A Knight who Eternally Regresses - Chapter 695

WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Abstract

A KNIGHT WHO ETERNALLY REGRESSES

Chapter 695: Enkrid Let the Woman Into the Room

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Enkrid brought the woman inside.

Ragna was surprised, but felt no jealousy or envy. He had watched Enkrid from the very beginning and stayed by his side all this way. What was there to be jealous about?

"He drew formless power into form," Ragna said, summing up what he had witnessed in a few words.

Enkrid understood, but if someone told him to do it again right now, he wasn't confident he could. Not immediately.

Can't feel my way back to it.

Honestly, he wasn't even sure how he had done it a moment ago. It felt like something glimpsed through a dream. Should he call it luck?

A single stroke of fortune arriving after tens of thousands of sword swings?

The goddess of fortune is said to ride the wind, never staying long enough to be caught. Fortune always passes by and never lingers. That was the old continental saying.

It had felt like luck, but Enkrid dismissed the thought at once.

That kind of luck had nothing to do with it. This was not luck.

Every hour stacked up over the years, every day spent swinging the sword, spoke to him now. That was what it was.

So what he had to do now was turn it over in his mind. Go back through it. Today would not be the only day like this, just as he had said moments ago.

Retracing the exchange, he could see that Alexandra had accelerated a second time in the middle of it.

She varied her tempo mid-fight. Changed the speed on me.

A movement outside any calculation. The Wave-Blocking Sword read what an opponent showed and worked out results from that. But a blade already swinging at a brutal pace that suddenly pushed faster still, that was a genuinely unexpected blow.

Never even imagined she could swing a sword at that speed to begin with.

If she had wasted even a little more movement.

If the angle of the blade had been off by even a fraction.

If the read had been even slightly slower.

If the body had been even a little duller in its response.

Dead.

The envoy of death had grazed right past him.

He also understood that through all of it she had acted with intent, and inside that intent was something full of consideration and gratitude.

It's like forced movement.

Alexandra's specialty was pressing an opponent down through sheer speed. Seeing it clearly now, she was not simply forcing movement, not just that.

Talking to me before she swung. That was part of it too.

She had spoken to pull her own focus to a peak. When Enkrid put desperation into words and used them as a weapon, she had forged killing intent from that, fired it back out, and sharpened her own edge even further.

A few sentences had been enough to confirm his state of concentration.

"Look at this little bastard. Not listening to me, is he?"

Words like that.

The first thrust, the one that drew blood on his cheek, was the same. She was watching how his body responded when it reached its limit.

Alexandra was also the one who had shown him that a single clumsy move meant death.

Do nothing half-baked when you're slower than me.

She had guided him, drawn him toward one swing. One swing, with every ounce of accumulated longing behind it, made to answer this moment. Of course, even within that consideration, his life had been hanging by a thread the whole time.

If he hadn't kept up, he would have died.

That was a truth that would not change.

"How many people has she killed in a spar?" he asked.

"My mother?"

Ragna repeated it, then shook his head.

"As far as I know, none."

Ragna had left home young. Enkrid's eyes went looking for Grida. She would know.

But Grida was nowhere among the onlookers. All he saw was his own group walking alongside the family head.

His gaze rested briefly on Ann's back, then moved away. The family head and Ann had just passed through the brick wall at the far end of the training ground and gone inside.

Alexandra glanced back over her shoulder but said nothing.

"Ragna, go with Ann."

"Sure."

Enkrid said it, and Ragna followed Ann without making much of it. This was unfamiliar territory for her. Whatever she wanted here, having even one familiar face nearby was better. There were other reasons too, but either way, it was better to keep all possibilities open.

He was still turning that thought over when footsteps approached, unhurried, uneven.

"Hey, guest."

The man had six swords hanging off him and wore his excitement plainly. Old cloth was wound tight around his hands and a thick band ran across his forehead. Crimson cloth of the same worn material circled his waist and his shins, and while it was old, it was clean.

Six swords should have made him look ragged. Somehow he did not look slovenly. His back was straight, his posture carried readiness to draw any of those six blades at any moment, and within that was a quiet tidiness.

He prefers clean movement, Enkrid thought. That was the impression he had gathered while watching the man approach.

"You've got it. I can see it all."

The man announced this without preamble.

Behind him, a man who looked at least ten years older than Enkrid shook his head.

"Take that with a grain of salt. His instincts are right only very rarely."

A deep, full voice. The first thing Enkrid noticed was the intricately engraved scabbard. Then the dense calluses packed into the man's palm, the width of his stance always ready to move, and the fact that his breathing was all but inaudible.

Neither of them is easy, was Enkrid's immediate read. Though real outcomes were never easy to predict.

Even someone like Alexandra or the family head, once a fight truly began, the picture could shift entirely.

That was the nature of a fight where your life was on the line.

By that same logic, it was just as hard to say this side had the higher odds.

"I'm Heskal. And this is..."

The man who had been shaking his head began the introduction, and the other cut in.

"I introduce myself. You cold fish. My name is Lynox. Looking for the best fighter in the Zaun family? That's not me. But I am the most romantic."

The one carrying six swords said it without missing a beat. Calling yourself the most romantic in the same breath as your own name did not come across as entirely normal, but it was not enough to rattle Enkrid.

He had spent years holding himself together as the sane one in a crowd of lunatics.

"Enkrid of the Border Guard."

At that, Heskal extended a hand. Enkrid took it.

"Apologies for the late greeting. Welcome to Zaun."

Lynox grinned and added his piece.

"Welcome nothing, you should rest first. Still want to keep going? Alex likes throwing people straight into the deep end, but I don't."

"It will not be an unpleasant experience," Heskal said.

Listening to the two of them, Enkrid got the sense that their standing within the family was no lesser than the family head's. Neither had asked his permission, and neither was watching for anyone's reaction.

The crowd of onlookers had grown since earlier. Still no sign of Grida or Magroon.

Instead.

"Let me join too."

A young-faced woman whose skill was hard to read at a glance stepped up behind the two of them.

"I'd like to add my hand as well, but I'll have to put it off until tomorrow. Something I need to see to."

Heskal glanced at the darkening sky like a man with somewhere to be, then pulled a pocket watch from inside his coat and checked the time.

Your surroundings become an anchor for reading the present. Enkrid knew exactly what that meant and still used it.

Knights naturally developed sharp insight within combat, but in a controlled situation that insight could extend further, matching what they knew against the current moment to draw out facts they could not otherwise see.

Reading cause and effect, thinking through the dynamics of a situation.

Simply put, a knight's situational awareness became extraordinary.

It took some natural talent too, of course.

Enkrid had always had that, whatever he lacked with a sword. Awareness, perception, that kind of thing.

Which was why certain things became visible without having to work for them.

Not in want.

The Zaun family was not one that lacked resources, even if they did not wear it loudly.

A pocket watch always carried a craftsman's name, and something like that cost as much as a magic artifact.

In fact, without some magical element inside it, the thing would not even run.

Heskal had taken it out and looked at it without any particular air, and no one around him had reacted. It was simply part of the everyday here.

Though the more important part of their everyday was something else entirely.

"You tired?" Lynox asked.

There was a hint of consideration in it, a willingness to go easy on him. Enkrid did not hear it that way.

"I'm always at my best right now."

He meant it. That the present version of himself was his best, always. It was as close to a creed as he had.

Saying it, a thought rose in him. He genuinely liked this place. Truly.

"You're smiling?"

Lynox said it, then grinned himself. Both of them were wearing the look of someone having too much fun.

The watching crowd looked much the same.

* * *

"It's serious, isn't it. How many years has it been?"

Inside, the walls were laid in alternating gray and brown stone. Two swords hung on one side. On the opposite wall hung the hide of some beast that was hard to name on sight.

The family head turned at Ann's question.

The fireplace at the center of the sitting room showed traces of past fires, but none had been lit now, and the air sat cold.

The family head was twice Ann's size. Standing that close, it should have been imposing. Ann did not notice. The family head had also made some effort not to loom, stepping back a good distance before turning to face her.

"Is that a healer's intuition?"

"No. Certainty."

Alexandra asked it as she came through the door behind them. Ann answered at once, her gaze fixed on the family head the whole time.

Alexandra was not much for jokes, so she left it at that. But Ann was staring at the family head so intently that if Enkrid had been there, he would have teased her: that kind of look gets mistaken for something else.

"Please, tell me. Do you know the cause?"

The word cause carried a slight pause before it, but Ann's manner did not waver.

The family head said nothing.

Ann knew this illness took many different forms.

Need to find whatever caused it and examine that.

Only then could she treat it. That had to come first. The family head's manner was not what anyone would call soft, but every trace of pressure had been stripped from the voice when it came.

"Not now."

Not what Ann had hoped to hear.

"...I beg your pardon?"

"My husband has said what he has to say."

Alexandra answered in his place. Ragna, who had quietly slipped in behind them, spoke from Ann's back:

"Let's go."

He had read from his father's expression that there would be no explanation. When the man had something to say, he could say it fluently enough. When he did not, he closed his mouth. No amount of pushing would move him here, and Ragna knew it.

Ann was thrown.

The family head clearly knows how serious this is.

If they had brought up the curse, she had eighty-nine things to say. If they had asked whether she could treat it, she had fifty ways to prove that yes, she dared to think she could.

None of the words she had expected came. The only thing said was those two. Not now.

Ann could not make sense of it.

* * *

Three more days passed after the spar with the family head. The sky had looked ready to pour at any moment, and it only kept gathering darker clouds.

But the faces of everyone who came looking for Enkrid were nothing but bright. The sunshine the sky withheld was there in their expressions instead.

"May I join as well?"

Even one of the servants running errands had come. Everyone here wore a sword and talked about swords. That alone was enough to make the pleasure plain on their faces.

"Of course."

Enkrid punched the servant in the face and swept the legs out, sending them sideways.

Thud, crack.

Anyone watching might have thought he was killing a child, but the servant had been using hands and feet together while swinging the sword. To shut that down, this was the only way.

"Eil Karaz?"

Something familiar in the servant's movement made Enkrid say it aloud.

He had something in common with Grida. He might forget a person's name, but never the name of a sword style or a fighting technique.

Eil Karaz, otherwise known as King of the Dirt. A Martial Arts system.

The name Eil Karaz came from an infamous continental prison. The fighting system developed by its wardens was called the Eil Karaz style of Martial Arts.

The servant had been weaving that technique into their swordwork just now, swinging the sword while going for joint locks.

Someone nearby mentioned they had never been taught it; the servant had simply been walking their own path.

Either way, this too was one of the more entertaining things.

Trading blows with everyone like that, Enkrid began to feel the quality that Odinkar, Magroon, and Grida had described.

They compete with each other, teach each other, push each other up, and learn without hesitation.

There was a certain stubbornness visible in the more accomplished ones.

But that kind of grit and drive, better to have it than not.

Maybe that was why everyone seemed to be having such a good time.

Another day was winding toward its close.

He was almost asleep when rain began outside, pattering and tapping, and even half-asleep Enkrid caught a different sound woven into it. By the time he opened his eyes and reached for the Three-Iron standing beside him, the window in his room had swung open.

A creak.

It was on the ground floor and had not been latched, so anyone could have opened it.

Through the window, a familiar face. For three days, every face around him had worn something warm and bright, like sunlight. This was the one face that matched the weather outside perfectly, carrying clouds right in the expression.

"I need to talk. Enki."

The gloomy face spoke.

"Grida?"

It was too dark outside. Even with eyes adjusted, her face was barely readable, just recognizable.

Enkrid confirmed it and asked again.

"What do you need to say?"

Instead of answering at once, Grida bit her lip once.

"The family head is acting strange."

Blunt, with no setup. But Enkrid agreed. Among everyone inside Zaun, the family head was probably the strangest one.

"Come inside first."

Enkrid brought the woman inside.

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