Chapter 225. Ruin in the Forest (5)
The middle of the deep lake of Rhodes.
At the sight of the knight descending, white spray swirling around his armor, the girl's eyes flew wide.
The joints of the armor covering his entire body collided against one another, ringing out clear, crisp sounds beneath the water.
Wrapping the current around him as he swam, the knight at last reached above the girl and stretched out one hand.
A silver gauntlet drew close before her eyes.
At that gesture — as if to say 'don't give up, take my hand' — the girl extended her arm to meet his. The hand within the gauntlet closed around her slender arm.
At that familiar touch, the girl's eyes widened beneath the water.
[……You are.]
In a voice that could not be heard, the girl murmured something as if she had just realized it in her heart. And in that instant, her field of vision was blocked by a shadow that cast itself through the water.
The girl glanced to her side.
In the water, the knight's great cloak spread wide like wings, silently sweeping around the girl and veiling the space beside her face.
As the girl sank, her water-colored dress drifting, the blue cloak of the silver-armored knight wrapped wide around her.
Before long, the cloak unfurled around her in every direction like a ripple. Because of that, the girl could not see the knight properly. For a single moment, all she could see before her eyes was the flowing cloak.
So when she opened her eyes the next moment, what she saw was her own figure emerged from the lake water.
In the middle of a shallow puddle gathered on a plain, the girl sat with her knees drawn together.
When she glanced down, the reflection of her dress fluttering in the breeze was visible on the clean water surface, where raindrops drew circular ripples.
"Ah…!"
Coming to herself suddenly, the girl hurried to look around. The surroundings seemed to be a plain beyond the fortress wall, near the lake.
White rain was still falling all around. Raindrops gathered on the wildflowers and weeds blooming profusely around her and ran down them.
A quiet, composed plain — wholly out of place compared to the fortress interior in the middle of battle.
"You've come to your senses."
A low voice rang at her ear. The girl raised her head and looked up at the knight who had saved her.
The knight was kneeling on one knee without removing his helmet, holding the girl's hand.
Through the black seam of his sleek silver helm, he was watching her at close range and asked calmly,
"Are you alright, my lady. Please answer."
The girl, who had almost drowned just moments ago, realized without thinking that she was neither coughing nor gasping for breath. Even she herself was surprised. Perhaps she had forgotten even that, too.
But setting aside all those thoughts and confusions, she simply stared at the knight who had saved her with her calm sky-blue eyes.
"When I took your hand, sir knight. I knew who you were."
"……"
"You are the knight who once delivered the news of Rhodes' victory to me."
Among the knights who had once come before her to convey Rhodes' victory, the golden-haired man who had taken her hand. And at the same time, the one who had first taught her the word 'mission.'
That very knight from that time was now kneeling here before her, holding her hand once again.
"Remarkable. You have a keen eye, my lady. Please forgive my inability to remove my helm in time of war."
He added solemnly from behind the helm,
"Even so, I did not expect that you, my lady, would recognize me as I am, helm and all."
"Indeed. I did not know you then, sir knight."
The girl slowly lowered her head.
"But now I do."
She slowly raised her head toward the knight.
"Leader of the Guardian Knights of Rhodes, the Grand Knight."
Staring at the knight in blue cloak and silver armor kneeling on one knee, the girl quietly opened her mouth.
"You are the Guardian Knight Commander. Aren't you."
The knight remained silent beyond his helm.
The girl looked directly at the knight commander, who neither affirmed nor denied it, and tilted her head forward.
"At the time, your armor was not so different from the other knights, so I didn't realize. And besides, you never called yourself the Knight Commander."
"That is so."
The knight slowly nodded.
"I do not wish for myself and the other knights to be distinguished among the citizens by rank."
The girl's gaze shot up. Her hands, resting on the hem of her dress over her knees, clenched tight.
"Why…?"
"Because, as it has always been, Rhodes will one day need another Guardian Knight to take this position in my place."
He raised his head dryly and looked at the girl.
"I do not wish to become a symbol."
"I find that difficult to understand."
"To put it simply. It is because I know, my lady, that I am not strong enough to be a symbol that the people of this place can rely upon."
'That's a lie─,' as if to say that, the girl weakly shook her head from side to side. Even the girl, who had never once held a sword, could sense it instinctively.
The powerful aura radiating from his entire silver-armored body did not, in any way, match his own assessment of himself as not strong.
"Rest here. The Knights of Rhodes will soon arrive, and they will protect you, my lady."
Keeping his gaze on the speechless girl, the knight commander read her state and slowly spoke.
"Leave what comes next to us."
The girl shook her head as if to say that was out of the question, squeezed her eyes shut, and cried out,
"But the enemies…!"
"It's alright."
Instead of answering, the knight commander, still on one knee, planted the longsword in his hand — still in its sheath — upright against the ground.
With a ringing clang of metal, a sleek longsword nearly as tall as the girl herself plunged into the ground, sending droplets of water scattering.
As if a long wall had been raised between the knight and the girl, with the sword between them.
In that posture, the knight gazed at the girl seated across from him. With the sword standing between them as a boundary line, the commander spoke from behind his helm.
"We have a mission."
"A mission… as before…"
The knight commander slowly nodded.
"That is right. As one who has become a Guardian Knight — to protect the weak with however meager a strength I possess, and to be a steadfast sword that holds off our enemies. That is how I decided to live."
"But still, to hold off the enemies alone…!"
"Impossible, yes. I am not a Sword Saint."
"Commander…?"
The girl's expression flinched at his declaration. To her, the knight commander shook his head.
"Regrettably, I stood at the threshold of the Sword Saint's summit, but I could never reach the Sword Saint's summit in the end. And most of the knights here in Rhodes are the same."
She could not find any answer to his words. The girl swallowed her voice, her fists clenched on her lap.
A Sword Saint was the summit of the sword reached by a swordsman. All trained with the sword, seeking to reach that highest summit that transcended the limits of the blade and of the body — but not everyone could ever complete that summit.
Still, even those who had only reached just before that highest threshold — the so-called brink of the Sword Saint's summit — displayed feats that went vastly beyond imagination.
The girl knew well how those called 'Sword Saints' of old had carried out such unbelievable exploits that they had passed into history as legends.
"You may set your mind at ease, my lady."
Placing his hand on the shoulder of the girl who sat quietly, the knight spoke each word with force.
"As I said, the Knights of Rhodes have not reached the Sword Saint, but all of us have climbed to the summit just before that threshold. I am the same."
"B, but I've heard that the 0th Unit warriors of Suleiman are at that level too — or even stronger!"
The girl, her face pale, pressed her upper body forward as if to stop him.
The Guardian Knights were strong, without question. But so too were the enemies who had earned notoriety for their overwhelming combat power.
The individual strength of the 0th Unit warriors — who had already, multiple times, wiped out small enemy states by the unit's 'strength alone' — was easy enough to gauge.
To have the knight commander alone face so many of those enemies of comparable caliber was tantamount to suicide.
The girl, to the knight holding her hand, leaned her head forward without thinking and cried out,
"Even if we don't know the enemies' precise identities, each one is at least an even match for the Guardian Knights of Rhodes─!"
"As you say."
The knight commander nodded calmly, then lifted the cloak that had trailed down onto the grass and wiped the dirt from the girl's cheek with it.
"I am not a Sword Saint, and so, as you say, I may not be able to defend Rhodes with my strength alone."
Having said that much, the knight commander turned his helm-clad head to the side.
"But if we are together, it is different."
The girl, who had been watching him anxiously, finally turned her eyes to the knight commander's side.
And the girl with her water-colored hair, her sky-blue eyes wide, was momentarily lost for words.
"Ah…"
Beyond his helm and shoulder, across the vast plain, an unbelievably innumerable silver radiance was revealing itself through the curtain of rain.
Knights, their blue cloaks streaming beneath the gray sky, each with a long spear or sword in hand, tore through the curtain of rain and stepped out beside the knight commander. The image of them reflected in her eyes.
Through the lead-gray clouds that blanketed the sky, cold beams of light pierced through onto the plain.
Before the girl's eyes, the Guardian Knights in their steel armor and drawn swords halted in unison behind the knight commander, forming their ranks like a vast wave.
In the center of that silver array of knights, the knight commander raised his head.
"In order to reach this place quickly, not all the Guardian Knights have arrived. But this will suffice."
The commander removed the sword he had planted upright in the ground and sheathed it at his hip.
Naturally, the boundary line that had existed between the girl and the knights vanished.
The girl raised her head with a dazed expression. The knight commander, gazing at her, declared in a voice ringing from inside his helm,
"Not only I — we, the Guardian Knights, will face the destiny of life in our own way, no matter what."
The girl could not properly watch the knight commander rise. As is often the case with those who move without hesitation, his motions were swift.
And as he turned his body, the great cloak lifting slightly around him filled her field of view.
The Guardian Knight Commander, from his very posture of turning and walking forward, began to slowly draw the silver longsword from his hip.
The blade passed beside the sharp seam of his helm and let out a low cry as it slid free.
Drawing his sword and stepping forward, on either side of the knight commander, dozens of Guardian Knights in silver armor, in tight formation, drew their longswords and walked forward in unison toward the enemy.
In that moment, across the gray sky that met the horizon, the brilliant silver-white radiance of drawn swords scattered light in every direction.
Watching that scene absently, the girl suddenly flung her sky-blue eyes open wide.
"Ah…"
The blue cloaks of the knights advancing toward the enemy trailed long in the wind.
Because the Guardian Knights were marching together toward the lake beyond the fortress wall, their flowing cloaks looked as though they were melting into the great, endless currents of the water-colored lake.
And beyond them, the enemies began to reveal themselves before their eyes, tearing through the curtain of pouring rain.
Massive figures nearing two meters in height. Unidentified white desert warriors, their bodies entirely concealed by white headscarves and masks, with sleek light armor wrapped around their arms and shoulders.
As they approached slowly, trailing long white robes, droplets of blood gathered on their crescent-curved blades and dripped down onto the grass beneath.
And walking straight into the face of those overwhelming enemies, the Knights of Rhodes drove their longswords — gripped with both hands — down into the ground as one.
CLAANNNGGG——!!
A wall of steel and swords, formed by the knights who met the enemies head-on without the slightest step back.
The girl, without even being able to draw breath, stared at their backs with her sky-blue eyes unblinking.
Reflected in her beautiful eyes was the image of the Knights defending Rhodes.
And from the center of the ranks of knights who stood against the enemy, the commander alone stepped one pace forward and raised his sword, holding it upright before his helm.
"Therefore, my lady."
Behind his sword, the knight commander quietly lifted his face.
"Pray, behold."
***
A great gust of wind swept through, and the heavy driving rain blanketed the field of view. The Sword Saint of the Waves' memory grew faint.
The massive battle being fought on that Rhodes plain of long ago, amid the downpour, was racing by.
The metallic shrieks of countless swords clashing, the sparks of blade against blade scattering in the air.
The silver radiance of steel, and the knights charging forward in unison. The figures of the white desert warriors retreating in disciplined order, swinging their blades.
And seated behind the knights, in her water-colored dress, the girl watching them alone and unmoving.
And there, in the middle of that ancient battlefield — to become one of the most important memories of the girl's entire life — Enoch stood.
Soon, the harsh roar of pouring rain rang at the ears of Enoch, watching it all, and began to wash the scenery before him away.
Enoch stared, expressionless, at the Sword Saint's memory as it naturally grew fainter.
The knights were no longer in his sight, nor the Suleiman warriors, nor the girl. Only gray sky sweeping past in disorder, spray, and ripples on the lake's surface.
Those vivid images began to cross before Enoch's field of vision at a terrifying speed.
To anyone's eyes, it was a clear anomaly.
"……"
Enoch's faint sense of suspicion became certainty. At some point, the World of Impermanence, which had been flickering alongside reality, was no longer returning to reality.
How had this happened? What, after that, had actually taken place in the Sword Saint's past? For now, setting those questions aside, Enoch slowly walked forward.
Just then, a hush fell over everything.
Splash.
At the same time, together with the sound of rippling water reaching his ears, a tremendous resistance swept across his legs.
Enoch's eyes widened in an instant. At the tension rushing over him, his heart pounded fiercely.
Turning his stiffened neck to look around, he saw the ruined scene of Rhodes. The countless stone pillars and broken fortress walls of an ancient fortress ruin, rising high above the surface of a lake.
In the blink of an eye, the surroundings had shifted into the Inner World that was being eroded by the lake of Rhodes.
And when Enoch looked down, his eyes widened as though they might tear. A sharp breath of dismay slipped from between his lips.
"Already, up to my thighs…"
Unlike last time, when the water had only reached his ankles. Already, about forty percent of his body was submerged.
〇 Until World of Impermanence Entry … 100%
〇 Sword Saint of the Waves : Synchronized
Enoch looked down at the messages without expression.
Right now, he had definitively entered the World of Impermanence. As predicted, it seemed, he would have to carry the inheritance further now that he had synchronized with the Sword Saint of the Waves.
"Of all times. Right now."
That the inheritance had suddenly begun after entering the ruin, and the synchronization that followed, he could accept. But from here on, things would become a problem.
Like with the Emperor's Supreme Sword before, if he now inherited the intense memories of life tied to the Sword Saint of the Waves — what was called the 'Root of Memory' — there was no telling what would happen to him as a side effect.
Naturally, it was only rough speculation, but whatever form the side effect took, it was clear that the risk Enoch would bear would balloon out of control.
In the middle of enemy territory, with the target of this solo mission — Indiviltal — right before him.
If, at the very least, he were rendered unable to fight — even if he didn't lose consciousness — it would place an immense burden on the operation.
If at all possible, he had to return to reality immediately.
He could not permit himself to bear the risks of the World of Impermanence without finishing the operation. In that case, was there a way to suspend the inheritance now and return…
That was when Enoch, recalling something, clenched his fist.
No, thinking it over, there was a way.
A definite answer that, until now, had been too unfamiliar for him to bring to mind properly — Enoch already possessed it in this world, did he not?
"Come out."
Having reached his judgment, Enoch raised his head without hesitation and spoke out across the endlessly spreading lake.
"You're listening now too, aren't you. Persona?"
As if in response, ripples spread across the lake with a gentle splash. Then, as if in resonance, the half-submerged stone pillars and fortress walls of Rhodes also rippled clear on the water's surface.
Sure enough, before Enoch even fully raised his head, a sultry woman's voice rang at his ear.
"They say people have many masks."
The voice had come from the sky above the submerging surroundings. Above the tall fortress wall of the Rhodes ruin, now half-drowned in water.
Lifting his gaze, the woman perched there as though it were only natural came into his sight.
Shrugging her slender shoulders, she ran one hand through her long hair as she spoke.
"Especially you, who usually never shows a single expression. As for the expression you're wearing now, I don't know what to compare it to as a mask."
A mature figure draped in a thin blouse, wearing a short skirt that openly displayed her shapely form.
"Seeing a little emotional stirring in you, unexpectedly, is also something of a sight — maybe that's the most fitting appraisal?"
Legs crossed gracefully, sitting atop the high ruin — the Black Mage who commanded the Inner World. Persona was looking down at him.
The Mage, her long olive-colored hair draped down, held a white mask wearing a weeping expression beside her cheek, and slightly tugged up the corner of her lips.
"Seems you need some help."
Persona moved the mask slightly aside. Her vivid eyes narrowed.
"Enoch. Don't you think so too?"