I Pulled Out Excalib Chapter 243

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On That Adventure Worth Telling With a Smile (1)

"What Don Quixote seeks is a paradise, a place that exists nowhere. As it happens, I have somewhere in mind."

"And where would that be?"

"The Outland? You can find just about anything here, truly. Whales that soar through the sky, frozen flames, salt seas, wasteland half-buried in snow and half in sand... but there is exactly one thing you won't find."

Rocinante spread both arms wide.

"The place where the sun rises."

As he said it, he pointed up at the sky. Not a blue sky overhead, but a pitch-black night sky. Not a sun, but the crowded stars of the Constellations packed from horizon to horizon. He pointed at the Outland's sky and cried out.

"A place with a blue sky, not this shattered wreck of one. A place with warm sunlight, not the maddening glare of the Constellations. Nowhere in the Outland has that. Or, well, perhaps it simply hasn't been found yet."

A place that exists nowhere.

A place no one has ever found.

"Wouldn't that be paradise itself? True heaven?"

In the fairy tale The Knights of La Mancha, the heaven the heroes finally reached at the end was a place overflowing with blue sky and warm sunlight. Listening to Rocinante, Don Quixote's eyes lit up.

"Where is this place?"

"No one knows."

Rocinante raised his staff.

"Isn't that exactly what makes it worth adventuring for?"

With a sharp tap of his staff on the ground, he pointed ahead. As if to declare that their destination had just been decided, he stepped forward with purpose.

"Let's go, Don Quixote."

Toward a place that exists nowhere.

The journey began rather abruptly. As it did, Najin fell into step and turned to Rocinante with a question.

"Are you a wizard, Rocinante-nim?"

"Come now, Sancho, we're companions on an adventure. No need for such formality. Just call me Rocinante."

"Fair enough. Rocinante."

"Good. Now, to answer your question, yes, your guess is right. I'm a wizard. A rather powerful one, at that."

Rocinante said it with a swagger, though it wasn't idle boasting. Even from Najin's perspective, Rocinante seemed close to Transcendence.

"How convenient, there's a perfect target coming this way. A seven-legged wolf. Common enough in the Outland."

Where Rocinante pointed, a beast the size of a house was barreling toward them. Straight at Najin and Don Quixote, of all directions.

Najin yanked out his sword. Rocinante tapped his staff against the ground at a leisurely pace.

"A great wizard crafts magic that is his alone, magic only he can use. And I am a great wizard. Which means."

Thwack. He jabbed the tip of his staff into Najin's back.

"That I have a unique magic of my own."

Acceleration.

"Huh?"

Najin's eyes went wide. His field of vision had lurched without warning. One second he was staring straight at the beast, and now somehow he was staring at the ground. It wasn't just a shift in perspective.

Glergh.

Najin planted his face in the dirt. He lay there cheek-to-ground, blinking. What just happened? He'd been about to stomp forward and charge the beast. And yet here he was, facedown.

"Ha ha. That's what happens when you can't handle the speed. I struggled with it myself, at first."

Only then did Najin understand. His body had moved faster than his mind could keep up with, his feet had tangled, and down he'd gone.

"What is this..."

"My unique magic. Acceleration. A spell that makes anything faster."

Rocinante shrugged and tapped his staff through the air.

"And not just the body."

His mouth moved rapidly. Syllables of incantation Najin couldn't follow poured out, several per second. Seven completed spell circles materialized in the air in the blink of an eye.

"Magic itself, too."

He tapped each hovering circle in quick succession, tuk, tat-tat-tat-tat...

A Flash. Then impact.

Seven beams of light shot through the beast. Every single leg punched through, and it crumpled to the ground.

Najin's eyes went wide.

What in the world...?

From casting to launch to impact, the whole thing had taken less than a second. Even Najin's motion perception, which rivaled that of someone near Transcendence, would have missed it without focus.

- That's... remarkable.

Even a fellow wizard, a Grand Wizard at that, was impressed. Merlin was watching Rocinante with undisguised curiosity.

- Accelerating a spell isn't exactly simple. Push one that fast and the structure collapses. What you're actually speeding up is a raw 'clump of mana' that hasn't fully converted into magic yet. Accelerate a Fireball and the flames usually scatter before they land.

Even accelerating the simplest spell is no small feat, Merlin said.

- Worth calling a unique magic. The claim of being a great wizard isn't an empty one.

Merlin was the pickiest person alive. For him to acknowledge someone was a rare thing. Najin was privately floored. He tried to push himself to his feet, but again the movement he intended didn't match the actual speed of his body, and he faceplanted a second time.

"......"

"......"

Najin looked up at Rocinante in silence.

Rocinante just shrugged, as if to ask what the holdup was.

"What are you doing? Get up."

"Could you take the spell off, please?"

"If you're traveling with me, you'll need to get used to it. Best to start now. It really is a wonderful spell once you adjust."

Easier said than done. If it were his own body, Najin might have adjusted quickly, but right now his body was half-merged with Sancho's.

Moving Sancho's body was confusing enough on its own. Add a speed multiplier on top and his limbs simply refused to cooperate.

"Sancho? Why are you facedown on the ground?"

Don Quixote had just finished off the downed beast and blinked at the sight. Najin shot Rocinante a look. Rocinante grinned like a mischievous child and nodded.

"Oh, it's nothing, Don Quixote."

Rocinante raised his staff.

"Sancho's experiencing my magic. You should try it too, milord. Better to get used to it early."

With a sharp crack, he tapped his staff against Don Quixote. The moment Don Quixote tried to step forward, he went down hard with a thud.

"......"

"......"

Silence.

"...What is this?"

"My magic."

"Take it off."

"Best to get used to it. Both of you."

For a while after that, crashes and thuds rang out one after another. It was nearly an hour before the two of them could manage to stay on their feet.

"You look a mess, Sancho."

"No worse than you, milord."

Caked in dirt, Najin and Don Quixote both burst out laughing without meaning to. Rocinante watched them and laughed along.

Don Quixote brushed the dust off himself.

"Yeah. This is how Don Quixote's adventure should be. No adventure without laughter. I'd forgotten that, for a little while."

He pushed the corners of his mouth up with his thumbs. Since the day he'd left burning Quixano behind him, Don Quixote hadn't managed a real smile. He forced one now, even if it looked absurd.

"Let's go, friends!"

He laughed as he called out.

"A ridiculous, joyful, never-ending adventure is waiting for us. There's no reason not to run toward it."

He took a great stride and broke into a run.

"I am Quixote."

The Ingenious Gentleman from Quixano, Don Quixote.

Shouting that, striding boldly forward, he couldn't control the speed and crashed headlong into the ground again. He rolled across the earth with a tremendous crash, and even then he laughed.

"Bwahahahahaha!"

He laughed as if he could wash the whole Outland away. As if that was the only way to bear it, or as if he believed that if he just kept laughing long enough, someday it would be real.

The adventure toward paradise had begun.

Najin traveled with them as both companion and observer, always one step behind, watching. He needed to see how this story unfolded.

As you'd expect.

The adventure wasn't easy.

"Sancho!"

"I know, milord."

A journey searching for a place that exists nowhere was never going to be simple. And this was the Outland, of all places. Monsters everywhere, and Forgotten Ones even more monstrous than the monsters themselves. Centuries-old Forgotten Ones and beasts lurching out at every turn, it was dangerous beyond measure.

"Oh my."

But the Outland had more to offer. Ever generous, it threw in forgotten stars on top of everything else to ensure its visitors felt properly welcomed, and Don Quixote couldn't help but marvel.

"What is that, Sancho?"

"That's a forgotten star, milord."

"A forgotten star?"

"You've seen plenty of Forgotten Ones by now, haven't you? A forgotten star is what happens when a Constellation becomes one."

"I see. And how do we deal with it?"

"You're planning to deal with it?"

Najin pointed at the forgotten star shaking heaven and earth, hurling lightning that bridged sky to ground. Don Quixote stroked his beard and gave a decisive nod.

"We'll have to run, Sancho."

"Milord, a knight never runs."

"Good heavens! I nearly forgot my knightly code..."

"We only charge in the other direction."

Crack! Najin broke into a run, hopping and dodging lightning bolts shooting up from the ground. Don Quixote clamped a hand over his rattling helmet and ran too.

"Run, Rocinante!"

"Way ahead of you, milord!"

With Acceleration active, all three bolted away as fast as their legs could carry them and dove behind a boulder, gasping. One look at each other and they burst out laughing.

"We need to figure out how to get past that lightning."

"Do we really have to go that way?"

"Something guarded that fiercely must be hiding a treasure of enormous importance! According to legend, wherever lightning strikes, treasure is always buried."

Najin was speechless. Rocinante chimed in with full agreement.

"Lightning is a symbol of the sacred. It represents divine miracles. I've no doubt there's a holy relic waiting beyond it, milord."

"You understand these things, Rocinante!"

Unbelievable. Najin sighed, then fell in with their madness anyway. After they'd somehow pushed through the lightning, they found a helmet sitting there. It looked like something a Constellation would have worn in life, before it became a Forgotten One.

"A golden helmet! It must be Mambrino's Helmet!"

"Who's Mambrino?"

"A hero of legend."

Don Quixote put on the helmet, half-melted from lightning strikes, and smiled. The sight was deeply absurd.

Similar things kept happening after that.

Faced with ridiculous ordeals and obviously dangerous places, Don Quixote never once passed them by. He'd insist they had to get through, rack his brain, and actually come up with a way to do it.

"These are golden gauntlets. Any proper knight must have gleaming gauntlets."

Every time, Don Quixote came away with something. Relics of Constellations and Forgotten Ones, broken junk with no special function whatsoever. He called each one a treasure and put it on.

A half-melted helmet. Yellowed gauntlets. Greaves full of holes. Badges bearing every kind of insignia.

And still the journey went on.

Word spread through the Outland as more and more people witnessed the antics of Don Quixote, Rocinante, and Sancho.

And then.

"Who in the world are you, traveling through the Outland looking like that? What do you think is on the other side?"

Those drawn by the rumors began to seek Don Quixote out.

Quite a few people, drawn by the rumors of Don Quixote, came to find him. They were Stars who had lived long years in the Outland, Stars who had once been heroes.

"I don't know what's on the other side."

Don Quixote answered one Star's question.

"Not knowing is what makes it exciting, isn't it?"

"Exciting? This dreadful Outland?"

"Dreadful? It's a land full of the unknown. Every single day brings a new adventure. How could that not be exciting?"

A Star who had never once felt anything like "exciting" about life in the Outland burst out laughing at that. The kind of laugh that comes when you can't quite believe what you're hearing.

"Would you let me join that journey? I find no joy in life. Life in this dreadful Outland is so painful I can barely stand it, and I can't seem to laugh anymore."

Then came the offer.

"But somehow I have a feeling that if I travel with you, I could laugh again. May I join you?"

"Of course. I am Quixote, the Ingenious Gentleman from Quixano, Don Quixote."

Their company grew by one. The newcomer called himself a shepherd and addressed Don Quixote as "Sir Knight." And he wasn't the only one.

"Sir, I want to die."

Wandering the Outland without a fixed destination, Don Quixote crossed paths with countless Forgotten Ones and Stars on the edge of becoming them, and he spoke with every one of them willingly.

"I've lived long enough. There's nothing left worth living for. I want to end this wretched existence right now. But I can't. Death offers no rest, only an eternity as a Forgotten One..."

The Star on the edge of becoming a Forgotten One asked.

"You said you wander in search of paradise?"

"That's right. La Mancha, a paradise that exists nowhere."

"Take me to paradise, then. You can even carry me in that urn of yours if you must."

A knight who called Don Quixote "sir" joined them.

"If you're going to die anyway, why not have one last adventure with me first? I promise it'll be enjoyable. A journey full of laughter!"

"You're telling me not to die? I have no reason to live."

"If it makes no difference whether you die now or tomorrow, what's wrong with one last adventure full of laughter?"

"...You're an impossible man."

A Constellation who had resolved to end their life joined them.

"You're looking for paradise, you said? I'm a gardener. Might paradise not have need of a gardener?"

A young woman who had lived as a hero, lived as a knight, but whose lifelong dream had always been to tend a garden, joined them.

"I wish to turn Sir Knight's travels into song. I am the finest bard in the Outland. Grant me the honor of singing your story."

A bard with a lute joined the procession.

Before they knew it, the adventure that had started with three had swelled to dozens. The bard played and sang, Don Quixote burst into laughter, and Rocinante added his commentary at every turn.

"Sancho!"

"I know, I know, milord."

Najin sighed as if he had no choice, then sang along to the beat. Even on the desolate, harsh terrain of the Outland, their group alone was bursting with life, and laughter never stopped along whatever path they walked.

Rocinante's wit. Don Quixote's laughter. And the occasional flash of Sancho's clever improvisation.

An adventure where the laughter never stopped, one that fit the Outland not at all. A joyful adventure in this dreadful land teeming with Forgotten Ones, where even death offered no rest?

"Me too."

Yet, paradoxically, countless Stars found themselves drawn to Don Quixote's adventure.

"I also want to laugh."

"So do I."

"Myself as well."

"If it wouldn't be an imposition."

Stars who had lost themselves. Stars becoming Forgotten Ones. Stars facing death. Stars who had lost the meaning of life. Stars longing for rest. Stars who wanted one last joyful adventure.

Countless Stars joined Don Quixote's procession for countless reasons.

"Bwahahahahaha!"

Don Quixote's laughter carried a power no one could quite explain, spreading through the Stars like something contagious. They laughed freely and danced with him, sang together, and fell in with the ridiculous journey.

Don Quixote no longer forced his laughter.

He had come to feel that it was genuinely joyful.

"Let's go, Sancho!"

They pressed on.

Toward a paradise that exists nowhere.

Toward the end of this joyful adventure.

"What is laughter to you, milord?"

One day Najin asked Don Quixote that question. What was laughter, exactly? There were so many kinds of it, after all, so what kind did he mean?

"Laughter, Sancho,"

Don Quixote said.

"Is like a scream. Some people scream because the weight is too much, because they can't bear it any longer. Others, like me, laugh."

"A scream?"

"Yes. Life is hard and painful, isn't it? Truly hard. The world is full of things that a single person can barely stand."

Don Quixote spread his arms wide and gestured at the many companions traveling with him.

"Those who lost their companions. Those who lost their homelands. Those who watched everything they loved burn before their eyes. Those who lost their beloved. Those who have lost so much they stand on the verge of losing themselves..."

He let out a long breath.

"You want to scream. You want to rage. To cry. But doing so only makes you feel worse."

So, he said.

"Then laugh."

Laugh.

"Turn up the corners of your mouth. Laugh ridiculously. Laugh until your chest opens wide. Rather than crying, raging, and sulking, just laugh! Because when you laugh, even a little, your mood lifts."

Don Quixote laughed.

"Laugh! Laugh and laugh again!"

It was the kind of laugh that made everyone who saw it feel better, that made you smile without meaning to.

"To get through today. To dream of a happiness that will someday come. And if that happiness never comes, then to sing joyfully today, right now."

Laugh. What's the harm in it?

"The world is short on laughter!"

In the sky above, Don Quixote's star flickered.

"So wouldn't it be nice to have at least one story you can laugh and talk about, Sancho?"

Merry tales. Stories shared through laughter and good cheer.

"I want my story to be that kind of story. That is what laughter means to me."

Najin looked up at the sky.

The Star of Merry Tales: a star whose story could be laughed about and shared in good cheer.

That had been Don Quixote's alias.

The name he carried before he became the Star of Scorn.

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