The Knight Of Prophecy (4)

Death Knight Plank became transparent like a wraith by day and could not be seen. Inevitably, if one wished to learn from him, one had to meet him at night.

Azadine rested in the tent by day, and when night fell, he met Plank.

Plank exuded a deathly aura that froze the air around him; for Azadine, newly returned from the brink of death, merely being near him caused pain.

Yet in the present circumstances, only Sir Plank could save Azadine. Who else would teach magic to a “soulless blasphemer” like him?

By day Azadine meditated, tuned himself, and contemplated; at night he posed the insights and questions he had gained to Plank, who, worthy of the epithet Knight of Wisdom, returned sound answers.

“The key is emptying yourself, Azadine. Right now you are broken because you’re crammed full of what you cannot bear—so emptying comes before all else. But who on earth had the orcish notion to cram a copy of the Heavenly Kings’ Grimoire into your body?”

“I know an orc who….”

“As I thought. It’s always elves or orcs—treating magic like mere tools.”

“No, but—emptying the magic was also that orc’s proposal.”

“Then he had a little common sense. Still, trust neither elf nor orc. They’re madmen drunk on strength and knowledge.”

“I… see.”

“Of course, don’t be a fool and empty yourself blindly. Empty while understanding and experiencing what’s entered you, so you can refill it whenever needed. It irks me that my body is saturated with death’s chill; in cases like this, a master adept with mana would teach by touch and you’d learn faster.”

“I don’t mind taking longer. It only means more time with Sir Plank, does it not?”

“Well now. Ha-ha… you flatter shamelessly.”

Plank laughed at Azadine’s glib flattery—but it was no laughing matter.

Plank liked this young man.

Was it because he was Aragasa?

No.

Though Plank had been in the Rescue Knights for over forty years, he had never seen a believer as pure as this youth.

Even Plank himself felt ashamed when measured against him.

One who had lived the hell of the Messenger Clan—mocked and persecuted by others; one persecuted even among the soulless blasphemers—yet he harbored the will of the Rescue Knights.

How admirable.

If he had had such a son, he felt, he might have lived each moment in joy.

But Azadine was dying.

His life-force was too far spent; even a chilly breeze made him groan in pain.

And yet, every night, he stood firm against Plank’s deathly cold and kept the night.

Thus the seasons turned.

The Arangi grasslands were warm, yet snow sometimes fell and lay.

On a snowy waste, with wolves howling in the distance, master and disciple exchanged questions and answers again.

“You are dying.”

“Yes.”

“You know it?”

“I do. I’ve not many days left….”

“Then how are you so calm?”

“With one already dead before me, how could I, still living, make a fuss?”

“Ha! Words pleasant to hear. With a disciple like you, a man could stomach being a master.”

“You are already my master.”

“…So I am.”

Plank liked his new disciple well—and the knowledge that he was dying pained him.

“Why are you so accepting of death?”

“To live, I would need a miracle—or Nether sorcery. I do not desire sorcery, and I dare not ask a miracle. So I will wait, as all do, to meet my fate.”

“Then why train now? Why endure such harsh training and burdens in the past?”

“I wanted to make Aldis proud. And toward Arael… I wanted revenge.”

“Revenge? Arael—your sister?”

“Yes.”

“She came to me begging to save you. It seems you two were not ordinarily close.”

“Ha. That was a kind of last confession, done at the very end. We were not on good terms—far worse than typical siblings.”

“……”

“I have lost my star. The night is dark, and I have no path.”

“Is that so? Then why learn this from me?”

“Because a small duty still remains to me. If I can regain even a little strength, then as an Aragasa I want to make some atonement for what Chief Hathir has done. And I must help Mediam and Ismail. They abandoned their own blood for my sake alone—if I do not repay that, then….”

“When your will runs high, they helped because they were moved by your will and spirit. So find your will. They did not want a slave to help them—they answered your spirit.”

“My spirit?”

“Yes. In your phrasing, you might call it your ‘star.’”

“…My star.”

Azadine smiled bitterly.

There was something absurd about the dead telling the living to keep hope.

This child… how pitiable. He has held nothing, bearing only responsibility. I, knight that I was, coveted power and died by my pupil’s hand—shameful.

Plank suddenly understood why he had wandered the wilds as a revenant—and what the prophecy given him meant.

Plank drew his sword.

“Master?!”

Azadine tensed.

Though Plank himself did not know it, he sometimes flew into a death knight’s fit and attacked those nearby. Azadine had suffered such attacks several times, but had never told Sir Plank.

Tonight Plank’s mind was clear. Yet what he said could scarcely be said with a sober mind.

“Azadine. How would you like… to become a Rescue Knight?”

“Eh? Me?”

“Yes.”

“Me—an Aragasa?”

A soulless blasphemer, an Aragasa.

Had a despised member of that cursed clan once come asking to be a Rescue Knight, Plank would have raised both hands in objection.

Yet now Plank himself asked Azadine to become a Rescue Knight.

“You need a calling. The emperor’s voice is gone, and the emperor’s messengers can no longer give you a true mission. Then—what of becoming a Rescue Knight? I will… perform the knighting for you.”

“…The knighting?”

“Yes.”

“That is…”

Azadine smiled wryly, recalling how, as a child, he had been moved by a Rescue Knights book Aldis had given him.

Even amid the pain of persecution, the stories of the Rescue Knights—and Aldis’s warmth in giving them—had sustained him.

But Aldis was dead, and Azadine had lost everything….

And yet—did the dream of childhood still shine? Did the star still burn above the night sky?

“Azadine of the Aragasa. In the names of the Archangels of Courage, Wisdom, and Mercy, I call you—answer the call and sit.”

“…Master.”

Azadine looked at Plank, now wholly earnest, and hesitated.

Sir Plank was already dead. A wanted death knight. Even if he performed the rite, others would not accept Azadine as a knight.

But Azadine knew why Plank wished to invest him.

Plank’s heart ached; he seemed a man who had lost his mission and waited only for death.

Of course, Azadine had no wish to die. He still had much to do.

Help Mediam and Ismail; atone for what Hathir had done.

Simply said—but a life’s work would not exhaust it. Though Azadine already had mission enough, Plank insisted.

Perhaps because he understood that heart—

Azadine bowed his head and sat before Plank.

“Be valiant before injustice, humble before the unknown, and merciful to the weak. Will you faithfully keep the three virtues, hone arms and learning, and do good until justice breathes in this land?”

“I will.”

“Then you are a Hospitaller.”

Plank prayed to the angels and raised his sword to the sky. Then he touched the blade to Azadine’s shoulders and head.

“I, Plank of Banreung, in the names of Wisdom, Courage, and Mercy, appoint you a knight. Now—the boy sits, and the knight rises. Rise, Sir Azadine!”

“……”

Azadine rose. At that moment—

“Master!”

“Ah.”

Plank’s sword fell to the ground. His fingertips were crumbling. The death knight’s curse was lifting—rest had come for him.

“Ha-ha.”

Plank remembered—and knew he had been right.

“So that’s it! Azadine—you were the prophesied knight of my fate!”

“Master?!”

“Thank you, Sir Azadine. Thanks to you, I shall enter rest….”

He jerked his chin toward his sword.

“Take my blade. If they recognize it, the Rescue Knights won’t ignore you entirely—it bears angels’ blood: a ceramite sword.”

“Master….”

“Then—blessings upon your road, Sir Azadine!”

Leaving those words, Plank crumbled to dust and scattered into the snowstorm.

Sir Plank, the death knight, entered rest and vanished.

Azadine sat dazed on the snowy waste.

As Plank had taught, he had now put all the grimoires within him in order; his inner being was calm.

And then—

—Thump.

His heart pulsed.

“Mm.”

Azadine had, all at once, become a Hospitaller.

It had been an investiture performed by Sir Plank, a death knight, out on the wilds. No one would acknowledge him as a Rescue Knight, and if he told others, they would call him mad. It was an act without meaning.

But was it really?

—Thump.

Azadine felt a warm strength suffuse his body.

Something like an angel’s touch was surely raising his body’s warmth from within. The power of the Rescue Knights had nested in him.

“Master has laid a truly heavy burden on me as well.”

Azadine brushed off the snow and rose. Where now should he go?

Should he head back toward Vthuma to find Ismail and Mediam again? But what if they had moved?

Should he return to the Kerim Range and go back to the Messenger Clan’s sanctuary?

As he turned such thoughts over—

—Thump….

“Hm?”

A vision surfaced in the back of Azadine’s mind. Someone placing an emperor’s gold coin and making a plea.

But the emperor’s voice had vanished—how?

“What…?”

Seeing who was performing the coin-call, Azadine felt dismay.

Rescue Knights. The Rescue Knights were summoning a messenger with the emperor’s gold coin. What on earth was happening?

The distance… about twenty ri—far.

Could he arrive in time? He had no mount, either.

Just then—

—Kwarreureung!

Piercing the winter blizzard, wreathed in mist, a beast appeared: a Kerim mountain goat bearing the dreadful trace of Nether sorcery upon its breast.

Its body was half-transparent, the landscape showing through; mist wreathed its frame as it moved. When Azadine stretched out his hand, its body—like lukewarm vapor—was solid beneath his palm.

And that trace of Nether sorcery—

“Arael’s Voice? You survived?”

It was Arael’s artificial spirit—Arael’s Voice.

For a moment he thought it had perished with her; but then he remembered: Arael’s Voice had been modeled after the Emperor’s Voice from the start.

Just as the Emperor’s Voice had guided and controlled the Messengers even after the emperor’s death, so too could Arael’s Voice remain after Arael’s passing.

“……”

He had thought he’d lost his star.

The emperor’s messengers had ended, the Rescue Knights were fallen, his beloved Aldis was dead.

And yet Azadine had become a Rescue Knight; whether it was the Emperor’s Voice or Arael’s Voice, those who yearned for a messenger still called to him even now.

Could a soulless blasphemer become a Rescue Knight?

Azadine did not know the answer.

He only took up the ceramite longsword his master had left him—and mounted the mist-goat his sister had left.

A star burned dazzlingly above his head.