Chapter 1 …
The desert. Once again, the desert.
It had been a life spent running desperately so that I wouldn’t die in the sand in the end.
How badly I had wanted to get away from this barren expanse of sand.
‘And yet in the end they’ll bury me in the sand anyway.’
I would die here.
The blood trickling from the slit in my abdomen told me that.
Still — it wouldn’t be a pointless death.
‘If only I can protect my lord, Kairun.’
Shudder—
My body, propped up by a single sword, wavered as if it would collapse any moment.
Seeing me like that, one of the assassins in the desert must have thought the time had come; he rushed forward.
“Die—!”
But—
Scrrrrrk—
Before he could take more than a step, the assassin’s body was cut in two.
The other assassins who had been watching staggered back.
“You’re still alive?!”
My lungs had been torn and my abdomen pierced; by all rights I should have been dead.
Yet I was still alive, still swinging my sword. To them I must have looked like a monster.
“You bastards—before you go for Kairun, you’ll have to get through me. I’ll drag you to hell with me.”
I spat the words like a curse. Blood surged up as I said the short phrase.
“Uuuugh—!”
I got up again and swung my sword.
Scrrrk, thunk!
All I saw was the path of the blade and an enemy’s head flying off.
Blades met me from every direction.
I only parried the ones that aimed for vital spots; the rest I left.
The agony of my body falling apart.
As long as I could feel this pain — as long as I was alive — I would protect Kairun Fel Rekrit.
Scrrrk—
“Graaah—”
The last assassin fell. Only then did I let go of my sword.
Clang—
“Huff… Are you alright, my lord?”
My chest surged with blood; it was hard even to stand, but my first thought was to check on Kairun.
Kairun was usually expressionless, but faced with a dying subordinate, his facial muscles twitched as if he couldn’t remain indifferent.
My lord. My honor, Kairun.
He—
“You’re not dead yet?”
He was smiling.
“You’re a stubborn desert bastard, after all.”
Clank—
Muttering something incomprehensible, Kairun approached me.
“L-lord. Wh—what do you mean?”
“You served me well. Now die.”
Crash—
Kairun struck me with a single blow. The welling blood sealed my words.
Kairun.
In that instant the name that had been my everything turned into a terrible curse.
Kairun Fel Rekrit.
I met him when I was about fifteen.
“Kill Kairun.”
An assassination contract came to me — to someone full of malice and poison.
After the sandstorm of my childhood that took my parents, I’d taken any work I could get. There was nothing I couldn’t do.
What drove me then wasn’t that Kairun was the desert’s enemy, nor any great cause.
‘Tonight I’ll be able to buy bread.’
That single expectation — that I wouldn’t starve — moved me.
I took the assassination job.
To survive in the harsh desert I had no choice but to become a cactus of my own making.
The day Kairun came to scout the desert, I disguised myself as a servant and slipped into his bedchamber.
But the moment I tried to slit his throat, his eyes opened.
Facing that wolfish glance, I was frozen.
“You don’t know how to hide your presence.”
I thought that was the end of me.
“Will you come with me?”
Kairun reached out his hand to me.
Why me?
Why would a man from the Rekrit family — the strongest sword clan — need a lowly desert rat?
But that question became irrelevant soon. I would have given my life for Kairun.
Honor.
Kairun was honor itself to me.
He pulled my hand, which had been rolling in the desert sand, and in an instant dragged me up into the northern order of knights.
Learning swordsmanship within his order, I vowed again and again.
‘I’ll guard Kairun with the sword he gives me for as long as I live.’
The entire Crow Knights under Kairun were gathered with that same thought.
The knights charged ahead and carved the kingdom’s foes. They took on the world’s finger-pointing so that only glory would come to Kairun.
I was always at the very front.
Once a despised desert native, I had become a seven-star knight of Rekrit.
On the fifteenth year of wielding his sword—
“Become my blade.”
Kairun acknowledged me.
He allowed me to use the name of the Crow Knights.
A name that originally only Rekrit blood could bear.
I became someone who could look up at him from the closest vantage.
But it was a cursed delusion.
One day, a sudden order fell on me.
“Become the lord of the desert.”
“Pardon?”
“Go to the desert and govern to uphold the will of the Rekrit. Can you do it?”
“Yes, my lord.”
To think that someone who had been rolling in the sand, skinning camels and the like, would be made a lord and return in triumph.
Besides, the ancient desert stronghold had been abandoned since the fall of the old desert kingdom.
To send a lord there was Kairun’s declaration of intent to embrace the ostracized desert.
It should have been a joy, but some corner of my heart felt uneasy.
At last the day of the appointment arrived.
Kairun went with me to the desert. It was unusual — the ceremony was to be held there.
“You are my long-time friend. It’s my final gift to you.”
Final gift. I never thought it would mean that.
Creak—
The gates of the desert stronghold opened.
Who greeted Kairun and me was not a proud parade or subjects kneeling at our feet.
A massive number of assassins.
Countless pairs of eyes stared our way.
There had always been many who sought Kairun’s life, but I had never seen numbers like this.
“My lord, avoid—”
How dare they attempt to assassinate Kairun in front of me. Impossible.
I fought to protect Kairun.
And the price I paid with my life was betrayal.
“Huh.”
A hollow laugh escaped me. Blood poured from the holes in my body.
I gathered my faltering consciousness and looked around.
Inside the desert stronghold, where the battle had raged, only the corpses of the assassins piled up. Kairun had already disappeared somewhere.
Only now, at the brink of death, did I realize: it had all been Kairun’s plan.
Where else would be a better coffin than an abandoned desert stronghold?
A place where an attack by assassins could come at any moment.
A place where, if he cut off a right arm he cherished, no one would notice.
A place where a desert native like me would let down his guard.
Whoever had discarded me like this — where did they leave the last trace? All that remained in my hand was a handful of sand, thick with blood.
“Kairun…!”
From the beginning to the end, to him I had been nothing but a lowly desert bastard.
He made me his sword? No — the truth was, I was merely his shield.
A shield that soaked up every filthy, brutal thing and, once cracked, was thrown away.
All the years I’d struggled to get out of the desert were mocked; I was abandoned in the sand.
“Huff… huff….”
My breath shortened. Regret surged.
Only now could I see clearly why he had chosen someone like me.
Talent and potential enough to reach seven-star knighthood were merely pretexts.
Many are trampled for their talent, and many roll on the ground for their loyalty.
Kairun wanted one more thing besides talent and loyalty.
‘A complex.’
The complex of someone who thinks themselves lowly — it makes them willing to give their life.
Gurgle—
The last of my blood spat out. Regret seeped from me in streams.
Why did I trust him? Why did I foolishly spend my life serving him?
No—why did I never once reach for his position?
I had held so many things in my hands, so many honors. Why did I think they were not mine?
Countless lands and honors. Even the household sword.
All of them things I had fetched for him like a dog.
He needed someone who would consider the ground beneath his feet to be the sky.
Someone who could hold the Rekrit order’s strongest sword and still see himself as a lowly desert native — someone like me.
Thud—
I couldn’t stay still any longer.
My hands, trembling, climbed the Golden Pyramid.
The Golden Pyramid.
It was a pyramid in the stronghold, known as the tomb of the ancient desert king.
They say the ancient desert king, even as bones, sleeps in the desert and guards it. If you climb to the top, the desert king appears and grants wishes.
Do I believe that ridiculous legend?
Well.
If such a legend were true, the desert wouldn’t be abandoned like this.
‘Even if the desert king doesn’t appear, maybe I can at least see which way north is.’
If I couldn’t lay Kairun’s throat open myself, I would at least throw a blade toward the north where he might be.
If I had no strength left to throw a blade, then I’d spit a curse.
If I had no strength even to curse, I’d at least spit.
Before I knew it, I had reached the top.
I stood on the apex piercing the desert night sky.
And there was nothing. As expected.
Beneath my feet lay the harsh desert. An endless wasteland.
Among it, I — dying — was as tiny as a grain of sand.
“Kairun… if I ever meet you again… I will drive a knife into your heart. Then I will surely… abandon you.”
No answer came back.
Whoosh—
Only the familiar sound of a desert sandstorm accompanied my end.
Thud—
My footing slipped.
I had no strength to catch myself falling from the top of the pyramid.
No — maybe I didn’t need to catch myself. After all, I was going to die.
Even as my vision blurred, I could see a ripple of light.
‘It’s strangely red.’
Was it a mirage of the desert? Or is dying always like this?
Is this hell? Or heaven?
No. Neither. Both my feet still stood on the pyramid’s peak.
I must have completely lost it.
Then —
“—Is that your true intent?”
A voice came from somewhere. Even as I was dying, I could tell this wasn’t a human voice.
A strange, bone-grinding noise mixed into the voice.
“—Can you promise? That you will not turn your back on the desert. That you’ll plunge a knife into the owner of the north, Kairun.”
“You are—”
I couldn’t believe my eyes.
What appeared before me was a skeleton dragon.
Was this the actual form of the king they said remained in the desert even as bones?
Bones curled like desert dunes.
But its eyes burned like a lone, blazing sun.
“The Desert King… Phkelon.”
Before I knew it, the dragon’s tail had wrapped tightly around the falling me. What clung to the dragon’s vertebrae wasn’t flesh but a deep darkness.
Where the desert ended and the dragon’s spine began was indistinguishable.
Like a living tomb, the skeleton dragon’s overwhelming presence pressed down on me.
But there was no time to marvel. I bit my finger hard to wake up the dull sensations.
Ziiik—
A horizontal vein-like line etched across my forehead. The desert people’s oath ritual.
“I swear it.”
I squeezed out the last of my strength and spoke.
At the same time, the sandstorm wrapped around my body.
I closed my eyes.
“Where is this…?”
I moved my hand reflexively.
Not gritty sand, but the touch of smooth bed sheets met my skin.
‘This isn’t the desert.’
If it were the desert I wouldn’t be lying here in a room decorated like this.
I slowly looked around. The unfamiliar space felt oddly familiar.
Click.
The sound of a door opening. I quickly lay back down.
The approaching footsteps sharpened my nerves that had briefly relaxed.
I was naked now. If someone rushed me I couldn’t handle it.
Wasn’t I mortally wounded?
‘Wait. Mortally wounded?’
Only then did I realize my body didn’t hurt.
The hole in my abdomen was gone without a single scar.
As confusion swirled in my head —
“Young master…?”
What? Young master?
“Master Ikael, you’ve woken?! Master!”
The maid’s words made me even more confused. There was no one who would call me “master.” Moreover —
‘Ikael. Ikael.’
A name I’d heard somewhere.
“I thought you were done for this time, master. You’d lain for a month! I’m so glad you woke… eek—!”
With a yelp, the maid grabbed a washbasin and held it so I could see my face.
‘Th-this is…’
For a moment I couldn’t think.
A face with proper features and dazzling silver hair. A handsome young master’s looks suit the description, but the sharp, blade-like eyes annoyingly resembled Kairun’s.
Thump—
“Ah…”
Startled, I overturned the washbasin.
“Eek! Master!”
Ikael Fu Rekrit.
The frail young master of the northern sword clan Rekrit. In other words—
“Kairun’s youngest son.”
“Master! Where are you going!”
I pushed past the maid who tried to hold me and went outside.
‘This can’t be real.’
My steps quickened. If I kept walking someone would surely offer a plausible explanation.
Creak—
I passed down the corridor, opening many doors. Finally, the front yard came into view.
Ugh.
Silver armor flashed as the sunlight struck it sharply; my eyes squinted but I saw the knights arrayed in formation. Seeing this familiar sight oddly reassured me.
This was the place I had belonged to until just before I nearly died; someone here should be able to answer me. But then—
“Behold Master Ikael!”
“We greet you!”
The knights in silver armor bowed and prostrated themselves at my feet.
They called me Ikael.
Dragon. What is this?
