WeTried Translations

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ I Pulled Out Excalibur

Chapter 376

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Strongest Knight of the Round Table (6)

Those who touched transcendence through a single sword naturally know how to pour themselves into their blade. Their sword aura does not merely take on a special shape, it can carry within it the landscape that exists inside their hearts, the inner vision.

Because of that, in a clash between Sword Masters, there are things that can be understood without a word being spoken.

"......"

A person's convictions, for instance. The precise details remain unknown, what tragedy they endured, what anguish they wrestled with, what pain drove them to their answer. None of that can be read. But the answer they finally arrived at, that much can be known.

Because that answer was carried in the sword aura.

And so Najin saw it. The answer the man before him must have reached at the end of long anguish. He glimpsed the conviction of Lancelot, the knight once called the Strongest Knight of the Round Table.

Unfailing.

It does not break.

The same mystique held within his beloved sword Arondight, yet to Najin's eyes, the meaning was not so simple.

What does not break?

He recalled what Lancelot had said.

The knight had told him this city was a contingency plan for when Arthur's plan failed. Then, with a sneer, Lancelot had added that he had no intention of joining Arthur's insane scheme. That they would prepare for the future in their own way.

Half of it had been a lie. Half had been the truth.

The city was both a contingency for if Arthur's plan failed and a supplement meant to raise the odds of that plan succeeding, even a little.

Arthur's story does not break.

That was Lancelot's wish.

He had wanted their story from a thousand years ago to not be severed, to not fail and become worthless. In pursuit of that wish, he had chosen a wrong path and committed great sins.

Then.

Najin gripped his sword hard.

Then, as a descendant of those knights, and as the very descendant of Arthur that Lancelot had waited so long for, what was he supposed to do? The answer was simple.

Najin was the Free Knight.

The Free Knight punishes a knight who has sinned. If a knight walks a wrong path, that path is struck down and cut away. Making knights into true knights is the Free Knight's charge.

Your conviction, I have seen it.

The destination that conviction aimed for was right. But the road chosen to reach it was wrong.

You chose the wrong road.

Dawn Sword.

A cluster of stars the color of platinum surged upward. The constellation of ten stars resonated together. In the one moment their vibration overlapped, Najin swung his sword.

First, I cut that road away.

Cutting Night.

Najin swung his sword.

Originally, Dawn Sword, Cutting Night is swung from below toward the sky, a sword meant to cleave the heavens. But now Najin brought his blade down from above.

The sky he needed to cut was not the sky of this false sanctuary. What Najin meant to sever was Lancelot.

The false sky was cut first.

Slicing through the sky of the Sanctuary of Oblivion at a diagonal, Najin's sword aura fell upon Lancelot like a guillotine. Meeting it was the sword Lancelot swung in answer.

Shlink.

The horizontal sword aura Lancelot drew leveled everything within sight to nothing. A heap of earth piled high as a mountain split without a sound. As though nothing could exist above the line of his swinging blade, Lancelot's sword aura became a torrent that swallowed the landscape whole.

A torrent that seemed it would never be cut.

Sword aura flowing like a great river.

Cleaving through the belly of that torrent, Najin's sword aura plunged down and split the sky. The Unfailing sword aura that would never be severed and the sword aura that cuts the night crashed together. They were polar opposites. The moment they collided, the silence shattered.

Gkakakakakakakang!

Sword aura ground against sword aura. Starlight burst wildly from the platinum-colored aura, and sparks flew from the white-burning one. Neither gave an inch. The shockwave their collision produced shook the Sanctuary of Oblivion to its foundation.

2.

Kirchhoff's sword bit in sharp and deep.

He had waited for this day alone across long years. There was no hesitation in his sword. Faster and sharper than he had ever moved before, he drove his blade.

At its core, this fight had been nothing but revenge for Kirchhoff.

A battle fought purely for vengeance, and once that vengeance was done, he would have found no reason left to keep living. He had barely managed to stay alive by fixing his eyes on this single moment. After bringing down the Star of Oblivion, Kirchhoff had planned to take his own life.

The most brilliant moment is over. There is no going back. Living on would only make things more wretched, and since the purpose is fulfilled, should I not end my life as well.

He had truly believed that. Behind the mask of a hero, his body and spirit had been worn down to nothing over three hundred years.

And yet.

Kirchhoff smiled.

He had believed that, but not anymore. On his shoulders rested Londinel. The Londinel he had to protect now had a clear and tangible form, and it was with him.

Grand Culmination, a star born from gathered stars.

All memories had returned. He had been reunited with his lord. He had faced his teacher. Kirchhoff had been able to remember what it was he needed to do.

Even still.

Even still, he could shine.

His lord had told him so. His teacher had passed the spear to him. The people of Londinel still thought of him as their hero.

I can still shine.

Kirchhoff's sword shone.

The Grand Culmination was still made of a single star. No new star had risen. Yet it shone more brilliantly than it ever had before.

The number of stars does not matter.

What matters is their brightness.

All he had was one star, yet the light that star produced yielded to no other constellation.

I am Kirchhoff.

He swung his sword.

On my sword, Londinel lives and breathes.

Sword aura shaped like pale blue petals scattered through the air. Blue flowers bloomed wherever he drove his blade. Kirchhoff charged through the bursting blossoms.

Guinevere's magic was cut. It was swallowed by a wave of petals. The light produced by one star did not bow before even ten.

"......"

Cracks began to form across Guinevere's expression. She watched the stars bearing down on her. Each one of them was a denial of who she was.

"I'll leave the right side to you, Sir Yuel."

There was a knight who had endured three hundred years against oblivion.

"Yes. I'll handle the left."

There was a woman who had accepted oblivion and affirmed the self she had forgotten.

"Then, Lapis?"

"Sure, do as you like. I won't let you slip away from me. Run as hard as you want, don't worry."

A knight and a witch whose story did not end in tragedy, or rather, simply two people, stood there together.

"It reminds me of times with your father, you know. Back then, too, he used to carry me on his back and run his heart out! So, Roselyn? I'm counting on you. Don't worry, I'll cast as many spells as you need."

"Were you using Echo like this, by any chance?"

Roselyn clashed the twin swords in her hands together with a sharp ring. The Echo layered Rena's magic twice over, then three times. Watching that, Rena drew a sharp breath and then burst out laughing.

"You really do take after him."

She murmured that and smiled a smile that looked happier than anything. Even after hundreds of years of suffering, she could still laugh. Guinevere watched that smile and pressed her lips together.

So that was it. That was how it was.

Truly.

Guinevere looked past them to Merlin.

Cruel of you, Merlin.

The road she pointed toward was always difficult, steep and harsh, never permitting escape. Tracing back old memories, Guinevere exhaled slowly.

She made her decision.

Guinevere raised her hand. The sanctuary trembled, and her constellation hanging in the sanctuary's sky blazed with light.

"If you desire a tomorrow."

She brought out her full strength. Ten stars interlocked and formed a great ring. A Grand Mage with ten stars poured every last one into a single spell.

"Then try crossing this river."

Her authority entered the spell. The Sanctuary of Oblivion lent its power to the magic, and her stars lit one by one, each amplifying it further.

Unique Spell, River of Oblivion (Lethe).

The great current that had flowed through the sanctuary converged in a single place. This was nothing less than oblivion itself, her mystique given form. A river that made everything it touched forget, be forgotten, and ultimately cease to exist surged and roared.

The River of Oblivion flooded.

The flood rolled in with force enough to swallow the entire sanctuary. From above came the flood; from deep below the sanctuary came the shockwaves produced by two clashing sword auras. As both sky and earth shook, the punishing party steadied their breathing.

The stars of Yuel and Kirchhoff shone.

After them, the stars of those who had broken the Taboo shone, and Merlin lent her power to those stars.

As if to say: swallow us if you can.

The battle was drawing toward its final act.

3.

The two sword auras pushed against each other without yielding a single inch. It felt as though they might hold that balance forever, but that could never be.

A difference so slight it was almost nothing.

A short length no longer than a hand's span.

What decided a battle between Transcendents who could cut through hundreds of meters was, by some strange reversal, something that trivial. This time was no different. Najin's sword aura at last cut through Lancelot's.

The Unfailing sword aura broke apart, and the mana compressed inside exploded outward. Papapapapang! Cleaving through the scraps of sword aura bursting in every direction, Cutting Night sliced Lancelot's arm. It should have bisected the body cleanly, but the Unfailing sword aura had bent the trajectory at the last instant.

Lancelot's arm was cut off. Blood sprayed in a long arc, and even that blood evaporated in the heat of the sword aura before it could fall.

The shockwave battered Lancelot's body and left countless small wounds across it. Lancelot stared into the air. He saw his own arm flying away. The arm swallowed by the sword aura vanished without a trace.

But some things did not vanish.

The thing the severed arm had refused to let go of until the very end, Arondight, still held in that hand, did not disappear even when swallowed by the sword aura.

Ah.

Because Lancelot had not yet been broken. So long as its master was not broken, Arondight would not be severed. Swept up by the shockwave, Lancelot tumbled across the ground, but he gritted his teeth and pushed himself back to his feet.

His one remaining arm slammed into the earth. He stood. He started running. He snatched Arondight as it fell from the air and, eyes wide, threw himself at Najin.

Through the dust the shockwave had kicked up, across the ruined earth, he ran.

His armor was shattered. His arm was gone. Only one arm remained, and the wounds on his body pumped out blood with every step. Soaked in blood, Lancelot ran.

Look at me.

I am not yet broken.

Cut me down. More, more, more......

The dust blocked his vision. It did not matter. Not being able to see was fine. There was only one road ahead anyway. Lancelot hurled himself into the dust cloud.

Thud!

Bursting through the dust with a single leap, Lancelot's eyes went wide. Then he could not help but break into a laugh. Because there was Najin, running straight at him from the other side, as though he had known all along that Lancelot would come.

As if certain of it even without being able to see.

Najin and Lancelot locked eyes, charging at each other through the blinding dust. Najin's condition was no better than Lancelot's. One eye was gone, and his body was covered in wounds.

He had poured out an Absolute Technique with a body already at its limit, and that body could no longer move fast.

Both of them were wrecked.

The sword fight two wrecked men carried out was too shambling to call the work of Sword Masters. There was no sword aura that cut dozens of meters, no power to shake the earth with a single stomp. What remained was the bare face of two men.

They swung their swords. Without the strength to swing again right after, they rammed the other with a shoulder. Punches, kicks, and if needed, headbutts. Nothing was off limits.

It did not matter how ugly things got. Only winning mattered.

Slash!

Lancelot's sword opened a long cut down Najin's forearm. Through the blood that leaped up, Najin's sword opened an equally long cut across Lancelot's shoulder.

Cut, get kicked, get beaten......

By this point, one of them might reasonably have said "I've lost" and conceded. But neither had any intention of admitting defeat. A defeat taken in words meant nothing. This was a fight that could only be won by forcing the opponent to their knees and breaking them.

Klang!

Both men were shoved backward. Putting distance between them, they breathed out long and hard. Dragging in ragged breaths, Najin wrung out the last of his sword aura. He gathered what starlight he had left. Watching that, Lancelot made the same choice.

Najin's tenth star, Tomorrow, shone.

Lancelot's eleventh star, Tomorrow, shone.

The paths they had walked were different. Their convictions were different. Their direction was different. Yet the answer the two of them had arrived at was the same. They had walked entirely different roads, but that answer alone was shared. Najin, who had opened his eyes wide, broke into a smile.

That was your purpose all along, Lancelot.

Lancelot answered that smile with a smile of his own.

Even so, nothing changes.

Whatever purpose he had held, nothing changed. Najin agreed with that. In the end, what had to be done did not change. Excalibur and Arondight crossed.

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