In all those todays, Encrid had never once managed to send Oara into battle unscathed. The conditions required were too difficult to meet.

'Kill the Ghoul before Oara steps in.'

Meanwhile, Roman would kill the spider monster that fought with its eight legs as swords. Encrid also had to block the Ghoul's final blow. He could not repeat a today in which Dunbachel or Rem died.

Oara killing the owlbear had not been part of his calculations, but...

'Not bad.'

That was his conclusion.

At that moment, the ferryman's words unexpectedly came back to him.

["Do you know what they call someone who chooses to walk a hard road?"]

["A saint?"]

["An imbecile."]

The ferryman had subjected Encrid to one scathing criticism after another. It had not bothered him at all. He was far too used to such condemnation and criticism. How many tongues had mocked and jeered at him when he said he would become a knight? None of it mattered.

The loss of failing to protect what he wanted to protect because he lacked the actual strength. That sort of thing mattered more.

He had seen a man fighting monsters to protect his family. He had seen that man die. He had also seen the family the man had wanted to protect.

When he saw a mercenary bastard leering at the daughter, the sole survivor, Encrid lost his mind.

["Somebody stop that crazy bastard!"]

["Hey, hey, you bastard!"]

["Aagh, my ear!"]

Encrid bit the mercenary bastard's ear off and drove a dagger into his neck.

["You... Hah. Never mind. Cool your head."]

The mercenary captain let him off. He was locked in prison instead. That was the mercy: left alone, he would have been stabbed to death by the dead man's so-called comrades.

He spent half a year imprisoned. There was nothing to do, so he trained his body. Most of the guards ignored him, but one asked him a question. It was the elderly head jailer, past his fifties.

["Why did you do it?"]

["I didn't like his smile."]

["Are you mad?"]

The head jailer released Encrid. What he said afterward stayed with him for a long time.

["Without strength, you end up unable to do what you want."]

As Encrid left the prison, he repeatedly rubbed his chin, irritated by his coarse beard, and answered.

["I know that very well."]

His dream was to become a knight. He had chosen that dream because he wanted to live protecting what he wished to protect.

"Hahaha!"

Oara kept bursting into laughter.

GRRRR!

The balrog fragment growled like a beast.

He could not count them precisely, but dozens of attacks passed between the two. Oara's Smile slashed the balrog's forearm and even punched a hole in its belly, but that alone did not kill it.

If anything, it moved more violently with a hole in its belly. Something like black smoke rose from the wound, and without any treatment, it half closed and stopped bleeding. Even as its belly was pierced, it swung the swordlike red rod in its hand dozens of times. It was a monster.

At times, the rod's trails spread over Oara like a net. Rather than retreat, she pulled Smile up in a rising slash. One strike tore the net apart. White light burst forth, and pressure swept the surroundings.

BOOM! RRRUMBLE.

The earth shook with the explosion. The balrog had stamped down as though striking the ground.

Oara shook her sword. Something rippled along the wavering blade. To Encrid, it looked as though the blade had suddenly multiplied into dozens. Through the imprinted weapon, formless willpower became tangible force and swept through the area.

The balrog did something similar. Thus the red rod met the white. At times the two rods became whips; at others, beams of light. They seemed to bend, then straightened and stopped, sometimes forming planes like walls of steel.

That was how it looked to Encrid's eyes. In reality, the two were merely swinging their swords and fighting.

BOOM!

With an explosive crash, Oara and the balrog fragment crossed past each other.

No one could intervene in this fight. Anyone who did would only get in the way. This was a knight's battle.

"Master!" Roman shouted.

Encrid watched in silence.

Oara's fight with the balrog fragment did not last long. Having glimpsed the realm of omnipotence, Encrid could roughly read where it was heading. Oara would win. Yet it was not a fight the balrog could be said to have lost, either.

Rem, who had been knocked away, had turned pale. He vomited a gush of blood, perhaps because a rib had pierced his innards. Of course, he was not the sort to die from this much. Instead, he walked over and stood beside Encrid to watch the fight.

"She won."

Dunbachel spoke from where she sat, having sunk to the ground after escaping death.

A long line appeared across the balrog's neck. Not a red line, but a black one. That line parted the monster's head from its body. Was it a heartbreaking farewell? Or a satisfying parting? Who knew what a monster felt?

Oara turned around. She was still smiling.

"Everyone dies eventually."

She said it with that same smile.

Encrid knew Oara did not have long to live. He also knew that whatever he did, he could not save someone who was already dying. Repeating today did not mean he could do everything. Even in a today changed by the curse, some things never changed.

"Whew. That was good."

The red rod the balrog had wielded was embedded in Oara's chest as she spoke. It was a sword resembling a skewer.

Hadn't Luagarne said a balrog used a flaming sword and a whip? She had said that the fragment was incomplete, so this was all it had. A sword that resembled a red rod and did not burn was its weapon.

"Roman, look after the city."

The knight spoke with the rod lodged in her chest.

"I'm sorry I won't make it to Rowena's wedding."

The ruler of the city built from a thousand bricks spoke.

"The Demonic Realm is finished now. You just have to kill what's left. No new monsters will emerge."

The hero spoke, concerned for tomorrow to the very end.

Without Oara, this city would not have existed. Without her, this place would already have become part of the Demonic Realm.

"Thank you, Encrid."

She acknowledged what he had done, too.

"Ah, that was fun."

Those were her last words.

What begins must end. Whatever flies must someday return to earth. To live is to walk toward death. All one can choose is what to do along the way.

There was no need to look back with regret at the road not taken. Such things had no meaning in life. Whatever one chose, only the effort to make that choice right could enrich life and make it beautiful.

Encrid sheathed Aker and stood straight. Then he placed his hand on the right side of his waist: a pledge to keep his weapon under control. It was the opening gesture of paying respect to the person before him.

Then he bowed his head, a gesture made out of respect for all she had done. It was a salute.

"Oa."

Encrid spoke the cry drawn from her name and witnessed the end of the knight who died smiling.

* * *

The two proto knights brought the situation under control, and Aesia dragged her exhausted body onward to handle the aftermath.

Anyone could die on a battlefield. Knights were not immortal. Everyone knew that.

"Master was dying."

A soldier with short blond hair approached and said those words. The soldier lit a torch. Few people were crying.

There was much to do to clear the battlefield. Every resident of the city came out to help make up for the shortage of hands.

Roman carried Oara's body in his arms. They laid her in the house where she had lived. There was no coffin yet. It felt as if she might leap out as soon as tomorrow, shouting, "Scared you, didn't I, you little shits!"

Of course, that did not happen. The knight Oara was dead.

Encrid washed the blood from his body. Outside, troops moving to establish the night watch kept up a constant commotion.

He returned to his lodgings, washed, lay down, and closed his eyes. He fell asleep at once. The ferryman appeared in his dream.

"Do you wish to turn today back? But some things never change. The number on the die, for instance. A curse has no power where a god has dwelt."

The ferryman mixed in things Encrid could not understand. There were several incomprehensible words. He could only roughly infer their meaning. What was this about a place where a god had dwelt?

"Had you remained in today, you could have gone your whole life without witnessing that death."

The ferryman's tone was quite tempting. But it held no allure.

From the beginning, there had been only one thing he meant to protect. A satisfied Oara. Oara of the Smile. Seeing a knight fight properly had been secondary.

And Encrid had seen that satisfied Oara, Oara of the Smile. Having seen a hero die smiling to the very end, he felt no anguish. What he had wanted to protect was her smile, not a life prolonged in misery by fleeing and abandoning what she had to protect.

Without a word, Encrid slipped back into sleep. The ferryman's figure blurred, and the sound of waves receded.

Soon he dreamed. This one was a real dream: the kind without the ferryman. A collection of stray thoughts reconstructed from the memories in his head. Memories and information mingled at random and spilled out.

"Hey, what do you think of my city?"

Oara stood atop the wall in her scarlet cloak. Encrid found himself beside her. He had no cloak. If this was a dream, it could at least give him a cloak. His back felt bare.

"Well? What do you think?"

"It's lovely. Lovely to look at, lovely to live in."

"Then will you stay?"

There was nothing to consider. He shook his head.

"And you're still set on becoming a knight?"

Perhaps because this was a dream, the conversation lurched from one subject to another. No, Oara had always been like this. She would toss out questions on impulse. Yet every one was sharp as a blade, cutting straight to the heart of things.

"Yes."

"Good. I think you'll make it. Anyway, thank you. Really. Whew, it was a close one at the end."

"Was it?"

"You didn't get a proper look, did you? Come here. I'll show you how I did it."

In the dream, Oara reenacted her fight with the balrog. Encrid stood in the balrog's place, then took Oara's role, committing each movement to memory.

"I knew if I brought my sword up like this here, the sneaky bastard would try to trip me."

"You predicted it?"

"I intended it."

Countless moves and countermoves had been packed into that brief exchange. So many that he wondered how she could calculate all of them while wielding Will at full strength.

"Right now, you're layering intent onto your movements, aren't you? But once you're used to it, you can use it freely. Will, I mean."

Oara taught him everything without holding back.

They talked like that for a long time. It was a dream, so he could not be sure, but it felt like a day, or perhaps a month.

"Goodbye."

With that cheerful farewell, Oara planted a kiss on Encrid's cheek. When he asked what that was about with his eyes, the hero in his dream answered.

"A thank-you."

There seemed to be no other meaning to it. Friendship, or gratitude, just as she said. Even in a dream, Oara was Oara.

Oara faded away, but behind her he saw the balrog's afterimage. He saw the dead monster fasten a chain around her neck. Why? Was it because this was a dream? Even so, it was a deeply unsettling ending.

Encrid awoke. It was dawn. He went outside and saw Roman.

"You're awake?"

Roman's complexion was dull, and fatigue showed on his face.

"You look like you haven't slept."

Encrid spoke after studying his face.

"I slept."

The answer was flat.

Yet his expression suggested that though he had slept, something was bothering him badly. Roman had suffered a deep cut to his forearm while fighting the spider swordsman, and it was wrapped thickly in bandages.

"Master appeared in my dream, just for a moment. She told me not to do anything pointless."

Roman let his troubled expression ease and spoke of his dream. It had been very different from Encrid's.

"A subconscious manifestation left through determination?"

The abrupt remark came from Luagarne, who was emerging from the lodgings. Encrid had woken and gone outside, so naturally she would follow.

"A balrog takes the souls of those it kills. They say it shapes them with hellfire into sculptures and keeps them."

What was a soul? Something every sentient being was said to possess.

"Then?"

Encrid prompted her at the right moment, inviting her to finish whatever she had to say. Luagarne did.

"That is why the balrog scatters its fragments. Its nickname is Soul Collector. In the great Demonic Realm, it is also called the Knight Hunter. It is a monster whose hobby is collecting individuals who fight beyond the limits of their species."

It ignored worthless souls. It watched those with outstanding potential, waiting for them to grow. Sometimes, it even nurtured them. Then, upon seeing someone with a powerful body and skill at its peak, the balrog would pounce like a dog that had starved for days.

A creature that displayed the utmost refinement while living drunk on desire. Such monsters existed. Monsters with true intelligence. On the continent, beings like that were called demonic humans.

"Then the balrog has Master's soul right now?"

Flames flickered in Roman's eyes as he asked.

"Probably."

The moment Luagarne finished answering, Encrid spoke.

"Ah, I see."

Words that would ordinarily mean nothing special rang with a certain weight. Those few words, "Ah, I see." From Encrid's mouth, they could not be taken at face value. They carried a hundred times more force than "Just you wait."

There was probably nothing he could do right now. It would be a difficult monster to find even if he went to the great Demonic Realm. But once he attained knighthood, and kept moving forward even after becoming a knight...

"Me first," Roman said.

He had understood Encrid's words.

"Become a knight. Then kill the balrog."

Encrid added another ornament to his dream. That was when he would play a requiem for the hero. In place of the song of encouragement he had never sung, the dance he had never shown her, he would kill the balrog. That was what he would do.

Luagarne looked into his eyes, blue flames burning quietly, never to be extinguished, and spoke.

"It's dangerous."

When Encrid offered no particular answer, she continued.

"You wouldn't listen if I tried to stop you. Simply becoming a knight won't be enough. Just remember that."

He had never dreamed of being just a knight. The knight in the song had borne the epithet "War's End," and those two words meant the martial might to put an end to every battle.

It had been that way from the beginning. His dream was not simply to become a knight, but a knight who could do whatever he wished.

He had glimpsed a fraction of omnipotence. Encrid knew his dream had brushed his fingertips. All that remained was to close his hand around it. That was what he thought.

Of course, the road would not be easy. Just as it had never been easy before.

But he would neither fear it nor stop. Just as he never had before.