Evade The Hero and Flee!

Side Story – A certain princess’s memories (11)

#14 Their story: someone’s story.

Self-proclaimed universe’s strongest.

My master, called by others one of the strongest swordsmen in the world, said.

“You really are a hella weird lad.”

“The middle is always the best.”

“If you’re a man you should aim to be the strongest.”

“Once I aimed for the strongest profession, a government official.”

“Not much in that life, is there?”

I nodded as my master snickered.

There wasn’t much.

“So you need to get stronger.”

“I believe that with this much I’ve learned everything worth learning from the universe’s strongest master.”

“Indeed. You’ve learned everything worth learning. You’ve combined body, mind and my swordsmanship’s form(形) into one complete whole. Out of all of my disciples, the only one that can perfectly use my swordsmanship is you alone.”

“Then you’ve accomplished your objective. Completed swordsmanship form, strongest disciple. Since you’re the strongest could you please leave me alone. There’s still many novels I have to read.”

“Oi, if your master’s talking to you… hey, wait. Stop right there. I’m still reading that.”

Master hurriedly took away the novel I’d been reading.

Damn it, knowing Master’s reading speed it’ll take at least half a day before I can read that again.

That’s the latest volume so could you please read it as soon as possible. There’s not much time before I have to return it.”

“Tch, I get it. You said this is the latest volume? When’s the next one coming out?”

“Ask the publishers.”

Starting with manga, my master had been gradually been falling more and more into the path of subculture, and I could only sigh as I watched on.

We spent a lot of time on standby so I’d brought a lot of material to read, and what started as Master curiously taking a look or two had turned into him forcibly stealing them away from me.

“Damn it, my Overg***ed Volume 549…”

It was an important scene where the enemy princess was falling for the protagonist’s VR grandson.(1)

As I grumbled and moved to pick up another novel, Master slapped my hand away.

“Oho, my teachings still haven’t ended yet!”

“…Say that after you put down the thing you’re holding in your hand.”

“Ehem.”

Despite blushing a bit, he still didn’t put down the book in his hand.

Pity. I’m pretty confident I could finish that in 30 minutes.

“Damn it, just why is it that the weakest of my disciples fear me the least.”

“What I don’t understand is why the others fear Master?”

“Tch, if you were strong enough to experience my swordsmanship properly then you’d know. Then you’d start growing some respect from this great master……”

“Pfft.”

“Oi, what’s that laugh. Just what do take this master for……”

“A nut-”

“Okay that’s enough. For the sake of King Sejong the Great(2) in the underworld I won’t listen to the rest. Swordsmen can speak with things other than words so we can talk without him knowing.”

I sighted as Master tucked the book away into his clothes.

“Please don’t soak it with sweat like last time. That’s the latest volume as well so if it gets ruined I really will get banned from the book rental place.”

Rental stores are hard to find these days so if that happens I’m in deep trouble.

“Then buy it.”

“You know my salary. Plus my house is so small I don’t even have any room for books.”

“I heard that people read with e-books nowadays?”

“I’m paying my regular dues to the yellow house(3) for that, but I can’t give up on the feeling of paper books.”

“Really now? I’ll be careful.”

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Looking at Master who despite saying so, neither took the book back out or put his sword down, I sighed again.

It couldn’t be helped. I just had to end this before Master started sweating.

“Now, this is my new technique. It’s something I’m trying on you before I show it to the others.”

“You call it teaching or whatever, but in the end I’m a human test dummy again?”

“Ho ho! I’m showing you my strongest move, so what’s a test dummy, a test dummy!”

“You’re not copying a move from manga like last time, are you?”

Last time I showed him a classic samurai manga where the main character carried around a single-edged sword for non-lethal attacks(4), I got hit by a Ryūtsuisen and nearly departed this world.

Sure you call it a blunt edge, but look at it from a slightly different angle and there’s no way someone wouldn’t die from a master swordsman hitting you full power with a steel pipe.

Indeed! All those lines about manga character cutting people with a blunt edge were all lies!

“Hmhm, that was just that one time.”

“And when you read that manhwa which you thought was about humans fighting monsters, but was actually about humans killing each other, you tried to use that Sky Slash(5) and I nearly ended up going to heaven?”

“Ehhehem.”

“And the time before that when you said you were going to try use santoryu(6) and you dropped the sword in your mouth when you said your jaw hurt, and nearly ended up putting a hole in my foot?”

“Khmhmm! Forget all that happened in the past!”

“Sure, although my body and life were at risk but if my heaven-like master says so……”

“Th, thank you.”

His expression was not at all thankful but if Master exploded then I was the one in danger, so I needed to hold it.

“This is for you as well so learn it. It’s pretty useful even if you learn the basic forms.”

“And once I finish learning it you’ll throw me to the low-rank disciples to teach them?”

“I pay you, don’t I?”

“I’ll do my best to learn.”

Master’s wages are higher than what I get on the outside. Much higher.

Which is why I’m still here no matter how filthy it is.

“Now, look carefully. This is the style that proves your master is the strongest in the universe. The strongest sword that even destroys planets, the Moon Sunder Blade!

Master raised his sword.

But before anything else, my mouth moved first.

“Master, if it’s the Moon Sunder Blade… you mean you’re destroying the moon?”

“Mm? And?”

“Didn’t you say it was a sword that destroys planets, Master? The moon isn’t a planet but a satellite?”

“……”

Master froze while still holding his sword.

And ten minutes later.

“Ah screw it! I’m not doing this!”

To hide his embarrassment Master threw a fit and ran away, and just when I was about to go back to my books.

“Ah, my O***geared Volume 549……”

If Master gets mad he can easily sulk for three full days.

And new books were only allowed on loan for two.

Just as I imagined the rental bookstore lady’s voice ringing vividly in my ears saying that if I brought it back overdue again then I would have to take full responsibility for whatever the consequences may be.

“Master!”

I barely managed to catch up to Master’s fleeing back, and barely managed to console him by saying that since Mercury and the moon were similar in size his name was basically the same thing.

With this new style, while the strongest in the universe was up for debate, regarding the title ‘one of the strongest swordsmen in the world,’ he could take out the words ‘one’ and ‘of.’

#15 Their story: The Sword Princess’s story.

“Damn it.”

A curse escaped from Sir Ast’s mouth.

With this, justice has been perfectly served.

Since I was little, I had heard many stories of the swordsman titled Sword Heaven, but never had I heard of him attacking an unarmed person.

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In a different way, Sir Ast was a very incredible person.

“Huh?”

But Sir Ast was an even more incredible person than I had thought.

“Setting Moon(落月).”

A small dagger flicked into Ast’s hand from his sleeve.

That tiny knife which seemed it would be good for nothing but cutting fruit knocked away the Sword Heaven’s blade just like that.

“What is this technique?!”

A master of swordplay that the entire continent acknowledged.

The movements of Sword Heaven’s blade, who in terms of pure swordsmanship would not be defeated by even the Sword Star or Sword Disaster, were being one-sidedly controlled by his opponent.

“Severed Moon(絶月).”

“Kgh?”

“Again?”

The Sword Heaven’s down swung sword tried to move back up for another attack, but was stopped again by Sir Ast’s blade.

Even without sword aura, no, to begin with the title of Sword Heaven was given to those with pure swordsmanship skills alone, without the use of magic power.

Right now, that man was currently being pushed back not by the use of mana, not by brute force, but by pure swordplay.

“Huh?”

And that sight indeed bewildered Her Highness, who had been about to become the first member of the imperial family to die of laughter.

“Hey Reia. I’m asking because I don’t know all that much about swordsmanship… but it’s not just me that it looks like Ast’s winning, right? Or have I been swindled by a fraudster who self-proclaimed himself to be the Sword heaven? Or a swordsman that resembled Ast jumped in the fight while I was laughing.”

Words completely out of character for Her Highness were coming out of Her Highness’s mouth.

Scenes that Her Highness, who believed in what she saw more than anything else, disbelieved to the point where she said those things.

Ast was pushing back the Sword Heaven with a knife that you would only barely call a dagger, and more resembled a hidden weapon designed for assassination.

Who on the continent could imagine such a scene?

Fwomf-

“Ah. It is Ast after all. So was it gramps that was the swindler that was so similar I was fooled?”

“Just why do you insist on such dirty tricks even with that swordsmanship!”

But the sword dance that seemed like an illusion was broken like a sandcastle with the sand Sir Ast threw.

“Ah, why……”

I whined unintentionally.

I was immersed in a realm of swordsmanship that I had still not reached as a swordsman.

Just when I felt that if I had kept watching for a tiny bit longer… I could have learned something as well!

“Moonlight Break, Shatter the Heavens(月光破天碎)”

“Kgh!”

But Sir Ast continued his movements as if nothing had happened.

“What are you!”

“And let me ask the man who is called the sky of the sword. What is a sword?”

“What new trickery is this?”

“It’s a simple question.”

As he expressionlessly swung his sword, Sir Ast continued to question the Sword Heaven.

“What is the sword? Is it the sword that exists physically? In that case is it the sword in your hand? Or the one in Sir Reia’s? or this tiny thing in my own?”

“They’re all swords!”

“Exactly. Which means that the kitchen knife held by a mugger is also a sword.”

“Now what are you insisting on with that!”

I heard the voices of the two men over the background music of sword meeting sword.

Clang!

“Haap!”

No matter how superior one’s swordsmanship skills were, there were differences in the blades themselves.

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In the end, Sir Ast’s tiny dagger which didn’t carry any magic power broke against the Sword Heaven’s sword.

“Tch. It’s exactly as I said. A weapon to hurt people, that is the basic nature of a sword. An item designed to kill people from its creation.”

But Sir Ast deftly brought out another knife from his sleeve.

“That is not what the sword is!”

“No, it is. Humans are animals who seek convenience. We sharpened rocks, cut down trees, and eventually melted rocks, melted iron ore and created the sword. In order to kill animals, monsters, enemies stronger than them.”

“It is not in order to kill. It is in order to not die.”

“Humans are the ones to decide that.”

“And swordsmanship is what teaches it!”

The song of swords meeting rang out once again.

“It is not. The ones teaching that swordsmanship are ultimately humans. Unless some god of swords descended and taught us directly, in the end, swordsmanship is simply a byproduct of the sword that was created by human hands.”

“Very well. But what is wrong with that?”

“I never said there was anything wrong with it. I simply answered your original question as to what the sword means.”

“So what is it you want to say?”

“It is as I have said. Swords were created by humans, swordsmanship was also created by humans. Therefore, it must also be humans who decide on what the sword means. What is the sword to you?”

“My sword……”

As the Sword Heaven mulled over it seriously, I also spaced out and thought it over.

What was the sword to me?

‘My everything.’

“My sword is my everything.”

The Sword Heaven, too, thought similarly to me. No, I imagine the majority of swordsmen would think that way.

“And your sword is… in that time?!”

The Sword Heaven no longer bothered to get shocked, but only gave Sir Ast a look of exasperation as I followed his line of sight to find a short sword in Sir Ast’s hands.

“I had something I never obtained no matter how I tried. Even if I tried to obtain in, I never grasp it in my hands. So I naturally became good with the sword that I continued to practice with. To me, the sword is my life. But unlike you, I do not live for my sword, it is but a tool in my life.”

“So it is different?”

“Yes, it is different. I am different from swordsmen who stake their lives on their swords. To me, the sword is simply a tool to live with. Much like a beast uses its claws and fangs to live, I too, hold a sword in order to live.”

“Not a life dedicated to the sword, but a sword for the sake of life……”

“Using poison, hidden weapons, throwing dirt, digging traps or using my surroundings are all part of my sword.”

“What a bizarre sword.”

“It’s a bizarre life.”

“It is a sword I will never understand.”

“I did not live a life that others could understand, after all.”

A bizarre sword and a bizarre life.

A life where sword and life were identical.

‘Is that how I am living?’

Could other people understand my life by watching my sword?

“I see, I understand. So that is why I could not understand your sword the entire time. Everything was the sword to you.”

Even as he saw the Sword Heaven nod, Sir Ast simply made a disinterested face.

“It’s nearly lunchtime so let’s finish this quickly. If Her Highness is late to lunch again then the head chef will scold me.”

“So time has gone by this much already.”

When he noticed how far the sun had set, the Sword Heaven nodded and raised his sword.

“This is my strongest technique, take it. This is the Fifth Movement of the Flowing Heaven……”

“I don’t have time to listen to your technique names! Null Moon(無月)!”

“To the end?!”

Sir Ast stayed true to himself all the way to the end as he thoroughly ruined his magnificent scene by his own hands, and thrust his sword two beats quicker than his opponent.

“What?”

“It can’t be!”

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And with that two beat difference.

“Kughh……”

Defying both Her Highness’s and my expectations, Sir Ast defeated the Sword Heaven.