Twin Lance Knight (5)

Twin Lance Knight (5)

“…”

Outside the carriage window, the scenery quickly passed by.

‘I will not give up until the very end.’

In my mind, the Saint’s final words echoed like an echo.

‘Humanity needs you.’

“…Ha.”

A hollow laugh escaped me.

What have I even done?

What’s so great about me that they’re so desperate to get their hands on me?

The Saint seemed to be under the misconception that I was some kind of invincible hero.

But that’s not the case.

Someone like me is just a weak and ordinary human who couldn’t even protect one comrade, one lieutenant.

“…Why do they expect so much from someone like me?”

My eyes felt heavy. When I rubbed my eyelids, my vision blurred momentarily before brightening again.

Beyond my brightened vision, I saw a familiar face.

“What are you staring at? Enjoying the view?”

Inside the carriage where I should have been sitting alone. Jack sat on the opposite seat that should have been empty, silently staring at me.

From under his chin, torn open from being hit with a rusty axe, something sticky dripped down.

“You’re quiet.”

“…”

“The last time I saw you, you were perfectly capable of talking, even in that state.”

Jack just stared at me without saying a word.

…I know. The fact is that he couldn’t possibly speak.

With his throat pierced, vocal cords inverted, and jaw detached, there’s no way he could speak properly.

And even before that, I know that someone who was definitely dead couldn’t come back to life perfectly fine and spew curses at me.

This is a hallucination. Just a fake image shown by my brain that still hasn’t escaped from the past.

Finding it difficult to keep facing that face, I turned my gaze back to the window.

“…She’s still not back.”

I arrived at the guest house, but Delphina hadn’t returned yet.

“What could this urgent matter be?”

I muttered as I flopped down on the living room sofa.

Being a holiday, there were no servants in the house.

In other words, it meant I was completely alone in the house.

No, not alone?

“Will you stop staring at me?”

From getting off the carriage to entering the house. Jack had followed me all along.

I didn’t expect him to be able to walk too.

Well, his legs are fine. So walking isn’t impossible.

But, it’s scary how his jaw dangles every time he walks.

For a hallucination, it’s unnecessarily realistic and makes me uncomfortable.

…I miss Delphina.

“…I’m lonely.”

Delphina, don’t leave me alone.

Suddenly, I felt resentful toward Delphina. Disappearing without even saying what the matter was.

“…She could have at least told me what the urgent matter was.”

Muttering complaints aloud, I stood up from my seat.

Because I sensed someone outside the entrance.

“…”

Without realizing it, I silently approached the entrance while muffling my footsteps. This was a bad habit if anything.

With my left fist tightly clenched, I flung open the front door.

“Who is it…!”

“…Ah.”

A familiar face was looking at me from in front of the door.

“…Alice?”

With half her face covered in blood, Alice stood in front of the door, breathing heavily.

She was clutching her right arm, which was streaming with blood.

“What happened to you? What…”

“Princess…!”

Alice took a step toward me, then fell forward as if her legs had given out.

“W-wait.”

“…It’s dangerous.”

Alice said with labored breathing. Before I could even think about what was dangerous, she continued.

“Delphina, Instructor Lore, they’re in danger.”

“Wait, what are you saying? Please explain so I can understand…”

Half-cradled in my arms, Alice murmured in a weak voice.

“Cor… nelio.”

“……What?”

In a barely audible voice, she said.

“A person named Cornelio attacked them…”

-Crash!!

The Aura-wrapped hammer and short lance collided in mid-air.

“Kuk…!”

Delphina groaned and gripped the hammer handle with her numb hands until they felt like breaking.

She felt like she would lose her grip on the hammer the moment she let her guard down even slightly.

The power of a Magical Beast far exceeding human strength, and the circulation breathing technique that vastly enhances physical abilities.

Cornelio’s power, using both simultaneously, was beyond imagination even for knights like Delphina and Lore.

The reason his forearm had been pierced by Alice’s spear was simply because he had been careless.

Without something to distract his attention like before, it was inevitably impossible for them to overwhelm him.

It wasn’t a matter of technique, skill, or experience.

It was a fundamental difference in power between individuals. Just as a child, no matter how skilled, cannot defeat a grown adult, there existed an unbridgeable dimensional gap between Cornelio and her.

The only reason a fight could even take place between him and them was because he had a “penalty.”

Due to instructions from the mysterious “higher-ups” who ordered his attack, he couldn’t kill them.

Even while enduring Cornelio’s fierce consecutive attacks, Delphina thought.

Who exactly were these “higher-ups”?

Were they the same person who had given Cornelio the power of a Magical Beast?

If so, were the “higher-ups” someone even stronger than Cornelio?

But if not necessarily, or if they were different people, why did Cornelio have to follow their instructions?

Was he being threatened with hostages or weaknesses? Was he receiving compensation? Or were they providing help for him to take refuge?

To begin with, it was a mystery how he had been able to infiltrate this Polaris inviolable zone where thorough security was maintained 24/7, especially since he had been publicly wanted by the Failon Kingdom.

‘I must endure.’

Delphina thought.

Now, they couldn’t just kill him outright anymore.

She had too many questions to ask him: how he had infiltrated Polaris Academy, who exactly these “higher-ups” giving him orders were, how he had obtained the power of a Magical Beast, and more.

She and Instructor Lore had to hold him back until Alice brought reliable reinforcements.

“Krrhaaaaaa!!!!”

With bloodshot eyes and highly excited, Cornelio roared and swung his short lance again.

-Clang!!

The short lance, heavily imbued with Aura, strongly struck the head of the hammer.

Firmly gripping the hammer handle that seemed about to break from bending, Delphina bit her lower lip until it broke.

Simultaneously, Lore’s blade flew in from behind Cornelio.

-Ka-ga-ga-gak!!

Cornelio, who had been focusing all his attention on Delphina until just now, twisted his upper body at a bizarre angle and swung his short lance.

As the Aura Blades collided with each other leaving blue afterimages, Cornelio roared.

“Picking, picking, it’s annoying!!!!!”

-Thud!!!

Cornelio stomped the ground roughly. The ground caved in with a footprint shape under his coarse fur and claws, and he charged toward him.

“Instructor!!”

Delphina shouted.

Lore reflexively thickened his Aura Blade, and Cornelio’s twin lances stabbed down onto it.

-Crack!!!!

Cornelio pressed down on Lore as if to bury him beneath the ground, scraping away at his Aura.

-Crash!!

Behind Cornelio, a hammer struck down.

“…Kheu.”

But instead of screaming, Cornelio laughed.

He swung his lance to send Delphina flying, and simultaneously pierced Lore’s stomach with his other lance.

“Kuk…”

Lore fell to his knees, spitting blood.

Leaving him be, Cornelio turned to face Delphina.

“Damn it all.”

Delphina breathed roughly, using her hammer to prop herself up.

-Grab.

At the same time, her neck was caught in a hand covered with coarse fur.

“──Kuk.”

“It’s over.”

Cornelio sneered in a low voice.

“For a novice, you fought better than expected, but this is how it ends.”

“Shut… up…”

Delphina glared at Cornelio and retorted.

“What are you so proud of, borrowing the power of a Magical Beast?”

“No, this is now my power.”

Cornelio gave a sinister smile.

“It’s my power since I’m using it. Isn’t that right?”

Delphina silently twisted the corner of her mouth. Cornelio roared in a growling voice.

“With this power, I’m sure I’ll never lose to anyone again! Not to Evangeline, not even to the Continent’s Best Sword!!”

“So what?”

Lifted by the neck in his grasp, Delphina retorted mockingly.

“Living on the run… taking orders for the rest of your life from someone you can’t even name.”

“…What did you say.”

“What’s the point of being stronger than anyone? You’re still just someone’s lackey after all.”

In Cornelio’s mind, the Saint’s voice buzzed and echoed.

‘You are our Holy Nation’s property.’

‘Just like a hunting dog, you only need to think and act as we command.’

‘That will be your way of life and reason for existence from now on.’

-Crack──

“Shut up.”

“Ka, huk…!”

“As a loser, act like a loser!! You should be begging for your life pathetically!!”

-Crash!!

With bloodshot eyes, Cornelio lifted Delphina and slammed her against a tree.

“Bow your head to me!! Beg for your life while sniveling!!”

“…I don’t want to hear that… from you…”

Despite choking, Delphina spoke.

“After all… didn’t you also lose once to the Princess?”

“…Fine.”

Cornelio, who had been breathing heavily, suddenly calmed down as if in an instant and lowered his voice.

“I’ll kill you.”

Cornelio muttered calmly.

“Orders or whatever, I don’t care. I’m going to kill you.”

-Crack…!

“Kehuk.”

Delphina exhaled a short breath and thought.

‘Damn, did I run my mouth too much?’

She had been like this since childhood.

Was it because she had learned it from her mother, or was it simply her innate personality?

Her darker skin tone compared to her peers, inherited from her father who belonged to a minority ethnic group.

Whenever she was called names like “darkie” or “Weldon steak,” she always responded with curses.

In verbal fights, she never wanted to lose. Nine out of ten times, it led to fistfights, and having been trained by her mother since childhood, she rarely lost.

Since her daily life involved cursing and throwing punches whenever something displeased her, she never properly made even one friend, common as they were.

‘Oh, come to think of it.’

Wasn’t the Princess the first real friend I ever made?

‘How things turn out.’

It seemed that without even realizing it, I had made a friend.

‘But what good is that? I’m about to die anyway.’

Unable to breathe, there was no way to use the circulation breathing technique.

Now, Delphina was just an ordinary girl.

Even when she tried to grab his hands and exert force, it was like pulling on a rock, showing no sign of moving at all.

‘This crazy bastard, he’s insanely strong.’

Her vision turned white, and her mind went blank.

The strength drained from both hands that had been clutching Cornelio’s fur.

‘Ah, I’m dying.’

Just as this thought crossed her mind.

-Swoosh…!

‘…Huh?’

Into her blurred, faded vision flew a sword with a familiar design.

‘That sword… where have I seen it?’

Inside the airship where she first met the Princess.

The beloved sword of Princess Knight Evangeline, wedged among the piles of luggage.

The large, sharp blade rising above the angular silver crossguard reminiscent of the edge of a castle wall.

-Slice.

Like a bullet, the flying blade cut Cornelio’s forearm in half.

Sticky blood splattered across her vision, and simultaneously, Delphina’s body fell to the ground.

“…Kahak! Kahak, heuuk…!”

The fingers strangling her neck loosened, and cold air rushed through her previously blocked airway, instantly filling Delphina’s lungs.

With tears welling in her eyes, she gasped for air while dry heaving, and before her appeared familiar platinum blonde hair fluttering.

A faded, dull color. But for Delphina, it was far more familiar than the original brilliant golden color.

“…Ku, aaaaaaargh!!!”

As Cornelio belatedly screamed after losing his forearm in an instant, a familiar voice reached Delphina’s ears.

“It’s been a while, Cornelio.”

-Thud.

Drawing out her sword deeply embedded in the ground, Evangeline said quietly.

“Are you ready to die?”