City of the Abyss, Artman (4)
Excalibur would not co out.
The Excalibur that had been erging from thin air suddenly caught on sothing with a clunk and stopped. Only the hilt in Najin's hand was exposed. The light-filled blade remained lodged in midair, completely still.
Najin frowned.
No matter how hard he pulled, the sword would not budge. Excalibur, which should have blazed the mont Najin touched it, gave off no light at all.
'What is this...'
Najin had drawn Excalibur before. The Sword of Selection had chosen him, and rlin, master of the Round Table, had acknowledged his right. No one could deny Najin's qualification.
【......】
Najin looked up. His gaze t that of a knight watching him from a hole at the top of the lighthouse towering over the city.
Only two arms and a face were visible.
The Rebel Knight, Mordred.
The traitor of the Round Table had a gaze that was not just sharp, but chilling. Under Mordred's stare, Najin felt as if even the depths of him were being pierced.
A powerhouse strong enough to make his body tremble.
A Transcendent stronger than anything Najin had ever faced. Only part of Mordred's true body had appeared outside the space, yet the entire space was already creaking, close to collapse.
A being too far above even a nine-star Transcendent's stage. And that being was about to be unleashed in the middle of the continent.
'I have to stop that.'
Najin knew it by instinct. He had to stop it. No matter what, he had to stop that monster from getting out.
If Mordred was released, if Mordred was added to the chaos created by the Carnival King, it would not end as re chaos. The continent would be shattered. Countless people would die, and the boundary between the continent and the Outland, perhaps all of Camlann's boundary, might collapse.
Doom. Destruction. Ruin. Ominous words flashed through Najin's mind. He tightened his grip.
Grinding his teeth, he yanked on the sword.
Najin knew. As he was now, he had no way to stop them. He could not even stop the lighthouse pulling Mordred out, let alone Mordred himself. That was why he had tried to borrow Excalibur's power.
If he could wield the Holy Sword, he could force a change.
Clack.
But because of that.
Excalibur refused to co out all the more. Najin could not understand why. Why now, at a mont like this, would the sword suddenly refuse to be drawn?
-Mordred used to be a knight of the Round Table.
Then rlin spoke.
-Excalibur is a sword completed by the stars of the Round Table together with Arthur's star. The stars of those who belonged to the Round Table are embedded in Excalibur. They are embedded, but...
She clenched her teeth.
-That is not the only reason you can't draw the sword right now.
Then what was it?
-Mordred has declared Excalibur to be "Arthur's sword." Not yours, Arthur's.
Najin looked at Excalibur, with only the hilt pulled free. Arthur's sword. Arthur's Excalibur. Najin still had not revealed himself as Excalibur's owner. Excalibur was still seen as Arthur's, not Najin's.
Mordred had pointed that out.
He had declared it through his own star embedded in the sword.
That Najin was still unqualified.
The Rebel Knight Mordred had always been the knight who tested whether a king was fit. He asked whether the king walked the right path, and if that path was wrong, Mordred's role was to stop the king even through rebellion.
That role itself was Mordred's Authority.
【You are not qualified.】
Mordred's Authority bore down on Najin.
If Najin had revealed earlier that he had drawn Excalibur, or if he had enough power to ignore Mordred's Authority, he might have drawn Excalibur now. But as things stood, it was impossible.
A Constellation with eleven stars.
A Transcendent with overwhelming rank.
That crushing gap in rank shackled Najin's body. rlin clenched her teeth. No one had expected this. The chains of the Round Table bound Mordred as he tried to step outside the crack, but...
The chains could not hold Mordred.
Because he had once belonged to the Round Table, because he was human, the Round Table's seal that bound Camlann's cursed ones who had strayed from providence worked loosely on Mordred alone.
"Ah, ahahaha!"
The lighthouse's laughter echoed.
Lighthouse that Illuminates the Abyss.
Burning every one of her stars and all the power she had built over four hundred years for the Abyss, the lighthouse guided Mordred. She shone Camlann's light through herself.
Mordred was being pulled out.
The Rebel Knight was returning to the continent once more.
Underground, where the night sky could not be seen, they could not tell, but the sky outside was in turmoil. Constellations shifted wildly, stars tied to the Round Table shook, and the Round Table, sensing the anomaly, began to move.
But it was late. Too late.
They could not leave Camlann's boundary, and it was difficult to project their power all the way to the center of the continent. As if it had been waiting for this exact mont, the Carnival King's star flashed.
Hundreds of stars churned. Moved. Raged.
Constellations tangled and collided, adding chaos to chaos. The Carnival King's curtain blocked the eyes and ears of the other stars. As if this ssy, chaotic stage was exactly her stage, the Carnival King and her jesters began to advance.
Cackle, cackle cackle cackle cackle!
Eight stars of the Lighthouse that Illuminates the Abyss.
And one star the Carnival King had given her.
Nine stars blazed brilliantly, dragging Mordred outside.
A situation no one had foreseen, a plan prepared over centuries, chaos designed by dozens of stars including the Carnival King, a continent swallowed by war, everything shing like gears and racing toward catastrophe.
Najin left Excalibur undrawn and moved to charge the lighthouse with his own sword.
At that mont.
Tap.
Soone's footsteps rang through the city.
2.
Lighthouse that Illuminates the Abyss.
She had dread of this day for a very long ti.
The "Lighthouse that Illuminates All Things," who had once built the underground city to affirm the depths of humanity and prove even those people had worth, was no longer here. She was already broken. At so point, in so way she could not even rember, her star had rotted away.
She had expected too much, then disappointed herself.
'Why did I ever hope for salvation?'
She could not rember anymore.
The continent would have remained peaceful if left alone, so why had she cried out for humanity's salvation? Why had she stirred up all this trouble in the na of saving humankind?
She could not rember why.
Then it must have been a mory not worth rembering.
Stained by the light of the Abyss, the lighthouse looked up at the sky in ecstasy. He is coming, the Rebel Knight is coming. The flas that will sweep away filth and purify the world are coming. To fulfill the salvation she longed for, the Witch of Camlann had personally sent her knight here.
Tap.
The lighthouse, who had been looking up at the sky,
at the sound of another tap,
looked down at the ground. A human had walked through the city and arrived here. White hair. Golden eyes. The mont their eyes t, hers widened.
There are mories that do not fade, even among countless others. Her mory of that man was one of them.
"It's been a while, Lighthouse."
"Eurypylus!"
The lighthouse smiled warmly.
"You ca at just the right ti, Eurypylus. I wanted to show this to you first, but... a guest arrived, you know? Still, I'm glad you're the second to see it."
As if she truly welcod him, she smiled at Eurypylus. There was not even a trace of hostility in her expression. Of course there was not. Eurypylus had always stood on her side, no matter the circumstances.
"Looks like a lot has happened."
The Lighthouse Keeper shrugged, as if she was impossible, and looked at the lighthouse. With a faint smile, he looked over the city. A city pulsing like a living thing, and the being of Camlann she was trying to send into the world through this city...
And.
"..."
Even the young man glaring this way. Eurypylus looked at Najin with eyes unlike the ones he gave the lighthouse, eyes gone cold.
Najin clenched his teeth.
With the lighthouse, Mordred, and now the Lighthouse Keeper added to the field, he had no idea what to do. Leaving Najin there, the Lighthouse Keeper spoke.
"So."
He looked at the lighthouse.
"Is this the salvation you spoke of?"
"Yes."
"It's different from what I imagined."
"Well, I realized it too."
The lighthouse spread her hands as she spoke.
About how terrible what she had seen was.
She had seen the depths of humanity he spoke of, seen how worthless humans were, seen that human nature was evil in the end, and concluded that salvation for them was not rescue but total incineration.
"I was wrong from the beginning."
The lighthouse continued her long speech.
"Right? I expected too much from humans in the first place. It took a long detour, but now that I've reached the answer, isn't that enough?"
"That's your answer?"
The Lighthouse Keeper only asked. When the lighthouse nodded, he smiled.
"One last question."
"As much as you want."
"Why did you cry out for salvation?"
At that, the lighthouse could not answer.
Because she did not rember.
One second, ten seconds, one minute.
The lighthouse, who had answered every question instantly until now, stayed silent for more than a minute. When a minute had passed, the Lighthouse Keeper said quietly,
"Looks like you forgot."
He smiled.
The lighthouse's expression hardened.
"Is that important?"
"Who knows. At least, it must have been important to you."
"To you?"
"Why ask about your dream?"
"Then I guess it was never that important."
"..."
"So, Eurypylus? Will you co to this side?"
The lighthouse smiled.
"You were always on my side. No matter what I did, even when I chose the wrong path, you always helped . Even when everyone cursed , you were the one who accepted ."
"I was."
"I'm the lighthouse, and you're the Lighthouse Keeper. The one who guards the lighthouse."
"I was."
"Let's do this together, Eurypylus."
The lighthouse held out her hand to him. Eurypylus looked at her in silence, then looked up at the false sky. Still looking up, he spoke.
"You know, living a long ti does not make soone wise. Locking yourself in a room for hundreds of years does not make you wise."
He muttered.
"I chose to remain unmoving, unchanging. There was not much value in that. Even if you refuse to move, refuse to change, the world still flows however it wants."
His gaze dropped.
He looked at the lighthouse.
"So what about you, who chose change and accepted countless things? Did your answer make you wiser? Wiser than ? I hoped it would. I believed it would. I entrusted you with the value of my four hundred years. I believed that if you found the answer, my four hundred years would have value too."
The Lighthouse Keeper smiled bitterly.
"Looks like there was not much value after all."
"Eurypylus."
"If there is one thing I have learned over the years."
"Co over here."
"It is that the world is not divided into right and wrong, and not cleanly split into black and white."
Tick.
"I accept you, but."
The clock hand that had been turning backward stopped.
"I cannot accept everything about you. Wrong is wrong."
The lighthouse reached toward the Lighthouse Keeper. The city surged, becoming a massive wave crashing toward him.
Facing the oncoming city, he said briefly,
"I think guarding it for four hundred years was long enough."
312 years, 3 months, 21 days.
The ti he had accumulated.
114,066 days.
One hundred fourteen thousand sixty-six days.
"I'll retire."
The second hand, which had only moved backward, began moving forward. As it spun rapidly, the minute hand, hour hand, numbers marking days, needle marking months, and numbers marking years all dropped at high speed.
One hundred fourteen thousand sixty-five days.
The ti he had accumulated burned white.
He had one day left.
"Hey."
Eurypylus looked at Najin.
"Duck."
Right after that, the city split apart.
3.
The mont Eurypylus swung his arm, a storm roared through. There was no other way to describe it. A torrent of imnse force shattered the city surging toward him.
In the raging storm, Najin lowered his stance, drove his spear into the ground, and held on. Before Najin, still unable to process what was happening, could even blink,
step.
Soone stopped beside him.
"Lighthouse Keeper."
"Didn't you hear ? I said I retired."
"Eurypylus."
"Yeah."
Najin did not ask what was happening or why he had taken this side. He said only one thing.
"Didn't you say the Starlight Order was your reason for living?"
What is the Starlight Order to you.
To that question, the Lighthouse Keeper had once answered briefly.
An old friend, and the reason for his life.
"It was."
Eurypylus let out a sigh.
"So I just left it behind, didn't I."
The mont Eurypylus grasped at empty air, a weapon landed in his hand. The weapon once carried by the hero who raced across the continent and quelled wars. Eurypylus's cherished halberd.
"The situation seems complicated."
"First, we need to stop that from opening."
"Agreed. I'm confident in my ability, but that thing is another matter. If it gets out, I don't think we can stop it."
Then Eurypylus frowned.
"Looks like they won't sit still over there either."
The passage in the sky leading to Camlann.
From there, Mordred looked down, saw the passage stop widening, and gripped it with one hand. Then, with his other hand, he stabbed his own heart.
Dark red blood spilled as Mordred tore his heart out.
He hurled the heart out of the passage. Eurypylus swung his halberd at it instantly, but his strike never reached it.
The instant it erged outside,
a body ford from the heart. The body, completed in an instant, swung its sword and canceled Eurypylus's strike. Najin stared silently at the being made from Mordred's heart.
Mordred was still watching from the hole in the sky.
Then what was this being?
It was Mordred's clone.
Just as a Constellation creates its Great Warrior and apostles, Mordred sent his own clone here through his heart. To buy ti for his true body to co out.
Or
to kill Najin no matter what.
A clone made from the heart of an eleven-star Constellation.
Though split from the true body, it radiated a presence on par with a Transcendent. Seeing it, Eurypylus gave a hollow laugh. Najin could not laugh. That being had no interest in Eurypylus. It did not even seem to care whether its true body made it outside.
Even at the cost of losing its heart.
Even if it weakened itself.
Even if it had to accept any risk.
Kill the one who drew Excalibur. Najin could feel that desperate resolve. The endless killing intent made his spine go cold.
"..."
Mordred's clone grasped at empty air. Clone or not, the one controlling it was Mordred himself.
Rip.
Dark red starlight stretched thickly, like blood.
What appeared in the air was the sword that symbolized Mordred. It had once been Arthur's sword, the sword Arthur used when appointing knights of the Round Table, but Mordred stole it and stained it dark red.
A pitch-black blade, with a dark red star etched into it.
The constellation extending from that dark red star pulsed like blood vessels.
A sword that resembled Excalibur and ca endlessly close to Excalibur.
Clarent.
The Rebel Knight leveled his sword at Najin.
As if asking a question.
As if asking again whether Najin was truly qualified.
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