The part that formed a devil’s core varied wildly from one devil to another, but for those resembling humans, that core was the heart. Once their hearts burst, devils could no longer maintain their forms and would collapse.

SPLATTER...

Orgis’s body melted away.

With a wet splat, black sludge pooled on the ground. In a few minutes, even that sludge would evaporate, erasing every trace of the devil’s existence. This was what people generally called “slaying a devil.”

But Najin knew.

In truth, others besides him would know as well.

Rather than slaying the devil, this merely rendered it “inactive.” After as long as a hundred years, or as little as a few decades, the devil would rise again.

“Devils are immortal by nature. Ordinary means can’t grant them permanent death.”

Merlin shrugged, then glanced at Najin.

“Unless there happens to be an exception, of course.”

Without a word, Najin summoned his sword aura.

With a faint crackle, the tip of the aura turned platinum. Before Argo could notice the light, Najin plunged his sword into the sludge the devil had left behind.

His platinum sword aura touched the devil’s soul.

Platinum sword aura was a devil’s natural enemy. Having become one with Excalibur, Najin’s sword aura possessed some of the sword’s properties.

That aura, which made the contradiction of killing an undying devil possible, burned the devil’s soul.

HISSSSS!

The sludge boiled with the hiss of evaporation. The devil, now reduced to sludge, had neither mouth nor hands nor feet, yet it almost looked as though it were screaming and thrashing.

“Hmm? What are you doing?”

“Nothing much.”

“Hmm. Anyway... I expected as much, but it seems we won’t be able to recover the Masterpiece after all.”

“We can’t recover it? What do you mean?”

“That’s how Masterpieces work. As a rule, they don’t break, but if they become contaminated beyond a certain point, or something goes wrong with their function, they disappear. Just like devils.”

They vanished without a trace, only to turn up unexpectedly somewhere on the continent, Argo explained.

“Why do you think Bookmark was found in a country village’s library? That’s how it works. Usually, they turn up near whatever had the closest connection to their previous owner. But with Bookmark, there’s no telling. It’s all become so mixed together.”

Argo shook his head.

“...”

Najin looked down at the devil’s sludge in silence. Indeed, he could see nothing in it that might have been Bookmark.

HISSS...

Once all the sludge had nearly evaporated, Najin extinguished his sword aura. He gave his sword a light flick, casting a contemptuous glance at the black-stained ground.

Did it think he would let it escape like that?

The soul of the devil that had tried to flee without paying the price burned and crumbled away. Najin let out a long breath and circled his stiff arms to loosen them.

‘That ended more easily than I expected.’

An ancient devil that had swallowed a Masterpiece, a creature made up of dozens of knights... From those descriptions alone, Najin had expected a difficult battle. Contrary to his expectations, however, the fight had ended smoothly and simply.

‘Was it weaker than the rumors said?’

“No? It was every bit as strong as you’d heard. Maybe a little stronger, even.”

‘What? It seemed a little weak for that.’

“You know...”

Merlin gave him an incredulous look.

“Ever since you came to the Outer Lands, you’ve been fighting fallen stars, monstrous Lost who’ve lived for centuries, and transcendent beings. It seems to have warped your sense of things...”

She pressed a finger firmly against his forehead.

“Even that devil would be a nightmare for ordinary knights, you know? In fact, it was far stronger than the red dragon you nearly died fighting.”

‘It was that strong?’

“Of course it was. You’re growing so fast that your judgment’s gone all skewed.”

Thinking about it, it was only natural that his sense of things had become distorted. The opponents he had encountered since coming to the Outer Lands had all been monstrously powerful. Besides, whenever he defeated a strong opponent, an even greater monster appeared, and once he overcame that one, something more monstrous still took its place.

After experiencing that over and over, a considerable gap was bound to develop between how Najin perceived his own strength and how strong he was by an objective standard.

“It’s finally over.”

As things settled down, Argo let out a long breath and looked up at the sky.

“I’ve finally avenged them.”

His murmured words sounded light, and a smile of relief rested on his lips. Najin followed his gaze upward.

A new star was rising in the sky.

It was Argo’s second star. He had earned it not simply by defeating a powerful foe, but by putting a long-held regret to rest.

“You’ve earned a star. Congratulations.”

“Thank you. And you? Did you earn one as well?”

Najin shook his head and pointed at the sky. Four stars glittered there. The faint outline of a fifth beside them had not changed at all.

“Ah... I see. Well, the more stars you have, the harder it is to earn another. That’s only natural. Still, four at your age? Every time I see it, it hardly feels real.”

Real. Hardly real.

Murmuring those words, Argo chuckled. Then he pointed toward a corner of the city.

“Let’s walk a little. I think we have something to discuss.”

“What would that be?”

Argo gave Najin a brief answer.

“Ivan.”

Najin had not realized it at first, but by now he could hardly fail to notice. Argo knew Ivan, and seemed to know that Najin was his pupil.

‘Well, Ivan was the alias I used at the beginning.’

Perhaps he had noticed from the very start.

And though Najin had not known it back then, fighting the Knight Devil had made him certain: the devil Ivan had talked about over drinks was the Knight Devil Orgis, and the comrade who was so good at parrying was Argo.

“There was a fellow named Ivan in my cohort.”

Argo spoke as they walked through the city.

“He was a promising one. Strongest of our cohort, and no less capable than our seniors. He had talent, of course, but he was a decent man, too. There were always people around him.”

Argo walked on, retracing his memories.

“He was the one we all gathered around. My cohort and I used to say, half joking and half serious, that if any of us earned a star first, it would be him.”

“By a star, you mean...”

“Yes. Not a metaphor or a rank, but a real star hanging in that sky.”

When they looked up, they could see the stars.

Then as now, those stars shone overhead as though they could reach them simply by stretching out a hand.

["Embrace honor. Uphold your pride. Chase the stars."]

Words Ivan had murmured so often that they had become a habit.

“The Knight Who Chased the Stars. That was his nickname. Half of it was mockery for his ‘absurd dreams’... The other half was awe for a man who never stopped challenging himself.”

Argo spoke of Ivan’s deeds and the sort of knight he had been. Listening, Najin found himself smiling. So his stories over drinks hadn’t been empty boasts.

“As those deeds piled up, the mockery faded from ‘the Knight Who Chased the Stars.’ His dream no longer seemed absurd. We began to think he really might earn himself a star one day.”

“But...” Argo smiled bitterly.

“In the end, it became mockery after all.”

“...”

“He became a condemned criminal and fell to a place where he couldn’t see the stars.”

The underground city of Atman.

The place where the knight who chased the stars had fallen.

“What was his crime?”

“I’d like to tell you, but I can’t. The order bound the incident with Forbidden Speech, so even speaking of it is forbidden. Only...”

“Only,” Argo continued, “Ivan challenged himself. Rather than remaining content where he was, he took on a challenge and failed. That failure made him a criminal.”

Argo smiled bitterly.

“Some knights say whatever they please about it.”

“...”

“He was foolish. He crossed the line. He reached for something beyond his grasp. He should have known his limits. Why do something so stupid? With a golden future ahead of him, why would he do such a thing...”

Argo’s face twisted as he murmured those words.

“What a load of fucking bullshit.”

For the first time, Argo swore.

“Isn’t that precisely what a knight should do? Dream lofty dreams. Reach for what lies beyond your grasp. If someone laughs and calls you foolish, charge ahead and proclaim that this is the very essence of romance. Isn’t that a knight’s privilege?”

He spoke as though singing.

“Even if you fail and fall, even if defeat brings you to your knees, cowards who never even try have no right to laugh at that failure or defeat. None whatsoever.”

“...”

“Even if the story ends there...”

“No.”

Najin cut him off.

“It hasn’t ended.”

“What hasn’t ended?”

“That story. The story of the Knight Who Chased the Stars has never ended.”

Argo turned his gaze toward Najin.

Najin could live up to the hope in those eyes.

“The lifetime of a human who is not a transcendent being is far too short to contain a whole story. Even transcendent beings are no different. Didn’t even King Arthur, the man called the Great Hero, fail to finish his own story?”

“Then,” Najin continued, “if one lifetime isn’t enough, two. If two aren’t enough, the next... That is how humanity has carried its stories onward. Countless histories bear witness to it. Ivan merely did the same.”

Najin raised his hand. His fingertips pointed toward the stars. Four brilliantly shining stars.

“I am here.”

I, who inherited that story, am here.

Pointing at his own stars, Najin spoke.

“I am here—the one Ivan taught, the one who learned the sword from him, the one who made him a promise.”

“What did you promise?”

“That I would climb to the highest place. That I would stand there and proclaim...”

His stars did not yet hang at the highest point. But with those upward-reaching stars as proof, Najin declared:

“That Ivan stood at the beginning of my story.”

That I am who I am today because you were there.

“That there was a man named Ivan, the Knight Who Chased the Stars.”

Argo fell silent at that answer.

His silence did not last long.

He drew a hand down his face and burst into laughter.

“Yes,” he said, still laughing. “That is a knight’s privilege indeed.”

Argo rummaged inside his coat and drew out a sheet of paper.

“Now is the right time.”

The paper bore the crests of the imperial family and Atanga. Holding it, Argo proclaimed:

“I, Argo, knight of Atanga, ask you this on behalf of the Sun of the Empire and the Atanga Knight Order.”

Najin knew what that question would be.

And because he knew, his eyes could only widen.

“You, young man who dreams of knighthood.”

Argo asked Najin the first question of his investiture as a knight.

“What is a knight to you?”

What is a knight?

This was a continuation of a conversation they had once shared. Najin had answered the same question on the day he first met Argo. Now, after all the time that had passed, he answered again.

“One who never loses his pride.”

The same answer as before, yet slightly changed.

“One who never yields. One who fears loss, but does not let that fear hold him still. One who always looks toward the heights and steps forward.”

Najin raised his head.

“One who embraces honor, upholds his pride, and chases the stars,” he said. “That is the knight I wish to become.”

Argo smiled at his answer, a smile of genuine pleasure. He raised his sword and lightly touched Najin’s shoulder with it.

“Easy to say, but difficult to uphold. Mere words have no value. Yet through your actions, you have given your words worth. Worth beyond measure.”

Argo knew what Najin had done in the Outer Lands. Through the imperial family, he had heard the stories dwelling in those stars.

“I know that you restored honor to those who had lost it, pride to those who had lost theirs, and the chance to be knights again to those who were knights no longer.”

Of those deeds, Godif, the head of Atanga, had said:

「You make knights true knights. You restore the honor and pride they have lost. If we do not call such a person Atanga, whom else would we call Atanga?」

The emperor had also spoken.

「You have fulfilled your promise admirably.」

「Then I must keep my promise as well.」

Both the imperial family and the Atanga Knight Order had agreed. Argo was the final assessor, and in effect, he had already made his decision the moment he first met Najin.

“You who make knights true knights,” Argo proclaimed. “You are indeed a knight.”

Collapsed buildings. A ruined city.

There were no cheers. No one stood watching. But what did any of that matter? Najin’s heart pounded.

“The Sun of the Empire and the Atanga Knight Order, guardian of knights, affirm your knighthood. From this day forward, you are a knight. A free knight, bound by nothing. Uphold what you believe is right. You have that right.”

Argo drew a deep breath to steady himself.

Until now, he had merely conveyed the words of the imperial family and the Atanga Knight Order. The man who spoke next was a single knight named Argo.

“Rise, knight.”

Najin rose.

Argo offered him his hand.

“I am Argo. Argo of the Atanga Knight Order.”

Having introduced himself to Najin, he asked a question.

“What is your name?”

A question whose answer had been deferred.

Even when the whole world chanted Najin’s name, Argo had never spoken it. He had yet to hear that name from the young man himself.

「Then I shall hear your answer to today’s question after you become a knight.」

「Once you have become a knight possessed of honor and pride, you will tell me your name, won’t you?」

He had still not heard the answer to his question.

Remembering that day, Najin smiled. He felt joy as well. At last, he could declare his name before this proud knight.