Chapter 987: More

‘Deflection.’

If you could not meet pressure with pressure and chose to dodge instead, you were forced onto the defensive. Yet the opponent received and deflected every attack as if he had been waiting for exactly that.

‘This too?’

A vertical severing strike. A cut that mixed the foundation of swordsmanship, the vertical slash, with the concept of breaking stone. The blow landed in an instant, and the impact burst in that single moment.

It was a difficult cut to stop with a flowing sword, yet the opponent received it with a loosened blade, then threw his body sideways to disperse the impact.

‘Defense and evasion at the same time.’

He was skilled. What would he be like compared to Valmung? The two were completely different in nature.

At this level, judging who would win or lose was foolish, so there was no point in comparing them. All Enkrid had to do was enjoy the now.

Tiiing.

Maintaining the world of silence consumed a great deal of stamina and mental strength. He needed rests in between. It might be fun to bring Uske to the front and turn it into a battle of endurance, but—

‘Show me more.’

Enkrid was interested in the opponent’s swordsmanship, but unlike before, he did not sink so deeply into it that he forgot his surroundings.

How to put it? Ever since he had seen Spell Butcher Zaiden’s past, Enkrid could immerse himself whenever he wished, and pull himself out just as freely.

His blue eyes settled deep. When a lake was deep enough, its water passed beyond blue and became a dark blue tinged with black. Enkrid’s eyes were like that.

‘More.’

Show it. Reveal it. Pour out what you have.

Enkrid’s offense grew faster. It gained speed.

From the outside, it was no different from blue lines cutting through the darkness, pouring down like a storm.

“Whoa there?”

After knocking down the two men presumed to be assassins, Rem stood with both feet on their backs and looked toward Enkrid.

They had told him not to kill, so was he planning to beat them half to death instead? If he only half-killed them, he had still granted the request.

Well, that was not bad either. Rem started to squat down, then thought it would be nice to have a chair, so he stacked the two fallen men on top of each other, sat on them, and crossed his legs. Then he picked up the nicely grilled meat and cup of liquor he had been eating earlier.

“You’ve got plenty of room to spare.”

Lynox approached and asked.

“No way he loses.”

Lynox looked at the man who had instantly flattened even the assassin heading for him.

A western barbarian with gray hair.

Apart from muscles that looked ready to burst, his flexible movements and response speed would have been astonishing even for a knight.

So this was the charge knight of the Mad Order of Knights.

And he had not even drawn the axe at his waist.

“Your stare’s getting a little hot there.”

Enkrid was in the middle of swinging his sword as if dancing, as if driving forward in a storm. Rem spoke while looking only ahead.

It was nothing new to be surprised by, but that did not mean he felt nothing. The current Enkrid did not fight simply with strength, but with the reason and principles of swordsmanship added on top.

Watching him made the blood quietly boil. It made a man want to cross blades with him.

The man from Zaun pacing beside him must have felt the same. Enkrid was the kind of person who awakened a person’s spirit just by being watched. He stimulated desire and set it boiling.

They were called assassins, but they were not actually threatening anyone’s life to that degree. Suppressing them was easy.

‘Feels like I barely got to use my body.’

So he had reached out even to the one who had not been aiming for him. His own body was itching too.

All the more so since the sly alley cat had launched a counterattack, which meant there would be no one else rushing in now.

Otherwise, that alley cat would never have left the king’s side.

“I want to have a go.”

Lynox knew that he was here as Enkrid and company’s escort, and to warn the Empire, and he understood his own position well. But for someone who held a sword, there were moments that simply could not be endured.

“You’re still at the age where your blood runs hot, huh?”

Rem stood with a grin. What reason was there not to answer that spirit and desire?

Lynox quietly steadied his breathing. Did aging mean there was no further growth? Was he supposed to stand in place, chew over the past he had already lived, and stop?

There had been a time when such questions filled him. At one point, he had wandered in search of that answer.

Funny thing was, the story Enkrid had told him remained in his chest. The story of a man named Castellan Graham.

A man who had seemed insignificant, who had seemed incapable of advancing, who no one had paid any attention to, had ultimately broken his own limit and moved on toward what came next.

Even if he had stopped now, he had not given up.

That heart, that will, that spirit.

Lynox knew it. He had realized it, and remembered it.

“Is it all right if I go a little rough?”

When he asked with all those feelings inside, one corner of Rem’s mouth stretched up.

“Do your best if you don’t want to die.”

At the provocation, Lynox’s blade came free. Clang. The clear sound spoke for his mood. This was going to be fun. His anticipation showed plainly.

He knew this was not the time, and he knew it was a moment he should endure, but Lynox charged anyway, and Rem lifted his axe.

It felt as though he was drunk on a few cups of liquor and starlight, and perhaps Enkrid’s will, which had naturally spread outward, had affected him too.

Did the reason matter? It did not.

Rem’s axe hammered into his sword.

Boom!

A thunderous roar burst out. A shock wave spread from the two of them, and the campfire collapsed violently to one side. Seeing it, Esther snapped her fingers.

Snap.

With that, a curtain of wind spread around the campfire and dissolved the shock wave. She then arranged the burning firewood.

‘Fire.’

Flames. It was not originally a field she used especially well. Yet for the past few days, her mind had been drawn this way the entire time.

Sometimes, one became deeply absorbed in a field for no reason. This was one of those times.

“I will guard your back.”

The Mage of Lewd Glances—no, Nephir, He Who Grasps the Morning Star, stood behind Esther and spoke. He had taken a step back, but he had not stopped showing goodwill toward her.

He truly was a man who did not know how to give up. What he did looked ridiculous, but elsewhere, he was a recognized mage and respected teacher.

There had been no need for him to step forward this time either, but he had volunteered for Seriana’s safety. Of course, he had secured a few benefits, but there was no mage who moved without payment.

That was why he was merely curious. What was moving Esther now?

‘Because of that man?’

It looked that way. The man over there, focused on swordplay—watching him made Nephir’s heart beat faster too. The scent of the will he spread while fighting affected the surroundings like a spell.

‘What an absurd knight.’

Would even the Empire’s top knights show such a sight?

‘He is clearly different from that so-called genius.’

Thinking of the knight who had recently turned his back on the Empire and left, Nephir steadied his mind.

For now, all he had to do was watch the surroundings and do his best to ensure no problem arose.

Just as there was no mage who moved without payment, a mage who lost composure had no value in existing.

When everyone responded to the surprise attack, Riley quietly moved his feet. He hid his presence with assimilation and said nothing, did nothing.

He opened his mouth only once he had taken Seriana’s back.

“Do not move carelessly.”

He had not drawn his sword. He only stood still with his hand on the grip and spoke.

At that one sentence, the attendant Mol’s body stiffened. When?

He had not even realized his back had been taken. Valmung had also lost track of Riley’s presence amid the situation.

“We won’t kill you. But the guests who came over there are not guests on our side. This is the minimum precaution.”

It was Grida Zaun speaking from the opposite side, with Valmung in the middle. He had not noticed when she had arrived. She had drawn her greatsword and rested it on her shoulder as she kept Valmung in check. Her face was expressionless.

It looked as though she did not much like this situation, but was doing it because she had no choice.

“Doesn’t Zaun solve everything with swordplay? And now you’re taking hostages?”

Valmung did not even look toward Seriana. His eyes were on Grida. This side looked like it disliked the situation itself.

“When we did that, we always took a bit of a loss. We decided to get a little more flexible too. Think about it and you’ll know. Why was Riley put in charge instead of Lynox or me?”

Yes, that had been rather strange.

Anyone could see that Riley’s skill was the lowest of the three, yet the leader was Riley Zaun.

“Sorry if you wanted a group of sword-swinging idiots who only ever get taken advantage of.”

This time, Riley spoke. His eyes gave off a languid light. That languor was an expression of his will to do anything calmly if necessary.

His father, Heskal, had died. How? By sacrificing everything. Reputation, martial strength, will, even conviction—he had wagered everything and chosen the path of protecting Zaun.

Riley had no intention of seeing another father like that appear again. He had inherited his father’s will.

Only, his method was different.

Before bleeding within, he would read the state of things, judge, and prepare. Well, for now, this had begun from not forgetting a debt, but it was also true that he judged this side to be better.

Hadn’t Odinkar said before they left?

“Do you think that madman is going to stop here?”

Yes, the madman named Enkrid would not stop. He would see the end. Whatever that end was, standing beside him was the profitable choice.

That was the will of Odinkar Zaun, who had become the head of the family, and Riley’s judgment as well.

Valmung stuck out his lips sulkily and crossed his arms.

“Damn bastards, seriously. Nothing ever goes the way I want. Fine. Do what you want. I asked you not to kill them, but if a few die, then there’s nothing to be done. The ones who did what they were told not to do are at fault.”

Half of that was said for the attackers to hear.

While the standoff continued that way, Jaxon found and suppressed the hidden ones one by one.

As he did, he saw a tattoo carved onto one of their necks.

‘Butterfly Troupe.’

A legendary assassin guild equal to Geor’s Dagger. They had butterfly tattoos somewhere on their bodies and enjoyed disguising themselves as an acting troupe.

‘So they belonged to the Empire.’

If the finest assassin guild on the continent was Geor’s Dagger, then these were an assassin guild based in the Empire, occupying a similar position.

He had already laid five of them down. He had not killed them. Was this a situation where killing was acceptable? Jaxon judged that it was not.

The basis for that judgment was the poison they used and their attitude. None of them were risking their lives to kill the king.

And when the situation turned this way, likely by the will of the leader directing them, they began aiming for Jaxon first instead of the king. It seemed almost as if they were asking him to play with them, so Jaxon was playing along.

As he moved through the darkness like that, fog gathered around him before he knew it. Fog, all of a sudden?

At some point, the influence of a rite or spell had wrapped around him.

‘I was wondering when you’d come out.’

One reason the Butterfly Troupe was famous was that every one of them handled strange tricks.

Among the southern knight orders, there were those who used things like psychokinesis, but this was a group that had trained people born with those supernatural abilities into assassins.

The fog wrapped around his body, but it did not invade past a certain area. Instead, dozens of assassins appeared before Jaxon’s eyes.

Every one of them held or bit down on sharp daggers smeared with poison. They were filled with murderous intent. They were full of the resolve to risk their lives for one knife wound.

Then, each of their faces changed into Yenatrice’s and his master’s.

It was a fog that showed illusions. Jaxon closed his eyes. Instead of sight, he used hearing.

He moved straight through the fog. The illusion of Yenatrice approached and stabbed with a sword. A skewer-like blade with a bent tip dug into his thigh and tore out flesh.

It must have cut a blood vessel properly, because blood poured out. Jaxon felt pain identical to the real thing, but ignored it.

‘A high-level spell.’

This was not a supernatural ability, but a spell. It enchanted the mind even with the eyes closed.

Well, if his heart was shaken by this much, he was disqualified as an assassin. The pain and the faces of people close to him were all meant to shake his heart. Jaxon overcame it by ignoring it, and reached his destination.

“Are you going to keep going?”

Then he asked. He had not even drawn a dagger; he simply stood in front of her and asked.

The woman who had her back to a tree, her hands crossed as she formed a hand sign, raised her head and looked at Jaxon.

“Wow. You’re handsome.”

It was the greeting of the woman assassin who had used the illusion spell. The assassins’ attack ended there. The commotion settled.

Even as the situation had more or less come to an end, Enkrid did not stop.

‘More.’

His heart and will were unchanged. His intention was filled with only purity, so no malice could even be felt.

The opponent, the Imperial knight, had to draw out what he possessed one piece at a time under the storm of attacks.

He was enduring the raging storm with ways to block and ways to evade.

Then Enkrid hopped backward. As he did, he changed his stance in an instant. He lowered the tip of his sword. It was the stance called Steel Gate.

It was a stance that focused on defense and drew out the opponent’s attack.

A gap appeared within the storm of blocking, dodging, and driving attacks. The instant the Imperial knight recognized that gap, his body moved reflexively.

The chance had come, so he seized it. His curved sword was specialized for flowing swordsmanship, but did that mean he had no attacking techniques?

He crossed both feet and attached his own sword to the downward-pointed blade, breaking his opponent’s prediction.

He deliberately brought his sword to Enkrid’s. Instead of aiming for the head or upper body exposed by the lowered sword tip in the Steel Gate stance.

The instant the two blades crossed, he pushed the curved blade, the falchion, upward. Then, while the two swords touched and locked together, he thrust his opposite hand into the inside of Enkrid’s elbow. The Imperial knight immediately attempted an arm lock.

It was a sight Audin would have gladly welcomed. Had he not repeated so very much training to prepare Enkrid for exactly this kind of method?