Chapter 216 - Preparation, Patterns, Experience

“Fuck!”

Olf was horrified to hear that something like a rebellion had broken out. In this situation? At a time like this? “Who the hell is it?”

Then came word that the ringleader had seized the gate. These so-called rebels could do nothing about the watchtowers or the battlements, but wasn’t the gate the immediate problem? “Guards!”

Olf hastily summoned his guards, who ran ahead of him.

“Go! Stop them!” ‘Who the hell would do this?’

He hurried after them, forgetting the weight of his armor as he ran. He was gasping for breath. A metallic smell rose in his throat, like dried blood. When he reached his destination, he heard:

“Sorry about this.”

Three of his guards lay bristling with bolts like hedgehogs. He also saw at least a platoon’s worth of soldiers blocking the guards’ path, their crossbows aimed at him and his men. The bastard who had just spoken smiled slyly. There was no other word for that smile. His mouth twisted, his eyes narrowed. This was a face, a look, Olf had never seen on him before. It was that ignorant bastard of an adjutant who had so boldly demanded the cavalry and declared he would crush the enemy. An idiot who knew nothing but fighting. That was what he had been until a moment ago. That was what he had always been. ‘That bastard?’

He had fought with such brainless abandon that Olf had never imagined this. No, had even that been deliberate? Had he been playing the ignorant adjutant who knew nothing but fighting? If so, he was a born actor. Olf realized he had been deceived. “The enemy is coming!”

BWOOO!

A great horn sounded, signaling danger and a looming threat. “Shoot! Shoot!”

While the archers on the galleries and watchtowers frantically drew their bowstrings and loosed arrows, the ignorant adjutant hacked away at the gate’s pulley with an axe.

BANG! CRACK! BANG!

To Olf, each blow sounded like a death sentence. ‘Hah.’

The situation should have drawn a sigh, but his mind had stopped working. He could not even bring himself to order them stopped. It was already too late. Even if he charged in and stopped the bastard now, he could do nothing about the opening gate. Once it opened, those men who had run wild on the battlefield would come through, wouldn’t they? A nightmare. Terror itself. Those five monsters. He had expected this. He had sensed that the mages’ attack had failed. Why else had the bastards who kept talking about their price not shown their faces?

‘Fucking shadow bastards.’ In his heart, Olf gave up. Fight to the death here? Stake everything he had, his life included? Throw away all these soldiers’ lives?

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

He couldn’t do that. Even if he survived by getting them all killed, what would he have left? Olf did not want his final act to be something idiotic. Defeated commander or not, he would not sully his name. He would end it with his own death alone. “You must surrender.”

Despite having made up his mind, Olf wanted to slap the captain of his guards when he spoke beside him. This bastard? Something like rage flickered in Olf’s eyes. “You must face reality.”

The guard captain spoke again. One look at his eyes made it obvious: he was desperate to save his own skin. Why did this bastard have so much to say when he wouldn’t even step forward and fight? RRRRRUMBLE.

The gate opened. Soon, a black-haired man came into view, seemingly alone in gazing at something far away. He wasn’t even wearing a helmet. His blue eyes looked not at Olf, but into empty space. As Olf watched the man approach, the guard captain unbuckled his sword and quietly laid it down. Preparing to surrender. This fucking bastard. Olf tore him apart in his mind. Then he, too, gave up. But then:

“There is no law saying we must hand over the city without a fight.”

Zimmer stepped forward from behind him.

“What?”

“Entrust the final duel to me. I will show them the spirit of a Lion of the East.” Zimmer’s eyes burned as he addressed Olf again.

“General.”

He had always been the best swordsman among the battalion commanders, Greg included. He had received proper training in swordsmanship, too. While the guard captain, usually so full of grave self-importance, was already debating whether to put his hands on his head or fall to his knees, Zimmer stepped forward. Zimmer, who took on all manner of unpleasant tasks, menial chores included, and often spoke unwelcome truths. ‘I must have been blind.’

Olf admitted it. He had failed in choosing his people, too. The ignorant adjutant had fooled him, and he had prized Zimmer far less than the guard captain he trusted with so much. He felt like gouging out his own eyes. “Do it.”

Olf nodded. Even if the battle was over, he felt he had no right to stop a man determined to burn the last of something within him as a warrior. And so Zimmer went to meet Encrid.

* * *

He had planted spies in Martai.

‘How long has he been planning this?’

The instant the gate opened, Encrid recognized someone’s handiwork. Marcus’s, to be precise. ‘Was it really a plan?’

Perhaps he had simply prepared for this independently of his plans. He might not have intended to use them at this exact moment, but planted them just in case. One thought led to another, gathering speed until he found himself thinking of the Righteous Sword Technique: the obscure sword art whose name he didn’t know, which he had learned from the evil spirit in the demon sword. ‘The foundation of the Righteous Sword Technique is forcing your opponent in one direction.’

Preparing for that was both the foundation of the sword art and its entirety. Where the Heavy Sword Technique overpowered with strength and the Swift Sword won through speed, the Righteous Sword Technique was a method of creating “patterns” that cornered an opponent. And “patterns” required preparation. A “pattern” was both preparation and a method for cornering an opponent. It was all well and good if the opponent moved as intended, but what if they didn’t?

‘Prepare more, and for more possibilities.’

He simply had to anticipate all sorts of moves and act accordingly. That was why the Righteous Sword Technique excelled at the game of moves and countermoves. The key was preparation: preparing in diverse ways, from many angles. The spies Marcus had planted were one such preparation. He would have plenty of other tricks hidden away. Even if the gate hadn’t opened, he wouldn’t have given up. He would have tried another ploy. The Righteous Sword Technique was no different. That was how Encrid could use it.

‘Without restricting myself to a single pattern.’

He needed to prepare enough to respond in different ways to his opponent’s reactions. Just as Marcus had. This was why the Righteous Sword Technique and the Flowing Sword Technique were singled out among sword arts that grew stronger with experience. The more games of moves and countermoves one played, the more varied the patterns one’s body would learn. The chain of thought sparked by Marcus’s magic led him toward a new direction in his swordsmanship. Fighting the evil spirit in the demon sword. Returning to spar with Ragna. The things he had learned from the Frog, Luagarne. It all mingled and intertwined. Encrid took three steps through the gate. In those three steps, he realized his own advantage.

‘Repeating today.’

The battles in which he had risked his life. The battles in which he had thrown his life away. Countless defeats, and the Review that followed each battle. Weren’t all of those patterns and experience? They were. Patterns and experience. ‘That old teacher must have specialized in the Righteous Sword Technique.’

He even realized the specialty of the swordsmanship teacher in the coastal village who had taught him the importance of Review. Understanding the diversity of patterns, he took another two steps. Within those five steps, Encrid had felt the need to revisit all his accumulated experience and make it part of his body. Had he been a genius—or merely gifted—would he have grasped all this at once and put it straight into practice? It would be a lie to say he had never regretted his lack of talent. But he no longer craved it as desperately as before. ‘One step at a time.’

He would move forward. This was the path to “Will,” the path to becoming a knight. His forgotten dream struck his heart anew. Only then did Encrid become aware of his surroundings. The gate had opened, and one of the battlefield’s main actors had entered. Hundreds upon hundreds of arrows should have been flying at him. If not, he should at least have been facing spears, swords, or hammers. Yet it was quiet. “Ah.”

Someone gave a brief exclamation, and Encrid lowered his shield. Arrows protruded from the wood. He set it down beside him and looked left and right, taking in the situation at a glance.

‘They have no fight left in them.’ The only troops before him had lost the determination to fight. They had returned battered from the battlefield and begun defending the city. Their last refuge was the gate and the walls. They had just watched the enemy come recklessly right up to the walls.

[“It won’t break, will it?”]

[“Fuck, is our gate made of mud?”]

Anxiety had prompted harsh exchanges, and an uneasy air had spread among the soldiers. Just as they recognized that unease but could do nothing about it, the gate opened, and the five fiends of the battlefield walked inside.

“Motherfucker.” Was it courage to charge toward certain death, or stupidity? Martai’s soldiers had no need to learn the difference. They did not put it to the test. They simply stopped. The eyes of men who had given up fighting settled on Encrid. Silence. A breeze blew, sweeping past the flagpoles above the city.

FLAP-FLAP-FLAP.

The fluttering of flags mingled with curses from a few foul-mouthed soldiers. Curses tinged with resignation and self-mockery. Taking all of it in, Encrid spoke.

“Do I need to tell you my name again here?”

My name is Encrid.

That single declaration, which had first sounded arrogant, ridiculous, and insane, settled over Martai with all its weight. And yet, even when everyone else gave up, there was always someone who would make one last desperate stand. Amid the heavy silence and frozen soldiers, a lean man stepped forward, parting the soldiers who were watching nervously with fingers on their bowstrings. Encrid could tell that, though the man wasn’t large, his body was packed with firm muscle. His balanced stance caught Encrid’s eye, and the lack of fear in his gaze was striking, too. “My name is Zimmer,” the man said.

Encrid had no idea who he was. He had never acted with such things in mind to begin with.

“Martai’s Second Battalion Commander.” Since his opponent had introduced himself courteously, Encrid answered in kind.

“Commander of the Independent Company in Border Guard’s standing army.”

“I see.”

Encrid looked into Zimmer’s eyes. These were not the eyes of a man who had given up. He meant to do something, at least. “Well, damn. Hard to butt in now.”

Rem grumbled as he followed him in, and Audin added with a smile:

“A duel is sacred. Brothers, I shall watch on our Lord’s behalf and convey His will.”

It was the sort of thing a priest serving the God of War would say, but no one took issue with it. All Zimmer did was make his intention clear.

“I cannot stand down without swinging my sword properly even once.” General Olf stood behind him, already looking half out of his mind. He had come back from the brink between rage and reason. Encrid, of course, paid him no attention. Only Krais was looking around. A battle already over, but one that some could not end with mere surrender.

‘Why go risking your life over it?’

Krais could not understand, but the others seemed more or less to accept the situation. Ragna stepped back to the right. If anyone interfered, enemy archer or otherwise, he would draw his sword without mercy. He unleashed the presence he normally kept hidden, making him seem several times larger to the enemy soldiers. And there was a warrior who actually was that large. “Interfere, and your skull will be crushed, sending you to heaven, brothers and sisters.”

Audin appointed himself referee, and Rem stepped back as well. Rem respected the man’s spirit, too. To step forward and ask to cross blades in this situation—wasn’t that the very image of a Hero? Zimmer, was it? Even in Rem’s own tribe, he would have earned that name. Jaxon had already vanished. It seemed he intended to slit the commanders’ throats again if things went awry. Encrid, too, was impressed by Zimmer stepping forward. It was a duel in which the man would probably die even if he won. Yet he did not back down. A warrior. A man who knew how to fight. SHING.

Encrid drew his sword. Once a demon sword, it was now simply an extraordinarily sharp, sturdy blade.

“My sword is no ordinary weapon.”

He told his opponent of the advantage his weapon afforded him, respecting the courage the man had shown in stepping forward. Zimmer nodded, then drew his own sword.

TING.

It was short and straight. An estoc. The moment Encrid saw his stance, he guessed his specialty. No, it was an intuition close to certainty.

‘A fast sword. Light on his feet.’

Being light on his feet meant he could move swiftly. Zimmer bent his knees. The instant he leveled his sword point ahead, his foot drove off the ground. Blurring like an afterimage, the sword point shot toward Encrid as though in flight.