Heroes, Ordinary People, and Nations (4)
Galahad's only armament was a shield.
There was no sword to pair with it, no secondary weapon of any kind. Only the shield. Bearing nothing but the cross-emblazoned shield, Galahad faced Najin.
Fighting him now, Najin felt a sharp sense of unfamiliarity.
He simply had little experience against shield-wielding opponents—not because he was special, but because most transcendents never used shields at all. The existence of sword aura had long since rendered shields meaningless among them.
A blade densely sheathed in mana over a narrow edge, versus a shield with mana spread evenly across a broad surface.
That sword aura held the advantage needed no explanation. Coating a shield in aura was several times less efficient than wrapping a sword in sword aura and striking. The higher one climbed in realm, the more defensive armaments like shields fell into disuse.
Yet the knight before him used a shield.
He gripped only a shield.
Galahad caught every one of Najin's attacks with the cross shield. At times he swung it like a bludgeon to bat the sword aura aside, shoved Najin back, and pressed down hard to pin him.
In absolute total mana they were equal, or Najin held a slight edge. Even so, Najin could not break through Galahad's shield.
Because.
That was no ordinary shield.
The cross shield, engraved with the great deeds Galahad himself had built, was a star-relic. The ten stars carved into it aided him.
Combined with the technique of the man once called the most perfect knight and with his iron body, Najin felt as though he were facing a colossal iron wall.
Thud.
Every time it met Excalibur, the cross shield vibrated and dispersed the impact into empty air. The spreading shock rang through the atmosphere, pealing like a great bell.
Gooooong······.
While that unbroken peal filled the air, Najin recalled a conversation he had once had with Bedivere.
"It is a wall."
"When you face Galahad, that is the thought that comes. As if you are simply crashing into a massive wall. It does not feel like fighting a person."
An opponent who felt like a wall.
"A great tree. Galahad is a knight like a deeply rooted giant tree. He does not sway. Because his feet never leave the earth, you cannot shake him, nor easily create an opening."
A knight rooted like an ancient tree, unshakable by any means—that was the Galahad Bedivere had described. Najin was forced to feel, bone-deep, that there had been not a shred of exaggeration in the words.
Thud!
The shield cut across the path of Najin's sword. The motion was interrupted before true power could gather. The instant Excalibur's edge caught in a groove of the cross shield, Galahad's movement reversed.
Whir—clack!
With the blade trapped in the groove he spun the shield. Wrist would twist; the sword would be wrenched free. Had Najin held an ordinary weapon, he would have lost it that instant.
But of course Excalibur was no ordinary weapon. Najin released it without hesitation. Leaving the sword to scatter into starlight, he kicked off the ground.
He slipped into the rotating shield's flank.
Gliding in, Najin seized empty air. In the fight against Siegfried he had learned something. He recalled the First Swordmaster, who had stored and drawn Gram again and again to display that ever-changing swordsmanship.
He drew the sword from the air and swung it in the same motion. There was no distinction between the draw and the cut. The act of drawing itself held no meaning.
Excalibur burst forth as it sheared through empty space.
Even against that sudden assault Galahad finally reacted. Boom! Planting his feet into the earth, he swung the shield exactly as one would a blunt weapon.
Clang!
Shield and sword met; Najin did not yield an inch. His coat snapped in the exploding shockwave. Eyes wide, he poured strength into the blade.
Galahad.
Najin fixed him with a glare.
He looked at the man who only blocked, shoved, and struck without ever truly engaging, and the corner of his mouth twisted upward. Words were unnecessary. Najin spoke with the sword.
If you plan to wait until I tire and fall, you'd best abandon that idea.
Thud—Najin smashed the shield and used the rebound to leap far back. Landing low, he leveled his sword with lethal precision.
An extremely lowered stance.
A charge meant for one thing only: to pierce. The moment Galahad saw that posture, his pupils narrowed. He knew it. It resembled the preparatory stance of the technique Siegfried had named Thunderclap.
And the movement that followed as well.
Najin kicked off the ground. There was no thunderous crack like Siegfried's lightning, yet the instantaneous acceleration recalled that man who had moved like a bolt.
Screeeee!
The sword shot forward, slicing air like a single thread of light. Watching it, Galahad moved. Spin—boom! He slammed the rotated cross shield into the earth. Crouching low, he braced both arms and one knee against it.
Thud.
Impact first. The instant something struck the shield, a shockwave erupted. Bricks across the tower's summit crumbled or lifted into the sky, unable to endure.
Impact first; sound second.
With a roar the shield vibrated more violently than ever. Amid the tearing peal of the bell the shock traveled into Galahad's body. He swayed. The feet driven into the earth trembled; the shield that should have been rooted like a great tree's base began to lift.
Boom! Galahad forced it down again. The rising shield settled back into place.
Screeeech······.
I blocked it, Galahad thought—and in that same moment the tip of Excalibur, pressed to the shield, began to spin. The instant the point twisted while scraping the surface—
———!
A storm burst from the sword tip with a roar that shredded the air. A storm detonated while still in contact with the shield. Najin poured every ounce of strength into driving the blade forward, as if refusing to give ground. He too was forced back—but he was not the only one.
Grrrrrind!
The shield scraped the floor as Galahad was driven far backward. For the first time, Galahad yielded ground. One might have celebrated forcing him to retreat, yet Najin only linked the next motion.
Enduring the technique's recoil, he dragged the sword free.
First Angle.
The enhanced form of Ramming he had refined in his own way. He gathered every scrap of superheated air and residual storm the technique had left behind.
If the recoil was hard to bear, he would use the aftermath the technique itself had created—exactly as Merlin once had.
The collected storm spiraled along his blade. Raising the sword high as if to pierce the heavens, Najin fixed Galahad with his gaze.
Triumph.
Najin brought the sword down. Along the path Ramming had carved open, a single line of sword aura fell like a guillotine.
2.
"What's this?"
"Records left by the previous lords."
"Previous lords? That old man?"
"Some of them are his. I didn't know myself, but the Closed City turns out to be quite an ancient place. How many lords have come and gone? There's quite a volume there."
"There were more of us besides us?"
She read the blood-written memoirs.
"Ah."
She read them, and read them again.
The instant the sword aura fell like a guillotine, Galahad stamped the earth. The tower shook as though a giant had taken a step. Boom! Feet planted, he swung the great shield straight forward.
Sword aura and greatshield collided. The aura that shattered everything in its path sought to swallow Galahad whole—yet as if daring it to try, Galahad took one more step forward.
Boom.
Triumph's sword aura was shoved back.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
One step, another, then another. Galahad pushed against the aura that sought to break him. Pushing, he advanced toward Najin. Without shattering it, without batting it aside, without deflecting it, Galahad drove the sword aura back head-on.
Boom.
And then he began to run. The retreating sword aura of Triumph shattered with the sound of breaking glass—crash!—and scattered into drifting starlight. Through that veil Galahad charged straight at Najin.
Najin had seen enemies break Triumph before, but never like this.
His eyes flew wide.
Boom!
Galahad, now right in front of him, smashed the shield into him. With a heavy crack Najin's body lifted into the air.
"Did I not say so then as well, Kirchhoff?"
"I······."
"Do not belittle yourself. Square your shoulders. Raise your head. It is the same as in the past. Even if the beginning was a lie, did you not strive to keep the words you spoke?"
"······."
"Then you are a knight. It is a little late, but the time has come to pass this on to you."
Linden Walterhorn held out his spear to Kirchhoff.
"Not because you are the last knight of Rondinel."
The Blue Spear.
"Because you are the noblest knight, you are worthy to take this spear. I guarantee it, and······."
"I guarantee it as well."
The princess smiled.
"I won't speak long, Kirchhoff."
She stepped toward him. Taking the spear from the Blue Spear, she commanded Kirchhoff to kneel. He looked up at her with unsteady eyes.
"I—"
"Kirchhoff."
"······."
"Don't look at me with those eyes. It's a simple story. Truly simple."
Galahad's shield smashed into Najin while he still hung in the air. He twisted his sword to block, yet he was driven into the floor, hurled far away to crash on his back, then stamped by the charging shield until bones broke.
"Kh—cough. Ghk······."
Forcing out the blocked breath, spitting the mouthful of clotted blood, Najin lifted his head.
Yes. This is how it has to be.
He clenched his teeth. The rule that death here was not true death did not apply to him. He was an outsider. Even so he fought ready to die. As always, he gave everything.
Crash!
He kicked off the ground and charged.
Crushed by the shield of a Galahad whose momentum had shifted, bones fracturing, he still forced counterattacks through. Sword and shield met; the bell pealed without cease.
Screeech!
Driving his sword into the floor and sliding, Najin drew a great breath and charged again. Driven back, charging, driven back once more. With bloodshot eyes he threw himself at Galahad like a beast.
Clang!
Every swing of Excalibur kicked up dust. As if a typhoon raged, the tower summit was scored with chaotic sword scars. Fresh footprints stamped the deeply gouged floor.
Boom—leaving his own tracks in the stone, Najin raced. If a single heavy blow failed, then a chain of strikes; if that was not enough, then the blind spot of vision; if even that failed, then a variable.
He clawed for every means available.
Galahad took it all and struck him again. Yet now Najin was not driven far. Minimizing the shock, he reset his grip. Then—thud—he rapped his own pauldron and twisted the corner of his mouth upward.
As if to say, keep going. As if to say this much would never break him, Najin smiled.
At that sight Galahad's eyes narrowed.
He looked at the Najin before him. He watched the successor who charged wrapped in platinum sword aura. A smile slipped unbidden across Galahad's lips. He was the one pressing the attack, yet the other side seemed to be testing him instead.
······Not alike, and therefore alike.
Galahad was a knight.
To withhold one's full strength against an opponent who gave everything was unknightly. He reset his grip on the shield.
"It was a life judged worthless. I thought it had no meaning. The Constellation of Omniscience still lived and fled, and though I gifted that madwoman failure with my death, I failed to finish her."
"Alive, she'll keep experimenting somewhere else."
"Yes. I thought so too, but."
"But?"
"That wasn't the case. We already won against the Star of Omniscience that day, in that place. The Star of Omniscience has remained sealed in its domain even now, a hundred and fifty years later··· and no new lord rose to succeed us."
"······."
"We were the last lords. The final lords of the Closed City who succeeded in closing it, who fulfilled the long-held wish of every lord before us."
A brief silence.
"'We,' you said."
"Yes."
"Not 'I'?"
"Did I not already say so?"
Yuel smiled at Yuel.
"That it is because of you that the me of now exists."
Just as the lords written there are the reason we of now exist.
"One question."
"The duel is not yet finished."
"Even so, I must ask."
Hoo—catching his breath, Najin looked at Galahad.
"This tower is a single vessel. The captain of a ship that carries heroes has a duty to lead his crew. What did you feel as you climbed this tower?"
Where is the destination you head toward?
That was the question Galahad posed.
"What use is eternity? However beautiful a dream may be, a single moment in reality is more precious."
Lift your head, Kirchhoff.
"We are the past."
"······."
"And the past is those who have steeled themselves to become the defeated for the sake of the future at any time. Because by losing, we are as good as victorious."
"Your Highness."
"My dear knight, Kirchhoff."
The last queen of Rondinel wore a smile no different from that day, the same smile as then.
"The Star of Oblivion claims this place is an ark. That when the day comes that humanity faces extinction, it will become a vast ship and flee to the ends of the world."
She burst out laughing.
"What a joke. Even if this world belongs to that constellation, the master of this land is me. It belongs to me, Yuria, queen of Rondinel. And as master of the land I intend to exercise my rightful authority."
"What authority?"
"What else?"
Did I not say it was a simple story?
"Rondinel does not flee."
She cried out.
"We never yield. Flee when humanity faces extinction? Nonsense. We must become the ship that pierces through extinction and presses on. And deciding the master of that ship is my right."
Yuria struck Kirchhoff's shoulder with the spear. Just as she had on that distant day when she first knighted him.
"Kirchhoff, last knight of Rondinel and its noblest knight. As the one who represents Rondinel, I ask of you······."
Yuria smiled.
"Go forward. Toward tomorrow."
"You asked what I felt climbing the tower."
"I did."
"Because the past exists, the present exists. Because the present exists, the future exists. Because you exist, I exist, and because I exist, Yuel Razian exists."
"I······."
"Yes."
"Did my life have value?"
"We'll have to wait and see."
"······."
"We walk forward. We will cry, laugh, grow angry, grieve, and become human. I don't know what ending waits at the end··· but isn't that better than remaining stuck in the past?"
Yuel laughed, then wiped her face.
"Yes. I suppose it is."
She took a coin.
"Heads, I'll let you go. Tails, I won't."
"Asking fortune. A classic method."
"Hmm. I'm not asking fortune."
She snatched the coin she had thrown.
"It's heads."
"You didn't even open your hand, did you?"
"It's heads."
"Ah."
"Honestly, reading the diaries, it looked cool. I wanted to try it once."
"I thought something similar."
They shook hands, then shared a light embrace.
"Go."
The lord spoke to the lord.
"Last Lord of the Closed City."
"May tomorrow be better than today."
Najin said.
"May tomorrow be more peaceful than today."
So saying, he raised his sword.
"What the heroes wished for was a bright tomorrow—the next day. Then what else is there for me, who am tomorrow to them, to do?"
Excalibur shone. Amid the nine stars flashing in the sky above, the outline of a new star was preparing to take its place. Feeling the contour of the tenth star nearing completion, Najin opened his mouth.
"I have to shine."
Najin smiled.
"Just like the tomorrow they wished for."