Two Birds, One... Stone?

Two birds with one... stone?

Having left Drak behind and returned to the mansion, I sank deep into thought.

How exactly am I supposed to get my hands on a holy relic?

The Eight Swords of the Empire—or the holy relics held by the imperial family alone. To obtain one, I would have to march into the Empire myself, or seek out the Eight Swords one by one. I had business at the Empire anyway, and if I ran into any of them, something was bound to come of it, so acquiring one wouldn't be all that difficult, but...

"Hmm."

Would the Eight Swords really show themselves that easily? These were dukes of a nation, a living saint—people of that caliber.

I suppose invading is the only way after all.

"Urrrgh..."

In the short time I'd been out, Sre had curled up on the plush carpet and dropped off to sleep. She'd always loved her rest, but ever since merging with Sgaredo, sleep now swallowed more than half of her day. Understandable enough, given she was still at the infant stage.

I was stroking the sleeping Sre when my hand stopped mid-motion, and I rose from my seat.

"...There's really no need to go, is there."

So this is the place.

The Duke of Twin Moons, Besk Lonhadia, arrived at the mansion where Lily was staying, guided by the intelligence he'd been handed. By all accounts, she was the mastermind behind this entire affair—the otherworlder Duke Mageuk had ordered him to watch with the utmost care. Word was that Lily had taken in a dragon's hatchling.

Besk's assigned mission was the slaying of the dragon atop the Snowy Mountain, but he carried a second duty as well: resolving the current situation. And that hatchling was another means to that resolution.

"Lamb skewers... nom."

Everything he had observed said that Lily and the hatchling were an affectionate master and pet, through and through—but the truth was otherwise. The frozen depths of winter. The child of Sgaredo, and a substitute meant to hold back 'destruction.' In fact, Lily had used the hatchling as that very substitute; she was not killing it now, but if the situation ever drove toward the extreme, she would cut it down without hesitation. Of that he was certain.

Sleeping so blissfully, is it.

Countless people—himself among them—had their eyes fixed on that snow-white throat, and yet the creature in question lay sprawled across a soft carpet, dead to the world. Drool pooled at the corner of its mouth.

Feeling something close to contempt, Besk drew his cherished blades—the Twin Moon Swords—from their sheaths. A razor-sharp sword aura gathered and settled not throughout the room, but into Besk alone.

Before he'd come here, Leo had tried to stop him, insisting it would be better not to go. Laughable. They said this Lily was a powerhouse even Leo couldn't overcome, a woman whose strength approached the realm of the 'Eight Swords'—so what?

Ridiculous.

Besk, on his own, might lose to Lily. But Besk wielding the Twin Moon Swords was another creature entirely.

A holy relic, they call it. Not merely some weapon.

Among the Empire's countless great houses, the reason the Lonhadia family could count itself within the top ten came down, in large part, to this holy relic. No matter how strong Lily might be, she could not defeat him while he bore the Twin Moon Swords.

Besides, this mission was never about facing Lily. It was nothing more than opening the hatchling's throat.

This won't even count as work.

He approached with care. The mansion lay utterly still; apart from that blissfully sleeping hatchling, no one was present. It didn't even notice he had come within arm's reach, still snoring away.

"Foolish thing," he murmured under his breath.

Still unaware. The limits of a lizard, no doubt. Fly as high as it liked, crawl as low as it pleased—it would never match a human wielding a holy relic.

"Well, then..."

Without the slightest hesitation, the Twin Moons shot toward the hatchling's nape.

CLANG!

"...Clang?"

The blade had come down squarely on its neck—and yet the hatchling's head remained firmly attached. More than unharmed, it was still fast asleep. Unable to trust what he was seeing, Besk brought the Twin Moons down harder still.

CLAAANG—!

He had swung with such force that his wrists rang out in protest. Perfectly fine. It was still perfectly fine.

"......Impossible."

The only things a holy relic failed to cut were another relic of equal standing, or techniques that existed outside all rules—Duke Mageuk's sorcery, and the like. But this was no dragon of the Snowy Mountain. It was a mere dragon's whelp. No matter how mighty the beast's bloodline, a hatchling should never have possessed defenses of this magnitude.

Did that otherworlder Lily have a hand in this?

It was a plausible theory. According to the intelligence, Lily was capable of erecting barriers of some kind.

"What a headache."

But it was not as though he lacked options.

Shing.

He crossed the Twin Moons into an X.

The Twin Moon Swords—twin blades that gleamed like a matched pair of crescent moons. Naturally, when both were wielded together rather than one alone, their power and speed were amplified severalfold. He had struck with only a single blade until now. With both, he could shatter that defense. It was finished.

"HAAAP!"

And so the two blades came sweeping down—

"Eepyup."

—and THWACK. Besk's own head was brought down by something dull and heavy.

CRASH!

"Thank you very much."

I had acquired a weapon containing Metamor.

The Twin Moon Swords.

You might call them a compact version of Vlack's Black Destroyer, I suppose. Two silver crescent-moon blades; layered one atop the other, they fit together with perfect precision, as if they had always been a single piece. Since the two swords were designed to be used as a set, swinging them together would no doubt grant some special bonus effect.

Of course, what caught my eye wasn't the effect. It was the fact that there were two.

Two swords means twice the Metamor.

Judging by their performance and their make, they clearly contained a beyond-first-rate quantity of uniformly high-grade material.

"Uuun...?"

"You can go back to sleep."

I patted the head of Sre as she stirred groggily upright. Honestly, I never imagined I'd acquire one like this. It was simply astonishing. How did the timing work out this perfectly?

Sre tilted her head, then leaned down toward the fallen Eight Sword and gave him a few inquisitive sniffs. A heartbeat later she wrinkled her snout, scurried around behind my back, and dropped into a low crouch. No need to be quite that wary.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"It was. He did send me a challenge first, after all."

He had infiltrated the mansion where I was staying, in secret, to kill Sre—the one under my protection. And even after I gave him two or three free swings, making it abundantly clear that he simply couldn't manage it, he refused to give up right to the very end. He only swung harder.

"He was fairly ferocious, though, I'll give him that."

Well, that's a holy relic for you. Truthfully, I'd meant to sit back and watch a little longer, but the Twin Moon Swords' momentum was far more serious than I'd anticipated, so I intervened quickly. If I'd left it alone, it would have been roughly an even match against Sre without her claws—and factoring in how much she'd grown after merging with Sgaredo, her actual level would have been higher still.

"Besides, if one of the Empire's Eight Swords has come all this way, that means they intend to take down the dragon on the Snowy Mountain. So if I use this to forge a weapon and take it down myself—wouldn't that accomplish his objective for him?"

The fallen Eight Sword wins: his goal achieved without lifting a finger of his own. I win: a weapon, acquired the easy way.

Two birds with one stone, plain and simple.

Anyway, I carried the Twin Moon Swords straight to Drak. He stared at me as though I'd lost my mind and demanded to know how on earth I'd pulled it off—but I have no idea myself. This was something I'd have needed to storm the Empire's deepest circles just to have a chance of obtaining, and it had simply rolled up to my doorstep on its own.

Better still, both the justification and the circumstances were flawless.

The world really is a strange place.

Feeling that strangeness anew, I deposited the fallen Eight Sword in a careless heap in front of the mansion where the imperial troops were stationed. They'd come ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠collect him themselves, wouldn't they?

"GRAAAAAAGH!!!"

CRASH!

"C-calm yourself, my lord!"

"Calm?! Does this look like a situation that calls for calm?!"

When Besk came to his senses the following day, he swept everything within reach of his hands onto the floor. His holy relic had been stolen from him—and after nothing more than a single blow to the back of the head that had knocked him cold.

What a humiliation...!

His reputation had already been deteriorating; he had intended to seize this very opportunity to turn it all around. To bring the subjugation to a triumphant close, and to display the Empire's majesty before those fools of a kingdom...!

"...Right now! Right now I am going to that thieving wretch Lily!"

"Calm yourself, my lord. Now is not the time to attack."

The knight in golden armor hurriedly restrained him, but Besk, enraged to the very roots of his hair, spat venom.

"Then what?! Are we simply to hand the holy relic over?!"

"...There are any number of ways to reclaim it. We must move only after the subjugation is complete. Only then can we secure justification."

"Justification."

Ghk.

"Since when has the Empire ever needed justification?"

An Empire that had carved out its vast dominion and its influence through wars of outright conquest?

Besk asked with scorn dripping from every syllable, but the knight's reply was glacial.

"Yes. It matters."

"How dare a pup like you—"

"Besides, this is also Duke Hwangyeol's will."

At the name of Duke Hwangyeol, Besk's mouth snapped shut. Duke Hwangyeol carried the blood of the imperial house and possessed the mightiest martial strength of all the Eight Swords. Besk served and trusted Duke Mageuk more faithfully than any—but Duke Hwangyeol's will was, for all practical purposes, the will of the Empire itself.

"Had you taken that hatchling's head in a single strike, Duke of Twin Moons, there would have been no issue. But having already been discovered and failed once, you stand on extremely unfavorable footing where justification is concerned."

"......"

"And with the holy relic stolen besides..."

Defeating Lily might well be impossible.

"...It was because I let my guard down. Fight me properly, and I win."

"But? How exactly do you intend to win without the holy relic?"

It was not the knight who answered.

Tap. Tap.

Emerging from the second-floor room into the lobby, Leo appeared, flanked on either side by her ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠spirits.

"That's why I told you not to go, you know. Honestly, you never do listen."

"...Such arrogance, scraping the very heavens. The Spirit God Duke who shields you is not present in this place."

"......"

"Moreover, Duke Hwangyeol, who issued the command, would never countenance such a private—"

"Duke Mageuk isn't here either, though..."

At the murmur—so quiet it bordered on silence—Besk flinched violently and fixed his gaze on Leo.

Leo was still smiling.