Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World-, Vol. 4

by Tappei Nagatsuki

  “At least you are enthusiastic. Shall we begin?”

  Subaru, his skin crackling with the electric energy of the audience, poised the wooden sword and pulled back, then twirled the waster in his hand around as he complained, “Ah, time-out. The feel of this doesn’t seem right.”

  “Is that so? I do not think they differ much, but you may use this one if you prefer?”

  “Sorry, sorry. I’m a child of the modern era, so I don’t wanna use something that doesn’t feel right.”

  As he spoke, he accepted the wooden sword Julius offered with one hand. In its place, he offered Julius the sword handed to him just earlier—

  “Oops.”

  “—”

  Subaru’s hand let the wooden sword go a moment before Julius’s fingers could take it. Naturally, gravity caused the waster to fall. Julius instantly bent forward as his hand chased after it. The knight, his body curved forward, had lost his height advantage over Subaru.

  “…Hmph.”

  Subaru stepped forward and flipped the waster in his hand from down to up, aiming squarely at the tip of Julius’s chin. Simultaneously, his left hand thrust straight forward, tossing the sand he’d covertly picked up during his warm-up exercises toward Julius’s eyes—a classic blinding, two-step surprise attack.

  —Got him now, thought Subaru, smiling with malicious satisfaction at his little trick. The next moment, he heard a voice right against his ear.

  “It seems that you truly have no shame—It must make the vulgarity easy to come by.”

  Simultaneously, a blow struck Subaru. He felt a sharp, hard jab right to the solar plexus.

  The shock to his torso shuddered through the rest of his body. He felt weightless; just after his feet left the ground, his face slammed hard into the earth. Sandy dirt smeared his face, mixed with vomit forced out by the blow to his solar plexus. Pain and heat struck his brain with equal force. The next moment, the parade square erupted in boisterous cheers at how Subaru, the fool who did not know his place, received what he deserved.

  The boy curled into himself on the ground as the pain caught up, screaming into the sky above the parade square.

  Higher, higher. Farther, farther.

  3

  “Reporting. Currently, Sir Julius and…Lady Emilia’s vassal, Sir Subaru Natsuki, are engaged in mock combat with wasters in the parade square.”

  “…Eh?”

  Upon hearing the guard’s report, Emilia’s thoughts slipped out in a breathless whisper.

  Stay calm, stay composed, the voice inside her kept saying. She didn’t know what it meant.

  “Wh-why would they be doing such a…?! The parade ground, you mean the knights’ building next to the royal palace, right? Julius and Subaru are…brawling there?”

  Emilia could not conceal her bewilderment. The guard, however, could not let one part go uncorrected.

  “Pardon me, but it is a mock combat. It is no brawl arising out of a personal grudge, but a matter of Sir Julius’s honor.”

  His manner, on the verge of open disrespect, shook Emilia all the more deeply.

  She thought back to the war of words between Subaru and Julius in the throne room. Neither had a good impression of the other, and if that was the reason for a private duel…

  “Anyway, I need to stop this immediately. Lead me to this parade square…”

  Emilia was about to rush off to the square to talk some sense into them when a high-pitched voice interceded—Anastasia’s.

  “Ah, I think you oughta let them be.”

  When Emilia turned, she saw that Anastasia had raised a hand, gathering attention on her. Having moved from the throne room to a conference room, the candidates were seated, with their associates at their side.

  Naturally, everyone else had heard the report as well. Anastasia continued, “I want to make sure of somethin’. Who proposed this mock combat?”

  The guard replied, “I understand that Sir Julius did. However, because Sir Subaru Natsuki accepted, we are in the present situation—”

  Anastasia gave the guard’s reply a generous nod before looking back at Emilia.

  “Ahh, that’s fine, that’s fine. I just needed to know it was Julius’s idea—Since Julius started it, I’m against stopping it.”

  Anastasia’s reply put her squarely at odds with Emilia.

  “Your knight and my…my friend, are clashing. Aren’t you worried?”

  “Worried? About what? That Julius might go too far and make me pay to heal your boy?”

  Anastasia tilted her head a little as she replied, looking mystified. Emilia was at a loss for words.

  In the half-elf’s place, Priscilla poked a small smile out from behind her fan.

  “Certainly. From what I saw, he is an incorrigible fool. I imagine he is having his face rubbed into the dirt for a second time today out of excessive stubbornness.”

  Anastasia added, “Perhaps. Back in the hall, he had some nerve. Makes you wanna look up to him—since someone probably threw him across the room.”

  The ill-natured smiles the two were trading left Emilia unable to believe her eyes, her voice quivering.

  “D-don’t you have anything else to say…?”

  But only adding to her shock, Crusch broke her silence and announced her own opposition to Emilia’s view.

  “If Emilia’s vassal had requested a duel, I would agree that it is correct to stop them. However, since it is Sir Julius who requested it, and Emilia’s vassal who accepted, I believe stopping them is a mistake.”

  “Why? I mean, Subaru isn’t my…”

  “If you do not understand, no explanation shall suffice. Besides, though his temper was quick, this is a necessary thing.”

  Crusch cut Emilia off with a strong tone that did not allow further discussion. Crusch, too, had taken a hard stance that Emilia should not get involved.

  The stalled conversation brought a sour expression to Felt’s face before she raised her voice in annoyance. “So why did that guard come to tell us about this, anyway? I mean, it’s one thing if you’re gonna report before they start, but why get all weak-kneed in the middle of it? Just wait for them to finish fighting and tell us what happened after.”

  Felt’s question, posed with arms crossed and a bad attitude, made the soldier’s face visibly blanch. Marcus, sensing from his demeanor that something was amiss, stepped in front of his subordinate and broke his silence.

  “Report.”

  “S-sir! I have come to request orders because…the mock duel between Sir Julius and Sir Subaru Natsuki is excessively one-sided!”

  “…What do you mean, one-sided?”

  “Sir Julius is surely holding back…but it does not appear that way.”

  The guard seemed distressed, as if he’d seen such a miserable sight that he couldn’t bring himself to look in Emilia’s direction. That announced to all present just what a terrible spectacle was occurring.

  That news was the last straw for Emilia, who threw her indecision to the wind and rushed out of the room.

  “I have to stop them…!”

  She ran down the corridor toward the knights’ garrison and the parade square within.

  Once Emilia left, the room seemed on the brink of an uproar when Al raised his hand and suggested, “So, how ’bout we follow the lady and take a look, too?” he motioned toward the open door and shrugged his shoulder to Priscilla, standing beside him. “You like this sort of thing, right, Princess? Watching a ferocious beast toy with a weak critter.”

  Priscilla lightly turned her back away from him as her charming laughter shook her bountiful breasts.

  “Do not cast aspersions upon me with your petty delusions, Al. Well, I do enjoy it… Very well. I wanted a break from this dreadfully long-winded talk, anyway. Looking down upon a variety of fools and laughing at them is good for the soul.”

  The haggard guard broke out in an icy sweat as Priscilla thrust the tip of her fan toward him.

  “Lead us to this parade squar
e—I command it.”

  4

  Blood from Subaru’s head wounds seeped into his eyes. He raggedly wiped at them to clear his red-tinged vision.

  He’d already lost count of how many times he’d been knocked to the ground. His left eye was already swollen shut; he tasted too much blood to tell if it was just his lip, or if the inside of his mouth was cut, too.

  He didn’t really feel the pain.

  He wasn’t sure if the aching had become so great that he had grown numb or if it was the adrenaline soaking his brain. It was probably a number of things.

  But what was driving the pain from Subaru’s mind was pure anger.

  The strength of Subaru’s spirit, so deviant from the norm, earned him exasperation from Julius, not praise. “How about you finally acknowledge your own limitations?” His handsome face was still untouched by a single speck of dust or a single drop of sweat as he calmly swayed the tip of the frayed wooden sword he had used to beat Subaru to a pulp. He continued, “Surely by now you are painfully aware of the difference between us, and how grievously you insulted me by treating the word knight with such casual contempt?”

  It was not an attempt to appeal to Subaru’s heart, but to smash it to pieces.

  Julius was only pounding on Subaru to show him what being a knight meant. Subaru was only recklessly, stubbornly resisting the reality Julius was drilling into him. There was no room for anything to grow between them. And nothing did, no matter how long their confrontation continued.

  Julius said to him, “I believe going any further may put your life in jeopardy.”

  “…Like this much is gonna kill someone. Don’t talk about it like you know.”

  “You sound as if you have prior experience.”

  “I know more about it than any man in this world.”

  Since Subaru had set foot upon that land, he had perished a total of seven times. There was no one in that whole, wide world that had faced death as many times as Subaru.

  People used words like hurts enough to die, mortified enough to die, enough to die, enough to die, but he knew that people did not die of these things.

  Shaking his cut, throbbing head, Subaru sluggishly lifted up his weapon, raising his voice as well. The instant he brought Julius into range, the tip of his wooden sword cried out as he raised it for a swing—

  “There is no beauty in you.”

  A moment before Subaru was about to unleash a downward strike, a blow struck his right wrist—his sword hand. The sharp smack sent his wooden sword flying, and Subaru’s eyes instinctively followed it. The next moment, he was bowled over by another blow to the solar plexus.

  His breath caught, and, unable to break the fall whatsoever, Subaru rolled onto the ground, the earth and sky trading places about five times before he ended up flat on his back, arms and legs spread wide. Subaru literally coughed up blood.

  The knights and guards were still gathered to watch Subaru’s public whipping at Julius’s hands. But there were no cheers any longer.

  Subaru was the villain who had belittled the very nature of knights at the royal selection that would determine the kingdom’s future. And so, Julius rose to represent the Knights of the Royal Guard and rebuke him, making him taste pain until he apologized—That was the scene they had come expecting to see.

  Indeed, when it had begun, they cheered heartily in delight, or laughed in mockery at Subaru’s pathetic display, unreservedly supporting their comrade, Julius. What had changed was that everyone now understood this was a beating, and nothing more.

  There was a vast, yawning chasm in ability between Julius and Subaru. Unskilled in attack and wide-open in defense, the boy was knocked down over and over.

  At first, derisive laughter rang out each time he went down. The exasperated sighs began when the number exceeded ten. By the time people had lost count, everyone wanted to avert their eyes. Just end it already, they thought. Anyone could see who had won and who had lost. They had learned all over again that knights were superior. Beyond that, this was a meaningless dispute.

  But Julius continued to beat Subaru and showed absolutely no sign of relenting.

  As referee, Ferris had the authority to stop the fight at any time, but made no sign of stopping, regardless of how hurt or injured Subaru became.

  And Subaru himself betrayed the knights’ hopes, standing up again.

  Everyone understood. This no longer held any meaning, any significance. It was nothing more than a pathetic display of senseless stubbornness. Therefore, in the end, it was the least they could do to watch Subaru be bullheaded to the bitter end. They did not leave, because those who watched the spectacle unfold had become part of it, and shared responsibility for it.

  “—”

  Subaru’s quivering upper body sat up before the eyes of the knightly onlookers. He picked up the waster that had fallen beside him, using it as a crutch to prop himself up. He coughed violently, spewing a large volume of blood.

  The somber sight confirmed everyone’s thoughts. As if by nature, they understood—

  The next exchange would be the final blow in this pointless dispute.

  5

  —One more hit and I’m done.

  Funnily enough, Subaru had managed to reach the same conclusion as the onlookers watching his absurdity. But he no longer cared about what anyone saw. Inside Subaru, there was no one but him and Julius.

  He wouldn’t get up after the next blow. Even if Subaru’s sword miraculously made contact, Subaru would be unable to continue.

  Why challenge him, then? If the end result would be the same either way, why even try?

  He couldn’t see the answer. He had lost his original reason for starting the fight, filled purely with hatred for Julius standing nonchalantly in his swollen field of vision. And so he decided he’d put everything he had into one final blow, aiming to break the bridge of Julius’s nose.

  “—”

  His lungs ached simply from breathing. Exhaling made his mouth hurt that much more.

  Pushing the agony away with his threadbare consciousness, Subaru collected his remaining strength and waited for his chance—hoping Julius would let his guard down for even a moment. He couldn’t let this opportunity slip away.

  —PainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainpainDIE.

  “—!”

  Julius’s gaze seemed to drift for an instant. In his tattered state, Subaru took his shot.

  He heard nothing. He left everything behind, lifting his sword up with all his spirit.

  Julius, having taken his attention ever so slightly off Subaru, hadn’t reacted yet. Something had attracted his attention, but every cell of Subaru’s brain was devoted to thinking about that single blow.

  “—!”

  He thought he heard something—something in that world without sound, where only he and his target existed.

  “—ru!”

  He heard a voice. Someone’s voice. Someone’s voice in his ears.

  His mind was being pulled away. But everything was forgotten, drowned out by his furor.

  That moment, his eyes trained on the single thing that gave his existence any meaning.

  “—baru!”

  The voice became clearer. It began to hold meaning.

  If he heard it clearly, there would be no going back.

  That was why Subaru brushed everything away, to escape from the overwhelming fear that pursued him still, right on his heels. With every ounce of his being—he shouted.

  “—Subaru!!”

  “—SHAMAAAAK!!”

  Betraying the clear-as-a-bell voice in his ears, Subaru chanted the incantation at the top of his lungs.

  A black cloud erupted, dying the reddish-brown soil of the parade square black, blotting out everything.

  A realm of oblivion unfolded. Within it, Subaru rushed forward, shouting in his guttural voice. In this space where reason held no sway, his brain commanded his arms to swing down.
The dark cloud swallowed the limbs stretching in front of him, ignoring all else to do as they were commanded, so that the tip of “something” might reach—

  “So this is your secret weapon, then?”

  Clear as day, Subaru heard the voice in a world that should be soundless.

  The black cloud brightened—And from within the source of light, a wooden sword cut through the air, mercilessly slamming Subaru’s body down to the ground.

  The voice flitting his way from above sounded surprised rather than hurt.

  “I did not expect that you would use Dark-type magic. I admit you caught me by surprise.”

  Subaru, lying on the ground with his limbs splayed, gazed up at the sky in a daze as he faced reality head on.

  “However, your training is deficient. Such low-level magic can only work on someone of lower ability than you, or perhaps an unintelligent beast. Such a plan would not work against a single Knight of the Royal Guard.” The voice seemed to carry pity. Pity that crushed Subaru’s heart and told him to give up on everything.

  He had thought he could change his situation. He thought that even he could accomplish something.

  “You are irredeemably powerless. You have no place by her side.”

  Those words, at least, he wished to refute—words that denied that his life held any meaning. Subaru moved his neck to glare at the man, trying to get him to at least take that part back…

  “”

  …but instead, he caught a glimpse of the silver-haired girl with violet eyes.

  She was leaning over a terrace on a floor midway up the royal palace wall that overlooked the parade square. Behind her were girls he recognized, each one coldly surveying the results.

  The thoughts behind her blanched face no longer mattered.

  Subaru no longer cared what anyone at all thought of him.

  Or rather, that would have been true if the person standing there hadn’t been the absolutely last person in the entire world he wanted to see him in this state.

  “”

  Inside him, Subaru heard a sound like a thread snapping.

  That was the last thing he knew before his consciousness began fading far, far away.