“The Earthguards are retreating!! Kill them!! Everyone, charge!!”

A squad leader from one of the World Coalition’s units bellowed.

There’s nothing easier than cutting down retreating enemies.

Because they won’t fight back when you attack.

“Cut their forces down as much as we can here!! We’ll have to fight them again anyway!!”

The captain’s judgment was spot-on.

If the Earthguards fled back home, they’d surely bare their fangs again.

So take them out while you can—this was total war, after all.

However.

The air burst with a crackling explosion.

“Wh-what is that!? Lightning!?”

In the next instant, every KOG that had the Earthguards on the ropes had its flight capabilities slashed in half, plummeting like withered leaves.

“Wh-what happened!? What’s—”

And then, right before the captain’s eyes, a single machine appeared.

Pure white. Pristine white. And…

“Y-you bastard!!”

A lightning-like machine wielding two swords.

By the time the captain realized it, he was already sliced—stripped of flight, he plummeted.

Resigned to death, the last faces in his mind were his family’s.

However, he fell slowly, like a withered leaf.

With just enough flight power left to survive the landing.

“Haa… haa… haa. I’m saved. Did it miss?”

Pale as a ghost, the captain gazed up at the sky from the ground.

That white lightning darted around at speeds the eye couldn’t track.

One by one, World Coalition KOGs dropped simultaneously. The captain’s face drained of what little color remained.

“No way… Is it targeting us…?”

That doubt soon hardened into certainty.

Because all around him, similarly downed KOGs crawled on the ground, stripped only of their flight capabilities.

Zero fatalities. Impossible on a battlefield this size.

Unless it was deliberate.

“No… way. What am I even seeing…?”

The downed soldiers stared at that white knight, frozen in stunned silence, able only to stand there.

…

“I’ll stop them all.”

Tears streaming from his eyes, he raced across the battlefield.

The world’s strongest gentle knight dismantled the battlefield without taking a single life.

“Watch me, Zeke.”

And Kenya tore through World Coalition KOGs one after another.

“Strip their flight and sustained combat abilities. They’re not bad guys. Right, Zeke?”

Kenya had made his choice.

Not to kill. And not to let them kill.

Far harder than simply overwhelming them.

Carefully. Without destroying. Gently slicing.

(Kaguya might be here on this battlefield… So I absolutely can’t hurt her.)

Right now, Kenya could do it.

His mind crystal clear. Capable of anything.

An omnipotent rush enveloped him, propelling him beyond the door he’d unlocked.

The world in slow motion, as if only he inhabited a different reality.

Right now.

“Fire! Fire!!! It’s just one machine! Shoot it down!!”

He could slice bullets from the sky.

“Fire—… No way? Sliced them? This isn’t a damn comic!”

Anti-KOG rounds were slow.

Big bullets. Slow enough to track with the eye.

But slicing them? That’s a whole different game.

No one could do it. No one would even try.

It defied human reaction speeds.

Yet that white KOG clearly batted the bullets aside with its swords.

Right now, Kenya could predict and slice them if he spotted the barrel and trigger.

And those twin swords morphed like spears, closing the gap in a blink—suddenly right there.

“Guh—”

No time to scream. It smashed every surrounding KOG.

And Kenya attained the pinnacle of martial prowess, proclaiming to the myriad host:

“I’ll buy us an hour.”

…

“What am I even seeing?”

Byakuren and the Asia 13 Gods assembled.

Thor gathered his 10 elite Thunder God Squadron members.

The World Coalition’s maximum firepower now converged.

“Byakuren… I know it’s wrong to say this, but watching that one, I thought…”

Thor gazed at Kenya from afar and spoke.

“That perfected movement can be this beautiful.”

Every pilot gathered there was undoubtedly among the world’s strongest.

Some could even claim Holy Knight Captain rank in Earthguard.

All who witnessed Kenya’s dance shared the same thought.

“So strong… Even all of us together… probably… couldn’t win. But you know, I was scared at first. But now…”

Kaguya felt it. The white KOG’s overwhelming technique.

And simultaneously…

“It feels so warm? … So careful and gentle… Why… it overlaps.”

Kaguya kept overlapping that enemy with someone.

The swordsman who’d once protected her. Her beloved.

“Why not kill…? Weakness? From a powerhouse like that? What’s the deal?”

The strong alone grasp true strength.

That one existed on a plane beyond their ken.

A clash would end them in seconds.

If grunts were mice, they were cats.

An insurmountable gap. No chance of defeat.

But that? Ravaging the field at will.

By the same measure, a lion.

Cats versus lions? One strike, same as the mice.

“So, Supreme Commander. What now? Just take it lying down? Ah, just wrecked another ten. Wanna charge? He’d probably drop us gently.”

Kaguya pressed Byakuren.

Byakuren eyed the withdrawing Earthguard forces.

“Objective achieved. Victory on this field is ours. Therefore… all forces… temporary retreat. Cease pursuit. Engage that white machine from long range.”

Byakuren issued the command.

A humiliating pullback for standoff attacks.

All forces combined could win—but pointless now.

Heavy losses then escape? That’s defeat.

So.

“All forces, withdraw! Restrict to long-range fire. No further casualties!”

Kenya merely hid in buildings, popping out again and again.

The World Coalition lowered its front line for the sake of one KOG.

Aiming solely for energy depletion. A mass assault held real odds of victory through sheer numbers.

But Byakuren chose certainty.

Mission accomplished. That white KOG fights no more without power.

A few hours tops. Front lines already broken—just wait leisurely.

Then reclaim Japan at leisure.

Surely that KOG would flee.

Byakuren’s strategy clicked perfectly. Zero losses thereafter.

Even so.

“Humiliating… One machine stalls 50,000 troops…”

The fact endured: the world’s might halted by a lone unit.

“Godlike—that’s the word. Byakuren, honestly, I glimpsed my goal.”

Thor murmured, eyes on Kenya. Thor himself piloted the famed high-speed Thunder God.

Facing his superior counterpart, war aside, one sentiment reigned.

Aspiration, pure and simple.

“The white KOG, Sword Saint slayer… How about Sword God?”

“Sword God… Perfectly apt. Godlike piloting, shunning all ranged arms, swordsmanship’s zenith… Sword God.”

From that day, Kenya earned the name.

From World Coalition and Earthguard alike.

Sword God Sword Silfield.

Son of the Military God. Surpassing Sword Saint. Loved by the blade above all.

True monster, one with the sword. The blade incarnate.

And.

“Evacuation complete… At least Zeke.”

Kenya hoisted Zeke’s machine and rocketed away from Japan at full throttle.

“It’s gone… Why does my head know it’s impossible? But…”

Kaguya murmured at the white KOG’s retreating back.

“But I can’t help linking it to you… Kenya…”