The End of the Ordeal (1)
"Um... hey. You."
Erti looked up at me. Then, as if to hide her flushed cheeks, she quickly bowed her head again.
I popped a long, sausage-like mystery meat into my mouth. Its shape oddly evoked that particular part of the body.
Erti's cooking skills weren't half bad, so the taste was decent enough. I bit off the end and replied.
"I'm listening. Speak."
Even after I said that, Erti hesitated to get the words out. It wasn't until I'd finished the whole sausage that she finally spoke.
"Did you sleep well last night?"
"Very well. I was exhausted from the ordeals, so I slept deeply without a single dream. I'm in top condition."
Erti's face fell in obvious disappointment. She must have known the events of last night would linger only as a dream. But she hadn't expected me to remember nothing at all.
"You didn't dream at all? You're a man in your prime. Living alone with a woman like this... you might've had that kind of dream. Maybe... I even appeared in it."
"Is that so? Other men might, but I'm no celibate monk."
Her expression shifted in an instant at my words—some mix of anger and injustice.
"Still, we've been alone together for days now. Isn't that strange? Unless you're... there's no need to lie out of embarrassment. Men need regular release, or they get wet dreams..."
"Hmm. Now that you mention it, you're right. No wet dream, but I do seem to have had some kind of dream..."
Color returned to her face.
"Yes! Try to remember it!"
"But it wasn't a dream with you in it. And if it was a wet dream, it'd feature noble ladies or women I know—not you. The Pantheon is full of young, attractive priestesses, after all."
Her frustration turned to near-tears.
"What kind of nonsense is that! How arrogant!"
It was Erti's first time. But if her partner remembered nothing... for someone who'd dreamed of romance for ages, it must be a shock.
And I just had to mention other women in the dream.
I decided to stop provoking her. We still needed more time to complete the ordeal.
"Calm down, Erti. Doesn't that just prove how little leisure I have? But if I can hold my own against you wielding Graiel's power... I might have the luxury for all sorts of dreams. You're plenty attractive, after all. You might even star in them."
I let the words slip casually, as if it were nothing. She reacted to the compliment.
"Really? Even after I slit your throat every day...?"
"That's just the ordeal. Can't be helped."
"Hmph. Fair enough. You have a surprisingly good eye for women."
She beamed at the lukewarm praise. It had only been one short night, but Erti seemed fairly tamed by my tyrant side.
After breakfast, the ordeals continued. The two of us headed to our usual hill overlooking the village.
"Yesterday, at the very end when you faced my sword. You managed a single counter against me. Remember that sensation?"
I nodded. I'd tried lucid dreaming to hold onto it, but her nocturnal assault had ruined that.
Still, moving through the night had ingrained a new martial insight instead.
"I remember. I won't let you lop off my head so easily this time."
"Full of confidence, I see. Very well. That means it's time for the true ordeal."
Our clashes so far had been like a tutorial. Erti extended her hand.
"Take my hand. We're entering the battlefield."
I took it without hesitation. But the moment our hands touched, she flinched.
"D-don't grab it like that!"
"How else, then? Should I let go?"
"No! I mean... don't let go, no matter what..."
So sensitive to a mere touch—she was clearly conscious of me. Her changed demeanor almost made me laugh.
Soon, we entered the Bernige Plains.
It's definitely different from before.
The space Erti recreated was the Bernige Plains I'd seen once. The timing matched the skirmish from days ago exactly.
Back then, I'd been a ghostly observer in a soldier or knight. Now, I was part of the desperate raid— an Essenmont soldier slashing at the monster charging me.
"Charge! Make way! Clear a path for His Highness, even if it costs your lives!!"
A White Night knight's command roared beside me. Demon aura choked the air. Without Agnes's Rosario or Yulian's blessed body, it was suffocating.
A vicious curse gripped my throat. Yet this soldier's body endured it.
Trust in the flesh bolstered my mind. Even in this ordinary body, the monsters didn't terrify me.
So my mental fortitude has grown too.
Death held no fear. No—it did. I knew how agonizing that moment was.
And how futile death could be. That's why I gripped my sword in this suicidal raid, fighting to survive.
The forms of the Lion Heart Sword. The one I seek...
I beheaded another charging monster—a third-form beast. Surprise flashed on the knight leading my squad.
"How does a mere foot soldier one-shot a third-form...?"
To him, I was just a grunt in a grunt's body. But my will differed.
I'm Yulian von Reinhardt. And I'll survive bearing that name.
The heroic blood of generations. This body wasn't Reinhardt flesh, but my will recalled it.
Its roots gripped the earth unyieldingly, compelling me into this mad assault.
Fusion Method... I need to make it work even in this body.
My self-made cultivation art. Overbearing for Reinhardt bodies, impossible for normals.
But I reframed it. I'd suppressed side effects with superior physique before. Now, I'd modify the Fusion Method itself for control.
Tame the rampaging mana—like a lion unchained. No need to crush its ferocity.
Just direct the rampage. Aim the lion's fangs at the enemy's throat.
Flow with that power to draw my sword forms.
Abstract, but simple: no wild scattering. Prepare only the final strike that kills the foe and spares me—from the start.
No need to waste power recklessly. Ride the flow. Use the method's momentum in that one crucial instant.
I surged the mana flow explosively. Refined it through my mana heart into pure mana.
A mana blade severed the monster's neck. Another soldier's head rolled.
"Max!! Damn it!! Another one down!"
No—a knight. Our allies were down to less than half, barely a quarter.
At the raid's vanguard, a female swordmaster swung a golden aura blade.
Atlin...
The Sword Empress was expressionless. But I saw tears well in her eyes, vanishing instantly. Another knight fell.
Suddenly, Atlin's holy sword Sielertia. The aura blade's color shifted.
Midnight without sun. Yet the golden flash that lit the field faded.
The blade darkened to jet black, echoing the Sword Empress's despair with a tearing wail.
"...Advance!! Spare no lives! I'll devour your deaths to survive to the end! Clear the path!"
That aura blade consuming deaths—Pre-Dawn Eclipse, the prior ultimate art. In the Lion Heart Sword's abyss of darkness, I witnessed her form of despair.
The Reinhardt family's Lion Heart Sword. The prior ultimate one must pass before the peak. And the realm I needed from this ordeal.
"To save some, others must die—a contradiction. Atlin was a once-in-a-generation genius in the Reinhardt line. Her despair must have been immense. Even she couldn't save everyone."
Erti, dwelling in the imperial sword, murmured softly.
Moments later, I too perished—my torso impaled by a monster—without seeing Atlin and the last knights reach Graiel's camp.
Three more days passed. Now it was evening after the ordeal.
The battlefield trial differed from the preliminary days ago. Not like my one-on-one death matches with Erti—no endless personal deaths.
Instead, I lived the soldiers' slaughter firsthand. Thousands sacrificed in one night raid.
Experiencing that raid as Yulian himself—that's this trial's goal.
Comrades charging beside me one moment, corpses the next. No twenty-one-year-old greenhorn endures that unscathed.
Hence the cozy newlywed home: fine meals, a bath to soothe fatigue despite the cramped space. All prepared by Erti for his trial.
Though even that won't preserve his sanity alone.
It was temporary. Yulian had to endure himself. Erti worried daily.
Yet Yulian ate his dinner calmly across from her. Serene.
He's eating well.
Of course. Even in a grunt's body, his skill grew daily—astonishing Erti each time.
He was instinctively grasping Pre-Dawn Eclipse, Atlin's despair form.
Limited to mana blades in a soldier's body, but his unique method infused it with jet-black mana momentarily.
As expected of a Reinhardt... Atlin's descendant. Learning the weight that name carries.
Atlin ordered the charge knowing all would die. The weight of those deaths crushed her as margrave and Sword Empress.
Her hair turned white overnight.
And if Agnes's prophecy held, this young Reinhardt was fated to bear that weight—or more.
But he's handling it well.
Better than expected—his growth outpaced her hopes.
On day one, he'd died far from camp in the soldier's body. Now, he reached Graiel's doorstep.
Victory loomed: confronting Graiel himself, mastering Pre-Dawn Eclipse. Joy for Erti, his trial guide.
Then why this regret?
Completion wouldn't part them—Yulian succeeding would make her his.
But this home was special. Just the two of them. Atlin's dream of rural life woven in.
And once we leave... he won't look only at me.
He'd taken her virginity, but as holy sword, she was still a blade.
Even as a woman, like his father Riel, women would flock to Yulian. Monopolizing his heart? Impossible.
So at least here, alone...
Lost in thought, Yulian finished eating.
"That was delicious. I'll head to bed, then."
"Good night."
She sent him off calmly to his room, then entered hers. But she sighed immediately.
"Sigh. Even after such intense lovemaking... you remember nothing, you insensitive oaf. It hurts."
These past nights, she'd slipped into his room after he slept, borrowing his dreams for intimacy.
Unable to forget that shocking first night—it was inevitable.
But tonight weighed on her. In this house of Atlin's memories, she wanted... an unforgettable mark for Yulian too. Not in dreams, but reality—conscious, skin to skin.
She lacked the courage.
But Erti steeled herself.
Yes. Just go for it!
She summoned spirits to purify her body. Used subspace magic for light perfume, subtle makeup.
Then Erti opened Yulian's door. He was still awake.