Chapter Ninety-Three: The Bloodthirsty Blade

“Is it you?”

Lancer stood dumbly before the forge, staring at the Japanese-style sword on the workbench. For a moment, he did not know what to say. It looked unchanged: a shattered weapon entwined with an endless blood-red aura.

As if in answer, the blood aura suddenly surged.

Only then did he remember the weapon’s special nature. It had no true physical form. It was his first genuine treasure weapon, a blade only he, as its master, could wield—the world’s one and only conceptual armament. It was the weapon that had followed him ever since that age.

“This is...” Lisbeth, standing beside Asuna, looked at the weapon in astonishment. They wanted to inspect its attributes, but for some reason it felt as though an unseen voice was telling them they could never touch it.

“Bloodthirst Blade. That’s its name. There’s no doubt it’s a demon sword,” Lancer explained, though he said no more than that.

“Um, Lancer?” Asuna asked cautiously.

“What is it, our vice-captain?” In an instant, Lancer shattered the solemn mood, teasing Asuna like a street punk.

“Idiot!” Asuna punched him in the face as he leaned closer. Her cheeks turned faintly red afterward, but unfortunately Lancer had only been trying to lighten the atmosphere and had seen nothing at all.

“All right, then tell me what’s going on,” Asuna said when she saw him rub his head and get back up.

Lisbeth had retreated behind Asuna. Lancer could only rub his cheek helplessly. Was he really that frightening? Or was the girl in front of him Silica instead of Lisbeth?

“It’s nothing, really~ It’s just that this weapon is very much like the one I use outside. Maybe because I’ve used it before, it was reproduced somehow. I was just a little surprised,” Lancer said without concern. After all, Kirito had already told everyone about his identity outside, and Lancer himself had never intended to hide it, so many people already knew.

“That still doesn’t add up. I remember Kirito telling us you were a British noble. You do look half-blooded, but why even the weapon you use...” Asuna had clearly found the inconsistency.

“What’s so strange about that? The weapons I can use aren’t limited to this one. Didn’t I also use a knight’s spear and a dagger the first time? I’m quite versatile, you know~” Lancer explained. He did not expect to keep it hidden for long, but at the very least he did not want people finding the flaw so easily. Not because of anything serious—just because it was terribly humiliating.

Seeing that Lancer’s explanation was perfectly reasonable, Asuna did not press further. She only asked him to take the weapon out so they could have a closer look.

At last, Lancer let out a long sigh of relief.

“Lancer, what is this attribute, ‘three hundred percent damage to demons, two percent damage to humanoids’?”

“Ah, that...”

Even after many twists and turns, Lancer had finally settled this matter. Every night, he came on time to serve as her walking experience farm. Even without his strange skill, the attributes of the weapons he forged kept steadily improving; by now, he could even forge A-rank weapons. Then, one day, Kirito knocked on the door of Lisbeth’s weapon shop.

When Lancer heard the knock and that voice unique to Kirito, he thought quietly to himself, It’s starting.

“Is anyone there?” Kirito called as soon as he entered. At the time, Lancer was in Lisbeth’s forge room, guiding her while also sorting through a backpack he had not checked in a long while.

“Lancer-kun, could you go out and take a look for me? This piece will be ready very soon.” Though she was no longer hiding behind Asuna like a frightened little animal the way she had when they first met, she still could not help speaking very politely.

“Heh-heh~ No problem. But I’d like to say this again—” Lancer turned and fixed his gaze on Lisbeth. “Please stop adding honorifics, and stop being so formal. I don’t want Asuna dragging me out and beating me to a pulp.” Though he said it jokingly, there had been a time when Asuna had walked in on him while he was giving Lisbeth instruction. Seeing the poor, wronged expression on Lisbeth’s face, Asuna had said nothing and immediately delivered a whip-like kick to Lancer’s face. It did not cost him any health, but it really did hurt. Later, Lisbeth apologized to Asuna, and Asuna apologized to Lancer as well. Still, Lancer’s instincts told him that if anything like that happened again, he would almost certainly be on the receiving end of another kick.

Although he already knew who the visitor was, Lancer still pushed the basement door open as if unaware, scratching his head and saying, “Welcome to Lisbeth’s Weapon Shop—yawn.” He even yawned at the end. Kirito, who had been looking around, stared in surprise at Lancer, dressed in a blacksmith’s outfit.

“What are you doing here?” Kirito asked in astonishment.

“What do you think? Can’t you even tell what my clothes are?” Lancer had expected a more important question, but instead Kirito had asked, in his view, something extremely superficial.

“Of course I recognize them. But I thought your workshop was...” Kirito began.

“I was kidnapped,” Lancer said, and though he was secretly pleased, he put on a terribly aggrieved tone to win sympathy. “After you left that day, I was taken by...” And in rising, dramatic cadence, he told the tale of a pitiful boy dragged away by a demon lord to do hard labor.

At first Kirito had still been brooding over Lancer’s abandonment of him the previous time, but now he could only look deeply moved as he patted Lancer on the shoulder. “Looks like I have to thank you for last time.”

The two of them chatted casually, but soon Lisbeth finished her forging work for the day and came out. The moment she saw Kirito, she began trying to sell him her wares. Lancer, however, was still curious why she did not recognize Kirito at all. By rights, the Black Swordsman’s fame should have been enormous; there was no reason for this.

But when he saw Lisbeth’s photo on the wall with several others, Lancer guessed part of the reason. It must have been that the day Kirito’s name had become famous, she had happened to run into that incident, and thus had not paid attention to the gossip afterward. In any case, the two of them soon cheerfully discussed the equipment’s price and various details, and the matter was settled.

“Then what about that ore?”

That was the crucial question.

At first, Kirito had intended to volunteer to help Lisbeth himself, but when he saw the one beside him yawning as though saying, Please just ignore me, he instantly changed his tune and said, “Lancer, why don’t you go? There aren’t any assault quests lately, and you’re better than I am at rescue work.” Seeing Kirito push the matter onto him, Lancer, who ought to have argued strongly in return, did something surprisingly uncharacteristic: he simply nodded to show he understood.

At the foot of the snowy mountain, Lancer crouched before a certain “snowman” that had been struck into a paralyzed state and kept testing his newly acquired weapon.

Thrust. Thrust.

The long blade pierced the snowman’s chest, while Lancer remained utterly calm. He did not even bother looking at the helpless monster beneath him; instead, he stared at his own status, checking whether this weapon still possessed the same power as the one outside.

Watching the man who had removed every piece of equipment that boosted attack and was now tormenting the poor snowman, the girl’s feelings shifted from fear, to anger, and then to pity. In the end, she even thought about urging Lancer to give the thing a clean death.

After calculating how much health the weapon restored after each attack, Lancer simply granted the creature that mercy. He even seemed to catch a glimpse of a monster with no intelligence at all wearing an expression of relief, which left him rather curious.

“All right, let’s keep moving and see whether there are more snowmen waiting to welcome us,” he said, then turned and continued upward. The girl, lost in endless emotion, did not notice that the color of Lancer’s weapon was far deeper than when he had first arrived.

Ding.

“Hm?” Lancer wondered whether he had misheard. A quest had appeared after so long. Delighted, he opened the ring and began to read...