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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 4
Chapter Title: The Essence of Northern Swordsmanship
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Among the martial techniques established by the Knight King, the one with the highest degree of perfection was swordsmanship.
It was because he, both king and knight, had researched it for years, helping to produce countless knights.
Northern Swordsmanship consisted of a total of twenty forms.
Most knights couldn't master beyond the tenth form before its complex and profound movements, but its power alone was enough to strike fear into orcs and elves alike.
Whoosh, clang!
I kicked the girl who stood there dumbly.
A massive greatsword crashed down right where she had been, kicking up the powdery snow piled on the ground.
If this dragged into a prolonged battle, I'd be at a disadvantage.
One per stance, steadily trading them off—that was my path to victory.
Stepping on the greatsword, I leaped into the air and cleaved the orc's entire head from its body.
Splatter!
It wasn't merely about speed.
The essence of Northern Swordsmanship lay in strikes as sharp as a blade's edge in the wind and as heavy as a mountain.
Dodging a thrusting attack to fell one orc, parrying a descending blow to claim another.
Never fully receiving their blades, but always committing my full body weight to the decisive cuts that severed their breath.
Eight full years had passed since I'd last swung a sword, yet the king's teachings remained wholly intact within me.
In a flash, I cut down seven orc warriors, shaking off the blood amid ragged breaths.
The remaining orcs advancing to attack hesitated and fell back.
"Send a messenger! Call the Sergeant—now!"
These orcs weren't the same level as before.
But their judgment in swiftly reading the battlefield and adapting remained as sharp as ever.
With half the orc warriors gathered in the clearing cut down, one called for reinforcements.
The others, who had exuded a murderous ferocity bent on killing me, shifted to a delaying tactic and began circling the perimeter.
Dragging this out would put me at a disadvantage.
I turned to the girl collapsed on the ground.
"Get up. We're running."
"B-but the people..."
"Look behind you."
The girl hesitated.
She was worried about the mother and daughter she'd protected, and the others nearby.
But that hesitant expression soon twisted into deep betrayal and hollow despair.
Because when she turned to follow my voice, no one was there.
Not even the mother and daughter she'd risked her life to save—they'd fled too.
"Ah..."
The girl must have thought that if she stepped forward as an example, the people would follow her lead.
That noble justice alone would be the unyielding force to bring order to this world.
But the reality she faced was nothing but cowardly masses and her own lone incompetence.
Slap!
I slashed another orc warrior approaching to probe my defenses.
Then, glaring at the faltering girl, I backhanded her tear-streaked cheek with a sharp crack.
Yes, there had been no need to go that far.
But the situation was far too dire to slowly make her understand everything.
"Snap out of it—or die here!"
If the girl had glimpsed reality even briefly, she never would have begged me to teach her swordsmanship.
I gazed at her with cold eyes, praying the reason I'd drawn my sword wouldn't fade away.
Trembling eyes, blood trickling from her slapped cheek.
Meeting my gaze, she staggered for a moment before steeling herself and regaining her footing.
And though slow, she unmistakably began running after me.
"Kyaaah!"
"Run! R-run away!"
We plunged into the midst of the terrified crowd.
The people screamed in panic, startling the orcs into momentary confusion.
A pitch-black night, snow just beginning to fall.
Once we broke from the village into the mountains, no orc would find us.
Shaking the green blood and chunks of flesh from my battered old sword, I shouted to the girl.
"There's a white-horned deer tied behind the big tree! Grab it and get back here!"
I couldn't abandon the king's sword.
I shoved the girl's back hard as she floundered, then glanced over my shoulder.
Huge spears sailed into view, hurled by the orcs.
Javelins hurtling toward the girl with relentless fury, determined not to let us escape.
But I casually deflected one, then heaved for breath.
"Hoo..."
Twang!
Crack!
I kicked up the deflected javelin and snatched it mid-air.
Then hurled it at a flustered orc, killing him, before dashing down the slope after the fleeing girl.
A fierce blizzard roared down from the peaks, accompanied by winter's howling winds.
The North itself seemed to cheer our escape, blanketing the pursuers' vision.
In moments, racing down the slope, I spotted the rundown shack—and the girl.
"Hahk, heuk! H-here!"
The girl, who had run with labored steps on the verge of collapsing, thrust the sword and gear into my hands.
She'd raced to fetch the white-horned deer tied nearby and our bags.
Eyes blending fear and resolve, lips trembling yet firmly set.
In that brief span, she'd reined in her turmoil and now awaited my next command.
But such admiration was fleeting.
For killing intent pierced the swirling blizzard and ambushed us.
Thud!
"?"
Whoosh!
I grabbed the girl's shoulder and shoved her aside.
A massive axe blade hurtled past with a vicious whoosh, right where she'd stood.
Had I not pushed her, it would have cleanly bisected her head from her torso.
Calmly evading the strike, I shifted into a counter stance.
Then whipped my sword at the heavy axe blade following in its wake.
Shing!
I aimed to deflect it.
But the incoming axe blade blazed with red aura, and my longsword snapped in half effortlessly.
An aura that seemed to cleave anything in its path, etched with blunt runes on the blade.
The ambusher swinging that axe at us was an aura user bearing a Martial Name.
Clang!
The girl, sprawled on the ground, her face drained with despair, muttered its identity.
"S-Sergeant..."
Red skin starkly different from other orcs, tusks jutting like a wild boar's.
A special rank among orc warriors, granted only to those innate berserkers.
Our attacker was an orc sergeant—the one who led warriors of red skin.
Slowly retrieving its axe, it snorted a hot puff of breath and asked me,
"Aren't you a knight?"
Aura manifesting on a weapon was a rare gift few could awaken.
And aura users inevitably earned a Martial Name in turn.
To orcs, it was the innate mark of sergeants and above; to we humans, divine proof of knighthood.
But true to its words, I was merely a mortal human incapable of wielding aura.
"......"
A squire who could never become a knight, cursed by my outsider birth.
I silently stared down at my halved longsword, lips sealed.
But that silence wasn't an answer to its question—it was quiet thrill.
The sword's excitement, ingrained like calluses in my palms, still coursed through me.
'Run away!'
Raising my head, I saw the girl, already resigned, mouthing silently at me.
To humans who'd lived like slaves, an orc sergeant meant death.
An insurmountable colossus, the very scourge that had frozen the North for so long.
But instead of fleeing, I drew the king's sword—honed across eight long years.
The blade that had berated and tempered me now gleamed with unprecedented sharpness.
Shing.
No aura. No Martial Name.
That truth had haunted me like a crushing burden right up to the king's dying breath.
Yet I'd never once yielded before warriors who flaunted their aura.
The king's sword melded to my hand like an extension of my body.
Powdery snow striking the blade halted mid-air, tracing its keen, formless edge.
At first, it was denial.
I desperately rejected it all: that my body couldn't birth aura, that no sword would grant me a Martial Name.
But reality, fledged from the bowstring, demanded I accept it.
A half-broken sword.
A lifelong squire, forever denied knighthood.
More agonizing than scornful stares was the towering wall that stunted my growth.
I trained until death loomed.
Swung the sword till my palms blistered raw and bones ground to dust.
Crossed eternal glaciers to test myself.
Yet the North, so beloved by humans, offered no reply.
It merely urged me onward down an endless road, in silence.
And even now, eight years after the king's death,
I wander still, seeking the way.
"Pity. I had high hopes since it's been so long."
Whoosh!
I drew my sword.
No aura ignited. Bored, the orc sergeant hefted its massive axe.
It swung at me and the girl, intent on closing today's chapter.
Time crawled slow, the aura's flames devouring falling snow with greedy hunger.
But as I shut my eyes, thick ripples cascaded across a serene lake.
I quietly shifted the hilt.
Scrape!
"...!"
Blade rode blade; the path diverted.
In a blink, the axe glanced off my edge, cleaving empty air and missing its mark.
The orc sergeant gaped in shock; the girl stared at me, incredulous.
Though aura had kissed the blade, the king's sword held firm.
Nay—it surged forth like an avalanche, aimed at the orc's throat.
Slash!
Three times.
No matter the master smith, no weapon endures aura beyond three clashes.
Such was the chasm between user and not—heaven and earth apart.
Yet amid countless brushes with life and death, I'd glimpsed one subtlety.
That even aura-less swordplay held a single rift to bridge that vast gulf.
"Y-you! H-human...!"
Exquisite precision.
A gap slim as a sheet of paper.
My sword wedged into it, sliding the aura-clad axe blade aside.
And carved a diagonal gash dead-center across its chest.
If a sword can't weather the third clash, then fell the foe in three moves.
When all dismissed it as madness, I'd spied a faint horizon.
The pinnacle of Northern Swordsmanship.
"Grrraaaah!!"
Slash.
Eyes blood-red, it thrashed in fury.
But no strike, no aura withstands the arcane depth of twenty forms.
Betrayed by its prodigious might and gift, the orc sergeant's stance crumbled at last.
Without pause, I spun, clasping the hilt two-handed.
Channeling the rebound's force wholly, I thrust a piercing slash forward.
Slash!
The head drifted free.
Movement light as fresh snowfall.
The blade swift as a gale.
Strike converged to one point—instantly beheading, the head aloft in void.
The severed neck's spray hushed in that instant, like silent fanfare heralding fresh strife.
As I sheathed my sword, the crimson head tumbled to the earth.
Thud.
It had stepped onto a road of no return.
Eight years of flight availed nothing after that final blow.
Yet I felt a treasure beyond worldly trade.
A fragile hope to begin anew—and the long-forgotten spark of will to fight.