Ha.
A short sigh escaped my lips.
It was because of the sword energy the man before me had displayed.
Because that had not been mere sword energy.
The star every knight longed to reach.
The epic that every Sword Master ought to possess.
A star condensed from the stories that only they could bring into bloom.
[Aura Blade].
What this man had used was undoubtedly an Aura Blade.
How...?
How could a Sword User wield an Aura Blade, the exclusive domain of Sword Masters...?
And on top of that.
How could that Aura Blade have taken the form of Durandal?
Just as sword energy bore a different color for every person,
the same was true of Aura Blades.
Yet the man before me possessed an Aura Blade in the form of Durandal.
And, like Durandal, it had cleaved apart this golden lance that had endured for three hundred years, technique and all.
My mind was full of questions.
And those questions had now turned into a hollow laugh.
A Sword User using an Aura Blade, the exclusive domain of Sword Masters.
That Aura Blade taking the form of Durandal.
And the man who had drawn out that Aura Blade wielding the same techniques as Orlando.
For it to be a coincidence...
Was it not far too perfect?
Could it truly be
that the one before me had inherited Orlando's will?
Was the careless thought I had tossed out meant to tell me that my empty claim was, in fact, true?
All I could do was laugh hollowly.
I no longer had the strength to move.
The Aura Blade that man had left in me had been the finishing blow.
My body crumbled away,
beginning to vanish into white particles.
It seemed the immortal body he had given me had reached its limit as well.
How absurd.
For a Sword User to defeat a Sword Master, even without being able to use an Aura Blade.
And by using an Aura Blade, no less...
Everything was a question, but there was nothing to be done.
To begin with, a Sword User exchanging blows head-on with a Sword Master was already beyond all common sense.
And it was a fact that I had been defeated by his sword.
I had succeeded in making Iris a Holy Maiden, as that braggart had asked.
But in the end, I had failed to obtain the item.
I had no regrets about failing to carry out the order.
Whether that organization prospered or fell was none of my concern.
It was simply a shame.
And this method of infiltration could no longer be used.
Within the organization, I was the only one with a magic eye who could cross the barrier without resorting to tricks like dungeon spawns.
The thread capable of binding skeletons had already been used.
And once this incident was over, the headmaster would be more vigilant, making even tricks like dungeon spawns impossible.
Unless the troupe leader stepped in personally, they would have to consider the item lost forever.
Well, it was merely regrettable.
I looked down at my hand, clenched it once, then opened it.
I could no longer feel anything.
All I could see was my body slowly dissolving into particles, starting from my fingertips.
The man before me could only stare at me in utter bewilderment.
It seemed he had never expected me to fall from that attack.
And so...
At that moment, my body tilted to one side.
The shin of one leg had dissolved into particles.
With my body tipped sideways, I found myself involuntarily kneeling.
Ian de Logres, was it...?
There was no time.
In a little while, I would become particles and disappear from this world.
So.
I needed an answer.
To the conundrum that had bound me three hundred years ago.
I needed an answer to that conundrum.
And perhaps the man before me could give it.
If he was the man who carried on the will of Orlando, whom I both admired and hated.
If he was the man who had continually irritated me and made me dig up the helmet I had buried three hundred years ago.
Perhaps he would know.
So I opened my mouth.
#
Heroes are often said to be available for a limited time.
A very short time, at that.
The reason I say this is because the skill ended the moment I cut down Scaramuccia.
If I had hesitated even a little before striking,
it had lasted so briefly that it was practically telling me I would have failed to cut him at all before it ended.
Of course.
I had succeeded in cutting him down.
Perhaps because it had been the finishing blow, his body was dissolving into white particles.
He was not dead.
I had not received any experience points.
Still, even in the game, when Professor Luke, who had intervened midway through, cut off his head, the bastard had simply turned into white particles and vanished futilely.
Besides.
【Scaramuccia】
◈ Level: 77
◈ He is incapacitated.
Insight Eye said so as well.
It should be safe to say this was over.
Seriously, this was ridiculous.
I stared at Carnwennan in my hand with an incredulous expression.
True, I could not use Aura Blade, but I had the Holy Maiden's buff, the retry from the Dream Ticket, Flower of Chivalry, and even that peeping tom's buff.
Even so, I had never expected to defeat the boss of a defeat event at my current level.
Good grief.
As the tension drained out of me, I collapsed onto the ground without meaning to.
And...
Thud.
The guy in front of me did the same.
Since his shin had dissolved into particles, he had been forced into a kneeling position.
And, inadvertently, our eyes ended up at the same level.
At that moment.
"It has been a long time."
Scaramuccia, before my eyes, opened his mouth.
Wondering if it was not over yet, I tightened my grip on Carnwennan.
"Three hundred years is a very long time."
Even as his entire body crumbled into white particles, he continued in a low voice as though it did not matter.
"It was long enough for a wound to heal, but..."
He cast a glance at the golden lance, shattered horribly into pieces and strewn across the floor, before raising his head.
"In the end, that wound remained as a scar, and the scar became a brand that could not be erased."
Having said that, Arghalia finally looked straight at me.
"...Suppose that day, I had not let go of the golden lance."
As though he were someone wandering alone through a forest despite having me before him.
As though he were the man who had stripped off his clothes and raved madly while desperately searching for an answer.
He muttered and muttered to himself.
"No, even if I had let go of it... if I had picked up the golden lance from the ground and charged in no matter what."
Was he reciting this toward empty air as though I could not see him?
Or did he want an answer from me?
"Would my little sister... not have had to make that choice?"
I did not know.
The fact that Scaramuccia had been Arghalia of the Katai Kingdom had never been revealed in the game.
Therefore, I did not know what he had gone through.
I did not know what had happened to him over those three hundred years, or why he had become Scaramuccia of the Dawn Troupe.
The only thing I could tell him was:
"I don't know."
That I did not know.
Arghalia looked at me as if utterly dumbfounded.
But no matter how he looked at me, that truly was all I could say.
"Because I'm not you. I can't know everything that happened to you that day."
I could not know.
Perhaps his entire body had been frozen by a curse, leaving him unable to move.
Perhaps he had been completely out of stamina, unable to twitch even a finger.
So I could not say something like, "You should have picked up the golden lance and charged in, even if you had to force yourself."
Everyone had their own circumstances.
...Though if it were me, I would have shut up, grabbed the golden lance again, and charged in.
"...But my sister died because of me."
Scaramuccia's voice, strained as he forced the words out.
It was thick with the whine of a child.
"Because I ran away from there, because I accepted the ring she threw to me... she ultimately chose death."
I looked at his face for a moment.
Then I sighed and spoke.
"Did you tell her to die?"
At that, he glared sharply at me for a moment, then let all the strength drain from his body.
"...No."
Of course not.
Then why had your sister thrown you the ring to save you?
Why had she chosen to die in your place?
Had three hundred years turned your brain to stone?
How could you not understand something so simple?
"Right. Your sister simply made her own choice."
I sighed.
"I don't know what that ring is, but from the way you put it, it seems your sister could have lived if she had kept it. It sounds like she chose to save you and die in your place."
After drawing a breath to break through the suffocating silence, I continued calmly.
"Your sister's death is not your fault. If you were the one who drove things to the point where that situation arose, then perhaps that is your fault... but the choice your sister made is not your fault as well."
"Then why in the world...?"
"Does love need a reason?"
I shrugged.
"Your sister probably made that choice simply because she wanted to save you."
At least, I thought that was probably the case.
And.
"Don't get the wrong idea. You had the whole point wrong from the start. Your sin is not bound to your sister's death."
There was not the slightest emotional tremor in my voice.
"The evil deeds you committed as an executive of the Dawn Troupe. And trying to take Haede's life. Those alone are the true sins you must face."
I looked straight at Scaramuccia as his eyes widened.
"So quit your damn confession and disappear quietly."
I hurled the words at him coldly, as if spitting on him.
"Nothing is less entertaining than a villain with a long, drawn-out sob story."
#
Three hundred years.
Three hundred years was an incredibly long time.
But was he saying that the answer had been so simple, there had been no need to spend those three hundred years on it?
He did not know, he said.
I mulled over those words and laughed hollowly.
You said you did not know, yet you clearly did.
Even after your sword broke and you dropped your dagger, you had not given up on charging at me.
And you had made certain to protect that woman from my attack.
I simply had not wanted to admit it.
That even without the magic eye, had I taken up the golden lance, I surely could have killed the knight.
No.
That even if I had simply charged in, I could at least have saved that person.
I had written it off as the fault of my obsession with chivalry.
I had rationalized that, without the magic eye, I could not have killed him even if I charged in.
I had arbitrarily become disappointed in the very notion of knighthood.
And I had merely put on the mask of a coward and fled far away.
It had been such a simple problem.
Truly.
What a laughable farce.
I wished you had resented me when you left.
Rather than choosing to die after leaving behind your ring and asking me to live.
I wished you had told me that it was all my fault.
You could not have said such a thing because you were too mature.
But perhaps it was what I wanted to hear from you.
Not for you to tell me to live.
But to ask me to save you.
To tell me it was because of me.
Perhaps I had wanted to beg your forgiveness that way.
My body continued to crumble.
And when it had crumbled up to my chest,
I...
could see something behind him.
Black hair fluttering in the air.
Red eyes gleaming like rubies, almost bewitchingly so.
She looked alike.
So very much like her.
My neck, too, was gradually dissolving into particles.
My face was now vanishing as well.
But at least, one last time,
I got to see you.
"Angeli..."
I could not speak the entire name.
My mouth, too, became particles and robbed me of the chance.
I see.
I looked up at the sky.
With my body gone, the sky was all I could see.
It has been a long time.
That sky.
Just as it had when I dreamed of becoming a knight.
Just like what that man's Aura Blade had shown me.
Stars hung in the night sky.
Where does one go when one dies?
At least, I did not think it would be where my sister was.
I would surely fall into hell.
No.
I am not going to hell.
Just as I had always survived alone in disgrace,
this time, too, I was fleeing alone and disgracefully into hell.
Leaving her, leaving them all behind, and going far away alone.
Disgracefully.
Because I am
Scaramuccia the coward.
Comments (0)
Please log in to leave a comment. Login or Register