Gavroche raised his hand in the air. After giving her some first aid to stop the bleeding, he was thinking of taking this sword demon to the Berkley-Gratten family. However, the knights who were supposed to jump into the waterfall one by one at his call did not respond.
Only then did Gavroche realize that his surroundings were suspiciously quiet. Someone else was nearby. "Are all the knights dead?" Without even a scream?
His agony was short-lived. He put his sword on the ground and tore the woman's sleeve. He first had to stop the bleeding in her shoulders. When the pale skin under her clothing was exposed, Gavroche was enveloped in confusion for the second time. This was not the arm of someone who wielded a sword. Sure, for a woman, she had strong muscles and good posture, but that wasn't enough to be able to handle a sword.
"What the hell is this swordswoman?"
When he faced head-on the doubts he had been ignoring, questions after questions flooded his mind as if a dam had collapsed. At first, he was simply supposed to deal with the risk factor that would come out of the vault. The sword master assigned him an important confidential mission. While on the mission, a straggler belatedly informed him that an intruder had entered the treasury and that he was waiting near the entrance for them to come out.
But.
—How well do I know you? Shall I start with what I remember? Let's see. Our dear Gavroche has a mole on the back of his neck, right? And, unfortunately, you get uncomfortable when it's sunny. Does drinking milk give you an upset stomach? I think if these details are correct, I must know you quite well. Well? Surely you're curious how I know all this, right?
Correct. Everything was correct. There was nothing wrong in the facts she told him. "I'm disconcerted." So he felt even more curious about the identity of this woman. Surprisingly, the moment he recognized his curiosity, the desire he had been trying to forget and suppress all this time began to make itself known. The desire to find the past he had forgotten.
"This damn woman. I had been trying to contain her." To embrace his new life as Gavroche Berkley-Gratten, he had been trying with all his might to ignore it.
Gavroche firmly tied the sword demon's left shoulder with her broken sleeve. Then, when he was about to tear off the rest of her sleeve, he raised his head at the sound of the unknown voice.
A tall man with blue hair was sitting with his legs crossed in front of the sword demon. And surprisingly, he was wearing pajamas.
"This must be the blue-haired man she was talking about."
In the first place, he looked half crazy just by his appearance. However, Gavroche was less surprised by the stranger's unconventional hair color than by the luxurious features beneath his hair. He had never seen in his life a face as chillingly beautiful and melancholy as the one before him. He was not ashamed at all to be captivated by that man's beauty. He didn't even pay attention to his pajamas. Not even his pink slippers.
—Sit down.
What was wrong with this crazy guy? Today many surprising things were happening to him. Just as he couldn't ignore the man's command and ended up sitting on the ground. "A mage?"
Gavroche raised his mental walls to resist the magic. But it was in vain. He could usually beat most magic with his resistance, but this man's magic was unbreakable.
—Agh.
Damn it. It seemed that only ridiculous things happened one after another. He wasn't used to feeling helpless. That's why he was upset. Now the blue-haired mage looked at him reluctantly and with disinterest. That made him twice as angry.
—Do they look alike? Well, not really... I don't see the resemblance.
A sword demon and a crazy mage. They were a perfect combination. Settling comfortably in his seat and half resigned, Gavroche found an object hanging from the man's left hand.
The diary of Dian Cecht.
His eyes narrowed slightly. By order of the sword master, they had brought the object with them here, and now it was in this man's hands. "This diary must have been what the sword demon was looking for."
The mage tore his robe and used it to stop the bleeding in the sword demon's right shoulder. His expression was cold. Surprisingly, with a few gestures of tying the cloth, the blood that had been gushing stopped quickly.
—Who are you?
There was no answer.
—Was that object your target? Did you kill everyone else?
Once again there was no answer.
—Damn it, say something. You were talking very well before, but can't you answer a question?
The mage muttered with a bit more understanding in his eyes.
—Well, maybe the personalities are somewhat similar.
—You also look a lot like this sword demon. Both of you are crazy people who like to prattle alone, eh?
Haha...
—Now that I think about it, you might have a very useful talent. But if you keep going like this, you'll only find a wall at the gates of becoming a true master. For the rest of your life.
—Are you a scammer fortune teller?
—Wielding the sword and being wielded by it only have a minimal difference. A master maintains a balance between both. In other words, it is the state of becoming one with the sword. People call this state resonance or harmony.
Thinking that a mage would talk of the sword in such a poetic way... It was like a cat meowing at a dog's tail.
—Are you still capable of saying those nonsense after seeing that sword demon?
Gavroche pointed gently with his chin at the woman lying in front of him like a lifeless body.
—Hey, mage. Resonance is not a good thing. Swordsmen are instinctively drawn to the voice of the sword. It is hard to resist. The stronger the resonance, the harder it is and the swordsman ends up losing control over the sword. That's how one becomes a sword demon.
And when they completely lost control over the sword, they experienced a phenomenon called complete assimilation. Gavroche thought of Jean. Jean was an excellent example of how a swordsman became a sword demon. The sword master had warned Jean several times. As long as he didn't abandon the sword, he would end up like that, he said. So, if he had no intention of getting rid of the sword, at least he advised him not to follow the path of a sword demon.
In the end, he ignored his warning and left the house.
—Is your world only black and white?
The smiling mage raised his right index finger.
—Power is balance.
At the tips of his fingers, carefully trimmed, two spheres appeared a bit larger than pearls: one was white and the other, black. "Silent magic." Actually, he was no ordinary mage. His hair stood up from tension.
—A perfectly black object cannot contain white, and a completely white object cannot contain black. Therefore, those who seek only black will find only black, and those who seek only white will find only white. But how can it be considered perfect to obtain only one thing without obtaining both? That is not perfection; it is precariousness.
The white and black spheres overlapped. The fused sphere was dyed a gray tone.
—Both black and white. Balance is achieved when both are pursued. Strength is balance. One must wield the sword and be wielded by the sword.
Wield the sword and be wielded by the sword.
—...You speak difficult words.
They weren't just words. To Gavroche it was extremely difficult to understand the situation he was facing. What was he doing face to face with a strange scammer? However, he couldn't take his eyes off the mage. Curiously, the man's argument sounded very interesting. Power and balance. It was natural logic. However, it was also an argument that went against the teachings the sword master had given him so far.
—That's easy enough to say. You mean you won't become a sword demon and be eaten by it, right?
—It's easy enough to say. Does it seem to you that that woman you call a sword demon is like that? As you said, this woman became a sword demon, but she wasn't eaten by her sword. She wielded the sword and was wielded by it. No one would object to her if she claimed to know her sword perfectly. But what about you? Have you ever heard what your sword says?
—No. My sword doesn't resonate.
—Then you don't understand your sword.
He thought it wasn't an incorrect statement. Gavroche forgot he was kneeling on the ground like a hostage and looked silently at the gray sphere floating in the air. The words the mage left strangely calmed him. The mage, who was looking at the sky as if he were measuring time, slowly opened his lips.
—You can go.
His rigid body was magically released. However, Govroche did not move. He felt a bit uncomfortable. He couldn't just leave Dian Cecht's diary behind and return, but he didn't have the confidence to face the mage and recover it either. "Since when have I acted with conviction?" Anyway, it was his duty to take the relic with him. Therefore, although it seemed impossible, he had to take it with him at any price.
It was then that Gavroche, who had already made a decision, was about to get up.
—However, if you're not in a hurry, you can stay here and watch over this sword demon.
—Watch over?
—Yes. It will be an interesting show that is only seen a few times in a lifetime.
What the hell did he mean by something worth seeing? The mage had focused solely on the sword demon from the beginning. It was intriguing how he was giving him instructions about the swordswoman, someone who was irrelevant to him. "Is he really telling me to just watch over the swordswoman?" Gavroche settled in his seat in front of the man.
Sure. If he was destined to die here, then it would be fine to die after a small delay. As the mage did, he also fixed his gaze on the swordswoman's face.