Chapter 280
Chapter 280: 4th Knights Commander (2)
2nd Knights Commander.
Closest to Cassion.
'Fair enough.'
Not that close.
But among the Knight Commanders, arguably the nearest.
Meeting count aside, they shared secrets.
To outside eyes, that looked close.
"I've heard much, Sir Terkan Tun."
"Call me Terkan. The surname has lost its meaning."
"......"
Not quite an order; closer to a request.
Harad averted his gaze without meaning to.
Terkan's eyes were overwhelming.
'Eyes twice the normal size, at least.'
Everything about Terkan was oversized.
His seated height exceeded Harad's standing height.
'The most colossal knight.'
That must be why Serzila called the 4th Knights' Terkan Tun so.
A larger canvas meant a grander picture.
Not a picture but scars, admittedly. In any case.
His face and body bore more scars than skin. The very model of a warrior.
'No, model isn't right. The ideal.'
What warrior could look like that.
Terkan Tun was a knight who embodied the warrior's destination.
"I take it you wish to befriend me. Correct?"
"Shrewd, for a mage."
"May I ask why?"
"Grand Duke Aratus sanctioned it. Do you need more?"
Terkan referred to Grand Duke Aratus without formality.
A hint of his seniority, ability, and record.
Before the previous Grand Duke -- Aratus's father -- had ascended, Terkan Tun had already been Serzila's Great Warrior.
He'd only stepped down to 4th Knights Commander because age had finally made him human.
'Stepped down to a Wall Knight Commander.'
Harad laughed dryly anew.
The Otherworld of the past life was monstrous, but so was Serzila. All the more if its flaws were fixed.
"Reason enough. But it's a first, receiving a gift before we've even met."
Old age bred rigidity.
Yet Terkan before him seemed flexible. No other Knight Commander had sent a gift before the first meeting.
Granted, Harad's position was now far greater than before, but even had he met a new Commander today, no gift would have come.
Knight Commanders were stiff men to the last.
They acknowledged only what they'd seen and experienced themselves.
"It's been a while, Sir Tun."
Ellen addressed Terkan by his surname.
She would have done so as Grand Heir Elaine too. Even the Elaine of the past life had found Terkan daunting.
"It has, Ellen Serzila."
A meaningless surname, he'd said.
Yet Terkan didn't correct her. Night and day from how he'd treated Harad.
"What brings you?"
"I followed Harad."
"To the Wall."
Terkan seemed displeased that Ellen was here.
'Because she's a collateral? Is he a stickler?'
He hadn't heard that.
"It seems the Grand Duke was revealing the head's origin."
"Aratus knows everything, regarding the Inner Fortress."
Harad took that as Terkan mocking the Grand Duke for never leaving the Fortress.
"But the Grand Duke surely wants me to earn the 4th Knights' recognition while I'm here."
"Recognition."
Terkan murmured shortly, folding his arms.
The illusion of a massive boulder shifting.
"I heard you earned merit in the Boundary with the other orders."
"Correct. Recognition through merit."
"Merit I cannot see."
True.
Cassion aside, no Knight Commander could enter the Boundary.
"Kalinos saw it."
"Who? Ah. The boy at the 3rd."
"Kesera too."
"Children."
Terkan dismissed Kalinos and Kesera as children.
A knight with every right to.
"Boundary merit means nothing to me."
Terkan was a knight who'd earned every merit the Boundary had to offer.
'And he was friendly a moment ago.'
Terkan had turned exacting.
"Didn't you want to befriend me?"
"I did."
Harad tilted his head.
"But I cannot enter the Boundary."
"Meaning there's no way to befriend you in there."
BOOM! A thunderous sound erupted.
As if a mountain had collapsed, though in truth Terkan had simply clapped once.
"Shrewd, for a mage."
Terkan wanted to see Harad's ability firsthand.
Therefore Boundary merit was meaningless. Harad understood precisely.
"Very well. What should I do here?"
Instead of answering, Terkan shifted his gaze.
Those enormous eyes locked onto Ellen.
"Is Ellen an issue?"
"This was unplanned."
Nor had it been for Harad.
The Grand Duke had pointed to the 4th Knights, and Harad had come straight here. This meeting was improvised.
"Even so. A collateral, yet still Serzila."
"I was Tun."
Tun.
The surname granted when Terkan became Great Warrior.
"Tun, who did all there was to do."
"You said the surname had lost its meaning."
"Lost, yet not gone."
The Terkan before him was no longer a Great Warrior.
But the meaning amassed by the Great Warrior Terkan Tun remained intact.
The merit Great Warrior Terkan had built was why the present Serzila existed. That was undeniable. Ellen had been born into a relatively peaceful era.
To this giant who'd been fighting since before the Boundary was tamed, before Grand Duke Aratus was even born, Ellen was a child resting on lineage alone.
"I'm fine. I'll wait outside."
The child respected the giant.
Had Elaine been here instead of Ellen, the same would have held.
Grand Duke Aratus herself respected Terkan.
"As far away as possible."
Harad had been nodding when his head stopped.
Irritation flared.
The reason was obvious. Ellen was being dismissed.
"Let's earn it together. Recognition."
Harad caught Ellen's arm as she turned to leave.
She tried to shake free, but her eyes went round. After Tempering, Harad's grip was stronger than expected.
"This woman is the second-smartest person in Serzila after me."
Harad spoke with conviction.
Excluding Eiga, it was the truth. Cassion was dumber than expected, and Ellen was occasionally a genius.
"Smart."
"About magic. So if we're to befriend each other, make it the three of us."
Terkan's gaze swiveled back.
Just his eyes moving, yet it felt like muscles shifting. Everything about him was heavy. Ellen received that heavy gaze.
"Versed in magic."
"That's right. Second to Harad."
But Ellen didn't shrink.
She stood taller, if anything. That was the woman she was.
"Why?"
"Because it gives you more options to choose from."
Harad thought that answer was too compressed. Knights needed things spelled out word by word.
"That is precisely it."
But Terkan lit up.
He'd understood Ellen's words.
"I too wish to learn magic."
"......?"
Harad and Ellen blinked.
***
Tun, who did all there was to do.
Terkan had introduced himself that way.
Harad had taken it as boasting that he'd earned every merit.
"Options. A wise word."
Terkan said.
"Charge. Fight. Kill. Die together. Every option a knight can choose, I chose as Tun."
As Great Warrior, as knight, he'd done it all.
That was Terkan's pride. And his tedium.
"I'm sick of it. Even if I could still enter the Boundary, I would be."
Magical Beasts, mages, the Boundary -- nothing stirred him anymore.
The old monster wanted to try what he hadn't tried.
"Even the same meal, chewing and swallowing differs in taste from savoring and swallowing."
But as long as he occupied the Wall, the food wouldn't change.
So he'd change how he ate.
Having killed brutishly all his life, he wanted to kill differently.
'Kill a mage. Kill a mage by dismantling the mage's magic.'
Those were plainly different.
Harad wanted the latter. That was why the magic examination had been introduced.
"Impressive."
So Harad was honest, and blatantly admiring.
Old mages grew rigid. Knights all the more so.
Terkan was the oldest knight Harad knew.
At that age, Terkan hadn't lost his drive. Scholarly zeal, fighting spirit, and pleasure all at once. He wanted to experience the battlefield he'd exhausted from a different angle.
"You're a true warrior, Sir."
Knight and warrior differed.
The former was crude; the latter, at times, shrewd.
At least in the North. Harad wanted the Wall knights to become warriors.
"I'm rash. No results."
Terkan spoke while checking Ellen's reaction.
Clear now. It wasn't Ellen specifically but anyone who'd be unwelcome. Terkan's magic study was a secret.
"Self-study usually goes that way. All the more when it's done in hiding."
Terkan's eyes went wide.
A hit. Harad chuckled.
"Don't tell me the tradition started because of that?"
"Shrewd!"
A hit.
Terkan's admiration shook the building.
"What are you talking about?"
Ellen whispered beside him.
Terkan's brow twitched.
"Not shrewd."
"......"
Ellen's brow twitched too.
The respect was fading slightly.
"Of course. I'm the shrewdest."
Harad waved a hand between their brows.
"Sir Terkan sometimes sends every knight on patrol at once."
That had hardened into a 4th Knights tradition.
A grueling schedule for the 4th Knights.
"That time is Sir Terkan's time to study magic. Studying behind his men's backs."
Hence no results.
Study time was too short.
And he couldn't send knights to the Boundary every day.
"......?"
Ellen's expression went peculiar.
Why go to such lengths.
"A Commander must set an example. As Tun, all the more."
Terkan answered.
Studying magic. An old man's greed and pleasure.
Terkan simply didn't want to put ideas in his young knights' heads.
"Because in Serzila, studying magic is unthinkable."
Terkan nodded at Harad's words.
Originally, Serzila had been ignorant of magic. In Terkan's words, chewing and swallowing without tasting.
So Terkan had no choice but to study in secret.
An ordinary knight might've gotten away with it, but he'd been a Great Warrior.
Exposure would muddy Serzila's waters, he'd have thought.
"And then I introduced the magic examination."
From Terkan's perspective, an already-itchy back had started crawling.
He must've been desperate for someone to come scratch it.
"So you sent the head. Because the 4th Knights' turn seemed to have come, yet I never showed."
Terkan nodded.
More vigorously than before. Like a colossal boulder teetering atop a cliff.
"The gift was a mage I treasured. I'd trade meals for knowledge from him."
The severed head.
To the self-taught Terkan, a captured mage had been precious goods.
He'd sent what he truly valued as a bribe.
"So the knights occasionally bring mages back alive. An inexplicable order, it must seem."
"If I say jump, they jump. The youngsters think my hobby is torture. Since I can't enter the Boundary."
"They think you take out combat withdrawal through torture."
A shrewd excuse.
"What would you have me do?"
"Introduce the same examination to the 4th Knights."
"I was going to anyway."
Harad nodded.
The Wall knights had to learn magic.
Harad intended to make it so. Normally crude, perhaps, but sharp about magic.
"And, Mage Harad, earn my recognition."
"How?"
Terkan shot to his feet.
Harad momentarily interpreted it as a challenge to fight. The intimidation warranted it.
As Harad half-rose in response, Terkan was rummaging through his desk drawer.
He looked urgent. Instead of opening the drawer, he ripped it out entirely. Enormous hands flipped it upside-down and shook. Countless papers showered the floor.
"This one."
He picked up a sheet and held it out to Harad.
"I can't make sense of it."
"......"
"Explain it to me."
Terkan was an intensely curious model student.
"Why does earth favor fire."
Harad read the paper.
Large, firm handwriting, unmistakably Terkan's.
"Well, because without fire, life can't......"
"It burns everything up."
"...... You can't approach it like that."
A model student wasn't always a bright one.