Chapter 16
Chapter 16
I’ll Climb Up from the Bottom
“Haaa…”
With a face full of misery, Leonid slowly got to his feet and trudged toward the weapon rack, grabbing a wooden practice sword.
He stared at the weapon for a moment in silence before suddenly turning toward the knights.
The look in his eyes and the expression on his face were so tragic and solemn that he resembled a revolutionary standing before the executioner’s blade.
“You cowards! You would abandon your convictions and throw your comrade into certain death over a single threatening word from Her Holiness?! Was your loyalty and brotherhood worth no more than this?!”
“…!”
A few of the knights who had been pretending not to pay attention widened their eyes at Leonid’s speech.
It was the kind of expression people made after suddenly remembering something important.
‘What kind of bullshit is this now?’
Thinking that, I crossed my arms and watched the ridiculous farce unfold before me.
“Even if everyone else submits, I alone shall resist! Though I may fall today beneath that witch’s tyranny… my struggle shall remain in your hearts and someday ignite into flame!”
“T-The vice-captain is right!”
“We stand with Vice-Captain Leonid!”
The ones getting swept up by Leonid’s emotional manipulation were mostly the rookies.
The veterans and older knights, meanwhile, had already stepped back and were watching with expressions that clearly said:
“There he goes again.”
Of course they knew exactly what this was.
A desperate attempt to drag others down with him.
Judging by the whispers spreading among the veterans as they placed bets on how many idiots would fall for Leonid’s speech this time, the future of the Order looked wonderfully bleak.
Still, rebellions had to be crushed early.
I uncrossed my arms and lightly tapped the wooden staff against the ground while smiling coldly.
“Fine. Anyone planning to stand against me, line up behind Leonid. Once I’m done educating him, I’ll educate the rest of you too.”
At my single sentence, the flames of revolution were instantly extinguished.
The idiots who had been shouting in support of Leonid scattered like the tide pulling back.
Cowards. If a man draws his sword, he should at least cut something down. Tsk.
“Vice-Captain, how could you call Her Holiness a witch?! I’m disappointed!”
“Saintess, I thought something was wrong with the vice-captain from the start!”
Leonid, left standing alone in an instant, stared at them with utter disbelief.
I snorted and pointed my wooden staff at him.
“That little drama’s over. Pick up your sword.”
At my words, Leonid made a pitiful face before raising his wooden sword.
“You ready? Here I come.”
Alright then.
Time to properly loosen up.
With that thought, I casually thrust the wooden staff forward.
Thwack!
The wooden sword and staff collided, a dull impact echoing throughout the training grounds.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me…! You’re even faster than before!”
“You’ve improved quite a bit yourself.”
Leonid deflected my thrust by guiding the blade aside.
Back then he could barely block at all, but now he could actually redirect attacks.
Looks like he’d grown a little.
“It’s not like I’ve been slacking around all this time!”
The moment he shouted that, Leonid charged straight at me.
Good choice.
The first thing a swordsman should do against a spearman is close the distance.
But I had no intention of giving him that opening.
A fight between spear and sword.
The spearman must never allow the swordsman inside their range, while the swordsman must force the opponent into close quarters no matter what.
In other words, it was a vicious battle over distance.
Swish!
Retrieving the staff that had just been knocked aside, I immediately thrust toward Leonid’s thigh.
Leonid hurriedly smacked the staff aside with his wooden sword as he rushed in.
At the same time, I stepped lightly backward, widening the gap again.
The distance between us remained unchanged.
A thrust was much simpler and more direct than a slash or swing.
And when that simplicity was combined with the naturally long reach of a spear, closing the distance became incredibly difficult.
The moment I retrieved the staff, I thrust again toward Leonid’s chest.
“Hup!”
Thwack!
With a shout, Leonid swung upward and slammed the shaft of my staff hard with his blade.
The rebound lifted the staff into the air, exposing my torso.
Leonid instantly lunged forward to seize the opportunity.
But I used the upward momentum to spin the staff, adding centrifugal force as I swung horizontally.
Thwack!
“Ghk!”
A spear’s sweeping strike had wide, obvious movements, but the power behind it was immense.
Even though Leonid managed to block by turning his sword sideways, he still staggered back several steps.
I immediately jabbed the tip of the staff toward his head.
In his current state, there was no way he could block it.
“Waaah!”
Screaming, Leonid raised one hand and blocked the thrust with his palm.
Only possible because it was a blunt wooden staff rather than a sharpened spearhead.
“Seriously?! Were you trying to punch a hole through my skull?!”
Stumbling backward, Leonid shook his throbbing hand while shouting furiously.
“It wouldn’t have pierced.”
“You sure about that?”
“…Probably?”
“…What do you mean probably?! Why is your answer so completely untrustworthy?!”
After venting his complaints, Leonid charged at me again.
His spirit was admirable, but he still couldn’t break through my range, and the damage kept piling up.
“Huff… huff…”
Compared to my completely spotless appearance, Leonid looked terrible.
He’d rolled across the ground several times already and taken countless hits from the staff.
The whining and complaints from earlier had vanished entirely.
Now his eyes burned with pure competitive spirit.
Yeah.
That was more like the kind of person fit to be vice-captain.
“Your spear techniques are always such a pain to deal with.”
“Oh? Thanks. But complimenting me won’t make me go easy on you.”
“Of course not. I know better than anyone what kind of devil you are, noona.”
This bastard always had to ruin the mood at the end.
Laughing incredulously, I lowered into stance again.
Judging by Leonid’s condition and fighting spirit, he was definitely about to gamble everything on one final exchange.
Even I had to take that seriously.
“I’m coming, noona!”
Leonid kicked off the ground and shot toward me like an arrow.
If he kept getting dragged into a battle of distance and attrition, he’d slowly die exactly like before.
This was his last gamble.
I thrust the staff threateningly toward him, but Leonid didn’t hesitate.
He intended to tank the hit with his body if necessary just to close the distance.
Not a bad decision considering I was using a blunt staff instead of an actual spear.
But there was one thing he overlooked.
A spear’s reach could become much longer than it seemed.
I stepped forward and released my left hand from the front section of the staff.
Then I twisted my body and extended the rear end forward with my right hand.
To Leonid, who was charging in, it probably looked like the staff suddenly doubled in length.
“Kh!”
Caught off guard by the attack arriving much faster than expected, Leonid instinctively halted his charge and knocked the strike away.
But because he blocked it so hastily, his stance completely collapsed.
It was only a tiny opening, but for me, taking advantage of it was easy.
I spun once and smashed the staff into Leonid’s waist.
A strike carrying both centrifugal force and the full weight of the weapon.
“Gah!”
With a crunching sound I could feel through my fingertips, Leonid flew through the air, rolled across the ground, and slammed into the wall of the training grounds.
He twitched a few times before collapsing motionless.
…Huh?
Oops.
I messed up my strength control.
Normally I would’ve only hit him hard enough that he could still grumble his way to the infirmary afterward.
But after returning from the Divine Realm, my overflowing power had slipped out of control.
Mm.
Yeah, all his ribs were probably shattered.
I felt a little guilty.
“So… anyone wanna carry Leonid to the infirmary?”
When Leonid woke up, he was definitely going to complain all day long.
Still, since I was the one at fault, I should probably listen to him for a while.
Or maybe buy him a drink.
Ah, but I still wanted to move around some more.
Should I practice alone?
Or maybe bully those idiots who sided with Leonid earlier?
“Handle things yourselves. I’ll be training over there, so let me know if anyone wants a spar.”
After thinking for a moment, I decided to practice alone.
Leonid was sturdy enough to survive my failed strength control, but if I made the same mistake with the other knights, they might genuinely end up standing at death’s door.
Watching the knights scatter like the receding tide at my words made me irrationally irritated, but I spun the staff once and headed toward a corner of the training grounds.
The infirmary of the Eris Order.
On one of the beds lay Cassian, candidate Hero of the Order.
“…Ugh.”
Cassian groaned softly.
Along with a piercing ringing in his ears, sensation slowly returned to his body.
Then came the pain.
It felt as though his entire body had been crushed beneath a giant hammer.
Suppressing the agony, he blinked several times.
Gradually, his vision returned.
The heavy scent of medicinal herbs and the overwhelming presence of divine power…
This appeared to be the Order’s infirmary.
“Oh, finally awake?”
Hearing a stiff voice from beside him, Cassian turned his head.
A red-haired knight lay in the neighboring bed.
Judging by the bandages wrapped all over his body, he must have returned from some brutal mission.
Still… Cassian definitely recognized him.
But his name and position wouldn’t come to mind.
Who was he again?
“You are…?”
“Leonid. Vice-captain of the Eris Holy Knights. Honestly, after getting beaten that badly by Her Holiness, the fact that you woke up this fast means your durability deserves real respect, mister.”
After hearing Leonid’s answer, Cassian stared blankly at the ceiling.
Every slight movement sent screams of pain through his body.
His condition was an absolute disaster.
Yet strangely enough, his mind felt clearer than ever.
For years, he had lived with the sensation of drowning underwater while someone held him by the back of the neck.
That bizarre feeling had completely vanished.
“What… no, what exactly did I do?”
“You don’t remember? Well, after what happened to you, memory loss wouldn’t be strange.”
As Leonid answered, he recalled the horrifying sight of Beatrice punching someone’s skull deep into marble flooring.
“…What happened to me?”
“You got beaten so hard the back of your head punched through the marble floor. Toward the end, you couldn’t even see your head anymore. Honestly thought you were a decapitated corpse.”
“……”
“Your face was literally split in half back then. You should bow to the Pope later and thank him personally. If not for His Holiness, you’d already be touring the afterlife.”
…His face had literally been split apart?
Hearing that, Cassian instinctively reached up to touch his head.
Without a mirror he couldn’t tell, but at least everything still seemed attached.
Amazing that he survived.
Probably thanks to the Hero’s body.
“I will absolutely express my gratitude to His Holiness.”
After saying that, Cassian stared at the ceiling and recalled the memories of the past few years.
The days spent wandering the outskirts of the Demon Realm with mercenary groups.
Then, driven by youthful recklessness, he ventured beyond his limits into the middle regions of the Demon Realm.
And there, he met someone.
He couldn’t remember what that being looked like.
But from the moment they met, he’d felt as though his consciousness no longer belonged inside his own body.
The memories of those years were hazy like a dream.
Twisted impulses churned within his chest, while a suffocating anxiety gripped his soul as though it had been mortgaged away.
It felt as though his own body no longer belonged to him.
A horrific sense of alienation.
And amidst all that, the only thing that remained vivid was the silver-haired, white-eyed girl who appeared in his dreams every night.
And now he knew.
He knew exactly who she was.
“…This is insane.”
Even if it had all been dreams, remembering the countless monstrous things he’d done to her made Cassian groan in misery.
“…I think I had truly lost my mind.”
“Oh, absolutely. Completely insane. When you said all that garbage to noona, I thought my blood was gonna freeze.”
“I… I need to apologize to Her Holiness.”
“Honestly? Better not. Knowing noona’s personality, the second she sees you, her fist will probably fly first. This time your face won’t just split in half. It might disappear entirely.”
Leonid stood from his chair and looked down at Cassian.
“You know something? Even after all that, His Holiness still decided to give you one more chance. Ah, right. You just woke up, so you wouldn’t know.”
“I didn’t know… To give someone like me another opportunity… I’m truly grateful. But why are you…”
“Wondering why I look like this?”
Cassian nodded slowly.
“…I had a spar.”
“…A spar?”
Cassian glanced over Leonid’s battered appearance and frowned.
What kind of lunatic turned a sparring match into this?
“You don’t need to look at me like that. If you become the Hero, this’ll probably become part of your daily life.”
“……”
Should he just run away?
For a brief moment, Cassian seriously considered it.
Leonid frowned slightly as he noticed the look in Cassian’s eyes.
Weren’t his eyes red before?
Why were they black now?
…Maybe they’d simply been bloodshot from lack of sleep.
But more bizarre than the color itself was the look within them.
Sure, getting your head smashed that badly could change a person.
But this was too different.
Calm, gloomy, yet filled with determination.
Those black eyes looked so different from the frivolous red gaze from before that he could’ve believed this was another person entirely.
“Becoming the Hero itself is already a harsh road. But with noona targeting you too? It definitely won’t be easy.”
“I know I fall far short of what a Hero should be.”
“Then why not give up?”
“I cannot do that. I’ll start from the very bottom and climb my way up.”
After probing him slightly, Leonid finally understood what kind of man Cassian was.
The same kind as Archbishop Bartholomew or Commander Vargas.
The sort of people who possessed absurdly stubborn determination.
Men with eyes like those would rather break than bend.
Yeah.
No point trying to stop him.
‘…Noona’s gonna be really annoyed.’
People like Commander Vargas and Archbishop Bartholomew were exactly the kind Beatrice struggled with the most.
“Heh, mister.”
“Yes?”
“I think I might end up liking you a little.”
Because noona needed to get annoyed sometimes too.
Thinking that, Leonid smirked slightly.
“…Thank you.”
“Ah, of course, that depends on how you do from here on. Right now, you’re way too weak. Work on your skills first. With your current level, even surviving the outskirts of the Demon Realm would be a struggle.”
“……”
And with that, the conversation between the two men came to an end.