WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS
Translator: Hydrogen B
Editor: Abstract
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
A KNIGHT WHO ETERNALLY REGRESSES
Chapter 319: Anguish
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Enkrid's dream appeared as a grim reaper.
Enkrid's eyes swept over the opponent's body on reflex.
Legs set just far enough apart, arms hanging loose, messy brown hair and eyes with no real character, and shabby clothes.
He was neither an enemy soldier nor one of their own.
Several questions rose at once.
First, how had that man gotten all the way here?
Second, how strong was he?
Third, what exactly was he sorry about?
"I have my reasons.
So let's end this quietly."
The man who said that drew his sword.
Clang.
It was a cheap shortsword.
The sound of steel leaving the scabbard, and one glance told Enkrid enough.
The edge was chipped, and the leather wrap on the hilt had come loose and hung in a strip.
Even the blade looked dull.
It was rusted.
The absurd part was that Enkrid had not even recognized it as a weapon until the man drew it.
The moment he saw that drawing posture, a bad feeling surged up in Enkrid on its own.
It was nothing like the pressure from the gnoll leader or junior knight Eisia.
If those had been indirect pressure, this was different.
It felt like overwhelming fate, telling him that no matter what that blade did, he could not block it.
Why?
After all his training, Enkrid's senses had grown sharper than ever.
Sense of Evasion had leaped past one limit and handed him this gift called foreboding.
It was an unexpected stroke of luck, but right now it was a useless skill.
Because of it, Enkrid's body stiffened.
The chain called foreboding bound his arms and legs.
"Hm, fiance."
Sinar spoke when she saw him like that.
What had the elf's keen senses picked up beyond this?
"You need to dodge."
Sinar said it, and the man vanished.
A long afterimage stayed in Enkrid's eyes.
His gaze snapped over on reflex.
The man, stretched into a long line, had already reached Sinar.
Even with his eyes open, Enkrid saw the man's figure stuttering apart.
He was that fast.
Even Enkrid's heavily trained Dynamic Visual Acuity could only follow him that far.
Kkeng!
Pibik!
The sounds came first.
Then his eyes caught up with what had happened.
Sinar was already in stance too.
Enkrid saw the chipped shortsword throw sparks off Naidhl, then pass from Sinar's chest to her abdomen.
Elf blood sprayed into the air.
When Naidhl blocked, he shoved it aside and split her body with the tip.
Power, speed, technique, all in harmony.
Enkrid felt it the instant he saw it.
This was what a completed sword strike looked like.
"If you're lucky, maybe that won't happen, though I doubt it.
Anyway, if you hold out through luck, I won't do it twice.
I know this isn't honorable.
So I'll ask your understanding."
The man let the shortsword hang and spoke as if muttering.
Even so, his voice landed clearly in their ears.
No one knew what he meant by once, or by luck.
The part about honor made even less sense.
Only one thing was certain.
Sinar collapsed.
She clutched her chest and slid to the floor.
She tried to brace herself by planting Naidhl on the ground, but the tip scraped uselessly across it, and Sinar pitched forward headfirst.
Thud.
"I feel dirty about this too.
I mean it."
The brown-haired man turned and said it.
Enkrid stared straight at him.
Even if that hand had held a single rusty knife, what had just happened would have happened again.
It had to.
Countless questions converged into one answer.
The man in front of him had gone beyond a junior knight.
One look at him forced foreboding and unavoidable fate into anyone.
In other words, he was a knight.
One who could cut down a thousand men alone.
A nightmare of the battlefield.
A disaster born from human hands.
A strategic weapon that changed the course of war.
Enkrid's dream appeared as a grim reaper.
"Fuck, what is this?"
A shaken Kraiss spoke from behind.
"Move."
Ragna stepped forward, yanking Kraiss by the back of the neck.
He did not even hold a sword.
He held a spoon instead.
"What is this?"
Dunbakel growled.
She had already completed her beast transformation.
The man let his shortsword hang.
Then he moved toward the next target.
No sound of feet pushing off the ground, no tearing sound through air.
He just moved and drew a line.
A simple motion, yet even following it with the eyes felt impossible.
Next was Dunbakel.
She drew her scimitar before he moved.
If he had not moved, Dunbakel would have struck first.
Clang.
Thud!
Smack!
To Enkrid's ears, those three sounds overlapped.
Then he saw the result.
He could not read the shortsword's path.
It was faster than before, and the man's back blocked his view.
Instead, he saw Dunbakel.
Her scimitar split in half, and one broken fragment bounced away, tore through the tent cloth, and flew off.
Then the shortsword in the man's hand split Dunbakel's heart without slowing.
"Shit, I should've used a better blade."
Dunbakel muttered on one knee.
In that posture, she grabbed at her split chest, but blood surged through her fingers.
It was not a survivable wound.
"Come on."
Next was Ragna.
He ran at him without a sword.
Even with one, it would have been impossible.
His arm was still not fully healed.
The opponent showed no mercy.
Without a word, he swung.
A silent slash fell toward Ragna's head.
Ragna did not act stupidly.
He twisted at the last second and thrust his uninjured hand forward instead of the wounded one.
Thk!
That hand was caught in the opponent's grip.
There was still a spoon in Ragna's hand.
The brown-haired man held Ragna's wrist with one hand and raised his sword with the other.
"You were the most useful one."
The man spoke and brought the raised sword down.
Ragna resisted to the end.
He tried to turn and ram him with his shoulder, but the sword was faster.
Pwack!
The opponent's blade stopped after taking one of Ragna's arms.
Ragna rolled aside, his arm severed.
Red blood sprayed everywhere.
With his arm cut off, he would bleed out if left like that.
"Right, no second time."
The man said that to Ragna.
Enkrid understood what he meant now.
No second time.
He meant he would use his sword only once, exactly once.
"If it's blocked, I withdraw.
That's the minimum condition I'll give you.
That's my conscience, and maybe, just barely, something honorable."
As he spoke, the blade moved again.
It was aimed at Esther, who had slipped in behind him.
That slash came down like ruthless lightning, yet it also looked like falling rain running off somewhere.
Thud!
Esther lost a foreleg too.
Not only a foreleg, her chest was split with it.
Kyaaaak!
The Lake Panther's cry, filled with pain, rang in their ears.
It struck straight at the heart.
"R...u...n."
Ragna said it while down.
He tried to get up, slipped in blood, and smashed his face into the ground.
His face scraped hard across it.
The ground was soaked with his own blood.
Ragna's face became covered in blood.
"Damn it."
Then a small trembling back blocked Enkrid's front.
The chain of foreboding still wrapped his whole body tight, and Enkrid could not move at all.
As if this was what fate meant, as if the goddess of fate, the other face of the goddess of fortune, was speaking.
You cannot escape. It ends here.
"I always knew this day might come, but Captain, I'll repay what I owe before I go."
Kraiss stood in front of him.
Enkrid could not raise his hand.
His mouth would not open either.
He only remembered the moment he had stood in front of Kraiss once.
"Big Eyes, run."
Why had he done that then?
It had not been his head that told him to do it.
"Go.
I'll hold on to him."
Big Eyes whispered.
He probably knew his own words meant nothing.
The opponent knew too.
He showed no emotion.
He did not even sigh.
He just raised his sword.
Fwoosh.
The brazier fire, scattering in the wind, cast many shadows from the blade.
One of those shadows became real and stabbed Big Eyes through the heart.
Kkh.
Kraiss fell with a death rattle, bleeding out.
Bloody tears streamed from his eyes too.
Enkrid watched all of it.
Outwardly, he looked calm.
The brown-haired man turned toward Enkrid.
Two flames rising over that calm face were deeply striking.
Enkrid's eyes burned far hotter than any brazier fire.
The knight saw that.
"Hoo, once."
The man let out an unpleasant sigh.
He disliked this whole situation.
A knight endured by honor.
And such a knight was carrying out an ambush.
He had not expected this.
In truth, that was not what mattered.
It had happened.
They were all dead.
Only then did Enkrid's mouth open.
"I never thought I'd say this myself."
He could see Sinar, Ragna, Dunbakel, Esther, and Kraiss.
Sinar fallen on the floor.
Ragna writhing after losing one arm.
Dunbakel with her heart split.
Esther snarling savagely after losing a foreleg.
Kraiss with a hole through his chest after standing in front of him.
Only Ragna and Esther had barely survived.
Sinar was dead, Dunbakel was dead, Kraiss was dead.
What about Ragna, floundering on the floor?
"Get out."
Ragna said.
He kept saying dodge.
He kept saying run, even if only an empty result waited there.
Even if the knight did not swing again, he would die from blood loss.
And if he somehow survived, would he be okay?
He had lost an arm.
Yet he kept repeating only one thing to Enkrid: run.
It was absurd.
Truly absurd.
Enkrid looked at the knight.
Then he finished speaking.
"I should die."
If he died, today would repeat.
He needed that today.
The man pointed his sword at him, expressionless.
"Sorry about this."
A flat voice followed.
Enkrid measured the opponent's skill.
He could not see it.
It was dark.
Like walking a dark road without a single torch.
Thud.
The blade flew in and pierced his heart.
Instead of dodging, he chose to accept it.
Repeat today, and make it the beginning.
Again.
This was the first time he had let go from the start.
He had no choice.
Enkrid realized it again.
Sinar, who always tossed out jokes.
Dunbakel, who blurted nonsense at every chance.
Ragna, the lazy bastard.
Kraiss, mad for Krona.
That leopard-mage with terrible sleeping habits.
'I won't let them die.'
Watching their deaths in front of his eyes was far from a good feeling.
Enkrid accepted death.
The sword of the knight who came as a grim reaper split his heart and pulled free.
"I'm killing you."
Ragna's voice came, still holding on.
That voice slowly grew distant.
Enkrid endured the pain and held on.
He did not even groan.
"Right, you live.
You have the right.
Stop the bleeding well."
The man kept his word.
He turned away.
Collapsed on the ground, Enkrid closed his eyes.
Death consumed him.
Slosh.
As expected, he saw the black river.
Over the flowing water, the Boatman holding a purple lamp opened his mouth.
He spoke.
"I said Despair."
Silence settled over the river.
Instead of accepting it, Enkrid asked.
"What about Anguish and Ignorance?"
You could not read the Boatman's state by his expression.
What state was he in today?
Maybe this counted as fortunate, but the Boatman answered him.
He spoke readily.
As that faintly visible mouth moved, the meaning he conveyed reached Enkrid.
"First is Anguish. Must you do what need not be done?"
Was this a test from the Boatman, or fate made by circumstance?
He did not know.
Still, he had not saved the child because he needed to.
If his heart told him to act, why would he agonize over it?
That was not worth anguish.
So it was not anguish.
At least not for him.
"Second is Ignorance."
Enkrid had failed to recognize the wall.
He did not know, so it was ignorance.
In that day called Ignorance, the Boatman had helped him.
He did not know why he had helped.
But even without that help, Enkrid would have learned someday and passed it.
So ignorance too was something he would have learned eventually, and through that time Enkrid would have kept walking in silence.
That wall called ignorance also held no meaning.
"Third is Despair."
That statement carried one meaning: you cannot overcome this.
The Boatman's intention came through clearly.
'Block the knight's sword.'
It could be called the nastiest today so far.
Before that, he had to watch all the people he called comrades die.
It would be a lie to say it had no effect.
"Savor despair."
Like every other day, the Boatman said it without a trace of a smile.
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