Najin had finished preparing to leave for the Outer Lands.

There had been a few matters to settle on the continent, and he had taken care of most of them during his three weeks in the capital. He had told the Empire's current foremost warrior about his predecessor and requested his cooperation. Gerd had accepted his proposal.

["Leave the rest to me."]

["You do what you need to do."]

That was what Gerd had told him, and he was now stirring up the entire Empire as if to prove those were no empty words. Najin could safely leave matters on the continent in his hands.

'As for the Order of Star Radiance, too...'

He had gained something there. Recalling his conversation with the Lighthouse Keeper, Najin ran his hand over his sword hilt.

The Lighthouse Keeper, Eurypylus, was undeniably powerful. His martial might rivaled that of the entire Empire; his very existence served as a counterweight. Najin still did not know whether they would clash or cooperate. As Eurypylus had said, they would only know when the situation arose.

But Najin always had to assume the worst.

A clash with Eurypylus. Imagining that scenario, he let out a long breath. He still had a long way to go, but his direction was clear. What he needed to do had not changed, either.

'Shall we go?'

-...

'Merlin?'

-... What?

'Did I do something wrong? What's the matter?'

-I'm not angry.

Najin tilted his head at Merlin's oddly sulky demeanor. She had been like this ever since he said goodbye to Dieta that morning. Since she refused to say what was bothering her, he could only feel frustrated.

-That girl.

'Dieta?'

-I don't know. Anyway, that girl... Never mind. Forget it.

He had told her Dieta's name several times, but Merlin still called her “the merchant” or “that girl.” She grumbled as she glanced at the back of Najin's neck. That was where Dieta had buried her face when they shared a brief farewell embrace before he left.

-...

After silently staring at that spot, Merlin abruptly climbed onto his back. He felt no weight. Resting her chin on his shoulder, she gestured for him to set off. He had no idea why she was behaving this way, but her mood seemed to have improved a little.

He was just about to board the carriage when he found someone waiting for him in front of it.

Two crossed swords with a shield depicted above them. A man wearing armor engraved with that distinctive emblem waved at Najin. He had an open, easygoing look about him, and his face was familiar.

“Sir Argo?”

Argo, a knight of Atanga. They had first met during the campaign against the Demon Knight.

“It's been a while, nameless boy.”

2.

“There's no grand reason for my visit. I've come to make you an offer.”

“An offer?”

“Yes. It brings back memories of when you were still a mercenary in Cambria... Though calling it the past is a bit much, considering it was only half a year ago.”

Argo looked at Najin in disbelief.

“Back then, you took a commission from Atanga and slew the Demon Knight Berheigen, didn't you?”

“I did.”

“This is much the same. We've found traces in the Outer Lands of a Knight Devil that escaped us long ago. I thought I'd invite you to help slay it. What do you say?”

Not a Demon Knight, but a Knight Devil.

Najin tilted his head.

“A Knight Devil? Is that different from a Demon Knight?”

“A Demon Knight is a knight who has contracted with a devil. A Knight Devil is something different. It's a devil that devours knights' corpses and mimics them. There was once a large-scale campaign against it on the continent, but we failed to kill it.”

Argo briefly explained the Knight Devil. Najin listened quietly, then sharply drew in a breath at one point. He could hardly have done otherwise.

“It was a devil I pursued with my seniors and fellow knights back when I was still an Expert, but it got away. Several knights of Atanga lost their lives to it, and another became a criminal because of an incident that arose from the pursuit.”

As he spoke, Argo named the knights who had taken part in that operation, one after another.

“Marchel, Yurik, Heblit, Oshuwell...”

And then:

“Ivan.”

The instant he heard that name, Najin's breathing faltered. As a warrior at roughly the level of a Sword Seeker, Argo could detect it, but he pretended not to notice. He casually stroked his chin and closed his eyes.

Keeping them closed as though reminiscing, he spoke.

“I'm ashamed to say it, but the pursuit of the Knight Devil remains a stain on the Atanga Knight Order's record. Few of our operations have ended in such disastrous failure, and worse still, the cause of that failure lay within our own ranks.”

“So,” he added, “we finally have a chance to wash away that stain. That's why I wanted to make you this offer. Would you care to join us?”

The answer had been all but decided the moment Ivan's name came up. Najin nodded.

“I don't much like seeing the word 'knight' attached to a devil. Wouldn't it be better if we removed the 'devil' from that?”

“That's the spirit. You and I understand each other.”

Najin and Argo grinned at one another. After a brief handshake, they boarded the carriage together.

“Come to think of it, you seem to have made quite a stir in the Outer Lands. Rumors about you are everywhere. I heard you even had a tremendous clash with a Demon King who had ten stars... How am I supposed to believe that?”

Argo took some preserved rations from his pouch. Offering Najin a snack, he gave him a prompting look. It was a long journey to the Outer Lands; he might as well share a few entertaining stories along the way. Chewing on the jerky, Najin gladly began recounting his adventures.

“The first person I met after entering the Outer Lands was a knight named Graf—Graf, the knight of Kurtan.”

“A knight of Kurtan... Ah, Atanga has a knight from Kurtan as well. I'm sure he'd enjoy hearing about this. So? What did Sir Graf do?”

“Uh... I don't think he'd enjoy hearing it, actually.”

Najin continued with a bitter smile.

The story of a knight who had fallen to become one of the Lost, a knight who had tried to uphold his duty even if it meant becoming one of the Lost, the silent knight, the knight in a helmet, and more. He gave a suitably condensed account of his experiences in the Outer Lands.

After hearing it all, Argo let out a long breath.

“You've been through an awful lot in just four months, haven't you? Then again, I suppose it takes experiences like those to earn two stars in such a short time.”

Argo nodded.

“That knight in a helmet commands my personal respect. I don't know much about the Outer Lands, but I've carried out operations there from time to time, so I do know how cruel that land is—and just how merciless it can become.”

Anyone who had experienced the Outer Lands even once learned, whether they liked it or not, that the land was not a sacred battlefield where stars clashed, but a graveyard where stars were buried.

“A man who'd lost every one of his stars endured a hundred and fifty years in that land? And he held on to his honor and pride for all those years? That really is...”

“Really,” he repeated with a smile.

“Magnificent. A truly magnificent story. I'm very fond of the expression 'a triumph of the human spirit.' Doesn't that story deserve it?”

“He was an extraordinary man.”

“It may seem rather paltry after such a magnificent tale, but I have a story worth telling, too.”

The carriage jolted with a clatter.

“It's about the Knight Devil, our target this time. Its individual name is Orgis. Its ability is simple: it makes parts of those it devours into parts of its own body... With devils like this, you have to get things right from the start. Nip them in the bud and they're nothing much.”

“But,” Argo continued, “that beginning was the problem. Things got off to a bad start.”

“A bad start?”

“As luck would have it, the first person Orgis devoured was a human who had become one with a Masterpiece.”

A Masterpiece. A weapon imbued with Mystery.

Having fought a dark mage who wielded one, Najin knew very well how troublesome an opponent armed with a Masterpiece could be.

“Which Masterpiece was it?”

“One you're probably familiar with. It's the most notorious of them all.”

Argo held up four fingers.

“Masterpiece No. 4, Bookmark.”

He added,

“It's famous for causing the unprecedented incident in which a small child killed a Sword Seeker.”

3.

Which Masterpiece was the most useful?

That question elicited many different answers. Some would name Masterpiece No. 16, the Undying Flame, while others would choose Masterpiece No. 27, the Ragged Cloak.

Then which Masterpiece was the most powerful?

That question, too, would elicit many answers. People would compare the different forms of their power and weigh their usefulness.

But to the question “Which Masterpiece is the most dangerous?” everyone answered in unison.

Masterpiece No. 4, Bookmark.

The first person to discover Bookmark had been a small child in a little village. A girl found an ornate bookmark in an old library and regarded it as her own little treasure. Without a second thought, she took it home, placed it between the pages of a storybook, and closed the book.

A book. A bookmark. Closing the book. Trapping it between the pages.

Without a second thought, the girl had fulfilled the conditions for activating the Masterpiece. She would pay dearly for her ignorance. That night, 324 villagers vanished without a trace.

A Sword Seeker was dispatched to deal with the incident, but the moment he approached the girl crying alone in the village, he, too, vanished.

Knights were then dispatched in squads to retrieve the Masterpiece, but the operation's losses far exceeded every expectation.

Eight knights had to die just to uncover the conditions for activating the Masterpiece. Another thirty-two died before they could begin to speculate about the Mystery within it, and twenty-eight more gave their lives before they gained even a vague understanding of that Mystery. And it took the deaths of still more soldiers.

324 villagers dead.

68 knights dead.

117 soldiers dead.

Bookmark was said to have been retrieved at the end of it all, but...

“That's a lie. Bookmark was never retrieved.”

Argo stated it unequivocally.

“Dark mages intervened during the retrieval. They attacked the soldiers, who had suffered unimaginable losses and had no strength left to spare, stole the Masterpiece, and fled. Their escape should have failed, but one coincidence followed another.”

As they fled with the stolen Masterpiece, the dark mages hurriedly summoned a devil to bolster their strength. The summoning should have failed, but a succession of coincidences allowed them to summon one, albeit incompletely. And it was an ancient devil at that.

The ancient devil, Orgis.

If successfully summoning it was the dark mages' good fortune, the summoning's incompleteness was their misfortune.

Though the incomplete summoning had brought forth only a fragment, the true being's standing was so great that Orgis was not subject to their control.

Right there, the devil devoured the dark mage who had summoned it. It also swallowed all the corpses of the sixty-eight knights and the soldiers killed by the Masterpiece.

In the process, Orgis “happened” to swallow the Masterpiece, and that was precisely the problem. Devils were beings made of Mystery. When a being made of Mystery swallowed a Masterpiece imbued with Mystery, a change occurred.

One coincidence followed another, then yet another. When three coincidences overlapped, they could no longer be called coincidence. Inevitably, Orgis transformed into something entirely different.

A devil composed of dozens of knights.

The Knight Devil was born.

“How dare it desecrate knights' corpses and insult their name? It was intolerable. Countless knights, including those of Atanga, immediately gave chase... But the result was disastrous.”

Argo smiled bitterly.

“The Knight Devil devoured about thirty more knights during that pursuit and escaped. Roughly half of those thirty corpses belonged to the Atanga Knight Order. I have a duty to give those friends of mine a proper funeral.”