Chapter 432
Encrid did not spend the time waiting for Ragna idly.
That was only natural. He had always been that kind of person.
It was the same now. He had called Rem over and was creating friction between sword and axe.
Clang!
The silver-bladed axe that blocked Aker as it came slashing down diagonally shoved the sword away.
Encrid put strength into his arm, twisted his waist, and let the force pushing him aside flow through him.
Rem noticed that, pretended to pull the axe back, then brought it down vertically.
Thud!
Once again, their weapons met and separated.
Sparks flew between the blades.
It was an exchange in which neither side gave up even an inch.
After that, they continued using techniques against each other and blocking them in turn.
It was a fierce dialogue between sword and axe, one with no room even to breathe. But no human being could live without breathing.
Both of them had pushed their stamina to the limit, to the point where their vision briefly spun.
This was already the twelfth time. After hours of intense sparring, even Encrid was panting heavily now.
Rem was the same.
“Huff, huff, watch closely.”
As he spoke, Rem stepped back and rounded his lips.
In that state, he inhaled—and swallowed the breath he had drawn in. His ragged breathing and heaving shoulders settled.
Instinctively, Encrid saw the line the axe would trace, starting from his opponent’s shoulder.
As expected, Rem swung the axe.
No, it didn’t end with a single swing.
Encrid barely managed to swing Aker in response.
Clang!
The blades crossed. Encrid immediately twisted his body and slipped away.
Rem’s axe continued moving, unbelievably so for someone who should have been exhausted and gasping for air.
Rem’s axe had always been fierce, sharp, fast, and heavy.
When an axe made from the lightest iron in the world flew in without recoil, it often made the back of one’s neck go cold.
But now, it was even beyond that.
And on top of that, he had suddenly done this right after panting like that?
Between the recoilless, lightning-fast swings of one axe, the other flew in at an off-beat rhythm.
The two axes in his hands broke rhythm and tempo alike as they pressed forward without pause. Encrid felt as though he were catching a downpour barehanded, one drop at a time, blocking with Aker and Gladius.
This was not the kind of attack you could stop simply because you had predicted it.
This was also Rem holding back.
If he hadn’t been, he could have taken at least one of Encrid’s arms with that sequence.
“You squeeze it out when you think it’s over. It’s called [Handful of Breath].”
After saying that, Rem breathed even more violently than before. His complexion also turned a dull purplish color. It was because, while holding his breath, he had forced out every last bit of strength remaining in his body.
Rem still taught more through action than words.
That suited both the teacher and the learner.
After catching his breath, Rem continued.
“If you mess it up, your heart might burst and you’ll die. Or your blood vessels might rupture. Damn it, you might even feel like your lifespan got shaved down a little.”
That meant it was far more dangerous than [Heart of Monstrous Strength].
Originally, it had been a technique used while protecting the body with Sorcery, but Rem had modified it a little.
It was possible because of the insight he had gained recently while drawing on Sorcery.
And if that crazy bastard of a captain in front of him learned it, he could use it even better.
“If you want to land even one hit, learn it and stick to him.”
The spar with Ragna was in two days.
Rem was saying he would help him prepare for that.
For Encrid, there was no reason to refuse. So he did exactly that. He woke up in the morning, loosened up his body with the [Isolation Technique], and learned [Handful of Breath] from Rem.
Rem did not hold back his advice in between.
“I was ambidextrous from the start, but you’re not, Captain.”
“What are you trying to say?”
While teaching Encrid, Rem was also busy honing his own skills. It was obvious at a glance.
He was training harder than ever, sweating buckets.
Because of that, Dunbakel was having a hard time too, and the work of creating the unit Encrid had ordered before was pushed back.
Encrid did not force the matter.
He was not the sort to force things in the first place.
Krys also thought forming the unit was not urgent.
“Organizing the troops is important, but war isn’t going to break out right away. It’ll be at least a year before anything happens.”
That was how long it would take the king to stabilize the country.
Above all, after seeing the Border Guards’ policies, Naurilia had begun establishing outposts in every city connected to the capital.
It was as if the kingdom and the Border Guards were being built in the same mold.
Of course, Encrid would rather swing his sword one more time than waste time worrying over such things.
Anyway, Rem kept swinging his axe more faithfully than ever, whether the unit was formed or not.
In the middle of that, he was also sparring with Encrid, so his explanations may have been a little lacking.
“Right now, it’s not about truly using both hands. It’s this.”
“Explain. Hoo. Hooop, go on.”
Encrid stabbed the tip of his sword into the ground and caught his breath as he spoke.
Rem thought for a moment, then asked,
“Hey, can you write with your left hand?”
He couldn’t.
He could draw Blazeblade with his left hand and activate [Will of Swiftness], but he couldn’t write.
“If you’re going to use both hands anyway, then use both properly. Being half-assed is worse than not using them at all.”
He had no intention of insisting that Encrid fight with a weapon in each hand. But Rem was right.
If you had something, then you ought to use it properly.
Otherwise, it was meaningless.
At this point, only opponents remained who would not be affected by anything less than that.
The two days passed quickly, but this time Encrid delayed things. It was because Ruagarne stopped him.
Of course, it was also because Encrid was convinced.
“Put the spar off a little longer. You’ll ask why, right? Yes. You already know your skill won’t suddenly improve in just a few more days. But your mindset can be tempered. You can’t casually throw away what you learned from the Mercenary King, can you?”
Ruagarne was not the type to hand over the answer to everything immediately.
Realizing it on your own came first. To help with that, she would offer assistance, but she would not state the answer outright.
That was Ruagarne’s way.
Encrid delayed it by a few more days.
During that time, he practiced writing with his left hand and eating with it too.
“If you’ve built flexible, strong muscles, then you need to use them for them to mean something, right? Brother.”
Audin also helped Encrid.
Encrid learned a few more techniques from the Valaf Style.
One joint-locking technique and one striking technique.
Not every technique needed a name.
Ragna simply watched all of that in silence.
During that time, though his handwriting was still poor, Encrid became able to write letters with his left hand.
He had to send a reply to the personal letter that had come from Krang anyway.
Krys, seeing that, curiously asked about the contents of the letter from the king.
“What does it say?”
It was probably about offering this and that in order to keep the King of the East in check.
Wasn’t it the letter that had arrived after word of the Mercenary King spread?
Seeing the letter arrive, Krys had been inwardly worried.
His prediction had been far off.
“It’s basically a complaint about how sitting on the throne really isn’t something anyone should do.”
“A complaint?”
Encrid nodded.
At a time like this?
Is Krang strange, or is our Captain strange?
Krys couldn’t tell.
Anyway, the reply Encrid sent back was simple.
If you’re going to do it, then do it properly.
Encrid put down the quill in his left hand, then clenched and opened that hand.
‘It’s lacking.’
He couldn’t make his left hand the same as his right overnight. But he felt as though he understood what Ruagarne had meant. So he stood from his seat and went outside.
The sun was directly overhead, and the day was brighter than ever. Under the cloudless sky, the scent of heat stabbed into his nose.
The smell of heated stone, the smell of dry earth, the fresh smell of grass—they were all mixed together. It wasn’t a bad day.
It was supposed to be two days, as agreed with Ragna, but a full week had passed.
Ragna waited obediently.
During that time, Ragna became certain that he could control his sword perfectly.
Even when swinging with all his might, he could stop after cutting a single strand of hair. He could stop perfectly without leaving even a red line on skin.
If he had done it after just two days, he might have ended the spar by cutting off an arm. But not now.
“You made me wait a long time.”
It was the center of the training ground. Ragna had stood there every day, swinging his sword alone in the same spot.
To an outside eye, it didn’t look like he was training in some grand swordsmanship. If anything, it looked like a string of sword swings even sloppier than before.
To one side, Rem sat in a chair he had made himself, his arms folded.
Next to him, Audin sat on a large rock he had brought from somewhere and was using as a chair.
Dunbakel, Teresa, Pell, and Roford—they all seemed to be watching too.
Jaxson was absent again today, and Esther too.
Both had plenty of things keeping them busy.
Encrid paid no attention to anyone’s gaze.
He took up his sword and aimed. The tip of Aker became a point directed at his opponent.
Intimidation, pressure born of [Will], reached Ragna.
Ragna was unaffected.
To Encrid, Ragna did not seem particularly oppressive. If anything, he seemed weaker than before.
“If you miss, you die.”
The instant those words left Ragna’s mouth—
It was beyond perception. Even [Eyes That See an Inch Ahead] could not catch it; only instinct barely reacted.
Before he knew it, Ragna’s sword hilt had grazed his thigh.
It was a slash from an unexpected angle.
It was also a speed and timing that did not even leave room for the thought of blocking with Aker.
Relying on instinct, Encrid barely managed to shift his center of gravity backward. Thanks to that, his body leaned away and escaped a fatal wound.
The black hilt swept across the thin fabric of his pants. Blood slowly seeped from the torn spot and soaked into the cloth.
From that single strike alone, he understood.
“Knight?”
Encrid murmured.
“Beginning stage.”
Ragna answered flatly. Rem, who was watching, found that indifferent attitude even more irritating and spoke up.
“A bastard like Spenadul.”
Spenadul was a Western curse. Literally, it meant a bastard who smoked cigarettes through his anus.
In Western usage, it also carried the deeper meaning of hoping for something through a pointless act, though in daily speech it was commonly used as an insult for a lazy person.
Naturally, it was a word no one else understood.
And even if they did, there was no reason to react.
Ragna still held his sword with the same indifferent attitude. The pitch-black greatsword made of incredibly heavy dark metal looked lighter than a shortsword in his one hand.
If he swung it like that, it looked as though the blade might bend like a whip.
He wasn’t particularly releasing any intimidation, but anyone who saw Ragna now would instinctively step back.
His sword looked like an unavoidable divine punishment, like a black lightning bolt that could fall from the sky at any moment.
Even though he had not yet swung it, everyone watching could already see the power the strike would carry.
Audin’s brow furrowed slightly. It was not a sword strike he could block while bound by Taboos.
Even before the sword fell, Teresa saw the illusion of her shield shattering.
Dunbakel broke out in cold sweat.
In her mind, she saw her own death. It was not a sword strike anyone should face if they wished to live.
The veins stood out on the hand Pell used to grip Demon Slayer.
Roford recalled the true Knight of the royal guard he had seen only once.
Roford, too, understood it clearly.
Ruagarne stood off to one side, silently watching Encrid.
Everyone was tense.
That was what a Knight was. A natural disaster that changed even the air around it simply by existing. A calamity.
And if that calamity stood before you with a sword in hand? If that sword were aimed at you?
Ruagarne’s bulging eyes were fixed not on Ragna, who had reached the beginning stage of a Knight, but on Encrid.
To be precise, she couldn’t tear her eyes away.
‘He’s smiling?’
Encrid was smiling.
It was the same smile he had worn when the Ferryman first told him that he would die now, that a wall would block him, and that he had to repeat today.
No one would know that, but it was true.
Encrid laughed.
Whoosh.
The black lightning bolt came without thunder. The soundless blade looked as though it would split Encrid in two.
Clang!
Of course, that did not happen.
Drip, drip.
Encrid had raised his swords above his forehead to block, but the force shoved him back, and one of his own blades grazed his forehead.
Just before the black lightning bolt fell, he had crossed Aker and Gladius to block.
The timing had been razor-thin, but he blocked it.
As he forcibly twisted Gladius, the edge scraped the skin of his forehead, and that was where the blood came from.
It wasn’t just a little. The blood dripping down stained Encrid’s face red.
And yet, he did not close his eyes.
It wasn’t because some new enlightenment had come to him.
Encrid was a wanderer who had spent his life searching for methods, losing his way, and roaming in search of signposts.
He was a madman who had stitched together dreams that had been torn to shreds and woven them into something that brought him this far.
That was why this moment was joyful.