Chapter 38
Baraha was sitting motionless, staring at her. His face was blank.
Cadet Ekinesia Roaz aimed his sword at his neck, lifting Baraha's chin with the tip. Her face was reflected in his yellow eyes. She asked in a low voice,
"Did you see it?"
"...I've seen so much, I'm not sure what you're asking about."
Baraha replied slowly. Eki looked down at him with cold eyes. He took a breath and continued,
"Demon Sword, Bardelgiosa... Hah."
The end of his sentence was swallowed by a gasp of air. It was because Eki had slammed the sword into the ground at his feet with a loud thud.
She planted the sword and collapsed onto the floor. A long groan escaped her lips. She brought her knees to her chest, buried her face in them, and muttered weakly.
"Ah. I'm going crazy."
"...Sorry."
"Why are you apologizing?"
"Uh... I just felt like I should."
Eki was taken aback and looked up, then chuckled. Baraha's face as he looked at her was blank, like a simpleton.
She untied the cloth that had been holding her hair back with one hand, then roughly combed back the falling strands. She knew that her appearance was very different from usual, but since she had already been exposed, it didn't matter.
Baraha's eyes followed Eki's hand as she smoothed her hair. It was an action that made him look like a fool or an animal. Eki waved her hand in front of his eyes.
"Are you okay?"
"Uh, um, well."
Baraha groaned. He shook his head as if trying to come to his senses, pressed his fingers to his forehead, and then opened his mouth with difficulty.
"Giosa Owner?"
"Yes."
"Of the Demon Sword?"
"...Yes."
"You were a Master?"
"Yes."
To be precise, she was at a stage higher than Master, but Eki still didn't even know the name of that stage. Most people didn't even know that such a stage existed. So she just nodded vaguely.
"Was it you who knocked me out by hitting the back of my neck earlier, Eki?"
"...Yes, I'm sorry."
"Because you didn't want to be found out?"
"You know me so well."
Eki gave a wry smile. What should she do? She had entered the Node to save Baraha, and she had killed Ian, who had tried to kill him. But now, she was going to get rid of him just because her Demon Sword had been exposed? That was ridiculous.
If she was going to kill people like that, she wouldn't have hidden her skills and made a plan to become a royal guard in three years as a Military Cadet. She would have raided the royal guard at night, killed all the guards, and stolen the Giosa.
She didn't want to kill innocent people, except for irredeemable trash like Ian. As long as they didn't threaten the people around her.
So she had to shut his mouth. For her, who wasn't a mage, there was only one answer from the beginning. Eki looked straight into Baraha's eyes. His sword was stuck between him and her, who was sitting down.
"Senior."
"Yeah."
"I, I don't want to kill you, Senior."
The color drained from Baraha's face. Eki rested her chin on her knees and stared up at him.
"But if you don't keep the fact that I'm a Giosa Owner a secret, I'll have to kill you."
Even if Baraha spread rumors everywhere, she had no intention of killing him. Killing him was impossible.
How could she kill someone she cared about with her own hands when those terrible memories were so vivid in her mind? She could struggle to save him, but she couldn't do that.
She wanted to see Baraha become a royal guard. So this was just blackmail. But she couldn't let it show that it was an empty threat. Eki continued expressionlessly.
"Keep it a secret. It's not a request, it's an order."
"...Um."
Baraha's expression became strange. He scanned her up and down as she sat in front of him, then opened his mouth.
"I have a few questions."
"Go ahead. But I can't answer everything."
"First of all, why are you okay when you have the Demon Sword? Bardelgiosa is a sword that controls its owner."
"I can't answer that."
"...Then, can you answer whether you can maintain your ego in the future?"
"Yes. Unless I go completely insane."
"Why did you hide that you were the Owner?"
"Because it's a Demon Sword. Not everyone would believe that I'm safe."
In reality, it was hard to say that she was completely safe. Eki smiled bitterly as she thought about the accumulating murderous intent. She had relieved it a little today, but it still wasn't enough.
Baraha easily accepted Eki's words. It was thanks to the Demon Sword's notorious reputation.
"Ah, that's true."
"You believe me easily, Senior."
"I have no choice but to believe you, right?"
Baraha chuckled. His gaze reached the corpses of the Monsters spread out behind Eki. Then, his gaze moved to the greatsword stuck between her and him. Eki shrugged, noticing his gaze. Well, she had threatened to kill him, after all.
"That's right."
"Why did you join the Azure Knights?"
"To get rid of the Demon Sword."
"Get rid of it? How?"
"I can get another Giosa. So I entered the Military Academy with the intention of becoming a royal guard."
"If you get another Giosa, can you get rid of the Demon Sword?"
"Yes."
That was a lie. She could get rid of the Demon Sword right now. But if she did, she would lose all her memories from before the regression. Eki had no intention of telling Baraha that she had turned back time.
Baraha rubbed his forehead as if trying to sort out his thoughts.
"You're a Master. Can't you just become a royal guard right away?"
"I'm going to become a royal guard in about three years. A twenty-year-old Master is too suspicious, isn't it?"
"Now that I hear it, it's very, uh, extremely abnormal... But that's the truth. The Commander became a Master at twenty-three, so you're more of a genius than the Commander, I guess. If you're a genius, that could happen."
Baraha looked at Eki with a bizarre expression, as if he had just realized her age. Eki tilted her head.
"Even though I'm a Count's daughter who has never received swordsmanship lessons? The Commander has been holding a sword since he was a child."
"...What?"
"Senior Baraha. I had never held a sword before I was twenty."
This was true. Shock spread across Baraha's face. Eki smiled, only raising the corners of her mouth.
"If a twenty-year-old Master appears, the entire continent will pay attention. Everything from my birth to my growth will become gossip, and everyone will dig into my growth process. It was the same with Commander Yuriene."
"...That's for sure."
"Then they'll find out. There's a limit to insisting that Ekinesia Roaz secretly taught herself before becoming a Master, without ever having learned swordsmanship. I don't even have calluses on my hands. It's too different from spending three years as a Military Cadet and becoming a Master."
Baraha approached Eki. Eki realized what he wanted and held out her hand. It was her right hand, which was not wearing a glove.
He was startled by the black mark on her palm, then carefully felt her hand. It was soft and supple. It was a hand that she could never have if she had been wielding a sword for more than a year. He looked at her with a blank face.
"How... How did you become a Master?"
"I became a Master because of the Demon Sword. So I can't reveal that either. It's too absurd to say that I'm a Master right away, so I was thinking of showing a gradual increase in skill and becoming a Master around the age of twenty-three."
"The Demon Sword had that kind of power too?"
"Yes, it does."
This was a lie. The Demon Sword doesn't have the ability to make its owner a Master. It can control its owner and make them able to fight even a Master, though.
[You're lying through your teeth. If I could do that, I'd be a Divine Sword, a Divine Sword.]
The Demon Sword grumbled. Eki didn't even pretend to listen. Baraha rubbed his face with one hand. He covered his eyes with his hand and called her.
"Eki."
"Yes."
"One last question, why did you come into the Node?"
"It just happened."
"Don't give me that. I just saw you running wild. You came in on purpose. There's no way you were swallowed by mistake."
Baraha took his hand off his eyes. With his dark skin, black hair, muscular body, and clear yellow eyes, typical of desert people, he said, looking like a crouching beast.
"You came in because of me, didn't you?"
"......"
"Because I was sucked into the Node. Right? You were confident that you could survive even inside the Node. So you came in to save me."
She had thought so before, but Baraha was quick to notice things in strange places. Eki averted her gaze without realizing it. She was too embarrassed to answer that she had come in to save him. She felt her face flush.
"No, I told you it was a mistake. I fell. Do you think Masters don't make mistakes? "
"A mistake. So you fell by mistake and came into the Node? Regardless of me? Just by mistake?"
"Do you think I'm crazy enough to come into the Node on my own? I'm embarrassed that I fell, so stop emphasizing it."
Eki said in an agitated tone. Baraha looked at her with a strange look and smiled.
"Eki."
"Why, why are you looking at me like that?"
"You're lying about killing me if I don't keep the secret, aren't you?"
Baraha didn't miss the moment when Eki's shoulders twitched for a brief moment. After a moment of silence, she moved at an incredible speed. She pulled out the sword that had been stuck between them and lunged at Baraha.
He fell backward from the momentum. She climbed on top of Baraha and pressed the sword to his neck. The blade slightly cut his skin and blood flowed.
"Does it seem like a lie? Are you going to test your only life? This is the Node, there's no one here."
A dry and cold voice. The murderous intent that reached him was ominous, and Baraha reflexively stiffened. He felt like he was being crushed by a cannibalistic Monster. Even though her body was light and soft.
But unlike his body tensing up, he wasn't afraid.
"Eki."
"......"
"Don't worry. I won't tell anyone."
Baraha raised his hand and patted her head while lying down. He smiled and continued,
"You say no, but anyway, I was saved by you. If you hadn't defeated those Monsters just now, I would have died here. Do you think I'm the kind of person who wouldn't even keep a secret that my savior asked me to keep?"
