Chapter 155: Next to You
The enemy is coming.
Their name is the Demons.
Their song is endless pleasure, and their desire is bottomless depravity.
The general said. “I will defend this place!”
The scene is familiar.
Lines being pushed and pushed, friendly units retreating. Units of the Order holding the line to keep the main body intact.
Making sacrifices, ordering sacrifices, watching sacrifices, the resistance continues to retreat.
“This war…when will it end?”
None of her subjects could answer her lament with certainty.
The enemy does not die.
Even if you kill them, they come back from the dead.
To them, material bodies are no different than golems powered by magic.
Even when they organize a coalition to break down one demon gate, demons pour out of a new one.
Countless kingdoms and cities were destroyed, and in the end, in the last remaining city, a voice whispered to her.
[Queen, make a deal with me]
Plant the Essence of Corruption, and if you last a hundred years, I will end the endless war and step down.
She had no choice, so she accepted, and so began a hundred harsh years of revenge on the queen who had stood in their way.
“I am the Lionheart King.”
Until the man appeared.
* * * * *
The Magician Queen of the Kingdom of Spero.
Despite her exalted name and authority, Beatrice is no stranger to the outdoors.
As the kingdom’s supreme power, she has spent most of her life on the battlefield since her ascension to the throne as a field commander.
In the swamps of summer, where flies and mosquitoes swarm, and in the frigid snowfields, where horses freeze to death.
Her experience in the field and camping out over and over again has made her generally tolerant of most conditions.
Of course, as the face of the kingdom and a symbol of the Demon Resistance, she is constrained by the need to always appear well-groomed and relaxed.
In that sense, it could be said that she failed to maintain that dignity this time.
“Ugh…….”
Opening her eyes, Beatrice wore a rare expression of despair.
She had unwittingly fallen asleep, knowing how dangerous it was to sleep in the freezing cold!
But it wasn’t the icy cold of the snowfields that greeted her, but a soothing warmth.
“You’re awake.”
“Your Majesty?”
She heard Leon’s voice. He was stirring the flames with his bare hands, melting the center of the den.
Needless to say, the flames burning in the absence of a single branch for firewood are the flames of the god Petos.
“I dug a snow hole since we need to rest for a while.”
Beatrice blushed at the realization that she had fallen asleep in front of Leon but Leon smiled at her and handed her the Holy Grail.
“Quench your thirst with holy water. ”
“This precious thing…….”
It was said that holy water could be created with only holy power, but Leon was in a position to save every bit of it.
As if he could read her thoughts, Leon reassured her not to worry.
“This is fine. Consider it a necessary expense.”
“Then…thanks.”
Beatrice accepts the grail that should be enshrined in a shrine after all the work that went into making it, but for now it’s just a goblet of water to quench her thirst.
The holy water feels warm as it slides down her throat and Beatrice looks up at Leon with a puzzled expression.
“I…Your Majesty.”
“What is it?”
“To see if I…have done something impolite.”
“Nothing much. You seemed to have stirred up some old memories.”
“I was ……embarrassed.”
Sometimes she dreams of the past, her times of glory and the nightmare of her downfall.
It was a miserable time that she could not tell anyone about.
“You have nothing to be ashamed of.”
“Your Majesty?”
Leon smiled bitterly and confessed.
“The past is a beautiful thing. It’s a dream I long to return to.”
“…….”
Beatrice clenched her jaw, empathizing with Leon’s story.
She knew his past, how he’d lost people he loved and cared about, how he’d fought to the end.
How great was the loss he must have felt when they were all dead and he was alone?
The only person in the world who could relate to his pain would be himself. Conversely, the only person who can empathize with his pain is…….
“I’m going to take a break. Get some more rest.”
“Yeah…….”
Beatrice hugged herself in the generous snow and realized that she had been covered with something all this time.
“Your Majesty, what is this?”
“A knight’s cloak, acquired by chance on Earth. A gift from that honorable knight.”
It was the cloak of the Headless Knight that Leon had been honored with. Apparently, Leon had taken it out of subspace and covered her with it.
“Your Majesty…….”
With his cloak covering her, Leon is sitting virtually naked in the snow but he didn’t seem to mind.
“This king is fine. I’m a knight.”
Beatrice was suddenly reminded of her general, Ricardo Burns.
He was a loyal knight who had tried to serve his queen even as he became a Death Knight himself. For their foolish loyalty, Beatrice could not repay them.
“Is that what all knights are like?”
“So I was taught.”
Leon had been born to a grand duke and thoroughly trained in chivalry. He knew how to honor what men and women were supposed to honor, and how to treat each other with care and respect.
But more than that.
“It is a knight’s duty.”
“Duty….”
Does the word “duty” even begin to cover the endless sacrifices?
At least for Grand Marshal Ricardo Burns and his knights, the Lionheart King of the Lionheart Kingdom was a man whose duty was greater than his right.
“Your Majesty.”
Beatrice gently lifted her cloak, revealing the hollow inside.
“There’s plenty of room, please come in.”
“Hmph… I see your point, but…….”
When one cloak covers another, there is inevitably skin to skin contact. Leon didn’t think it was polite to the lady.
And Beatrice didn’t think it was polite to leave Leon alone and wear the cloak herself. Most of all──
“Come on, are you planning on embarrassing me?”
A rather blatant flirtation, one that the queen was quite prepared for.
“I would never… embarrass a lady.”
Leon carefully slipped into the cloak. Flesh pressed against flesh.
“Not uncomfortable?”
“Not uncomfortable, just warmer.”
Beatrice leaned against Leon’s shoulder, her abruptness catching him off guard.
“Beatrice…….”
“Please allow me this much. I won’t…ask for more.”
“…….”
Leon let go of his shoulder without a word. The seat next to him remained empty for a long time.
He watched Beatrice’s defenseless form as she slept soundly.
[Leon, my knight]
Arianna’s voice descended upon him.
“Do not speak.”
And in a rare moment, Leon refused but Light and Justice continued with a flurry of words.
[Your goddess asks, when will you make a new love?]
Leon smiled wryly at her words. He spoke out of turn, but the gods didn’t seem to think so.
[Nay, neither do we, for true and pure will make a good wife.]
At the sound of Poma’s voice, Fle rebuked him.
[Hush sea, for this is the turn of dreams and death, and the next queen’s place belongs to my priestess.]
[You don’t think of anyone to feed, but you talk a good game.]
[What is war, that thou shouldest defeat thee!]
Fle’s eyes whirled around as Petos spoke from the flames of the snow cave, but then the God of Vengeance spoke.
[Avengers, it is right that they should be joined by the same avenger, a motive.]
[The Darkness’s best candidate for queen is a young, blue child.]
[A year younger than the goddess of the sea and war. War.]
[Humans take that one year very seriously.]
Leon wiped his forehead as Ventasis slipped in. Meanwhile, the Goddess of Light and Justice is relaxed.
[Hoo-hoo, my knight, son of the Goddess of Light and Justice. I decide the pace.]
“Goddess…I have only two mothers.”
An orphan, but one on Earth. The other, the Grand Duchess of Lionheart. A goddess is an object of worship, but not a mother…….
[Let’s make it a third mother]
“I can only imagine.”
Leon stirred the hair of the woman who slept soundly beside him. She was a young, beautiful woman. She must be in the hearts of the gods because of her great favor with him.
[I hadn’t forgotten Castile yet]
“…….”
Leon smiled bitterly, remembering his old love.
He snatched up the priestess who served the moon and the goddess of chastity and whispered his love. Then he had to undergo trials to appease the angry goddess of purity.
It was a love so hard-won that Leon cherished his wife and protected his home.
Now that she was dead and in the arms of the gods, he cannot covet a new woman.
[Leon, my knight, your life is not meant to be with common women. Your tender heart may be pleasing to her, but what about your weary mind and body and your unrelieved misery]
Arianna…The gods, as well as she, were worried about this stout lion king.
Even the gods live for eons, sharing their mortal frailties and falling in fiery love.
As the gods would have it, Leon had protected his chastity for too long.
He’s been on a bloody demon hunt with an insatiable appetite.
In the eyes of the gods, his end should have come long ago.
[You also have a duty, as the only living human of the Lionheart, to keep its bloodline alive and thriving.]
“…….”
The goddess laughed and a tear ran down Leon’s cheek as he was still unable to answer.
[Love like a star, Leon, you deserve it]
Leon leaned back and glanced over at the queen, who lay exhausted.
He is still young and healthy. Even though it’s been two hundred years since he’s held a woman. But…….
[Father]
He recalled old memories. The fruit of his love and the hope that the child who did not end well is alive.
It’s not something to be taken lightly.
So for now he can only endure.
The lady next to him adjusts the cloak to keep her from getting cold, and even in the harshness of the glacial continent, her skin is warm and soft against his.
* * * * *
“The reactions are getting stronger.”
Beatrice led Leon in a direction where the flames of the dagger were becoming increasingly clear.
“Beatrice, there don’t seem to be any other creatures around.”
After several days of exploration, they had not seen a single demon in this frigid land.
Of course, in a land that Leon and Beatrice could only endure so much, any demons would attack on approach.
“I thought there would be glacial demons.”
“You mean the demons of sloth and idleness?”
“Yes, and the demons of icy coldness. They are quite troublesome… but nothing compared to the flames of the gods.”
At the turn of the Randolce Plain, Vulcanus led his knights against them and eventually Leon heard that they had repulsed the demonic legions.
“Nevertheless, the disappearance of Sir Vulcanus and his knights is puzzling. But now that I’m here, it’s not impossible.”
What a cold, bitter continent. It’s almost like a law.
“But that makes me even more convinced that Lord Vulcanus is alive on this continent.”
“You mean cold sleep… ah, in His Majesty’s world, the theory is…….”
“I’ve heard of it from Lord Yappy.”
In Leon’s world, science hadn’t progressed that far. But it’s not a theory he’s unfamiliar with, having vaguely heard of it in his time as an Earthling.
“They are the knights of God. They must have survived in a world where even space and time were frozen.”
It was then that Leon halted Beatrice and began to sense something.
“Petos.”
[Yes, I can feel it, I had to get this close to find it.]
Petos, the god of war and flame, shared the same sensation as Leon, his searing fire coursing through his body.
“There it is. There’s someone there.”
The two hurriedly headed in the direction of their senses, and as they got closer, Vulcanus’ ritual dagger glowed with vivid flames.
“Nothing but a giant…glacier.”
A massive, towering wall of ice stood in their way. Frozen solid with snow and ice, it is harder and more massive than a rocky cliff.
Leon stepped forward, facing the looming ice wall.
“Stand back.”
Leon drew his holy spear and the flames of Petos spun furiously around the tip.
The spiraling flames melted the ice wall as soon as they touched it, propelling him forward.
How far did it go? Several times before the icy water on the melted ice wall was vaporized by the divine flame, releasing a massive plume of steam.
“Found it!”
Leon spotted the familiar armor, though it was not Vulcanus── it was a crimson knight, from his helmet to his armor to his horse.
Even the banner of the unit, symbolizing the glory of the Knights Templar that would never be forgotten.
“Your Majesty, who are these?”
“Knights of the Flaming Sword of Baltan, under the direct command of Lord Vulcanus, Holy Knight of War and Flame.”
Within the ice wall, countless knights were frozen and preserved.
