I once read a book from the West.

One passage on its white pages was so magnificent that it seemed to speak for my very life.

It read thus:

How happy was the age when one could look upon the starry heavens and read the map of the paths one could—and must—travel? And how happy was the age when starlight shone clearly upon those paths?

I longed for the Age of Stars.

Not some Age of War.

Swords, spears, shields.

Rusted armor and arrows that embroidered the sky before raining down. Boys and young men thrown onto battlefields knowing nothing. Countless lives crumbled, covered in dirt and submerged in blood. I know that every one of those lives was no different from a star. They could have become stars. Rather than being extinguished in vain, they could have become brilliant lights illuminating the world. All of them held that potential, and all deserved to enjoy such light.

But war extinguished every light.

Life faded before violence, and the hot blood spilled beneath cold steel soaked the continent. Beneath the dark sky, I lament. Why did they have to perish under meaningless violence?

The Age of War brought darkness to this land.

No one sang of peace. No lovers whispered of love. Children no longer laugh as they chatter about fanciful legends and tales of heroes.

Parents who lost their children hanged themselves, and children who lost their parents die buried in hunger and thirst. What remained at the end of the wars they waged while singing of glory? Where is the glory in parents hanging dead above shattered spears and swords? Can one find joy in the sight of a withered infant searching for its dead mother's twisted breast?

Only darkness remains in a world whose light has faded.

Every light that might illuminate this world filled with darkness has vanished.

As I gazed upon that bleak world, I arrived at a thought.

The stars that once illuminated the world were gone. No stars remained to light the paths we must travel. The poor souls had lost their way, and hungry children wandered, bursting into tears. I thought: there is far too much of value in this world for it to end like this.

I remembered the Age of Stars.

I resolved.

I would become a star in place of those that had vanished. I would become a guide so that the wandering could walk the right path. I would become a lantern illuminating those souls.

Gathering the lost together was not difficult. Like mayflies drawn to a torch, the wretched gathered around me. I did not use those who gathered as my servants. Nor did I raise them as soldiers, as the rulers of the Age of War had done. I merely taught them the beauty of the stars.

I taught them of the Age of Stars.

I taught them how radiant life could be.

And so they began to shine.

Their eyes began to shine. When they thought little of themselves, they had been insignificant. But once they learned that they were radiant beings, they began to shine. Once they knew how beautiful they could be, they finally became beautiful.

Parents held their children and spoke of trivial things. Young children looked up at their parents and chattered about the insignificant events of their day. Young men and women sitting together before a campfire fall in love. The elderly watch the young and reminisce about the past. Speaking of the good old days, the elderly sang of peace; the young sang of their present pleasures and love; and the little children sang of the happiness that would someday come to them. Filled with anticipation.

Children dream of the future, the young race through a fulfilling present, and the elderly sing of peace as they reflect upon the past they have traversed. I was deeply moved by this utterly ordinary sight. It truly delighted me to see scenes from the distant past recreated upon this little patch of land.

The Age of Stars was returning.

In my eyes, they were all twinkling stars. Stars holding limitless possibilities. Human life could be this beautiful. Whether a little child, a young man, or an aged elder...

Simple tranquility is everything in this world.

Even without abundance, three meals a day without going hungry are a blessing. To be able to hold someone, to love someone, and to be loved by someone is a blessing that cannot be exchanged for anything.

I wished that the lives of these beautiful, shining people would not crumble in vain. The Age of Stars I had longed for was here. But little stars only just beginning to twinkle cannot shine fully on their own in a harsh world. Those wandering souls cannot yet find their own paths. They need a lantern to illuminate the world, and a guide to walk ahead of them.

I would gladly become that lantern.

I would gladly become that guide.

And to fulfill its purpose, a lantern must keep burning without going out. It must drive away the darkness more brightly than anything else, so that everyone can see clearly.

... Even if it must use itself as fuel and burn until nothing remains.

In the twentieth year since I came to be called king, an army with no end in sight arrived in our land.

The age would not leave us be.

The unfinished Age of War had its eyes upon us.

But.

"You must not step forward."

I could not let my stars, only just beginning to shine, be sullied. I did not want to throw them into that cruel world. I wished only for the people who had shown me the Age of Stars I so desperately longed for to shine beautifully. To sing of happiness, not war. To feel joy, not anger.

"Care for your wives. Protect your sons and daughters who have yet to grow up. Protect what you love. And protect yourselves. Do not suffer the loss of what you love. Do not cause what you love to suffer."

And so I became a lantern.

"I shall protect this land. You must protect yourselves and what you love."

I alone was enough to sing of anger.

.

.

.

Amid the flood of memories, I slowly opened my eyes. As I did, all my senses took in the world with heightened sensitivity.

The air was foul.

Not clean air, but air full of dust and thick with the stench of blood. It smelled of iron. The smell of war.

The sounds were foul.

They were not the sounds of people laughing and talking. Not laughter singing of peace, but the screams of steel singing of war and anger. The sounds of death, of flesh and bone breaking and lives being begged for.

There was nothing lovely about those sounds.

Nothing lovely about this age.

Nothing lovely about this world.

The scene that met my open eyes held countless soldiers pointing steel at one another with gloomy faces. Swords, spears, shields. Rusted armor and arrows embroidering the sky. The people who had sung beautifully in that world of stars were nowhere to be found; instead, they bared malice toward one another that neither side wanted.

To my eyes, they all looked like wandering people.

Sad people, lost and straying.

「You must carefully temper the flame dwelling in that blade.」

Among those sad people was a girl, covered in blood and sniffling.

「Heroes die and become myths. Lowly humans are deified and worshipped by later generations, and the story of a human life may become a legend, then a religion. Thus the blade you swallowed lost its original name and acquired that absurd name, Dragon Sword.」

The lost girl could not stop crying.

In the crying girl's hand was a sword.

「You must restore that sword's name.」

I knew who the girl was.

「Lantern.」

Seolyun.

「The original name of a flame that became a star in darkness so deep one could not see a step ahead.」

Genius talent.

Overwhelming martial prowess.

I no longer saw any of those things.

"... Phew."

There was only a pitiful girl who had yet to reach the end of childhood. That was her true nature. A poor girl who had lost everything precious she held in her hands, and received nothing from heaven but a single faded sword.

Strangely, I thought the sniffling Seolyun resembled me.

Back then, when I knelt and sobbed in a mansion drenched in blood. A boy despairing at a reality he could not accept no matter how hard he thought; a boy screaming, spewing anger and hatred at the world; a boy who broke his final promise and oath to his mother and swung a blade with his clumsy body and meager talent.

A boy who thereby awakened the forgotten blood of steel, and who still sharpens the blade of revenge. The sorrowful girl before me resembled that boy. Yes, Seolyun and I, who had still not grown up, were alike.

"Seolyun."

Truly, so very much...

"Let's have a match, you and I."

* * *

The final war of the War of Conquest fought on the eastern continent. How did the war between Han and the Khan Empire, the 「Great Land」, unfold and end? That war was not as noble as people imagined. The end of the War of Conquest unfolded and concluded in the most 'warlike' fashion imaginable.

The 「Great Land」 chose tactics ill suited to its invincible conquering army. It blockaded supplies flowing into the peninsula and sent spies disguised as residents of Han to burn its paddies and fields. It even mobilized shamans to ruin the crops. Though other nations never learned of it, it also employed false overtures of conciliation and a two-pronged strategy of war and peace. Dishonorable. But dishonor is precisely what war is. The Khan Empire knew that history was written by the victors. And therefore it knew that, so long as it won, whatever it did could later be distorted.

The great 'Khan's descendant' left his subordinates' dishonorable deeds unchecked. He knew, yet pretended not to. Only then could 'Khan's descendant' remain noble. Even if those deeds were discovered someday, he could dismiss them all as the independent acts of impious subjects.

And so the final stretch of the War of Conquest proceeded in a thoroughly tedious, trite fashion. Arrows flew back and forth, men fought with swords and spears leveled, and they smeared filth such as shit and piss on the walls in the hope that, by some stroke of luck, disease would spread through the opposing camp. They even hurled diseased corpses. Both sides wanted this war to end that badly.

No magnificent hero appeared to transform the situation in an instant, as in legends or myths. There was only 'Khan's descendant,' so great that he could throw in any number of insignificant soldiers, and one king who stubbornly held on by whatever means he could to fulfill the duty of the sovereign he had inherited.

In that struggle, the 「Great Land」 simply possessed overwhelmingly more supplies and overwhelmingly more troops, and so could endure longer. That is the nature of war. The side that can endure longer wins.

The Khan Empire planned to advance into the central continent after subjugating the eastern continent, so it did not pour in its elite troops. 'Khan's' descendant did not intervene either, except to kill the 「Guardian Dragon」. To accomplish its great undertaking in the future, the Khan Empire threw in all its insignificant cavalrymen. Their numbers were already so excessive that some winnowing had been necessary. And so that war was utterly horrific, tedious, and overflowing with sorrow.

With that war recreated, the War Duels were also very much like 'war,' contrary to people's expectations. Even with the fighters' intervention, the protagonists here were the defending army and the conquering army. Their numbers were overwhelmingly greater, and they were far more desperate than the fighters. Yet the balance between the two sides was extremely close. However overwhelming the attackers' numbers and strength, a siege favors the defenders enormously.

Thus, the fighters were originally meant to receive attention only in the 'latter half' of these War Duels. As outside forces, they were perfectly suited to breaking that tense balance. The plan was for the fighters to distinguish themselves one by one among the utterly exhausted soldiers, while the dragon artifacts were spotlighted one at a time to raise their prices and build the duel's narrative to a dramatic crescendo.

But.

"..."

At this moment, the protagonists of the War Duels were neither the defending army nor the conquering army.

"That's completely insane—"

"Quiet. You're breaking my concentration."

Silence settled over the spectator stands.

Everyone was watching the same place.

"Shut your mouth and watch."

The protagonists there were two swordsmen.

"We might never see anything like this again..."

Every spectator felt it.

"Seriously."

The duel between those two swordsmen would determine the outcome of these War Duels.

It was ridiculous that just two individuals could decide the outcome of a war, yet strangely, none of the spectators found it strange. That was how overwhelming the presence radiating from the two swordsmen was. Truly overwhelming.

"Sword Demon Liam and The Black Bride... Once this duel ends, there won't be anyone in the steel city who doesn't know those two..."

The side of whichever fighter won that duel would win the war.

Everyone naturally thought so.

Everyone's heart was growing hot.

"Hmm."

Well.

"But why is the blade gone from the Dragon Sword the Sword Demon is holding? Isn't that a little strange? It's damaged like someone tore chunks off and ate them..."

"Shut up! Does that shit matter right now? We're watching an incredible scene we'll never see again—"

"N-no. Doesn't it still matter? It's the winner's prize..."

"Just shut your mouth! You clueless fucking loser—"

"..."

For Arhan, who had thoughtlessly put the winner's prize into his stomach, this was lucky.

Very lucky indeed.

* * *

Seolyun knows the Little Gladiator's gift.

The Little Gladiator can become many people.

He can become a wandering swordsman like the wind, an assassin of the Free City carrying the scent of death, or even something like an orc. He can even be a boy one night and become a young man the next day. Seolyun does not know where this mysterious gift the Little Gladiator displays comes from. But rather than questions, she always harbors anticipation.

What will he become next?

What swordsmanship will he wield?

"..."

Once again, the Little Gladiator had become someone new.

And as someone new, he wielded new swordsmanship.

"... Ha, haha."

And.

"What is that?"

This swordsmanship was distinctly different from everything before it.

Seolyun looked down at herself.

There was a clear mark on her armor.

A sword mark.

"... That's quite a surprise."

Just one step.

One step had saved her life.

Had it reached one step deeper, Seolyun would have died then and there. She would have made a lonely exit without even displaying her newly attained level, without a chance to reveal the foothold she had gained in the rank of 「sword runner」.

That was how exceedingly lethal the swordsmanship of the Little Gladiator—Arhan—had just been.

No, could it even be called swordsmanship in the first place?

"You really are amazing."

Seolyun looked straight ahead.

The Arhan reflected in her eyes looked extraordinarily peculiar. He was neither a venomous swordswoman, nor an assassin of the Free City, nor a knight standing before twilight, nor a wild orc, nor a wandering swordsman. He was not something that could be defined by such labels. If she had to give him a name, this would be the right expression.

"Truly."

A flame.

A lantern that suddenly illuminates its surroundings in a dark world.

"So I'm going to pour everything into this, too."

Seolyun murmured those words as she watched Arhan flicker like a flame. The next instant, her heart gave a mighty beat. It was not the heart that supplied blood to her body. It was her second heart, which supplied Mana rather than blood. Her 「mana heart」 surged. Along with it, the 「paths」 that granted her body superhuman strength spread like a spiderweb.

Power unsuited to the girl's slender body filled her. But the activity of her second heart did not end there. The 「paths」 circulating within her resonated with the outside world. Thus, the 「paths」 branching like veins no longer existed only within Seolyun's body, but clearly manifested outside it as well.

As the Mana within her resonated with the Mana outside, those 「paths」 now sparkled clearly for everyone to see. The intricately woven 「paths」 sprouted behind Seolyun's back like an organ. They were a symbol. A symbol that a swordsman had finally become able to run through the world.

With awe, the world calls that symbol by this name.

"Everything I have."

Wings.