Soul of Searing Steel

Along the pitch black corridor, climbing the spiral stairs, Ying approached the castle wall.

It was different when battling with the monsters during daylight. The castle wall stood silently, faint echoes of footsteps from patrolling soldiers could be heard, the white snow covering the rocks was slowly melting. One of the patrolling soldiers with a torch saw a glimpse of a young girl with silver hair in the snow. He rubbed his eyes and looked again but there was nothing there; he started to think that he must be seeing illusions due to fatigue.

Ying focused on the pact’s resonance. After awhile, she found her master.

The last light has completely died out, the heavy snow covering the fortress under the pitch black sky, the dark-haired warrior stood at the castle wall, eye gazing at the distant white mountain terrain and black forest.

At first, Ying thought of greeting Joshua happily and telling him that she has brought him the armor, but after seeing him gazing at the scene, the silver-haired girl slowly closed in, holding her breath while approaching him.

The eyes that revealed his desires.

What does Master desire? 

This question had been in her heart ever since she was drawn out of the blade-sealing chamber.

Slaying enemies, retrieve back the lands, from Moldavia to the fortress, driving back the monstrous invaders, then defeating the monsters at Moldova, holding down the fort, through endless battle and slaughter, many have paid their gratitude and praise for his arrival; they placed their admiration and trust in him.

For a warrior, what more could one ever desire more? Has he not achieved the highest accomplishments in his life?

It was useless to take a wild guess; any doubts will be cleared with questions. Ying slowly approached Joshua and stood beside him.

“Master… What are you thinking about now?” she asked.

“What is it that is keeping you awake, sitting here on top of the lone fortress in darkness feeling the chilling breeze and looking at the distant mountains?”

“Ying, you’re back.”

Joshua was aware that the silver-haired girl was approaching him, but continued staying still and did not answer the girl’s question.

The snow was heavier than ever, along with the howling wind blowing relentlessly; both of them stayed on top of the castle wall silently.

The time felt extremely long, the snow had long covered the shoes, as it started to freeze and Ying thought that she will not be getting the answers. As she was preparing to accompany her master doze off, she heard her master answering her unexpectedly.

“I guess it is the eagerness to fight.”

The voice came from Joshua, while still gazing at the snow as white as feathers covering his body and continued to say, “It may also be desire.”

Upon getting the answer, the girl felt confused and asked, “But why? Master, you are not like me, that exists as a weapon…”

“My desire to battle is to hope that you use me more as I can fulfill my purpose and responsibility, this is what I exist for, but you are a human.”

The girl recalled those broken weapons at the fortress, exhausted soldiers, those homeless people who have lost their home and those armor stained with blood and residue of steel.

Although it may not be appropriate for a weapon to voice out these thoughts, to be away from home for thousands of miles is to build a better life, it should not be due to the desire for battle as it was against the law of nature.

Ying did not say the last phrase aloud but since she has said it out there is no use to say further.

Joshua sat there silently and did not answer her doubts. Raising his head, the snow on his head fall off. He looked at the sky and the clouds but the moonlight had long gone, but his eyes gazed through the clouds and looked straight at the starlight. After a while, he mumbled, “Human nature differs from others.”

Covered in the snow, his cloak must be frozen. Joshua slowly turned around and look into her eyes and said with seriousness in his face, “Ying, not everyone is born to enjoy peace and love, there are some who are born to fight and slaughter.”

“Without people like this to fight, without people like me, how do we protect this world and create peace?”

This time Ying was the one stayed silent frowning, thinking about what her master said, but this type of problem seems to be a bit hard for her to understand.

The dark haired warrior stood on the castle wall and looking from where he stood, there were crawl marks of daemons everywhere; he can still smell faint blood in the breeze, the smell of explosions had long seeped deep into the castle wall.

Joshua recalled the memory before he traveled through time when he was asked by the girl.

In his previous life, he was born to an old and normal dojo; his mother passed away while he was still young. His father as the head of the dojo raised him up with the harshest way ever without showing love towards him.

As the next heir of the dojo, Joshua learned all knowledge about fighting, to be an ultimate killing machine, that was all he needed.

Continuously training his body, storing up strength and then learning how to control strength, learn how to stack up power, there were countless ones, whether it was killing or infiltration, or art of riding a horse or to learn how to use all types of weapons, he learned all the skills from the dojo.

Although all the training was harsh, to Joshua it is all unusually fun and interesting, it is as he was born for it. After a period of time, his father had taught him all the techniques but he was still not satisfied.

To be able to know better about human body, weak points, and blind spots, Joshua asked his father to get a medical professional to teach him all about anatomy, to understand what a battle was, using the most advanced knowledge of science, how to defeat a person quickly and even kill an enemy.

Due to his unusual passion for battle, he was eager to learn all related knowledge; he trained relentlessly day and night, until the year he turned seventeen years old when he defeated his father and take up the seat for the master of the dojo. It could be seen that his strict father smiled after he was defeated as his son surpassed him.

To Joshua, a battle was elegant as it is humanity’s big assembly which comprised of everything, no matter what it is, feelings, determination, dreams, future, knowledge, skills, strength, and soul as everything is united as one.

In order to implement one’s thoughts and determination, humans would fight, betting everything on the line to determine who the best is.

Yet, to Joshua at the time, everything he learned until then had become meaningless, for that was already the Age of Great Unity, and the original Age of Martial Arts and the Age of War had ceased, never again to be had. Humanity entered the bright golden era of peace, needing neither fight nor labor, having the ability to realize their dreams and obtain whatever they want…

To humans, it was the happiest time.

But to Joshua it was meaningless.