Crossroads of Life and Death
Once again, the Hero returned having completed his mission. Countless allied soldiers had been spared, while countless enemies had been extinguished in their stead.
"...And so, the Lich King perished while clashing with Grandis, and Grandis's own forces suffered substantial losses as well."
Above all else, what seized the court's attention was the fall of the King of the Dead.
"Magnificent. To think you would turn one enemy against another to eliminate them both."
The Emperor showered him with commendations, and the gathered nobles looked upon him in awe—astonished that he had wiped out an apocalyptic calamity while merely tasked with evacuating allied troops.
Yet the man himself felt nothing at all.
"...Idiots, the lot of them."
Lying back on his bed, Einzel muttered into the quiet room. He could not fathom their perspective in the slightest.
He had simply scratched and clawed for a way to stay alive. Yet everyone else fixated on something entirely different. Did his desperate thrashing for survival look like some glorious feat or historic triumph in their eyes?
He exhaled a long, heavy sigh.
When he truly thought about it, an unbridgeable gulf lay between him and everyone else—a rift carved by time wound backward again and again. Yes, just like that night he had fought shoulder-to-shoulder with Sayne. They had fought, suffered wounds, bled, and in the end, he had even died. And yet, a quiet corner of his heart still cried out that it had been a fond memory.
It was not as though he had forgotten the terror of death. If anything, the specter of death dug its claws deeper into him with every turn of the wheel, slowly strangling the breath from his throat. Yet why did the memory of that solitary day still make his chest ache so keenly? Why did it torment him so that the memory had vanished from the world, preserved only within a solitary corner of his own mind?
Einzel bit down hard on his lower lip and pulled the blanket over his head.
Even now, the moment he closed his eyes, he could feel undead jaws tearing into his flesh; with every breath he drew, it felt as though his skin were burning away. Perhaps he had branded the memory of that day 'fond' merely to wrap a shred of counterfeit meaning around a Hero's agonizing existence.
He was still in agony.
He was still utterly alone.
"A few more days of marching and we'll reach where the Hero is hiding! Burn everything to ash—leave not a single trace behind!"
Count Cerindel's coarse roar rolled across the ranks. His Imperial Majesty had bent the rules and strained protocol to manufacture this golden opportunity for him. If he failed, he would have no face left to present before the throne. At his back rode five hundred cavalrymen. Against a true Swordmaster, ordinary troops meant little, but Count Cerindel was a Swordmaster himself. When two blades stood on near-equal footing, victory was decided by the narrowest margin. Five hundred elite soldiers would surely tip the scales in cutting down the disgraced Hero.
Cerindel inhaled deeply, a smug smirk carving into his mouth. In his mind's eye, he could already picture himself ascending to the undisputed pinnacle of the military, drunk on absolute authority.
At that exact moment, someone took notice of their approach.
"...They're here."
"Einzel? What do you mean?"
"Ah, it's nothing."
Though his tone was mild, his eyes were dead and cold as ice.
"I'm going out for a bit."
"All right, dear."
He stepped beyond the village boundaries. The encroaching dusk surged forward, shadows rising like eager arms to enfold him.
A venomous sneer curled on his lips.
"Look at them rushing in like hungry dogs. How pathetic."
His expression twisted, gradually warping into madness.
"Should I burn them alive? Rip them to shreds? Skewer them through? How should I do it? Decisions, decisions..."
His pace quickened, his stride stretching long.
"Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them."
Pale moonlight broke through the canopy, bathing his figure in white.
"I made sure to return to my hometown without a single complaint, ready to live out my days in peace. But if a meal rolls right into my mouth... what else am I supposed to do? I have to chew it up and swallow it down."
He snapped his fingers once. Darkness, radiant light, and myriad disparate currents of energy coalesced, knitting together into intricate geometric fractals.
Einzel snapped his fingers a second time. Before the sound had even faded, he stood directly in front of the encamped soldiers.
"W-What the—?!"
Count Cerindel barked in sheer shock. The clearing had been completely empty an instant ago, yet mana had suddenly surged and a living presence had materialized out of thin air.
"Why look so surprised, huh? It's just me."
In the moonlight, bleached-white hair and deep runes etched into pale skin came into sharp relief.
"...The Hero. It really is you."
Count Cerindel's face relaxed into a confident grin.
"To think you'd deliver yourself right into our hands. I hardly know whether I should thank you."
"Funny. I was about to say the exact same thing."
"Prepare for battle!"
"Yeah, hurry up and bring it on. My hands were just starting to itch anyway."
In an instant, the imperial soldiers drew their blades, their polished armor catching the dim campfire glow—clearly seasoned veterans rather than common levies.
"I never imagined you'd be foolish enough to walk alone into an army of five hundred."
"Seems to me you're the real fool here. Walking straight into my barrier of your own free will."
Cerindel flinched at the word 'barrier,' but he quickly recovered his swagger.
"Hah! We marched through without meeting the slightest resistance. There's nothing in your so-called barrier—you're just bluffing."
"Moron. You're right, there's nothing in the barrier. The problem is that you stepped into my domain."
"And what of it? Even a goblin fights fiercer in its own nest, but I am a Swordmaster, and the numbers are overwhelmingly on my side. You fool. If I were you, I wouldn't have challenged us head-on; I would have chipped away at our ranks from the shadows."
"Pfft!"
Einzel spat a short laugh.
"Pfft—hah, no, ahahaha!"
The chuckle tore into full-blown, uproarious laughter.
"Do you... do you honestly believe you and I are anywhere near the same level?"
Count Cerindel's expression instantly froze.
"Utterly absurd."
Einzel snapped his fingers.
"My thoughts exactly."
The surrounding darkness writhed, twisting into violent, predatory shapes.
Crunch!
With a sickening snap, jaws of shadow clamped shut, shearing limbs and torsos clean away from dozens of soldiers—as though something colossal had bitten straight through them.
"What? Five hundred? A measly five hundred?"
Einzel let out a grotesque, unhinged laugh.
Cerindel's gaze locked onto a nearby soldier whose upper torso had vanished into thin air. A warm splatter hit his cheek. When the count reached up and brushed his fingers across his face, they came away drenched in fresh, steaming blood.
His hands began to tremble uncontrollably.
"If you wanted a piece of me, you should've brought ten times that number. You idiot."
Einzel's eyes burned a manic, crimson red.
Several months slipped by. Then, shocking news crashed into the Imperial Capital.
"...What did you say?"
"A single soldier has returned, Your Majesty. Judging by his uniform, he belongs to the vanguard unit dispatched to track down the Hero."
"Not the entire force, but a single man? What of Count Cerindel?"
"You had best hear his testimony directly, Your Majesty. Though... he is currently in the grips of severe lunacy."
"Very well. Lead the way."
The Emperor descended into the subterranean dungeons.
"Why have you brought him down here?"
"As I mentioned, Sire, he is afflicted by violent madness. He thrashes incessantly and attempts to mutilate himself during his seizures... Furthermore, we could not rule out the possibility that he was subjected to brainwashing or mental curses."
"Hmph. A prudent measure."
The Emperor and his retinue finally arrived before the iron-barred cell. Inside, the survivor was bound hand and foot in heavy iron chains.
"Do you recognize Us?" the Emperor asked.
"Y-Your Imperial Majesty...?"
"Yes. It is We."
"Y-Your Majesty! The s-search party... Count Cerindel...!"
He began babbling in fractured, panicked bursts.
"N-No! No! Please, spare me! Save me!"
The soldier thrashed wildly against his restraints, his eyes rolling back in terror. With a slight nod from the Emperor, an imperial mage wove a calming charm over the prisoner's mind.
"Now, speak clearly. What became of the search party?"
Wheezing hoarsely, the soldier vomited the words out in a desperate wail.
"Annihilated! Total annihilation! That vile, monstrous Hero slaughtered every last man!"
The answer hit the Emperor like a physical blow.
"...What?"
"Count Cerindel was cut down as well! And... and that wasn't all! That bastard... that Hero...!"
"Speak! What did the Hero do?!"
The Emperor's brow furrowed in fury, and the soldier shrieked at the top of his lungs:
"The Hero raised Count Cerindel's corpse as a Death Knight! The fallen soldiers, even the count himself—every single one of them was turned into the walking dead!"
The soldier fell into wild hysterics once more, clawing at his chains. The Emperor stumbled backward, his footing giving way.
"Y-Your Majesty!"
"Leave Us be for a moment. Our head aches..."
Count Cerindel was dead at the Hero's hand. The entire elite search party had been wiped out. And on top of that... what? The Hero had turned Count Cerindel into a Death Knight?
The Emperor stood completely dumbfounded.
He had been utterly certain they could eliminate the Hero. He had calculated that sending a compact, elite force—walking the razor-thin line just shy of a border violation—would be more than enough to hunt down and put an end to the banished warrior. That was the very reason he had exiled him in such haste.
And yet, complete annihilation.
What in the gods' names had happened out there?
And that massacre had taken place months ago.
Before long, the grim tidings reached the ears of the Hero's former comrades as well.