Book 1 Chapter 267

267

Clang-! Clang-!

The sound of a hammer striking red-hot metal echoed.

The little giant.

Dwenoh poured his soul into the hammer.

His appearance was more serious than ever.

Hwa-reu-reuk-!

A bright yellow flame erupted from Dwenoh's hand.

A flame that could also be seen as golden.

"Sharp enough to cut through black flames."

Dwenoh muttered.

Clang! Clang!

"Hard enough not to yield to black flames."

Dwenoh, who usually praised beauty, made his weapons as beautiful as possible.

But the sword he was currently making paid no attention to its appearance.

No beautiful patterns were carved into the blade.

The blade did not emit a dazzling light.

He put only one thing into the sword.

A wish that the user would not yield to the flames of disaster.

Hwareuk-!

The bright yellow flame, symbolizing Dwenoh, shone brightly.

Kyle, watching from the side, felt as if the light looked like gold.

Soon, the flame subsided.

Dwenoh reached out his hand.

The sword was still glowing red-hot, but Dwenoh didn't mind.

As a dwarf beloved by fire, he had a strong resistance to it.

Teop-!

Dwenoh, with the blade pointing downwards, extended the sword to Kyle.

"Take hold of it."

At his words, Kyle paused.

Dwenoh, possessing resistance to heat, might not be affected by the heat of the red-hot sword, but Kyle was not.

After a moment's hesitation, Kyle soon reached out his hand.

Deop-seok-

A searing heat was felt in his hand.

Hwa-a-a-a-ak-!

But that was only for a moment.

The heat soon turned into warmth.

The red-hot sword quickly turned into a transparent silver.

A crude longsword that was hard to believe Dwenoh had made.

But the sword was perfect.

The moment he held it, it felt as if it had become a part of his body.

Woong-!

The sword let out a resonant hum.

It had reacted to Kyle's touch.

"This is a sword I made, inspired by you."

"Didn't you say there was nothing inspiring about me?"

Dwenoh, who worshipped beauty, drew inspiration from all beautiful things.

He especially drew the most inspiration from Lisinas and Luna.

Though not as much as the two, he also drew inspiration from Ar-on.

But he had never once said he found inspiration in Kyle.

"That's right. I thought I couldn't get inspiration from you."

Dwenoh let out a low laugh.

"You didn't seem to have a dream."

The beauty Dwenoh spoke of wasn't just about outward appearance.

He was a dwarf who considered the process of a person pursuing a dream and achieving what they pursue to be the greatest beauty.

Lisinas harbored a grand aspiration to save the world.

Luna had a goal of creating a world blooming with flowers.

Ar-on dreamed of a world where many children would not be unhappy.

Dwenoh also had a dream of leaving behind beautiful works of art.

But Kyle had nothing.

"In my eyes, your inner self looked like burnt ashes."

"That's not an incorrect assessment."

Kyle chuckled.

When he heard Lisinas's plan to subjugate Erebus.

Luna treated Lisinas like a madman, but she didn't mock that aspiration.

Ar-on was terrified but soon put his faith and trust in Lisinas.

Dwenoh was dumbfounded but lent his strength to the grand cause.

But Kyle was different.

He mocked Lisinas when she first sought him out and continued to mock Lisinas's dream until the moment they began their journey together.

Now, he understood why he had done so.

'Because I have no dream.'

He had struggled day by day to survive.

The title he earned from it was 'The Surviving Hero'.

A cursed hero whose every comrade died.

A person whose sole purpose was to live day by day, without an ideal to pursue or a goal.

Kyle thought that was him.

"Honestly, I really disliked that about you."

Dwenoh smiled bitterly.

"Perhaps that's why I turned my eyes away from you even more. I thought there was nothing beautiful about you and turned a blind eye."

"That's a bit too much."

"Yes. It was a terrible and ugly thing to do."

Dwenoh looked down at his hands.

"Your grayness… reminded me of my past self."

"Your past self?"

"Yes."

Dwenoh clenched his fist.

"People call me the man beloved by fire. But for me, this ability was a curse."

After awakening his ability as a child.

Dwenoh said he burned everything he touched.

Everything around Dwenoh was desolate.

"It was a misfortune for a dwarf. My flames melted even anvils and hammers."

A monster of fire that emitted flames even the Great Spirit of Fire and Phoenix feared.

A cursed dwarf who turned everything to ashes.

"If everything around you didn't survive, how did you become a crazy dwarf who can't get enough of beautiful things?"

"I'd appreciate it if you'd drop the 'crazy dwarf' part."

"Be grateful I didn't call you a perverted dwarf like Luna."

Dwenoh, looking at Kyle discontentedly, said.

"One day, I saw her. A beautiful elf woman."

"So that's why you're so obsessed with asking Luna to be your model? Because she reminds you of the elf you saw back then?"

"Don't compare her to Luna. That's an insult to her."

Dwenoh rarely looked so serious.

In reality, Dwenoh's reason for asking Luna to model so often was simple.

It was because, if she just kept her mouth shut, she was truly the embodiment of a beautiful elf.

"She was a painter. An artist who captured the beautiful scenery of the world in her paintings."

"Was she a famous painter?"

"No, she was just a wandering painter. A woman who had left her kin because she was fed up with elf society."

Dwenoh smiled faintly.

"But the paintings she drew were truly beautiful."

That was the moment Dwenoh became captivated by beauty, he said.

"I tried to control my power so as not to harm beautiful things. And I succeeded."

Dwenoh looked down at his hands.

"I detest my past self when I couldn't control my power. My turning away from you was due to my ugly desire to turn away from the past."

Dwenoh looked at Kyle.

"Only recently have I been able to look at a human like you squarely."

"So? What do you think? Did you see any inspiring dreams?"

"No, you are still full of grayness. But I saw something I hadn't seen before."

"What is it?"

"It's that despite having nothing, you do not stop moving forward."

Dwenoh's eyes softened.

"And I realized that the reason for that is for us."

Kyle, reflected in Dwenoh's eyes, was a human who carried nothing of his own.

But he silently carried the burdens of his comrades.

"When I realized that, I understood. That you, too, are a person with a beauty that cannot be exchanged for anyone else."

Dwenoh smiled faintly.

"Lisinas choosing you, Luna relying on you the most, Ar-on wanting to be like you. And me, who wouldn't make weapons for those I disliked, making weapons for you."

Dwenoh stared intently at Kyle's face.

"It must be because this aesthetician instinctively saw through your beauty."

Dwenoh puffed up with pride.

"Therefore, that sword is my greatest masterpiece."

Kyle looked at the sword in his hand with a slightly surprised expression.

Dwenoh never referred to the weapons he made as 'works of art'.

This was because Dwenoh didn't particularly like making weapons.

Yet, he called a simple, crude longsword a masterpiece.

"That sword is just like you. No mana is contained within it. To others, it's just a sturdy and sharp iron bar."

For a sword made by Dwenoh, it was excessively humble.

Dwenoh loved anything flamboyant.

"But… the moment you hold it, that sword can become anything."

It could become a powerful weapon, a formidable magic staff.

Or it could become a catalyst to summon a familiar.

"The world's only… sword for an All-Class."

Kyle looked down at the sword.

He felt the sword reacting to his abilities.

"What's the sword's name?"

"Posteritas."

Dwenoh smiled meaningfully at Leo's question.

"It means 'future'."

***

"So this was Sir Kyle's sword."

Mel exclaimed in admiration at Leo's mutterings.

"How do future generations evaluate this sword?"

"The dwarves expect it to be a failure left behind by Sir Dwenoh."

Every one of Dwenoh's weapons possesses such beauty that it wouldn't be strange to call them works of art.

Furthermore, they retain their form even thousands of years later.

Of course, nearly none of the weapons used during the Last Expedition, considered Dwenoh's greatest masterpieces, remain.

Even if they do, they are on the verge of breaking from fierce combat but barely maintain their form.

However, this sword had the appearance of a crude longsword, and no power could be felt from it.

In addition, it was a sword whose form wasn't even properly preserved.

Since its history was even more unknown, the dwarves regarded this sword as a failure made by Dwenoh.

"To think it was the sword Sir Leo used."

As Mel admired, Leo said calmly.

"This is also the last sword Dwenoh made."

"What?"

'After completing the sword, in battle… Dwenoh lost his life.'

Leo's eyes sank.

'Go forth, Kyle. For those who will follow… make a path. That sword is for that purpose.'

Even as his lower body was burned away and his life was flickering out, Dwenoh said so with eyes burning like flames.

And inheriting that will.

This sword succeeded in opening the path to the future.

"To think it was Sir Dwenoh's last weapon…"

Mel exclaimed, learning a fact she hadn't known.

Mel, whose eyes shone like a girl listening to an old tale, suddenly realized something.

"Wait a minute. That means…"

"Yes."

Leo reached out for the sword.

Woong-!

It was so damaged it could hardly be called a sword, but it broke its 5000 years of silence and responded to its master's call.

"This is the sword that vanquished Erebus."

Hwaak-! Tak-!

The sword hanging on the wall flew into Leo's hand.

As if happy to be held by its master for the first time in thousands of years.

The sword continued to resonate.

And at the same time…

Woong-! Woong-!

Dwenoh's legacy stored in the armory began to react.

Mel looked around the armory with a surprised expression.

Hwa-reu-reuk-!

A yellow flame erupted from Leo's hand.

It was Dwenoh's flame, awakened by Fivah's divine power residing in Polium.

All the weapons here were born from this flame.

'Dwenoh never called the weapons he made 'works of art'.'

Leo looked around Dwenoh's legacy.

'But it doesn't mean he didn't pour his affection into them.'

Dwenoh put his heart into making weapons.

The reason Dwenoh was called the divine smith.

It was because the weapons possessed a will.

Not a will created by magic engineering like an Ego Sword.

A will purely residing in the weapon itself.

That will seemed to be crying out something.

'Perhaps these weapons have been displayed like this for thousands of years at longest, and hundreds of years at shortest.'

From the dwarves' perspective, as a legacy left by a great divine smith, they would have wanted to preserve them carefully.

But would these weapons want to rust away like this?

Hwa-reu-reuk-

The weapons emitted bright yellow flames.

And for an instant, they returned to their magnificent forms of the past.

Mel's mouth fell open at the sight.

"I see."

Leo nodded at the sight.

Previously, Luna had asked why Dwenoh didn't call the weapons he made works of art.

To which Dwenoh replied:

'The essence of a weapon is, in the end, a tool for combat.'

Dwenoh would often say, tapping a weapon.

'Ultimately, they are objects that must fight on the battlefield. So I cannot call them works of art.'

Dwenoh smiled bitterly.

'These children… are destined to disappear on the battlefield someday. Perhaps that is their greatest happiness.'

"You all… can still fight, huh?"