A Knight Who Eternally Regresses

The moment Enkrid emerged from the world Acker had created, he felt the breeze brush through his hair.

Time-wise, the sun hadn't even sunk behind the western mountains yet—so not much time had passed.

His finely tuned senses could feel it. His internal clock—that biological timekeeper—told him so.

Enkrid understood from its rhythm that only a short time had truly elapsed.

'It felt like ages passed inside.'

It felt that way—but reality said otherwise.

Because it was a world where only consciousness wandered. Did that mean everything learned inside was meaningless?

Probably not. He would need time to adapt when putting it into motion with his body again—but still.

Opening his eyes, Enkrid observed his own state in the same stance as before.

Standing with his sword awkwardly in hand.

'I'm not hungry.'

He didn't feel the need to eat more. He wasn't sleepy. Even after such intense concentration, there was no dizziness.

He felt fine.

Though he'd remained standing and gripping a sword the whole time, his limbs weren't crying out in fatigue.

"You do the weirdest things every time I see you."

It was Rem, approaching with both hands relaxed at her sides and her axe slung at her waist.

With the help of sorcery, she now operated at the level of a knight, and had caught glimpses of the sword's trickery.

Most of all, she'd seen Enkrid suddenly grip his sword, close his eyes, and begin to twitch.

She knew something was happening. She'd used her sorcery to assess his state.

That's how Rem knew Enkrid's consciousness had been yanked away. More precisely, that he had been drawn in—synchronized with the sword.

Not just Rem—others had also judged Enkrid's condition in their own ways. And now all eyes were on him.

With a glance sweeping across those eyes, Enkrid spoke.

"Playing with Acker."

"Yeah, that's what it looked like to me too."

"Mm. Going back in now."

As he spoke, Enkrid relaxed his grip on the sword, shook out his legs to loosen the muscles, and walked over to a stump chair in the corner of the training yard.

Normally, to enter the world Acker had created, one had to sink their consciousness downward, like descending into water. But Enkrid—having met far too many Ferrymen—was already a pro at this kind of thing.

Not by choice, of course. But how many times had he wandered the boundary between dreams and consciousness?

Without even waiting for Acker's invitation, he dove back into that world again.

***

"I guess this is the part where I should act surprised, but I won't. Like you said, wasting time is pointless."

Acker tossed the words out mid-fight, casually.

Normally, questions should've come first.

Like:

Did I ever teach you how to enter this realm?

Do you know how much harder it is to control Will that never runs dry?

How did you come back so fast?

You're not immune to mental fatigue, so how the hell is this even possible?

Did you make some kind of pact with the goddess of fortune, after nearly dying hundreds of times?

Questions like that.

Things that couldn't be explained. Things that defied reason.

That's the kind of person Enkrid was.

But Acker decided not to ask. He abandoned pointless questions.

Why?

Because after fighting this guy... something inside him had begun to stir too.

"I'm not going to go easy on you just because you're tired."

Acker clenched his teeth as he said it. Even as a thought-form, he felt a fire rising within himself.

"Yeah. Thanks."

Enkrid replied with complete calm—and that just got under Acker's skin.

Both the tone and the words.

"You little shit."

This translation is the intellectual property of Novelight.

Acker laughed. At least there was no need to teach this one about psychological warfare.

A ghost, a being without a body—and yet Enkrid had lit a fire in the heart of such a wraith.

From that moment on, a full month passed in the real world. But in the consciousness-world created by the thought-form, uncountable time went by.

There was a lot Acker had to teach. It was his lingering regret—so he gave it everything.

"If you get good in here, then what? Just get the basics down. Once you're back out, you'll have to re-ingrain it into your body anyway."

"Mm."

Enkrid never asked for rest—he just kept requesting duels. And Acker obliged, speaking as they fought.

It was around this time that Enkrid realized—he didn't need to breathe here.

They weren't fighting with real bodies in this place.

So, just as Acker had said, mastering the feel of it was enough.

That's exactly what he focused on.

He aimed to pull out just the methods, the instincts.

Of course, it wasn't easy. Each movement had to be repeated dozens of times—then explained—and then repeated again just to get the basics down.

"You're kind of... slow, you know?"

Or—

"What happened to that knight training of yours? Why is your absorption rate so low?"

Acker could have said those things. And Enkrid wouldn't have minded—he'd heard worse.

But Acker never did.

One month wasn't long.

Acker was too busy pouring everything out, so that not a shred of regret remained.

He ignored unnecessary questions. Talent? Irrelevant.

What would words change? Nothing.

So he stuck to only what mattered. The thought-form remained focused on the goal.

That was how Acker taught.

"Show me the sword techniques you've learned. You must've learned the ones Knight Acker left behind, right?"

As the thought-form, Acker referred to his original self in the third person.

Enkrid nodded.

Mind Duel. True Blade Form. Nameless Blade Form.

Those were the names of the techniques. Enkrid showed how he had developed and altered them in his own way.

He also demonstrated how to block foresight: overwhelming the opponent with dozens, even hundreds of layered intentions, creating chaos and ambiguity.

"You think I'm some greenhorn who just became a knight? That kind of trick only works on amateurs."

Back in Acker's day, there had been more knights—and far more battles.

For a nation to be founded, chaos was more useful than peace, and the continent had been wilder than it was now.

Anyone who fell for such tricks back then was called a fledgling.

Knights back then didn't hold back, eyeing each other carefully like they do now.

Historians now call it the Age of Strife.

The Demon Realm had been quieter back then, but humans, beastfolk, giants, fairies, and dwarves clashed nonstop.

As Acker spoke, he blocked Enkrid's swing.

Clang! Clang! The metallic ring of blades echoed between them.

Enkrid moved between the grass blades, striking with intent to pressure his opponent.

"Oh? So that's how you're doing it?"

Acker muttered as he dodged, blocked, and countered.

"You've made some progress. Still, you should probably learn the latter half of Nameless Blade Form. That'd help, yeah?"

Enkrid didn't have time to nod.

Even if breathing wasn't necessary here, was it really right to not breathe?

Maybe Acker's thought-form didn't need to—but Enkrid did.

He needed to act as if he were using his body.

A flash of insight sparked through his mind, and Enkrid listened as Acker continued.

"The original name of this sword art is Acker's Web. Acker liked spiders. He even kept them."

While learning the latter half of True Blade Form and refining his control of Will, Enkrid constantly tried to handle that blunt, massive force with his senses.

Time, once loosed like an arrow, could never be retrieved.

Time passed could not be reclaimed.

Aside from eating, sleeping, and brief breaks—Enkrid spent the entire month with Acker.

They say every meeting must end in parting.

Acker knew his time was almost up.

And every time Enkrid returned to reality, he noticed that the blade in his hand grew dull, and the once-sturdy hilt became soft.

Soon, he could probably shatter the blade with just his fingers.

The once-proud sword of legend, the brilliant blade Acker, was gone.

All that remained was a worn, brittle weapon.

And then, on one otherwise uneventful day...

Within that grassy field of the mental realm...

Acker's body began to fade.

"Well, I'm off."

Enkrid nodded, eyes fixed on Acker's face.

His cheek had already begun to dissolve, scattering like grains of light.

From his cheek to his hair, then his entire body—it all began to fragment into tiny particles.

In a way, it was a beautiful sight.

In another, it was cruel.

After all, this was the vanishing of a being, regardless of whether it was just a thought-form or not.

And Acker smiled gently.

Regret? Sadness?

There wasn't a trace of such emotions on his face.

His smile held no pain, no sorrow—just peace.

"Thank you."

Acker said.

They hadn't had much time for deep conversation, so Acker hadn't spoken much about himself.

Sure, he had dropped a few stories in between.

But there hadn't been time to speak of his lingering regrets or his goals.

Instead, they had exchanged sword strikes.

And through that alone, Enkrid had understood what Acker wanted.

There was nothing more to {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} be said.

The human shape formed by the thought-form blurred, faded.

Grains of light scattered upward, as if spiraling into the sky in a tiny whirlwind.

At the same time, the sky above the field—filled with sunlight and swaying grass—split open.

From that split, light poured forth.

A flickering brilliance, like hundreds, thousands of shooting stars streaking past his eyes—

It was the sensation of drifting back from the border between consciousness and unconsciousness, back to reality.

When Enkrid awoke, he lowered his head, eyes opening.

Fwoosh.

The sword in his hand—Acker—disintegrated like dust.

When he looked up, the sun overhead shone down through a thin veil of clouds, as if to say, What could possibly block me?

Light poured freely from above.

It was a bright, clear day.

"A midday field... Acker's favorite place. It was his homeland."

Those were words spoken by the thought-form Acker.

He acted like he didn't speak much about himself—but in truth, he had said quite a bit.

Claimed he didn't know much because he was just a thought-form, but he turned out to be quite the chatterbox.

"You learned Valen's swordsmanship too?"

"Valen-style mercenary sword?"

"Why do you call that man a mercenary?"

"Wasn't he?"

"He was a knight. Ranked among the top ten. You think those sword forms are just tricks? Sure, they are tricks—but dig deeper. You'll taste something different.

It was swordsmanship built entirely on the premise of Will."

It was the kind of revelation that should've made Enkrid perk up his ears.

But in the moment, he hadn't had the luxury to react.

Too much to do.

Yes, Acker had taught him. But—

Enkrid had also struggled on his own, striving to grasp what he knew he had yet to understand.

That's why he'd charged forward, never resting, swinging his sword over and over.

And in the end, what Acker left behind was passed on wholly to Enkrid.

There were no regrets left.

And the fact that he had left without regret meant that Knight Acker's lingering will had been fulfilled.

With that, the royal treasure known as Acker had completed its purpose.

No—he had done more than that.

What does it mean to go beyond one's purpose?

Enkrid had realized just how crude his way of handling Will was.

To overcome that, he had to hit his limit again and again.

So he fought Acker—again and again—forcing his Will to burst forth.

If he was going to fight within the conscious world anyway, then he might as well use that time to swap out the old bricks he'd built up with something stronger.

'I'm the one who should've said thank you.'

Enkrid watched the falling sunlight and silently gave his thanks to Acker.

It was fully autumn now.

Autumn—the perfect season for battles and war.

With the heat gone, food wouldn't spoil as quickly, making it easier to store rations.

And if forests or fields were nearby, provisions could be sourced on-site.

The cool breeze was refreshing rather than cold.

And with it being the driest season of the year, most days saw thin clouds or clear skies.

High skies and broad visibility.

The battlefield would be Greenperl.

If they were to fight on open plains, it would be a poor setting for tricks or surprises.

That meant it was a full-scale war. At least, that's how it appeared on the surface.

While Enkrid spent a month with Acker and began embodying what he'd learned, Azpen declared war.

"If you give us half of Greenperl, and two of the fortified cities you've built, we'll let this pass without a fight."

That's what the envoy who arrived at the royal palace had said.

"I assume you didn't speak those words thinking I'd accept them. Very well—let's see what you place your faith in, Azpen."

Crang, seated upon the throne, didn't rebuke or raise his voice.

He merely spoke calmly, and in doing so, showed his authority.

Azpen's envoy was from the Ekkinz family, who symbolized administration and governance.

He concluded that the king of Naurillia possessed great composure and withdrew.

Azpen moved with noisy fanfare—

And so the whole continent was abuzz.

They took full advantage of rumors.

This time, Azpen would win.

First, it was the loose-lipped merchants.

Then came the heads of major trading companies, all talking about the war.

Some of them openly bet on Azpen's victory.

They had seen the grand army—a force that had sucked dry even the marrow of their kingdom.

By contrast, Naurillia's response seemed... passive.

At least, on the surface.

They made it look like the border guard would hold first, and then the army would move.

Naurillia wasn't revealing its full strength.

Azpen wasn't hiding theirs at all.

Their stance: Try and stop us if you can.

Amidst all this, Kraiss set his plan—a strategy in action.

"Deployment preparations complete."

A man with large eyes and dreams of running dozens of salons in the future looked over the gathered warriors in the training yard.

Everyone was fully equipped.

Enkrid, having lost the sword Acker, now carried a new blade—

A solid Valerisan-forged steel sword.

He still wore three swords at his waist.

On his back, he strapped a throwing spear, tilted diagonally—making four large weapons in total.

Under his blue gambeson embroidered with golden thread, he wore drake-scale armor.

Instead of a gauntlet, his left forearm was wrapped tightly in leather bands—

Fastened by hooks at each end.

The wrist guard had been made for him by Aitri, using leather she'd received from a giant merchant.

At Enkrid's sides, the Mad Platoon gathered.

Rem with her axe.

Ragna with his greatsword slung over one shoulder.

Jaxon, arms crossed, eyes lowered.

And Shinar, standing expressionless right behind Enkrid.

"Somehow... this is both nerve-wracking and reassuring," Kraiss said, watching them.

According to his plan, Audin and Teresa would remain on this front.

The rest of the forces would need to move.

"So we head out together, and then split up right after?"

Enkrid asked for confirmation, and Kraiss nodded.

It was time to begin.