Chapter 16
Chapter 16
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 16
Chapter Title: Proof (4)
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As the duel began, Heropin pointed his sword at me.
The sharp gleam of the blade tip was aimed straight at me.
A chilling energy flowed along the edge of the sword.
Just from that, I could gauge his skill.
Heropin narrowed the distance step by step.
Perhaps because he had heard that I defeated Hwarenca, his movements were cautious.
He struck up a light conversation.
“Then, let’s see what you’ve got…”
He trailed off mid-sentence.
Because my sword was already at his throat.
With a single stroke, I had cut off his words.
Heropin’s face stiffened in bewilderment.
He seemed unable to comprehend the situation.
The onlookers watching the duel were the same.
“……”
The heated arena fell silent as if doused with cold water. The boisterous cheers died away in an instant.
And rightly so.
In one exchange, a sword was at his throat, deciding the match. It was an anticlimactic end that left everyone deflated.
“Wahahahaha!”
Those who came to their senses burst out laughing, clutching their stomachs.
From the jeers mixed in with the laughter, most were blaming Heropin’s carelessness.
Heropin gave a silent bow, scratched his head awkwardly, and stepped down. He seemed to think it was just his own lapse in vigilance, not attributing his defeat to my strength.
Everyone present felt the same.
People tend to believe what they want to believe, after all.
“The man who will step up next, rising from Heropin’s bitter defeat that will be remembered forever! The beast prowling the deep battlefields, the one who freezes foes with a mere glance! The continent’s predator who devours imperial troops, Il! Li! A!”
As the announcer strained his voice, a flushed-faced woman shot to her feet from the crowd.
Her slender frame bore enormous gauntlets that looked absurdly oversized on her arms. She strode forward, clanging her fists together.
A wild, untamed ferocity that suited the term “beast.”
As she twisted her lithe body from a distance, her gauntlets rattled ominously.
“I won’t let my guard down, so you can look forward to this.”
Even before the starting signal, she proclaimed it with a triumphant expression.
Would a predator eyeing its prey have eyes like that?
She licked her upper lip with her tongue, savoring the moment.
Unlike the cautious Heropin, Ilia was already tensing her muscles for a charge before the duel began.
She planned to rush in the moment it started.
“Get ready! Duel begin—!”
No sooner had the duel started than a loud thud echoed.
Ilia had stomped the ground hard and charged with reckless momentum.
An aggressive offense, the polar opposite of Heropin’s.
But the result was the same.
Even the heavy silence that followed.
“……”
Ilia stood frozen in place, fists clenched. She seemed to have forgotten her words at the chilling sensation on her throat.
The arena fell into silence once more.
The duel had barely begun; they hadn’t even caught their breath.
Yet the victor was already decided.
The flustered announcer shouted, half-dazed.
“Jenes wins!”
* * *
Even as Ilia’s defeat became clear, the spectators were still in a daze.
Allen, Freddy, and Ches were equally stunned.
They had been the only ones predicting Jenes’s victory, but they hadn’t expected a result so embarrassingly one-sided it barely qualified as a duel.
How to describe this hollow, empty feeling?
It was like a dream.
Events defying common sense were unfolding right before their eyes.
Heropin and Ilia were among the top fighters of the “Northern White Lion”…
No, even if they weren’t.
At the very least, there should have been exclamations like “Whoa, he’s strong!” or “How did he move like that!”, with some back-and-forth before the outcome was decided. Only then could they accept, “Wow, that guy’s incredible.”
But this? The match felt like it hadn’t even started, even after it ended.
It wasn’t as frustrating as stopping a shit midway.
Jenes looked at the announcer and said.
“Keep it going.”
“Ah, right. Who’s next?”
The flustered announcer hurriedly called the next opponent.
“So, next up is… the lightning that shakes the heavens! The terror of traitors and the grim reaper of the imperial army! The White Lion’s sharpest fang, unyielding like an ancient oak that breaks before it bends, a man of unswerving resolve! Lightning Spear! Ur! No!”
“Waaaaah!”
“Urno! Urno!”
Amid the cheers, the massive man beside Hwarenca rose, hefting a long spear.
The crowd cheered louder than ever for him.
As the only officer among the duelists, he was one of the strongest in the camp.
Everyone expected a different outcome this time.
Urno’s heavy footsteps mounted the training ground.
And soon, the cheers began to fade.
Unlike before, the spectators watched the training ground with wide eyes.
The first duel had passed in a blur, the second dismissed with disbelief.
By the third, they doubted their own eyes.
‘Go all out from the start.’
Facing Jenes, Urno gripped his spear shaft tightly.
He had heard of Jenes’s strength from Hwarenca and knew the previous events were no fluke.
Sweat beaded on his palms.
Never had a duel made him this tense.
If he dueled Heropin or Ilia, could he have shown such overwhelming dominance?
Urno shook his head.
Impossible, from any angle.
Anxiety surged that he might suffer the same humiliating defeat.
He wanted to believe otherwise, but an inexplicable unease prickled his sharpened senses.
Urno took the most defensive stance possible before Jenes, who held his sword loosely.
“Duel begin—!”
Even at the announcer’s cry, Urno didn’t move.
A heavy silence fell over the stands, thick enough to hear neighbors swallowing.
Everyone watched, tense enough to forget to breathe.
Only Jenes remained utterly at ease.
Watching him, Urno thought.
If the results so far were truly his skill.
If that absurdly overwhelming power was real.
He was a being beyond Urno’s comprehension.
‘I’ll at least survive one exchange.’
Urno heightened all his senses to the max.
His stance was so defensively oriented it belied his title of Lightning Spear.
All to block Jenes’s single thrust.
That was when the sword of the still Jenes twitched.
With all his nerves focused on the blade, he sensed the motion.
Like grass rippling in a gentle breeze, a faint flow.
Urno raised his spear with full power to block the oncoming sword.
……But could that truly be called a sword?
He saw a flash hurtling toward him.
In the pure white sword light, heaven and earth split, erasing everything around.
The blinding beam swallowed the world.
Yet he could do nothing but watch.
His feet, planted on the ground, wouldn’t budge, pinned like stakes. His body stiffened like wood.
An overwhelming sword pressure he couldn’t resist even with all his might.
Like a tidal wave of light crashing down.
Swaa—
A cool breeze blew.
As his tousled hair settled, the sword light that had filled the world vanished without a trace.
Jenes stood before him with a serene expression.
A chill touched his throat.
The spear shaft he had raised with all his strength hovered at his chest.
Urno stared blankly at the sword aimed at him.
Time, frozen until then, resumed its flow.
Never had he felt so powerless.
An overwhelming might that killed even the will to resist.
Jenes’s sword transcended the world he knew.
The third heavy silence blanketed the arena.
But this one meant something different.
Everyone had seen—or rather, felt—his sword.
That crushing, overwhelming power.
No one could speak easily.
‘All my plans are falling apart.’
Lake realized, watching Jenes’s dominance, that every scheme he had built over years of sleepless nights was crumbling.
All reduced to nothing.
By a single man.
Yet Lake’s lips twitched in the brightest smile he could muster, one he hadn’t shown in ages.
The tower he had meticulously built had lost meaning and collapsed.
But if he could gain this man’s power, Lake was confident he could hand the world to the man beside him, who couldn’t close his mouth.
“……”
Unaware of Lake’s gaze, Lucian stared solely at Jenes.
The sword he had just witnessed was like the sky.
Vividly present, yet its limits unfathomable.
He had never heard or seen such a sword.
A shiver coursed through his body, refusing to subside. His heart pounded, thundering in his ears.
Seeing that sword made the world feel within reach.
If only he could possess that sword.
If only he could embrace that man.
The dreams he had cherished would become reality.
“Hey, announcer, wrap it up.”
Jenes’s indifferent words snapped the frozen time back to life.
Only then could people escape their fantasies and return to reality.
“Uwaaaaaah!!”
Cheers like thunder, incomparable to the start, shook the training ground.
An inexplicable heat enveloped everything.
* * *
Hearing their cheers, I knew my message had gotten through.
That was the purpose of my sword.
All three duels ended the same way, but the power in each single stroke differed.
Meaning the effort I put in varied to achieve the same result.
I had deliberately subdued them in one exchange.
To show immeasurable, overwhelming might.
Uncharacteristic of me, but to encourage them.
Fighting for the independence of a fallen nation is no easy task.
Francia had fallen ten years ago.
They had battled ceaselessly for their country since.
Had independence drawn closer?
No.
No one could be certain when that day would come.
Joining the independence army was like walking endless darkness, unsure of the end.
That made it all the harder.
Yet they staked their lives on that uncertain dream.
For their country and people alone.
That was why.
I wanted to repay them, even a little.
Having led the Righteous-Demonic War to victory, I knew well the impact of my strength on the battlefield.
Unfathomable power becomes an object of awe.
Especially when it stands beside you.
They would naturally imagine fighting alongside me.
And at the end of that vision, see their ideals clearly.
I had shown it to them deliberately.
Told them with my sword.
The independence you dreamed of is now within reach.
I will make it so.
That was the best encouragement I could give them.