Fled Without Realizing I Had Prevented the Apocalypse

“Were you that child’s teacher?”
After laying the unconscious Araxis young lady’s body against a tree, I glared at Scarlet, who was standing quietly in the clearing.
“You seemed to have taught her right up to the final sword strike.”
Scarlet Frausia’s sword is as alien as her appearance.
Looking at her face, which seems like a well-made doll as if the concept of expression itself doesn’t exist, many swordsmen become curious about her sword, but all those who have resolved that curiosity have died.
Scarlet’s sword, which must walk a fine line between reason and instinct.
Innate sense and physique, coupled with a bit of reason, naturally find the best way to kill the opponent.
It might not sound like much when just described, but those who have learned this sword cannot spar with opponents.

Because it’s a sword that continues without suppressing the instinct to kill the opponent, the option of subduing is not given at all.
That’s also why I used magic power in the final sword strike.
“It’s hardly worth calling me a teacher, I just gave her a few words of advice. It was she herself who realized it.”
“You’re saying that makes sense…”
“It worked when I did it, so doesn’t that mean it makes sense?”
I frowned as I watched Scarlet shrug her shoulders as if it was no big deal.
That delusion of thinking others can do it just because she managed to do it doesn’t seem to have improved despite becoming the commander of the Imperial Knight Order.
“And.”
Ignoring whether I frowned or not, Scarlet smiled brightly and said,
“It’s been one year, three months, and twenty-seven days. Eight hours, twenty-three minutes, and thirty-one seconds since we last met. Are you planning to waste time on such trivial conversation?”
As soon as her words ended, a slashing attack came flying.
It was a shockwave created by Scarlet Frausia’s palm moving lightly.
Shwaaaak-!
I immediately ducked my head to avoid that slash, but the trees behind me weren’t so lucky.
Crash crash crash crash!!
Dozens of trees were cut down at once by a slash created by just one palm.
Her sword emits such power even without being drawn.
Seeing this, I confirmed that while her personality might not have improved, her achievements with the sword had progressed even further.
Also, the fact that my life had become even more precarious.
Kuung-!
Seeing her slash blocked, Scarlet kicks off the ground and rushes towards me.
The knife hand she created with magic power would probably cut my neck clean off if it just touched it.
I immediately infused magic power into my hands like her, then took a step forward.
Bang!
As I stepped forward, the ground cracked with a crunch.
I threw a punch towards the fragments that flew up.
Then, as if magic had been used, chunks of rock flew towards Scarlet.
Their speed was powerful. So fast that an ordinary person wouldn’t have been able to react properly to the flying rocks before being pierced.

However.
Slash, slash.
Mere rocks can’t stop a Sword Master’s approach.

Scarlet lightly swung her palm to cut all the rocks into pieces, then approached me.
At her approach, I rushed towards her as if I had been waiting, kicking off the ground.
At the same time, I swung my clenched fist towards her face.
Whoosh.
But Scarlet tilted her head just enough not to be touched by the fist and continued her attack.

This is impossible without a transcendent sense of distance.
And her knife hand thrusting towards my abdomen.
‘I can’t avoid it just like this.’
It’s an attack thrown without any waste.
At a level where there’s no way to find a flaw even if you try.
Plus, the speed is so fast it happens in a single breath.
Moreover, my posture is also disrupted from throwing the punch.
It was impossible to avoid such an attack in this posture.
So, I had to change my posture.
“Hup.”
I take a breath. I pour magic power into my feet. At the same time, I kicked the ground as if to shatter it.
Bang-!
Then the ground cracked with a crunch, and my body instantly floated up.
Naturally avoiding Scarlet’s attack, I immediately rotated my body and thrust my fist towards the top of her head.
Clang-!
As the ground shattered, I heard a sound like metal clashing from within the smoke.

No matter how much we reinforced our palms with magic power, in the end, they’re still hands.

And hands can never make such a sound.
“Phew…”
As if to prove this, a reddish sword was held in Scarlet’s hand.
Scarlet Frausia.

Her symbolic unique weapon.
Bloodred.
The cursed magic sword that chose to become red by itself after drinking the blood of hundreds of thousands was gripped in her hand.
“As expected, it seems I can’t surpass you with just a few months of learning.”
“…You’re saying that’s just a few months of learning?”
I looked at Scarlet with disbelief as she sighed deeply as if disappointed.
If people could gain enough sharpness to cut down dozens of trees and pierce a person’s abdomen after learning for just a few months, how happy would the people of this world be?
If they heard her words, most knights would probably cut off their own hands.
She was waving her hand nonchalantly as if she didn’t even know what she was saying.
“Yes, well, now that our greetings are over. Shall we get started properly?”
“……”
As soon as her words ended, Scarlet’s aura changed.
I reflexively distanced myself from her.
It was killing intent incomparably more intense than before. Although killing intent had been emanating from her since the moment she first appeared, what she’s emitting now is not comparable to that.
The vast clearing. Killing intent dense enough to fill that clearing weighs down on my body. As if a palm was slamming down from the sky, I immediately drew up my magic power in response to the killing intent thrust at me. As if reacting to the killing intent I hadn’t faced in a while, all my senses stood on end.
“Magic power enduring the killing intent. The posture of reflexively leaving the attack range. And at the same time, a stance ready to counterattack at any moment. You’re the same as before.”
“……”
“However, the sharpness contained within… It’s regrettable.”
Scarlet, who had drawn her sword, sighed towards me. Genuine regret melted into her blood-red glittering eyes.
“Unlike before, you’re now a wanted person of the Empire. I have enough justification to have a duel with you, but… I’m not a fox that rushes in to eat unripe grapes.”
“…So, you’re saying you won’t duel?”
“Yes, I don’t intend to.”
I opened my eyes wide as I watched Scarlet put down her unique weapon from her hand as if without any lingering attachment.
Do you know what kind of being the woman before me is?
Isn’t she the woman who had been consistently making advances that weren’t advances, asking for life-and-death duels with me even before I was under His Majesty the Emperor along with her?
Once, she even tried to stab a dagger right next to my neck while I was sleeping and then begged me to request a duel, saying I had tried to assassinate her.

Such a crazy woman is now saying she won’t challenge me to a duel?
Why?
“You look like you’re asking why I won’t do it.”
“……”
“While I personally want to request a duel right now, your current state is significantly weaker compared to before. If we fight in this state, it would certainly result in your defeat.”
Scarlet’s cold analysis.
I didn’t bother to deny her words.
As she said, I don’t have the strength to fight her now.
It was already the case before, but if I were to clash with her now that she’s grown even more, I would probably be overwhelmed.
“I don’t want a predetermined victory. I want a duel with a strong opponent where the outcome cannot be gauged. A bloody battle where we stake our lives. In such a process, it would be even better if I take a life or lose mine.”
“…Crazy woman.”
“Yes, I’ve heard that about seven thousand five hundred and thirty-six times. Among them, from you alone…”
I looked at Scarlet with a disgusted expression and cut off her words.
“So, if you’re not going to request a duel, why did you come? To see your disciple?”
“That’s somewhat correct, but not entirely.”
“Then, is it by order of His Majesty the Emperor?”
I had forgotten for a moment due to the intensity of Scarlet’s madness, but she is ultimately under the Imperial Family, directly under His Majesty the Emperor.
And that Emperor has currently placed a bounty and arrest warrant on me.
It wouldn’t be strange if Scarlet, the Imperial Knight Commander, came to capture me herself.
“That’s not entirely correct either. His Majesty the Emperor ordered me to capture you, but I have no intention of taking you in. The reason I came to find you is different.”
“A different reason?”
“Yes, according to information obtained by the Imperial Intelligence Agency exactly one day ago.”
Scarlet paused for a moment.
As she rarely hesitated to say what she needed to say, I tilted my head in confusion.

And soon, I understood why she had hesitated to speak.
“Someone claiming to be a survivor of the Kingdom of Raziel has appeared.”
The Kingdom of Raziel.
A place that has now perished and disappeared from the map, and…
It was my hometown where I was born.