The old man was clearly no ordinary old man.
So much so that the moment I saw him, a joke that had become all too common popped into my head.
No weakling.
Well… it wasn’t as if he had such a powerful build that I felt threatened just by looking at him,
but the weight of the presence and atmosphere I felt from him was very different from that of ordinary people.
To the point that, if I had met him before reaching upper-tier Expert, I probably wouldn’t have even been able to stand in front of him like this.
What was even more surprising was
that even now, when it was hard to stand properly, this old man wasn’t particularly trying to crush me.
It wasn’t as if he wasn’t conscious of it at all.
If that were the case, not only the spectator seats on the second floor, but the entire Holy Kingdom would have been crushed under the atmosphere emitted by this one monster.
But since that wasn’t happening, it meant he had narrowed the range to just around me.
I resisted the pressure bearing down on me as best I could and tried to guess who the old man before me might be.
‘He’s at least a Master.’
After all, only a Master could toy with an upper-tier Expert like me in this way.
Among Experts, there were still ways to manage somehow.
Of course, from Expert onward, even within the same realm, the difference between lower-tier and mid-tier, just one step, was truly huge.
Even so, it didn’t feel completely impossible to face them.
But with the old man before me, I instinctively felt that he was an existence I could not contend with.
Ah, you might wonder why there was someone with this level of martial force in the Holy Kingdom.
Aren’t they just a religious group? Something like that?
The first reason they had people with this level of force was the overwhelming influence the Holy Kingdom possessed.
And the second reason was their doctrine.
***
The Church of Runiya was the only religion in the world recognized by the entire continent.
I didn’t know the exact reason why.
If you went to some religion tucked away in a rugged mountain valley thinking it might be heresy, it turned out to be a religion that served the chief god Runiya, just under a different name.
If an undersea temple was discovered and investigated, it too ultimately served Runiya, only under another name.
Scholars had proposed various hypotheses, but there was still no clear answer.
In any case,
because it was the only religion recognized on the continent, the Church of Runiya had become the continent’s largest religion.
Whether it was the house next door or across the street.
Anywhere you went, if you asked, “Do you know Runiya?” it would get through.
Maybe even a stray cat passing by would answer with a meow.
I wasn’t joking. I was serious.
That was why every statement made by Ariel, the Saintess of the Church of Runiya, and the Pope always caused ripples beyond imagination.
Almost everyone on the continent was a believer of the Church of Runiya, after all.
Even though the Church of Runiya didn’t particularly demand donations from its believers, if the Saintess and the Pope visited?
People would go wild as if they were ready to sell their homes and everything else to give to them. That alone showed their prestige.
Now imagine they were suddenly assassinated by demons, heretics, or some other force.
How would anyone handle the aftermath?
Society would be shaken by their absence,
and if they disappeared, ordinary people would lose the spiritual pillar they relied on.
If an impure force took advantage of that moment to strike society as a whole, the continent could suffer far greater damage than expected.
For these reasons, the Holy Kingdom naturally had no choice but to possess an armed force of its own.
Also, as mentioned above, even if not for that purpose, they had to possess martial power according to their doctrine.
One of the doctrines of the Church of Runiya stated that all evil in the world must be rooted out.
The Church of Runiya fundamentally pursued peace, but that did not extend to evil beings.
The knight orders of the Holy Kingdom created for that purpose were what we called the “Saint Knights.”
The Guardian Knights, who protected important figures of the Holy Kingdom,
and the Radiant Knights, who eliminated all things related to heresy and evil, formed the Holy Kingdom’s armed forces.
They possessed a high level of martial force and carried a sense of mission that they worked for God.
People regarded them as honorable and noble, and they were treated extremely well.
The fact that they ranked first among the occupations noble young ladies in society preferred in a man should be explanation enough.
In any case,
perhaps because of that, applicants trying to enter the Holy Kingdom’s knight orders formed huge crowds every year.
Was it because talent was supplied so well like this?
The Holy Kingdom had as many as four Masters under its command.
As a single force, it was a martial power that surpassed the imperial family, the sole ducal house in the Empire, Count Roten’s family, or the count’s family in the south.
I could have tried looking for the identity of the old man standing before me among those four.
But the old man didn’t seem particularly intent on hiding his identity.
If he hadn’t wanted to reveal himself, he would have concealed his appearance.
Right now, this old man was showing every one of his physical features before me, including his face.
As if he didn’t care, since it would be known anyway.
In particular, that white hair tied back and those gray eyes were quite distinctive, so if I looked it up later, I would quickly figure out who he was even if no one told me…
‘Uh…?’
Maybe because his appearance was so distinctive.
I felt like I had heard of him during my mercenary days.
It was something I’d heard in a tavern, so I’d dismissed it as a simple rumor or baseless gossip.
Still, it had been interesting enough that I remembered it vividly, without forgetting a thing.
‘I got lost in the Holy Kingdom and wandered around, and somehow I ended up in a deep area where there wasn’t a single person. Then I found an old-looking chapel, and for some reason, I felt like I had to go inside. So I went in, and there was an old man sitting there, praying.’
‘In a place like that?’
‘Yeah. His hair was pure white, but it was long and tied back, and his eyes were gray. Just because his eyes were gray, they didn’t look like a dead man’s eyes or feel creepy. Instead, I felt like those eyes were looking not at me, but at something inside me.’
‘Fuck, are you making this up all of a sudden? How do you even get lost in the Holy Kingdom in the first place?’
‘I don’t know either. I was just walking around without thinking, and somehow I ended up there.’
‘Sigh… idiot.’
‘Anyway, I asked an acquaintance I have in the Holy Kingdom, and apparently that man is the commander of the Guardian Knights.’
‘What bullshit. You’re saying someone like you saw the commander of the knight order, whose face even the Emperor has a hard time seeing?’
‘I’m telling you, it’s true! That man told me the way out, so I barely managed to leave!!!’
‘Bullshit.’
That was roughly how it went.
The physical traits of the person in that story were exactly the same as the old man before me now.
In that case…
“Do not rack your brains so much. I intended to tell you who this old man is anyway.”
—Shrrrrk.
The old man perfectly withdrew his energy.
Then the air pressing down on me instantly became lighter.
“This old man’s name is William Gallerhead. I am the commander of the Guardian Knights.”
Upon hearing his self-introduction, my suspicion turned into certainty, and cold sweat ran down my body.
Very few people, enough to count on one hand, knew who the commander of the Guardian Knights was, but there were plenty in the world who knew his realm.
He was one of the Empire’s Five Swords,
one of the five Grand Masters who had reached a realm above Masters, a heaven beyond heaven.
“Hmm…”
William gazed at me quietly.
Just as the man in the tavern had said, the place his gaze was directed was not me.
Of course.
Now that I’d met him in person, I could tell.
This old man was blind.
Was that why?
The old man truly seemed to be seeing something ordinary people could not.
“Hoho… As expected, it is not.”
“What… isn’t?”
“Ah… The reason I called you here was to check whether you might be a spy sent by the Demon Realm or a demon.”
“Me?”
Fuck.
So they really were investigating me over something serious.
“Black was mixed into your aura, was it not? Because of that, the higher-ups were in an uproar, telling me to confirm it.”
……
So that was true too?
These fucking color-discriminating bastards.
So what if a person’s aura is black?
Why don’t you discriminate against people because their skin is black while you’re at it?
You need to respect the color black.
You need to become color-accepting…
Color-accep…
Huh?
N… Never mind.
Anyway.
“What’s wrong with a little black being mixed in? Aren’t there quite a few people besides me who use black aura?”
“There are. But the higher-ups seemed uneasy. If anything happened to the Hero’s party, it would be a problem. However, now that I have seen you… it is not as though there is nothing bothering me at all, but there seems to be no particular abnormality.”
Hm?
Then that meant there was something bothering him.
“What part bothered you?”
“Your aura… That is not something an ordinary person should possess.”
“Pardon?”
I was a little flustered.
A moment ago, he had been pointing out the color, and now he was pointing out the aura itself.
Good grief, since the higher-ups are trying to nitpick every single thing, what’s the point of living any longer?
I should just not use it, damn it.
“Once you reach Master, I could tell you about that aura… but it seems a little early for you yet.”
“That’s a shame, then… It’s not anything bad or anything like that, right?”
“It is not, so you need not worry too much.”
Then why say something like that?
You’re just making people anxious for no reason.
“Then is the investigation over now?”
“No, it is not over yet.”
???
“You said there didn’t seem to be anything particularly wrong.”
“Yes… I did. But after seeing you, there is something I personally wish to give you.”
“…?”
“Try blocking this old man’s attack just once. With your talent, it will likely be a great help.”
“Pardon?”
Me?
Block a Grand Master’s attack?
How?
This suddenly???
“No, no, wait!”
But before I could stop him,
“Receive it well~ Hohoho. For your information, you have no choice.”
“You son of a—!!”
William operated his aura and instantly created a sword made of aura in midair.
It was a gigantic sword formed of pure white light,
and judging by its size alone, it looked as if it could split the Imperial Palace in half.
The ceiling here had already collapsed because of that sword too.
‘Does he have so much money it’s rotting away, damn it…? Does he not know moderation?’
I was so flustered that curses wouldn’t stop coming out of my mouth,
and then something bizarre happened before my eyes.
Even though he was standing still and doing nothing, the aura moved on its own into a high guard.
—Sseung!
Then it came plunging down toward me.
I could only watch that attack in a daze.
What, it was just a simple vertical slash, but within it were numerous sword paths and profound principles, blah blah blah.
= Boring, pedantic, and nonsensical.
A sword several times larger than my body, so huge it cast a shadow and made me unable to even guess what it was made of or how, was falling over my head, and there was nothing I could do.
= Makes you nod.
Fuck.
—Kwaaaaaang!!!!!!!!
At the same time as the white light came crashing down on me,
I lost consciousness again, not long after I had finally recovered at the Magic Tower.
***
“Evan!”
Ariel and the others hurried down from above.
“Thank goodness. You’re not badly hurt.”
William slightly bowed his head to Ariel.
“Hohoho. This old man is not so unskilled that I cannot control that much strength, Saintess.”
“Grandfather William! Evan hasn’t even been recovered from his injuries for long! I came here relieved because we weren’t going to a dungeon.”
“Urgh… A man’s body won’t break down from this mu—”
“Grandfather.”
“Hoho…”
Upon seeing Ariel’s coldly frozen gaze, William moved his feet and left the training ground.
—Step. Step.
He normally did not go around giving off any particular atmosphere, just like an ordinary person.
He was the same now.
To others, he looked every bit like a single old man.
However,
that did not mean he lived through the world absentmindedly like an ordinary person.
“Karmic Fire… I see. So it has finally come out into the world.”
William stopped walking for a moment and stared into empty air.
What, right now, was reflected in his eyes?
“The world… will grow noisy.”
That was likely something even the chief god Runiya, whom he served, did not know.