A Knight Who Eternally Regresses Novel - Chapter 641

Chapter 641

A boatman chewing on his own words and faltering?
Initially, Enkrid wondered if this was some bizarre brand of humor. Since fairy jests didn’t exist, perhaps this was how a ferryman told a joke.
Naturally, that wasn’t the case.
His mind shifted into high gear, hurtling toward a realization.
The polar opposite of Walking Fire.
What he had required to slice through Walking Fire was the concentration of his entire being into a solitary impact.
Therefore, that wasn’t the solution here.
Actually, he had already attempted that approach across a multitude of todays.
Funneling every ounce of his Will into a single strike had proven useless.
So what of the reverse?
Enkrid’s gut feeling was more acute than it had ever been.
Furthermore, through the endless repetition of this day, he had managed to categorize, comprehend, and integrate a staggering wealth of data.
Consequently, Enkrid began to perceive truths that lay just beyond the borders of his logic.
Much like one might intuit the definition of a word by analyzing the sentences around it, his recurring experiences allowed him to deduce effects from their origins.
That deduction, that fleeting vision of a finality, was the “light” he claimed to see.
The ferryman’s guidance was unfinished.
Particularly because he had only managed the opening segment.
So—was the goal to mock him? Perhaps.
A sliver of him dreaded that possibility. Yet if there was a path left to tread, wasn’t it mindless not to take the step?
Thus, he opted to anchor himself entirely in the now.
The ferryman’s hint had been vague.
Enkrid interpreted it through his own lens.
“Recall the instant you stood before Walking Fire.”
Everything after that was a mental rehearsal. Not the moment of learning, but the raw reality of the encounter.
He journeyed back through the todays where he clashed with Walking Fire, summoning the headspace he inhabited and the logic he employed.
The sort of conflict where a mere touch equaled a tombstone.
Where even a nick meant the end.
In that case, simply do not be struck.
There existed a duel where he had persisted, stripping away the flames layer by layer like parchment.
Fortitude.
Suddenly, a memory flared—the image of someone who had turned that style of attrition into an art form. Rearvart. The blended knight unveiled by Count Molsen.
He had transformed physical endurance into his ultimate weapon.
Even if he leaned on dirty tricks like physical restructuring, he ultimately fell short of his intended goal.
Nevertheless, battling him had provided a foundation. And enduring against Walking Fire had bolstered that foundation further.
The archives of his life flew open. He revisited his lessons. He translated them into motion through his limbs. Even fused abstract theory into the physical deed.
The Concept:
A blade capable of halting the tide.
The Execution:
Intercepting every incoming strike.
The Regimen:
Scores of distinct drills.
Once the concept, the execution, and the regimen were solidified, they coalesced into a true martial discipline.
He had reached enlightenment. Now his flesh had to mirror it. He was prepared.
Each strike from the Onekiller was lethal. Every arc carried a malice sharp enough to turn his blood to ice.
To parry the steel of such an adversary, Enkrid would need to move his blade not dozens, but hundreds of times with surgical accuracy.
Select the incorrect path and you perish.
A jolt of pressure, thrill, and dark mirth rippled down his spine.
In this fresh iteration of today, the Onekiller initiated the dance as if it had been anticipating the signal. The edges on both its limbs functioned as independent entities. It brought to mind a synchronized performance of Valen-style mercenary bladecraft.
Confronting those clashing cadences, Enkrid gripped only a solitary True Silver Sword.
Analysis.
He partitioned the incoming onslaught, observing them in a linear flow of time. That was the province of deep perception. His heightened mental speed made the impossible achievable.
His pulse hammered. Vitality surged through his arteries. Alongside it, the invisible weight of Will flooded him, fortifying his resolve.
Clang!
He jerked the True Silver Sword upward and shunted aside the slanting edge. Without a moment’s hesitation, he swung again, stitching the movements together. He had to. Using that momentum, he caught a blade that had darted through a narrow opening, but there was no luxury of a breath or a blink.
He instantly yanked his weapon back and positioned it before his face.
A spike, extending like a dagger from the Onekiller’s foot, ground to a halt centimeters from his throat, caught by his steel.
The blade that had erupted from the foe’s leg stopped just before tearing through his jaw.
Skkkrkkk.
Metal ground against metal. Steel biting steel, both vying for dominance.
I grasp the intent.
Following that kick, a relentless chain of strikes was inevitable.
Enkrid determined it was his turn to pressure the enemy. He summoned sparks from within to hijack the adversary’s rhythm.
The Onekiller’s dense musculature permitted sudden, violent bursts. It could also withdraw with equal velocity.
The fluctuating geometry of its legs made this a reality.
When pushed beyond a certain threshold, its limbs shifted, adopting a predatory shape. Even now, they had changed.
To human eyes, it appeared as though its joints were snapping backward. In reality, they weren’t.
Grasping the mechanics of a beast’s anatomy showed that this “inverted joint” was a visual trick.
To a man, what looks like the knee of a predator is actually the heel.
Thus, beast legs aren’t “backward”—they are simply built for standing on the balls of the feet.
A survival adaptation designed for instant flight.
Like perching solely on one’s toes—primed to spring at any second. In that configuration, the power of its legs was more than doubled.
Boom! Boom!
The masonry of the floor splintered and erupted. Through the falling dust, bolts of amber light lunged forward.
The monster that had just backed away now charged with double the ferocity. Flailing its arms, it produced a terrifying display.
From the opposite side, it looked as though a rain of falling stars was descending from the heavens.
Amber streaks burned not just downward, but in straight paths, arcs, and even horizontally across the stones.
It is said the Shower form of the Four Seasons Sword matures into a meteor storm at its zenith.
It mirrored Shinar’s Shower technique. Only swifter. More punishing. Neutralizing every blow felt like trying to stop a flood.
Enkrid had to shatter his own ceiling. And so, he did.
His conditioned frame, his mind tempered in flame, pushed past the breaking point.
There was no alternative—take a cut, a puncture, or a hit, and life would vanish.
His heightened vision captured the fluctuations in velocity. A level of sight far beyond the human spectrum.
Will simmered within. First, it reinforced his frame. Then, it spiraled through his organs and climbed into his mind.
Will sharpened every fiber of his being, allowing him to surpass the mundane. That was the secret to these miracles.
The Onekiller’s anatomy shifted once more. First the lower limbs—then the upper.
Its arms elongated like those of an aquatic predator. No skeletal structure—only dense, coiling muscle that added whip-like speed to its blades.
Enkrid slipped, parried, and retaliated.
Crimson leaked from his hands onto the True Silver Sword.
Even with protective wraps, the vibrations couldn’t be entirely nullified. Over skin that had been shredded and rebuilt a thousand times, fresh gashes yawned open.
It’s too much.
But yielding was never on the table. He parried, and parried again.
He forgot the count of the clashes. He forgot the passage of time itself.
At a certain point, his eyes burned as if someone had seared them with molten fat.
Inevitably, countless choices culminated in errors.
Exhaustion accumulated. Blind spots materialized out of over-analysis.
An edge from the Onekiller sliced across his cheek. Its muscular forearm stretched out, leaving a trail of orange.
Splurt!
Enkrid severed both its limbs—but not before the mark was made.
Even a nick is the end.
That decree remained absolute. This was a loss.
Blistering agony ripped through his system. It felt as though a needle was being driven through the very fluid in his veins.
He recalled an old woman’s warning from his youth—if a needle enters a vein improperly, it will slay you as it travels toward your heart.
Now, that terror felt tangible.
Crack!
While he stumbled, a blade from the Onekiller’s foot buried itself in his cranium.
Torment detonated from his head through his entire frame like a bolt of lightning.
It hurts.
First came the pain. Then the void.
Death arrived. Today concluded.
—
“Is that to be your resolution?”
The ferryman, drifting on the dark, swaying current with his glowing violet lantern, inquired with cold neutrality.
Enkrid gave no answer.
The reverse of Walking Fire.
The ferryman standing here now felt altered—like a different soul entirely.
“I am also in the dark.”
“How ridiculous.”
The ferryman spoke without the slightest hint of amusement.
And today commenced once more. A beginning identical to yesterday, and every today that preceded it.
He gripped his weapon, using passion as his edge and resolve as his protection.
“Today is going to be more entertaining than yesterday.”
Enkrid uttered words that no bystander could fathom.
“What was that?”
Shinar questioned, but no reply followed—because the Onekiller, detecting Enkrid’s murderous intent, lunged instantly.
Clang!
Metal sang in a sharp chord. The conflict was reborn. He weighed the factors. He extracted a logical solution.
Enkrid could feel himself evolving within a single sun-cycle.
As long as the Onekiller didn’t alter its shape, they were nearly matched—or Enkrid held the advantage.
But when it mutated, he was clearly outpaced in both speed and force.
But I can close the gap.
And so, he campaigned.
He ground his teeth together and held the line.
His anatomy paid the price.
Initially, blood began to leak from his eyes. Overtaxed Will had ruptured the capillaries.
Then his nose began to bleed. The more data he had to process, the more his intellect strained.
Heat pooled in his skull until blood sprayed from his nostrils. His ribcage tightened. His skin flushed a deep, bruised red.
For a brief window, his entire body was a map of crimson contusions.
“Damn it all.”
That was the only remark Lua Gharne could muster upon seeing him.
Clang!
Pell, observing Enkrid, unsheathed the Idol Slayer and stood ready for the fray.
I believe I have held out long enough.
Yet the Onekiller showed no signs of weariness. It didn’t even seem capable of it.
A knight, with only fleeting bursts of Will, could decimate a thousand foes in a single day.
Enkrid had circulated Will through every fiber of his being. As if he had cut down far more than a thousand enemies—not over a day, but in a violently condensed span of time.
Thus, nosebleeds that flowed like a burst dam were to be expected.
This isn’t right.
He concluded that his training philosophy had a defect.
He was finishing hundreds of equations simultaneously through high-speed thought—believing it was the sole method to intercept the Onekiller’s fluid strikes.
There is a hard wall to how fast one can think.
So what then? Another barrier blocking the path?
No.
Even as he bled out, Enkrid slammed his blade into the dirt and remained upright.
He watched the Onekiller pull back.
This creature…
He assumed the monster focused on him because he was the primary threat.
Perhaps in the heat of battle, its cognitive speed rivals my own.
That appeared to be the truth.
Certainly, it hunted him because he was a danger—but also because it was the most strategic path.
Once it decided his efficiency had plummeted, it pivoted to a fresh objective.
It was fighting with the most cold-blooded efficiency imaginable.
If it can eliminate me, the others are trivial.
Had it targeted Lua Gharne or Pell first, they would have stood a collective chance.
Even if the result remained the same, it never chose that route.
It always seized the smallest possible advantage. Exactly as Enkrid had always done.
Demons are creatures of logic. It fits.
“We aren’t finished.”
Enkrid managed to speak. The Onekiller, rather than answering, pointed its blade at a different target.
Not Lua Gharne. Not Pell.
It set its sights on Bran, the Woodguard.
“I anticipated it would end this way.”
And Shinar stood up.
Crrrrrk.
As she rose from her stone throne, thick cords or veins tore away from beneath it.
Blood spilled from her back. So that hadn’t been a mere chair.
Enkrid watched a comrade fade. He saw the fairies enter the fray.
He saw Shinar stand in defiance—but she could no longer fight as she once did.
And he saw her perish.
She bit her lip and charged, ignoring her failing muscles—but the Onekiller bored through her heart in a heartbeat.
And she was gone.
Even the ferryman failed to appear after that shroud of black. Trembling from the ghost of the pain, Enkrid woke up.
“If I cannot depend on high-speed thinking…”
Pain notwithstanding, his logic still functioned. So he whispered to the air.
Theory, vision, practice, and memory collided in his mind to carve a new trail.
The Wave-Stopping Swordsmanship.
Concept: A sword that halts the tide.
Execution: Intercepting the storm.
Regimen:
Condition the mind itself.
How does one condition a thought?
Up until this moment, Enkrid had identified two paths.
One: speed up the thought.
The other, he had discovered in the hidden city.
Split it.
The partitioning of thought.
The adversary used its limbs independently. It partitioned its consciousness to fight.
It utilized its entire form for the duel. And its focus wasn’t just split in two.
What it had consumed was the martial art of the fairy knights.
Primal combat intuition merged with fairy-style tactical logic.
Its blades were fatal even with a scratch. Its shape complemented that reality.
Its intellect had matured in the same fashion.
They say demons are the natural predators of knights.
And truly—it earned that reputation.
“Then I must simply partition it.”
Enkrid’s eyes sparked. Rather than falling into the abyss of failure, he—like any dedicated seeker—took the initial step on a fresh journey.
He repeated this day again. He died again. Over and over.
Five hundred fifty-six todays slipped by.
Eventually, the ferryman stopped showing himself.
And when he did appear, he delivered the same tired lines like a hack actor.
“Surrender. You are a prisoner of this day.”
“Do you require an object for your rage? Then despise yourself.”
In one of those recurring todays, Enkrid spoke to Shinar once more—and received the exact same answer.
By some fluke, it was the same thing she had said on the very first today.
In these looped realities, such things were rare.
The future is a fluid thing, after all.
But life is a constant flux, and occasionally, a fluke becomes a miracle.
“So, Enki, will you be the one to save me?”
Shinar asked.
“I will,” Enkrid replied.
Hadn’t that been the whole point of his pilgrimage?
Even after five hundred versions of today, his determination never faltered. His will, much like a blade, stayed sharp and predatory.
He had always understood his duty.
From high-speed thinking to partitioned thought.
He had no guarantees.
But as was his custom, Enkrid simply… dared to try.
The Onekiller stepped forward. Observing the creature, Enkrid whispered to himself:
“I’ve seen your face so often, I might actually start to like you, you bastard.”