Sharon Pierce (1)
Sharon Pierce (1)
Something was wrong in the mansion.
Sharon realized it on the day she had gone a full day without sensing anyone's presence.
Sharon was bound in a corner of the mansion by Hermann.
Through the crack in the door, she glimpsed figures with ominously red hair passing by.
Blood Rock Cultists.
The sworn enemies who had taken her mother from her. The targets she was to eradicate.
Sharon freed herself from the chains binding her hands and feet. She had kept them on only because Hermann would be furious if she removed them without permission. The punishments were always worse after that.
But now, something was clearly unfolding in the mansion.
The punishment could come later.
Sharon followed the traces of the Blood Rock Cultists.
The trail led toward the Lord of the House's study.
Creeeak—.
Sharon opened the door and witnessed a sight beyond belief.
The Lord of the House, Richard Pierce, stood with a ghastly wound in his dantian.
"M-my Lord! Are you all right?!"
The crimson-clad figures who had preceded her were already dead.
That was only natural. The Lord had always loathed the Blood Rock Cultists. Her dying mother had told her as much. Stay close to the Lord if you wish to defeat the Blood Rock Cultists.
Now, the Lord was facing off against masked figures of unknown identity.
He must have been wounded while fighting them.
Blood streamed from his lower abdomen.
"Wh-what in the world..."
"Sharon. Lend me your dantian for a moment, child."
"What do you..."
Richard smiled at her, the expression gentle.
Sharon had no time to be unsettled by a smile she had never seen from him before.
His lips parted at once.
"Lend me your dantian. I require your will."
"...Ah."
"Can you entrust your dantian to me?"
Entrusting one's dantian to another was not a decision to be made lightly. No. Could a dantian even be handed over to someone so casually, as if it were nothing? Surely this was no ordinary method. A sinister art of some kind. The sort of thing Blood Rock Cultists would use.
"Sharon. My child. Help your father, just this once."
The Lord of the House had called her his child, for the first time, and had spoken her name as well. Every trace of doubt melted away.
Sharon nodded, as if entranced.
"Yes. My Lord."
Something sliced into her back.
Her vision went black.
She suddenly recalled the day her mother died.
Then, too, her mother had bled into the snow with her back torn open.
That day, her mother had told her.
Hate the Blood Rock Cultists, and stay close to the Lord.
She only had to obey those words.
◆
KWA-BOOOOOM—!
A colossal spike of ice ripped through the spot where Ian had stood a heartbeat before.
Several severed strands of hair drifted through the air before scattering.
Frozen Horn. One of the final boss Richard Pierce's hidden patterns. An attack that pulverized its target with horn-shaped pillars of ice.
Fighting the final boss in Fanta X Aca's scenario ranked among the worst possible decisions a player could make—and that was exactly why some chose to do it anyway.
Most died in a single stroke of his sword, but a few had uncovered several of his hidden patterns.
One of them was Frozen Horn, which swept opponents away with those monstrous ice horns at the mere flick of a finger.
The Frostblood Sword, Richard Pierce.
At his core, he was a knight and swordsman who had attained the pinnacle of mastery with the blade.
His most overwhelming ability was cutting down opponents without mercy, in a single stroke, through sheer, crushing swordsmanship.
The issue was that even when wielding the aura unique to knights, he drew near to magic itself.
While all other knights could only mimic sorcery through sword aura channeled through their blade, Richard wielded such techniques without a sword at all.
Mind Sword.
The state in which one could employ the sword through the heart alone, even without physical form.
If you focused every sense solely on the final boss's blade, a magic pattern would fly at you from nowhere and end your life.
'I almost died.'
That gesture from Richard.
Had he not memorized the pattern of that flicking index finger, he would be dead.
The motion itself was difficult to even perceive, but once seen, it had etched itself into his mind—because most who witnessed it died right after.
A chill ran down his spine.
Every nerve in his body stood on end.
He had barely evaded certain death, after all.
And this insane final boss bastard.
'Just moments ago, his eyes were full of greed.'
Now he was trying to kill without leaving a trace.
No. Or was he testing me?
Ian's eyes narrowed as he stared at Richard.
The faint smile lingering at the corner of Richard's mouth was nothing short of ominous.
"Isn't that a bit too forceful for a mere counterattack?"
"Foreign mana is difficult to regulate, it seems."
Look at this geezer's grudge.
He was clearly furious that Ian had seen through his use of Sharon's dantian and mana.
"......"
Ian steadied his breathing in silence.
He lunged with his sword at once.
The third move.
The thrust bored toward Richard's heart like a stabbing strike.
CLANG!
Richard's blade deflected Ian's attack with ease.
"Nghk!"
Shaken by the difference in martial power, Ian still pressed forward.
One, two.
The damage accumulated.
Even so, he kept up the assault without breaking.
His sword was a branch.
And in winter, it was only natural for snow to accumulate upon it.
CLAAANG!
Sword aura like pure-white snowflakes scattered from Ian's lunging blade into the air.
"Ho-oh."
An unconscious murmur of admiration escaped Richard's lips. A mage with swordsmanship of this caliber. The sword's application was marvelous, but the refinement of the technique itself felt strangely familiar.
Still, Ian's sword did not reach Richard. It embedded itself in the floor.
One of the blossoming snowflakes drifted down near Sharon, then vanished.
Ian confirmed the flinch in Sharon's pupils.
She was clearly aware of her surroundings to some degree.
Her mind was simply clouded due to sharing her dantian.
Richard's voice was cold.
"Do you think you can cut that girl down?"
Step.
He took a stride toward Sharon.
"Do you imagine I will stand idle while you strike her?"
Sharon's shoulders trembled.
Look at this cunning final boss. Working an angle even now.
Our heroine, dumb-as-a-brick Sharon, was bound to be dragged right in.
"Of course you won't stand idle."
"Indeed."
"You wouldn't want someone else hunting the prey you've been fattening."
Richard's brow furrowed.
Flick.
"Fu—ck!"
KWA-BOOOOOOM—!
Ian threw himself sideways, but a deep gash tore through his thigh.
"I thought it coincidence."
"......."
"But it is not."
The hunger in Richard's eyes deepened.
"You know my technique. An ability I have never revealed to anyone."
Ian had no chance to answer.
His slashed thigh throbbed with searing numbness.
He tore his sleeve and hastily bound the wound to staunch the bleeding.
"Nghk."
Two counterattacks from Richard had reduced him to this.
Struggling back to his feet, Ian opened his mouth.
Not toward Richard—toward Sharon.
"Sharon. Get up. You saw it just now, I'm sure. Even if you didn't see it, you felt it."
No response. But he was certain she was listening.
"That's your mother's swordsmanship. Try calling it Yergina, or whatever you want."
"Th-that's right. I saw it too! Richard Pierce, swallowing your mother whole!"
Sharon's unfocused pupils began to shudder violently.
But Richard stepped between them.
"Resorting to fighting with your mouth instead of your sword. How unsightly."
Richard's lips curled into a cold smile.
"Sharon Pierce."
Richard spoke her name.
"Trust your father's words. That is an illusion."
Sharon's trembling pupils gradually stilled.
"The Snow Blossom Sword Art is only complete when the snow blossoms truly bloom. Do you think that child can bloom Snow Blossoms? This is nothing but a magical trick, a mere deception of the eye."
Sharon's head drooped, slack as a doll whose strings had been cut.
Dark smile widening, madness glinting, Richard turned back to Ian.
"Child. It will not go as you wish."
Crunch.
Ian ground his teeth.
Right.
This was another reason Richard was so troublesome.
For all his power, he was cunning and insidious.
A man who had raised his own children for the sole purpose of absorbing them.
'There's no choice but to show her.'
TAHT!
Ian kicked off the ground.
He hurled himself straight at Richard.
It felt like charging into death itself.
But there was no other way.
Whether he closed that collapsed idiot heroine's eyes, or forced them open.
That was the only path, so Ian rushed the final boss.
— CLAAAAANG!
The instant Ian unleashed a strike, Richard countered.
But the situation was different from before.
As if refusing to tolerate any more of Ian's nonsense, Richard's blade seemed to split into many, filling the space before him.
'Phantom Blade!'
Ian instantly transformed his sword into a shield.
He protected only his vital points.
— Ssh-shrak!
— Ssh-sh-shrak!
Chilling sounds marked his body being carved open all over.
Blood from his torn forehead blinded him, and his slashed left arm could no longer summon strength.
But he turned the shield back into a sword at once.
Watching Richard's eyes widen for an instant, he thrust the blade forward.
Richard's expression twitched.
The swords clashed.
A clear gap in ability.
Yet.
— Zzz-zzzzt!
Deflecting Richard's blade, Ian swept his arm wide in a single, long motion.
A fluid movement, like a branch weighed down by snow shaking its accumulated burden free.
"...!"
White blossoms budded. One. Two.
The Snow Blossoms began to bloom.
"...Wh-what!"
Richard's eyes filled with shock.
This was unmistakably the art of the Snow Blossom Swordmaster he had devoured.
One. Two.
The blooming snow-blossoms sparkled radiantly, filling the air around them.
The number was not great, but these were unmistakably blossoms of snow.
Richard struck away the ones that drifted toward him.
But.
One of those blossoms fell before Sharon Pierce.
The pure-white flower reflected in Sharon's darkened pupils.
The light returned to her eyes.
— Keuh-huk!
Gagging roughly on his own blood, Ian greeted her.
"Sharon Pierce. Sleep well?"