‘I didn’t expect him to come out that excited.’
This was something else. He was charging in like a child who had waited all year for a present.
That was how Valmung saw the count. Was he not acting like a child greeting the day he had waited and waited for?
‘He wasn’t even that bad when he received his sword and shield from the emperor.’
Values and perspectives differed from person to person.
And it was not as though he completely failed to understand.
‘Seeing that bastard does make your blood boil. Though having your blood boil the moment you see him and charging in feels like the realm of perversion.’
That bastard Enkrid had a talent for making a person’s hands itch and want to have a fight just by looking at him.
On top of that, the Margrave lived in a different world from Valmung, so Valmung guessed he must have been even more desperate. If Valmung was a stray dog, that man was a guard dog.
Not that anyone would compare him and the count to dogs.
“Is that attitude the reason he’s called Count Coty?”
Crang asked on the way inside. Behind him, he caught a glimpse of the count’s back as the man went at it with Rem.
He blocked and struck from where he stood. Crang had no eyes for recognizing the exquisite swordsmanship mixed into that simple motion, so he simply watched. Seriana also looked in the same direction as Crang and said,
“In the Empire, they say you’re not the real thing unless the Margrave acknowledges you.”
It was a nasty hobby, but he was so sincere about it that everyone acknowledged it. Even the emperor had nodded along.
“Let him do what he’s been doing. He says he enjoys it. Besides, he’s good at it.”
Receiving the emperor’s recognition in the Empire was no easy thing. That was how much effort Count Coty put into his hobby. Moreover, he even had his own standards for classifying knights.
“That sounds like an interesting story.”
Crang showed interest. Seriana found the king before her curious again. Leaving aside political viewpoints or relations, was he not showing pure interest?
He was literally asking again because it sounded entertaining. This man had just crossed the Empire’s border. From his position, he had reached enemy territory, and one of the guardian generals protecting that border had charged at him out of nowhere.
‘And yet he doesn’t know how to be flustered.’
He had been surprised by the fact that he was facing a giant count, but there was no panic. Part of the reason she had not told him beforehand had been that she wanted to see the king surprised, but it had not worked at all.
Would the king not know her intention? Impossible.
‘He knows, and still.’
He simply let it pass. He did not bother wasting little pieces of his mind on trivial matters. This was probably what people meant when they said someone’s vessel was different.
“Yes. Count Coty calls knights who have only just entered the path unripe, soft ones.”
“That sounds like intuitive naming.”
“The knights who hear it have every right to be offended, but he then suppresses that with strength, and those who are suppressed work to earn his recognition. In that sense, it inspires ambition.”
Seriana smiled softly. She, too, was beautiful. Crang looked not at her face, but toward Valmung.
“You seem like someone who would have gotten along with this Count Coty.”
“I played with him a few times. The stage after soft was ripe, and after ripe came seasoned. He called me seasoned.”
Soft, ripe, and seasoned.
He divided knights into three stages above the rest. To Crang, for some reason, it did not sound all that different from the beginner, intermediate, and advanced knights Enkrid had once told him about.
“The count said in private that even within seasoned, there are standards of their own, but by that point, they are people who have already achieved something on their own path.”
Seriana added.
“You know a great deal about it.”
Did an executor take interest in this sort of thing too? Her stamina was not at a pathetic level, but she did not look as though she had devoted effort to training either.
That was why it was acceptable for her to stay close to Crang.
Conversely, Jaxon was always positioned between Crang and the female assassin with the twin braids, whose signs of training were obvious.
“For the sake of fairness, the count compiled his standards for viewing knights into a book and distributed it.”
He truly was serious about this.
The guardian general suddenly looked impressive in a new way. Whatever it was, those who immersed themselves in one thing like that and fulfilled their dream were bound to be respected.
‘Enki would especially like him.’
His actions, yes, but also what he had accomplished so far, and even his way of life.
“Soft knight, ripe knight, seasoned knight. Three in total, then. Is there no next stage?”
“He says that beyond that, he would not dare measure them himself, so he has not attached a name.”
Crang could not gauge a knight’s skill just by looking.
‘Enki, what level are you now?’
Curiosity abruptly raised its head.
Should one call it a succession of violent fights?
He was a giant, but because he had overcome his instincts, the count had earned the name Coty. He was an eccentric who honed his skills in order to choose the knight of the year.
When he focused on blocking, dodging, and enduring, he was like the gate he protected. That was why his other epithet was the Knight of the Gate of Steel.
Rem’s axe happily hammered and struck the shield. Even so, he could not simply continue attacking without thought.
The count shoved with his shield and thrust in with his sword whenever he saw the slightest opening. Every one of those motions aimed for those gaps with truly proper timing. Rem half enjoyed it.
‘This is.’
In a way, it was like sparring with the captain. That did not mean he could get heated the way he did with the captain.
‘I’ll kill him at this rate.’
Rem cooled the rising heat by one breath. No matter how well the other side received it, he could not cross the line.
Rem swung the axe in his right hand horizontally, struck the shield, then bounced lightly back.
“Splendid.”
Temares, who had been watching from behind, burst out in admiration. Leaving skill aside, his restraint was first-rate. Temares was dragonkin, so he had mind-reading eyes, eyes that read what lay within. In terms of insight alone, it would be difficult for any species to surpass dragonkin.
Should one call them natural masters of the true sword?
Count Coty revealed only his yellow eyes beyond the shield as he stopped moving. Even standing still, a strange force poured from his whole body. Hot steam rose over the shield in time with the breaths he exhaled. The reason he had stopped was obvious: he had read his opponent’s intention. Here, his opponent had deliberately broken the flow.
“You didn’t have to stop on purpose, did you?”
Had it not been getting interesting? It also felt as though something more might come out if they continued.
The words came out because he was disappointed.
“Figured I’d spare you, since if we kept going, I was about to take off one of your arms.”
Rem said it with a sly grin. The count burst out laughing too. A giant’s laughter was like a shout exploding inside a deep cave. The air trembled from the hearty laughter alone.
The count knew Rem’s words were not empty. Of course, if it was a fight between seasoned knights who had reached this level, one would have to go all the way to know.
“Rem, that was splendid.”
Enkrid raised a thumb at the patience of the barbarian from the West. Had he not stopped without seeing it through to the end and left the tastiest part behind?
He had left the great chunk of meat on the ribs, torn off only a little to taste, and stopped.
“What else was I supposed to do when you were standing behind me making it that obvious you were waiting your turn?”
Had Enkrid not been showing his presence from behind for a while now, as if saying he was next?
In any case, when it came to loving fights, he was the best on the continent. One should perhaps call it crossing swords rather than loving fights, but to Rem, it was all the same.
“My betrothed, you truly haven’t changed at all.”
Shinar laughed. A faint smile lingered on the fairy’s face. She had not managed to complete the epic she wanted, but this moment was quite enjoyable.
Simply traveling beside Enkrid was fun. She was also highly satisfied by the fact that, as soon as she arrived, she had disposed of one wicked fox that had been cleverly hovering around him.
Esther had no particular thoughts. Since she had found peace, she was merely thinking of spells as usual.
In a way, the witch Esther was also single-minded. She did not worry about Astrail’s next move or the demons’ schemes.
‘If I live like this and die, is that all?’
No. She wanted to live. Now she had a dream too. She only knew that doing what she could do now was better than worrying.
That was a truth the man named Enkrid had taught her. Today—no, even now, he held fast to the attitude that had supported his life.
“Are you going to rest?”
At the question, asked in a tone full of anticipation, the count shook his head.
“I’m just right.”
Some people needed to move their bodies a suitable amount before their stamina or ability to handle Will rose. Count Coty described that as being like heated iron, while others simply said he had strong staying power. He was that type.
Enkrid lifted his sword. As though they had made a promise, the two soon walked over from either side and faced each other. The moment they faced each other, Today struck the shield.
Thoom!
Their sparring was long. They crossed blades until sunset. At first, several of the count’s adjutants guarded the surroundings, but midway through, when Rem said, “Those two are going to keep at it until tonight,” and went inside, the adjutants also left their posts.
Only one person, the knight who had first been beaten by Enkrid, remained and watched the sparring to the very end.
“You really are fun.”
Only when night came and two moons had risen did the count end the fight with admiration.
“It’s not Uske, so what is it?”
Enkrid asked. There was no sign that he was tired. That did not mean there was no fatigue at all, though.
“You split your Will, use it sparingly, and make back as much as you need each time. When you really don’t have enough, you endure with your body. Uske isn’t the only answer. On the continent, they only talk about Uske and Induress, don’t they? Uske is too abstruse and difficult to achieve. It’s dangerous too. So the Empire opened other paths as well.”
The words came pouring out.
Restauratio, meaning restoration. If one could not use an undrying well through Uske, it meant gathering up as much of the scattered water as possible and using it again.
More precisely, it was a method of restoring Will even while fighting.
“Once you become accustomed to Restauratio, it develops into Iterum, and Iterum is using Will whole once again, as it was at the beginning. Once Iterum is perfected, it becomes Enovatio.”
“Enovatio?”
“It means experiencing your own Will changing completely. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?”
So, in the end, it was a road leading to Induress?
“Even in the Empire now, only one person has properly achieved that stage. The rest are somewhat clumsy. You want to meet that knight too, don’t you?”
The count asked, lifting the corner of his mouth. At the obvious question, Enkrid nodded.
“You’re saying it’s different from Induress?”
“Induress has a great deal that must be achieved, including changes in form and nature. That also needs to be subdivided somewhat.”
The count nodded at the words that it was different from a change in nature, then added that. This one was a giant and a researcher of swordsmanship. In some ways, it would be fair to consider him similar to Lua Gharne.
“Anyway, I can’t be bothered with that far.”
Rather than digging into swordsmanship itself, he found measuring people, ranking them, and competing more entertaining. He had suppressed a giant’s instincts, but if he merely locked all of that away, it would only burst inside him.
‘To control it, he focuses on this—competition and ranking games between knights.’
That was how a giant lived. The giant count, Coty, continued with his face still smiling.
“They say that when it becomes Enovatio, the purity of your Will changes. I haven’t experienced that myself, so I don’t know.”
A change in purity. For some reason, hearing those words made Enkrid think of the blond swordsman he had met before the Demon-lands.
‘Every movement was fast, and everything he had was different.’
The clearest difference was reaction speed. Knights were superhumans called disasters, and yet movements and reactions faster than those disasters were something he could not help being astonished by.
‘If I had died there.’
Would he still be struggling desperately to overcome that today?
Then should he see the present, where he was somehow still moving forward, as having gained another chance?
He did not know. There was no end if he looked back on what had passed and weighed each piece one by one. What had flowed past, he left as it had flowed.
He merely focused on the present and what had to be done now. Enkrid closed his eyes, then opened them, turning over again what the count had told him a moment ago.
There were many ways to handle Will. This count had taught him something new as well, and Enkrid found that extremely enjoyable.
“This is exciting.”
“I feel the same.”
The two mad swordsmen smiled at each other.
“Rest for today. The fatigue from the journey must have built up. It’s your first time in the Empire, after all.”
There had been no fatigue from the journey, and it was already too late to tell him to rest for today after they had just made such a noisy mess of playing.
Whatever the case, that was how the first day in the Empire came to an end.
They had been so absorbed in spending time together that they had not even noticed the sunset passing. The count who had said that also knew his opponent had gone easy on him quite a bit in the middle.
“I suppose it has to be you. Tomorrow, I’ll cross blades with the fairy and that dragonkin too, but, hmm, it’ll be you.”
The count finally left those words behind and turned away.

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