A Knight Who Eternally Regresses Novel - Chapter 787

Chapter 787

Enkrid quietly concurred with the sentiment expressed by Balrog and turned his focus inward, summoning his Will. Regardless of his agreement, the necessity of his task remained absolute; he would not falter in what must be done. He maintained a suffocating grip on that harnessed Will, ensuring it did not spiral out of his command.

‘Regulation.’

Control was the genesis—the art of remaining still. The fire would come later. He synthesized the linear detonation method with the concentrated point-impact style he had observed from the patriarch of the Zaun family. Internalizing these distinct philosophies of Will, he projected them through his own unique lens. He poured into the strike a finality that suggested he would accept death the moment the blade fell. A knight’s spirit, after all, gained its potency through the weight of sacrifices and self-imposed limits.

Casting aside any further mental rehearsals, Enkrid lunged. The window for preparation had closed. The instant his stationary form ignited into motion, the world fell into a vacuum of silence. The atmosphere grew thick as sludge, a heavy pressure weighing against him as time itself seemed to congeal. Balrog, predictably, shifted into that same slowed temporal dimension without effort.

However… the adversary had not yet tucked back his wings.

This provided Enkrid a razor-thin opportunity. Every element—the placement of his feet, the tension in his hands—fused into a solitary execution. It was a basic diagonal path, yet it arrived before the sword Surtr could find its mark, and before the fiery serpent Salamandra could strike.

The timing was flawless. A strike imbued with cyclonic force and arcs of electricity grazed one of Balrog’s crystalline cores.

*BBOONG! KAGAK! TUNG! JJENG!*

The sonic boom only caught up after the contact. Enkrid’s frame was sent reeling. As he was propelled through the air, Balrog sent forth a secondary ripple of mental energy.

—Persist.

Tossed like a ragdoll, Enkrid tumbled across the terrain, eventually arresting his momentum by driving his blade, Dawn Tempering, into the soil. The metal shrieked as it tore a jagged wound into the earth.

“Urk!”

As he came to a halt, his body revolted, and he coughed up a spray of crimson. That kick from Balrog—aimed perfectly at his vitals during the clash—had shattered something internally. Though his own blade had found its target, Balrog had not been a passive victim. Instead of fighting the air resistance to bring his sword around, he had opted for his limb. That right leg had collided with Enkrid’s midsection with the same velocity as the sword stroke.

‘His entire physical form is a weapon.’

It was a reality Enkrid understood intellectually, but the sheer magnitude and swiftness of the blow were unprecedented. Blood ran hot down his chin, staining the dark earth. Resting on one knee and using Dawn Tempering as a crutch, he looked ahead.

Responding to Balrog’s command, he managed a strained word.

“What?”

More blood flecked the dirt with the effort of speaking. The command had been “Endure”—the foundational technique of every knight, the precursor to the Iron Skin discipline. At its heart, it was the art of surviving agony.

—Commendable.

Balrog was not engaging in a dialogue; he was simply voicing his own observations. Enkrid focused on the creature’s chest. His sword had struck home on a crystal, yet there wasn’t a mark on it. Dawn Tempering hadn’t breached the core; it had only sliced through the protective layer surrounding it.

‘Deceptive wretch.’

In a previous iteration of this day, Balrog had pointed to the three chest crystals as his vulnerability. He had omitted the detail that each was encased in a dense defensive film.

‘No… I should have anticipated that.’

He simply hadn’t accounted for its sheer resilience. Endure, the manifestation of Will used to nullify pain, acted as a secondary suit of mail for Balrog, perfectly shielding his weak points.

‘This won’t be a simple task.’

Enkrid locked eyes with the black and gold gaze of his foe. His internal organs felt as though they were being wrung out. At the final millisecond, his fairy-wrought cloak had instinctively moved to cushion the impact on his torso. Without that magical intervention, he would likely have been incapacitated instantly.

—To encounter another mortal of this caliber so swiftly… truly remarkable.

Balrog mused.

Who the “other” referred to remained a mystery, and there was no luxury of time to investigate. The fire serpent struck. The blade of dark embers seared and tore at Enkrid. Balrog seemed to have grown weary of the exchange—the casual dismissal of a child finished with a plaything. Wrapped in the dark inferno, Enkrid was consumed. The agony was familiar, yet its intensity never diminished.

Still, he had gathered data: the shielding on the crystals was more robust than he’d calculated.

‘If I had committed more mass to the swing, I could have shattered it.’

His instincts told him as much. But such a commitment would have been a suicide pact just to destroy a single stone.

—Exquisite intuition. Quite exquisite.

Balrog’s praise echoed.

Then, the world shifted for Enkrid.

*Whoosh—*

The murky river, the wooden vessel, and the Ferryman with his glowing violet lantern materialized.

“A pathetic sight.”

The Ferryman sneered, beckoning him toward hopelessness and surrender. The moment Enkrid attempted to find his footing on the boat, the guide shoved him back into the abyss.

Back to the start. The cycle renewed.

When Enkrid regained his senses—

“Hold on, just a moment.”

Before his adversary could utter the usual greeting of “So, a guest…”, Enkrid raised a hand—projecting a wave of pressure—and gave a slow, deliberate nod. Fine. If that strategy failed, he would pivot to the next.

“…Do I look like a common cur to you?”

The man erupted in fury, shaking off the weight of the pressure. The wielder of the single-edged blade grew incensed when snubbed. This particular opponent always preferred to talk before fighting—an attempt to fracture his target’s focus. When the gambit failed, he was the one left off-balance.

It was a stale maneuver. Asking if he looked like a dog was merely a lure to invite a mistake. Even if his eyes were steady, his mind was clearly racing to find a verbal barb that would unstick Enkrid’s resolve.

“Aren’t you?”

Enkrid’s reply was detached; his mind was already several steps ahead.

‘Balrog finds joy in the struggle. Can I manipulate his ego?’

No. It was impossible. Enkrid, having leaned into trickery, faced another defeat. The strategy of outlasting him through a war of Will had already proven futile. He had gained knowledge from the failure, but the Ferryman only laughed at him.

“What, do you believe there is some glory in a mutual demise?”

If the engagement lingered, the Mad Order of Knights would close in from the rear. Enkrid had never met them in the flesh during these loops, only sensing their echoes from the distance.

“Hey—just me!!”

The fairy’s voice always carried too far.

“You’re hogging the excitement again!”

“If you lose your way, just call out—I’ll find you.”

Rem and Ragna.

“Master, is this the captive You seek?”

“Hold your position—I am en route.”

Audin and Jaxon.

Those memories were from the threshold of his previous passing. Right when he could no longer evade Balrog’s definitive strike, after exhausting every defense. In that final moment, Enkrid had seen the light in Balrog’s eyes. The fire in his pupils was alive. Malice and euphoria were perfectly balanced.

That was the realization: when Balrog truly committed, merely surviving was an impossibility. Even absolute defense fell short.

Once more, Enkrid lived through the day in the dark cavern.

‘If I fight without reservation…’

In the next attempt, Enkrid threw his entire being into the fray. He did not hesitate to employ a destructive power that threatened to shatter his own skeletal frame. Balrog met that intensity with his own.

—Excellent.

The creature even offered encouragement. Surtr lopped off Enkrid’s left arm, but Dawn Tempering buried itself into a crystal. A desperate, suicidal gambit. In that instant, Enkrid felt a mutation in his own Will.

‘It has shifted again.’

Whenever he pushed past a boundary, he noted a change in Balrog’s aura. It was reminiscent of the expression Ragna wore when committing to a full-power strike. He had seen glimpses of it in Rem and the others, but when questioned, they had no answers for him.

“Because they cannot meditate on what isn’t theirs, they fail to see the line between their essence and another’s.”

Through his cycle of deaths, Enkrid had mastered the ability to analyze both his own Will and the Will of those around him. This didn’t mean his fellow knights ignored him; they simply offered their own skewed interpretations.

“So you’re saying the leader’s Will is a bit plain, but ours has flavor?”

Rem’s voice surfaced.

“I’ve always preferred masking lethality within the mundane. It’s a matter of aesthetics.”

That was Jaxon.

“I intend to kill with it—so I pour that intent into it.”

That was Ragna. It was an explanation that only made sense to the man saying it. He would nod as if he’d shared a profound truth, which only made the situation more ridiculous. Audin had simply laughed, suggesting that the divine path was an entirely different beast.

“Want a dose of fairy essence? Slip into my quarters tonight and I’ll provide it.”

The memory of that specific jest brought a small smile to his face.

Returning to the present.

“You’re find this funny?”

The man pulling a blade from his sleeve scowled, playing at being offended by the lack of attention. It was his signature move. This was the seventy-sixth “today.” Enkrid had only managed to crack a crystal once.

This time, he capitalized on the man’s momentary lapse and drove his sword forward. The light moved like a lightning bolt. From the front, it would appear as nothing more than a vanishing dot. It was a thrust of incredible acceleration, fueled by a concentrated explosion of Will. It was built on the foundation of the very first lesson he’d learned, but it had evolved into something far more lethal.

The opponent was on the verge of death. Reeling back, he crossed his twin blades and leaned into a deep backbend. Enkrid expected a lateral dodge and a counter. Instead, the man dropped back and delivered a kick. It was a gymnastic feat, the product of rigorous discipline. Balancing on a single point and striking out, a hidden needle-blade extended from his boot, targeting Enkrid’s throat. Enkrid jerked his blade back just in time.

*CLANG!*

The hidden spike sparked off Dawn Tempering and flew into the air. Enkrid could have finished him before the metal even hit the ground. Honestly, he hadn’t even needed to parry.

“It would have just been a scratch.”

Yet, he stayed his hand. Why? Was it a whim? Or a subconscious desire for more time to process? He hadn’t used his pressure to end it instantly.

‘No…’

The unexpected nature of that kick had vaguely echoed Balrog’s movement. That was the connection. The man, now standing again after his acrobatic recovery, drew two short blades and held them in a cross before his eyes. He watched Enkrid through the gap in the steel.

Now, Enkrid was the one studying the “guest.” That last desperate move was a secret technique, yet it had been intercepted with ease. The realization had paralyzed the man’s movements.

‘What is happening?’

He stared. The man with blue eyes seemed to be staring into a different world, his expression blank.

‘Is he trying to bait me into an opening?’

It was a tactic he knew well. A deceptive fighter is always wary of deception.

‘Who is this person?’

As he watched in bewilderment… the distant eyes snapped back into focus.

‘He really was just daydreaming?’

‘What kind of madman is this?’

“We skipped the formalities, didn’t we? No matter, names aren’t vital. It seems you’ve mastered the fundamentals of the Valen-style mercenary arts. Carry on. Let’s see more.”

The opponent, Rino, masked his lower face with his blades and swallowed hard. This man was truly unhinged.

“Rino.”

“I said names weren’t necessary.”

Enkrid countered and lunged. Rino instinctively braced his crossed steel. It was a defensive posture designed to use the friction for a sudden counter—simultaneously, the unique alloy of his weapons produced a shower of sparks. It wasn’t a fire, but a blinding flash. It was a trick to steal a second of vision. To a seasoned knight, it wasn’t a death sentence, but in a high-stakes duel, a moment of blindness creates the perfect opening.

And, in truth, Enkrid was briefly surprised.

‘Those blades…’

So that was their secret. He had been ending these encounters so fast that he’d never seen the trick play out.

‘It reminded me of the way Balrog kicks.’

The thought returned. When Rino had leaned back to strike, the essence of the move felt familiar. The power and the form were worlds apart, but the underlying intent was identical.

‘Balrog uses misdirection too.’

If it secures the win, he will use it. Enkrid felt the same way. And a new realization dawned on him.

“Even a plowman who has spent his life in the fields has something to teach you.”

His original mentor had told him that during his first days of training.

“You likely learned a thing or two watching Aitri work the forge, even if he isn’t a warrior.”

Lua Gharne’s voice joined the chorus of memories.

‘You were a fine instructor, Lua.’

A brilliant Frokk. She lived for her own whims, and those whims included molding Enkrid. That education was etched into his soul.

‘I’ve become arrogant.’

It was time for an honest assessment. Of this man, of Donapha, of the one-edged sword user. They were warriors caught in Balrog’s web. Every one of them possessed a piece of the puzzle. And Enkrid had dismissed them.

‘I let my pride take over.’

Had he become so intoxicated by finding a superior foe that he’d forgotten the value of the journey? Had he let the safety net of the loop make him sloppy, despite his vows not to waste a single day?

Contemplation followed contemplation.

“Good.”

With genuine focus, he observed his opponent’s form and absorbed the lesson. Enkrid now viewed the man before him as a mentor.

“That was a fine maneuver. Do you have others?”

He inquired.

Rino, the “teacher,” could only stare back in sheer horror.

“You complete lunatic…”

Would you like me to focus on a specific character’s dialogue style for the next chapter, or should I continue with this balanced narrative tone?