Kraiss sat in the shade to escape the afternoon sun and thought.
There was a man who said he would plant an apple tree even if the continent ended tomorrow.
What was that man's name again?
Was it Martin? Spiza? He couldn't remember exactly.
But he knew the name of this one. Enkrid. Rem, beside him, had said it.
"Geez, they say the Devil's lackey has arrived, and he's as steady as ever."
It was the day after the Devil's lackey came. During the afternoon training hour, a man with a sword stood out front. Black hair, blue eyes—the leader of this group.
Enkrid, commander of the Mad Order of Knights.
In the world, he was called the Devil-Slayer, the savior of the realm, guardian of the Border Guard, the king's friend, the demonic knight, the heartbreaker, the butcher of monsters, and so on.
"And he frankly deserves the alias Balrog Slayer on top of that."
Amusingly, the first to react to that feat weren't the continent, but the Demon Realm.
"Well, once rumors spread, of course there'll be an uproar."
Kraiss remembered Abnaier, jaw unhinged at the words that Enkrid had killed Balrog.
Even that man, who claimed composure was his greatest weapon, had been that shocked.
What about everyone else?
Should he discreetly leak the news to the trade city he'd recently opened ties with?
They were already yielding here and there, but if they heard "Balrog Slayer," they'd make concessions several times greater than this.
Trade cities are quick on the uptake.
He had no intention of exploiting them, so there was no real need to tell them.
If asked why he didn't need to press it to exploitation, he'd say it was because of the man up there. Because these were things born of a human named Enkrid.
"Conscience, standards, conviction."
In short, a decision woven from such things.
"It's an ideal form, but for this to last, the trade city needs to share the same mind."
Abnaier, watching, let out a bitter remark, and Kraiss nodded as if it were only natural.
"Yeah, of course."
He knew it. If the other side turned its back, what they were doing now—at best—was playing the fool.
But—
"If the captain stands firm…"
Then the trade city, or anyone else, wouldn't be able to just act as they pleased.
"But if the captain gets taken by the Devil?"
Oh, even imagining it wrapped a horrible foreboding around his heart. The present situation approached like an honed blade and pressed against his throat. Kraiss's head throbbed.
Is this okay? It isn't. Ordinarily he should have already packed up and bolted. But that thought didn't come to him now.
Even with the cold edge touching his neck so that a bead of blood seemed to roll down, he could endure it.
Why?
"I've invested a lot here too."
He told himself that inwardly, but he knew the real reason was different. Kraiss, too, had been moved by his captain.
Still, that didn't mean he wanted to say some saccharine line about protecting people.
There are times when you recognize your change but don't want to admit it.
"They say men are just boys, even when they're grown."
It was something he often heard from his lover. Kraiss simply didn't want to say anything sappy.
If you show it by action, it amounts to the same thing anyway.
"Isn't this a bit dangerous?"
At any rate, Nurat beside him did voice concern. No doubt, from now on, unanticipated events would hammer down without pause.
"Yeah."
Kraiss answered evenly.
"Still okay with it?"
She was his lover. She knew how he would respond.
"Yeah."
Kraiss answered briefly and, anxiety and all, kept his mind turning.
"Are all Devils the same?"
No. There was a Frog, who carved ornaments, and a giant who had joined a church. That was the nature of individuals surpassing the traits of their race.
"Devils will be even more self-willed than that."
With their headcount small, their collective traits would be blurry.
"There'll be stubborn ones, ones who bear grudges, ones who rush to retaliate right away…"
And some who would watch from the sidelines.
Whatever the case, Kraiss judged he had to prepare for varied situations. With that thought, he opened his mouth.
"Add one more soldier to each secure route and…"
He trailed off, and Nurat asked back:
"Add—and?"
What more should they do? Is it even possible to predict Devils' responses?
If he relaxed for even a moment, unease would lunge up and smack his head. Kraiss's gaze drifted toward Enkrid.
There he stood, the man honing himself as he swung his sword.
Unshaken in any moment, straight as ever.
Like a reassuring wall, or a rampart.
He hadn't changed a bit from the day he declared he would be a knight to now.
Even when the Devil's lackey came and said whatever he said, not a nick was made in that will.
"I protect those who stand behind me."
Uttering such words, he made the end of war—war's end—his knightly creed, and the eradication of every Demon Realm on the continent.
"Hey—tch—one round?"
Beside him, a gray-haired barbarian thrust out an axe. That barbarian, too, seemed not the least interested in the Devil's lackey having come. In other words, it was business as usual.
"Do I have to get in line?"
Squire Lawford and Pel held the back, and Dunbakel—reading the mood—cut ahead of Rem and rushed Enkrid.
Without a word, without a signal, she shot a fist—Enkrid calmly slapped it aside with the flat of his blade.
Clack!
With a dull sound, the two began to circle.
In step with Dunbakel's three-dimensional maneuver tactics, Enkrid's feet began to dance.
Of course, to Kraiss's eyes, not all of that was visible.
"Knights are a calamity."
Nurat murmured.
If that calamity is on our side, shouldn't we call it something else?
"Not a calamity, a blessing."
Kraiss muttered.
"You all seem to be enjoying yourselves. Brothers."
Soon, Audin and Teresa returned from an all-night service.
"Are they gone?"
At some point, Jaxon had come back and was studying the traces of battle, mumbling to himself. In that "gone?" was no doubt the meaning, "Did you kill them off?"
"A blade that's not eaten by heat."
And the genius who loses his way at the drop of a hat muttered something no one could parse as he showed up with Luagarne. The moment he arrived, his gaze was stolen by Enkrid's bout.
"Cut in line and I'll plant an axe in the back of your head."
The barbarian, cut off by the beastwoman, spoke in a voice full of pique, but the path-loser ignored him.
"Oh-ho."
Luagarne's eyes rolled left and right without rest, bulging.
Grrrk.
Frokk's cheeks puffed as he watched Dunbakel's movement and Enkrid's answers to it.
The fairy and the witch were inside the Fairy City to recover.
"They say a Devil bastard came?"
Not that he was a replacement for them, but the tree-giant who flew into a rage at the mere word "Devil" was here.
Puff.
Bran, the Woodguard, exhaled smoke. Every time Kraiss saw it, he could never get used to a Woodguard clamping a lit roll of leaf between his teeth.
Seeing all this let the unease settle. Ridiculously, relief raised its head.
Kraiss hadn't expected the Devil to send a lackey. But because he didn't know what might happen, he had poured Krona and time into training the Border Guard's standing army.
It was an investment not even the homeland, Crang included—and the capital—knew in detail. No, even a decent information guild would have missed it.
From the start, the Mad Order of Knights drew every eye, so of course it went unnoticed.
The Krona funneled into the Border Guard standing army were astronomical. And the ones who took on their training in full were the entire Mad Order.
Those influenced by them became commanders, and those commanders, in turn, exerted similar influence on other soldiers.
"If the captain is an epidemic, the rest are a plague to match."
You could see it that way.
"Ah, this is fun."
In the middle of it, Enkrid drove a mid-level roundhouse into Dunbakel's ribs and knocked her away, then spoke.
With his right leg still raised in the air and his left foot alone on the ground. Even standing on one leg, his sense of balance was exceptional. No wobble. As always.
The struck beastwoman twisted in midair and dropped back into place, then bounded backward with little hops.
It wasn't that there was no shock from the hit, but with absurd athleticism she bled it off. It was like showing a soft-sword form with the body itself.
In principle it resembled Audin's torso-slipping, but the method was a completely different body-work.
"Saying that after you hit me—now that's infuriating."
Drip.
Her body wasn't as hard as a giant's, but a beastwoman's physique was stout all the same; yet a nosebleed ran. She hadn't bled off all the force carried in Enkrid's kick.
"What was that last part?"
Dunbakel asked, and Rem cut in.
"What do you mean, you stinking beastwoman?"
And the one who was actually surprised was Audin.
"Sacred Infiltration?"
Ragna's eyes changed too. A moment ago, Enkrid's Will had changed. Indules. And that change was different from before.
It wasn't hard as a wall; it ran like water, seeping into the opponent.
Enkrid let the hand holding his sword hang loose and said calmly,
"Enkrid-style combat technique: Seep-in Strike."
Rem, without a hint of a smile, said,
"…Don't name it yourself."
In truth, he'd just named it on the spot. Enkrid smiled. With a bright grin, he crooked a finger.
"One at a time."
The Devil's lackey has come? And so what? Are we supposed to lose our nerve? To fret and agonize?
No—spending that time to swing the sword one more time would be the right call.
"But how many people can truly say they understand that?"
Kraiss asked himself, and answered himself.
"More than a few."
There were people like that here. Every last one of them was gathered here.
Watching them, Abnaier remembered those in Azpen who had lately argued that, for the sake of national autonomy, they should make an enemy of the Border Guard.
"I should tell them to have them all beheaded."
He wasn't actually going to take their heads, but you couldn't just leave alone those who'd place themselves outside the eyes of people who could nonchalantly spar even with a fight against Devils on the table.
***
The sunlight was warm.
Which meant, it was a good day for training.
Of course, if it rained, he still thought of it as a good day to train, so in truth there were no bad days for training.
Still, today was a day when the sunlight felt especially good.
Between clouds dotted like islands across the sky, the blue shone vividly.
Last night, it had seemed as though starlight would pour down. Even so, he preferred days like this to those smothered by dark clouds.
'A clear day.'
A day when the sunlight wrapped around the heart.
Enkrid moved his body as he enjoyed the sun. Drenched in sweat, he worked each muscle one by one with the Isolation Technique.
'Better than before.'
Since strengthening his Will with Indules, making it like a fortress wall, his body had changed as if in response—muscle quality tougher, denser.
'Still, I won't ever be like a giant.'
According to Luagarne, giants literally carved the letters of Will into their bodies. Instead of engraved weapons, they etched Will into their skin.
'Fury.'
And that Will was said to respond to a giant's emotions.
When stray thoughts surfaced, he let them be, moving as usual. The Devil's lackey wasn't in his head. All he did was give this day his full measure.
Each knight of the order moved for their own tasks, while Bran the Woodguard, here in place of the fairy and the witch, stayed behind like a bored onlooker.
"Every time I see you, the progress is astonishing."
He'd said that after hearing the words "Balrog Slayer."
"And still you let no day pass in vain."
At that moment, his face had been one of admiration. Or so Enkrid guessed. However sharp one's intuition, it was hard to read the expression of a fairy covered in bark.
"Fairies have learned to temper emotion and pass their days dryly, but now even we must change…"
With those words, Bran departed.
At one point, Luagarne came by and they spoke of this and that.
"Our unit's finally worth something in its own way."
Rem reported on his unit's training. Not exactly a report—closer to boasting.
"That path-lost bastard, does he even train those ten properly?"
He didn't. At best he sparred with them now and then.
Even so, Ragna had ten swordsmen under him. It was almost entirely Lawford's share to actually teach them.
Pel came saying he was researching a new technique.
Anne complained about her situation with Ragna.
"I wish sometimes he'd come to me first."
She meant she always had to seek him out if she wanted to see him. Enkrid cleared the misunderstanding.
"He can't find the way alone."
"Ah."
Anne realized, then went back. Her workshop wasn't in the middle of the city, but tucked away in the inner walls, in a corner. Naturally, her room was near the workshop. For Ragna, finding the way there was far too convoluted.
After sending off all those who had come, Enkrid immersed himself again in training, and before he knew it, time had flown.
Today's sunset was golden.
On a clear day, the sun sank very slowly, the sky's colors changing with its descent until gold was strung across one side of the heavens.
Shadows fell over clouds, and every tree or structure was split between sides touched by light and those left dark.
The time of dog and wolf—they called it the hour when one cannot distinguish the four-legged beasts veiled in shadow.
It was Enkrid's favorite time of day. He paused, stopped hand and foot, and looked up at the sky.
Perhaps today shouldn't be called the time of dog and wolf, but the hour when gold lights the world.
"A fine sky to look at."
"Indeed."
It was Esther. She came up and stood beside him.