Ch.24Report on the Fall of Innocence (11)

From within the shadow, severed hands rose up. Though their skin colors varied, they were all dark, rotting, and twitching as if alive.

The hands gently wrapped around the apprentice knight’s body, starting from his feet. It was disgusting how these dead things pretended to be alive, flirting with existence. It was nauseating how the putrid pretended to be pure.

Like white clean cloth wrapping a corpse, the hands of the dead gripped the body of the living. Soon they withered, but like dead branches that hadn’t broken, they fluttered against the apprentice knight’s body.

The rotting flesh, after extorting blood, sweat, and tears from the living body, hardened into calluses. The dark bruise-like flesh became as solid as iron plates, gleaming.

Like armor.

“Wh…wh…what?”

Lord Aldric fell backward. Not because someone pushed him, but because his legs trembled, as if trying to escape from their owner’s body to save themselves. So Aldric was busy crawling backward on his buttocks.

He tried to grab the sword at his waist, but with such trembling hands, he would miss even the wall of the sanctuary.

“Don’t just stand there staring! Strike!”

Commander Marco drew his sword. The surviving knights, the apprentice knights who were once comrades, even the squires who had once laughed and played together, rolling in the training ground ditches—all rushed forward.

The apprentice knight spread his arms as if welcoming guests.

The blades of the Mercy Knights pierced his body. A logging axe struck his shoulder. A spear, though clumsily but firmly gripped, penetrated his thigh. The squire couldn’t even properly pull out the spear, eventually breaking the shaft.

The apprentice knight fell to his knees. But he didn’t collapse. What flowed instead of blood was black oil, and his once clear, bright eyes kept rolling back.

Below his feet, severed hands jumped from the shadow like frogs, rubbing against his body. The hands that climbed up his back and shoulders to his head, covering from crown to jaw to neck, all withered at once.

The dead skin that wrapped his head and face became an Armet helmet with no pattern or decoration. A helmet commonly seen throughout the Empire.

The apprentice knight stood up. Despite the swords, axes, and spears embedded in his body, he stubbornly rose.

With each step he took, the weapons stuck in his body fell to the ground. They dropped with thuds, as if thrown into a waterfall.

Kain rummaged through his pocket. He forcibly placed Father Haspel’s emblem in Lily’s hand.

“Run away.”

Lily looked at Kain with bewildered eyes.

“What…?”

“Listen carefully. Get to safety. Take my bag, find Professor Anna, and tell her what happened here. Not even Verneith. Only tell the professor.”

Lily looked at Kain, at the Knight of the Scabbard, at the monastery chapel that was shaking with thuds.

Though the flames had died down, the heated fire was burning the furnishings inside, causing the chapel to collapse from within.

“Where… where are you going?”

Kain shifted his staff to his left hand.

“Going to catch the bastard who crushed people.”

“Do you know how? How to catch him…”

“No.”

Lily widened her eyes. Kain shook his head.

“I don’t know either. That’s why I’m going to find out. So watch. Watch how the Mercy Knights fought, how I fought. Watch closely what techniques he uses and what evil he does. Then tell everyone. Find a way to cut off his head.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“If we both die, who will bring news to the Empire? In this situation, one agent needs to buy time.”

“Then we can both escape!”

Lily clenched her fists. Kain gave a slight smile.

“I have my dignity as an agent. How can I just leave when there’s a bastard crushing people right there? I’m going to do my job. You do yours. What would people say if the section chief didn’t even look after his trainee’s life?”

Lily lowered her head. But soon she forced herself to look up. Kain, thinking this might be the last time, gave her a bright smile.

“You’ve worked hard all this time. Go. Hurry.”

Turning his back to Lily, Kain lowered his body. Silently, he ran toward the back of the apprentice knight, following the shadows.

* * * * *

“Aah… aaaah!”

Lord Aldric screamed. Commander Marco retreated hesitantly. His sword was already embedded in the apprentice knight’s heart. The black knight didn’t fall. He just kept walking, swinging his scabbard.

“Run… run! Run…”

The shadow flowing from the apprentice knight overturned the ground like a wave. Shadow figures in black robes rose from the ground. They seized weapons embedded in the knight’s body and picked up fallen arms.

“…a knight… in any… situation…”

A metal-grinding sound came from the apprentice knight. It was quite similar to a voice.

“…must not… abandon… weapons…”

The shadows rushed to return the fallen weapons to their owners.

The squire who had dropped the logging axe received his weapon with his skull. The other apprentice knight who had stabbed the apprentice knight’s leg with a spear received the broken shaft through his throat.

Commander Marco resisted desperately. Fists. Stones within reach. Metal boots. He kicked, hit, and pushed away. Still fighting, fighting, and fighting again.

But his head had already fallen to the ground. While his head lay face down, shedding tears of blood, his body swayed back and forth, flailing its limbs. Blood spurted from his severed neck like a fountain of irritation.

“Aaaah! Aaaaaaaaah!”

Lord Aldric clutched his head. The apprentice knight stood before him.

“…a knight… in any situation…”

The knight captured by darkness gripped the sword handle. Something dark, flowing like blood along the sword, firmly bound the crossguard and scabbard. The knight didn’t draw the sword. He just held the handle of the sword bound to the scabbard and raised it above his head.

“…must not… run away… from the enemy…”

The Knight of the Scabbard brought down the scabbard. Slowly. Irreversibly.

With a thud, the scabbard stopped. In mid-air. Not far from Aldric’s head, blocked by an ash staff reinforced with metal.

“I’ve been wanting to see you. You bastard.”

Kain kicked the apprentice knight with his right foot. The knight’s knee buckled. The shadows that had haphazardly returned weapons by stabbing them into their owners’ bodies rushed toward Kain.

Kain jumped backward. The monastery courtyard was open ground. If surrounded, it would be over.

One at a time. One by one.

Kain drew his sword. The imperial sword was unsheathed silently. A shadow ghost swung down an axe. As if to split him in half from head to toe.

Kain didn’t confront it directly.

Arm. Angle of the axe. Direction of the body. Just from these, he could predict the axe’s trajectory. The slow axe swinging from top to bottom. Simply shifting his foot was enough to avoid it.

Thud.

The axe stuck in the ground. Kain swung his sword at the shadow’s wrist. He didn’t even feel like he was cutting anything. Literally, it felt like slicing through air.

But the shadow clutched its severed wrist in agony. Kain knocked it down with a kick. Leaning his body backward, he avoided the trajectory of a longsword aiming for his neck.

Using his staff in his left hand to push off the ground, he rose with the momentum and slashed the shadow’s neck with his diagonally held sword.

Yet still, there were too many shadows that hadn’t fallen. Like a pack of dogs, they tore apart even the last servant of the Mercy Knights.

The chapel could no longer withstand the heat inside. Heated stones burst out.

To the library. To the main building. To the dormitory.

Broken lamps spilled oil onto the floor. The hearth set up to care for patients was overturned.

Horses tied in the stable wailed. Sparks jumped onto their manes, their glossy fur, their gentle and frightened eyes.

Soon it became a wildfire. Horses with their bodies on fire ran amok in all directions.

“It’s hell! This is hell! This place is hell, this place is hell…”

Lord Aldric couldn’t finish his words. A horse with its mane and back on fire trampled his mouth. The lord reached out his hand in protest but soon collapsed with a thud.

Shadows rose from the ground like stakes of a pyre.

Rotting hands seized the bodies of the Mercy Knights.

Black flames burned their bodies.

Only the Knight of the Scabbard silently watched the scene.

Kain leaped through countless shadow hands and weapons like a bird with broken wings.

Throwing himself forward, he rolled once, then kept low as he rushed toward the Knight of the Scabbard.

‘I can do this.’

The shadows were slow. The Knight of the Scabbard would be too. If he could overcome the terror gripping his legs and the fear blinding his eyes, they were nothing but illusions.

The Knight of the Scabbard swung his scabbard.

Kain instinctively swung the staff in his left hand.

He could see the trajectory. It was calm, like slow motion. He could have easily dodged it and then cut the enemy’s neck. Yet his instinct made him swing his staff.

Kain’s wrist snapped. As if he had struck the staff against a rock. The recoil transferred directly. Sparks flew from his eyes, but Kain stepped back.

“Heroes hide their strength, is that it? Isn’t that too cliché?”

His left hand wouldn’t work properly. Kain threw away his staff. Now he had to evade and defend with only his imperial sword in his right hand and his legs.

‘If necessary, I’ll sacrifice my left arm.’

Kain rushed in again. This time the black knight thrust his scabbard straight forward. Again, Kain’s instinct whispered.

That it would be like impaling his neck on a pike. That going straight would mean death.

He put strength in his legs and pivoted. Jumping diagonally forward to the left, he struck the knight’s wrist with the sword in his right hand.

But the knight had already pulled his arm toward his body. The sword tip only slightly cut the knight’s gauntlet.

Kain slid across the ground. His pants tore and blood flowed from his scratched calf, but Kain paid no attention. He stood up straight and readjusted his grip on the sword.

The Knight of the Scabbard gripped the handle like a handshake. He extended his arm straight in front of his stomach. A long-range defensive stance.

“Hey, tin can. Let me ask you one thing. Are you happy?”

Kain deliberately swung his sword around. Crudely, but the Knight of the Scabbard didn’t waver at all. He just maintained his defensive stance.

Behind him, the bodies of the dead Mercy Knights were engulfed in darkness and burned.

“…No.”

A sound like metal scraping emerged. Kain tilted his head. The right side of the helmet still rippled with shadows, but the left revealed a human face—the youthful face of the apprentice knight. Though his eyes were still rolled back, tears were streaming down.

“If you’re not happy, let’s stop. Maybe… if we go to the bathhouse and wash up a bit, couldn’t you take that off?”

Damn it, his broken wrist showed no signs of recovery. His scraped calf was stinging. The muscles throughout his body felt like they were cooking from the inside. Still, Kain readjusted his grip on the sword.

“…When I was suffering…”

“What?”

The Knight of the Scabbard held his sword straight up. It was an attack preparation stance. Straight out of a textbook.

“Where were you when I was suffering? Where were you when I was crushed by injustice? Now that I seek revenge, why do you stand in my way? What are you?”

“Me?” Kain shook his head. He needed to focus.

“A civil servant.”

The knight gave no answer. Kain decided to use his last move.

With good luck, it would end with just a sprained ankle; with bad luck, his left arm would be shattered. But at least the knight was only using a scabbard, so he wouldn’t be cut.

But to do this, he needed to deceive. He needed to hide his intention. So Kain rambled.

“I’m sorry. I’m not God. Just a human. I doze off, need to eat, have frustrations, chronic gastritis, occupational muscle pain—that’s why I submitted my resignation. But you know what.”

The knight mustn’t notice. Though slow, he had good instincts. He knew how and when to block. In one go. Kain had to deceive him.

While steeling himself, Kain deliberately stalled.

“But you know what… no matter how blind I might be, if someone is beating people to death in front of me, I can’t let that slide. I don’t care if you’re taking revenge or whatever, but in my eyes, you’re just a criminal caught in the act.”

“…I was wronged!”

A little more prodding might do something.

Kain’s mind raced. He shifted his feet slightly. Gathering strength for the final charge. From an angle easy to approach. From a direction the enemy wouldn’t expect.

“You know, I’ve locked up over a thousand guys like you. Not one of them ever said ‘I’m sorry.’ They all talk like you. Yeah. It’s unfair. I’m sure it feels unfair. I saw it too.”

“Didn’t you see the injustice I suffered!”

“I did. ‘Isn’t this too harsh? Shouldn’t this be stopped?’ I told your superiors many times. But they wouldn’t listen. And, as I said, I’m a civil servant. I can’t freely do bad things, but I also can’t freely do good things. That’s the damn aspect of being a civil servant. I don’t have the authority to force the Mercy Knights to do anything.”

“You are a hypocrite. You are a coward. You are strong only against the weak!”

“That’s what they say.” Kain nodded. “That’s why I’m quitting. I know what kind of person I am now. I’m sick of it all. But before I go.”

Kain kicked off the ground and leaped toward the knight.

He rushed in with his left arm held stiffly to protect his head, face, and body. His right hand held the sword extended downward. To anyone watching, it looked like he was about to swing the sword in his right hand widely.

“I need to take you in first.”