The Name of the Sword
Astria had spent a long while lost in anguish, but no matter how hard she wracked her brain, no answer revealed itself.
After turning the problem over and over in her mind, she finally reached a single conclusion — that a rational approach was simply meaningless here.
"…"
She let out a short sigh and suppressed the rising impatience.
Master said… to 'listen.'
Perhaps he hadn't meant for her to think, but to feel and accept.
All the knowledge and logic she had learned in Lucenoct proved powerless before the strange assignment Sian had given her. Maybe he was demanding that she shatter that very way of thinking.
The voice….
She set the sword down before her and focused her consciousness, tracing the shape of the blade in her mind as she had done so many times now, and tried to feel its presence.
The weight and balance grown familiar from countless swings, the texture of the grip, the keenness of the edge — she searched for something beyond mere physical sensation.
"…"
Slowly, Astria closed her eyes.
The basic mental discipline of Lucenoct. Inhale, exhale. Slowly, and deeply.
The clean air filling her lungs seemed to gradually sweep away the tangled thoughts in her head. The sound of wind brushing through the leaves, birdsong in the distance, the scent of earth and grass….
She sought a state in which only she and the sword existed, and nothing else. The sword was a part of her, a vessel holding her will. She could almost believe the boundary between her hand and the blade had blurred, that a faint energy was circulating from her fingertips into the sword and back again.
And then—
…?
Something, faint as a whisper, seemed to reach her. Not quite a sound — closer to a vibration, or the fragment of an emotion.
A memory of the sword's forging? The lingering afterimages of the countless cuts it had delivered? Or perhaps… a reflection of her own inner self cast into the blade?
This might be the thread that led to the 'voice' Sian had spoken of. She tried to focus her consciousness wholly on tracing the source of that faint sensation.
But—
"…"
Her senses, honed razor-sharp by total concentration, detected figures drawing near. Not one, but many. And judging by their speed and the faint presence they gave off, she knew exactly who they were.
Silently, without a word, she lifted her sword.
"To sense our approach — have you grown a little more in just that short a time?"
A voice tinged with admiration drifted out of the darkness. A faint presence despite standing right before her — these were among the most skilled assassins in the entire Blood Sword.
"It will be worth the trip to bring you back."
"…"
"Before we drag you off by force, I'd like to ask one thing. Why did you run? This was your chance to become a member of the glorious Blood Sword. With your talent, you could have climbed over the others in no time."
The Blood Sword was the most infamous organization in the world of assassination, but it took commissions from no one and did more than kill. It was Lucenoct's hunting dog, willing to commit any crime imaginable for its master, murder being merely the beginning.
That was the truth of the Blood Sword.
And—
"I have no use for such a disgusting position."
Its members were all raised and trained from childhood within the ducal house. To think she had clenched her teeth and learned the sword through sheer desperation to survive, only to become a hound.
That was why she had fled before she could be inducted into the Blood Sword at all.
The man let out a dry snort of contempt.
"You too are a creature born of the darkness. You cannot deny your roots."
"…"
"It seems there is nothing more to discuss."
At his signal, countless silhouettes burst from the undergrowth. Six shadows converged on Astria without a sound, from six different angles — an encirclement tightening without a single gap.
Clang! Clash-clang!
Astria swung her sword on pure reflex, deflecting the wave of attacks. Blades flashed in the darkness, ceaselessly probing for her vitals.
Her body, tempered by Lucenoct's brutal training, did not fall easily — but—
There are too many…!
For every opponent she faced, two or three more strikes came flying in from her flanks. She moved without rest, swinging her sword again and again, yet found herself driven back step by step.
They, like her, had been trained in Lucenoct. Perhaps they had once crossed blades under the same roof — not a single one of them was an easy foe. And their true strength lay not in individual skill, but in the coordinated assault of a pack closing in on its prey, cutting off every avenue of escape before going for the throat.
Shwick!
A blade slipped past her by the width of a sheet of paper. For men who claimed they wanted to take her back, their swords were full of killing intent — lethal strikes, every one of them.
The sharp ring of steel on steel split the stillness of the quiet forest. Astria moved without pause, blade never still, yet she could not help but be pushed back, little by little.
Trickle.
Blood from the wound grazed across her shoulder ran down her arm and soaked into the hilt. A heavy fatigue was accumulating in her sword arm. If this went on, an opening would appear, and she would fall.
Listen to the voice of the sword.
She couldn't understand why her master's words surfaced now, of all times, in the middle of this crisis. There was no voice to hear — she could barely keep up with the storm of blades raining down on her.
Was this that voice? The scream of terror and survival instinct felt in the face of death? Or the sound of herself and her sword wailing together?
Doubt and anxiety bloomed in a corner of her heart. But at the same time, a desperate refusal to give up held her fast. Her instincts screamed at her to flee, right now — but her reason held her in place, telling her that the meaning of Sian's assignment was the key to breaking through this crisis.
CLANG!
A moment's lapse. The leader's sword knocked hers hard aside. The impact numbed her wrist and threw her stance wide open — and two more assassins drove in from either side without missing a beat.
An unavoidable combination. In that instant, she believed it was all over.
Thump.
With the pulse, she felt something. Her body reacted on its own, following that strange sensation.
Shwick!
"Kgh—?!"
"Ugh!"
In a flash, the two who had been about to strike her down were themselves cut down.
"So you thought it was over — were you still hiding your strength?"
"…"
He was right. Even she had thought it was over.
She stared down blankly at her own sword, at that strange sensation she had just felt.
That just now….
A sensation utterly unfamiliar. It felt as though someone — as though the sword itself — had spoken to her.
The other assassins charged at her where she stood dazed. But—
Fwish!
Astria was no longer the helpless girl being driven back. That strange sensation from moments ago had not entirely faded. Like a lingering echo, a faint reverberation, it hovered around the edges of her consciousness and her senses.
It wants… something.
That was how it felt. As if the sword were calling out to her for something. For now, only a faint cry circled in her head — but—
A little… more….
If she could hold onto this sensation just a little longer, she felt she could reach what her master had spoken of.
One after another, the Blood Sword's assassins fell to her blade.
"Th… this can't be!"
The assassins were thrown into confusion. Only moments ago they had been pressing her hard — and now, suddenly, her sword had become impossibly fast and precise, as though she were reading their every movement before they made it. Their combinations broke apart again and again, and the counterattacks only mounted their wounds.
The leader's expression hardened as well. The flow of battle was turning.
Watching it unfold in silence, he finally let out a resigned sigh.
"Tch."
They still held the advantage. But if this dragged on, he thought, an unforeseen variable might appear.
Sian, was it? What in the world is he?
According to their intelligence, he had been with Astria for barely a week. And in that short span, he had pushed her a full step forward in her growth. He was no ordinary man, without question.
It had to be finished before he arrived.
"All of you — release your power."
In that instant, the very air changed. The quiet forest seemed to turn cold in a heartbeat.
And then—
Stir.
The fallen Blood Sword members, struck down by Astria's own hand, began to rise one by one. Bones cracked and popped. Joints wrenched back into place with sickening crunches.
The eyes of the risen men were no longer sane — the whites had all turned a vivid, bloodshot red.
Creak.
At that grotesque sight, a quiet fury rose in her chest. People she had known had become that — and if she were captured, she too would become the same.
This was the darkness of Lucenoct.
"What is there to be so angry about? You and I both — we were born fated to the same end as these men."
"I am different."
"You mean to deny your roots? Denying them changes nothing."
In the end, they would all be swallowed by the darkness — so he was saying.
I will not be swallowed by the darkness.
With that resolve, she gripped her sword.
And then—
Thump.
Once more, she felt a pulse from within herself. And in that instant, an emotion beyond all words came pouring into her.
It was — unmistakably — a voice.
Having heard that voice rising from within her own being, Astria knew.
"…So that's it. Now I understand."
What Sian had truly meant when he told her to 'listen to the voice of the sword.'
"What are you grinning to yourself about? Have a sudden change of heart?"
"…ra."
"What?"
"The name of my sword — hear it well!"
At her cry, the leader let out a scornful laugh and gave the signal.
"Hah. I wondered what nonsense you were spouting."
Responding to his gesture, the resurrected assassins of the Blood Sword charged at her once more — faster than before. In an instant they were upon her.
But she paid them no heed at all, and as though in a trance, she opened her mouth—
The Flowing Fire — the true name, spoken at last.
The moment the word left her lips—
FWOOSH!
Flames began to bloom from her sword.