Claaaang-!

Esther took in Callius and Emily’s forms at a glance, as they sparred.

At first, she couldn’t believe they were father and daughter, but the more she watched, the more alike they felt.

It was a gradual process that became more and more evident during battle.

Don’t parents say that their children are ‘a chip off the old block’?

Emily dancing with her sword somehow looked like Callius’ spitting image.

Esther, who was silently watching them spar, couldn’t shake off that thought for some reason.

“It’s really nice to see them together, isn’t it? You know, I couldn’t believe it at first either.”

“You are…”

“Orphin.”

“Ah, yes. Sir Orphin.”

“By the way, the more you look at them, the more they somehow resemble each other, doesn’t it?”

“Emily seems to be taking it a bit too far.”

There was a saying that daughters resembled their fathers.

Indeed, Emily spoke and acted like one would expect from Callius’ daughter. And even her swordsmanship was beginning to resemble him.

Unlike a normal child, she never changed her expression while speaking, and even the look in her eyes whenever she tried to drive others away was the same as her father.

‘She’s so similar that it’s a bit unsettling…’

For example, when she ridiculed or criticized someone, she’d subtly curl up the corners of her lips in a vexing smirk.

Seeing them spar, anybody could tell that they were father and daughter.

A wave of complicated and subtle emotions surged through Esther at the thought.

“I’m pretty worried, though.”

“What are you worried about?”

“He still has to get married. He’s still young, shouldn’t he find a partner and have more children?”

In this day and age, nobody knew when and where another war would break out. Wasn’t it the duty of a noble to have at least two or three children, if only for the sake of the family?

‘Well, it’s true that he’s a noble.’

A noble among nobles, in Carpe.

One of the four great noble houses, the Jervain, whose dark hair and sharp beauty were praised often by poets and bards.

The fact that such an aristocratic scion has an illegitimate child, couldn’t be called a bad thing.

In the first place, he’d never been officially married, so the ladies who were honestly interested wouldn’t care.

Besides, he’d inherited the rank of count, and he would be the Lord of the North once he returned home.

Callius was exactly the sort of marriage partner that all young noblewomen who dreamed of a charmed life longed for.

“But the count doesn’t seem interested in marriage.”

“… Is that so?”

“Yeah, the topic came up once while he was in the North, but he just cut it off.”

Rather than just cutting it off, it’d be better to say he’d ripped it to pieces.

The scene where Callius had overturned the table and railed at his father, was still vivid in Orphin’s memory.

“It was when Sir Helena stopped by and there was talk of arranging a marriage. He said he already had an heir, so there wasn’t any need to look. That was my first time seeing him so angry.”

Esther’s eyebrows furrowed slightly.

At hearing Helena’s name.

Orphin’s eyesight wasn’t bad enough to not notice that momentary change.

“What is it?”

“A-ah, nothing. Maybe there’s someone that he loves? Since he was that angry.”

“…?”

Something was wrong with Esther’s expression.

She was making a strangely happy face.

Orphin was puzzled, but she didn’t intend to pry.

“That would be welcome news. Anyway, I started complaining at our first meeting, didn’t I? My apologies.”

“No, no. It was nice to hear such an interesting story. And we’ll definitely meet from time to time in the future, so feel free to share! If you have any more stories like this, I mean.”

“Of course. It was an honour to meet you, Sir Esther.”

Esther’s steps as she took position to teach the children again, seemed very light for some reason.

“Did something good happen, I wonder?”

Orphin didn’t know.

After watching the bloody, no-holds-bared spar between father and daughter for a few more moments, she went back to her own training.

“Instructor[1] Esther? Why are you smiling?”

It was Flora who’d spoken up.

Was she smiling?

Esther touched her face for a moment and denied it.

“I didn’t smile.”

“You did though, I saw you!”

Maybe it was because Sullivian’s words kept ringing in her ears.

Hmmm, it felt good to be outside on a sunny day.

“It’s a nice day, isn’t it?”

“Really, the weather today’s perfect for doing laundry.”

“Since the weather’s so good, let’s run to the mountaintop and back.”

“Eh? What does a good weather have to do with that!?”

Esther said confidently as she looked at Flora and the children who were crying.

“The power behind the sword comes from the lower body, don’t you know? The last place get a hundred extra swings.”

Esther started running in the lead.

Clang- clang-!

The smithy of the Church.

An ingot and a furnace.

Gregory was working, but suddenly noticing a rising shadow, he stopped his hammer.

“You back already?”

“Yes. It wasn’t hard.”

The shadow that rose like ink was naturally Helena.

She was holding a wooden box by her side, and Gregory could intuit what was inside without having to ask.

It was Gregory himself who’d entrusted Helena with this quest.

“Yeah, travel’s pretty quick if I ride the shadows. Besides, someone got there ahead of me.”

Helena was a little suspicious as to why Callius had been there.

Was it bad luck or good?

Callius was there to uncover Count Valentine’s corruption and kill him, but the guilty party died and became a sword that slaughtered his own knights.

How the world turned!

“Hmm…”

Gregory sighed deeply as he received the wooden box from Helena.

Many emotions flashed in his eyes.

“Gid is dead.”

“… How were his final moments?”

“Well, by the time I arrived, he’d already gotten his head chopped off.”

Gregory and Gid.

They had originally been fellow students, and they’d had a special bond of friendship, but one day they’d come to a parting of the ways.

“Gid, he… changed at some point.”

The image of him excitedly comparing the methods of the empire with Carpe’s, talking about some research notes he’d found somewhere, was still vivid in Gregory’s mind’s eye.

How pure had he been in his pursuit of the sword!

“We once agreed that we’d make a sword together.”

“Did you?”

Gregory shook his head.

The empire’s methods Gid had found by chance were terrifying.

“I could never quite agree with the idea that even death row inmates should be tortured to inscribe emotions deep within their bones. No matter how sinful they might be, this is something no human should ever do.”

But Gid had criticized Gregory for flinching in the face of progress.

“Everyone has a different opinion about what sword to offer to God.”

“That’s right. How can I offer a sword I made by killing death row prisoners to my God? It should be made by honouring a truly worthy death, instead.”

Gregory glanced at the wooden box, shook his head, and asked Helena.

“Did he finish his sword?”

“Yeah, and it made quite a mess.”

“What happened to it?”

“I left it behind. It felt too ominous to take with me. I heard that it was made with the lives of a hundred knights… It was never going to be a normal sword.”

Having a scabbard didn’t mean she didn’t covet other swords. But Helena found that particular one quite repulsive.

“Transforming a hundred knights into a sword. Honestly, how did he even come up with that idea?”

“If you look at the old records of our Church, there are occasional records of such things. People always make the same mistakes over and over again… The empire still does it.”

“See, this is why I hate them. They’ve got no romance, no romance at all.”

“From the empire’s point of view, this is romance. It’s said that they gather the leaders of defeated enemy nations and turn them into a single spear.”

Because of this, the empire had a large collection of bizarre and impure spears.

But it was also an example, a sign.

Of the cruelty that was required to form an empire.

“Enough to devour multiple nations and assimilate them.”

“Anyway, I didn’t want to get involved, so I left it alone. I thought something weird might happen if I touched it.”

“Possibly. Perhaps your mind would’ve been devoured by that sword. That’s a demonic sword truly worth the title. It has to be managed or sealed by the Church.”

Gregory put down the hammer that’d been clenched in his hand and asked.

“Who got that sword, in the end?”

Helena’s head tilted as she looked at Gregory.

He’d most likely try to ‘retrieve’ the sword from Callius, to put it mildly.

It wasn’t a good sword to have, but… that didn’t mean it needed to be parted from its current owner.

‘He took it, so he must have a countermeasure.’

From what she’d seen so far –

He wasn’t that much of an idiot.

The man who’d even managed to steal her gold coins after being saved three years ago, was no fool.

“Someone took it. There probably won’t be any problems.”

“Is he a good person?”

Helena’s ambiguous response made Gregory raise his eyebrows.

“Even if he has that sword, he won’t go crazy. That’s the type of person he is.”

“Eh…”

Gregory tilted his head in disbelief. However, he leaned towards trusting the judgment of Helena, the highest of the Five Stars.

“… I believe in your judgment.”

“So, what about my reward?”

“Like I said before, the convoys of ingots that go through the West will be left to the Bolivian Merchant Group to manage.”

The corners of Helena’s lips rose so sharply that they were about to reach her ears.

“Gid? So he died in the end?”

A dark space, with only a single lit candle providing some illumination.

An old voice and a young one flowed through the silence.

“Yes. He died cleanly.”

“So it must’ve been a failure.”

“Yes, the sword was completed quite successfully, but the timing wasn’t right.”

“Hm?”

The sword was completed, then why was the timing not good?

It was something he couldn’t understand, but after hearing what the other party had to say next, the old man stroked his beard that’d been cut vertically in half.

“Although the sword was completed, a lion and a wolf faced it side by side, and at the end even a snake appeared to deal the final blow.”

A lion, a wolf, and a snake.

A really haphazard combination.

“Tch, he got really unlucky. He should’ve been a little more careful. I thought all the baits I sprinkled in his path would now show their true value… how unfortunate.”

A middle-aged man with a half-cut beard –

Bishop Milliman, clicked his tongue in disappointment. He’d prepared it for a long time.

Just as one of the many arrangements he had sown was about to sprout, Callius had ruined it. Again.

“Yes, it’s the worst outcome. Even Count Valentine is gone, and the plan to stop Callius has gone up in smoke.”

“Don’t worry, don’t we have still have our prince?”

Yes, the prince.

The prince who had gone mad with a single mistaken touch of a sword.

“Power is such an alluring thing. Even the proud prince became such a monster by pursuing it. But we should still take advantage of what little use remains in him.”

“It’ll happen soon, then.”

“Yes, it’s coming soon. In just a little while, our great cause will start.”

Carpe had to collapse once.

So that it could rise again, greater and stronger.

“At long last, it’s time for war. Our long-awaited war. Aren’t you looking forward to it too?”

Bishop Milliman looked at the young-looking man and asked.

“Aren’t you, Orcal?”

Editor’s Notes:

[1] 교관 (lit. instructor) is often used in a military context, e.g. a drill sergeant. See Namu Wiki.