The underground Colosseum of the Duchy of Nightwalker.
The iron gates swung open, revealing the opponent for Sien’s baptismal trial.
It wasn’t even human. A monster. A threat so great that even a small nation would have to mobilize its entire knightly force—a mid-grade beast, the Minotauros.
A considerable number of Shadow Knights, clinging like wild Beast Tamers, restrained the monster with Magic Shackles. Each time the beast howled and lunged, the countless chains binding it rattled and clattered.
Clang!
At that signal, the Shadow Knights simultaneously let go of the chains in their hands. The monster was unleashed.
Freed, the Minotauros paid no heed to the Shadow Knights surrounding it, charging instead at the most tempting prey before its eyes.
Thud.
The ground shook with every step, and the very air quivered. That sound—it wasn’t just any Minotauros.
Clank—clank!
It was a fully armored, ironclad beast-soldier.
The helmet on its bull’s head was adorned with steel, intricately forged to coil around its horns. Even the massive battle-axes gripped in both hands dwarfed Sien’s small frame with ease.
In comparison, the weapon in Sien’s hand looked almost laughably small—just a single, slender dagger. In the Imperial tongue, it was called the Hirschfanger, meaning “stag hunter,” a knife meant for hunting.
“To face a fully-armored monster, and all he gets is a Hirschfanger?”
The moment they saw Sien, thrown into the arena with only that weapon, the Shadow Knights who’d been restraining the beast up until now were utterly dumbfounded.
The Minotauros, clad in full-body steel, charged at Sien.
Whoosh!
The enormous axe in its hand swung down. With a gust of overpowering wind, the sharp blade came crashing toward Sien.
Sien slammed into the ground. The axe’s edge narrowly grazed the hair atop Sien’s head.
“What was that?”
At the sight, the Shadow Knights felt a faint sense of dissonance.
After holding out until the last possible moment, Sien’s movement was shockingly quick and precise. And yet, these knights—who prided themselves on having been surprised enough by Sien’s talent already—could not understand one thing.
Why did Sien hold out until the very last instant?
He could have dodged earlier, but he chose to move late, on purpose. Sien was not the sort to show off or be careless for no reason. Carelessness and composure were words that had no place in the vocabulary of an assassin of Nightwalker. There had to be a reason.
As the Shadow Knights exchanged puzzled glances—
Far above, Laila Nightwalker, who was observing the arena, let a faint smile curve her lips.
Once Sien opened distance, the ironclad Minotauros, unable to restrain its bloodlust, swung its double-bladed axe again and again. Every time, Sien kept just close enough for the edge of the axe to graze his hair, dodging each blow by a hair’s breadth.
Dodge, dodge, and dodge again. At this rate, it would never end. This was a duel to the death that would continue until one of them finally fell.
And the opponent was a mid-tier monster. It wouldn’t tire out or run out of stamina from something like this. Not even the weight of its full-body armor could change that.
“What is he trying to do?”
One Shadow Knight thought, just as—
The Minotauros lowered its horned head like a bull and charged. Sien twisted his body to dodge, then spun the dagger in his grip.
At the same time, the Hirschfanger in Sien’s hand emitted a chilling, pale-blue light. It wasn’t just a trick of the light; realizing the true nature of that blue gleam, the Shadow Knights gasped in shock.
Sword Aura.
“Aura Blade!”
“No matter that he’s completed baptism, but at that age…?!”
Even the Shadow Knights who took pride in having been astounded by Sien’s earlier display of talent could not hide their astonishment at this moment.
And with good reason.
The ability to wield an Aura Blade meant one had reached the level of a “Sword Expert.”
Yet, on this continent, there are countless ordinary people who dedicate their whole lives to arduous effort and never even approach the level of an Expert. Such is the difficulty of mastering the power of aura.
Only those born to the best bloodlines of the highest noble families, raised under the greatest teachers, with luck and relentless training—only when all those cogs fit together does one become a “Sword Expert,” and even then, only after considerable time.
Even the elite knights of the Empire’s 1st Order of Imperial Knights typically reach the threshold of Expert at the earliest by age fourteen, or at the latest by seventeen.
Even the continent’s strongest, the undefeated sword and Sword Saint, Grand Duke Grandel, did not reach Sword Expert until the age of twelve!
And yet, Sien was only ten years old.
The youngest elites of the Imperial Knights were not even his rivals. He was two full years ahead of the man who would one day dominate the continent.
Thud!
The Minotauros charged again, and Sien swept aside the incoming attack, swinging his dagger.
It was no ordinary blade. It was a blade suffused with aura. Although it couldn’t compare to the aura of a true Master, it was still more than enough to slice through iron as if it were paper—let alone flesh.
But even with Sien’s Aura Blade striking the Minotauros’s armor, he could not wound the creature beneath the steel.
The blade was too short to pierce through the armor and reach the vital organs.
He could scratch it, but not deal a fatal wound. That was the limit.
“The blade is too short to penetrate!”
“Even if it’s an Aura Blade, that steel plate is too thick for such a short weapon to cut through and wound!”
The Shadow Knights shared the same regret.
An Aura Blade can slice through steel. But with Sien’s dagger, barely a few dozen centimeters long, all he could do was scratch the iron plates.
The blade was simply too short.
“If only the fight were without armor…”
“Watch your tongue. That is the Duke’s decision.”
“S-sorry, Sir.”
One Shadow Knight timidly voiced his regret, only for Sir Hyde, the Shadow Master, to coldly admonish him. Far off, Laila, who was watching, paid it no mind.
She simply gazed at Sien with her usual cold expression.
Just then, the Minotauros charged again. Sien slipped past the attack and swung the Hirschfanger once more.
No matter how many times he tried, he could only make shallow scratches—a truly meaningless attack. Or so everyone thought.
But after Sien’s blade flashed, an unbelievable sight unfolded.
Thud!
The breastplate protecting the Minotauros’s chest—its breast armor—fell away limply.
No way!
Only then did the Shadow Knights finally understand what all of Sien’s seemingly pointless attacks had meant.
“He was aiming for the rivets from the start.”
“He used the Aura Blade to cut the rivets binding the breastplate…”
“That’s why he kept just enough distance to study the armor’s construction!”
What Sien targeted with the Aura Blade wasn’t the Minotauros itself.
He was carefully slicing the rivets—those holding the steel plates together. With relentless precision, he focused only on the rivets securing the beast’s breastplate.
With that last strike, the Minotauros’s chest was exposed.
With the short blade in Sien’s hand, he could now easily reach the vital, defenseless flesh.
—From the beginning, the Minotauros’s movements could not threaten Sien. No, Sien had been overwhelming the creature all along.
His only obstacle had been how to overcome the monster’s steel armor.
The insurmountable gap in mass and defense could not be conquered by speed alone.
And now, the only barrier had vanished. Only flesh remained.
Tap.
Sien sprang forward. The cold blade flashed—a blade that had felled countless mighty foes across the continent.
Sword Saint Grand Duke Grandel, the great sage Marquis Bar Muore, Cardinal Aquinas…
“I wonder.”
He was simply, purely curious. How far could this blade reach? He could not help but want to see the future that awaited him.
Shwik.
The thick steel that had shielded the Minotauros was gone. Sien’s senses etched themselves into his fingertips. The feeling of flesh splitting, blood spurting, the blade sinking deep into the body.
As he plunged the blade in, he worked it along the seams of the flesh.
He knew exactly where to stab so the edge could slip surely between bone and muscle, how to guide the blade through the tangled sinews.
That much had never changed, in the past or now.
Sien was born with a talent—a talent for killing.
Even if the target was a monster, it was no different.
He moved the blade with the skill of a master butcher who’d slaughtered and dismembered thousands of cattle, knowing exactly how to sever the creature’s vital points.
Splurt!
Blood spurted everywhere.
Before the Minotauros could even swing its axe, a grisly, grotesque spectacle unfolded.
Just as its breastplate had fallen away before, now its chest itself collapsed.
Crunch!
Bones and ribcage were exposed. Heart and all the organs inside spilled out with a sickening crunch.
No matter how monstrous, no creature could survive with its vital organs completely torn out. Such was the law and the curse of life.
Thud!
The monstrous body, several times Sien’s size, armored in impenetrable steel, collapsed feebly.
The match was decided.
Turning his back on the Minotauros’s corpse, Sien looked up. The gleam of aura vanished from his blade.
“…Remarkable.”
There were no other words for it.
He was a fitting heir, standing at the apex of those who walked the night—a chalice brimming with overflowing talent.
No, more than that.
Even Laila Nightwalker, let alone any previous head of house, had never displayed such talent.
Unless it was the very first to walk the night, the founder Kasan himself.
“Well done, Sien.”
Just then, a voice rang out without warning.
Laila, who had just been at the edge of the spectator seats, now stood before him—as if she had always been there.
“Duke.”
“Don’t call me by such stiff titles.”
The Mother of Assassins, the leader of the present generation of those who walked the night.
At the sound of her gentle, kind voice, Sien hesitated. Surrounded by Shadow Knights, it was not easy to reveal the childish side of a young boy.
“Mother.”
Even so, Sien finally opened his mouth, showing an emotion he hadn’t even revealed while facing the Minotauros’s blade. Seeing this, Laila smiled softly.
“Let’s go home, my son.”
Laila smiled as she whispered. Sien nodded silently, his ears tinged a faint red.