Argonaut (4)
The figure seated there was the Helmet Knight—yet he was not the Helmet Knight Najin knew. Hearing that answer, Najin felt a conflicted tangle of emotion.
Regret, and relief.
The quiet hope that he might reunite with his master in this place had curdled into regret; yet even as the disappointment settled, relief rose alongside it.
“I suppose,” Najin said with a bitter smile, “that ending suited you just fine, Master.”
The final duel fought in the Revelry Emperor’s domain. When that clash ended, Alderan had stepped down from the stage called the world. He had accepted his end without a scrap of lingering attachment, without a shred of regret.
And so Alderan had placed the period at the close of his own story.
A tale already finished. An epic already complete. To tack another sentence onto an ending the man himself had accepted… that would have been a graceless thing indeed.
“The duel Sir Gerd and I showed him must have been thoroughly satisfying. How else could he have left this place without so much as a single small regret?”
Najin smiled as he spoke. The regret was real, yet right now relief—and a swelling pride—outweighed it. Leaving nothing behind meant Alderan had been content with his end.
“Yes. In his final moment, the Commander was smiling. ‘You absolute bastards. Really, to go this far…’—that’s what he said.”
“He’s one to talk. If I had to list the most dangerous moments I’ve faced in the Outer Land, the duel with my master would make the cut every time. First bout or second, I nearly died both rounds.”
“He was always harsh with disciples and successors alike.”
Kruenbel nodded hard, and a quiet understanding formed between the two of them. Both had been marked by Alderan as the next commander; both had endured truly brutal training for the privilege.
“You were the next commander, Sir Kruenbel?”
“Yes—though it shames me to say it. I fell to the Revelry Emperor before I ever inherited the post.”
Najin, who knew exactly how Kruenbel had fallen, fell silent. Kruenbel shook his head at the look.
“It’s all right. I failed… but you succeeded, didn’t you? If my failure was of any use to you, that alone is enough for me.”
His voice trailed off.
“……Did my technique help you?”
He pointed to the Cross-Star Lance strapped across Najin’s back—the exact same weapon Kruenbel himself once carried, the spear that had been his emblem and his pride.
“Need I even say it?”
Najin answered with a laugh.
“Ramming. Of every technique I used while traveling the Outer Land, I relied on that one the most. Clearing a path, keeping enemies at bay, batting aside incoming projectiles—nothing else came close.”
Kruenbel said nothing. Najin rose, adjusted his grip on the lance, and drove it through empty air. He demonstrated the perfect form he had learned from Kruenbel, showed the storm coiling around the spearpoint, then followed with the improved Ramming he had refined himself. Kruenbel watched it all in silence.
“When I swept away the jesters, when I burst the Revelry Emperor’s paints blocking the road, when I faced the Star of Contempt, when I brought down the Wandering Star Icarus……”
Najin listed, one after another, the enemies he had pierced with Ramming. Ramming—the technique whose name meant to ram with a ship’s prow and open the way. True to its meaning, it had always opened Najin’s path.
“And most recently, I used it to hurl back the Sword Fiend of the Abyss.”
“The Sword Fiend of the Abyss… you mean the wielder of Gram?”
Kruenbel’s eyes went wide. There was no constellation that did not know of the Sword Fiend of the Abyss, the terror that made the stars themselves tremble. Even those who had never met him had heard the rumors of his strength.
“You’re telling me Ramming worked on him?”
“I modified it a little, but the foundation was still Ramming. It was the first technique that actually landed. I used it to fling him all the way to the boundary of the Abyss.”
Kruenbel’s eyes shone like a boy listening to a hero’s tale. There was a strange charm in Najin’s storytelling that could turn even a solemn knight into a wide-eyed youth. That was the nature of Dalso—the Star of Laughter, the hero’s tale told with a grin.
“I see.”
Listening, Kruenbel found himself able to smile.
“That… is something to be proud of.”
The technique that had never been able to open his own road had, in the hands of his successor, opened another man’s way. Hearing it, Kruenbel dragged a hand down his face.
“I’m glad you’re the next commander.”
“Is that so? Well, the heir who pulled Excalibur isn’t exactly common talent.”
“No. This has nothing to do with Excalibur.”
Kruenbel cut him off cleanly.
“That you drew Excalibur, that you are the heir of Arthur the King of Knights—those things are astonishing, yes. But what I am grateful for is not the great king’s successor. It is you, Najin.”
He smiled gently.
“You turned a commander who was becoming an undead back into a knight. You raised once more the banner of the Golden Horn Knights, who would have vanished from history, and made us shine again……”
Kruenbel’s finger pointed straight at Najin.
“I am grateful for the existence of Najin himself.”
For a moment Najin had no idea what to say. Then he smiled.
“So,” Kruenbel said after a little time had passed, “what do you intend to do now?”
“Above this floor waits Sir Galahad of the Round Table. You mean to challenge him, I assume? Then I’ll clear the path.”
“I do mean to challenge him,” Najin said, shaking his head, “but not just yet. It seems I still have business left here.”
“Business?”
“I am the next commander of the Golden Horn Knights, aren’t I? Next commander in name only—I’m basically the youngest member. I took the commander’s seat without even a proper succession ceremony.”
Najin rose as he spoke.
“I never received recognition from the seniors who came before me.”
He started walking forward.
“And I never showed them who I am.”
The Golden Horn Knights standing at a distance turned their gazes on him. Under those stares, Najin stopped before the Helmet Knight, who still sat perched on the boulder.
“Kruenbel?”
Najin looked back over his shoulder.
“How is the succession ceremony of the Golden Horn Knights conducted? I’m still not familiar with this side of things.”
“That… was never strictly defined. But the Commander used to joke, ‘Whoever beats me becomes the commander.’ He said it often enough.”
“Ah.”
Najin nodded, then drew the sword at his hip.
“Then let’s hold that ceremony now.”
He settled into stance before Alderan.
“Foundation of the Empire.”
Then:
“Commander of the Golden Horn Knights.”
As if introducing himself before a duel, Najin spoke the names that pointed to him, one after another, before Alderan.
“Yeomyeong-gak—Dawn Horn—Najin.”
I challenge you to a duel.
The moment the challenge was issued, Alderan Basaglia rose from his seat. The Alderan composed solely of the records of that age possessed no self. He was merely a being who performed actions befitting a hero.
Even so, Alderan Basaglia was a knight.
Even so, he was the commander of the Golden Horn Knights.
He recognized the duel request offered by his successor. Without a word he tapped his helmet once with a gauntleted fist—tung—then drew the sword from his hip. No further introduction was required.
On his head sat the most radiant horned helm; in his hand rested the blade that was the symbol of the Imperial First Horn.
What further introduction could be needed? I am the sword of the Empire, the commander of the Golden Horns, Alderan Basaglia. The presence before him seemed to declare exactly that. At the sight, Najin could not help but laugh.
“……”
“……”
In silence the two raised their swords in the formal salute. Then, still holding that posture, neither moved an inch—as though waiting for something.
Only then did Kruenbel—and the Golden Horn Knights watching—realize what they themselves must do. Like a Round Table they formed a circle around Alderan and Najin, and drove the lances from their backs into the ground.
Thoom.
Then they took the horn trumpets from their belts. Horns to their lips, they looked to Kruenbel. Under their gazes, and under the weight of the moment, Kruenbel muttered, “Honestly……” and dragged a hand down his face.
Horn-blowing Star Kruenbel.
He set the horn to his mouth. The constellation who blew the horn blew harder than he ever had in life.
Bwoooooooom————.
With him as the lead, the Golden Horn Knights raised their horns and blew with all their might. The deep rolling call echoed through the 129th floor.
Duel—commence.
The twelve knights of the Golden Horn Order watched the duel between their commander and the successor who had taken his place. The instant the horns fell silent they moved almost as one, settling into identical stances and driving their blades toward each other.
“That’s the Triumphant Sword.”
One knight clicked his tongue.
Having watched from the closest seats, they knew Alderan’s Triumphant Sword well. They also knew how brutally difficult the style was to learn.
“The form is perfect. Footwork, breathing—flawless. And the blade path needs no comment.”
“It’s like watching the Commander himself……”
“As if someone set a mirror between them.”
Of course they knew Najin had learned the Triumphant Sword; the Commander had told them so. But they had never seen Najin perform it, never seen him fight at all. They had only pictured it in their minds.
And the duel unfolding before their eyes now surpassed anything they had imagined. The knights watched with eyes wide open.
Kaaaaaaaaang!
Blade met blade and sprang apart. One would give ground only to close the distance again at once; at point-blank range the edges locked, slid, locked again.
Ka, gagagagak!
The force distributed through each sword was precise. The arcs the blades traced carried weight. Paths that anticipated the opponent’s movement, that slipped aside or answered instantly with a counter—there was no word for them but perfect.
Two flawless sword-paths collided again and again, and neither yielded an inch.
At that fact the knights marveled.
“The Commander standing there—isn’t that the Commander of those days? The time he charged alone into an army led by a Demon King and came back after wiping them out.”
“The Commander in his prime.”
“The Commander at his brightest, before erosion, before he broke. The era when he had no equal.”
What they were watching was Alderan Basaglia at the height of his power—the war hero who had accepted not a single defeat, who had led every campaign to victory.
Everyone here remembered that age.
Even if the world had forgotten it, that glorious era still lived and breathed inside their memories. How could they ever forget the man who had driven that age forward?
“……”
Every one of them had dedicated their lives to that radiant figure. They had marched crying out the glory of the Empire. They had gone into the Outer Land hoping that those who came after would live in a better world.
Remembering that time, they looked upon Alderan, the symbol of their past. The Commander’s sword was still beautiful. The Commander still shone. Yet their gazes soon left him and settled on the young man crossing blades with him.
The youth’s Free Knight’s coat streamed behind him. On his shoulder he wore a pauldron modeled after the glorious horned helm, the Hornhelm, and from that pauldron the banner of the Golden Horn Knights snapped and fluttered with fierce life.
And in his hand was Excalibur.
A youth who had inherited the hero’s seat a hundred and fifty years after the age Alderan had led stood there now. The star rising at his back blazed. The young man who refused to yield even a step shone with a light that dazzled the eyes.
“He isn’t giving ground. Not an inch.”
“Looks more like he’s the one pushing.”
“Against the Commander of that era, no less.”
“Did you see that last technique? Hah.”
“Unbelievable. Never thought anyone would be able to match the Commander strength for strength……”
“That level is what it takes to pull Excalibur, isn’t it?”
Looking at Najin, they found themselves laughing.
“Didn’t the Commander say it once? ‘Whoever pulled Excalibur, I don’t know him, but the bastard’s master is going to have a hell of a time.’”
“Hahahaha! He got hit with his own karma good and proper. About time the Commander paid his dues. I heard his own master prophesied, ‘You’ll meet a disciple just like yourself.’”
They laughed and bantered, yet none of them could tear their eyes from Najin. At times their palms grew damp; they held their breath and watched the two duel.
At some point the chatter stopped.
They forgot even to breathe, sinking wholly into the duel. The radiance the two heroes created stole their gazes. And between the flashing brilliance they saw it—
the blade of Excalibur,
and the stars, the stories, carved into it.
“Ah.”
One knight let out a soft cry. His name was Kruenbel. Seeing the engraving of the Cross-Star Lance upon Excalibur, he could not help but smile. He was not the only one who smiled.
Because what was carved into Excalibur was not Kruenbel’s story alone.
Beneath it was the Commander’s image; and beneath the Commander, the emblem that stood for the Golden Horn Knights themselves. Confirming it, the knights fell silent. One laughed; another dragged a hand down his face; yet another finally released the breath he had been holding.
On that Excalibur—
on the sword that was the very symbol of the greatest knight—
their own stories had been carved.
However much they had pretended to have no regrets, regrets had remained. No one could simply accept that their lives had gone unrecorded anywhere. They had only endured it.
Even so, our lives will have meaning.
Someone will carry them on.
The years they had soothed themselves with those words and forced themselves to endure flickered past. The emotion they felt, facing the junior who stood at the end of those years, was something no words could hold.
“Truly.”
The knights saw it.
“What a magnificent duel.”
A duel more beautiful than anything.