Ch.182Knight Demon (3)

Najin threw his sword high into the air as he drew his spear. Gripping the spear with both hands that had just held the sword, Najin thrust it forward. All these movements flowed together seamlessly.

Charging Horn.

In the instant Najin thrust his spear, everything in the city froze simultaneously. The cityscape folding toward Najin and Argo, the waves made of bricks and buildings, even the rain of arrows—all were held in place.

A momentary, fleeting pause.

This wasn’t a pause created by magical means or mysticism. Rather, it was a deadlock created by forces acting in precisely opposite directions and the resulting impact. And naturally, this deadlock wouldn’t last long.

Cr-crack…

Because the force erupting from Najin’s spear tip was stronger than the city’s folding power. The balanced scale tipped in Najin’s favor. The storm bursting from his spear tip pushed back the folding city in the opposite direction.

CRAAAAAASH!

The wave of buildings and bricks was shredded by the storm. The rain of arrows dispersed. Like a ship’s bow cutting through waves or breaking through ice, Charging Horn shattered everything blocking Najin’s path without exception.

Witnessing this sight, Argo’s eyes widened, as did those of Schmitz and the priests of The Sacred Host standing behind them. Anyone would react the same way. It would be strange not to be surprised when seeing a city advancing like a wave pierced through in a single strike.

“…”

Silently, Najin reached his hand upward. The longsword he had thrown high before unleashing Charging Horn fell precisely into his outstretched hand. After catching the longsword, Najin looked ahead and clicked his tongue.

‘If it had been that person, they would have shattered that bell tower completely, but I’m not quite there yet.’

-The Bull Horned Star? Or the One Horned Star?

‘Both of them. Either one would have pierced through to that bell tower.’

-They’re both transcendents.

So I still have a long way to go.

Merlin glanced at Najin with eyes that seemed to say “What is he talking about?” and Argo, standing beside Najin, had a similar expression.

Of course, Argo couldn’t read Najin’s thoughts, but he could tell that Najin wasn’t satisfied with the strike he had just delivered.

‘He looks unsatisfied, like this wasn’t enough.’

Argo looked ahead. There lay a city landscape with a clear road running through it. Looking sideways at the boy who had created a path straight through the center of the free city Pavanne, Argo laughed incredulously.

That’s not enough? That? How could it possibly not be?

He wanted to argue, but there was no time. At the edge of their clear view, in front of the bell tower, a demon had revealed itself.

The Knight Demon, Orgis.

When Najin saw the demon’s true form, his expression crumpled. So this is what a demon made of knights meant? Najin immediately understood the name “Knight Demon.”

Orgis did not take human form. It resembled more a beast crawling on the ground, but unlike ordinary beasts that crawl on four legs, Orgis had many legs. Many, many legs.

To be precise, about 40 legs protruded from both sides. These legs were made from parts of knights’ bodies. Knights’ heads, legs, arms, torsos… numerous knights’ corpses had become legs supporting Orgis.

A demon made of knights.

Moving with knights’ arms and legs.

A demon supported by knights.

Its very existence was a mockery and ridicule of the concept of knighthood. Najin felt the back of his neck tighten. His lips twitched.

“Sir Argo.”

Najin and Argo’s gazes crossed briefly. Words weren’t necessary. They already knew the plan. After nodding to each other, Najin and Argo kicked off the ground and began to run.

2.

As Najin and Argo began to run, Orgis responded by starting to move as well.

There’s no need to use 80 legs to walk on the ground. Humans live walking on two legs, and beasts get by just fine with four. But as if mocking them, Orgis used all 80 of its legs to move.

The sight resembled a ball rolling, or perhaps a spider climbing a wall.

-Ugh, urgh, bleurgh!

While Merlin dry-heaved at the grotesque sight, Najin clicked his tongue. Though the movement was ridiculous and bizarre, he couldn’t deny that it was efficient.

Dozens of hands gripped buildings and pulled the body forward, while dozens of feet kicked off the ground to accelerate. In an instant, Orgis closed the distance and lunged toward Najin.

‘Left. Right. Diagonal. Spear, sword, mace, chain. Six diagonally, then seven, then three…’

Najin’s eyes moved rapidly.

He calculated the dozens of arms and legs Orgis was swinging, the weapons they held, and their directions. Just as Najin finished these calculations and was about to move—

Thwack.

Hidden limbs extended from Orgis’s back. With the directions suddenly doubled, Najin frowned. Too late to calculate. Najin moved his body first.

Seven spears thrust forward. Five arrows were fired. Eight maces, twelve longswords, five greatswords, three rapiers, seven war hammers…

All these attacks came almost simultaneously. Spears thrust, swords slashed, axes chopped down. The arms sprouting from Orgis’s back continuously drew longbow strings, and what they fired weren’t ordinary arrows but the longswords and rapiers once held by knights.

Clang, CLANGCLANGCLANG!

Each individual attack was insignificant, but the combined power of these attacks couldn’t be ignored. Though Najin was facing just one demon, he felt as if he were fighting dozens of knights simultaneously.

A squad of knights. Well-trained knights executing a coordinated attack. Knights from different orders united under the banner of the demon Orgis.

The knights’ weapons no longer shone. As corpses, they could no longer draw out sword energy or aura. What replaced it was the demon’s magical energy.

Pitch-black magical energy flickered in place of sword energy. This dark energy enveloped the knights’ limbs and the weapons they held, burning black.

“…”

Najin’s expression hardened as he faced them. This desecration, this mockery that turned corpses into something ridiculous. The demon before him reminded Najin of another demon.

The Demon of Pleasure, the Empress of Bliss.

Isn’t this exactly the kind of thing that madwoman would do? Recalling the jesters she commanded, Najin gritted his teeth.

“Sir Argo!”

As Najin called out, Argo dove into Orgis’s flank. Argo precisely exploited the opening Najin had created while deflecting attacks, and Orgis bled a little.

Tap, spin.

As Argo swung his sword, he twisted his body. A second strike following the first—the swordsmanship of Atanga. Just as this second attack was about to draw more blood, Orgis leaped backward with a jerk.

—————!

Using its dozens of legs to instantly create distance, Orgis roared and drove its limbs into the ground. At that moment, the city pulsed with a thump, like a single living organism.

Once again, the city began to “fold.”

But unlike before, it didn’t surge forward like a wave. Instead, buildings and bricks opened their maws around Orgis as if protecting it, glaring at Najin and Argo. Half-folded, leaving a slight gap.

Both men knew well what would happen the moment they were caught in those jaws—the moment they were “trapped” between those upper and lower teeth.

The Knight Demon unleashing the power of Bookmark.

Looking at this, Argo smiled bitterly. About 20 years ago, he had faced a similar situation. Back then too, Orgis had spread the masterpiece’s ability around itself “in this way.”

“About that thing.”

Argo recalled what his comrade had said back then.

“Couldn’t we use it against him instead?”

His comrade had pointed at the Knight Demon as he said this.

“Let’s go, Argo.”

“Yes. As you said, we’re weaker than it. Pathetically weaker. That thing has devoured even our seniors who were much stronger than us. But is that a reason to back down?”

“I’ll ask you again, Argo.”

“Do you think a knight of Atanga should retreat just because the opponent is strong?”

“If we cower and retreat because the enemy is strong, how can we call ourselves knights? I am a knight. What about you, Argo?”

Recalling that exchange, Argo smiled. Back then, he couldn’t answer his friend’s question, but now…

Argo looked ahead.

The opponent was formidable. A powerful enemy even among Sword Seekers. That nightmare from twenty years ago stood there, stronger than before. Back then, it merely folded wood and stone, but now it was folding an entire city.

All the better.

Thinking this, Argo’s lips curled upward. There was no need to verbalize his answer. Argo responded with action what he couldn’t answer twenty years ago.

Tap.

Argo kicked off the ground and ran. Unlike that day when he watched his friend’s back as he charged forward, Argo now stood at the very front.

‘I too am a knight, Ivan.’

I can’t let you be the only one to become a knight.

‘This time.’

Argo smiled, feeling Najin running behind him.

“This time, you follow me.”

3.

Masterpiece No.4 ‘Bookmark’.

After dozens of knights sacrificed themselves, they finally discovered the activation conditions and abilities of Bookmark:

Like inserting a bookmark between pages of a book and closing it, the masterpiece ‘Bookmark’ activates when something is inserted between two objects. The problem lies in the excessively broad range of this ability.

Bookmark could fold anything its owner perceived as a “book.” As long as the target wasn’t a living being with a soul, it could be literally anything.

Depending on perception, trees, cities, land, villages—the range of application could expand indefinitely, making it threatening enough. But if that were all…it wouldn’t have killed dozens of knights.

Dozens of knights died retrieving this masterpiece because of Bookmark’s ability that activates when something is caught between objects.

An object caught between book pages. An object inserted into a book’s fold is defined by ‘Bookmark’ as a bookmark. In other words, the moment something is inserted into what the owner perceives as book pages, that object transforms into a bookmark.

Into a paper-thin plate.

Into a bookmark resembling a human.

The girl who accidentally discovered the masterpiece thought her bed and blanket looked just like book pages, and fell asleep thinking she was lying between books.

“Mom? Mom? Where are you, Mom?”

As a result, when the girl woke up, her parents had transformed into bookmarks beside her. It was the same outside the village. A village full of bookmarks. At that point, the masterpiece began to go berserk. The masterpiece recognized the village itself, filled with bookmarks, as “a single book.”

That was the inside story of the masterpiece retrieval operation that killed dozens of knights, and the ability of Bookmark revealed through the sacrifice of dozens of knights and hundreds of soldiers.

“And they say the Knight Demon took that ability.”

After hearing this story, Ivan said:

“If you look carefully, that demon doesn’t include itself in the range of what it folds, right? The original owner of the masterpiece would be exempt from its ability.”

“A Knight Demon is ultimately a demon made of ‘knights’ corpses.’ And it draws power from those corpses.”

“We thought of them as parts of Orgis’s body, but what if Orgis considers them tools?”

If so, Ivan smiled.

“Argo, you know what we’re good at.”

“Parrying.”

“Let’s deflect. Toward that ‘folding’ part.”

Recalling that conversation.

CLANGCLANGCLANG!

Argo deflected Orgis’s extending limbs and the weapons they held with a single longsword. In the past, he would have struggled to block even one attack, but now he could deflect three weapons simultaneously.

Parrying.

The technique of deflecting an opponent’s attack.

Atanga swordsmanship aims to defeat opponents head-on. Therefore, parrying is both fundamental and one of the most important principles in Atanga swordsmanship.

Having mastered Atanga swordsmanship, Argo was naturally proficient in parrying, but his parrying was too exceptional to be described merely as “proficient.”

After failing the Knight Demon pursuit mission in the past, Argo became even more devoted to parrying. He immersed himself in the technique. Now, after 20 years, Argo’s parrying had reached a singularity.

Cla-CLANG!

Argo’s parrying didn’t simply deflect or bounce off the opponent’s attacks. Precisely and meticulously, he guided the opponent’s attacks to exactly where he wanted them.

Orgis’s limbs, entangled with Argo’s sword, bent in strange directions.

The “book pages” made from parts of the city tried to close on Argo, but what got caught between them wasn’t Argo but Orgis’s limbs that he had parried.

Snap.

The pages closed on Orgis’s limbs. In that moment, three of the limbs forming Orgis’s body transformed into thin plates. Najin, who had been waiting for this moment, cleanly cut off the parts that had turned into bookmarks.

While cutting a demon’s limbs is difficult, cutting bookmarks is all too easy.