Chapter 54
Chapter 54
A chilling killing intent sent shivers racing down my spine.
It was the world of the mind, yet my five senses were vividly alive.
Faced with River’s goblin-like face that looked as though she might devour me at any moment, I slowly brought my hand to the sword at my waist.
“You dare threaten your master. What a rude sword you are.”
“When my master is distracted and looking elsewhere, who but me would set him straight?”
For a mere sword, she certainly spoke smoothly.
Well, having lived for hundreds—no, thousands—of years, she would be sharper than most humans.
“I’ll give you one last choice. Will you abandon that demonic sword and obediently become my master? Or will you remain trapped in this space forever?”
She spoke such spine-chilling words with a perfectly calm expression.
But I had no intention of losing in terms of momentum either.
Srrng.
When I drew my sword, a jet-black demonic sword with a glossy sheen revealed itself.
At that, a flicker of surprise rose within me.
‘Tyrfing should definitely be in a deep sleep.’
Perhaps because this was the world of the mind, her appearance—previously reduced to a worthless, rusted iron sword—had returned to the original form I had seen in the Imperial Palace Treasury.
To begin with, the sword I usually wielded was not Tyrfing.
She should have been stored deep inside my subspace pouch.
Drrrdrdrd—
Seeing me draw Tyrfing, River’s smiling face stiffened.
Then, with an expression cold enough to freeze over, she leveled the tip of the Excalibur she was holding straight at me.
“I understand your answer well.”
At the same time, an auspicious light began to settle over her entire body.
The holy aura that was Excalibur’s inherent effect.
It was a pure energy that drove away all manner of impurity and corrected twisted distortions.
Tsuzuzuz—
Simultaneously, pitch-black darkness poured forth from Tyrfing’s blade as well.
It pushed back the white aura that had been spreading around us, and soon the two began to clash fiercely.
“A paltry demonic sword like that—!”
Perhaps her pride was wounded, as River stepped forward forcefully and swung her sword with all her might.
The aura surging from Excalibur shot forth, leaving a vivid trail in the air.
I, too, swung Tyrfing, and murky demonic energy surged up to collide with the aura.
Kuuung-!
The table and dishes between us shattered to pieces and flew into the air.
The green meadow was overturned, and the once-clear sky was now stained crimson as lightning began to strike.
“…From where I stand, you look more like the demonic sword.”
The sight of her holding her true form and pointing it at me with a sinister expression was that of a textbook villain.
Yet River twisted her lips into a warped smile and spoke to me.
“Because you’re the bad one.”
The instant her words ended, her figure vanished.
At the same time, sensing sharp killing intent from behind, I kicked off the ground and hurled my body forward.
Ssshaeaeak-!
Light-like thrusts aimed at my heart again and again.
In a situation where dying here might have repercussions in reality as well, I had no intention of meekly accepting it.
‘Her swordsmanship is immaculate.’
River’s blade, swung in 0.1-second intervals, looked like that of a seasoned master craftsman.
There were no wasted movements, and each one flowed seamlessly into the next as a preparatory motion.
If it were Tyrfing, she could likely have matched her blow for blow.
But.
Paaat-!
After leaping acrobatically to evade River’s attack, I scattered the dirt I had clenched in one hand straight at her face.
“Ah!”
River covered her eyes with a flustered expression, apparently never imagining I would resort to something like this.
But that fleeting moment was, quite literally, a fatal opening.
Ssshaeaeak-!
The sword, laden with surging demonic energy, swung down without a shred of mercy.
It knocked away the Excalibur she was holding and sent it flying far off, then severed her right arm so she couldn’t grasp the sword again.
Thud.
The arm, cut off at the shoulder, fell onto the ground.
Naturally, there was no blood.
Instead, a pure white light flowed from the severed cross-section and slowly rose into the sky.
Signaling that the match was decided, I raised my sword and aimed it at River’s neck.
She stared at me blankly, clutching her severed shoulder.
“A fight isn’t decided by swordsmanship alone. No matter how many endless years a sword has lived, the one who wields it is still human.”
They say that even a village dog will recite poetry after three years, but that alone wasn’t enough to defeat me.
At my words, River lowered her head deeply, her shoulders trembling.
I thought she might simply be frustrated at her defeat, but I couldn’t help showing my surprise at the droplets falling at her feet.
“But, but!”
River lifted her head and looked at me with a face stained with tears.
“I don’t want to lose the contractor I finally met after hundreds of years!”
Despite having the appearance of a fully grown woman, her behavior was like that of a whining child.
After confirming that there was no longer any hostility coming from her, I let out a sigh and sheathed my sword.
It seemed absurd that she had caused all this over such a reason, but it wasn’t entirely incomprehensible.
Both Tyrfing and River must have endured hundreds of years of solitude until a contractor worthy of being their master appeared.
They must have been lonely.
“At the very least, until I die, I won’t abandon you.”
When I said it in a calm voice, she looked at me with an expression filled with distrust.
“That’s what Arthur said too, and he left me stuck in a rock.”
“I am not Arthur.”
By Arthur, she meant the first head of the Pendragon Britain family.
After ending the war hundreds of years ago, he feared that the overwhelmingly powerful Excalibur might fall into someone else’s hands, so he sealed it into a rock along with a binding in the center of Camelot Palace.
That was the beginning of the Excalibur legend that spread throughout Britain.
How could the heart of a woman betrayed by the master she trusted be at ease? If she hadn’t been a holy sword, the grudge accumulated over hundreds of years would have been enough to engulf all of Britain.
“So, believe me.”
They were rough words, lacking any ornate embellishment or sweet persuasion, but my face wasn’t thick enough to spit out such things at a crying woman.
I merely reached out my hand because I pitied River in her fragile state.
She looked at my hand as it came closer, then made a slightly conflicted expression.
After that, she nodded vigorously and tried to grab it, but perhaps the hand she absentmindedly extended was the side that had been cut off—she made an “ah,” expression.
“Ah, wait a moment.”
She ran over to where the arm that had flown far away lay, brought it up to her shoulder, and with a flash of light, the arm returned to its proper place.
Then she hurriedly ran back to me and clasped my hand.
That the sight was slightly grotesque and almost made me reflexively step back was a secret no one knew.
“Haa.”
The world of the mind shattered, and I returned to the room where I had originally been.
My body wasn’t tired, but my head throbbed dully, as if I had expended quite a bit of mental strength.
Clink.
Excalibur lay atop the table, exactly as it had originally been.
River, too, could materialize her form just like Tyrfing.
However, since she had taken no small amount of damage when I severed her arm, she complained in a sulky voice that it was difficult for her to do so for the time being.
I wanted to say it was her own fault, but considering she had been crying just moments ago, it wasn’t something I could bring myself to say.
It felt like things had ended in a rather vague way, but since this was a world inside a novel, I decided to let it slide.
If the writing got bogged down in overly detailed descriptions, comments would surely complain about wasting word count on unnecessary parts.
“…….”
Lying down on the bed with my eyelids growing heavy on their own, I must have fallen asleep before I realized it.
When I opened my eyes at the busy sounds coming from outside, the darkened view beyond the window came into sight.
Kiiik.
When I opened the window, countless torches were bustling about, cutting through the darkness.
With an atmosphere as if a war had broken out, I picked up Excalibur from the table and left the room.
“Ah, Mr. Ostia.”
Upon reaching the first floor and entering the corridor, I ran into Elain, who was with heavily armed knights.
Wondering what was going on amid the commotion, I asked her, and she replied lightly as if it were nothing serious.
“The monsters have started moving. I believe word was already sent to your companions…….”
“I was sleeping. Still, monsters? Isn’t that usually something that happens around winter, when food runs scarce?”
“It’s rare, but something like this happens once every few years. You don’t need to worry. Britain’s walls are sturdy.”
With that, Elain bowed politely, saying it was fine for me to return to my room and rest, and then left.
“Hm.”
Standing alone in the silent corridor, I let out a small groan.
In the original storyline, there was no monster attack.
There was only a development where the protagonist and his friends laughed and joked around.
After all the hardship from the dungeon incident, was a monster invasion suddenly thrown into a story filled with a rewarding tone where obtaining Excalibur was the payoff?
“There’s no way this is nothing.”
Elain had said there was nothing to worry about, but if things in the world always went so smoothly, characters like Leios who suffered tragic disasters wouldn’t exist.
“Ostia.”
At the presence I felt behind me, I turned my head.
I then saw Alice running toward me, her hair still damp as if she had just finished washing.
“When did you wake up? You were sleeping until a little while ago.”
“I woke up because it was noisy. More importantly, where is everyone else?”
“They’re all gathered in the dining hall. I went back to my room for a bit because I wanted to wash up, and I came to see if you were awake, but you weren’t there, so I came looking for you.”
“I see.”
Hearing that my companions were gathered in the dining hall, I followed behind Alice and headed there.
“Ostia.”
As soon as I entered the dining hall, Werner was the first to greet me.
I waved lightly in response and sat down in an appropriately empty seat, and Alice immediately darted over to take the seat next to me.
“You heard what happened, right?”
“Yes, that the monsters started moving.”
“It doesn’t seem like a good situation.”
Werner spoke with a grave expression as he tapped the table.
“From what I’ve heard here and there, it seems the Grand Duke and the elite knights are in the Empire for some reason.”
“What about the teleport gates? Someone of Grand Duke rank should be able to use them even in wartime.”
“Well…….”
This time, Leysias spoke up with a dark expression.
“It seems someone destroyed all the teleport gates across Britain. Even the ones inside Camelot Palace.”
“…What?”
“In other words, Britain is isolated.”
All teleport gates had been destroyed.
And as if timed to take advantage of that, the monsters had begun to move.
‘Either the Empire, or the demon race.’
There was no other conclusion to draw.
Of course, there could have been some faction trying to undermine Britain, but there were only a few forces capable of acting so widely and so precisely.
Still, it was difficult to believe the Empire had done it at this point in time.
Britain was, in name and reality, the Empire’s shield—a buffer zone that blocked monsters descending from the long mountain ranges.
In such a situation, there would be no need for the Empire to deliberately scheme against Britain.
That meant the scales tipped toward the demon race.
‘I’ve barely begun to grasp the path to the realm of Sword Master…….’
The experiences I had gained from the various battles so far had certainly helped me grow, but even so, it felt like something was lacking.
…Wait, experiences?
“…Ostia?”
When I suddenly sprang to my feet, Alice looked up at me with a puzzled expression.
The others wore similar looks.
In response, I pointed outside and smiled broadly.
“Let’s go.”
There was nothing better than war for gaining experience.