Chapter 471 - 414: A Knight’s Lament

"Traitor..."

Jens knelt on one knee, a hand gripping his sword hilt tightly as he struggled to rise from the ruins.

His gaze toward Reinhardt and Nelom was filled with anguish and hatred.

He hadn’t come from a formal Knight Training Camp, nor was he an Imperial Knight commissioned to a Legion. In fact, his relationship with Claudius dated back one hundred and thirty years.

They were lord and vassal, but they were also brothers and dear friends.

Even though the horrific wound in his chest threatened to tear him apart, the death of Claudius was far more difficult to accept.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the headless corpse at Reinhardt’s feet. Jens could still remember meeting an equally down-on-his-luck Claudius when he himself was at his lowest point.

To pay off the Empire’s Tithing, Claudius had sold all his family’s assets and even fallen deep into debt.

To clear his debts, he founded a Mercenary Corps that operated on Tania World.

That was when Jens met Claudius, and he was the first Free Knight to serve in the Iron Hand Corps.

The glint of flashing blades.

Fighting to the death.

Surviving by a thread amidst the crushing weight of politics.

Scenes from the past flashed through Jens’s mind. He could never forget them standing shoulder-to-shoulder on a battlefield littered with corpses, the stench of death filling his nostrils, his blood-soaked undershirt clinging wetly to his skin.

He remembered that high-spirited Knight General, who had smiled and made a grand vow before him in a half-joking tone: one day, they would stand at the pinnacle of power on Tania World and make all the bastard scum who once looked down on them grovel in terror at their feet, begging for forgiveness.

One hundred years later, Claudius was only a single step away from fulfilling that grand vow. But that final step had become an insurmountable chasm they could never cross.

Reinhardt.

That name was a nightmare, a colossal boulder barring their path to the summit of power.

From the United Court of Judgment to the ambush and schemes in Cyrenaica, he and Claudius had exhausted every option, but fate had played a cruel joke on them.

This Imperial Knight, exiled to the Ash Soil Star Zone after the Great Rebellion, was like a star streaking across the heavens. In just twenty short years, his relentless rise had generated a light so brilliant it eclipsed their one hundred and thirty years of arduous effort.

It was then that Jens’s thoughts turned to that night, twenty years ago, when they had secretly negotiated with Cicero.

Perhaps.

From the very beginning, they had chosen the wrong path.

Because back then, across the three hundred worlds of the Imperial Administrative Region, no one could have imagined that twenty years later, the descendant of an Eternal Lord who had fled here like a beaten dog would seize sole control over the Administrative Region’s military and political power.

And no one could have predicted that the new recruit Cicero went to such lengths to extract from Verne, even negotiating with Grand Lord Kles for him, would grow into the spiritual leader for countless Imperial Knights and tens of millions of soldiers.

Even the National Church had acknowledged the legitimacy of the Fire of Vengeful Sect.

To put it dramatically, Reinhardt was only one step away from canonization: achieving the rank of Legendary Immortal and then, finally, having his soul return to the Divine Emperor’s radiance amid the flames of war.

To everyone’s surprise, Nelom did not retort in the face of Jens’s insults. He simply endured them in silence.

He sheathed his weapon and walked slowly to stand before Jens.

"Claudius is dead, brother.

I don’t want to see you make a pointless sacrifice. Surrender. I swear on my Knight’s Oath that the Lord of Vengeful will not kill you."

Jens shoved Nelom out of his way, as if another glance at the man who had betrayed his lord would be an insult to his very eyes.

As he moved past Nelom, he uttered a single, cold, and merciless sentence.

"I never should have brought you to Claudius. I was wrong about you."

Jens’s voice was flat and unremarkable, but to Nelom’s ears, the words were like a spell of silence that shattered his defenses.

Nelom turned to look at Jens as he limped onward, struggling to attack Reinhardt. This was the Domain Level Powerhouse known as the Ash-Burning Tyrant, a man who had served for over a century.

At that moment, he looked like a boy who had done something wrong.

His hands clenched into tight fists, as if searching for an excuse to defend himself. He shouted back, "Jens! Nothing in this world stays the same!

I change, you change, and Claudius changed too!

The only thing that should never change is our Knight’s Oath—the Imperial truth we swore to dedicate our lives to!

Look at what Claudius did—consorting with heretics, colluding with foreign enemies! He’s the one who betrayed the path an Imperial Knight should follow! He betrayed the soldiers of the Administrative Region! He betrayed the sacred truth of the Empire!"

Unfortunately, his only answer was Jens’s cold silence and disregard.

Nelom hurried forward and grabbed Jens’s shoulder in a last-ditch attempt to stop him. "Brother! Listen to me! Your life isn’t worth throwing away for a traitor."

Jens spun around and slashed, his blade biting deep into Nelom’s shoulder and cleaving down into his chest.

Like a dying lion, Jens got right in Nelom’s face and roared hysterically, "What do you know?! You don’t know anything!

Claudius and I gave our entire lives for this!

And you, you damn traitor, you ruined everything! And you still have the gall to stand here and preach to me about knightly ideals?"

Blood gushed from Nelom’s mouth and nose as the super-heated embers of his Extraordinary Armor, the Ashen Battle Armor, flared to life around his body. He grabbed the blade buried in his chest with both hands and roared, "But what was I supposed to do?! The Lord of Vengeful told me the truth! Your so-called ’fight for truth’ was nothing but a grab for power in the Administrative Region!

If I hadn’t helped the Vengeful Angels, you would have plunged the Administrative Region into chaos and civil war! What was I supposed to do about the soldiers on the Verne Front Line?

Was I supposed to just abandon them? To become an accomplice in your rebellion, all for your so-called Loyalty?!"

Nelom threw down his Full Coverage Helmet, his furious gaze locked on Jens. He spat out a mouthful of blood and growled in a trembling voice, "I owed you, but now... we’re even!"

Nelom kicked the heavily wounded Jens away, then grimaced in pain as he pulled the Knight’s Broadsword from deep within his own chest. Though the Special Ability of his Ashen Battle Armor meant the wound wasn’t fatal, the excruciating, bone-deep pain was not diminished in the slightest.

In truth, he’d had countless chances to dodge Jens’s strike.

But he had chosen to take the blow with his body to repay an old debt. Years ago, after he had betrayed the Holy Temple of Justice and become a wanted man, it was Jens who had invited him to take refuge on Tania World.

「And now.」

There was nothing left to be said between them.

Just like their Knight Power, they were as irreconcilable as fire and water.