Change (6)
I already knew Carl was strong.
He was someone I'd sparred against countless times before, after all. Back when I was staying at the Aln estate, I'd often watched him train with the other knights, too.
But facing that strength head-on was an entirely different story.
"Kgh!"
I blocked Carl's swinging blade, but the impact shoved me backward, and the distance I'd worked so hard to close stretched wide open again.
Ha. Damn it. I can handle the strikes themselves just fine, but getting pushed back with every block is a pain.
Carl isn't even that bulky—how is he this strong?! Is he some hybrid of external and internal muscle fiber?!
"You blocked even that. Your skills have improved by leaps and bounds through real combat. As expected of the young lady."
Carl, standing a few paces away, offered his heartfelt admiration, but all I heard was trash talk.
The guy who's been hogging the initiative and toying with me this whole time gets to brag about getting stronger? All it does is piss me off!
"What, can't pierce a single shield so now you're pretending to compliment me?♡ Even your swordplay philosophy is pathetically noob-tier, ultra-noob♡"
"Haha! Would I have anything to be ashamed of? It's the young lady's shield, after all!"
What's even more irritating is how poorly my provocations land on him.
Anyone else would be seething by now, but he remains perfectly composed.
Has he built up a resistance from all the abuse I sling at him on a daily basis?
There it comes again. A slash starting from the upper right.
That heavy-looking overhead swing is a feint and the real thing at the same time.
If I ignore it, he'll commit fully and smash through me. If I react to it, he turns that strike into a feint and goes for what follows.
He has enough breathing room fighting me that for him this is simply a contest of cracking the shield and nothing else—which is what makes the trickery possible.
From the receiving end, it's the kind of thing that makes curses pour out of your mouth.
I know that if I don't want to eat it, I should move my feet and step into an attack of my own. But I didn't.
Partly because someone taught me that I mustn't.
And partly because things aren't desperate enough to warrant gambling on a desperate gambit yet.
"Wow."
After I dealt with two slashes in quick succession, Carl's eyes went round. He clearly hadn't expected his setup to be read this easily.
Honestly, I was surprised too.
The rapid improvement in my shield proficiency surely played its part, but more than that, my body feels absurdly light.
"What exactly do you think you can cut with that noob, loser, ultra-noob sword of yours?♡ I don't think it'd even manage a trim♡"
"I've never tried, so I couldn't say! Shall I give it a go?!"
"I'll pass♡ How could I ever trust a lolicon pervert like you with my hair?♡"
The exchange of blows continued.
Carl swung his sword to break through my defense. I desperately blocked each strike.
To any onlooker it might have looked like a fierce battle of wits, but I knew the truth.
I knew Carl was still holding several things back.
The desperate swordwork he'd shown sparring against Forsell.
The very best he'd displayed crossing blades with Duke Burrow just days ago.
Neither had been on this level.
"You blocked even this?!"
How long had we carried on this deadlocked stalemate? Gradually, I began to feel the change in my body born from the rise in my Divinity's rank.
Operating Divinity within my body felt so effortless now.
I didn't even need to think about it. As naturally as breathing, Divinity was filling my body to the brim.
And that wasn't all. My overall physical capabilities had climbed—I could feel it.
Things I couldn't see before, I saw now.
What I couldn't have blocked before, I blocked.
What I shouldn't have been able to react to, I reacted to.
It was unmistakable.
Strength. Agility. Reaction speed. Dynamic vision.
All of it had jumped up another tier.
So this is what it means for Divinity's rank to rise.
It was hard to grasp while staring in a mirror, but facing a strong opponent made the change self-evident.
Lady Armadi! I'm sorry I just mindlessly curse you out as a lolicon-loving bastard, but without a Status Window, how am I supposed to know my own body got better?!
So hand over the Status Window! The Status Window! Give us a Status Window so we can check anything easily, I'm begging you!
"Loser-dog♡ Is this really all you've got?♡"
As I grew accustomed to the changes in myself, one conviction took root.
If Carl kept fighting exactly like this, sooner or later I would seize victory.
If I exploited his consideration, I could land a properly decisive blow.
Not one that merely cracked a bone—one that knocked his lights clean out.
"Our loser-dog is just overflowing with consideration, isn't he♡"
But that wasn't what I wanted.
"Is it that a loyal hound can't bare its teeth at its master?♡"
My goal right now isn't to beat Carl.
I want to know how far I can go in an extreme situation.
I want to know how much the current me can block.
So I'm going to scrape at your pride, Carl.
If you were perceptive, I wouldn't have needed to go this far.
But what can I do? You're an ultra-noob dog who can't even read what's on his master's mind.
"What a loyalty-brimming son of a bitch you are♡"
"Thank you for the compliment!"
Watching Carl smile even at the words 'son of a bitch,' I smiled back in kind.
Throughout our exchange, he'd no doubt been reading me just as I'd been reading him—and I was no different.
My Weakness Perception had told me exactly what made him uncomfortable.
Not only the deficiencies in Carl's swordsmanship, but what he truly didn't want to hear.
"What a shame♡ The dog I want isn't an adorable little puppy like you♡"
"...I beg your pardon?"
For the first time, disturbance crept across Carl's face at my words.
I dove through the gap that opened between his slashes, raising my shield to smash into him.
But Carl was Carl.
The instant he saw me move, he wrenched his blade around in desperation and turned my attack aside.
"I want a fearsome hound with sharp fangs♡"
I kept my mouth moving while my mind raced.
His stance has wavered slightly—should I press inward?
...No. If I go deeper, I'll be the one who loses.
Fall back and regroup.
"Not a broken cur like you, whose manhood's been snipped away♡"
"Young lady, that is—"
"What?♡ Oh, don't tell me this was you going all out?♡ Pfff—♡ It wasn't a metaphor, you really were a neutered puppy♡ How pitiful♡"
"...Understood. I'll pick up the pace, then."
Magic coiled around the sword Carl raised overhead.
Aura.
Haha. Yes. Should've done this from the start.
I know your loyalty runs deep, but stop coddling your master and actually think about what your master wants, you loser-dog.
Do I really have to spell it out like this?
Watching his aura deepen by the moment, I poured Divinity into my shield.
And the instant I raised it against him, my smile reflected off the shield's back.
Not a smile meant to mock my opponent—one born of genuinely enjoying every second of this.
"I shall show you just how sharp the fangs of this devoted hound truly are."
"Oh really?♡ Don't overdo it♡ If the rest of your teeth fall out too, you'll look even uglier♡"
For now, my immediate goal is...
Let's make it coloring that pure, unformed aura of his.
Everyone knew that Lucy Aln stood far beyond the level of an academy first-year.
She was a monster among monsters, existing entirely outside the bounds of convention—a living miracle heralded as the one who would succeed Benedict Aln and bring glory to the kingdom.
Naturally, Arthur knew better than anyone what an absurd talent she possessed.
It was his own lifelong wish to surpass her even once, and he'd prided himself on understanding the depths of Lucy's strength better than anyone.
"...Ha."
But that had been an illusion.
"So this is how much she was hiding."
The Lucy now clashing with her own knight before his eyes—
"I'm going to lose my mind."
—was not a being the word 'student' could contain.
What is that shieldwork, anyway?
She doesn't just casually parry an aura-laden blade—she deflects it like it weighs nothing.
And the one swinging that sword is no ordinary knight, either.
A knight of House Aln, an order so elite that even the capital's First Knight Order—the gathering place of the kingdom's finest—couldn't afford to look down on it.
How could she possibly laugh off a strike delivered with genuine seriousness by one of the very best of them—the knight whom Benedict Aln trusted with his daughter's personal protection?
As if bewitched, Arthur watched the exchange unfold, and placed himself in their positions.
If I stood opposite Carl?
It wouldn't be a question of winning or losing.
It would be a question of how many seconds I lasted.
Ten seconds would count as a valiant struggle, wouldn't it?
And if I stood opposite Lucy?
There was nothing to discuss at all.
Forget pressing her the way Carl did—I'd be dancing on the strings of that girl's three-inch tongue until I self-destructed, and she'd look down on me for it besides.
Haha. Goddamn it.
So what is genius, then?
That is what a genius is—those monsters are what the word exists to describe.
I'm nothing more than a mediocre fool who mistook himself for special.
This feeling of something inside me buckling—it's been far too long.
It hurts. It hurts so much.
I thought I'd grown used to it watching my eldest brother's exploits, but apparently not.
"Beating her myself is impossible for a lifetime, I see."
"That's not true."
A weak mutter escaped him, unbidden, from the hollowness in his chest.
The one who answered was Frey. She kept her gaze locked on Lucy and Carl's exchange as she continued.
"Lucy is strong, no question. But she's not beyond being hit with a decisive blow."
"You're saying that after watching that?"
"If you can coat your aura in color, it's entirely possible."
Is this girl mocking me again?
It was already miraculous for a first-year to use aura at all, and she's talking about coating it in color?
The only reason our elder brother is being praised as a peerless prodigy despite his countless sins is the single fact that he once coated his aura—does she not realize that?
Arthur turned his head to tell her to know her place, but swallowed the words the moment he saw Frey's face. In her eyes, fixed on the duel, burned a rapturous elation.
"...You're serious?"
"The Second Prince managed it, so what's stopping you? He handles a sword worse than I do, and he's dumber than the Third Prince, too."
Ah.
Right. That's how it was.
Lucy Aln's comet-like arrival had obscured it, but this girl was a monster in her own right, and then some.
Wasn't she the one who'd held the seat Lucy Aln now occupied, barely a year ago?
A laugh of pure incredulity escaped Arthur—and just then, Frey drawled out her next words.
"What's wrong, Third Prince? Lost your confidence? Weaker than the Second Prince?"
Arthur gritted his teeth at the insinuation that he was inferior to his second brother.
Is she provoking me on purpose?
No. Surely not. How could this sword-obsessed brat possibly know about the rift between our elder brother and me?
"Don't be absurd."
Still, the fact remained that even careless words stung.
"I'm far more capable than that blockhead of a brother. Naturally."
"Really?"
"I'll prove it."
He'd already repeated grueling training enough to grasp the shape of aura.
He couldn't wield it freely yet, but it wouldn't be long before he could put it to practical use.
"I'll reach color before you do."
Beyond that, the rest would be trivial. Anything would be possible by then.
I'll place our elder brother beneath me. And you as well.
"The Third Prince? Ahead of me?"
"Isn't it obvious that I'd be faster than a dim-witted beast like you?"
"But the Third Prince is a noob who loses to me."
"I have no idea what era you're living in. You seem to be the type who clings to past glories."
"Want to settle it?"
"Come at me."
Arthur, responding to Frey's goading like a petulant child, turned his eyes back toward the escalating clash between Lucy and Carl.
If only to carve into his memory a little more of how a knight of House Aln handled his aura.
At some point, Carl had stopped playing games.
Gone were the tricks meant to worm through my defense—in their place stood a man intent on shattering my shield with pure, overwhelming force, and in that figure I could see the Carl I'd watched duel Forsell so long ago.
So everything before was the warm-up, and this is the real thing.
Blocking ultimate-grade slashes that bored into my Divinity itself, trying to annihilate blade and shield together—laughter kept bubbling up out of me.
This is fun.
That I've gotten stronger.
That I get to fight a battle like this.
That my shield is turning back his sword.
And that the crease between Carl's brows keeps deepening and deepening!
"So the fangs of a beaten cur were♡... this dull all along?!♡..."
"You don't sound very relaxed for someone saying that!"
"That's just... what you want to believe!♡..."
Blocking Carl's blade was getting harder by the second.
But not yet.
I still haven't faced his color.
So I can't stop here.
"You mongrel beaten-dog whose collar's too good for you!♡..."
Show me your everything, so I can answer with mine!
You oblivious, noob, pervert knight!