A Knight Who Eternally Regresses Novel - Chapter 733

Chapter 733

Years of rigorous discipline instill an intuitive alarm system that remains active even during slumber—safety was never truly in doubt.
His solitude didn’t equate to a descent into sorrow.
There was simply no room for the luxury of loneliness.
There was only the blade.
In truth, the profound silence and lack of motion provided a flawless window for honing his martial craft or categorizing his reflections.
The volume of knowledge he had absorbed recently was staggering, after all.
Between the intricacies of Imperial combat styles and the overwhelming aura projected by Valphir Valmung as a Knight of the Empire, he had been receiving a masterclass in lethality.
“An Imperial knight.”
Enkrid had scrutinized Valmung with the clinical precision of a surgeon over a cadaver.
Visually, he mapped the dense network of Valmung’s conditioned musculature.
Auditorily, he tracked the rhythm of exertion as it harmonized with the man’s breathing.
He didn’t stop at the surface; he engaged every faculty.
What kind of scars and triumphs had shaped Valmung?
What form would his killing intent take when the steel finally met?
If one viewed Tempest Zaun as a massive, crushing greatsword, and Alexandra as a piercing, elegant thorn…
“Valmung is a chaotic fusion of sword, pike, and mace.”
The mental construct Enkrid formed was that of a jagged spearhead forced through a cracked shield, merged with the weight of an axe, the edge of a blade, and the blunt trauma of a morning star.
It was the sensation of a lone, predatory eye watching through the narrow slit of a heavy barricade.
“He is a master of concealment, striking only when the advantage is absolute.”
Valmung might present a simple club to the world, but he surely harbored a dozen hidden lethality points.
Was it underhanded?
Calling it dishonest felt wrong; it was more that he lived up to his own introduction.
“He will seize victory by any path available.”
Could Enkrid hope to match him using only refined tactical forms? Just that?
There was no path to triumph if he shackled himself with rules.
The man commands the blade.
Limiting oneself to a singular philosophy of combat was the height of arrogance.
In a life-or-death struggle, there is no such thing as a “cheap” method.
It was the same mindset he used when he fused Flash with the Blade of Coincidence to dismantle that bastard Gelt, or whatever his name was.
To stand against Valmung, he would need to burn every resource he possessed.
Even then, the scales of fate would likely remain balanced on a knife’s edge.

Enkrid located a suitable cavern and made camp.
He eschewed a fire.
Instead, he gathered a handful of bitter, strong-smelling berries, crushing them to smear the acrid liquid across his skin.
It was a classic survival tactic for solitary wanderers and hired blades.
The scent effectively neutralized his human musk, making him a ghost to the keen noses of predatory beasts or monsters.
Finding animal scat nearby was an even better omen.
In wild territories where monsters claimed dominance, common prey animals stayed far away.
Therefore, the presence of herbivore droppings suggested the immediate area was a neutral zone of sorts.
The Pen-Hanil peaks were crawling with nightmares, meaning the borders of various territories were usually starkly defined.
Without those boundaries, the local wildlife would have been decimated, leaving only a hellscape of demons.
While the heart of Pen-Hanil was rumored to be exactly that—a demonic wasteland—most of the range was a complex ecosystem.
Monsters, predators, and prey all lived in a tense balance.
That meant the lines of safety were clear, if one knew how to read them.
Of course, bad luck could still turn a man into a meal.
But Enkrid wasn’t worried about himself.
Any monster or beast unlucky enough to cross his path would be the one facing its end.
He wasn’t in a desperate rush to reach the border outpost.
He wasn’t stalling, either.
Enkrid simply flowed with his gut feeling.
His internal clock told him he still had a margin of time.
Settled within the darkness of the cave, he deconstructed his lessons and meditated on his growth.
He mimicked the arc of a blade with his hand, contorting his frame into various positions to test the structural integrity of his balance.
Visualizing the maneuvers Valmung had displayed was a form of mental whetstone.
After all, accumulated wisdom eventually hardens into raw power.
“I just have to ensure I don’t cement any flaws into my form.”
Knights possessed such high-level somatic awareness that the risk of unintentional bad habits was minimal.
When sleep finally beckoned, he took it in brief, efficient bursts.
He felt no heavy burden of exhaustion.
The miles traveled had left their mark, but it was a fatigue he could easily carry.
“I could draw my steel right this moment and be ready.”

This was the night following his departure from Valmung.
A night where twin moons hung heavy and bright, and the starscape burned with enough intensity to challenge the moonlight.
He closed his eyes, intending to sink into a deep rest, using the rhythmic chirping of insects and the rustle of summer foliage as his guide…
Suddenly, Enkrid found himself standing on the deck of a small vessel.
The ferryman had called—no, summoned—him.
The figure stood upon the obsidian surface of the river, clutching a violet lantern and fixing him with a stare.
Was this merely a repeat of his previous visions?
There were subtle shifts.
The ferryman’s features were more defined than in the past.
His skin resembled the parched, cracked earth of a dead land.
His face seemed elongated, stretched by some unseen force.
His eyes were voids of blackness, offering no reflection, and his mouth mirrored that emptiness.
His tongue was a bruised shade of purple.
The interior of his throat was a literal abyss.
It was like looking into a dark, bottomless pool where one loses all sense of up and down before drowning—that was his mouth.
It was an image designed to trigger a human’s most ancestral terrors.
He had always been a disturbing figure, but tonight he felt malignant.
The ferryman spoke, his voice a calculated facade of warmth and gentleness.
“You are welcome here.”
The kindness was a thin veil.
Enkrid’s honed instincts caught the lie immediately.
He couldn’t pin down the motivation, however.
In their previous encounters, hadn’t the ferryman urged him to protect Anne and cherish the gift of the present?
Enkrid had never felt true friendship from the being, but tonight the atmosphere had soured completely.
“What has changed?”
A massive, obsidian shadow billowed out behind the ferryman.
It was a presence Enkrid had never spotted before—vast and suffocating.
If that shadow required a title, “Malice” was the only one that fit.
Yes.
The ferryman was saturated with ill intent tonight.
When the creature’s mouth widened into a grin, there were no teeth or gums—only an expanding void.
Even the black river, which usually flowed with a steady calm, seemed to recoil from the sheer weight of his spite.
“Your greeting feels… a bit much.”
“If I do not welcome you, who else is there? In this infinite dark, there is but a single spark of pleasure.”
He spoke while maintaining that hollow smile.
“And what exactly is this pleasure?”
“Bliss, euphoria, carnal delight, serenity, rapture—the eternal loop of this perfect, joyous day.”
Enkrid didn’t hear mere crudeness in the voice.
He sensed a deep, terrifying fixation.
Where did such a drive come from?
It was raw hunger. A craving.
The ferryman was a thing apart from humanity, yet his psyche followed a similar logic.
“To truly grasp a person, you must identify their core desire.”
He remembered the wisdom he’d gained by observing Heskal.
The ferryman tonight was a vessel of malice.
And that malice had finally stepped into the light.
“He’s stopped hiding.”
In a strange sense, the ferryman was being honest.
What he once whispered in riddles, he was now proclaiming as his gospel.
To him, this was likely the ultimate form of sincerity.
An endless cycle of a single day, drenched in hedonistic satisfaction.
That was the ferryman’s dream.
“And if I had failed to keep Anne safe?”
The ferryman’s fractured lips curled even higher, causing flakes of grey skin to drift away like ash.
“Then you would be trapped in this day, bound by agony and rot. Not the worst fate, perhaps… but was that the conclusion you hungered for?”
The question hung in the air.
Enkrid remained silent, meeting the black stare.
“The moment will arrive. A single wrong turn at the fork in the road, and you will reach a point of no return.”
The ferryman wasn’t a seer.
Enkrid was certain of that.
And yet, the weight of the words felt as heavy as a death sentence.
“Observe.”
The ferryman pulled back a curtain on a future that had not yet transpired.
In that vision, Enkrid lay wasting away, consumed by a terminal plague.
“If you claimed to find joy in every duel, then show me that resolve.”
Ragna’s gaze was hollow and cold as he looked down at the dying Enkrid.
Nearby, the cold remains of Anne lay abandoned.
The background was a blur of shadows, but the core truth was sharp.
In this version of reality, Enkrid had embraced suffering as his only companion—reliving a death that never ended.
With no savior on the horizon, there was only the infinite repetition of his final breath.
The ferryman’s voice began to tunnel into his mind, like cold fingers probing a wound.
“I provided the help you needed.”
Each syllable felt like a blade sliding between Enkrid’s ribs.
At every critical juncture, the ferryman had moved the pieces.
He had warned him before the beast could strike at Anne.
He had whispered tactical advantages before the clash of steel.
Was it the truth? It didn’t actually matter.
The ferryman had successfully tapped into Enkrid’s core fears.
A single error, and he would be caged in a nightmare version of “today.”
The past is a locked door.
You cannot gather the water once the jar has shattered.
Enkrid looked down, his voice stolen by the weight of it.
For the ferryman, this was the desired reaction.
When men face their deepest terrors, they paralyze.
That is the moment to implant the seed of temptation.
“Take your place at the feast. I will guarantee your triumph.”
“Take a woman to your bed. Drown in sensations that this world cannot offer.”
“Consume the lotus. Let the fire of the drug surge through your veins.”
“You live for the sword? Then swing it. You want to see blood? Then spill it. Indulge every whim. I shall be your benefactor.”
The ferryman’s distorted grin burned his agenda into the silence of Enkrid’s fear.
“Live in this ‘today,’ bathed in total ecstasy.”
That was the ferryman’s craving—rapture, delight, the peak of the senses.
A flash of pleasure to fill the void.
This was how human dread was supposed to break Enkrid.
“Protect Anne.”
Every instruction the ferryman had ever given was now a source of terror.
The entire game had been a setup for this specific moment.
The command to save her, the assistance—it was all leverage.
One slip, and everyone he cared for would perish.
That kind of day can never be rewritten.
Yes. It was a checkmate move.
Fear began to eat at his resolve.
It would be so simple to just give up.
The human spirit isn’t a bottomless well.
It erodes.
And fear acts as a funnel—stripping away choices until only one path remains.
Even Enkrid felt the chill of it.
He was made of flesh and blood, after all.
But fear and horror are only unbearable the first time.
With enough exposure, they become just another weight to carry.
Fear is a powerful engine for a man.
Even more so when there is a promise of relief on the other side.
In this moment, Enkrid finally understood the limits of the ferryman’s power.
“The ferryman can see what is happening now and project what might be. But he is blind to what has already passed.”
If he truly understood Enkrid’s history, he wouldn’t bother with these mental games.
This strange being with the violet light had no idea who Enkrid had been before this loop began.
Enkrid reached back into his memories.
The faces of those he had lost because his strength had failed.
The people he couldn’t shield with his own life.
The way time can shatter based on a single heartbeat.
He had lived through those failures more than once.
“If I surrender here, then every step I’ve taken up to this point becomes a lie.”
He spoke the words aloud.
The ferryman’s face didn’t just change; it contorted.
The smile vanished, replaced by a mask of pure, sharp irritation.
His violet lamp trembled.
The surface of the black river began to churn.
“…You will live to mourn this choice.”
“I already mourn. Every single day.”
A heavy silence followed, and while the ferryman’s face remained frozen, it radiated a sense of absolute, thwarted rage.
Then, the sensation of gravity failing took hold.
Even as he drifted back toward consciousness, a chorus of strange, jarring voices filtered through.
“Impressive.”
“You arrogant little shit.”
“He made the right play.”
“And that is why you put your money on the underdog.”
“Take a look at that bastard’s expression.”
Then came a wave of mocking laughter and snickering.
It was a cacophony.
So incredibly loud.

Enkrid’s eyes snapped open.
Regardless of whether it was a nightmare or a psychic intrusion, he was back.
The world was still shrouded in the deep black of night.
There was no sound of predators or encroaching monsters.
His awakening hadn’t been triggered by a physical threat.
Enkrid rubbed his face.
“Thank the gods.”
A stray tear had escaped while he slept.
If he had been back at the garrison, Rem and the rest of the crew would have branded him “the weeping captain” for life.
Kraiss would have made sure the entire province heard about it.
Those absolute idiots.
Enkrid kept his eyes shut for a moment longer, finally standing as the first light of dawn touched the sky.
He oriented himself by the sun, mapped his trajectory, and set off.
He chose not to rush toward the border guards in a straight line, opting instead for a more manageable path through the terrain.
That was when he crossed something he hadn’t anticipated.
Evidence of passage.
The way the tall grass leaned, the faint, lingering scents—all the markers of human presence.
This was the No Man’s Land between the empire and the rest of the continent.
People didn’t settle here.
So what was this?
A trail left by a tracker?
No, this was far too deep into the wild.
Trackers hunted for profit, not suicide—none would push this far into the interior.
Anyone without curiosity wouldn’t be human.
Enkrid tracked the signs—a trail that only someone with his specific blend of luck and experience could decipher.
And then, he found a settlement.
He recognized the nature of it instantly.
“A hidden village.”
The continent wasn’t designed for small, isolated hamlets.
Because of the monster threat, people huddled in the safety of great cities.
But there were always those who couldn’t—or wouldn’t—fit into urban society.
The victims of greedy lords.
Those fleeing false charges.
Actual criminals on the run.
Where do such people go to survive?
They live in the shadows.
They survive by staying off the radar of both the law and the beasts—by any means necessary.
What he was looking at was exactly that kind of sanctuary.
The location was a natural fortress.
They had supplemented the terrain with pits and obstacles to keep monsters at bay.
“And more than that—they’re piggybacking on the monsters’ own territorial boundaries.”
The sight felt like a homecoming.
After all, Enkrid had been forged in a place just like this.