Chapter 17
Chapter 17
I could not tell whether the sword I was gripping was me, or whether I was the sword being swung by me.
The shell was breaking apart.
I could feel the frame that had confined me shattering, and a new boundary being drawn.
One step forward.
If I took just one more step, I could advance to a realm further beyond.
Countless notification sounds and Tyrfing’s sharp voice rang through my head. But nothing could block my path. And so, I took another step forward.
Kang-!
Truly in that single instant, just before my foot was fully set down, someone knocked my sword aside.
At the same time, the world that had been filled entirely with me shattered apart, and my shriveled lungs sucked in air with all their strength.
“…Huh?”
When I came to my senses, I was lying spread-eagle on the training ground.
Turning my gaze away from the countless clusters of stars spread across the night sky, I discovered an unfamiliar someone seated before me.
“That path ahead is the road of an asura.”
White, snowlike hair fluttered in the wind.
From between deeply etched wrinkles, sharp eyes pierced through my body, and under a gaze that seemed to strip me bare, I could not utter a word.
“What on earth have you been bewitched by?”
A voice that sounded indifferent, yet carried both reproach and surprise.
That was the first meeting between me and the man called the Sword Saint.
The Sword Saint Yohanel was evaluated as the strongest among all those who had ever been called Sword Saints.
His age was fifty-eight.
It was an age at which an ordinary person would not find it strange to begin preparing for the end of life, but it would not be an exaggeration to say that he was renewing his prime with each passing day.
However, unlike the name Sword Saint implied, he did not like fighting.
To him, the sword was a means of cultivating what was lacking, and a way to nurture one’s own heart.
But there were many people in the world who suffered.
He did not make the mad claim that he would save everyone, but as far as his hand could reach, he had the will to swing his sword willingly.
It had already been several years since he first saw Leios.
The embodiment of incompetence and obstinacy. Despite his young age, the widespread ill repute reached even his ears.
To reach that extent, he even thought it was impressive. Not even ten years old, yet he had spread his own infamy so widely.
But when the Sword Saint saw Leios, he let out an unconscious sigh.
The embodiment of incompetence and obstinacy was not him, but the people around him.
Simply because he was an illegitimate child rather than blood of the Empress, they were devouring the Empire’s potential with their own hands.
They did not exchange many words, but he instinctively felt that Leios’s potential far surpassed that of the other princes.
He wanted to take him in as a disciple and help him, but the Sword Saint too could not escape from a political position.
He could only curse the empty fame of being a Sword Saint, which allowed him nothing more than to pray for the future. And time passed.
The National Foundation Day ceremony, which he had experienced many times before.
At the Emperor’s letter asking him to attend and grace the occasion after a long absence, the Sword Saint dragged his heavy body to the Imperial Palace.
He had hoped things would have changed a little by now, but within the palace there were only jackals who watched each other’s reactions for their own benefit, not even for the safety of the Empire.
They would claim it was for the Empire in their own way, but to him it was nothing but contemptible.
In the middle of the banquet, the Emperor made an unexpected remark.
A sparring match between princes.
The Sword Saint recalled Leios, whom he had forgotten until then.
The other princes had also achieved growth befitting the name of Ribera. Then what about him, who possessed a talent bestowed by heaven?
He watched the spar with expectant eyes, but Leios’s movements were not even using one-tenth of the power dwelling in his body.
He was somehow holding out with excellent reflexes, but it looked as though the match would soon be decided.
‘What a pity.’
The Sword Saint sighed inwardly.
The potential and fullness he had seen in childhood were no longer visible.
He had become worse than an ordinary person.
But he realized that this was a misconception immediately afterward.
A momentum that changed in an instant. At that appearance, like a single sharp line of a sword, he could feel the nobles around him waver.
The same was true for the Sword Saint himself.
‘So he had been hiding his fangs.’
Even if he had grown older, discrimination and persecution would remain.
No, if anything, they would have grown worse rather than diminished.
That was why he had waited for the right time. For the day he would reveal his hidden power.
Only after the National Foundation Day ended was the Sword Saint able to finish all his meetings. In his heart, he wanted to run to the Third Prince’s palace immediately, but due to the commotion of the celebration, there were many eyes watching him.
Thus, with lingering regret, he had no choice but to watch secretly. Later, even later, if a chance should arise.
He had intended only to watch.
Until just moments ago.
Shiiik-!
“······?”
The sword he was swinging while training basic forms cut through a strange trajectory.
The Sword Saint looked at Leios’s face.
The focus of his eyes was not aligned.
The sword was at their end, yet his eyes were looking at something else.
‘Has he fallen into a state of selflessness.’
The Sword Saint quietly leaned against one wall of the training ground.
This moment would be an important turning point for Leios.
And so, to prevent any possible interference, he volunteered himself as a guard.
‘Dazzling.’
The Sword Saint could not even begin to fathom how much effort he had put in.
From what he heard from others in the palace, Leios had trained in swordsmanship for barely around a week.
‘That’s impossible.’
At the very least, he must have undergone grueling training for several hundred, several thousand times that amount, hidden from others’ eyes.
No matter how much of a genius one was, it was a realm difficult to reach in just a week.
No matter what kind of trickery he had used to conceal it, the Sword Saint had roughly guessed that Leios’s level was around intermediate Sword Expert.
Considering that the First Prince Carius, called a genius of the sword, was only just about to reach intermediate Sword Expert, it was truly astonishing.
But Leios was on the verge of growing another step further.
What if, what if he had received sufficient education and support since childhood, he wondered.
‘Then perhaps the Empire might have seen the birth of its youngest Sword Master.’
As the end of the state of selflessness slowly came into view, the Sword Saint pushed himself away from the wall.
“…Hm?”
Leios tried to leave before he could come to his senses, but his growth did not end there.
Hwirik.
An unusual piercing sound.
At the strange sense of déjà vu felt at its tip, the Sword Saint’s eyes narrowed.
Leios had clearly achieved growth by one step. However, that momentum was saying that it was not the end.
A form that could not even be compared to moments ago bloomed from the tip of Leios’s sword.
At the complex principles that even he himself could not read in a single glance, ripples appeared on the Sword Saint’s face for the first time.
‘Swordsmanship that can only be unfolded upon reaching at least Sword Master. But how could that child…?’
Only then did the Sword Saint realize something.
Leios’s movements were not being made by his own will.
Whether he was being led, or bewitched, he was achieving a forced awakening through external interference.
Srring.
The Sword Saint, who had been merely watching quietly, drew the sword he held in his hand.
A Sword Master was a sacred realm in which a human who had completed mind, energy, and body in harmony transcended the limits of the species and achieved transcendence.
However, Leios had completed none of the three.
He had merely been led by the sword, as if possessed, stepping up those stairs and reaching the boundary.
If he reached Sword Master, there was a high chance he would collapse, unable to withstand his own power.
That was why the Sword Saint swung his sword.
He closed the distance in a single dash, approached the center of the training ground, and struck away Leios’s sword, which was still repeating bizarre forms.
Kang-!
Sparks born from steel colliding with steel illuminated the surroundings for an instant.
It was regrettable to destroy the birth of the youngest Sword Master by his own hand, but there would be another opportunity. It would be enough if he guided him himself.
“…Huhk!”
Leios, sprawled on the ground, gasped for breath as if someone who had barely escaped from drowning.
“That path ahead is the road of asura.”
A question of whether there was meaning in abandoning one’s humanity and climbing to that realm.
“What on earth have you been bewitched by?”
The Sword Saint looked down at Leios with boundless benevolence.
An old man with white hair fluttering was looking down at me, emitting piercing blue eyes.
Before I could even understand the situation, the exhilaration that had filled my chest drained away, plunging me into an indescribable emptiness.
Just one step, just one more step, and I would have been able to reach it.
Thinking that, an unpleasant emotion began to creep up from the very bottom.
Who was this old man to interfere with me?
I gripped the sword that had been lying beside my hand once more. Then, forcing my exhausted body up, I glared at the old man before me.
“Why!”
My cracked lips spat out a hoarse voice. Unable to control my emotions, I shouted at him.
“I was almost there!”
I did not know what lay beyond that point. But blind rage toward the old man who had interfered at the crucial moment burst forth.
Swaeaeak-!
Before I could even understand what I was doing, the sword swung. Though it was a blunted practice sword, it was a heavy chunk of metal.
If struck, it was a dangerous weapon that would not end with mere broken bones. But I swung the sword without the slightest hesitation.
Kang-!
Once again, sparks flew as the sword was blocked. That only further stoked my anger.
As I clenched the sword with all my strength, something wriggled and rose up from within.
Uwoong-
The sword let out a cry, blooming with clear blue flames.
As I stepped forward, my body naturally took the stance of the Fiore Style sword form.
Le-Punte(Le Punte).
A swift single-thrust strike burst forth from the tip of the sword.
A piercing sound a beat slower followed behind it, but only the result—that it had already been blocked—remained there.
“Kuhk!”
My fingertips tingled painfully. But that alone was far from enough to quell my rage.
Wungwungwung-
The energy gathered in the sword grew even denser.
As if being interfered with by something, its form was perilously unstable, but its momentum was ferocious enough to tear the old man before me to pieces.
More. More. More.
I gathered power into the sword until my hands trembled.
The wavering light began to take shape, and the violently shaking radiance took on a sharp killing edge.
“I’m sorry.”
The old man calmly uttered an apology. But I did not care. What I wanted was nothing but cold drops of blood to cool this rage.
The old man also slowly raised his sword.
Soon, just like mine, a blue light began to frost over his blade.
But that momentum soon surpassed mine. It was not merely a mass of light.
The light that poured out as if to cover the world eventually formed a single sword.
Swaeaeaeak-!
And then he swung it at me.
‘…I’m going to die!’
The second time the fear of death came upon me.
Overwhelmed by the difference in power, I could not even think of dodging and simply stared blankly at it.
A warm mass of light swept over my body. If death was like this, I thought it might not be so bad.
Thud.
Perhaps because my legs gave out, I sank down onto the ground on my own. As I stayed still, lacking even the strength to move, the old man approached and stood before me.
“Look into my eyes.”
As if bewitched, I followed his words. I lifted my head and gazed into those piercing blue eyes, and felt something pierce through my body.
[Aaaaargh……!]
Suddenly, Tyrfing let out a sharp scream.
As I frowned at the pain that rang through my mind, the old man nodded with a relieved expression.
“I cut down the inner demon that had been hiding deep within you and disturbing your mind. I couldn’t deal with it perfectly, but it must have suffered a considerable wound.”
[Damn itdamn itdamn itdamn itdamn it…….]
With two voices ringing incessantly by my ears and inside my head, I felt like I was about to lose my mind.
Wondering if there was any solution, I called up the status window, and my link with Tyrfing caught my eye.
[SYSTEM: Would you like to sever the link with the demonic sword Tyrfing? Y / N]