Rodgers lay on the wooden board, his body broken, his breath shallow, his consciousness flickering like a candle in the wind. The Iron Lantern stood just above him his body still upright, his posture still defiant, his presence still absolute.
But this fight was already over.
And a victor was not decided by fate, but by the will of a single man. But who won this battle? Two ideals that stood against each other. Well then, it all falls down to what is considered as victory in battle, and what type of battle this was.
In battle, we normally call the living the victor, and then we call the dead the defeated.
The Iron Lantern stood.
But for the first time, his face was not smiling.
This man had long ago died. Since this battle had begun, it was simply the fact that death could not catch him fast enough to end the battle on time. Now, truly, a man who pronounced himself as a free man had died.
What would you say then?
You would say that the ideal of a man like Rodgers is right, because whoever is a victor is right. And to say such would not be wrong. After all, that is how the world operates. The world is superficial as such, they judge everything as superficial.
But this battle was won by the Iron Lantern.
As he stood there dead.
Rodgers got up.
His body screamed in protest. His muscles burned. His wounds ached. But he rose. He needed to see. He needed to know.
His first action was to look at the Iron Lantern's face.
And then he noticed.
This face it was like the face of a man chained up. It was not the face of a free man. The smile was gone. The brightness in the eyes was gone. What remained was something still, something quiet, something at peace.
Seeing this, a smile was made on Rodgers's face.
He finally won.
He believed himself the winner.
He then had a thrill he had never had, even in the world of the living. It surged through him hot, electric, overwhelming. It was a feeling of triumph, of validation, of certainty.
He felt a taste of it.
Conviction.
The certainty that what you believe in is right, and there is no other truth.
He could not see beyond the superficial. But yet this is what the Iron Lantern wanted to happen.
The truth is, he wanted to show something to his rival. Something he had never showed him before not in the living, and not even in Valhalla. He showed him conviction. And then planted the seed in his heart.
Even if it may remain untouched, one day it would break free, like the cry of a young born from the womb.
Rodgers laughed.
"HAHAHAHA!"
The sound echoed across the deck bright, triumphant, free. He felt no shred of guilt for the Iron Lantern's death. He got up, his body shaking, his legs trembling, his will carrying him forward.
He placed his finger on the body of the Iron Lantern.
And pushed.
The body fell slowly, heavily, finally and landed like a log beside him. The impact was soft. The sound was quiet. The silence that followed was absolute.
Rodgers stood there for a moment, looking at the body of his rival.
His face was still. His breath was shallow. His heart was pounding.
He was fully drained.
He could not fight in battle at all.
He let out a breath.
It was long, slow, exhausted. It carried all the weight of the battle, of the storm, of the centuries that had led to this moment.
Then he spoke.
"I'm so tired."
The chapter ended there in the space between the victory and the emptiness, between the conviction that had been planted and the conviction that had bloomed.
Rodgers stood over the body of his rival.
The storm raged above.
And the sea roared.