The moment Najin summoned Excalibur, a star rose once more over the underground city.

It was not as brilliant as when he had drawn the sword from the stone, but the light Excalibur produced could not be hidden by the fog and darkness blanketing the underground city.

Starlight soared high into the sky.

The residents of the underground city saw it.

The covert operatives pursuing the boy saw it.

The Order’s knight, convinced of his own righteousness, saw it.

The mercenary who had chosen loyalty over money and power saw it.

And...

“Ah...”

The knight who had chased the stars, too, saw the starlight clasped in the boy’s hand. Ivan let out a breath of wonder and adjusted his grip on his sword. He was grateful for this glorious opportunity to cross his blade with the sword of legend.

Ivan’s sword aura blazed a vivid blue. As though answering it, platinum sword aura enveloped the boy’s blade.

Starlight-colored sword aura wrapped around the Sword of Stars. Ivan smiled at that light, which he had never once forgotten since being cast into this underground city. The dream he had abandoned was there before him.

“Come.”

Ivan spoke, and the boy ran.

The boy who held a star and the knight who had chased the stars collided.

2.

Najin gave it everything he had.

He lowered his stance, kicked off the ground, and charged, swinging his sword with the speed he had built up—a technique that gave no thought whatsoever to defense. No one had specifically taught it to him, and it was questionable whether it could even be called a technique...

But it was unquestionably the best strike Najin could deliver.

With a sharp tap, Najin kicked off the ground.

His body accelerated with every step. At his third step, Ivan lost track of his movement, if only for an instant. By his sixth, Najin’s speed surpassed Ivan’s.

Ivan could no longer see Najin’s movements. All he could make out was the arc traced by the Sword of Stars in Najin’s hand. And that was enough for him.

‘Come at me.’

Ivan did not retreat.

‘I’ll meet you head-on.’

It was coming. The Sword of Stars.

It was coming. The starlight.

BOOM!

Najin took his final step and drove in toward Ivan. This was the greatest speed he could attain. Excalibur took the full force of that peak velocity and accelerated. As the sword surged toward him, scattering starlight, Ivan moved.

Ivan, knight of Atanga.

The essence of the skill he had honed his entire life was a sword art that embodied Atanga itself.

To meet an opponent’s technique head-on and utterly deny them—that was Atanga’s way. Without retreating an inch, Ivan met Najin’s sword.

CLAAAAANG!

Sword clashed against sword, sword aura against sword aura.

As he met the blade, Ivan thought: simple yet steadfast, and heavy precisely because of that steadfastness. The weight behind Najin’s swing exceeded anything he had imagined.

His firmly planted foot trembled.

His knee threatened to buckle.

But a knight of Atanga would break before bending, and would never retreat before an opponent’s force. Ivan braced his knee, planted his slipping foot even harder, and roared.

CLANG! GRRRRIND!

Little by little, Ivan’s sword advanced. Najin still lacked an understanding of the sword as a weapon. He had never learned proper swordsmanship. Ivan’s blade, tempered by long years of practice and training, exploited that weakness.

What had appeared to be a stance for receiving Najin’s blade had, before he knew it, become one that pressed it down.

Ivan’s buckling knee straightened. The foot that had threatened to slide backward instead took a step forward. As Ivan advanced, Najin was driven back.

“... Ngh!”

The tide had turned.

At the instant when Najin’s gradually retreating strike was about to be overcome completely, his eyes widened. He brutally rammed the flow coursing through his body into Excalibur.

He knew he was outmatched in technique.

Then he would settle this through sheer output instead.

As though responding to its master’s determination to win using everything at his disposal, Excalibur flashed fiercely. The platinum sword aura grew denser in an instant and smashed through Ivan’s technique head-on.

“...!”

Ivan’s eyes widened.

Najin’s sword forced Ivan’s blade aside completely, lifting his sword hand above his head. It left a fatal opening. Ivan had no capacity left to withstand the second strike that would follow.

He hastily drew his blade back, but a mortal wound was unavoidable. Just as Ivan sensed his defeat...

With a soft rustle, Najin’s sword dissolved into starlight and vanished in mid-swing. With the blade gone, fragments of sword aura lost their course and merely raked Ivan’s body. The mortal wound he had braced for never came.

“Gah!”

Instead, it was Najin who suffered grievous harm.

Still in the posture of his swing, Najin pitched forward. He had used power not yet permitted to him. Though the boy had drawn Excalibur, his body and soul were not yet mature enough to wield it properly.

He had no strength left to sustain Excalibur, and so he collapsed before he could deliver his second strike.

“...”

Ivan was silent.

Drops of blood pattered from the wounds grazed by the sword aura. Something fell among them with a soft thud: the patch covering Ivan’s right eye.

The fallen eyepatch. The fallen blood.

And the boy lying before him.

Taking it all in with his one remaining eye, Ivan realized that he had won—and also lost.

One-Eyed Ivan, ruler of the underground city, had defeated the boy. He was the one still standing at the end, and he could kill the boy with a swing of his sword right now.

But Ivan, knight of Atanga, had lost to him. Atanga’s way was to defeat an opponent head-on, without ever bending or retreating. Yet, overwhelmed by the boy’s force, Ivan had retreated and bent at the final moment.

Victory as the one-eyed ruler.

Defeat as a knight of Atanga.

Which of the two should he accept?

Ivan groaned before the choice laid out for him. At the very last moment, the world asked him once again:

What would he choose?

And what would he remain?

3.

To anyone, their own life is the most precious thing. Death is the end, after all. Death is frightening. It is a primal fear shared by every human being.

That was why, when faced with death, a person could become endlessly servile, cruel, and contradictory. No one could dare mock that display of the desire to live. Everyone possessed that hidden side.

Ivan was no different.

Ivan wanted to live.

He did not want to die in a place like this.

He wanted to see the stars again, to see the sun again, to become a knight again. The chances of any of that coming true were infinitesimal...

But as long as he survived, there was a possibility.

Death, however, was the end.

Ivan gritted his teeth. He had to kill the boy lying before him if he wanted to survive. The right thing to do, then, was to swing his sword and finish it. In his head, he understood that.

He understood, but...

His sword would not move. The blade he had raised could not advance even an inch. Najin lifted his head from where he lay and looked up at him. The moment their eyes met, Ivan’s face twisted.

A boy unlike him.

A boy shining with a star in his hand.

Looking at the boy whose light he had no right to trample, Ivan groaned. What would he remain? What would he become? He had put off answering the questions posed to him, but now he had to decide.

If only Najin’s sword had cut him down. If only he could have met his death that way. Ivan groaned.

「I swear upon my pride as Ivan, knight of Atanga.」

What rang in his ears was the promise he had sworn upon his pride. The moment he brought this sword down, that pride would be lost.

Someone who had lost both honor and pride.

Could such a person be called a knight?

Of course, the world had plenty of knights who knew neither honor nor pride. Plenty—but Ivan, at least, could not regard such people as knights. The moment he lost even his pride here, he would cease to be one.

Ivan knew that.

Even if he survived this moment, could he still chase the stars after abandoning his pride and embracing false honor? Could he proudly call himself a knight of Atanga?

‘No.’

No. He could not.

What he wanted was to possess a star as a knight.

Not as some sullied, dishonored piece of trash.

‘As a knight with pride and honor.’

His dream was to possess a star as that kind of knight.

“...”

Ivan deliberated.

He agonized.

And he hesitated until the very last moment.

... Everyone held their own life dear.

‘But knights...’

The knights he had wanted to become.

‘They’re fools who will readily throw away their lives for honor and pride.’

Foolish, yet for that very reason, they lived lives more radiant than anything else. Recalling the dream he had cherished as a child who admired knights, Ivan made his choice.

“Fuck.”

Ivan ruffled his hair.

“Seriously, goddammit.”

Cursing, he sheathed his sword.

With his sword secured at his waist, Ivan reached down to Najin. Najin blinked blankly, then took the offered hand and rose to his feet.

“Can you move?”

The killing intent was gone.

Najin slowly nodded at Ivan’s question. Ivan kept opening and closing his mouth, as though there was something he wanted to say but could not easily put into words.

“Well, Najin.”

Ivan began slowly.

“Watch out for the wet footing when you climb down the waterfall. The footholds will keep slipping, so be careful. One wrong move and you’re done for. And... No. No, that’s not it.”

He let out a long sigh and spoke again.

“Najin.”

“... I’m listening.”

“Remember what I always told you?”

“About not crossing the line?”

“Yeah. That.”

Don’t cross the line. Know your place.

Don’t reach for what you cannot touch.

“About that.”

Ivan touched the place where his right eye had been.

More than ten years had passed since he had been cast into this city.

Over those years, Ivan had abandoned his dream and chipped away at himself as a knight. He had constantly told others not to cross the line and to live with what they were given... but those words had also been directed at himself.

At the man who could no longer rise above this place.

“I take that back.”

Only today had Ivan resolved to change those words.

“Listen carefully. You know I hate repeating myself.”

Ivan smiled.

“Cross the line, Najin.”

He spoke with a smile.

“Reach for places you cannot reach. Punch anyone who mutters about knowing your place right in the face. Only you know how far you can go.”

Ivan denied the words he himself had spoken.

“Look to the heights and run toward them. Climb high, higher than anyone else. You have the talent for it. Believe in that talent of yours.”

He had only one eye.

He had neither eyes that could see the future nor keen senses that could foretell it. He had nothing of the sort, but...

“When you reach the highest place...”

Ivan was certain.

The boy before him would reach the greatest heights. He would hang his own star at the highest point in the night sky. Ivan was certain that future would come.

And because he was certain, he spoke.

“Shout it from there.”

Shout what?

“That I was here.”

That I was there at the beginning of your story.

“That Ivan, knight of Atanga, was here.”

If he could adorn the opening of a hero’s tale, would that not be an honor beyond what a knight who chased the stars deserved? To seek glory while holding fast to his pride. What finer end could there be for a knight?

“Go on.”

Ivan pushed Najin’s back toward the mine tunnel.

He no longer looked at the hesitant boy watching him with wavering eyes. Turning his back on him, Ivan stood guard at the tunnel entrance.

To buy him at least as much time as he had taken from him.

“... Thank you, Ivan.”

After those words came the sound of the boy’s retreating footsteps. Before that sound had faded, new footsteps began to approach from ahead.

They were coming. The pursuers.

Drawn by the light, the pursuers who sought to bury it were coming here. They were the Order’s covert operatives and its knight—and that knight had once been Ivan’s senior.

Listening to the footsteps growing distant, and paying no heed to those drawing near, Ivan drew his sword once more.

This time, not against the departing boy, but against the pursuers who had followed him.

‘Not as One-Eyed Ivan.’

Ivan trampled the eyepatch lying on the ground.

‘As Ivan, knight of Atanga.’

The knight who chased the stars smiled.

His smile was lighter than it had ever been.