Chapter 271
Chapter 271. Latent Heat (8)
What met his eyes was a lake brimming with water in the darkness of midnight.
Enoch stood frozen for a while, staring at the scenery before him. The mental landscape of the Inner World, where countless stars shone as if about to pour down, stretched endlessly beyond the horizon.
He clenched his teeth without thinking, gathered himself, and quickly scanned the surroundings.
Why had he been pulled in here now, of all times? Why — for what reason?
His back still hurt. But the damage from the glass shards wasn't yet anywhere near fatal.
The moment he thought that far, the answer came immediately.
So in the end, even holding out through sheer willpower was approaching its limit.
No. There was still work to be done.
A soft lapping sound made him glance down.
The lake's surface had already risen to his waist.
Half his body was submerged, but the water of Rhodes was so clear and transparent that he felt the illusion of sinking into the starlight of the night sky itself.
Suddenly, what the red-haired knight had once told the girl about stars flickered through his mind.
[—But the dream and ideal called Sword Saint is like the stars hung in the night sky. Reaching out to claim it for your own is endlessly close to impossible.]
The first thing that rose was a question.
Why had that, of all things, come to mind — at this very moment?
Perhaps it was because this entire sinking lake was the life itself of the water-haired girl — the Sword Saint of the Waves — that the memory had resurfaced like this.
But this sight, too, was something he had anticipated.
He had known from the start that the erosion was steadily advancing again, the price of pushing himself in the battle against the Master Class beast.
First, he had to get out of here.
But where was the exit? What did he have to do to escape his own mental landscape?
Thinking that far, Enoch realized he didn't know the clear answer, and out of habit, he touched his lips and lowered his gaze.
Because this inner world was not his own, he still didn't know how to properly navigate it. That obvious fact, which had persisted all this time, felt more bitter at this moment than anything else.
But he couldn't just stand still.
He raised his head and simply started walking. Paying no mind to the cold water lapping below his waist and dragging at his body, he just walked forward.
Circular ripples spread across the water's surface around his body, radiating outward along the path he traveled.
Just then, something appeared before his eyes.
It was a three-dimensional image, risen like a small circular stage upon the surface of the clear lake that blanketed the Inner World.
Enoch stared at it and finally understood.
——It was noise.
As if the world itself had glitched, the space unfolding before his eyes crackled and wavered.
And upon it, several people stood frozen still, rendered in three-dimensional form like holograms or statues sculpted from light.
The people and scenery, formed motionless and wreathed in faint light, looked like a scene cut from the past and preserved.
......What is this?
Enoch narrowed his eyes and approached.
Then something remarkable happened.
As he drew closer, the noise gradually lifted from the three-dimensional image, and the colors sharpened. And then, on the small circular stage manifested within the Inner World, a memory began to play.
"—Is that true?"
The Sword Saint of the Waves — back when she was merely a girl, before reaching that supreme realm — murmured quietly with a stunned expression.
Then the voice of an unfamiliar man answering right in front of her rang out.
"Twenty-six Guardian Knights of Rhodes are dead."
Turning his head that way, he saw a scarred man standing before the girl, clad in a knight's silver armor with his helmet removed.
Whether he had been in fierce combat until just before, fresh cuts and dried bloodstains stood out vividly on his cheek as he stood at attention.
"Instructor, that concludes my report."
"So I heard."
Looking to the side, the red-haired knight sat half-leaning against the edge of the office desk right beside the girl, arms crossed.
The knight narrowed her eyes and fixed the man before her with an interrogating stare.
"That the seasoned scout knights of Rhodes were annihilated during a reconnaissance mission beyond the island — I can't hide my surprise. I was told you just encountered Suleiman's scout unit in the field?"
"It is as you say."
"You yourself would know best. Our Guardian Knights of Rhodes may not have reached the realm of the Sword Saint, but most of them are longsword masters who stand at its very threshold."
The red-haired knight, arms folded beneath her chest, asked sharply.
"And yet they were no match?"
The man bowed his head as if he had no excuse.
"Regrettably, that is so. By rights, I too should have shared my comrades' fate......"
"Then the reason you alone returned alive?"
"The fallen scout knights of Rhodes, on the verge of annihilation, made me their messenger to carry their final words."
"Then speak. Leave out nothing."
The man snapped his head up as if he had been waiting.
"Instructor! Compared to Suleiman's previous raid, the enemy soldiers we faced this time were far too powerful."
"When Rhodes was last raided by Suleiman — were you on that battlefield as well?"
"I was."
"I see. If you fought them then, you can gauge this new enemy's strength without exaggeration. Good."
The red-haired knight nodded, still leaning against the desk. Then she rested the back of her hand against her cheek, crossed her legs lightly, and turned to him.
"Then continue. The scale of the enemy you encountered, and the course of the battle?"
"There were merely ten enemy soldiers, Instructor."
The Instructor's eyes narrowed.
"Ten? An enemy outnumbered more than two to one."
"Yes. Against them, the twenty-seven knights including myself were routed and destroyed without achieving anything of note. The enemy was, quite literally, closer to monsters."
"Monsters. Not a simple figure of speech, it seems."
"No. Our swords didn't work."
"That part — report it in detail."
The man bowed his head as if shuddering.
"Instructor. The enemy soldiers wear human shapes and disguise themselves in Suleiman's warrior garb. But when I swung my own sword and cut their clothes away, I clearly saw it."
"Saw it — saw what?"
"In place of human skin, they were sheathed in jet-black carapace like obsidian. And from beneath the white hoods covering their eyes, green light poured out."
The man said that much, then clenched his teeth as if recalling the memory of the engagement.
And the next moment, he leaned his upper body sharply forward, as if pleading.
"Instructor, what I just told you was no trick of the eyes! That appearance was, quite literally, what the world has begun to call——"
"——Magical Beasts."
In an instant, an icy chill filled the room.
"I don't yet know what Magical Beasts truly are. But the enemy's strength has already, without question, grown to surpass the knights of Rhodes."
The man in silver armor lightly traced his gauntleted hand across the breastplate of his armor.
Looking at the cross-section of the steel breastplate, shredded pitifully in battle, the Instructor silently tilted her head.
"Magic, then."
"And not just that — I believe they are something like biological weapons created by the rumored Black Mage who reached 1st Rank. I saw the one commanding them from behind with my own eyes."
"Who?"
"Someone wearing a bizarre mask."
"A mask?"
"Yes. And he made statements I cannot comprehend."
He murmured softly, his eyes glazed with terror.
"He said things like — his mask is a Magic Gear, and this battle is a sacrifice for records to be handed down to the mages of later generations. That he could use the knights of Rhodes for his research."
"There's no need to entertain the enemy's nonsense. He likely needed psychological warfare."
The Instructor dismissed it with a shake of her head.
"We knew well of the enemy's might, but seen through direct engagement like this, it's grim."
"The fallen knights of Rhodes fought valiantly to the end. But separate from their knightly and honorable deaths, resistance will prove reckless."
"Continue."
"What the 1st Rank Black Mage who appeared in Suleiman is perpetrating defies the order of this world and borders on madness. It was as if he wields a power that should not exist in this world."
"......"
"You must already know it well, Instructor. The unit's defensive combat personnel were just reorganized days ago. Isn't it because you know the threat of such enemies all too well — because you feel the crisis?"
The man gestured with his chin toward the water-haired girl standing quietly in a corner of the office.
"And I hear that even rookie Guardian Knights like that one are being mobilized for the live defense formation. I find it difficult to believe she'll be of any help against enemies that powerful."
The water-haired girl, having heard all of it from the side, said nothing and quietly bowed her head.
Seeing the girl shrink like that, the red-haired knight smiled wryly and shrugged.
"I won't deny it. But don't crush our young lady's spirit. She's already troubled enough that her skills won't improve no matter how much she trains these days."
"And so you're sending that novice to the battlefield?"
The Instructor glanced at the girl and nodded.
"It's my theory. On a battlefield straddling life and death, one learns many things, like it or not. There may be a realization waiting for her there."
"A realization......"
The water-haired girl murmured.
The Instructor replied with a faint smile.
"That's right. Who knows? Young lady, you might discover the realization that lets you grow — in war. A sword, in the end, is a thing that exists to stand against an opponent."
The red-haired knight said that much, then turned her head from the girl and looked back at the man.
"Do not dwell on the defeat. Do not fear the enemy more than necessary — and do not forget them either."
The knight spoke languidly, chin propped on her hand.
"The current Knight Commander of Rhodes — the one closer to the realm of the Sword Saint than anyone — guards this place."
"That I know."
The man straightened his posture and continued.
"The Grand Knight — I have seen the Commander's strength myself. The one who stands, in name and in truth, at the pinnacle of the current Guardian Knights of Rhodes. And not only that — I know you are here as well. Instructor, no......"
The man gazed at the red-haired knight before him and quietly added.
"—「Knight of Rhodes' Dawn」, Vice-Commander."
"I told you not to call me by that title."
The knight flicked her hair back with mild irritation.
"Our Commander forced it on me, you know. And in exchange, I made him agree to let people call me Instructor."
"Eh......?"
Noticing the water-haired girl — who had persistently been calling her by no title but its association — staring at her blankly, the Vice-Commander, the red-haired knight, pressed her forehead with a sigh.
Then she added, as if making excuses to the girl.
"Weeell, honestly, if I were a bit stronger, I'd love to plant a fist right in that stubborn Commander's face. Though if we sparred, nine times out of ten I'd lose to him, same as always."
"I heard you two were childhood friends......"
"That's ancient history. Don't bring it up."
The red-haired knight turned her head back to the reporting man and gestured with her chin.
"At any rate, I understand things have become difficult. Withdraw. Do not act rashly; we watch how the situation develops. If there is a moment that demands we act, we will act."
"......As you say."
"Having returned alive, do not waste that life — that is the path that honors your comrades. Rest first. To prepare for the coming invasion, there is much I must ask you about the enemy."
"Yes. As you command."
At the knight's words, the man pressed a fist to his chest in a knight's salute, then turned and walked out of the room.
Even amid all of it unfolding, Enoch had been staring at only one place.
In the middle of the office, the water-haired girl stood quietly, watching and listening to everything.
When at last she was left alone with the Instructor, the beautiful girl clenched a fist before her chest, her expression anguished, and bowed her head slightly.
"Instructor, the routes our scout knights take on regular reconnaissance are limited. They don't stray far from the island. And yet for them to suddenly run into Suleiman's scouts and engage......"
"Hm?"
The girl quietly raised her head.
"They — Suleiman — will march on Rhodes soon. It may even be within days."
"Aah, yes. So it would seem."
The red-haired Instructor nodded. Then, folding her arms before her chest, she added.
"Suleiman's invasions of its neighboring states are intensifying. The times are changing."
"Instructor! But our forces were routed even with more than double their numbers!"
The girl raised her head urgently. Her eyes shone desperately with impatience.
"Just hearing of that defeat is enough to make one flinch — that's how overwhelming their strength is. As long as an unknowable enemy called 1st Rank exists among them, our Guardian Knights of Rhodes......!"
"I know full well how it stands."
The red-haired knight walked toward the office door. The girl stood frozen in place, watching her retreating figure.
[—Yes. 'We' know full well how it stands.]
The voice of the Sword Saint of the Waves, sounding directly in his mind.
The voice echoed in a strange, layered overlap.
It sounded like a delicate girl's voice — and at the same time, like the clear, resonant voice of the woman who had reached the Sword Saint's realm, the one he had seen during the inheritance.
It was as if the same person were speaking simultaneously from two separate points in time — childhood and adulthood.
Listening to her countless voices vibrate through the Inner World's air, Enoch quietly closed his eyes.
The inner voice of the Sword Saint of the Waves' thoughts was now sounding directly in his mind.
Realizing from this that the erosion was advancing toward a dangerous threshold, Enoch clenched his fist in frustration — and at that very moment.
The red-haired Instructor spun around and added.
"But don't worry too much, young lady. In the coming invasion, we won't be fighting alone. We've been promised a rather dependable alliance."
"What? An alliance?"
"That's right. And it's with people you know quite well."
The Instructor opened the drawer beside her, pulled out a single document, and laid it on the desk.
Then, with one hand on her hip, she planted the other hand on the document with a thump and grinned.
"Our knights of Rhodes have formed an alliance for this war — with the Dragoons of Victoria."