Spear Saint Asel (2)
"Clear skies today."
Ardel murmured it as he gazed up at that cloudless blue. Back at the estate, the quiet rush of wind and the maids hurrying to hang out the laundry would have answered him. This place was different.
"Is something the matter, sir?"
"Nothing at all."
The reply came from a guardsman swaddled in leather so thick it looked suffocating even on a day this bright. Ardel was not staying at House Briten. He was serving as an apprentice of the Golden Knights.
Joining the order as an apprentice had never been the hard part. Decent skill and the right pedigree were enough. Becoming a full knight, on the other hand, was a wall most people never climbed. Still, Ardel had just taken the first step toward the dream he had carried since childhood: becoming a proper knight of the Golden Knights.
He would have enlisted much earlier if not for the chaos of recent days — and the moment he did, another disaster had erupted. The sky above him was peaceful. His thoughts were not.
Just what was his little brother doing out there?
First a kidnapping, and now a practical exam that had turned into a massacre, wiping out examinees in droves. According to Caron's report, Argal had survived, but he was badly hurt. And Ardel, bound by his new post, could not even go visit him. Abandon his assigned duty and he would never set foot in the Golden Knights again.
What else could he do? As long as the boy was alive, that was enough.
"Hah..."
The duty he had been given was to patrol Antoni, day in and day out. Filthy, boring, exhausting work — but it was mandatory if he ever wanted to become a full knight. On top of that, he had to sit through constant evaluations of his skill and claw his way past the other apprentices in a life that never stopped competing.
Even so, there were moments that soothed him.
A little girl came trotting toward him.
"Big brother, are you on patrol again today?"
"Hey, kid."
Was it because she reminded him of Ariel, back at the main house? He found himself smiling as he met the child's eyes. She was exactly his little sister's age, and something about her felt familiar. For Ardel, who knew almost no one in Antoni, even a handful of casual conversations on the street was enough to make this girl the closest thing he had to a friend.
Not that he ought to get too close.
The girl fumbled her bundle open and held up an armful of mushrooms.
"I found these on the mountain across the way, so I brought them. Do you think they're safe to eat?"
"...Those do not look like anything a person should put in their mouth."
"O-oh. Really?"
Having grown up on a rural estate, Ardel at least knew you did not go around picking mushrooms at random and eating them. He could not tell a poisonous cap from a harmless one, but he had no desire to put something that might kill him anywhere near his mouth.
"Luna, don't eat those. Throw them all out. Mushroom poisoning is no joke."
"Aww..."
"Ahem. We should be moving on, sir."
The guard's nudge to resume the patrol cut the conversation short, but for a moment Ardel had felt something like peace.
And yet something was wrong. The bright sky had not turned to evening, but it was darkening all the same. Antoni was still a vast city — and it had gone utterly still.
"They're all gone..."
The Spear Saint looked thoroughly miserable. She had dragged her sick body all the way here, suffered the humiliation of being forgotten even by the comrades who had come with her — and now she had been abandoned again. She had every right to be in a foul mood.
"Do you want to follow them that badly, Asel?"
"That's why I came in the first place."
"And if you could go, you would?"
I had been thinking of making her an offer, just in case. The Sword Saint and the Spear Saint were the only ones who did not look at me with that excessive, clinging obsession. As for the Hero, I still could not tell. Whether she watched me out of some basic conviction that people should not die, or whether she carried the same kind of feeling as the others, I had no idea.
The Spear Saint coughed.
"Khack, khack. What good would following them do in this condition?"
"There's a way."
I drew the vial I had been hiding inside my coat.
Elixir. A single drop of that miraculous tonic could take someone on the verge of death and put them back on their feet. A flu hardly warranted more than that.
"W-wait, I thought you drank all of that?"
"Why would I finish something that precious?"
"If you still had some, you should have given it to me sooner!"
Ah... so the Shameless Saint was still the Shameless Saint.
I looked at her with a gaze gone thoroughly cold. She had the decency, at least, to glance away.
"...I-I just mean the timing is terrible. What good does it do to give it to me now, after everyone already left me behind?"
"This is practically my lifespan, you know."
"Ahem! W-well, even so!"
Even after I spelled out that I was offering her something that could have been years of my own life, she stood there without a shred of shame. In a way, that was a relief. Whether it was just her personality, she did not carry any heavy guilt over me. In front of her, I might even be able to die in peace.
"You still want to go after them. Right?"
"...Yeah. I do."
"There's one condition."
I thought of the bishop. I still did not know what he had intended by showing Besia my death, but I was going to that city regardless. I had even tried to reach him again, just in case there was more to say, but he no longer pulled me into his mindscape. Fine. Then I would go.
The bishop had said that my companions and I would kill the Black Tower Lord. His advice had been not to lean too hard on my immortality.
...That did not mean I was not an Immortal.
I had no idea what he had seen that made him so determined to keep me from dying. But I was an Immortal. I could be a little more careful. I could even listen to what he had said. And I would still go myself, and I would kill the Black Tower Lord with my own hands.
The root of the thing that had forged this eternal loop called immortality. I would cut it down myself.
"I'm coming with you."
"...Is that even possible? You made a mana contract."
"It's possible."
The Spear Saint looked puzzled, but she did not press. As long as the flu went away, she would have agreed to anything. The illness really had wrung her out far worse than it should have.
"I-I don't care. As long as the flu's gone, I'm fine."
"Then open your mouth."
"...Can't I just drink it myself?"
"And I'm supposed to trust you with that?"
She had enough self-awareness to concede the point. Even she seemed to know that if the elixir landed in her own hands, she would drain the bottle. A single drop was worth an entire mansion, after all.
Still, she must have been a little embarrassed. Her face went red as she parted her lips.
The stopper came free with a soft pop, and the elixir's fierce fragrance spilled through the room.
"Aaaah..."
I let a single drop fall into her open mouth. Even that was a lot, given how little of the elixir remained. There was not much left now.
The moment she swallowed, the color rushed back into her face. She tore off the mask hooked under her chin and the towel wrapped around her head, then stripped off the heavy, warm clothes she had been wearing on top of everything else.
...She startled me, peeling everything off like that. Underneath, at least, she had on a set of light clothes she could actually move in. What a strange one she was.
"Nngh. I can finally breathe."
The flu that had shackled her fell away cleanly, and the Spear Saint — whose face had been nothing but gloom for days — broke into a deep, genuine smile. She looked truly happy. Giving her that drop had not been a complete waste.
"Then let's go."
"Alright."
I had no intention of hunting down a carriage. If we left on foot now, we would probably reach Antoni ahead of the Hero. She still had to deal with the Church and get the Golden Knights moving. Until then, it was on us to hold the Black Tower Lord back as best we could.
What was she after, exactly?
I thought back to the time before the regression. This was not my first clash with the Black Tower Lord. I had brought Ambrosia down with my own hands, and I had killed her myself. She had not been that strong back then. More precisely, my ambush had never given her the chance to use a black mage's real strengths.
This time was different. She was reaching for the seat of Transcendence — the highest place a black mage could climb. And once she got there, what did she mean to do?
...A thought I did not like occurred to me.
Was she after my immortality?
The Black Tower Lord was a black mage who had poured her entire life into creating an Immortal. And yet she had never researched immortality herself. She had always been off doing something else. Back then, Gaudium had kept the success of his research to himself, never telling her he had actually managed to make an Immortal. The first time she learned about my immortality was after the Black Magic Tower had already fallen, in the moment I ambushed her.
I had already contracted with the Great Demon by then. I had died over and over to kill her, and the last thing she had said as she truly died was nothing but bitter resentment.
Something like that.
But could the power of immortality even be stolen?
"...What are you brooding about so hard?"
The Spear Saint was staring at me, puzzled that I had gone so still. I had only been turning over something important. It did not change the plan. We were still going to Antoni.
She studied me a moment longer.
"You look kind of cute, just standing there like that."
...Was she picking a fight out of nowhere?
I shook my head, shook the thoughts off, and started walking.
"You look like an idiot, Asel."
"...H-hey. What's that supposed to mean?"
A journey with just the Spear Saint. Even if it would only last a short while, it felt strangely awkward.
We were about to leave when someone stepped into our path.
"It would hardly be proper to let patients wander off as they please."
A priest so old he looked carved from age itself blocked the doorway.
"Please. Rest here, and be at ease."
"...And you are?"
"I am Yoas."
His vestments were extravagantly fine. In a Church that made a point of restraining luxury and ostentation, clothes like that could only mean one thing. This was someone of very high rank.
"I am merely a servant of God who happens to occupy the office of Cardinal."
A Cardinal. That was no ordinary title. He was a figure high enough to run the Capital's entire Church branch by himself. His sudden appearance was strange enough on its own — but then his gaze settled on my necklace.
That was when I felt it. Something wrong.
"I did not expect the gift I once gave Bishop Revega to find its way to you. Might I have the guest's name?"
There was a presence in that gaze so familiar it was almost grotesque. Other people might have missed it. I could not.
It was Magi.
"I must ask this of you, Commander."
"Even coming from the Hero herself, this is a difficult request."
She held her ground before the visibly uncomfortable Knight Commander.
"The Golden Knights must be deployed. There is no other way. If they are not, a far greater catastrophe will surely follow."
"I understand what you fear, Hero, but it should be enough to send a portion of my knights. Why must every last bit of our strength leave the Capital empty and march on Antoni?"
"As I have already said, a black mage—"
"Even a black mage cannot erase a city overnight, can they? It would be more than sufficient to observe their true strength first, and then deploy at the proper time."
Faced with that argument, the Hero decided she had no choice. She drew out the thing she had hoped not to use.
It was the seal Reinhardt had given her — the seal of House Russelmani, stamped with a ducal crest. Its effect was immediate.
"...That is?"
"The seal of Russelmani."
"Why would the Hero be in possession of such a thing?"
"I once rendered House Russelmani a service, and received the seal in return. I offer it to you now, Commander."
She gave him a cleaner explanation than the truth — that Reinhardt had simply handed it to her. It was a lie, but that hardly mattered.
Greed bloomed openly across the Commander's face. There it was, a physical token more persuasive than any speech. The Hero would bear the responsibility, and even if the whole affair turned out to be a wild goose chase, the Commander stood to lose almost nothing.
"...Give me one day. I will mobilize our full strength and proceed to Antoni."
The Hero nodded, feeling oddly hollow. He had not even pretended to listen when she spoke — and the instant she produced the seal, he folded without a fight. The emptiness she felt then was of an entirely different kind.
"...That is the nature of the human heart."
Which made him all the harder to understand. If this was what people were... then what, exactly, was he — the one who threw his life away without a second thought?