Without instinct, the Sword of David was swung by the dead man Galahad.
There was no thought behind the motion. No calculation. No intent. The blade simply moved following a path that did not exist, tracing a line that had no meaning, cutting through a space that had no definition.
The beauty of the Sword of Death.
A sword style that did not exist.
Its path was undetermined.
Nothing could stop it. Nothing could block it. This sword style was true more real than reality itself, more absolute than the laws that governed Valhalla. It was death made manifest, given form by a man who had become death.
As the blade was swung, General Titus became anxious immediately.
His heart raced. His breath caught. His eyes trained by years of battle, sharpened by countless victories searched for the attack he knew was coming.
Can I stop this? The thought came unbidden, desperate. Is this attack even coming?
He had thoughts of weakness. Of depravity. Feelings he had not experienced since he was a young soldier, since before Caesar had found him, since before he had become invincible.
Not even he could believe that he could think like this.
He, General Titus, the invincible soldier afraid.
But in his contemplation, he noticed something strange.
There was no attack coming his way.
The blade had swung. The air had parted. The space between them had shifted. But there was no projectile. No shockwave. No visible evidence of an attack.
His smile returned slowly, tentatively, then broadly.
"What's this?" His voice was steady, almost boastful. "No attack incoming?"
He spread his arms.
"This means there was nothing in that. Simply a bluff."
He began to laugh.
"Yes! That's really a big bluff of nothing!" His laughter echoed across the battlefield. "Now I win!"
He paused.
Something was wrong.
He felt it throughout his entire body a sensation that had no name, no precedent, no explanation. It was as if a section of his entire body had moved to one side. Shifted. Separated.
He looked down at himself.
Nothing seemed changed. His armor was intact. His flesh was whole. His
Then he felt it.
From his right ear like a line drawn by a little child, unsteady but certain a cut.
Not a wound. Not a gash. A separation. A division. As if his body had been drawn with a pencil, and someone had taken an eraser to the line that held him together.
And so that part of his body was detached.
His right side from ear to hip, from shoulder to thigh separated from his left. Not cut. Not torn. Separated. As if they had never been connected at all.
His blood began to spray not from a wound, but from the absence of connection. It poured from him like water from a broken vessel, like life from a dying man.
He opened his mouth.
No sound came.
The pain was indescribable not because it was intense, but because it was wrong. His body was not designed to feel this. His mind was not equipped to process this.
One of his eyes rolled, looking at the damage.
His right side his arm, his chest, his leg was hanging. Connected by nothing but threads of flesh that were already tearing.
He tried to heal it with his ability.
The regeneration kicked in flesh reaching for flesh, blood flowing back into veins, bone seeking bone.
But it could not connect.
The cut was too clean. Too absolute. It was as if the two halves of his body no longer recognized each other. As if the space between them was not physical, but conceptual.
He could not heal.
Tristan and Percival watched from across the battlefield.
Their faces strained, bleeding, exhausted slowly broke into smiles.
Tristan was the first to speak.
"Yeah." His voice was low, almost a whisper. "Now that's what's up."
His smile widened.
"Finally."
He looked at General Titus at the Roman who had killed their comrades, who had wounded their king, who had dominated them from the moment he arrived on the battlefield and felt something warm spread through his chest.
"You stupid fucking general." His voice rose. "Try surviving that."
Percival said nothing. Just watched. Just smiled. His bleeding eyes still strained, still pushed refused to look away from the sight of the invincible soldier falling.
General Titus could not move.
His body what remained of it collapsed. His left side hit the ground first, followed by his right, the two halves slapping against the sand at different angles. His blood pooled beneath him, dark and thick, spreading across the ground like a dark tide.
He tried to speak.
His lips moved. His tongue flopped. His throat worked.
"Hhhoww..." The word came out broken, stuttered, barely intelligible. "Hhhoww caaann thhiss haappeeennn..."
His remaining eye wide, desperate, uncomprehending stared at the grey sky.
"iii loooveee..."
His voice cracked.
"ceeaasser."
The name of his emperor. The man he had served for centuries. The love that had driven him, that had sustained him, that had made him invincible.
His eye blinked.
Once.
Twice.
Then it stopped.
Galahad stood still, the Sword of David still raised, his eyes still empty.