[Diana. The sword will take you. Under the moonlight.]
Fuck.
Father.
Please shut up.
Please, just for this moment.
It's been five years since I first heard my father's voice.
[Diana. Listen to the sword cry.]
My father is dead.
He was horribly murdered in front of me.
So that can't be my father's voice.
I shook my head.
I felt like my mind was not clear.
For the past five years, I haven't slept properly and have been starving as if I were eating rice.
I slept with the smoke that filled the forge and the iron dust on my body.
I did it even though I knew it would shorten my life.
To beat 'Gram".
Gram.
It was the name of the sword my father made.
Blacksmiths called swords with names 'famous swords'.
It is said that a famous sword has a soul, and that soul also has great power.
[I have heard that you are the best blacksmith in the empire. Make a sword for me, blacksmith.]
[Is this the royal order?]
[Yes. You know there's no way to refuse, right?]
Walter, the second Prince of the empire.
A boy of only seventeen spoke lording over his father, the greatest blacksmith in the empire.
It was my first time seeing the royal family, and I found myself staring at him without realizing it.
My father made me sit in the back.
It seemed like he wanted to hide me.
[Make a sword that will make all things in the world tremble in fear. A sword that can reign over all things. Make such a sword.)
A sword that can reign.
Doesn't Walter already reign over everything?
When I was young. I thought so.
My father hesitated for a long time.
But at last, the moment Walter's dry gaze fell on me, my father's answer flowed out.
[I will obey your command.]
A faint smile appeared on Walter's face.
[The deadline is one year.]
After that, my father poured his soul into making a sword for a year.
If I make a fake sword and offer it to the royal family, not only my father's life but also my life will be in danger.
[A sword is not something that can rule people through fear, Diana. You should not make a sword like this.]
This kind of sword.
My father called his sword 'this kind of sword'.
But in my view, that black sword was great.
Gram.
The name is said to be derived from the name of the God of wrath.
A radiance befitting his name emanated from Gram.
It was a radiance that made one's heart shrink with fear just by looking at it.
Rule over all people.
The first day I saw Gram, I could understand what Walter had said.
That sword seemed alive.
He seemed ready to open his eyes wide and pierce the hearts of everyone who met him.
Even at that moment when the sword was stuck in my father's stomach, I looked into Gram's eyes and thought of that.
Gram is alive.
"Wh, why on earth..."
My father asked in vain with a hole in his stomach.
There was no longer that greedy black horse that had pierced through my father's belly and was drinking his hot blood.
His father was the best blacksmith in the empire.
He was a man who would not give in to the hot flames.
He was a man who melted iron, tempered it, and turned something that was nothing more than a blade into a sword.
He was the god I worshipped and my only family.
Even as the family grew cold before me, I couldn't take my eyes off Gram.
I can't believe that the great sword my father created swallowed him.
"Rejoice, blacksmith. The sword you made is so excellent that it is killing you. For you can make someone an even better sword."
Was my father really happy when he heard that?
I couldn't figure it out.
All I could do was watch my father's body shake as he was held captive by the soldiers, and then soon even the writhing became quiet.
I was shaking so much that I couldn't even cry.
"Is that child the blacksmith's daughter?"
"..."
I didn't answer. I just looked at Gram, who had greedily tasted my father's blood, in Walter's hands.
Walter was smiling with my father's blood on his face.
"The sword seems alive. I only have to apply a little force, and it tears through flesh and bone at will."
Walter chuckled and looked at Gram shining under the moonlight streaming in through the dark audience room window.
Gram shining blue.
And Walter's eyes sparkled in Gram's light.
Yes.
Gram may really be Walter's.
Gram was born from my father's hands, but he resembled Walter, not my father.
"Should I cut off your limbs with this sword?"
Walter came to me as he spoke. His words made my body tremble, and soon I had no choice but to collapse on the floor.
Even if you don't try to do it, the sword makes it that way...
Reign.
Control.
Obedience.
The black sword had the power to make anyone who saw it kneel, even if they didn't want to.
My eyes burned like hot iron.
Gram.
I despise you.
I despise you as I despise Walter.
I closed my eyes with that thought.
That was when.
"It is too good a sword to be stained with lowly blood twice."
Walter put away his sword.
He looked down at me, trembling with a smirk.
He was mocking me as if he had read my fears.
"You guys, just kill me and I'll make you laugh."
At those words, the soldiers nearby could be heard chuckling.
The soldiers dragged me out while I was trembling.
One of the soldiers threw me to the ground. The other soldier went to another alley to watch the net.
I heard heavy breathing.
I hated that humid air terribly, but I waited.
Until finally the soldier unbuckled his sword and held me properly.
I took out the dagger I had been hiding in my bosom and stabbed the soldier in the neck. The sword slid into the soldier's body as if it had found a sheath that fits it well.
A gasp of air was heard from the soldier's throat.
I kicked the body of the guy so hard that he couldn't even scream.
I quickly spat in the idiot's face while the glare was still in his eyes.
"You stupid kid."
I hoped that was the last thing I heard from him before his eyes turned from this world to the next.
That was what the fifteen-year-old girl wanted to say to the soldier who believed she didn't have even a single dagger in her arms.
'You should have done a body search.'
This dagger that just blew a hole in that idiot's neck was my first creation.
The first work to receive recognition from my father.
[You've made a sword that's truly a sword, Diana.]
Diana.
I loved that name.
My father said that the name was that of the goddess of moonlight.
The name of a goddess who can tear through a deer's thick hide with a single arrow, fight a bear, and is not afraid of hunting competitions with men.
It was also said to be a name that suited a blacksmith well.
Because it shines most beautifully under the black moonlight.
[Don't listen to that nonsense about women not being blacksmiths, Diana. You can be whatever you want.]
At that time, my father was the moonlight that made the sword shine, and I was the sword.
As a blacksmith, I became a sword in my father's hands, not just a blade, and not just a sword, but a famous sword.
But my father was wrong.
Moonlight is a word that suits my father, not me
"Ugh... Gasp..."
I pushed the sagging soldier away and started running.
Under the moonlight, the legs moved without rest.
If someone was chasing me, I would blow a hole in their neck too.
Now I was not afraid of getting someone else's blood on my sword.
I was just afraid of the irreversible reality.
My father, who never once smiled gently at me, silently taught me how to pickle when everyone in the blacksmith shop looked down on teaching blacksmithing to a woman.
That face that was so proud of my first work.
I was afraid of the fact that I wouId never see my father like that again, a fact that seemed strangely obvious.
No matter how angry I am, no matter how much I curse and throw tantrums, my father will not come back.
"Ugh..."
It was only when I realized that the only thing chasing me was my shadow that I slowed down.
I realized that I had run back the way I had come with my father riding the calf.
And now I was alone, without father or foal.
Alone.
Standing at the entrance to the village, I looked at the burning village.
I thought nothing could be more surprising, but when I looked at the burning village, my heart started pounding.
Smoke was rising all over the town where I was born and raised.
As if someone was going around setting fires sporadically.
That was when.
Men carrying oil cans and sparks walked by.
I instinctively hid my body.
"His Highness Walter ordered that all the people in this village be killed and burned?"
"Yes. The Lord tells us to pretend that the blacksmith in the village went crazy while making a sword and started a fire."
"Why on earth?"
"His Highness hates it when someone else has what he has. He must be worried that the blacksmith might have hidden a similar sword."
The moment I heard those words, the fire that had spread to the village began to spread to my hands, feet, chest, and back.
My hands, feet, chest, back, and head were hot.
It felt like my whole body was burning along with the village.
My body was burning along with my dead father, along with the dead townspeople.
In particular, the heart was the hottest.
[The fire that melts iron must be hot enough, Diana.]
My father's voice rang in my ears.
[Like the fire burning your heart right now, Diana.]
I clutched my heart.
That was that day.
The moment the fire that melts iron in my heart is born.
From that moment on, I heard my father's voice ringing in my ears.
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