Chapter 130 - One Strike and Scission

"What a load of bullshit."

The man who had taught him that skill and character did not go hand in hand. What was the fellow's name again? The man's mouth twisted into a sneer. "Want me to give you another asshole, Enkie?"

He took a step forward as he spoke. Encrid decided to exchange words with him just once before killing him.

"What was your name again?" The man stopped with his right foot jutting forward.

"... Fucking bastard. You've always been good with that tongue."

He did not give his name. Oh well. Encrid did not really need to know it. "Kill them."

At the nameless son of a bitch's command, the nine people surrounding him moved. How to put it? This might be what the Border Guard would look like if it went rotten. Judging by the way they charged about with their weapons, each seemed to have some skill. Their weapons almost seemed to reek of blood. TWANG!

One of them fired a slingshot. He aimed, drew, and released in an instant, his movements fluid. The slingshot launched a small metal pellet. Ragna avoided it with a mere tilt of his head. It had been aimed at his eye. "Slingshot."

Ragna muttered the word. Encrid saw an unusual heat in his eyes. In that case, there was nothing to worry about. "By himself?"

Someone spoke from behind him. Encrid looked and saw Vengeance. The man's limp drew his gaze to Vengeance's thigh. Before he could even ask how he had been injured, a soldier behind Vengeance spoke, performing the remarkable feat of showing both worry and hatred in his eyes.

"He was trying to save me from that filthy bastard." Encrid could guess without hearing an explanation. The bastard would hardly have handed his old habits off to a Ghoul. He must have done what he always did: deliberately torment a soldier to draw Vengeance out, then exploit an opening to put a hole in his thigh. Exactly the sort of thing that fucker would do. Vengeance, by contrast, would have accepted the injury to save his own man. What would have happened if Encrid had not come? Vengeance would have died. He must have been prepared for death. A man like that, yes, might make someone want to be his friend. Someone like Vengeance would be worth befriending. But not that bastard. Friends? Ridiculous. "Watch out. That thing's sharp."

Vengeance spoke again. Only then did Encrid slap his right fist into his left palm, as though he had just remembered the man's name.

"I remember your name now."

His opponent smirked.

"As if you'd ever forget my name. Pointless fucking provocation." As he spoke, the man drew his sword with a metallic ring. It was a blade that bent under pressure: a slender, flexible sword made of wrought iron. Watching the wavering blade, Encrid spoke.

"It was 'Motherfucker,' wasn't it?"

Son of a Bitch was his nickname, and Motherfucker was his name, right? That had to be it. Probably. "... You'll beg me to kill you."

The man's eyes gleamed murderously. Was he angry? Ah, that had not been Encrid's intention. Encrid shrugged. The two stoked each other's anger with their inane exchange. Among the son of a bitch's nine followers, Slingshot moved again.

TWANG, WHOOSH, CLANG!

This time he aimed at Encrid, but Ragna was suddenly there, pulling his sword free of his belt, sheath and all, to deflect the pellet. The little piece of metal shot straight upward, glittering as it disappeared through the fog. "Quick hands. Be fun to put a hole in them."

Slingshot spoke. Beside him stood a man with twin axes, one in either hand, much like Rem.

"Funny guy. You mean to take us all on alone?"

Twin Axes cast Ragna a sidelong look as he spoke. That was not good, Encrid thought. Sure enough, Ragna reacted.

"One knockoff of that crazy barbarian."

"... What?"

The axe wielder could not understand what the blond, red-eyed bastard staring at him meant. Those red eyes held clear hostility for some unfathomable reason. Two hand axes, one in either hand. He had chosen the wrong weapons. There were also three swordsmen. Their unusual blades had deep fullers, and the three men looked alike. Triplets. "Once this battle's over, we'll be serving Aspen. Might even get noble titles if things go well."

The son of a bitch, otherwise known as Motherfucker, seemed eager to boast. Just as before. He wore the same expression he had worn when he spared Encrid: that self-satisfied face, pleased to explain his reasons for fighting in advance. So that was it. Encrid said no more. THUNK.

He advanced and brought his sword down. His opponent underestimated him. Still sneering, he flicked his blade against Encrid's.

TRILLING! The distinctive flexible blade aimed for Encrid's wrist. As it struck his longsword, its tip bent downward and came straight for his wrist. Unorthodox Sword at its most unorthodox. Had the man said he had learned his swordsmanship in the East? Encrid was fairly sure he had said something like that. Encrid watched the sword aiming for his wrist until the last moment, then shook his own sword up and down. The flexible blade sliding along his edge bounced upward.

TWANG. 'Well, look at this bastard?'

He could see that question, that surprise, on his opponent's face, but Encrid was not interested. He simply advanced and swung as he had learned, practiced, and trained to do. Had he not learned how to face an Unorthodox Sword, too?

'Begin with a solid, straightforward strike.'

He did exactly that. Just as Ragna had taught him. WHOOSH.

His blade sliced through the air. With Concentrate on a Single Point, everything slowed until it felt within his grasp. Connecting point to point and layering power over the path, his diagonal cut descended on his opponent. The son of a bitch hastily stepped back and struck upward.

TRILLING!

His flexible blade cut through the wind toward Encrid's throat. Toward it, and no farther. Encrid's diagonal cut had already reached his body. Faster, stronger, and more precise. One strike was enough. CRUNCH.

Encrid felt resistance in his hands. This strike, too, had been clean enough to leave no sensation in his grip, but cutting through armor and everything else made it impossible to feel nothing at all. His longsword sliced through the man's armor and half his ribs, then severed the wrist holding the sword. The blade bending toward Encrid's throat dropped to the ground.

TING.

Encrid paused in his finishing stance, then flicked his sword sideways.

SPLATTER.

Blood sprayed across the ground. Before him lay a remnant of his past, dead with eyes wide in surprise. Encrid spoke inwardly to his former companions.

'I've avenged you.'

They gave no answer. The dead never did. Neither did the opponent whose life he had ended with one strike. He had died without even a final cry. It was only natural. The mercenary wielding Eastern flexible-sword techniques, that son of a bitch, had been skilled, but...

'Compared to the Frog and Mitch Hurrier...'

He fell short. Compared to Encrid's platoon members? How could he possibly measure up? The very comparison was laughable. Still, without Encrid, this part of the battlefield would have been a mess, too. Just as much of a shitshow as the place where the Giant had appeared. It was all relative. These were practitioners of the Murderous Blade, men who made killing their trade and used it as a means of honing their skills. Against someone stronger, they might die quietly like this. Against someone weaker, they would become efficient murderers. They would undoubtedly run wild. "... What the fuck?"

One of the three sword-bearing brothers spoke.

"What do you think?"

Ragna answered him and strode toward Slingshot. His footwork was a marvel to behold. Whatever steps he had used, it took only a few to reach the man's flank. "Tch!"

The man turned sideways. That was his last act. Leaving that click of his tongue behind, his head flew into the air, still wearing its startled expression. When? When had Ragna drawn his sword, and when had he swung it? Terrifyingly swift, immaculate work. Even Encrid had seen the curving blade only as an afterimage. "Slingshot."

Ragna murmured toward the man he had killed, then moved.

"Three swords."

He headed for the three brothers. All three drew their swords. They clearly had no intention of meekly dying. Ragna saw the red bloodlust in their eyes. Practitioners of the Murderous Blade who used killing, killing people over and over, as their means of advancement. There were a fair number of their kind. Idiots who did not even know how to improve their own skills. Swords that began by killing the defenseless and thus learned only to kill the weak. Whatever his opponents, whatever the circumstances, Ragna was in a very good mood. How many times in his life had he felt so brimming with motivation? Three? Five? Probably not five. His irritation, too, had been building up. That irritation, that frustration, had been transformed through his sparring with Encrid. Something that had begun as a small flame blazed in his eyes. Light streamed from eyes already red. A gleam. Leaving that gleam in his wake, Ragna swung his sword.

SWISH, CLANG, THUNK, CRACK, SLICE! The three practitioners of the Murderous Blade fell: one's throat pierced, another's severed, the last split from chin to crown. Ragna's sword cut through anything in its path. Sword, armor, flesh, or bone. Impressive. "Pitchfork."

Ragna found his next opponent. The man used a pitchfork as his weapon. It looked chosen specifically to inflict pain. He swallowed hard. It seemed he had finally met his match. "All at once!"

He shouted, and everyone moved the instant the words left his mouth. Then he himself wheeled around and bolted. Encrid's eyes widened in surprise at what followed. Normally, Ragna would not have spared a glance for a fleeing man. But that same Ragna...

TAP-TAP.

Moved almost too quickly to see. He kicked off the ground and swung left and right. His sword moved so fast that wings seemed to flutter around him. Though those wings began at his hands, not his back. The wings formed by his blade's afterimages split the spearman's head and severed both arms of a woman wielding daggers.

CLANG!

They also sliced in half a dagger blade caught in their path. The terrifying power of those cuts was hard to describe. "Aaaaaargh!"

The dagger-wielding woman's scream tore savagely through the air. Ragna ran straight on after the fleeing man. Pitchfork twisted around and thrust his weapon upright. It was made entirely of iron. Ragna swung as he had before. Judging by his stance, it was a back-edge strike: clearly a movement meant to knock the opponent's weapon aside, then reverse into a strike with the back edge. Except that his opening motion cut halfway through the iron pitchfork. His blade immediately reversed and cut through the man's neck with its back edge.

SLICE.

What was that? With a little more force, he would have cut right through the pitchfork first. After all that industrious movement, only one remained.

"Fuck."

The man with an axe in each hand.

"You're the main course."

How to put it? Something was very, very different about Ragna today. He walked straight over to face the axe-wielding enemy. The man's appearance bore no resemblance to Rem, but that would not be what mattered to Ragna.

"Legs first."

He immediately made good on his words. His sword moved. The axe wielder could certainly be called skilled, but how to describe this? Encrid saw himself in the man. His past self, to be precise. The moment of facing a wall that effort and training could not overcome. "Aaaaaargh!"

The axe wielder struggled desperately. That was all he could do. Ragna cut his thigh first, then severed the tendons in both arms. The axes dropped with a pair of thuds. Resting his sword on the man's crown, Ragna realized anew how excited he was. It was an unusual feeling.

'Is this really something to get excited about?'

At any rate, it did not feel bad. "S-spare me, and there's treasurr... hidden awaaay..."

CRACK.

Whatever his opponent had to say, Ragna did not listen. In the end, the last surviving member of the ten-strong mercenary band wielding the Murderous Blade died with his skull split open. Ragna checked his sword, found its edge chipped all over and its hilt rattling loose, and discarded it. Then he gathered all the swords the three brothers had used.

"Hmm. Now I have three swords."

Like Encrid, he strapped one to either hip, then slung the third at an angle across his back. "Going for the Three-Sword Style?"

"No. I'll use them one at a time."

Ragna shook his head at Encrid's question, then spoke again.

"Do you know what technique I just used?"

He was speaking faster than usual. That, too, was remarkable. How would Encrid know? It had looked like nothing but cutting and slicing. One thing had stood out, though. Whatever stood in its way, Ragna's sword cut through it. Daggers, anything. While Encrid considered it, Ragna spoke again, still faster than usual.

"I named it Scission." An uninspired name. Unlike the name, though, the technique's power was unmistakable. Scission. Cutting apart. It was a particular art of cutting with a sword that he had developed through his own methods. "I'll teach you."

Ragna announced it as a fact. Encrid nodded. Watching the fight, Vengeance could not even click his tongue in amazement.

'Fucking monsters.'

Those were the only words that came to mind. Encrid collected the two axes from the ground. Rem had broken his weapons fighting the Giant, so he would need new ones. The only other things worth taking were a few throwing daggers from the dagger wielder. It was a shame he had used up all his whistle daggers.

'It would be nice to have new ones made.' As they finished the fight and sorted out their equipment, cheers erupted from ahead.

"Waaaaah!"

"Audin! Audin!"

The front. The direction Audin had gone. Something seemed to have happened. Encrid looked forward. The sun had risen before he knew it, and the fog was lifting. Their surroundings were gradually becoming visible. This was no spell, merely riverside fog that would clear with time. Beyond that clearing fog stood Audin. Utterly alone. In the very midst of the enemy.