The Man Who Remained — His Second Life Began with a Humble Bow of Apology.

A Soul So Sincere, It Borders On Painfully Awkward.

It was something he had always known from the very beginning—something so inevitable, so immovable, that there was simply no other way to describe it.

Cross had carried a certain feeling with him for a long, long time—ever since those distant days when he journeyed alongside the heroes.

Back then, it was in relation to Claude and the others; now, it was toward the Demon King Aulafeel and the pureblood Valeria.

He had always sensed it—not just a gap in ability, but something else between them and himself. Something insurmountable. A wall he could never climb.

Even now, he didn’t understand the true nature of that wall.

He had pondered it constantly in his former life, yet not once had he found an answer. And even now—tragically—he had not even come close to discovering one.

Being stronger didn’t always mean victory, and being weaker didn’t always spell defeat.

That’s how battles are supposed to be.

And yet… no matter what method he used, Cross could never imagine himself defeating Claude.

Not just Claude.

Sophia, Medil, Mary—every single one of the comrades he had once fought beside as heroes. Cross had never once bested any of them.

And when he faced them in mock battles, that wall between them became unmistakably clear.

Those who had crossed that wall were his companions. And he—who could not—remained behind.

At times, the wall felt paper-thin; at others, it seemed as vast and impassable as a canyon that could never be bridged.

Even now, he did not know what that wall truly was.

Was it proof of true mastery? Or was it, quite literally, the boundary of his existence—his limit?

He didn’t know. But even without knowing, he understood one thing with certainty:

Against someone who had already crossed that wall… Cross was utterly powerless.

In the end, the very fact that he couldn’t even grasp the nature of the wall—let alone overcome it—was its own answer.

And if that was true, then how could someone like him possibly hope to defeat a man like Sourin, in whom he sensed the same wall?

So yes—this was something he had known from the start.

A nighttime assault. A poisoned arrow from the shadows.

This was the most effective, the most decisive preemptive strike Cross could manage.

Aimed at Sourin, who sat alone in the mansion sipping tea, Cross silenced all sound, erased his presence, and loosed the arrow.

But Sourin didn’t even bother to look at the incoming bolt.

As it tore through the paper screen and closed in on his face—he didn’t so much as glance at it.

With casual grace, he caught it at the base of his teacup.

After setting down the cup, Sourin let out a quiet breath. He looked in the direction the arrow had come from and allowed a faint smile to curl his lips.

“As the head of the Kiryuu line, I accept this duel. Since you come as two, I need only come as one. Now then—come forth.”

He declared this in a rich, resonant voice, before standing slowly and walking toward Cross and Unyou, who waited in the courtyard.

“Yeah… I knew this was how it was going to end,”

Cross muttered, discarding his now-useless bow and arrow. In his hand, he took hold of a particularly unusual sword.

A straight, single-edged blade with deep serrations carved into the spine—like the teeth of a saw.

It was a Sword Breaker, a weapon designed for one purpose only: to destroy swords.

“You went through all that trouble to prepare such a potent poison, even knowing it was pointless?”

“That’s exactly why, Unyou. When you know you can’t win from the start, what matters most is trying everything—grasping at even the smallest chance, giving it your all.”

“…Sure, but if that one shot had worked, wouldn’t it have killed him? I told you—I want him alive.”

“He wouldn’t die. Beings like him are far more absurd than you realize. I know that all too well… painfully so. That’s why we do everything we can. You good with that?”

“…Man, you’re seriously messed up—in so many ways.”

Unyou muttered under his breath.

An opening strike—a perfect assassination attempt using a lethal poison arrow, delivered in complete silence.

The moment he realized it was ineffective, Cross abandoned it without hesitation and prepared for close-quarters combat with the Sword Breaker.

From what Unyou could tell, Cross had at least a dozen more tricks up his sleeve.

Really, in so many ways, Cross was just off.

He didn’t seem like someone who’d once been a sage, a hero’s comrade, or the envoy of the Demon King.

To Unyou, Cross looked more like a seasoned assassin.

“Unyou. Forget about flashy teamwork. Use me as a stepping stone if you must—just be ready to finish this.”

Unyou didn’t quite understand what Cross meant by that… but he nodded anyway.

“…A single strike. Let us begin.”

In the courtyard, Sourin called out to Cross, who held his Sword Breaker and crouched so low his hand nearly touched the ground—a posture as strange as it was eerie.

Cross didn’t answer.

Instead of words, he called forth every last drop of mana within him, exploding it inside his body.

In an instant, he entered a state of awakened combat—a battle trance unique to mages.

It felt as though he had connected to the world itself—as though the world now belonged to him.

He hadn’t felt this in years.

And then, unmoving, Cross remained perfectly still, poised like a spring, waiting to strike.

“…You look like a spider preparing to strike.”

With only those words, Sourin slowly drew his blade and assumed a middle stance, eyes forward.

He remained still, just outside of range.

Cross remained low to the ground, never moving an inch.

Neither man took a single step.

“RAAHHH!”

With a battle cry, Unyou swung in from the side, slashing his sword toward Sourin.

A full-force, no-holds-barred strike, devoid of technique or strategy—just raw muscle.

Sourin’s expression fell.

A moment later, Unyou was sent flying backward.

Sourin hadn’t appeared to move at all.

Yet something had clearly struck Unyou.

Even as Unyou crashed into a rock, Cross didn’t move a muscle.

He couldn’t. He couldn’t take his eyes off Sourin—couldn’t even try to cover for his ally.

A single bead of cold sweat slid down his cheek.

The fact that neither of them had moved made this the worst possible situation for Cross.

It wasn’t just that he was trying to counter an opponent who refused to act.

In duels—especially with swords—it’s not uncommon for both combatants to stand still, locked in a contest of stillness and tension.

Both waiting. Both watching. Both cautious.

This kind of quiet standoff—where neither makes the first move—is called a battle of stillness.

And the one who wins that battle is the one who can truly remain still.

Which is to say—the one most in tune with their blade.

That alone made this a terrible situation for someone like Cross, who was, in the end, a half-measure.

Against someone stronger, with unreadable intentions, and in a scenario where his options—his weapons—were slowly being stripped away.

And yet… he had no choice but to wait.

Even in this miserable situation, Cross kept his entire focus on Sourin, refusing to let his attention waver for even a moment.

If Sourin moved, Cross had to be ready.

But Sourin… hadn’t moved even a millimeter.

“Cross! Get out of there!”

Unyou’s desperate shout rang out—and that’s when Cross finally realized it.

Sourin, who he thought hadn’t moved at all, was now within striking distance.

A man who had killed his own desires… his self… his friends… his family.

A man who had slaughtered everything in his path.

His blade even killed sound itself.

After their swords crossed in utter silence, both men turned slowly to face one another again.

“…Had you been just one step faster, the outcome may have been reversed.”

Sourin said quietly.

Cross let out a scoff.

“A gap that can’t be closed in a lifetime—that’s not what I’d call ‘one step.’”

The Sword Breaker in Cross’s hand was broken in half.

The already-short blade now barely longer than a knife.

And yet, the truth was that the difference between them had only been a single step.

Had Cross moved just a moment earlier—had his Sword Breaker slipped just slightly sooner into the enemy’s guard—it would have been Sourin’s sword that broke.

But that step—that strike—had come from Sourin only after reading and mastering the entire battlefield.

That one step was the very wall Cross could never overcome.

And so, it remained: a difference he would never bridge in this life.

Sourin raised his sword again.

No words this time—but the intent to kill was unmistakable.

He lifted the blade high—an overhead stance, meant to kill with a single blow.

Cross, in turn, dropped his broken sword—and reached for another.

It was identical to the first.

Silently, Sourin lowered his sword from an overhead guard to a middle stance.

A flexible, ready posture—seigan-no-kamae—ideal for responding to whatever came next and, if necessary, for shattering the Sword Breaker once again.

In response, Cross drew another Sword Breaker from his coat and assumed a unique stance: a reverse-grip dual-wield—two blades held backhanded, poised for unpredictable movement.

“I thought you were like a spider… but perhaps you’re a cloud instead. Always shifting into unreadable forms,” Sourin murmured, eyes narrowing.

“If I’d used a predictable stance, this fight would’ve been over long ago,” Cross shot back with a faint smirk.

“Indeed. I fully agree.”

Sourin responded calmly, and then began to slowly sidestep with gliding footwork, trying to offset Cross’s axis and disrupt his center.

Cross matched the motion, stepping lightly, deliberately preventing Sourin from locking onto his movement or balance.

It was the exact opposite of their earlier stillness—a dance of motion, both men probing, adjusting, calculating.

This was the tense give-and-take of combat: searching for decisive movement, testing reactions, measuring gaps.

Sen-no-sen, go-no-sen, go-no-go, sen-sen-no-sen—attack before the attack, counter the counter, delay the initiative, or intercept before it even forms.

As long as the current tempo remained one where any move could connect, Cross still had a chance.
At the very least, he could create one for Unyou.

Or so he believed.

“I see it now,”
Sourin whispered.

Cross saw nothing.

He hadn’t even realized that Sourin had moved. Not his hands, not a shift in stance—nothing.

And yet, his body remembered.

A lifetime spent fighting enemies far beyond his ability.
A soul forged through battles that could only be described as despair—where death was always a breath away.

That soul knew what this was.

The scent of death.
The moment of ending.
The reaper’s blade.

It was all too familiar.

That chilling presence surged toward him, and without a moment’s hesitation—without shame or hesitation—Cross threw himself backward, retreating in a graceless, frantic leap that could only be called cowardly.

The sound of steel cutting through air.

If you had to compare it to anything—it was thunder.

The kind of sound that, by the time you heard it, it was already too late.

That sound rang out—and Cross’s torso was slashed clean through, struck diagonally in a deep, devastating kesa-giri.

“Impressive…”

Sourin murmured as he fluidly re-centered his stance, returning to seigan with a measured breath, his sword extended before him.

Cross grimaced from the pain of the deep cut across his body.

“Sorry to make you take all that. You alright?”

Unyou’s voice called as he returned to the fight, having caught his breath and recovered his stance.

Cross gave a short nod.

“Yeah. Though I can’t say I got out unscathed. Give me a minute—no, thirty seconds. I just need to stop the bleeding.”

“Got it.”

With that brief exchange, Unyou stepped forward to face Sourin.

“Why didn’t you both come at once?”

A perfectly reasonable question.

Unyou answered with a shrug—

“Hell if I know.”

And with that, he forcefully swung his sword.

In a way, it was the correct move.

There was no need to answer every one of your opponent’s questions. Sometimes, the best reply was to ignore them entirely.

Unyou’s strike was wild, rough, and completely devoid of finesse.

He raised his blade and brought it straight down with brutal force—no technique, just raw power.

Sourin parried with his own blade, the two swords clashing in a lock of tsuba-zzeriai—a close-quarters contest of strength.

Then—a swift flourish.

Sourin rotated his blade, expertly wrapping Unyou’s sword in a disarming twist.

It was a textbook move from naginata technique—a method used to entangle and neutralize the enemy’s weapon.

Unyou’s blade was now completely immobilized—he couldn’t swing, couldn’t even pull it back.

A technique that not only blocked the opponent’s attack, but also created an opening.

But Unyou’s answer to that?
It was something Sourin could never do.

He let go of his own sword—abandoning it mid-grapple.

And instead, he drove his fist toward Sourin’s face.

It came down to a margin of a single moment.

During the brief instant when Sourin had committed to locking down his opponent’s weapon—just before he could shift into his next attack—Unyou struck.

A straight punch, launched like a spear thrust.

A giant arm, backed by inhuman strength.

The full force of an oni’s raw might.

Sourin took the blow—and was sent flying.

“Alright! I’m back—and damn, nice job!”
Cross shouted, having witnessed the clash.

Unyou glanced over at him.

“…What’s with that look?”

Cross noticed the hesitation in his partner’s face and asked with a furrowed brow.

In response, Unyou held up his right hand.

Two of his fingers—his middle and ring—were split open from the counterstrike he’d taken in return.

It was a brutal, bloody mess.

“Sorry. Got a pretty bad one. Think you can heal it?”