former knight they had believed an ally—but there was one thing they had misjudged.
"I am Ivan."
What stood before them was not a half-knight who had lost his honor and fallen into the underground city. Though his honor might have been stripped away, he had kept his pride to the last—and for a star that would shine one day far in the future, he had thrown his own life away.
A man who cast his life aside to keep an oath.
A man who, to the very last, wished to remain a knight.
Foolish—and because he was foolish, sublime. Who would dare mock that sublimity? What stood before them was a knight who had accepted death.
"Knight of Atanga."
In an underground city where no stars rose.
In a city of the damned, lit only by the dim glow of ore-lamps—
"I am Ivan, the knight who chases the stars."
Sword-aura coiled around the knight's blade.
A deep, vivid blue. A common color, nothing special. It could not light the underground city the way the boy's star-sword did. It did not resemble starlight the way Najin's aura did. An ordinary thing, thoroughly unremarkable.
And yet—
The sword in Ivan's hand was shining.
"Not one step further."
He held a shining blade.
He staked his life to protect something.
In this moment, Ivan could cry out to himself without shame. That he was a knight. That he was a knight of Atanga, a knight who chased the stars—he could proclaim it with pride.
And at that truth, Ivan smiled.
The pursuers charged. More than ten of them had gathered, and the blades they held were sharp beyond measure. But Ivan did not take a single step back.
A knight of Atanga does not retreat.
That was Atanga's pride.
Ivan swung his shining sword. To buy his squire time to escape this city. To give back the time he had stolen from the boy.
Come, then. As many as you like.
My pride is not so light that I would open the way for those who know neither honor nor pride.
Berlo, knight of the Church.
Arriving late at the place where the starlight had erupted, Berlo's face hardened in an instant. The scene before him was nothing like what he had expected.
Bloodstains everywhere.
Severed arms and legs.
And the corpses of assassins, strewn across the ground.
Even a rough count put the number past twenty. The majority of the assassins deployed to this city had met their end here. A heavy loss—but one he could have accepted, if only the objective had been achieved.
It had not.
There was no body of the boy who had drawn the star-sword. Berlo slowly lifted his gaze. Standing there was the man responsible for this slaughter.
Ivan.
At the sight of his old junior holding the tunnel entrance, Berlo let out a hollow laugh.
"Ha…"
What foolishness was this?
Berlo felt rage toward the man who had trampled the goodwill he had extended. A crease formed between his brows; his expression twisted.
"Ivan. Have you lost your mind?"
Ivan did not answer.
"Do you think you can fight me? Do you mean to take on the entire Church? This is pure folly—!"
Berlo raked his fingers through his hair in agitation. Everything had gone wrong. The mission entrusted by Archbishop Orlan—he was the one responsible for it, and at this rate there would be no escaping punishment.
He would have to continue the pursuit alone, if necessary.
The moment he drew his sword in irritation and took a step forward, Ivan—who had stood silent and unmoving—opened his mouth.
"Well now, Senior."
Ivan grinned.
Having faced more than ten assassins at once, his body was a mass of wounds, and blood ran from a long gash across his shoulder. His breath came rough and uneven.
He was exhausted beyond measure.
And yet his stance had not wavered in the slightest, and the sword in his hand still shone.
"What a sight you are."
"…What?"
"I asked what kind of sight you are. You abandoned honor and pride and left the Order, so I thought you'd at least caught hold of something grand."
Ivan sneered.
"But it looks less like you caught something and more like something caught you by the throat. How are you any different from the corpses lying here? To my eyes, you're just another hunting dog of the Church."
Open mockery. Open contempt.
Bloodshot veins rose in Berlo's eyes.
"I cannot let that pass. That is an insult to the Church. I will give you one chance to retract it."
"Hahaha!"
Ivan burst out laughing.
"Leave the Knights of Atanga and you forget even a knight's bearing, it seems. If you've forgotten, then this worthless junior will have to remind you himself."
A stance that had not faltered.
Eyes that did not waver.
A sword that had not lost its light.
"An insult is washed away by duel. Honor and pride are proven by the sword. That is a knight's code—you filthy hunting dog of the Church."
"…Ha!"
A provocation that had clearly crossed every line. At the scalding abuse, Berlo laughed hollowly and drew out his sword-aura. The same deep blue as Ivan's—yet it did not shine the way Ivan's did as it coiled around Berlo's blade.
Aura wrapping his sword, Berlo advanced on Ivan. Still, Ivan did not move.
He looked as though a light shove would topple him, but Berlo knew better than to lower his guard. Even cornered, Ivan's eyes still shone. In that light, Berlo felt something close to dread.
The presence of a man who had accepted death. The spirit of one who had sworn not to release his sword until the very last.
In the dark, steel met steel. Sparks of aura leapt. Droplets of blood flew. It was the blood of a knight—and the life of a knight. As their blades clashed, Ivan smiled.
Because he could no longer hear it.
The sound of footsteps fading behind him.
That bought the time. You damned squire.
What other squire in this world could make the knight he was meant to serve stake his life for him? Damn that brat, anyway.
To the end, Ivan smiled.
To the end, he was able to remain a knight.
3.
A waterfall, its current plunging straight down.
Driving stakes into the sheer cliff face, Najin descended toward the ground. Even when his hands slipped on the slick rock and the spray, the rope bound around his body and the rebound of his own weight carried him, little by little, lower.
His body was spent from one battle after another, but Najin wrung out every last drop of strength he had left.
Even a cliff that had seemed endless was beginning to show its bottom. The waterway stretching into the distance came into view. To the last, Najin climbed down with care.
Thud.
Landing on solid ground, Najin gasped for breath. He had gripped the stakes so hard that when he opened his palms, the skin was raw and torn. He bound the bleeding hands with bandages, then looked back one final time.
The falling waterfall.
As if to say there was no climbing back up—as if it could only pour in a single direction—Najin watched it in silence. He turned over the last of his memories of the underground city where he had been born and spent his childhood, and then he turned his head.
What he needed to look at was where the flowing water led.
Once he had begun to run, he could neither stop nor turn back. Where the current would take him, Najin did not know. He did not know—but of one thing he was certain: there would be stars.
He ran along the waterway.
And so he arrived at the end of the path.
The road ended. A wall barred his way. But the water still flowed. Oppen had told him: at the end of the path, hold your breath and dive. Not knowing what waited beyond, Najin felt fear—
"…Hoo."
He steadied his breathing and threw himself into the water.
He surrendered his body to the rushing current. The wild flow seized him and swept him along. In the midst of it, Najin cracked his eyes open.
Nothing. He could see nothing.
Past being swept along, he began to feel himself sinking. His lungs slowly filled. And when he reached his limit, Najin lifted his head. Above him stretched the endlessly flowing surface of the river.
Something was reflected on that surface.
A glittering light.
Najin moved toward it. The body that had seemed only to sink began, slowly, to rise.
"Gah—hagh…! Hoo…!"
Breaking the surface, Najin dragged in air. Gasping, he worked his way toward the bank. Again and again he failed to catch the stones jutting from the shore; again and again the rocks scraped his body—until at last he dragged himself free of the current.
His whole body ached. He could not even stand. Soaked through, Najin collapsed on his back at the river's edge, arms and legs splayed.
Lying in the open field, catching his breath, he understood what the light on the water had been. Blinking again and again, Najin looked up at the sky for the first time in his eighteen years of life.
A vast night sky, spread without end.
And there, countless stars—stars beyond counting—were shining.
A vista no sentence from any fairy tale could describe unfolded before him.
The first night sky he had ever seen was beautiful.
More beautiful than anything else in the world.