7.5.7

—He raced like the wind, and the gleaming, treasured sword rent the stone-like hide with ease.

"Ooooooooooo—!!"

The shout the aged swordsman raised seemed to trail behind him. Whale blood spewed from the fresh blade wound, dying the sky scarlet.

He appeared wounded all over his body.

Then as before, blood seemed to be dripping from his left shoulder, but the blood spatter drenching his entire body had mixed with his own blood, turning its color to black.

Over such a brief period of time, no more could be expected from healing magic than stopping the bleeding and restoring a small amount of endurance. He was still in a gravely injured state, told he must have complete rest.

But seeing Wilhelm as he was that moment, none could laugh him off as an old man on death's door.

Seeing the gleam in both his eyes, seeing the strength in his steps as he raced, seeing the vividness of the slashes of the sword he wielded, hearing the earsplitting cry echoing forth, and captivated by the glimmer of his soul, none could laugh off the old man's accumulated life as that of a fool.

His blade ran, a scream rose, and the White Whale's enormous, suffering body was wracked with intense pain.

With the demon beast crushed under the Great Tree, unable to move, the Sword Devil racing along its back did not hesitate to use his blade. The slash begun at the tip of its head ran down its back and reached its tail, and when the Sword Devil stood upon the ground, he turned right around, rending its belly on his way back to the head.

In one swing—sharp, deep, and very, very long—the single flash of silver cut the White Whale in two.

With a leap, the Sword Devil came down onto the tip of the unmoving White Whale's nose once more.

He shook the blood off his drenched sword as he and the White Whale looked each other eye to eye—their two fates merging together.

"…I have no intention of speaking ill to you. There is no use explaining good and evil to a beast. Between you and me, there is only the law of life and death: The weak are cut down by the strong."

"━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━"

"Sleep—eternally."

Leaving behind one last little murmur, light faded from the White Whale's eyes.

Its enormous body went limp, and when it collapsed, the earth shuddered; the droplets of its fresh blood formed a muddy river.

No one could put the feeling of blood running underfoot into words.

A silence befell the Liphas Highway. And then—

"It's over, Theresia. It's finally…"

Atop the head of the immobile White Whale, Wilhelm turned his face skyward.

When the treasured sword fell from his hand, he brought that hand up to cover his face, and with a quivering voice, the weaponless Sword Devil said, "Theresia, I…"

The voice was raspy, but there was boundless, undiminished love within it.

"I love you—!!"

They were words of love only Wilhelm knew. Things he had never told her.

They contained feelings accumulated over many years, words he had not spoken even once to the one he loved most, right up to the day he lost her.

Finally, after the passage of decades, Wilhelm had voiced the words with which he should have answered her question so long ago.

Atop the corpse of the White Whale, his sword fallen from his grasp, the Sword Devil cried out his love for his departed wife, and he wept.