Kingdom's Bloodline, page 290
"When a distinguished woman gets f*cked, the readers feel a greater sense of accomplishment; a virtuous woman, they'll feel a sense of conquest; a gracious woman, they'll feel more pleasure down there; a pitiful woman, they'll feel more dignified; a pure, lovely woman, they'll feel more secure; a cunning, insidious woman, they'll feel more satisfaction!"
"As long as she's a woman, whether she's the heroine or a supporting role, she must be the attachment in the man's life and exist for the man." Kroesch braced herself against the wall, gritted her teeth and said, "From the novels to reality, from birth to death, from law to life, this is the story this shameful world tells us repeatedly, and it is the f*cking truth!"
"What exactly are you talking about?" Miranda shook her head in disbelief as terror swept into her heart. "Esch!"
"Even for you, Mira. In Constellation where the women have inheritance rights, if you don't have a strong husband, your vassals wouldn't wholeheartedly obey you either." Rays of dissatisfaction and pain seeped from Kroesch's eyes.
"Even women as independent as Heart of the Rain and Fortress Flower must achieve results far exceeding the ordinary to receive equal standing as the men, as well as receive the same rewards as the men."
In that instant, Miranda suddenly thought of her past, of how the subordinates in the fortress looked at her, of her father's expression when she was seven, of… Raphael.
"So, I understood another thing: The ones who rejected me and the independence of women weren't the White Blade Guards, nor those suzerains..." Kroesch walked in front of Miranda, her gaze was desolate and her voice hollow. "...it is this damned world."
Kroesch's voice fell. Miranda stared blankly at her, for Kroesch's words—regardless of whether it was her past misfortune or astonishing perspective—had shocked her.
Kroesch regulated her breathing and steadily raised the sword in her hand, her face was frosty.
She said viciously, "F*ck them all."
The sword flashed!
Enduring the sharp pain in her ribs with great difficulty, Miranda rolled onto her side in a dishevelled manner and evaded the killing blow from Kroesch's sword.
If it was not for the inconvenience of the other party's leg, she would have been decapitated long ago.
Reacting quickly, Miranda turned around and lunged with the sword on her hand. She went directly for the abdomen.
Just as Kroesch, who had less mobility, circled her sword back in defense, Miranda's sword pivoted wondrously and jabbed straight ahead.
It struck Kroesch's left ankle; it was as if Kroesch herself had moved her sword away so that Miranda could hit her.
*Clang!*
The tip of her sword collided sharply with Kroesch's boot.
Kroesch fell onto the ground in excruciating pain, she clutched onto her ankle in the boot.
They are both in the Pegasus branch. Miranda's Pegasus' Music learned more towards linking attacks from herself and from her enemies while manipulating the enemy and her own rhythms at the same time, creating an unnoticeable opportunity to break through the enemy. Similar to an alternating and repeating concerto.
On the other hand, Kroesch's Pegasus' Music was accustomed to taking the initiative in controlling the overall rhythm of the battle. With its high-speed offense and a clear division between her enemy and herself, like a powerful scherzo[1] showing the difference between the strong and the weak.
This was presented vividly during their exchange of blows just now in Kroesch's heavy, ribbed pommel and Miranda's ankle attack.
"Esch, forget that unbearable past." Miranda shook her head. Gasping for breath, she said, "You've been thinking too much, you've diverted this specific hatred into—"
"Thinking too much?"
Enduring the pain from both her ankle and legs, Kroesch snorted coldly. "You don't understand, Miranda. The most terrifying thing isn't the injustice suffered as a woman, nor the repeated failures in resistance. Rather, it is how, in thousands of years, even our own women have taken these things and regulations as just and rational."
Both former schoolmates fell to the ground and glared firmly at each other. There was only a distance of three steps between them. This was just the right distance to thrust out a sword attack—the final strike.
"My mother was an ordinary countrywoman, my father never loved her." Kroesch clutched Centurion as she searched for an angle. "Since I could remember, she sat in the house all day twirling knitting with the needles in her hands. From dawn to dusk, she guarded the light on the table persistently, waiting for her only support to return from the glorious White Blade Guards, even if he never returned.
"And yet, my mother remained proud of that man. She believed that it was an incomparable honor to be the wife and daughter of the king's security guard, as if both our worth could only be reflected in that man. Even if he only appeared before me for the first time ever at my mother's funeral."
Kroesch laughed softly.
Miranda stared firmly at the enemy's shoulder, adjusting the position of her sword's tip accordingly with Kroesch's weapon.
"After mother died, I was brought back to Dragon Clouds City and was entrusted to be raised by a lady of noble birth." Kroesch's complexion darkened. "Lady Adele married one of the people with the highest statuses in the country—the heroic, up-and-coming, bold, and just Prince Soria Walton.
"You cannot imagine what I saw." Kroesch could not help but to speed up her breathing. "If other people still knew how to use florid words to hide the fact that women were assets to them, then Soria Walton was probably an honest man. To him, assets should be treated as they were—with a whip.
"When I was a child, I hid under the bed countless times, and with my hands over my mouth, I would tremble in fear as I listened to that damned bastard enter the door." Tremblingly, she said, "I would hear Lady Adele's pained screams, listen to that bastard prince treat her like the lowliest female slave, venting his resentment towards his wife time and time again. Prince Soria was punishing her for the utmost disrespect and humiliation towards him. That disrespect being the fact that Adele did not set aside her first night for her newlywed husband, but gave it to a knight in her hometown when she was younger instead.
"I always climbed out to comfort Adele, she would be naked and covered in bruises after he left dispirited. With a body covered in scars, she would cry as she hugged me, telling me and herself at the same time: Don't be sad, because this was her sin, and also a woman's fate."
Miranda looked at this side of Kroesch in amazement. It was a look she had never in the slightest seen before in the past at the Tower of Eradication.
Kroesch said exhaustedly and in fragments, "You know, Miranda, in reality, from birth until death, we women have never been complete human beings compared to the other type of human since the beginning. When we are children, we are the assets of our fathers, used in exchange for the assets of another man. After we grow up, our faces and bodies become the reputations of our future husbands, our first nights and chastities their dignity, our lower bodies their territories, our wombs a warehouse to extend their bloodlines. Even our thoughts must be theirs."
Kroesch's eyes were filled with a dull grey hue. "The moment I cut my whole body open and turned it inside out, I realized that the only thing that belonged to me… was this sword."
"Esch..."
Miranda swallowed her words. In her eyes were a mix of grief, bewilderment, pain, and other emotions.
Finally, Miranda heaved a sigh. "What exactly do you want to do?"
Kroesch looked quietly at her and squeezed out an unpleasant smile. "I want to use this sword that I'm left with… to take back the things women were deprived of since birth. And from then on, allow women their independence."
In that moment, Miranda swayed a bit and fell against the wall in low spirits.
"I don't understand," she said, her face drained of color.
Kroesch merely let out a snort, as if she was not surprised at all.
"Mira, I don't blame you. Blessed, pitiful, innocent, lamentable woman… happy with the status quo, yet the least bit aware."
Miranda pursed her lips, looked at the sword in her hand and then at Kroesch.
"Regardless of what you plan to do, history and the world have been operating like this for thousands of years. Even if you become a god, such nonsensical words…" She gritted her teeth and shook her head. "You simply will not succeed!"
Kroesch raised her head suddenly. "Of course I know I'd never succeed!"
The guard captain of Black Sand Region had a pained and twisted look on her face, causing a shudder to run through Miranda's heart.
"Whether it's this concept the world has become accustomed to, or the deep-rooted traditions in Northland, or our own awareness…" Kroesch sucked in a breath, her gaze firm. "But in everything, there must be someone who takes the first step.
"His Grace, he was the only one in Northland who could throw out the restrictions, break tradition and crush stereotypes." She resumed her tranquil expression and said unquestionably, "And only when he has shattered everything Northland and the Eckstedtians believed in, denied every inch of the past that had fallen behind, that's when women will finally have the hope of gaining a whole new future in the new world built on the ruins—to not live as anyone's attachment anymore."
Miranda did not know how to answer her. She only frowned and shook her head continuously with a sense of forlornness in her heart.
'Esch… Esch!'
"The other people in the world may remain unchanged, and in the end they may not even look into the eyes of those women who are eager for their independence and hopeful for the future," Kroesch said coldly. "But at least, I want to let them know that in that earthshaking age of turmoil, under the hands of the archduke who shook the world, there was such a woman!
"The world will know that she was a woman, she too could bleed, perform meritorious deeds, fight, and survive alone. All without the need to naively become some man's wife, to rely on her face or womb to survive, or to put on the identity given to her by the world, just to survive while gasping for air!"
"Just like Queen Erica; just like King Yao." Anguish and hesitation surfaced in Kroesch's eyes, but it immediately turned into impregnable icy coldness. "Like this, through myself, through our repeated efforts, repeated attempts, repeated failures… The unjust can be made up for, and predicaments can be broken through!"
In the next second, Kroesch suddenly raised her sword. Subconsciously, Miranda also raised the 'Soaring Eagle' in her hand.
*Ka-clang!*
The two swords met and clashed in the air. Neither one had the slightest intention of defending, but instead pierced into their enemy's bodies!
*Splitch!*
Blood flowed out from Miranda and Kroesch's chests at the same time. The two who had a matchless understanding of one another had correctly guessed their counterpart's intention. Their postures at this moment were almost exactly the same.
With their swords in one hand, they thrust forth, and with the other hand, they grabbed the blade of their opponent charging at them. Their gazes met, and the atmosphere was melancholic.
"So, for this incomprehensible reason, you placed yourself in the hands of Lampard..." Miranda gripped her old friend's sword as her eyes widened amid her pain and trembling.
"...and betrayed us all."
Opposite her, Kroesch revealed a smile mixed with apology and relief. Crimson liquid began to spread beneath the both of them.
Kroesch opened her mouth and said in a soft voice, "No, Mira. It isn't incomprehensible." Her face trembled slightly as tears flowed from her eyes. "It's close at hand, but you've been disciplined to accustomization by this world."
Breathing in a daze, Miranda recalled all the things in the tower as her sight blurred.
"His Grace bore the weight of so many people's expectations and beliefs, including mine…"
In her ears, Kroesch's voice grew further, smaller, and more indistinct.
"He will succeed. He must succeed."
Editor's Note:
[1] scherzo: a playful composition, typically meaning a joke, originated from the Romantic period. A good example of a scherzo is Chopin's Scherzo No. 2.
261 The Reason for Battle Two |
In Heroic Spirit Palace, the armory near the corridor.
The Severing Souls Blade and Soul Slayer Pike were about ten meters away from each other. One of them was nailed firmly to the wall, and the other lay quietly on the ground.
The Soul Slayer Pike made indistinct yet ominous tremors from time to time.
The two people who should have noticed this had neither the time nor energy to even glance at the weapon.
Their battlefield had already shifted from the corridor to other places.
*Ping!*
A large wooden door was smashed open with a loud noise!
In the dark, the two figures threw themselves into the room.
This was an armory, the wide storage racks were covered with layers of thick cloth, and it held a huge variety of equipment in the darkness: long swords, nail hammers, shields and armor... There were all sorts of weapons there. Different, and all the types of weapons could be found.
It was a special store the White Blade Guards set up in the Heroic Spirit Palace, and it was used to provide the standard weapons training for the guards in Heroic Spirit Palace, though they would never use so many variants of weapons with such distinctive characteristics.
In the dark, Nicholas moved calmly, going by memory, until he reached the nearest storage rack. Nicholas heard the voice behind him. He knew his enemy would not hesitate… Just like how he, too, did not hesitate.
Nicholas emerged from the dim light, he brandished the weapon in his hand swiftly.
*Ting!*
As expected, Nicholas felt his hand stop for a moment; his weapon had encountered a man-made obstacle.
With this sudden collision, the enemy and him became somewhat unstable. Both of them tried to balance themselves by using the opponent's strength and shifted backwards in the dark.
Nicholas retreated to the wall and found the position with his memory. He turned the weapon in his hand in an ingenious manner, causing a spark on the iron frame. The Eternal Oil on the shelf was swiftly ignited, setting the firewood in the brazier ablaze.
Across from him, the enemy also grabbed the flint next to him, and with a light sound, set the brazier in the corner burning.
The dim armory suddenly became illuminated.
Kaslan watched the hilt of Nicholas' single-bladed battle axe.
"Looks like you and I are the same," Kaslan said as he turned the blade's hilt. "We both search for the closest weapon during a battle."
Nicholas pouted his lips, not saying a word.
'Of course… This was one of the guidelines for the White Blade Guards. Back in the days, the person who taught me this was…'
Nicholas did not utter a word as he narrowed his eyes. He gripped the hilt, the axe swayed back and forth in front of him. With practiced skill, he hacked out a cross-shaped slash.
Kaslan put on a smile.
Based on tradition, when an Archduke of Eckstedt was newly crowned the common-elected king, he had the right to take over the iconic 'Legend of the White Blade Guards' and set up a unique group of guards that Northlanders are proud of—the White Blade Guards, who had a long history and a noble status. The king will use the guards to show the glory and importance of the king.
The White Blade Guards were elites whom would be selected from the regular troops who went through the regular three periods of training held each year, and would then be retrained. In the process, they would become elites who could personally pinpoint the situation in battle and act as commanders of a battle. They could also personally go through life and death experiences in battle. They were not only the king's guards, but also his blade.
Every White Blade Guard must have all the traits of a commander, such as the 'Ground-Shaker' Kaslan Lampard who, according to his own example, required the White Blade Guards to master the use of almost every weapon on the battlefield.
Hence, this armory where every weapon from almost every era was kept was formed.
"Your ability to perceive and assess the battlefield has regressed." Kaslan's gaze rose from the opponent's weapon, "You know this: its attacks are monotonous, its slash is slow, and I'm not in heavy armor either, the axe isn't really a good choice."
His answer was a merciless swing from Nicholas' axe.
'Well, duh. I couldn't see anything. The only solution for me is to use whatever I just grabbed.'
*Ping!*
Kaslan parried his attack with his broadsword in a reverse grip. He slashed back but was once again blocked by Nicholas. Nicholas angrily took two steps back.
'No. The broadsword is double-edged. Its attacks are agile and swift. If he countered with a backhand, I would have to spend a little more Power of Eradication to defend against it.'
At the thought of this, Nicholas swung both his hands without hesitation, letting the axe fly towards the enemy.
Kaslan avoided the axe, but the moment he lifted his head again, a one-hand Panzerstecher—a weapon with lightness and nimbleness reaching a perfect balance—near the weapons rack was already on Nicholas' hand.
"Good choice—"
Kaslan only had time to say these two words. Nicholas, with his Power of the Eradication, slashed forward without pauses in between maneuvers!
In several clashes, the Panzerstecher[1] nimbly attacked the openings provided by either side of the broadsword. He combined both slashes and thrusts, attacking in a manner that put Kaslan in an incredibly pathetic situation.
During the last round, Kaslan struggled to avoid Nicholas' attacks but he was attacked again. He was forced to a point where he had no way to get out of this situation, and with no other choice, he had to fall to the ground and roll. At the same time, a row of weapon racks were knocked down and blocked Nicholas's next move.
Countless weapons fell on the ground with a loud clattering. Nicholas was forced to stop and adjust his breathing.
