The Free City of Crowd failed to live up to its name. To its citizens, myself included, the city had long since lost its freedom.

Crowd was one of six free cities that had broken away from the now-fallen Republic of Grid. It revered freedom and strictly prohibited slavery. Countless tourists came every year to see its jewel-bright coast—a home for everyone, overflowing with milk and honey.

They said the people of the continent had once called Crowd a paradise.

But whatever history had recorded of this city, we did not live in the past. We lived in the present, and the Crowd of today was a dreadful land that deserved neither the name of Free City nor the epithet of paradise.

“Spare a copper, please. Just one copper.”

The Masters who governed Crowd were corrupt, and the enforcers charged with protecting its laws and freedom had been blinded by greed. The wealthy went unpunished even for heinous crimes, while the poor died from stray stones even when they had committed no offense.

“Please, just a piece of bread, so I don't have to go hungry today...”

Blinded by luxury and pleasure, Crowd's upper classes sold off the free people of this land to sustain their glittering lives.

They drew up deeds to the free people's land of milk and honey and sold it to nobles of the Golden Empire. When even that money ran short, they borrowed vast sums of gold from the 「Red Bank」, pledging the free people's human rights as collateral.

“Stay the night. I'll give you all the drink you could want—the kind you simply have to try if you've come to Crowd.”

“No, come to my place. My place—”

And so Crowd's free citizens ceased to be free. They lost their land of milk and honey, the human rights that should have protected their basic entitlements, and even the freedom they had won through a long struggle.

They became wretched creatures who offered entertainment to tourists visiting the coast as though begging for alms, sold themselves into slavery to avoid starvation, and had no choice but to grin foolishly even while drunken tourists beat them.

Without freedom, we were no better than beasts.

I thought so when I saw my father die begging for a piece of bread even as a drunk beat him. I thought so when I saw my mother sell herself into slavery to avoid starvation. And I thought so when my little sister died of illness because we lacked five copper coins.

Why did we have to meet such an end?

Why should we bear responsibility and punishment for things we had never done?

That question had hung over me from the moment my life began.

And then.

“...”

One day, the answer to that lifelong question came without warning.

“Stop, stop—!”

One of the citizens being beaten by a drunk could no longer contain his rage. He stabbed the drunk in the neck and killed him. Blood spouted from the man's throat, and the minstrels playing their dreamlike music fled screaming.

The enforcers who rushed to the scene executed the citizen who had committed the murder.

We thought the drunks' anger would erupt the following night.

But what happened the next day was not what we expected.

“...?”

The drunks still used violence, but their violence never crossed a certain line. It was as though they feared what might happen if they went too far.

It was a small change, but it sent enormous ripples through me.

Things could change.

We could change them.

In that moment, a thought struck me.

Perhaps we bore some responsibility for having fallen to such wretched depths. Our responsibility lay in our failure to act.

We had merely watched as we sank to rock bottom, as our freedom and rights were taken, as we were robbed of our paradise flowing with milk and honey, our Free City.

The sin of not resisting.

Somehow, I felt I knew what I had to do.

I took up a small dagger and pulled on a worn hood to conceal my face.

Then I repeated the truth I had just discovered.

To reclaim our freedom, someone had to stain their hands with blood.

I willingly chose to be that person.

“Whew.”

When I closed my eyes and opened them again, the world had taken on cold hues. The assassin's emotions spilled from the small blade in my hand, which resembled 「Fang」. I had not fully digested them, but these memories were utterly different from the swordswoman's memories held within 「Needle」.

「Do not let them consume you. You must learn to control them.」

It felt as though a different soul stirred within each of the two swords. How could I remain myself amid them? Rational thought yielded no answer, so I acted on instinct. I needed an electrifying tremor that could shake off this confusion in an instant.

“Hoo, hah—”

My second heart, my 「mana heart」, pulsed, heating my body. The instant it began to beat, my mind became clear. Still in control of myself, I slowly leveled Needle and then Fang at the Black Bride.

「A mercenary swordswoman and an assassin from a Free City. They are different, but they share something unmistakable. That is why those blades suit you best right now.」

Something in common.

What could it be?

That both swords specialized in thrusting? Or that their former owners had worked in the shadows rather than in the light? But the instant I saw Liam's face, I knew both guesses were wrong. He spoke.

「Both were made to fight enemies stronger than their wielders.」

As Liam finished speaking, a booming voice rang out.

“This sacred duel shall be dedicated to the goddess Lepri, guardian of justice!”

The voice announcing the start of the duel.

At the same moment, my senses, honed as keenly as a beast's, sounded an alarm. These were the senses I had gained by fully digesting Needle. I surrendered my body to instinct and moved.

Fast. Very fast.

* * *

The circular ring where the 「Arena」 held its duels was not as spacious as one might think. It looked enormous, but once you faced an opponent inside, it often felt smaller than expected.

There were no obstacles, either. For the spectators' convenience, the ring was perfectly level and clear of anything that might provide cover.

That made it an extremely unfavorable place for the weaker fighter. I could not hide behind cover and exploit a blind spot to catch a stronger opponent off guard, nor could I use the terrain to launch an acrobatic ambush.

In other words, the many dark techniques embedded in the assassin's memories I had absorbed were reduced to useless tricks here.

But I neither despaired nor lost heart.

That was thanks to my habit of always questioning things rationally. It was also the attitude the assassin within 「Fang」 had always held.

[“To lose the will to resist is true death.”]

[“We need not instill overwhelming terror. We need only show them that we, too, possess at least one lethal fang with which to bite them.”]

The Black Bride did not rashly attack first. She was not yielding the first move because she underestimated me. She had sensed the unfamiliar aura I gave off and was gathering information methodically so she could sink her teeth into me with certainty. Liam spoke.

「The girl has good instincts.」

I kept my distance from the Black Bride, my sword leveled at her, then sharply kicked my leading foot forward to throw up dust. It was a dirty trick I had used time and again, but sand was the only means of obstructing an enemy's vision in this ring. If I had only one tool available, I had to use it.

'... Not even a twitch.'

As expected, the Black Bride was no pushover.

She maintained her firm stance without moving an inch. Beyond the dust, I could see countless 「paths」 traced out. Whether her vision was obscured or not, the instant I entered one of those paths, my defeat would be certain.

I had learned that from Petel, the 「sword walker」 I had met before.

[“If you face another sword walker, never enter their path. It might be different for a fellow sword walker, but for a sword beginner, entering a sword walker's path is suicide.”]

Petel had compared it to entering the sea to fight a shark.

So instead of recklessly charging into territory that favored my opponent, I decided to draw her into my own space. Even a terrifying shark became nothing more than a gasping fish on land.

'The rules favor me.'

The duel did not require me to defeat the Black Bride.

The condition for victory was to last three minutes.

I would exploit that condition to the fullest.

Sneakily, underhandedly, and unlike a true fighter—just as the spectators had said.

Fortunately, that approach suited the memories within Fang.

[“To evade Crowd's enforcers, I had to become a rat. A little rat that found tiny holes to hide in and thrust its head into foul, stinking places everyone else avoided.”]

[“That is what it means to hide in the shadows.”]

TAP

I sprang backward.

The Black Bride matched my movement with one leisurely step. Even then, she never took her eyes off me, as though determined to eliminate even the smallest variable.

[“Finding places to hide and places to shake off my enemies was my daily life.”]

THUD

As I continued retreating, I had reached the edge of the ring, the wall adjoining the spectator stands. Cold iron pressed against my back. The crowd's jeers rang out close by.

“Boooo! You cowardly little shit!”

“If the goddess Lepri saw you, she'd strike you with lightning!”

I shut them out and turned my gaze to the Black Bride. Though she had seemed to move leisurely, she had already closed much of the distance between us. Was that footwork taught at the academy? Or could she cover such a great distance in a single step because she had reached the realm of the superhuman?

It did not matter which.

I pulled my muscles taut like a bowstring and aimed my leading hand, which held Needle. Beyond its blade, I saw the Black Bride approaching like a ghost. I thought I could smell thick blood—the scent spilling from the sword she held. The scent of death.

[“I ran, and ran again.”]

[“Until I knew every twisting alley of Crowd by heart.”]

I also saw the 「paths」 blooming around the Black Bride. The blue paths extended around me, cutting off my escape routes. Before they could surround me completely, I thrust Needle forward. My muscles snapped taut, sending it out like lightning.

But the Black Bride's sword was faster than lightning.

It was unlike the swords of the other fighters I had met in the 「Arena」, and unlike the knight Petel's as well. This was not a difference in proficiency or the refinement of technique. Her swordsmanship was alien—so much so that I wondered whether it was swordsmanship at all.

Liam's voice rang out.

「That is the sword of the East, young descendant.」

“...”

「Since ancient times, the East has produced many swordsmen of wondrous skill. They call their techniques martial arts.」

The Black Bride's swinging sword seemed to paint upon a canvas suspended in the air. Its movements were composed of curves, graceful and beautiful, as though depicting a scene from nature. But I had no time to admire that beauty.

That beautiful sword was meant not to delight me, but to hurt me.

“Hoo, hah—”

My heart of steel beat.

Needle did not stop with a single thrust. It lashed out repeatedly at a perilously close distance. The Black Bride swung her sword fluidly, disrupting the course of my thrusts. As we traded attacks and defenses, her expression twisted.

“... This isn't the kind of hardness a sword beginner should have.”

Apparently, she had noticed the special quality of my heart.

Then the Black Bride drew in a deep, forceful breath. At the same time, the internal 「paths」 extending from her heart through her body like blood vessels became distinct.

Her sword grew faster and faster.

CLANG, CLANG!

The loud clash of steel against steel repeated fiercely.

Needle danced to match it.

Of course, this exchange between the two blades was far from equal. I was merely struggling desperately to keep up with the accelerating tip of the Black Bride's sword.

I was not reacting by tracking its movement with my eyes.

I watched every tiny movement of her muscles, predicting the trajectory in advance and slipping my blade into it. Whenever my timing faltered, I squeezed power from the Caravan's hard 「mana heart」 to force myself to hold on.

Flashing curves and straight lines intertwined countless times.

I knocked aside her swinging sword with thrusts, targeted the comparatively weaker tip, and used my crossguard to divert its force. My suspicion could not stop. To avoid falling prey to that whip-like sword, darting in from bizarre angles like a snake's tongue, I had to be perfect.

Yes. Perfect.

“... How? This makes no sense.”

The pupils visible through the Black Bride's helmet widened. At the same time, our swords tangled and clashed. My timing slipped, my 「mana heart」 reached its limit, and my body was driven backward.

BANG

Intense pain erupted through my back.

I had struck the wall.

Leaning against it, I kept Needle aimed at her and gasped for breath. My breathing grew ragged, and the Black Bride before me blurred.

“You, just, what are—”

As her halting voice continued, memories surged through my head like a lightning strike. The assassin's voice poured out through Fang.

[“I was always running. But no one can escape every single day.”]

[“One day, I reached a dead end and faced my pursuers with nowhere left to run.”]

The Black Bride's sword tip slowly rose to point at me.

[“My enemy was clearly powerful. I could tell from the countless paths extending from his second heart alone. A superhuman. Someone no ordinary citizen of a Free City could hope to fight.”]

As the Black Bride's sword drew closer, her 「paths」 extended and surrounded me. No matter where I looked, I could see no way to survive.

And then.

[“Something astonishing happened.”]

As 「Fang」's voice intensified, a mysterious phenomenon occurred.

[“I saw a hole in the paths the superhuman had aimed at me.”]

[“A rat hole, like those I had hidden in time and again in Crowd's alleys, the ones that had let me escape.”]

I saw a tiny hole in the Black Bride's 「paths」.

[“Perhaps that was my talent as a fugitive.”]

[“The talent to find an escape route in any situation.”]

[“Come to think of it, my brothers used to call me that.”]

[“A genius.”]

I stared at the hole as though spellbound. As the Black Bride's swinging sword approached, I made a strange movement.

I thrust Needle deep.

The Black Bride's 「path」 traced itself out, knocking aside my thrusting Needle. Instead of forcing myself to resist, I let the long, slender blade go. I relaxed my grip, and Needle fell. But I still had another weapon.

I raised a foot and planted it against the wall of the ring.

I sprang upward as though taking flight, and in that instant, in midair, I became someone else. The dark arts of the assassin of the Free City of Crowd.

I saw the Black Bride briefly freeze at this unexpected move. From the air, I stomped down on the crossguard of the sword she had swung downward, pinning it beneath my foot, and instinctively thrust my dagger along a deadly trajectory.

It opened a hole in the Black Bride's 「path」 and pierced through it.

“...!”

At that instant, a blue ripple spread from the Black Bride's body. Movement beyond human limits followed. Bending her waist to a grotesque degree, she arched her upper body back, pulled her neck away, and sharply turned her head to narrowly evade my thrust. Immediately afterward, she drove a kick into my side with superhuman strength.

CRACK

My body went flying and tumbled across the sand.

“Keh, keh-hehk.”

Damn it.

That sensation again. The overwhelming impact I had felt when I crossed swords with Petel. Pain that shattered my whole body, as though a speeding carriage had struck me head-on...

“Ugh, ptui.”

Spitting out the blood pooled in my mouth, I barely managed to rise.

The world seemed to spin. Looking ahead, I saw the Black Bride standing in place as though frozen.

Why? I soon understood.

Because I could see it.

“...”

A deep wound had opened in the Black Bride's shoulder.

She had saved her neck, but she had not completely stopped the thrust.

That wound looked far more serious than the injury her kick had inflicted on me.

“Uh...”

The spectators were no longer jeering.

Instead, they watched the match in silence, eyes wide and mouths open. This was no longer an execution ceremony. Nor was it a rookie hunt.