Who Am I? (1)
Every person has a limit.
Just as even the most sumptuous feast laid out before you becomes impossible to finish once your stomach is full, the moment that limit is crossed, human beings instinctively reject it.
It is not only the stomach that has its threshold. Shock—mental shock, for instance—works the same way.
Take, for example, the young woman who found herself in this situation: I ran into a young man in an alley. He was handsome, had a certain presence, and his eyes sparkled, so I treated him to a meal—only to discover he was the youngest 7-star, the youngest Sword Master, and a once-in-a-millennium prodigy of legendary hero caliber who had drawn Excalibur.
A shock that left her capacity far behind.
The moment she saw the glittering Excalibur before her eyes, Dieta Arvenia made a soft gulping sound and fainted clean away.
Dieta opened her eyes a few minutes later.
Faced with a shock that had obliterated her tolerance, her choice was to flee from reality: Ah. I must have had a really strange dream.
“What a weird dream I had. You, Najin, pulling Excalibur or whatever…”
Clack—and a flash of light.
“Gulp.”
Second faint.
Fortunately she came to a little faster this time. Still, Dieta stared with trembling pupils at the Excalibur sparkling before her.
An impossibly radiant sword.
Was that the legendary Excalibur? The holy sword King Arthur once wielded—the Star Sword? Pupils quaking, Dieta called for her guardian knight.
“Um, Pasion?”
“……”
“Pasion?”
She meant to ask him if that really was Excalibur, if she wasn’t seeing things. That was the plan—but no matter how many times she called, her guardian knight gave no answer.
Why isn’t he answering? Dieta turned around.
Trembling.
There were Pasion’s eyes, vibrating at least twice as fast as her own. Opening and closing his mouth, gasping for breath as though hyperventilating, he made Dieta tilt her head.
“Um, Pasi—”
“Knight of the Empire, Pasion!”
Thud! Before she could finish, Pasion dropped to one knee. Then, without the slightest hesitation, he bowed his head.
“I greet the greatest of knights!”
It was the natural reaction for any knight of the Empire—no, for anyone who bore the title of knight, regardless of nationality. Excalibur was the symbol of Arthur, the greatest knight and the King of Knights.
“……”
Dieta looked at Najin in silence.
Najin shrugged his shoulders in silence.
“That’s how it turned out.”
2.
Najin tried to brush the whole thing off with a single “That’s how it turned out,” but of course it was not a situation that could be dismissed so lightly. In the end he gave Dieta the full story, and after hearing it, Dieta…
“Good heavens.”
She dragged both hands down her face.
Having already fainted twice, she managed not to pass out again, yet she was still thoroughly confused. The tale had outstripped her imagination entirely.
Buy low and sell high—that may be a merchant’s virtue, but there are degrees. Finding a strangely shaped stone on the street that turns out to be a diamond is something one can accept with pleasure. But…
Accepting that the stone you picked up off the street was in fact a legendary treasure, the very symbol of a hero lost a thousand years ago, a priceless absurdity beyond any price tag—that was another matter. And the scene unfolding before Dieta’s eyes was worse still.
“So?”
Dieta’s voice trembled.
“You’re the youngest Sword Master now?”
“Ah—only while holding Excalibur, that is.”
“The youngest free knight, the youngest 7-star, selected as a candidate for one of the Empire’s pillars, and once things settle down His Majesty the Emperor will personally pay his respects and bestow the Empire’s Hero Medal?”
“An invitation did arrive.”
“And on top of all that, you pulled Excalibur?”
Clack. Flash.
“That’s how it is.”
“Ah—it’s a bit dazzling…”
“Shall I put it away?”
“Yes, for now…”
Najin obediently stored Excalibur. He almost seemed to be enjoying her reaction. Dieta let out a long sigh.
“I had guessed you might have drawn it, but seeing it right in front of me… how should I put it. It feels a little unreal.”
“Does it?”
“You seem perfectly calm.”
“It feels like what was coming finally arrived.”
In truth he was not entirely calm. After he drew Excalibur, throngs of knights had come to kneel and pay their respects, and even the Emperor had sent a handwritten letter addressing him with honorifics.
It was inevitable that his shoulders would swell a little.
Of course he never showed it. Outwardly he remained as frugal and restrained as ever. Even before the Emperor he had said, with stylish modesty, “I merely did what needed to be done.”
The pride, the satisfaction, the sense of accomplishment he never voiced piled up inside. Ordinarily, what piles up is bound to burst someday—but…
In Najin’s case it was a little different.
Merlin.
……
Merlin?
……What.
Because Najin was relieving his need for recognition in a timely fashion. With a thoroughly smug expression directed at the constellation inside him, he shrugged his shoulders. Look. This is how great I am. Merlin’s face crumpled as if she had bitten into a bug.
Who am I?
She was receiving the exact same question for the fifty-seventh time.
See that, Merlin? Who am I?
Aaaaaaaaaargh!
The question, repeated for a total of fifty-eight times. Unable to endure it any longer, Merlin screamed. Face flushed bright red, she seized Najin by the collar and shook him left and right. Naturally, there was no one to hear her screams. Most regrettably.
“So, Najin?”
Having steadied her confusion, Dieta stared intently at him, as if asking what he intended to do next.
“I plan to stay here for a while. The Empire’s situation needs to stabilize before I can move, and that seems to require some time.”
Tilting his teacup, Najin looked at Dieta.
Flinch—her body went rigid.
“Y-you’re going to stay here? Meaning, at my mansion? Not even a villa, but here?”
“Of course—only if it’s all right with you, Dieta.”
“Uh, uhhhh…”
Dieta stuttered. The mansion was immense, of course. After all, it was the main house of the Arvenia Ducal Family. It was simply that she had zeroed in on the fact that she would be living under the same roof as Najin.
“Ah, if it’s inconvenient I can find somewhere else—”
“No, no!”
Dieta cut him off.
She slammed the table and stood.
“Pasion? Prepare an empty room at once. Tell the steward. You know what to say without me spelling it out, yes?”
“Huff—Excalibur…”
“Pasion!”
“Huk!”
The dazed Pasion snapped to attention, saluted Najin, and bolted into the mansion.
“B-but what’s the reason? Wanting to stay at my mansion. Of course I’m fine with it, but…”
Dieta asked, glancing sideways at him. It was rare for Najin to make such a request first. She meant to probe his intentions.
“Well.”
Najin answered, rubbing his chin with a thoughtful hum. Honestly, with his current standing he would be an honored guest wherever he went, and there were plenty of places calling for him. The Emperor himself had offered to prepare a separate residence in the imperial palace.
Yet Najin had come to the Arvenia Ducal House.
Pondering the reason carefully, he said,
“Because it’s the most comfortable?”
“What?”
“When I’m by your side, Dieta, my heart feels the most at ease. You could say I feel stable—or like I’m resting.”
There were many reasons Najin felt this way. Ever since the days of Cambria, the City of Opportunity, he had sought Dieta out whenever a situation was resolved—whether to report, to receive help, for any number of reasons.
And if he did not go to her, she came to him; when he lay bedridden, the first to arrive was always Dieta.
Even after he crossed into the Outer Land little changed. Whenever he returned to the Continent, and whenever he decided, after finishing his business there, that he wanted to “rest,” Najin headed to Dieta’s side without much thought.
Closer than a friend.
They could not yet be called lovers, but the face that came to mind first in moments like these was always hers. From Dieta he felt familiarity and ease.
“Huff.”
Dieta swallowed hard. Najin had spoken without particular intention, yet for her it landed as a critical blow. She clapped a hand over her mouth and whipped her head away.
Isn’t this practically a confession?
It was different. It was not a confession.
But either way, what did it matter? Her excited eyes spun. Dieta murmured, “Is that so,” rose from her seat, and held out her hand to Najin—offering to show him around the mansion herself.
It was originally the steward’s duty, but that hardly mattered. Covering the corners of her mouth that kept twitching upward, Dieta began making plans in her head: what they might do while living under the same roof, how best to fill that time richly…
She moved forward while screaming inwardly.
Stop! Stop it! You—you try that one more time?!
Who am I?
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!
Coincidentally, Merlin was also screaming inside Najin’s mind—face flushed red, though for a slightly different reason than Dieta’s.
3.
A few days after Najin chose to remain at the Arvenia Ducal House, the gaze of the entire Empire fixed upon it. Natural enough—he had rejected countless invitations to come here.
And some gazes did not stop at looking.
Numerous transcendents expressed their intention to visit. Dieta had refused most of them in order to enjoy private time with Najin, yet she could not bring herself to turn away a transcendent as well.
The first to arrive was the Sword Saint, Caron.
The transcendent of the Sword Church visited Arvenia.
“Hey, Najin.”
“Yes. What is it, Master?”
“Right. I’m still your master for now, aren’t I? Ah—wait a moment. Should I be using honorifics? Since even His Majesty the Emperor addresses you with them, for now…”
“We’re in private. What does it matter?”
“That’s a relief.”
Sword Saint Caron rubbed his chin.
In the middle of the Arvenia garden, the two transcendents sat at a table conversing.
“……”
And the knights of Arvenia swallowed dryly, gulping as they watched. One was Sir Caron the Sword Saint, master of the Sword Church; the other was Sir Najin, the Empire’s hero who had been revealed to have drawn Excalibur.
What conversation were these great transcendents having?
They were desperately curious, yet they dared not approach. Surely the two were discussing matters of the gravest importance, things bound up with the fate of the world—highly dimensional talk that ordinary people like themselves could never comprehend.
It looked that way from the outside, too.
Sir Caron the Sword Saint was continuing the conversation with an extremely serious expression. Though his voice could not be heard, that face alone made the gravity of the content clear.
……Of course, that was only the knights’ assumption.
Najin looked at Caron sitting before him.
“Do you remember what I said before?”
“What are you referring to?”
With an extremely serious expression, Caron pressed on—as though there was nothing more important in the world.
“About Excalibur.”
“Yes.”
“Can’t I hold it just once? I’m asking you like this.”
“……”
“I can even kneel.”
It was not a joke. Najin had to break into a cold sweat stopping Caron, who was already rising from his seat as if ready to drop to his knees right then and there.