Interlude, Soone's Dream (2)
"Galahad is a double that Lancelot created."
When rlin said that, Najin was not particularly surprised or shocked. He had been half-certain of the answer from the mont he posed the question.
Because he had seen it in a dream.
Najin had watched Lancelot split himself in two before Arthur. Now that it had been confird as fact rather than imagination, what he felt was sothing closer to bewildernt.
"So what I saw was true after all."
"What? You saw it? Saw what?"
"I've been having dreams here and there lately..."
Najin explained to rlin what he had experienced recently. She listened in silence, then made a complicated face.
"So you're saying you saw Arthur's mories? In a dream?"
"That seems to be the case."
"I'd like to ask why, but you wouldn't be able to answer that, would you."
"You look troubled. Do you have so idea what's going on?"
"Troubled, yes. Not because I have a guess, but because I don't have even one."
rlin let out a sigh.
"This is sothing the whole Round Table would agree with, not just ,when it cos to anything connected to Arthur, there's no shortage of things that make no sense. How is this even happening? Oh, Arthur did it? Then I suppose it got done sohow... that was generally the feeling."
"...Pardon?"
"You said you've read the Chronicles of Arthur multiple tis, right?"
"Enough to have it morized, yes."
"Then it's in there. The land here has good fortune. Let's build a nation here. Arthur said that out of nowhere one day, they built Calot Castle there, and it really did turn out to have good fortune."
"First edition, page 312 of the Chronicles of Arthur."
"Hm? Right, anyway, that was the kind of thing. Sotis he acted as if he could see the future, and he knew things no one could figure out how he'd learned..."
It was not one or two such incidents, rlin said. Asking why Arthur had managed sothing remarkable was simply not very aningful.
"So with you having glimpsed Arthur's mories, I genuinely have no guess. The closest thing I can co up with is that Excalibur and the Round Table triggered so kind of reaction."
"Well, it's sothing to figure out gradually."
There had to be a reason and intent behind being shown these mories. Najin set that question aside for later and focused on what was in front of him right now.
"So why did Lancelot split himself? From what I could tell, it looked like you were trying to keep that secret."
"I wasn't really trying to hide it. I just put it off because it's a rather complicated matter to explain on the spot."
"Fair enough. You promised no secrets, and the one who made that promise wouldn't be the first to break it."
rlin broke into a cold sweat. Najin smirked and waved his hand as if to say it was fine. Everyone had things they didn't want to talk about. He had no intention of reproaching her,just teasing her a little,but rlin dropped her gaze and watched him nervously.
"...Sorry. I really didn't an for it to go like that."
"It's fine. Truly. So then,I think I need an explanation now. Is that all right?"
Of course. rlin nodded and opened her mouth.
"I should explain this part first. The Round Table had two goals."
"One was to defeat the Witch of Camlann and reach the utopia of Avalon beyond."
"Right. And the other one..."
rlin spoke as though biting down on sothing bitter.
"Was the search for the Sacred Relic."
"The Holy Grail, you an?"
"That na is the most well known, yes. The records actually vary,sacred scripture, sacred feast, sacred blood, sacred radiance, sacred body, the nas differ. We just lumped them all together and called it the Sacred Relic."
She exhaled a long breath and continued.
"During our days of active adventuring, we found a number of similar records in the ruins and tombs of ancient nations."
"Records."
"Yes. Records concerning a Sacred Relic created far earlier than our age,estimated to be from tens of thousands of years ago, around the ti the Witch of the Abyss is thought to have been born."
The Witch of the Abyss dyes the world black.
All the stars that lit the heavens fell.
An unending, eternal night ca to the world.
rlin spoke as if reciting a song. She seed to be describing an ancient poem inscribed in those ruins.
"To illuminate the eternal night, we made the Sacred Grail. A Sacred Grail filled with only the most radiant things. It is humanity's ark."
"..."
"The fact that similar records were found across multiple ruins, not just one, made it clear this was sothing that truly existed. Traces of attempts to pour a vast amount of starlight into a single object were also found throughout those ruins."
"The rest is sothing I know roughly, I think."
From here, Najin knew the story.
"The knight who set out to search for the Grail was Galahad."
"Right. That's what the records say. To be more precise, Galahad was a knight created for the purpose of finding the Grail."
rlin had said it once before.
That Galahad was a made thing. Not a being that had co about naturally, but one born for a purpose.
"To use the Grail, one must be incorruptible, blaless, pure, free of desire, and perfect. Every record said so. But where does such a being exist? So they decided to make one."
"...By extracting only the most perfect pieces?"
"Yes. Lancelot volunteered. After several attempts, he drew out only the perfect and beautiful parts from among his own achievents and brought forth the knight Galahad."
rlin shrugged.
"He had so personality issues, but when you lined up his accomplishnts, Lancelot was close to perfect. Soone helped with that separation,I can't quite rember who."
She furrowed her brow.
"There was definitely soone. A being who helped with the separation. Anyway, that's the background behind Galahad's birth."
"Just hearing it, it doesn't sound like such a thorny or complicated matter. Why didn't you tell until now?"
"Up to that point, it was fine. The problem is what cos after."
rlin's eyes grew heavy.
"One day, a letter arrived from Galahad."
Her voice grew heavy too.
"It said: I have found the Grail. That single line arrived, but Galahad never ca back. He vanished."
"...What?"
That differed from the accounts Najin knew.
According to the records, the Grail was never found, and the journey itself was where Galahad had gained so manner of enlightennt,a sowhat anticlimactic story.
"Lancelot set out imdiately to find Galahad. He searched, but for so reason, Lancelot returned alone."
"..."
"Imdiately after returning, he raised the revolt alongside Mordred."
rlin smiled weakly.
"In the final monts, Arthur had so exchange with Lancelot, who was pointing a sword at , and then Arthur abandoned the traitors and left for Camlann on his own. Alone, without a word to anyone."
A sigh escaped her lips.
"Lancelot, who was blocking my way, said this. I am no longer a knight. From the beginning, I should not have been in this place. You and I are different."
He had trampled the Trust that the Round Table had placed in him.
"I cannot trust you, your king, or any of this story you have built together. In your eyes, was there any worth to this whole journey, rlin?"
Trampling his companions' trust, Lancelot betrayed Arthur.
"So I thought Galahad was dead. Even if he were alive, it would be Lancelot living on as 'Lancelot,' not as Galahad."
"...But Sir Bedivere."
"Right. Bedivere treats the two as separate. It's a difference in perspective."
rlin looked at Najin.
"What cos after that... I don't have to spell it out, do I?"
Mordred's revolt. Lancelot's betrayal.
The fracturing of the Round Table.
And Arthur's death, and the end of the story.
"Naturally, I cannot look at Lancelot kindly. Sa goes for Galahad. What the Grail they supposedly found actually was, and why they made that choice,I still don't know. I didn't have an answer, so I put it off."
"...The Lancelot I saw in the mory seed like a careful knight."
"Of course. Every knight who ever sat at the Round Table was soone worthy of that seat."
It was just, rlin said.
"That for so reason, for so unknown cause, they suddenly fell apart one day. Every one of them had once been a brilliantly shining being."
Her expression turned distant, as if she were rembering the past. Najin understood now. To rlin, the Round Table was not a place that could be sumd up in a single word, and the ti she had spent with them was the sa.
If he had to put it in one word, love-hate would be the most fitting.
rlin looked at Najin quietly.
"Don't you do the sa."
"Pardon?"
"I said don't."
She gripped his sleeve. Najin held her gaze for a mont, then smiled.
"You don't need to tell . I already intend not to."
"What?"
Najin answered plainly.
"I said it back then, didn't I? That I'd take rlin all the way to Avalon. I keep my promises. A person has to live by their word. I was taught that if you break a promise, your arms and legs go flying."
"What on earth are you talking about."
rlin shook her head and shoved his shoulder as if she couldn't believe him, then stood. Whatever she said, Najin noticed the corner of her mouth twitching.
"Well, then. Shall we make a plan?"
She opened the window, and a cool rush of outside air swept into the room. rlin perched on the windowsill and glanced at Najin.
"A plan for dealing with Lancelot and the Star of Oblivion."
2.
"Well, look who it is. The hero of the campaign against the Carnival King, the great Sir Najin, called a hero across continent and Outland alike."
"I am fairly great, yes."
"Ha ha ha ha! No more pretending to be modest, I see. Well, excessive humility can beco its own form of deception."
The nearest Imperial Army garrison to the boundary of the Outland.
Kirchhoff had been waiting there for Najin and greeted him warmly. As soldiers who had risked their lives on the sa battlefield tend to do, he gave Najin a brief embrace and then a handshake.
"How have you been keeping, Sir Kirchhoff?"
"? Nothing to complain about. After killing that cursed demon, it's like half of a three-hundred-year-old indigestion finally cleared up."
The drink has been tasting wonderful lately. Sweet, too. Kirchhoff said so with a laugh.
"You do look like you're in better spirits."
"All thanks to you. So what brings you here?"
"It's about the Star of Oblivion."
"Ah, naturally. I rather thought it might be."
Kirchhoff exhaled slowly.
"They say the Star of Oblivion erases all information connected to itself, but the reason its True Body's location has been so hard to find all this ti wasn't only because of that."
Najin nodded.
"Oblivion erased it, and the Carnival King warped whatever information remained, so tracking it was nearly impossible."
"Right. But now? The Carnival King has been defeated and all the information she had contaminated has found its way back, they say. The distorted parts have been restored too."
The sa was true for Gerd and the Golden Horn Knights. The parts 'forgotten' by Oblivion had not returned, but at least the constant warping of that information had stopped. Najin recalled Gerd smiling at that fact and slowly opened his mouth.
"We've mobilized the Empire's historians to search for places where information has been erased in unnatural ways. We're also cross-referencing parts where information changed once the Carnival King's distortion lifted."
"Those historians of yours are working hard. Please pass along the gratitude of Londinel's Sword Master."
"I'll make sure of it. In any case, the threads are slowly coming together. The more sothing is erased and hidden, the more traces it leaves behind."
And now that even the Carnival King, who had been warping those traces, was gone, it was only a matter of ti before the Star of Oblivion's sanctuary was pinpointed.
"So you ca to because..."
"News that may lead to the subjugation of the Star of Oblivion, and not telling Sir Kirchhoff of all people first,that would be discourteous. Wouldn't it?"
Kirchhoff smiled bitterly.
Then he extended his hand to Najin. They had already shaken hands at the greeting, but he couldn't help doing it again.
"Thank you."
"What do you intend to do?"
"No need to say more. I've been waiting three hundred years for this mont. I have no intention of backing away now, not a hair's worth."
The last knight of a forgotten nation,a country erased by the Star of Oblivion,ran his hand over the hilt of his sword.
"I have an obligation to take my revenge on them. This is my right. One that no one can deny..."
"Lancelot will be there."
"I know. There's no way I wouldn't."
Kirchhoff gave a low chuckle.
"On that day, the one who led the charge and shattered Londinel was none other than Lancelot. The great Knight of the Round Table who cut down Londinel's knights and people alike,how could I ever forget him?"
There was an edge to those words. Not the usual cheerful, easygoing voice of Kirchhoff, but one that seethed.
"...Ah, that wasn't the right thing to say in front of a descendant of the Round Table. A slip of the tongue. Forgive if it offended you."
"It's fine. Given your position, it was a fair thing to say."
"Glad you understand."
So then, Kirchhoff said.
"I ask this just to be sure..."
Kirchhoff's eyes narrowed.
"You're not thinking of showing Lancelot rcy because he was once a knight of the Round Table, are you?"
"..."
"I trust you wouldn't. That man slaughtered the people of my holand without rcy. Together with the Star of Oblivion and the Carnival King, he was one of the monsters who destroyed an entire nation."
He said it plainly.
"No matter how great his deeds for this world once were, the fact that he is a mass killer now does not change. I would like you to keep that much in mind."
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