Kenshin no Keishousha:Volume 1 Chapter4

The curtains were raised for the second day of the elimination matches.

What was shocking was things went about as usual as if yesterday’s disturbance within the warehouse never happened. The elimination matches stayed on track and resumed as usual.

Because of the agreement between Kurou and the sun cultists, they did not pursue them. In consideration of Lima’s honor, the matter of her being wounded by a human was never disclosed. However, it was quite unimaginable that the incident’s follow up was conducted in a way as if nothing ever occurred.

Lars’s cover up of the incident was quite horrifying. You wouldn’t want this guy as your enemy.

“......However, this is such a pain. The waiting time is so long.”

Kurou heaved a heavy sigh.

At the assembly place where the elimination matches were held, there was a lounge accessible to the many participants waiting on their matches. Kurou and Hinako were just staring on as they sat on a couch within a corner of the lounge.

“Kuro is really quite laid-back.”

“I don’t need to hear it from you.”

“However, everyone else seems to be in a nervous wreck.”

The students who were about to take the stage stayed close to the side of the lounge that was towards the arena. As a result, an air of tension clouding over that place was probably to be expected.

“It’s now round three, the competition has become more fierce. Everyone has probably forgotten about the assault incident already.”

“Even those words sound quite carefree. Eh? That said, I haven’t seen Sefi or Lars.”

“I already told you, don’t directly call them by their names. Also, since when did you start directly addressing Sefi-sama by her name as well?”

Hinako was too unsophisticated in these matters. It didn’t matter much for a guy like Lars, but if she were to call Sefi, who was the princess of the four generals and possessed outstanding swordsmanship, by her name directly, then it would cause a huge commotion. Although that was the case, no matter how many times he warned Hinako it was probably a fruitless endeavor.

“Jeez......since Lars always wanders off as he pleases, even I have no clue where that guy is. However, there’s a special lounge for distinguished students so perhaps Sefi-sama should be in there.”

If your grade was good, it would result in better treatment. Since this school was organized by competing for ranks, it wasn’t a bad thing to bestow special treatment to those with superior grades.

“Ah, it’s Sefi’s turn.”

Hinako was watching the large display screen installed in the lounge as she spoke.

The large display screen broadcasted multiple sections of the arena, allowing it to capture many matches occurring at once.

“Can Sefi win?”

“Last time during the tournament she attained third place. As long as she doesn’t fool around she won’t lose.”

As he was saying this, Sefi’s wooden sword heavily struck her opponent’s shoulder and the wooden sword fell out of her opponent’s hands. Just as he was considering whether or not the girl looked a bit shaken up————she toppled over. She hadn’t lost her fighting spirit from the beginning, but her body was unable to withstand Sefi’s attack.

Sefi comforted her opponent and then departed from the tournament stage. She was very gentle towards her own gender. If only she was that gentle towards me as well, Kurou thought along these lines.

“It still isn’t Kuro’s turn yet?”

“No, there’s still around ten minutes left.”

Kurou responded while being fixated on the display screen. It was just as he said, once at round three, those that were present were all the students with excellent swordsmanship. They weren’t fully developed yet but after two or three years, who knows to what extent they would mature to.

Although there were Swordies who blossomed early on, there were also many who developed slowly. Among those kinds of people, they could perhaps become one of the Seven Swords of the future as well.

Kurou suddenly recalled, if the number one ranked student from year one, Migune, was still alive————

“Ahhh————!”

Suddenly, the cry of a girl’s voice sounded from somewhere.

Kurou did not spare a moment of hesitation. He grabbed the hand of Hinako, who blankly stared on, and ran out.

Everyone within the lounge had heard the cry, however Kurou was the fastest one to respond.

Kurou held Hinako’s hand and raced towards the sound of the cry.

Although it was quite a foolish thing for a bodyguard to specifically lead the person he was guarding to peril, Kurou would rather confront the danger than run away.

Based on the circumstances, in many cases he had to actively eliminate the danger factors to create a safer environment as opposed to running away. Kurou judged based on his own intuition, hence having fallen under this state.

Afterwards, they ran through the intricate paths leading around the arena.

As Kurou and Hinako arrived at the entrance of a room, there were many female students gathered around and chattering away indistinctly.

Kurou instantly noticed the red colored liquid flowing out from the room to where he was standing.

As he made his way through the crowd of female students and caught a gander of what was in the room, he noticed that what was lying there was just as he expected.

It was a girl covered in blood.

Although her face laid downwards, there wasn’t even a need to confirm who it was.

The number two ranked swordswoman, Freya, was dead.

“All of a sudden, a strange person stormed into the room......”

One of Freya’s supporters, with tears in her eyes, stated as such.

In order to inquire more about the situation, Kurou brought one of the girls standing by Freya’s corpse out of the lounge. Right now, gathering information was absolutely essential.

However, she appeared to be inattentive towards Kurou who was asking her questions. She was still in a state of confusion so grasping the main points of her explanation proved quite difficult.

Even so, this was what he understood after organizing what she had said: When Freya was in the lounge, she was ambushed and killed with one strike.

“She appeared to be wearing......black, loose fitting clothing. I couldn’t discern her appearance due to the hood she was wearing......”

“Is that so.”

Basically, it must have been the same arts user that Kurou had encountered a couple days ago or perhaps an accomplice of hers.

The number one ranked student of his grade, Migune, was murdered, the third ranked Sefi was attacked, and now the second ranked Freya was killed. The chances of her targets being the exceptional students were quite high.

What if, the arts user wanted to conveniently finish the task left undone from a couple days ago after she slayed Freya————

“Tch.”

Kurou clicked his tongue and hightailed off once again while pulling Hinako along.

However, he instantly stopped in his tracks and returned to the sobbing girl. Kurou then grabbed her shoulders.

“People are gathering here due to the fervent crowd. Freya probably wouldn’t want herself to be seen like this. Forget about the safety of this crowd for now, just have her body set down properly and cover her with a blanket.”

After the girl confirmed with a nod of the head, Kurou set off once again.

Although it felt like Hinako wished to say something, Kurou remained silent as they continued to dash forward. They only knew Freya from their brief conversation so their silence wasn’t because either of them were in deep sorrow over her loss.

Despite that, Kurou wanted to protect Freya’s honor. That was all the reason he needed considering this was expected from him.

Furthermore, he must put an end to the number of victims. Thus, he had no choice but to immediately head towards his destination.

“......”

However, Hinako wasn’t a fast runner. It was obvious that she didn’t have adequate exercise since she had always been imprisoned in a sun cult facility. Nevertheless, there was no way he could just ditch her.

“Kurou-kun.”

“What!?”

Suddenly, from the corner of his vision came a girl wearing a red long coat————it was Manaka.

Kurou stopped and unwaveringly stared at his boss.

“Manaka, what are you doing here?”

“Oh nothing. I received an invitation from the principal asking if I would like to watch the elimination matches. Furthermore, I also had to send two squads over to the academy out of courtesy, and I was told that ‘the students would be quite happy if one of the Seven Swords could come’, so there’s various reasons why I’m here. That said, why are you in such a hurry?”

“I don’t have the leisure to explain right now. However, you came at the perfect time. Please take this child off my hands for now.”

“Ha? You’re asking me? You want me to train her to have your favored tsundere attribute?”

“Why would I request my boss for something like that!? I’m asking if you would take my place as her bodyguard for now. Taking her somewhere where there's a lot of people would probably be more suitable. Well then, I’ll be taking my leave!”

Kurou did not even wait for Manaka’s response and just handed her Hinako.

Although it was very unexpected that Manaka would come here to watch the competition, it could only be said as good fortune for him. There was probably no one more suitable than having her take his place as that child’s bodyguard.

However, there were still matters that needed to be attended to————

“He left.......”

Hinako muttered while gazing at the pathway that Kurou swiftly ran through.

“It all developed into a complete mess rather quickly......”

“Kurou-kun has already trained to his limits as a human————even with his Olden Style, he can never stride past the disparity in terms of physical capabilities against a Swordie. He might even be the strongest among all humans.”

That was probably quite the exaggeration still. Although, Hinako kept this thought to herself. She had absolutely no understanding of his physical capability.

“That said, he has some nerve to be pushing his own work onto his boss! That bastard is really undaunted.”

“Sefi is really important to him. Kurou highly values her even though it clearly isn’t part of his work.”

“That guy went to Sefi’s place? I’ve noticed that things are a bit rowdy around here, what in the world happened?”

Hinako roughly explained the incident regarding Freya. Hinako guessed that Kurou had probably figured the enemy had their sights set on Sefi, thus he ran towards her location.

“.......Oh, the incident occurred once again? In that case, there’s probably no chance of them being able to conceal themselves within the academy anymore. It may turn into a more catastrophic situation. Guess I’ll be busied with this as well. Alright alright, what should we do next——”

“......?”

Hinako looked at Manaka as she tilted her head.

No matter what, wasn’t the job of the Sabers to find the assailants and arrest them? Or was this situation handed over to the police to deal with?

“Haha, no need to worry. Compared to this......it is really quite awful of Kurou-kun. No matter how cute Sefi is, for him to have thrown you aside is really......”

“This precisely demonstrates how important Sefi is to him. Is it due to the difference in the amount of time acquainted?”

“Is that so. I don’t quite understand dating and such, especially if it is between a Swordie and a human. It is possible for humans to marry Swordies since they can still bear children, however relationships between Swordies and humans are rarely seen. They’d eventually go through many hardships.”

Manaka seemed to really sympathize for Kurou and Sefi.

It wasn’t just the difference in race between Kurou and Sefi, there were plenty of other obstacles. Even Hinako felt that was the case.

“By the way, Kurou hasn’t made a move on you yet? I've even gone through the trouble of giving you nice clothes.”

Manaka overtly gazed at Hinako’s voluptuous chest and her soft legs.

“I’m also quite fascinated at the concept of making love.”

Hinako calmly endured Manaka’s line of sight and faintly mentioned.

“Kurou hasn’t done anything to me. He didn’t seek out my undergarments and never even peeked in as I was bathing.”

“Really? That’s pretty lame. I wasn’t sure if Kurou-kun would be motivated in guarding you. I basically thought if he were to make a move on you, then he’d take his bodyguard assignment more diligently.”

Manaka had her arms folded as she began pondering.

It was quite difficult to imagine Hinako ever being together with someone like Manaka who was one of the Swordie’s strongest Seven Swords. She gave the impression of an older sister improperly dealing with boredom.

“Well, there’s nothing we can do either way. If that side fails then it’d be perfect. That means we can make some progress over here.”

“What side do you mean?”

“About that, just·wait·and·see.”

With Manaka’s statement possessing some sort of implication, Hinako blinked in response.

Hinako was immediately dumbfounded————

“......?”

Suddenly, an overwhelming pressure came at her.

Against this astounding power that was hard to stand up against————Hinako felt as if everything in front of her was violently shaking.

Meanwhile, just as a precaution, he had already checked on the lounge where Sefi was.

During the elimination tournament, Sefi had supporters by her side and as a result, Kurou felt there was no need to be overly concerned about her. However, Freya was pretty much under the same circumstances when she was killed, thus it showed how naive his thinking was.

Kurou mustered all his effort in running towards the front of Sefi’s lounge. Without a shred of hesitation, he forcefully opened the door.

“Sefi!”

“......Eh?”

A splendid scene awaited Kurou on the other side of the door.

Sefi, who was only wearing an aqua blue bra on top, was drying herself off with a towel. Since the skirt to her uniform was raised, her legs were completely exposed.

Tiny beads of sweat covered her flushed red face. From the valley of those two swells, her slender waistline, and supple legs, it all emitted a peculiar seductive aura.

No, right now was not the time to be getting excited over this stuff.

“Thank goodness Sefi.”

“H-Hold on......!”

Kurou tightly hugged Sefi’s body. Her skin was tender and smooth, her body heat even faintly transferred over.

“I’m so glad you’re ok. For a moment I was thinking what would become of you......”

“W-What are you doing......what made you do something like this, there must be a reason!?”

“It’s fine as long as you’re ok.”

“It’s not fine!”

Once Sefi returned to her senses, she forcefully separated herself from Kurou’s body. Under these circumstances, it was plain to see that Kurou’s strength could not resist that of a Swordie’s.

“What is this all of a sudden you idiot.”

Sefi swiftly put on the shirt to her uniform and promptly combed her hair. Her face was in a blush and her eyes were brimming with tears.

“Looks like if I don’t explain first......”

Kurou concisely briefed her of Freya’s situation. He also explained that he thought the attacker might come towards Sefi as well so that was why he hurried over here.

“......Freya’s dead? No way, how could something like this happen in school?”

“Although it’s quite regrettable, it is the truth. Sefi, are you by yourself? Where are your supporters?”

“Since I wanted to concentrate on the match beforehand, I sent my friends off. I had thought that the attacker wouldn’t be stupid enough to come here with all the people gathered in the room......”

“That’s what I thought as well. However, the opposition doesn’t seem to care about how things turn out. For now, let’s leave. Sefi, do you have the Starbreaker on you?”

“Yeah, I had it just in case. Where do you plan on heading?”

Sefi grabbed the Starbreaker that was leaning against the wall in the corner of the room as she asked.

“Perfect, Manaka is here as well. Although she always makes me feel a bit gloomy, there’s no safer place than by her side.”

“That’s true.”

Despite her attitude, Manaka was someone worthy of being one of the Seven Swords. One or two arts users was probably no big deal.

Kurou and Sefi both walked out of the lounge and scurried along the path. They kept a close watch on all sides as Kurou retrieved his cellphone to call Manaka.

“......Hmm?”

Since Manaka was pretty negligent, having forgotten her cellphone elsewhere was very possible. For now, they could only head towards where he last parted from Manaka.

“Hey, Kurou.”

“What is it?”

Kurou put the cellphone back in his pocket as he replied.

“Even if it’s a time like this......please forget about that matter from before.”

“What are you talking about?”

Seeing Sefi’s face, he noticed that she hastily avoided his line of sight and blushed. This girl who was holding that ridiculously gargantuan sword revealed an embarrassed expression. How unusual.

“What I meant was......t-that matter regarding when I attacked you, you should just erase that sort of thing from your memory.”

“Ah. You see, there’s been a lot of things happening recently.”

“Y-You’re right. However, please just forget about it. I must have been in a daze at the time. It’s because it has been a long time since I last witnessed Kurou’s sword so I just got a bit excited is all. It’s got nothing to do with being captivated or anything.”

As Sefi’s face turned red, she rapidly spoke with a barrage of words.

“Please forget all of that. I-I......also......did that thing with you. Just erase the memory of what was pretty much a dog bite!”

“What dog, hey.”

Of course, she was most likely referring to the kiss.

“Even if you tell me to disregard it————that impactful experience is hard to overlook.”

Kurou was an exceedingly aberrant individual, but despite this he was still just a fifteen year-old teenager. After kissing a beauty like Sefi, it was impossible to pretend nothing had happened.

“It was an impactful experience......y-you haven’t......kissed that girl yet?”

“That girl? Haha, oh you mean her. N-No way, I haven’t even laid a finger on her.”

This he could swear to god. Although they were living under the same roof, for Kurou to even visually take pleasure in Hinako was a bit worrying.

“I-I see. So you haven’t done anything to her, not bad not bad. Nevertheless, it’d be pitiful if the number of victims increased.”

“So you’re saying you want to have all of the sexual harassment to yourself......”

“I never said such a thing! Jeez————”

Sefi suddenly tensed up.

Practically at the same time, Kurou ceased smiling and narrowed his eyes as he attentively gazed towards the front.

“......There’s a person. I don’t sense anyone except that one individual.”

“Rou......”

Kurou used his finger to gesture Sefi who wanted to head forward.

From around the corner ten or so meters away from them, the sound of footsteps could be heard.

“Is the person coming out?”

With the sound of the footsteps, out came someone in the corner of their vision————it was the black robed suspicious figure from before. Just like back then, she had a hood draped over her head which concealed her appearance.

The robed arts user drew her sword without uttering a word. The slender blade was enveloped in a faint white light.

Kurou also pulled out his katana and set it into its usual upright stance.

“Rou, today I’ll......”

“Stand down. In these narrow pathways, it’d be hard to engage in battle with two people at once. Furthermore, matches against Swordies are pretty much one-on-ones right?”

“Oh......”

After Sefi faintly muttered, she took a few steps back. Even if she wasn’t going to enter battle, backing off a bit was beneficial to Kurou.

Suddenly, the arts user took action. She hopped up like a spring, instantly closing in ten meters, and then she swung her sword.

“......!”

Kurou unwaveringly parried the arts user’s strike and took advantage of this opportunity to slash the opponent’s shoulder. Following that, he felt the sensation of cutting through flesh.

“What......!?”

Although it was a shallow wound he had suddenly inflicted with a slash after easily deflecting her first strike, it made the arts user unmistakably tremble.

However, the arts user’s bewilderment was only for an instant. Immediately after, she hurriedly readjusted her stance. As she moved her body in a dance-like motion————

Instantly, a six slash strike came speeding at him. The attack which involved the white light enshrouded light blade flashed like a shooting star.

Confronted with these continual attacks that would cut him up into pieces, Kurou had deflected all of them.

That kind of masterful technique resulted in the sound of multiple blade clashes that rang one right after another.

“Guh......!”

The arts user uttered indistinctly and staggeringly backed off. The left side of her abdomen was bleeding.

After Kurou blocked the six strikes, with the next strike, he had stabbed the arts user’s flank.

“Tch, it’s still not deep enough. Well, looks like this matter can’t be resolved so easily.”

Although she had been stabbed in the abdomen, it was absolutely not deep enough to reach her internal organs. If it was a Swordie, they should be good enough to continue battling.

“......”

Although the arts user’s expression couldn’t really be seen, her anxiousness was very noticeable. Perhaps to her, that last six strike attack was a must-kill technique. At any rate, having that maneuver be effortlessly blocked by Kurou and having been counterattacked, it must have been completely unexpected to her.

“There’s nothing to be astonished about right? My Olden Style, simply put the principle behind it is just reading your opponent’s attacks while not letting them be able to read yours. This is the second time you’re battling me so I’m already able to read your sword maneuvers. Of course, even after a hundred battles you’ll still never be able to understand my swordsmanship. Since you were unable to deal with me during our first battle, you should have never appeared in front of me again.”

Kurou wryly smiled.

Swordies didn’t put all their strength into wielding a sword, rather it was being able to read their opponent as they battled. However, Kurou turned the tables by having unpredictable movements————in other words, he used an exceedingly rudimentary theory to derive his unpredictable swordsmanship for combat engagement.

From a Swordie’s perspective, from the gesture of Kurou’s sword and its movements, it would deviate from the trajectory that they predicted and come at them in an unanticipated speed. If their swordsmanship and opportunities to strike had been thrown into utter disorder, then it would even be hard for a Swordie’s physical capabilities to counter Kurou’s swordsmanship.

An intriguing, indiscernible swordsmanship————that was the truth behind Kurou’s blade.

However, based on the words from the arts user, she must have thought there had to be some trick behind it. Kurou’s sword maneuvers were not limitless.

If they were to reach a hundred battles, those maneuvers should become readable right? If it did reach that extent, Kurou’s sword wielding should appear identical to that of other humans in the face of a Swordie’s capabilities.

Nevertheless, it was impossible to battle someone a hundred times, especially if those combats involved real weapons.

“You have lost, arts user.”

However, under a situation where he held supremacy, this line could become the chains to the opponent’s shackles. Kurou knew this because he had personally experienced this on his own body.

Following that, Kurou had remembered.

He had been chained by these same words in a distant past.

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