"...That"s right... somewhere... -Back then... that time..."
His once-closed eyelids gently raised and the integrity knight commander spoke.
"-A sword like that was in the nest when I kil ed the guardian dragon of the north..."
a.s.sault by another wave of shock, he blurted out his words, the thought of the chill freezing over his entire body momentarily leaving him.
"You kil ed... it...?"
The scene Alice and him witnessed when they explored the northern cave together eight years ago resurfaced in his mind.
Those countless, giant bones stacked up in that s.p.a.cious area at the heart of the cave. Sharp wounds were carved into them from al angles. Injuries caused by neither the tusk nor nails of beasts, but by a sword swung by human hands.
"Those dragon bones... You"re the one who did that...? You...
even killed the... dragon who appeared in your own story...?"
Not restraining the feverish emotions welling up in his chest despite the cold cutting through his whole body, Eugeo viciously shook his head. Something ran from his two eyes as wel , blurring his vision.
"So you"ve truly forgotten... anything and everything...
Bercouli, you"re a hero who everybody knew about in the vil age I grew up in, Rulid, whether they"re old or young. You made the 122.
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long and harsh journey to the north from the central and founded a village in the wild lands, you"re our ancestor. The highest minister captured you, sealed away your memories, and made you the first integrity knight. You aren"t the only one, Fanatio-san"s the same, Eldrie-san too, and even Alice... it happened to everyone. Before they were made into integrity knights, everyone were the same as us... every one of them was human..."
"Sealed away... my memories, you say...?"
Bercouli"s eyes, that had proved utterly unwavering throughout the battle, lost their focus as though they were looking towards somewhere far away. A soft voice, barely audible, streamed out from his mouth that lost its strength.
"......I can"t quite believe in your story so easily... But... I also thought... the story about me being summoned from the Celestial World as a knight of the G.o.ds... didn"t cut it for a long time..."
All of Bercouli"s strength had already left him since some time ago. Frost settled in layers over his manly features once again.
The tears flowing down Eugeo"s cheeks, too, froze before long and they were absorbed into the layer of ice encroaching over his face, vanishing.
The fairy tale he had heard countless times since he was young, of Bercouli and the white dragon. The reality that the hero who served as its lead had killed the dragon who served as the other main character brought an indescribable sense of loss and futility to Eugeo.
The highest minister, Administrator, had strength far beyond what he could imagine. After all, she could manipulate even 123.
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some great swordsmen with ease, turning them into her loyal knights. She might not have been an existence two mere swordsmen-in-training could have hoped to deal with in the first place. The highest minister... and the Axiom Church too.
Eugeo sensed, somewhere in his head, that barely any of his Life that the ice roses continued absorbing remained within himself. Bercouli was the same. Those half-open, bluish-gray eyes beyond the frost had nearly all of its light vanquished.
-It"s a tie?
The moment he thought so, a minor spark flickered to life in the depths of his chest, the desire to not fall here and now. But he couldn"t even move a finger. The strength began to gently leave his right hand, gripping onto the Blue Rose Sword under the ice...
It was then.
"Ho-hooo, sublime, simply sublime."
A grating voice, like scratching a fork across a metal plate with strength, rang widely throughout the large bath.
Eugeo moved his hazy eyes and saw a queerly formed silhouette swaying along the pathway as it approached.
It should be a human, but excessively round for one. Its torso, that swelled out in a perfect circle, had comical y short limbs attached to it. Its neck was absolutely out of sight and a head, round as wel , sat directly atop it. It appeared just like those snow figures kids built in winter.
However, the clothes it wore were so richly colored, it hurt to look at them. Clad in a l.u.s.trous costume that was deep red on 124.
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the right and deep blue on the left, its lavish stomach had golden b.u.t.tons that could hardly hold on. Likewise, its trousers were differently colored on the left and right and that attention to detail stayed the same for even its shoes.
There wasn"t a single strand of hair on its round head and a golden angular hat sat on the smooth top. Its shape resembled the hat that Cardinal, the sage from the Great Library Room, wore, but was far worse taste. And to add on, its height was no more than a little over a mel.
A similarly dressed jester balancing on a ball was among the troupes of performers that showed off various acrobatics in Centoria"s sixth district"s plaza during the midsummer festival.
However, it was evident enough from his facial features that the small man had no such smoothing qualities at all.
He couldn"t put a figure on the man"s age. His skin was bizarrely white, his nose was round, his cheeks were loose, and his unreasonably red lips split into a split in a wide smirk. His eyes were long and narrow in a crescent shape, arching upwards as though they were laughing, but the glint in those eyes peeking from those slits were abnormally cold.
The jester clad in red and blue skipped as he crossed the marble path, then jumped down onto the frozen bath with vigor.
His shoes, pointed at their ends, crushed two ice roses with a splintering noise.
"Ho, hoo! Hoo, hoo, hoo!"
Apparently having found something hilarious, the smal man clapped his hands and laughed a squeaky laugh for a while, then began kicking about the roses around, turning them into specks of gla.s.s one after another. Making a ruckus as he continued 125.
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scattering those specks, he approached Eugeo and Bercouli who were captured within the ice.
Standing stil several mel away, the smal man kicked one last rose to pieces before final y turning his face towards them.
Those red lips opened widely and that unsettling voice reverberated yet again.
"Oho... unacceptable, this is simply unacceptable, Sir Knight Commander. I don"t suppose you thought you could just kick the bucket like that? That would be clear treachery, you know, towards Her Eminence, the resplendent highest minister. I"m sure she"ll be outraged when she awakes, you know?"
To that, with his consciousness seemingly on the verge of fading, Bercouli"s lips quivered and a low and hoa.r.s.e voice flowed out.
"Chief Elder... Chudelkin... Don"t get involved in a battle between swordsmen... you sn.o.b..."
"Hoo, hohoo!"
Upon hearing Bercouli"s words, the smal jester skipped three steps while loudly clapping his hands.
"Swordsmen! Battle! You make me laugh, hoohoohooo!"
That shril laughter that didn"t seem like that of a human spread out.
"You sure can speak, after even so generously going easy against a filthy traitor! Sir Knight Commander, you haven"t used the "other side" of your Time Piercing Sword yet, have you? You could have kil ed that brat before he could get a word out if you 126.
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felt like it! That"s what I meant by treachery towards the highest minister in the first place!!"
"Shaddup... I had... fought with all I got... Besides, you lied to me, didn"t you... This rascal... isn"t some a.s.sa.s.sin from the Dark Territory... He"s way better than some ugly lump of meat like you..."
"Shuuuut your moouth! Or I"ll pull out your haaaair!!"
His two eyes peeled open widely all of a sudden and the smal man hopped up and down like some ball, then stomped hard on Bercouli"s head with his short legs. Swaying left and right atop the knight commander"s head, he continued screaming in his shril voice.
"In the first place, it"s because you s.h.i.tty knights do such a s.h.i.tty job that it ended up this troublesome. You made me laugh so hard when you guys got beaten up by just two kids that my stomach"s splitting. Once Her Eminence awakes, I"m sure every single one of the knights... or at least, both you and the deputy knight commander will be reprocessed!"
"What... you, just... what did you..."
"Ah, geez, shut up, shut up. That"s already out of you, go to sleep."
The smal man stuck out his little finger on his right hand out in an exaggerated gesture while riding on Bercouli"s head.
Licking his lips with his deep red tongue, he began a sacred art chant at a piercing pitch.
"System caaaaall! Deep freeee-eeze! Integrator unit, ID zero zero oneeeee! "
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It was a sacred art he had never heard before. The art itself was unusually short and even if it was an offensive art, it wouldn"t have any great effect-or so he thought.
"Guh..."
Bercouli moaned weakly. Immediate after, his body-his hair, his skin, even the clothes he wore, began increasingly dyed in a dim, gray color. Rather than being frozen, it appeared like he was turning to stone.
Light completely vanished from his two eyes and his body, bound by ice, changed to a mud-like color from its edges, before the smal man-the jester called Chief Elder Chudelkin-finally jumped off Integrity Knight Commander Bercouli"s head with vigor.
"Hoh, hohi, hohihi... actually I have no need of some geezer like you anymore, you know, number one. I mean, I"ve found a p.a.w.n who seems like he"d be pretty useful... haven"t I?"
The jester muttered so as his pinhole, small eyes glared fixedly at Eugeo. Fear, colder than the ice surrounding him, ran down his spine.
However, Eugeo reached his limit then. He desperately stared at those red and blue shoes approaching as they trampled on the ice roses, but that scene immediately faded out into a dim darkness.
-Kirito.
--Alice...
Eugeo"s consciousness was severed as he cal ed out their two names in the depths of his chest.
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Chapter 11 The Secret of The Chamber of Elders.