Encrid filled his stomach with dry, crumbly bread, watery soup, salted meat, and soft cookies made with mixed grain flour, then did exactly what he had decided to do.

"Pwah! You're killing me!"

Dunbachel resisted, but there was no escape. Encrid shoved her head into the bathtub. It shot back out, spraying water everywhere.

"But I washed ten days ago!" she protested.

If splashing a few drops on her face counted as washing, then yes, she wasn't wrong.

"I could put Rem in the same tub."

"I'll wash myself."

While Dunbachel surrendered and washed herself, Encrid asked for another tub to be filled.

"I'll scrub your back," Luagarne kindly offered.

"No need."

Encrid declined. As he soaked in the warm water, he felt the weariness of the journey melting away.

He felt as though he had forgotten something, but it couldn't be important. After thinking about the work ahead and the knight Oara, he grew drowsy. There was no reason to fight it, so he closed his eyes.

Encrid fell asleep with his neck resting against the wooden tub.

"You've come somewhere interesting."

SLOSH.

River water and a violet lamp filled his vision. The face of the black-hooded shadow blurred, then eyes, a nose, and a mouth began appearing one by one.

Skin like a heap of gray stones. Unfocused eyes devoid of emotion. The ferryman.

"Is something ominous approaching, by any chance?" Encrid asked.

Outwardly, the ferryman did nothing. But had he been human, if he had, he would have been clenching his teeth and fists right now.

He might even have gone further and punched the bastard in the face before he knew it.

Purple veins bulged on the hand holding the oar.

"No?"

Encrid tilted his head.

The ferryman clung to his slipping reason. Never since he had begun ferrying had his emotions roiled like this. Until now, he had only mocked and despised his passengers, savoring a base sort of delight.

Now he felt something different. In a way, perhaps this was a positive emotional change. Hadn't he lived so long that he had forgotten he could even feel anger?

He reasoned with himself and suppressed his feelings.

"It's all right if you don't know."

Encrid meant no malice. To him, the ferryman was something like a god. He was simply voicing his honest thoughts.

He had been hoping, but if nothing was coming, that couldn't be helped. His tone and manner made that so painfully clear that the ferryman could speak calmly.

"Fuck off, you crazy bastard."

Now that Encrid had come to the Demonic Realm, he would bless his today. Perhaps only after enduring the cruelest today of all would Encrid regret it.

The ferryman never got to deliver a single one of his prepared taunts.

* * *

The absence of an approaching ominous threat changed nothing. Starting the next day, Encrid settled in on his own.

"Good morning."

He greeted the soldier cleaning the dining hall, who was either Rowena's boyfriend or her customer. The soldier looked up.

Dunbachel followed him down, her fur now white instead of gray thanks to yesterday's bath, and addressed the soldier.

"Hello, beggar soldier."

That was an original form of address.

"... Why am I a beggar soldier?"

"I saw you asking for a discount because you didn't have any Krona. In that alley."

Dunbachel mimed thrusting her hips.

The soldier flushed. It had been deeply shameful, all of it, including losing his temper and raising his hand.

"I'm a squad leader too."

"Are you?" Encrid said as he walked past. Dunbachel followed without even acknowledging the soldier.

"Any roasted grubs?"

The Frog came downstairs after them. The soldier shook his head at her question.

"We don't serve those."

"I see. Keep up the good work, you, ah, soldier with the healthy loins."

Once all three had left, the soldier spat out his words.

"... I'm a squad leader too, you bastards."

But the reality was that if he lacked contribution credits, he had to do something, even serve food in the dining hall. He had overextended himself getting hold of Krona this time.

Not that he regretted it.

He shut his mouth.

Outside, Encrid settled into the first empty lot he found. The entire city was one vast barracks, with wooden training dummies scattered throughout. The houses stood well apart, leaving plenty of open lots. Any of them could serve as a training ground.

He had washed and rested well yesterday. His travel fatigue was gone.

"A sturdy body. Excellent," Luagarne praised him.

With each day's sunrise, Encrid had repeated the same exercises tens, hundreds, thousands of times. The Isolation Technique was a method of tempering the body to the utmost limits of its physical capabilities.

Today, he did the same.

Even an approaching ominous threat wouldn't have changed that. With none coming, there was all the more reason to continue as usual.

Training. Moving his body. Swinging his sword.

Luagarne drew her sword.

TING.

A Frog with a Loop Sword was not an opponent to underestimate.

As they warmed up with a light spar, the sun broke through the clouds in the damp air, spilling dawn light.

Using the light to guide his positioning, Encrid employed the footwork he had learned and drew lines with his sword, unsettling Luagarne's balance with suggestion and checks. He feinted a strike to the right, then aimed a stab at her left shoulder.

He used a step she had taught him, placing his weight on his left foot and stabbing with the sword in his left hand.

It resembled the movements of a nervous soldier. The Tree Frog Step. A technique inspired by the way a stiff body sent the arm and leg on the same side forward together.

His constant practice writing and doing all sorts of things with his left hand now allowed him to move more precisely. All of it came together to make this movement possible.

"Good!" Luagarne cried, delighted.

She wasn't particularly driven by the instinct to fight, but facing Encrid sometimes excited her before she knew it.

After they had worked up a thorough sweat, a gray-haired barbarian approached the lot.

"You know, when someone disappears, aren't you supposed to look for them?"

"... Oh."

Encrid now realized what he had forgotten in the tub yesterday. Rem.

"Where've you been?"

"Do you even care?"

"No."

Encrid figured he had gone off hunting on his own. Bits of grass and dirt clinging to him made it clear he had been wandering around. There was a faint smell of charcoal too, as if he had spent the night burning something.

He also carried a heavy pouch that seemed to contain stones. Part of one showed through the opening.

While looking around the city, Rem had found a good whetstone. Told he couldn't get one without contribution credits, he had gone to find his own. It was a natural whetstone, the kind that grew harder when fired. He needed something like that to sharpen his Lewis steel axes.

Finding a few stones, exploring the area, then returning to the smithy to fire them had taken the entire night.

"Anyway, I'll see you after I've had some sleep."

Fatigue accumulated. You had to rest when you could. Whether he was in Thousand Brick or the heart of the Demonic Realm, Rem wasn't a man who let his surroundings affect him.

He did what he always did.

Encrid took it in stride and focused on his training.

He had been swinging his sword for quite some time when a voice interrupted.

"I hear you're going to be a knight?"

When had she arrived? It was Oara.

She was squatting on a stump beside the lot, elbows resting on her knees and arms dangling. A plum in one hand, she chewed noisily. Purple juice stained her lips, a drop trickling down them.

Seen in the sunlight, her hair was indeed brown. Its natural waves curled pleasantly, and a neatly folded cloth encircled her forehead. Her eyes were round, her gaze clear.

She seemed to have sobered up. After a little more chewing, she spat out the pit. It lodged in earth much the same color as her hair.

"Yes. That's my intention," Encrid answered.

"Mm-hmm."

Oara nodded and said nothing more. She simply watched. Encrid continued what he was doing.

Oara watched for only a moment before getting up. She broke a branch from a tree growing between the houses, then struck it lightly with the edge of her hand, sending leaves showering down. Finally, she took out a knife and trimmed it into shape.

"We'd better be on our guard," Luagarne said as she watched.

Oara had just turned back toward them with the trimmed branch.

THUD!

Dunbachel kicked off the ground and retreated more than five paces. Transformed into a white lion, she bared her fangs and crouched. Her hands braced on the ground, she lowered herself until her chin nearly touched it, lifting only her head.

She was on guard.

The intimidation was brutal. A knight's intimidation usually felt like a great stone bearing down on the shoulders. Oara's went further.

Hers was like iron shackles. No, like being struck with a lump of iron.

Rather than "Move and I'll cut you," it seemed to say, "Before you move, let's start by giving you a good hit."

"Ah, it's been a while since I used this on a person. Having a little trouble controlling it."

She stepped forward as she spoke, raising the branch and taking a position opposite Encrid.

He raised Aker.

Normally, moving should have been difficult. Oara's intimidation covered a limited area: precisely five paces, fanning out in the direction she faced. Within that space, its pressure was on an entirely different level from ordinary intimidation. A mere proto knight should have struggled to move.

Yet Encrid not only raised his sword and took his stance, but also let his fighting spirit show.

The moment he felt that invisible lump of iron strike him, the Will of refusal activated inside him. Determination canceled out determination. Her intimidation was therefore meaningless.

It hadn't been his intention, but he had piqued Oara's interest.

'He's not even a knight, and he's shaking off my intimidation?'

Did he possess some abnormal means of defense?

He was like a seven-year-old child holding a shield made of black gold. Unless that child was a Giant, he shouldn't even have been able to lift such a heavy shield. Yet somehow Encrid had raised it, blocked with it, and knocked her attack aside.

That was impressive.

The corners of Oara's mouth lifted. With a faint smile, she said, "Nice sword."

"It's a treasure of the royal house."

"They did say you were a hero of the civil war. They could've given me one too. Stingy bastards."

"You know His Majesty?"

"No. Never even seen him."

Oara had taken no part in the civil war or anything happening within the royal house. Her job was to protect this place. That was the promise she had made to herself.

"Want to play?"

Her question sounded seductive. She looked like an attractive woman inviting him into her bed at night.

Encrid succumbed to the temptation.

He stepped forward without a word, without a single feint. A straight line and nothing else. He staked everything on seeing two points and joining them.

A probing attack to gauge her skill? He didn't need that. His opponent was a knight.

He had to show her his best move.

The Heart of the Superhuman beat. Concentrate on a Single Point made time seem to stretch. Pressure bore down on his entire body, as though he had sunk into a swamp.

Overcoming that pressure, Encrid struck.

Watching from the side, Dunbachel's eyes widened. Her claws tensed without her realizing, splitting a stone embedded in the ground with a grinding crack.

She had seen this technique before. She had been on its receiving end too.

Giant's Strike, was it?

But what he was showing now was something she had neither seen nor faced.

Encrid threw his entire body into that technique, that single stroke. The muscles throughout his body, honed through the Isolation Technique, erupted with power.

It was as though someone had seized time at both ends and stretched it. Along that timeline, Encrid alone advanced and brought down his sword.

A ray of light cleaved the sunlight, descending toward the knight's head.

TAP.

An anticlimactic sound rang out.

"Too much tension."

Encrid froze in the middle of his swing. Oara's branch rested atop his wrist.

From there, he turned his left foot to the side and moved. His blade traced a new course.

Oara lifted the branch away, then brought it back against his wrist.

She was a knight. She expected that to be enough to knock the sword from his hand.

But even a knight couldn't be perfect in every respect.

CRACK!

The force behind the branch could have broken an ordinary person's wrist, but Encrid endured it. His long-trained muscles now possessed an altogether different toughness. And after countless lessons from Audin in taking a hit, he tensed at the moment of impact and drew his hand back, shifting the point of contact.

Then he completed the sword stroke.

Pivoting on his right foot, his muscles channeled force into the blade. The sword shot forward, shining like a White Thunderbolt.

Oara released the branch. The moment she recognized her failure, she grasped and drew her secondary weapon.

CLANG!

Aker's blade stopped.

Oara looked at Encrid over her angled shortsword. Brown eyes met blue eyes shining beneath black hair.

Though their blades had met, neither side pushed forward or was driven back. Force had been applied precisely at the center of impact, bringing them to a halt.

That was Oara's doing. She used exactly the force required to hold Encrid's sword in place. The technique was called Blade Catch.

"You're pretty good," Oara said.

She meant it. At this level, he could be considered on par with the two proto knights she had personally raised.

No, judging by his fighting spirit, might he do even better?

She didn't know. You never knew how a fight would go until you fought it.

But there was something she could tell now without testing it. She had meant to finish with a branch, yet she had drawn her sword.

Was it because she had misjudged his ability?

Oara had made two mistakes, and she now recognized them.

'It has been a while since I fought a person.'

Even sparring was rare for her. That was the first error.

The second was...

'It's not that I underestimated him.'

This Encrid was, how to put it, tough. If an ordinary proto knight was a well-made steel sword, he was a sword forged from melted scraps of iron with an absurd amount of care.

Hence the failed prediction.

He wasn't someone polished and properly trained. He was a tenacious bastard who had clawed his way up from the bottom.

Now that she understood, it was only natural to change her approach.

"This'll hurt if you don't block it," Oara said, pushing Encrid's sword away.

He tried to draw back his trapped sword and close in, but she forced him back. The force of her push was tremendous.

"What is a knight?"

Oara asked with her sword arm hanging at her side.

Rather than answer, Encrid readied his stance again.

"Someone who gives physical form to the intangible power of determination."

It was a definition grounded entirely in reality. Strip away the romance, and she was right. You couldn't speak of knights without speaking of Will.

Then Oara demonstrated the definition she had just given.