“……Lord.”Tom looked at Arhan with a dazed expression. Ever since he had placed the blade into his mouth and swallowed it, Tom felt a strange loss of strength. It was as if something inside his body had slipped away, as if a part of his soul that must never be lost had been severed and disappeared. Emptiness rose, followed by a faint fear.
But Tom knew he did not need to fear what would happen from now on. It was not disappearing, it was continuing. Just as Santiago’s life had continued from him and into Tom, now this old caretaker’s dream and life would continue into the young man.
“Thank… you.”
Beyond the shore stretched the wide sea.
Ernest’s sky reflected the ocean exactly as it was, so from afar it looked as if an endless sea spread out above and below without end.
The straight horizon and the sun gleaming on the water looked like a painting. Before the beautiful scenery, Tom simply smiled.
“It is an honor… to be together with you, my lord.”
Strength faded from his worn body. All the power he had held as a 「Sword Expert」 flowed into Arhan, and Tom finally became nothing more than an ordinary old caretaker.
He was now a man too old to swing a sword, too frail even to move normally. But Tom did not regret losing all of that. He merely looked up at the sky with a satisfied smile, a smile that slowly began to fade.
“……?”
Up in the high sky the sky that reflected the world below like a mirror the center began to ripple. It looked as if the sky itself were being whipped into waves. With a fierce shudder— CRACK! a sound like shattering glass rang out, and the sky collapsed.
A hole opened wide in the broken sky. Beyond that hole… Tom saw two eyes he knew painfully well.
A dragon.
The dragon that had just tried to kill Tom and Arhan had tracked them all the way to 「Ernest」.
A mystical creature appearing in a mystical place. But Tom knew that the dragon was no benevolent being from fantasies— it was a monster that desired destruction and violence.
“Ah.”
The persistent hunter had finally found its two human prey.
Tom tried to rise as he stared at the dragon but his body refused to move. Now that the soul of the sword had passed into Arhan, Tom was merely a normal old man. And no ordinary old man could freely move under a dragon’s gaze. His body froze stiff.
An approaching threat. A crisis with no escape. Within that moment, Tom looked toward Arhan.
Still a young man wandering inside memories of the past.
***
“A soul?”
I clung to Santiago’s sword. I struggled to grasp his light. But it slipped through my hands.
“Are you drunk, lad?”
It felt like drifting in an endless sea. No matter how desperately I searched, the you I sought never responded. No matter how many times I assembled the shattered blade, no matter how many times I swung your sword, I could not understand.
Did a blade truly contain a soul? Did your will truly remain in your sword?
“Nonsense.”
I dismantled the sword piece by piece. I even visited the finest blacksmiths. Every one of them dismissed me, telling me to stop talking nonsense.
A blade was just a blade. A sword was just a tool. It was nothing more than a weapon.
“A soul inside a blade? Ridiculous.”
Even I could not convince myself. While I wandered in confusion, my fame only grew. In the Arena of the Steel City—in the coliseum—there was no one left who could face me.
Rumors spread throughout the Iron Kingdom of Cherville: An outsider fighter is writing a legend. A mere gladiator is on the verge of becoming a 「Sword Expert」…
“You must have heard some silly talk.”
No one could withstand my sword. No one could injure me.
But within my young and powerful body— there dwelled an old, festering soul.
I wandered. I wandered endlessly.
“Stop listening to such rumors and prepare for the next match.”
People told me my achievements were extraordinary, that the honor awaiting a 「Sword Expert」 was beyond imagination, that even the Steel Legion might recruit me.
The Iron Kingdom was ruled by strength. Wealth, fame, the finest women, wine and meat— all of that awaited me. But none of it meant anything.
The dragon that stole everything from me. My friend who saved me when I was a child. My gladiator, my Santiago. My life—my sea.
Had I come here to become the greatest gladiator? No. I had come to take revenge on the dragon.
But the meaning of “revenge” had grown blurry.
A soft bed was nice. Wine and meat were nice. Time with beautiful women was nice.
But more than all of that combined— I cherished the time I spent with Santiago.
“The entire Steel City shouts your name now.”
The old fighter was my hero.
The old fighter was my family.
The old fighter was my friend.
And.
I had not witnessed my hero’s final moment.
I had not seen the light he pursued his entire life.
I had let meaningless things blind me.
“A fighter on the verge of becoming a 「Sword Expert」, is it?”
People spoke with swelling expectations.
A fighter nearing the realm of a Sword Expert. But their words were contradictory. Because the expression “nearing the realm of a 「Sword Expert」” was impossible.
There was no such realm between Sword Runner and Sword Expert. Anyone who had reached that level would know. The place I had reached was my limit.
‘I cannot forge a sword. I will never obtain complete armor.’
I lacked a necessary requirement for forging an “armor.” To create a shield that would never break— to possess a will that never bowed to anyone— one needed an unyielding obstinacy.
An unwavering conviction that said, I am right, even if the entire world insisted I was wrong.
The moment that obstinacy became complete, a soul formed a small world— and forged its armor.
That was why I could never create complete armor.
A person filled with regret and lingering attachments could not wear an “armor.”
I would likely carry this regret forever. Absolutely forever.
“This is a miracle, Tom.”
Those who knew nothing praised my future.
“The entire Iron Kingdom will know your name.”
Why was my armor only a half-formed thing? The answer was simple.
I did have stubbornness but it was stubbornness woven from regret and lingering obsession. Not conviction born of myself, but a tangled knot of past mistakes and remorse. A stubbornness I could not break or abandon, even though I was never certain of it. A single unshakable belief embedded deep within my heart— the precious memory I shared with Santiago, dismissed by everyone else, but never lost to me.
“By tomorrow, you will enjoy a glory no fighter in history has ever had. No one will dare look down on fighters as mere blade-handlers again, and no one will mock our duels as lowly entertainment.”
Honor and expectation. A glorious moment everyone desired.
At the moment I could have shined the brightest— I was looking somewhere entirely different.
The darkest place in the grand coliseum. A damp corner reeking of mold. A place no one cared to look at. The display shelves are lined with rusted blades.
“The one who will change history—Tom.”
The Hall of Honor.
“……I’m sorry.”
In the end, I betrayed everyone’s expectations.
“That is not the future I want.”
Representatives from Cherville and nobles from many nations gathered.
They wished to see the fighter who stood on the brink of becoming a Sword Expert.
But I did not enter the match. I announced my retirement and declared that I would become a caretaker of the Hall of Honor.
The Arena’s caretakers thought I had gone insane. But they could not retaliate. This kingdom was ruled by strength and I, even with half-formed armor, had achieved the “most brilliant accomplishment” in Arena history.
At first, people were puzzled seeing me as a caretaker. Because of my fame, some stayed around for a while. Youngsters came asking to be taught the sword. But interest never lasted. Stars rose again. Scandals rose again.
The flow of time. When one star set, another rose. In that cycle, I merely became a caretaker.
I explained swords to visitors, cleaned old blades filled with the souls of the past, and sometimes stopped passing travelers to tell them about a certain old fighter— a great man who lost every day but never stopped challenging.
However,
“Why are you telling stories no one asked for?”
It was nothing like my days as a rising fighter.
The life of a caretaker that I chose— a life where I spoke of stories everyone ignored— I was no protagonist.
A man pushed into the shadows of history. No one listened to my stories. No one heard my words.
“……”
It was harder than I thought. Living while carrying stories no one believed, chasing something no one acknowledged— it was not easy. Loneliness and solitude gnawed at me. And before I knew it, I had grown old. Youth disappeared in an instant.
‘Don’t be alone when you grow old, kid.’
Santiago’s words sometimes held me up when I felt like collapsing.
‘But it’s something humans cannot avoid.’
I asked him to teach me the sword. He did not. Instead, he taught me what he alone could teach.
‘In the world of unyielding men, no one is ever truly alone.’
‘Being alone is unavoidable for humans.’
‘Fighting until you die— that is the essence of life.’
Life.
‘Kid, I have spent my whole life fighting an enemy stronger than dragons. Every human fights it from the moment they are born. You are fighting it too, kid.’
The way to live.
‘Time.’
Years flowed. My body decayed, my mind dimmed. I cleaned swords and hung them neatly. No one spared them a glance.
To the young, swords were nothing more than sharper, stronger weapons. They did not feel the souls within them. They wanted clear victories and simple rewards— nothing complicated.
I felt as if I might break. At some point, I even thought: Maybe it’s okay to break. Maybe it’s okay to give up now. Maybe it’s foolish to cling to blades like this. Haven’t I done enough? Isn’t this just wasting time…?
“Ah.”
That moment, I dropped a sword.
Santiago’s old rapier. It clattered—clunk clunk— rolled— and a passing carriage ran over it and snapped it clean.
It looked exactly like my heart.
When the carriage finally passed, I went to pick up the rapier. The blade and the hilt were separated. I matched the pieces together. And then… I saw something I had never seen before.
Inside the hilt— in crude handwriting— were two sentences.
Santiago’s handwriting.
「A man can be destroyed, but not defeated.」
A sentence that embodied Santiago’s life.
「Still, a person is not created to be defeated.」
The most valuable way of life he had ever taught me.
‘Fight until the day you die.’
I slowly stood back up.
I was old now. My hair had turned white, my face wrinkled, my back bent. But being old did not mean losing the right to fight. Humans simply fought. Until death.
My fight had not ended. Not yet.
“……Ohh.”
And then,
“Young lord, you have fallen into the Hall of Honor.”
“Hmm? The Hall of Honor…?”
I met the young man.
“If you have anything you’re curious about, ask anything. I am the caretaker of this glorious place. Feel free to call me Tom.”
A young man who would prove my life. Arhan Karavan and…
.
.
.
“……Haa.”
It was the first time I had ever eaten the sword of someone still alive. On the border between dream and reality— with the haze still lingering— I slowly opened my eyes.
The memory had not given me a clean answer.
I did not see whether Tom truly witnessed the soul within Santiago’s sword. I did not see how Tom’s choice ultimately blossomed. I did not see in what way his efforts were finally rewarded.
Of course, that was natural. In knightly novels or the plays of troubadours, those who strive are always rewarded. Those who devote themselves always receive compensation.
The protagonist gets what he desires, and every question finds an answer.
But reality is nothing like that.
People die before ever reaching what they seek. They die without ever solving their deepest questions. Those who work hard are not rewarded. Those who devote themselves are not compensated.
Stories that end perfectly— exist only in fiction.
“Lord… Arhan.”
Santiago had known this.
The duel he fought before dying— its outcome did not matter. What mattered was that the old fighter had fought until the very moment before death. No one knew what he had pursued. He had told no one, and he did not wish for anyone to understand. He simply fought— as if fighting was the only proof that he was still alive.
Tom, too, was the same.
In a life filled with regret, with lingering guilt, with sorrow— Tom still fought. Unlike Santiago, he wavered, faltered, pleaded to be understood— but even then, he did not break in the end.
The swords the two old men swung were different.
The accomplishments they reached were also different.
But—The two shared a single soul. Within this sword, the two old men’s lives were melted together.
“The… the dragon… it followed us here…”
“It’s fine.”
Two old men who burned themselves to the very end. If their sword were to be given a name— there was only one name that suited it.
「Indomitable」
“Leave it to me.”
That was the name of my eighth sword.
“And now… I don’t think I’ll lose.”
The name of my second Legend.