"Teordo."
A clear, graceful voice.
A familiar call.
When he lifted his head, he saw Sylvia’s face, far younger than she was now.
"I want to look around the garden."
Sylvia said so with her large, round eyes.
Teordo shook his head.
"I heard His Highness Belloke is out for a walk."
It was for Sylvia’s sake.
If she ran into Belloke, there was no telling what she might suffer again.
"Ah... I see."
Sylvia lowered her head.
"Yes... I suppose it can’t be helped."
The small child turned away weakly.
Disappointment could be felt in her small shoulders. Frustration. Helplessness.
Teordo raised his hand, but in the end, he could not bring himself to reach out.
A stubborn knight with neither the skill to offer comfort nor the talent to speak hopeful words.
It could not be helped.
It was a situation that could not be helped.
How many times had he let things pass with those words?
How much had his heart ached because he could not grant even that one small request?
How deep must that regret have been, for a corner of his chest to ache even now?
Now he understood.
What could not be helped had not been the situation.
It had merely been an irresponsible phrase used to excuse his own weakness.
Now he knew.
The one who had been afraid to go out into the garden had been Teordo himself.
The one who had lacked the confidence to stand and fight had been none other than himself.
And so...
"Wh-what the hell! He’s alive! The bastard is still alive!"
And so, knight.
Raise your sword.
Open your eyes wide and raise your sword with all your might.
"What are you doing! He’s already half dead! Finish him off!"
Do not be afraid.
Do you not know now?
More than wounds as paltry as these.
More than swords being driven into your body, do you not know what hurts far more?
So move more.
Swing your sword without rest.
"A m-monster..."
"An evil spirit! He’s an evil spirit!"
Roll across the ground.
Spit the blood pooled in your mouth into your enemy’s eyes.
Drive your sword into your enemy’s neck.
"Gaaaah!"
Endure, no matter how wretchedly.
Even if you become the ugliest knight in the world, endure and endure again.
Do not forget.
For what did you take up the sword?
For what did you wish to become strong?
Was it not to protect?
Was it not for this very moment?
So do not stop.
Even if your arm is severed and your ankle is cut deep, do not stop.
Raise your aura.
Even if you must burn your very life away, raise an even denser aura.
Higher. Higher still.
High enough for everyone on the battlefield to see.
High enough to reach that sky.
Raise your final flame.
......Knight.
* * *
A figure like a yaksha.
Dozens of knights surrounded only Teordo, hesitating.
They had been overwhelmed by his momentum.
His left arm had been severed below the elbow, his armor had already lost its function, and how many grievous wounds were laid bare on his body?
If it had been anyone else, he would have died several times over already.
And yet how could his blue aura burn even more savagely, and how could his presence swell even larger?
Was it not as though he were burning his own life to raise that aura?
The knights surrounding Teordo swallowed dryly.
Yet though they had been overwhelmed by his force, their judgment had not grown clouded.
"It is his last... struggle. Keep your distance and do not rush in."
His wounds were already severe.
The amount of blood he had lost had passed beyond all bounds.
If they left him alone, his life would eventually gutter out before long.
...However.
Even in that state, the noble blue aura did not waver in the slightest.
The knight whose arm had been cut off and whose ankle was half severed was, on the contrary, smiling.
With his mouth full of blood.
With a face from which blood streamed as his wounds split open, he shouted with all his might.
"Hio—! Pavlenko—!"
How was even that so resounding?
Was that truly a knight on the verge of death?
"My oath with you! Do not forget our promise—!"
The shout, spat out along with blood,
"I! I will do what I can do!"
rang out across the battlefield.
To the side of the soldiers trembling in fear.
Over the head of Yon Torno, who was screaming as he swung his sword.
Past Hio, who was biting his lips, and to the carriage where Sylvia lay asleep.
One man’s cry took hold of the battlefield.
The cry of a blunt, indifferent knight.
His final scream.
"So—!"
The First Prince’s knights facing him moved in haste.
They could no longer simply stand by and watch.
That desperate cry. That knight’s scream was making their allies blanch and raising the enemy’s morale.
"Keep the promise! Hio Pavlenko!"
If they left him any longer, it seemed the morale of their entire side would be pushed back.
Because it seemed the entire battlefield would be overwhelmed by a single man.
The knights surrounding Teordo once again aimed their swords.
"Kill him! Everyone charge him at once!"
"The bastard is on the verge of death! Do not be afraid!"
"That fiendish bastard!"
The knights surrounding Teordo rushed in simultaneously.
A dozen or so swords came crashing toward him.
Teordo’s final response to them was utterly like him.
The blue aura, straight and upright like the knight himself, fell from above to below.
The bodies of the two men charging from the front were split in two, armor and all.
But.
"......"
At the same time, one sword pierced Teordo’s heart.
Another sword pierced Teordo’s neck.
Into his chest, his side, his shoulder, his thigh.
Swords lodged themselves.
The blood that surged up was pitifully little.
His head slowly bent.
The knees of the knight who had stood so steadfast at last gave way.
That body, which had never wavered like a boulder for his entire life...... slowly began to tilt.
Teordo Ricart, guardian knight of the princess.
The stubborn knight who had refused the Sword Saint’s offers to join the Royal Knights several times, and in the end remained by the princess’s side.
The soldiers he had blocked alone numbered over a hundred.
The knights who had fallen by his hand alone were close to twenty.
He was truly a man worthy of being called a knight among knights.
* * *
[Hidden Trait: No Violence! (Patience 999 / 1000)]
Hio did not miss a single moment, taking every scene into his eyes.
The scream of the knight who had stopped him when he tried to step forward.
In order to keep that promise.
The knight had done all that a knight must do.
And in order for the mage to do all that a mage must do.
Without blinking even once, he took it all in with his eyes.
Until his wide-open eyes were bloodshot red.
[Hidden Trait: No Violence! (Patience 1000 / 1000)]
Only after the knight’s great body collapsed.
「Congratulations! You have reached the target value for the hidden trait ‘No Violence!’ A hidden reward for the hidden trait will be granted.」
Hio closed his eyes.
「You have selected the skill — ‘Vampiric Touch.’」
「The effect of the skill linked to the trait — ‘Vampiric Touch’ will be div......」
He shoved the message aside and dropped his head.
"Ah......"
And when that head rose again, what could be seen was.
「Skill — ‘Thunder Emperor’ is activating.」
Eyes burning white.
The radiance of lightning surrounding his body.
Thunderclouds, heavy with rage, covering the battlefield.
* * *
The battlefield darkened in an instant beneath black clouds.
Yet no one could spare any attention for them.
In a place where extreme excitement and extreme terror ran rampant, what did a mere black cloud matter?
But.
Kwaang—!
What if lightning struck down with a roar that seemed to tear the ears apart?
What if there was one who walked forward with such lightning at his back?
"......Move."
A man appeared together with the lightning that had suddenly begun to lash down.
The knights’ attention focused on him.
"What are you—!"
One knight who had been about to open his mouth.
Kwaang—!
Turned to ash and scattered.
"A skill user!"
"Everyone, raise your swords!"
The knights quickly grasped the situation and moved in perfect order.
Kwaang—!
Kwaang—! Kwaang—! Kwaang—! Kwaang—!
It was simply that none of it had any use.
Before long, the surroundings had fallen as silent as death.
Those who had narrowly escaped the range of the lightning covered their mouths, forgetting even to breathe as they collapsed to the ground.
They froze there just like that.
The man who had brought the lightning with him trudged forward and lifted up a corpse.
A corpse that had been cruelly hacked to pieces.
What was so bitter and unjust?
He carried the corpse of the knight whose eyes still had not closed and moved his steps.
Toward the place where his master slept.
Slowly.
He carefully laid the corpse down beside the carriage.
An arm severed, an ankle hanging in tatters, and more than a dozen fragments of blades embedded in his body.
He stood still and examined each trace one by one.
How he had been cut, how he had been stabbed, how much it must have hurt.
He tried to imagine it for a moment, and in the end closed his eyes.
[Hidden Trait: No Violence! (Patience 89 / 1000)]
The patience that had begun to fill anew.
"What do you want me to do about it?"
He shoved it off to one side and opened his eyes again.
His lightning-filled, pure white pupils turned toward the far end of the battlefield.
* * *
Where had it gone wrong?
When the information had leaked?
When he handed Sylvia the Book of Evolution?
Had the problem started when the three of them had headed together toward Yon Torno’s castle?
No, perhaps the problem had been making such an absurd promise at their very first meeting.
If he had known it would be such a painful promise, he never would have made the damn thing.
It would have been better if he had treated her as someone who was going to die anyway and ignored her to the end.
Really... where had it gone wrong?
"......Hm? Answer me. What was the problem?"
Gleaming white eyes.
The chilling ash scattered around him.
Low thunder rumbling between the black clouds that had seized the sky.
"D-do you even know w-where this is......!"
Though the hand holding his sword trembled pitifully, the knight guarding the First Prince desperately aimed his blade.
A man who had appeared literally like a bolt of lightning.
A man who had appeared before their eyes after several strikes of lightning.
At that, the First Prince’s escort knights had reacted quickly and swung their swords, but......
This was the result.
Several flashes of lightning striking down.
The acrid stench of burning carried to the tip of the nose.
Ash powder fluttering through the air.
The surroundings gone silent.
The only reason the knight had survived was that he had reacted the slowest.
The magic stone in his hand crumbled with a brittle sound, and Hio walked past the knight before him.
The tent had vanished in the aftermath of the lightning.
The figures of the First Prince and the legion’s leaders who had been hiding inside like rats were fully revealed.
Among them, the bravest one sprang up from where he had been sitting and shouted at Hio.
"How dare you, do you know where you are!"
And that became.
Kwaang—!
His last words.
A single bolt of lightning struck down before he could react.
The end of the brave man left not even a corpse behind.
White eyes that were hard to believe belonged to a human swept over the surroundings.
"Where is the source of the information?"
One noble whose eyes met his barely managed to open his mouth, averting his gaze.
"What do you mean by......"
Kwaang—!
More ash.
A terrible burning stench.
Hio’s eyes turned to the one beside him.
"Who was the one who informed you?"
The man whose eyes met his this time was fairly quick-witted.
"I truly do not know what you mean! If you would make the question a little more specific......"
The noble answered while pressing his body flat to the ground.
Kwaang—!
As expected, lightning fell.
Pity?
As if such a thing could arise.
Thousands, tens of thousands had died.
If they had won, everyone on the other side would have died like this.
Surely they had not come to the battlefield without even that much resolve.
"P-please spare......"
Kwaang—!
"Answer the question."
No one could answer the question.
Not daring even to meet his eyes, they merely trembled with their heads buried against the ground.
"I see."
In truth, he had not expected anything.
Would someone of that level of ability have handled the matter carelessly?
So Hio indifferently flicked his hand.
What answered that gesture was thunder loud enough to tear the eardrums.
A baptism of pure white lightning that seemed enough to blind the eyes.
A hellish instant passed.
"......"
And only three people remained.
Hio, the First Prince, and one nameless knight.
The reason he had not killed the First Prince was simple.
Because proof that he was dead was necessary.
Because he had to take that worthless head and inform them that they had been defeated.
And so Hio looked at the lone remaining knight.
"What is your name?"
The knight’s face had turned as white as the armor he wore.
"P-P-Pablo...... sir......"
"Yes. Pablo."
He tilted his head to the side and pointed at the First Prince.
"Behead the Prince."
Hearing those words, the First Prince, Allenbert, released the hands clutching his head and screamed like a madman.
"How dare you! Do you know who I am to speak such words! I am the Crown Prince! The Crown Prince of the Empire!"
Even as he spewed heated words, veins bulging in his neck and spit flying, Pablo approached Allenbert as if entranced.
"W-what do you think you're doing! I am the Empire's noble...."
Prince. Crown Prince.
What use were any of those titles?
Before overwhelming violence that left no room for even the will to resist, not a single emotion stirred.
Before a terror that turned everything it touched to ash, the title of Crown Prince was far too shabby.
And so Pablo raised his sword high.
"I—I will become the Emperor of the Empire....!"
Splurt— Blood spurted from the severed neck.
Thick drops of merely red blood splattered across the knight's pure white armor.
Not noble blood, but the same red blood.
Allenbert's head rolled across the floor, and Pablo trembled faintly.
Watching this, Hio burst into a meaningless laugh.
A knight who beheads his liege.
"Hahaha...."
Was he not far too different from the knights he knew?
* * *
The First Prince, Allenbert's head rolled across the floor.
- Get a hold of yourself.
Only then did Purnelle's voice reach him.
- Shouldn't you check on the Imperial Princess first? After all that patience, are you planning to throw it all away?
It was an extremely valid point.
Why had Teodore sacrificed his life? For what?
"....Right."
He rummaged through his subspace pocket, pulled out a magic stone, and grasped it in his hand.
The power of lightning he could now wield naturally.
While Thunder Emperor was active, his mana leaked out endlessly, as if he were riddled with holes.
But it was a top-tier skill worth every bit of it.
Crack—!
Becoming lightning itself, he descended in an instant right beside the carriage.
Dispelling Thunder Emperor, he opened his skill window to check the skill that must have finished evolving.
The power of a hidden trait that made the effects of Vampiric Touch a reality.
「Skill: Reaper (死神) Summoning」
「Summons the ghost that governs death.」
「The Reaper can control the life force of all living beings within a certain range.」
「No separate mana is consumed for summoning or maintenance.」
「While the Reaper is summoned, no skills can be used. The skill restriction is lifted 12 hours after the summon is dismissed.」
「Caution. The Reaper's scythe shows no mercy, even to the summoner.」
He couldn't grasp exactly what it was, but a penalty restricting skill use was attached.
A heavy penalty accompanying a power strong enough to break balance.
"...I'll check it later."
What was important right now was the third sentence.
The words stating that it could control the life force of all living beings within a certain range.
He could finally draw out the death energy devouring Silvia's body.
"Reaper."
「Skill - Reaper (死神) Summon is activated.」
His vision grew darker by one degree, centered on Hio.
The landscape grew even darker beneath the overcast sky.
The air grew heavy.
And the red eyes of the Reaper that had appeared out of nowhere.
They turned toward Hio.