WeTried Translations

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ I Pulled Out Excalibur

Chapter 398

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Sacred Body (1)

"What is Caliburn? Merlin."

"Caliburn?"

Merlin tilted her head at Najin's question.

"Haven't heard that name in ages. I think it's another name for Excalibur? Back in the old days, not long after we'd set out on our journey, Arthur used to call it that."

"Another name?"

"Yeah, Excalibur itself is an incredibly old sword. No one knows exactly when it first appeared, and every written source describes it a little differently."

So naturally the names people called it varied too, she said.

"In legend there's Caliburn, Caledfwlch, Caliburnus... quite a few names, and Caliburn is just one among them. The most famous was always Excalibur, of course."

"That many names?"

"Well, records of a Holy Sword thrust into a stone existed across every culture and people, regardless of race. The same concept gets different pronunciations depending on the language."

Merlin shrugged.

"Excalibur was already something of a legend even a thousand years ago."

When it first appeared, and where it came from, accounts differed enough across sources that nothing could be pinned down as definitive. The only things described consistently were the Holy Sword embedded in a stone and the legend that whoever pulled it free would become a hero. That was what Merlin said.

"The best-supported theory is that the Primordial Blacksmith, the one said to have forged masterworks, had a hand in making it. Some masterworks do share structural similarities with Excalibur."

"I never got that impression. Really?"

Objects that contained a mystique. Masterworks.

Najin had fought enemies who possessed masterworks on a few occasions. On the continent he had faced a dark mage carrying one, and out in the Outland he had fought a demon fused with the fourth masterwork, a bookmark.

Yet he had never sensed anything about them that reminded him of Excalibur. Mysterious, yes, but nothing beyond that. None of them gave him the feeling of something that reigned above the laws of nature the way Excalibur did.

To that, Merlin answered as though the answer were obvious.

"That's because we smashed them all."

"Pardon?"

"Of the forty-seven masterworks, the ones numbered in the forties, we destroyed every single one a thousand years ago. They were too dangerous."

She said it plainly.

"I mentioned there are forty-seven masterworks in total, didn't I?"

"You did."

"The higher the number, especially past the forties, the more they start to resemble Excalibur in structure. Instead of simply containing a mystique, they begin amplifying it with starlight, or shift into being reinforced by melting stars into them entirely."

That was, unmistakably, a structure similar to Excalibur.

"The demon lord Baal was a prime example of someone who held a masterwork like that. The forties were mostly in the hands of the corrupted stars or the Witch of the Abyss's apostles. Dreadfully difficult to deal with."

At some point Merlin had said that even a masterwork could be shattered if struck with something of a higher concept, something like Excalibur, or Gramr.

"So that came from experience."

"More or less. Anyway, given how the higher ones kept resembling Excalibur more and more... I'd say it's safe to conclude that Excalibur is that unknown masterwork the Primordial Blacksmith is said to have forged at the very end of their life."

Guinevere had claimed the Witch of the Abyss created Excalibur, of course, but the Primordial Blacksmith being involved in its making was a strong possibility.

"I've rambled on."

Clap. Merlin brought her hands together once.

"Back to what you were asking. To say a little more about Caliburn specifically, in the texts that describe Excalibur as Caliburn, it's characterized like this."

Her expression turned vaguely sour.

"Scapegoat."

A being offered up as a sacrifice.

Thinking of what Guinevere had called the original role of Excalibur, it was a rather unsettling word to hear.

2.

The Old Holy Site of the Sacred Body Church was located in the Outland.

Orders and certain nations having their sanctuaries in the Outland was not unheard of, but the Sacred Body Church's holy site differed from the others in several ways.

First: it lay in the innermost depths of the Outland.

Most sanctuaries had originally existed on the continent and been swallowed as the Outland expanded. The Sacred Body Church's holy site had been rooted in the Outland from the start. Even by the measure of a thousand years ago, it had already been situated in territory classified as the Outland.

Second: the road leading there was not especially treacherous.

"That much is only natural."

The Star Incarnation explained why.

"The Sacred Body Church has two primary duties. One is to train and research without rest in pursuit of the most perfect physical form. The second is to regularly maintain the path leading to the Old Holy Site. You've heard the term ascetic before, haven't you?"

Najin nodded.

He had encountered a few of them out in the Outland.

"They are all people dispatched by the Sacred Body Church. I maintain the path periodically as well."

"What is the reason for it?"

"I don't know. The High Priest tells me to, so I do."

The Star Incarnation shrugged.

Since they had set out, she had worn a persistently sour expression, but after Najin said he would petition the imperial court in the name of the Dawn Horn once the journey concluded, her attitude had turned cooperative.

"You seem to have a close relationship with the High Priest."

"Well, he was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes, and he was the one who taught me everything, from how to speak to how to handle starlight."

The High Priest of the Sacred Body Church, Framan.

He had originally been in charge of the Star Incarnation's upbringing, but when the chaos the Carnival King stirred up got the previous High Priest killed and the seat fell vacant, Framan was the one who took it.

"Though I have no idea what goes on in that old man's head."

The Star Incarnation sighed.

"So? Would it be all right if I asked what wind brought the esteemed Dawn Horn all the way to the Old Holy Site of the Sacred Body Church? I'd at least like to know the reason."

"Something has been bothering me."

"Something like what?"

"The last time we spoke, I mentioned seeing a woman holding Excalibur near the Eternal City."

She nodded.

"You did."

"I met her. We exchanged a few words."

"See? I told you I wasn't seeing things. She was really there."

While the Star Incarnation shrugged, Najin kept his eyes fixed on her.

"From that encounter I came away with a few impressions, and one of them was that she resembles you."

"......Resembles me? Me?"

Najin nodded. In the past, during the period when they had been exploring La Mancha, in the process of tying a rope around her body and hurling her at the sky whale, Najin had found himself with a rare opportunity to observe the Star Incarnation's physical form up close.

At the time, he had thought this.

That this person was not built from a human body.

She was a being composed of starlight, created from starlight. Not something that had arisen naturally, but something fashioned by deliberate intent. Her body held a quantity of starlight far too great for any human frame.

Even by the standards I had back then......

Najin narrowed his eyes.

And by my standards now, the same holds true.

He held ten stars and had received every last drop of Lancelot's starlight, making him someone who carried a staggering amount of starlight. Even measured against that, the starlight the Star Incarnation held was abnormal.

She was not a human who had been born with bones and flesh, tempered her soul, and eventually touched Transcendence. She was a being who had touched Transcendence from birth, by some means.

He had never bothered raising the question openly since it counted as a secret of the Sacred Body Church, but encountering the platinum-haired woman in the Eternal City had changed his thinking. From her, he had sensed something that felt strikingly similar to the Star Incarnation.

Najin said as much.

The decisive thing had of course been the moment in his dream when Arthur mentioned the Sacred Body Church, but he could hardly say that part out loud.

"So you're saying, to understand who that mystery woman is, you first need to understand the origins of the Sacred Body?"

"That's about the size of it."

"Awkward. That's top-level secret information for the Church."

The Star Incarnation made a face.

"Though even calling it top-level secret, I don't know it myself, so I couldn't explain it to you."

"......You don't know?"

"That's right. And I'm not particularly interested in knowing."

She shrugged.

"From the moment I was born, I am the Star Incarnation. A being who receives the devotion of the faithful, who holds the most perfect physical form they could ever hope to see. Have you seen the statues placed throughout various places, Dawn Horn?"

He had. Statues of Arthur were scattered everywhere. Najin nodded, and the Star Incarnation continued.

"Do people demand things of those statues? No. A statue just needs to be there. Unchanged, year after year, simply existing in that spot is all it takes to fulfill its purpose."

Then people look at the statue and choose to worship it, take comfort in it, find peace of mind from it on their own terms. Saying that, the Star Incarnation let out a slow breath.

"I am nothing more than that. Does a statue need to know what it is made from, or how it was made?"

No, she said.

"To exist in an ideal and perfect state at all times, that is my role. And when I can no longer perform that role, I will simply be replaced with the next one. The way you tear down a worn statue and raise a new one."

"......What happens when you are replaced?"

"Who knows? I'd wander the Outland, probably, or take my own life and pass my starlight on to my successor. I think I'd be the latter."

It was not the sort of thing one could say so flatly.

Najin looked at the Star Incarnation.

Even speaking of her own death, she gazed out the window as though it were no particular concern.

"An Idol that has fulfilled its role ought to be discarded. There's no sense in having two of them cluttering up the world and burdening the next generation. Besides, the moment I am no longer worshipped, my physical form will begin to break down, in that case, isn't it better to simply die quickly?"

It was not the voice of someone who had resigned themselves to fate. Nor the voice of someone who had pondered it long and finally accepted that there was no answer. It was the tone of someone for whom it had been decided from the very beginning, and who had never once thought to question that fact.

Like the sun rising, setting, and tomorrow arriving.

As though it were the most natural thing in the world, the Star Incarnation spoke. Najin found himself asking her without thinking.

"Is it all right with you, to end your life that way?"

"My life? Ah."

The Star Incarnation gave a short, dry laugh.

"That old man said something like that too. Who knows? To be honest, I'm not sure what my life is supposed to be. But I suppose... I'm enjoying what I can enjoy, so that when the time comes to leave I won't think, ah, I should have done that."

Indulging in luxuries, eating good food, going out to see the latest novels turned into plays. That was what filled most of the Star Incarnation's days. She shrugged and answered.

"The power that other Transcendents like you grind your bones to dust over a lifetime just to reach, or sometimes never reach at all, was mine from the moment I was born, wasn't it?"

That was true.

"Likewise, I was born holding authority that an ordinary person could never obtain even if they devoted their entire life to it."

Also true. She had come into the world with a perfect body and perfect strength, without any effort at all.

"All of it is luck. Being able to enjoy luxuries like this, being able to take pleasure in things, that too is luck. The expiration date on that luck runs about a hundred and twenty to a hundred and fifty years or so......"

The Star Incarnation said.

"It's long. Long enough. Wanting more than that would be greed. Enjoy it to the fullest, then go without looking back."

She had gotten that far when she seemed to remember something and said, "Oh."

"Come to think of it, that's where we're headed now, isn't it?"

The road to the Old Holy Site.

She pointed toward the distant horizon.

"The place where the Star Incarnation is replaced."

Replaced, she said.

"At the latest, it's probably where I'll be buried within forty years. The new Star Incarnation is always born there."

Rough sketch of Najin on horseback with a Korean New Year greeting.

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