Chapter 198: Two Manuals
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 198: Two Manuals
The bastard charged, fists clenched as he stomped the ground. His ankles flexed with elastic power, propelling his body forward. It was a perfect transmission of force, flowing from his knees and thighs all the way through his upper body.
Consequently, he was terrifyingly fast. Yet, it wasn't to a degree that made reacting difficult.
And naturally, he was no match for Rem.
Rem raised the axe in his left hand at an angle, feigning a downward strike. Just before the bastard's fist could connect—at the very moment his head was about to be split in two—the charging man’s speed surged even further.
He moved with such explosive speed that he left a blurry afterimage in his wake.
It was a technique designed to blur an opponent's vision through instantaneous acceleration.
Whoosh!
Rem's left-hand axe sliced through empty air.
Having closed the distance, the fighter pivoted on his right foot, stomped his left foot down hard, and thrust out a knuckle-duster-clad fist.
Anyone could tell at a glance: he was a properly trained bastard.
And then—thud!
"Hey, why’d you go and shove your neck into my axe?"
Following the dull impact, Rem's calm voice drifted over the clearing.
Encrid replayed the scene he had just witnessed in his mind.
A charge that maintained a constant speed before suddenly shifting tempos. There probably weren't many who could easily withstand that blow. At best, dodging would have been all they could manage, and once the opponent dodged, the fighter's style was to relentlessly follow up with attacks from his preferred distance.
Hadn't Audin said so as well?
"Fighters who use their fists focus on controlling distance more than anyone else, Brother."
Against a charge aimed at seizing that distance, Rem's response had been almost indifferent.
He had pretended to play along with his left-hand axe, only to swing the axe in his right hand several times faster than the left. It was a similar tactic to his opponent's, but the result was entirely different.
The axe blade, flying like a beam of light, struck and severed the man's neck.
The headless fist tapped harmlessly against Rem's stomach. Naturally, there was not a shred of power behind it.
The severed head floated briefly in the air before dropping to the ground with a heavy thud. When Rem pushed the lunging body away with the back of his hand while still holding his axe, the corpse collapsed.
"He's no pushover! Don't let your guard down, any of you!" shouted the opponent holding the halberd.
Five of them swarmed Rem at once. Three wielded tridents and swords, one fiddled with a dagger, and another joined the fray.
"How exciting," Rem said, perfectly calm even against the five of them. No—going beyond calm, he even did a little shoulder dance as if he were genuinely enjoying himself.
Ragna strode forward, his hand resting on his sword's grip. He was heading toward the one with the halberd.
"Kill him!" the halberd-wielder shouted.
At that moment, a female bandit perched on a tree branch fired.
Ping!
A short bolt hissed toward Ragna's shoulder. Ragna twisted his body to dodge the projectile, drawing his sword in the very same motion. It was as smooth and natural as if it had been rehearsed a thousand times.
Shring!
As he drew his sword and made a wide slash, the man with the halberd brought his weapon forward to block.
Clang!
"Hmph!"
Did he think it was a slash lacking power? Though he blocked the sword, the halberd-wielder's body tilted sideways for a brief moment under the weight of the blow.
Just then, ping!—a second bolt flew.
Ragna, of course, dodged it. The short bolt struck a stone embedded in the ground and bounced off with a sharp clack.
Up there.
Encrid also spotted the source of the bolts. It was up in the trees. A small figure was shooting bolts using a device mounted on her wrist.
Encrid moved as well.
He didn't have his Whistle Dagger, but he had the Flicking Sword Style he had properly mastered.
He stretched time for a split second. Activating Single-Point Focus, he gauged the distance to his opponent and flicked his hand. It was his left hand—the one not holding his sword, which he could now use as skillfully as his right.
Thrown with heightened concentration and sharp senses, the dagger sliced through the air. The figure in the tree hooked her legs around a branch like a monkey and spun upside down to dodge.
Thud!
The dagger passed where she had just been and embedded itself deep into the thick tree trunk.
"Kill him, Rumt!" the halberd-wielder shouted upon seeing this.
Soon, someone stepped up to face Encrid. It was a bastard wielding two daggers.
The eyes of the man named Rumt swept over Encrid's waist. Hanging there was the dagger Encrid had salvaged after killing the guard earlier.
"You... that dagger..."
"It was a gift."
Answering before the opponent could even finish his sentence, Encrid made Rumt furrow his brow. With sparse eyebrows and exceptionally small pupils, the man had a menacing look.
Well, a menacing appearance and actual skill were two different things, so it didn't matter.
A common face in the mercenary business.
Among mercenaries, bastards who decorated their faces with scars to look terrifying were a dime a dozen.
"That was the kid I was training."
The opponent was in his forties; to still be fighting on the front lines at that age meant he had to be quite skilled.
Encrid's heart hammered. He would surely be better than the kid he had trained. But would he be better than a Gnoll Leader?
A strange sense of anticipation welled up. If there was one thing he hoped for...
"Are you going to do this alone?"
Five against Rem, three against Ragna. Why did he only have one? The only other one was the monkey bastard constantly leaping through the trees.
Rem was grinning as he swung his axes against his five opponents. The five bandits showed caution. Having seen their companion killed in a single blow, they had to be.
The halberd-wielder was also cautious. When you had the advantage in numbers, slowly surrounding the enemy was more advantageous than a reckless charge. The halberd-wielder and two of his companions formed a circle around Ragna. The same went for the bastards facing Rem.
"I'm going to kill you, and then I'll rip that beastman bitch's crotch apart and kill her too."
Whatever his relationship with the black-clad guard had been, Rumt was clearly furious. Yet, he didn't rush in blindly. Was it because he was cautious? No, it was likely because he was highly experienced.
Encrid had no intention of waiting around.
Thud.
He kicked off the ground and surged forward. He had gained a new realization in swordsmanship from the few words he had heard from Ragna. Maintaining Single-Point Focus, he sharpened the blade of his senses. The prickling murderous intent radiating from his opponent stung his skin.
As Encrid lunged, Rumt's hands moved. He was fast. Terrifyingly fast. As his hands blurred, it looked as if he were wielding multiple blades instead of just two.
Encrid thrust his sword forward, using the Orthodox Sword style as his foundation. His plan was to parry if the opponent blocked, then wind his blade inward to thrust.
The opponent swung his two daggers and deflected Encrid's sword.
Clang!
It was a deflection infused with technique, not brute force—a skill that disrupted balance by striking the center of the blade. Encrid couldn't thrust where he had originally aimed. The tip of his sword slipped.
While his sword was deflected, the bastard closed in and stabbed with his dagger. It was a trajectory that momentarily slipped out of his field of vision. From bottom to top.
Sensing the approaching blade purely through his Sixth Sense, Encrid put strength into his left big toe and halted his body. With a sudden jerk, he restricted his body's movement.
As he pulled his elbow back to block the incoming dagger tip with his forearm guard, the dagger curved like a snake, aiming for his chin. It was unorthodox, fast, and bold.
Encrid snapped his head back. Swish. The tip of the blade grazed his chin. When he retrieved his extended sword and pulled it inward, the opponent rolled to the side to dodge.
Then, crossing his two daggers, the man glared at him. Those eyes seemed to ask: You dodged that?
Encrid thrust his sword forward again, unbothered. Why wouldn't he be able to dodge it? Honestly, if it had been before he developed his Sense of Evasion, he might have been sent straight to the grave. But as long as he perceived it, his body reacted.
He was a quite satisfying opponent. Yet, somehow... he also saw openings.
There was certainly a clear difference in skill compared to the bastards who had come with the beastman named Dunchabel.
Above special-grade, below Associate Knight.
That was his estimation of the opponent's skill. Along with the thought, Encrid thrust his sword forward once more. The daggers flew at him again. It was a trick he had already seen once.
Thump!
What he had learned while harvesting the heads of those bastards in the Gnoll fields wasn't just the Sense of Evasion. His swordsmanship had also improved, and he possessed the Heart of Monstrous Strength.
As he awakened his heart, power surged throughout his entire body. He shifted more weight onto his left foot. He pressed forward as if bearing down. He poured in his strength—a monstrous power that the opponent could neither gauge nor anticipate.
His concentration and sharp senses made the incoming daggers look like a series of disconnected frames rather than a blurry afterimage.
Clang!
Sparks flew as the dagger struck the flat of his sword. That was the end of it. For a technique to work, one needed at least a baseline of strength to match the opponent. The dagger could neither push nor deflect Encrid's sword.
He crushed it with overwhelming force.
In the slowed-down time, he saw his opponent's eyes. Looking at those panicked eyes, Encrid thrust his sword straight ahead.
Squelch.
The leather armor covering the chest tore open as the blade passed through. The opponent tried to twist his body to deflect the sword at the last second, but the sword Encrid held was simply too good. The tip of the blade gouged through the leather without mercy. Starting from below the collarbone, he stabbed diagonally and pulled it straight out, causing blood to spray.
Ping!
Then, a short bolt flew, aiming for Encrid. Ragna had dodged these by making it part of a continuous motion. Encrid imitated that.
Dodging the bolt, he spun on his left foot, momentarily showing his back to conceal the beginning and end of his hand's movement, and threw a dagger.
Whoosh!
The monkey-like female bandit hadn't anticipated this, and the knife struck her straight in the thigh.
"Ugh!"
She froze right there on the branch, clutching her leg.
Encrid's fight had ended rather quickly. And why wouldn't it? It had concluded after exchanging only two rounds of offense and defense.
Encrid's gaze naturally drifted toward Rem and Ragna. Needless to say, those two were completely dominating. These were men who were not only "somewhere near the feet of an Associate Knight" but could even kill one if circumstances favored them.
The difference in skill was clear. The cause of defeat, of course, stemmed from ignorance. They didn't know Encrid and the Mad Company. Because they didn't know, they had to suffer.
Encrid's gaze shifted to Ragna.
Whoosh.
The halberd feigned a thrust before sweeping horizontally. Ragna swung his sword in response. Defense? No.
Clang, screech.
Bind.
Since blocking with the edge would damage the blade, he blocked with the flat of his sword, then adjusted his strength to wind his sword around the halberd. Following that, a spear and a rapier flew at Ragna from his left and right. Both seemed to weaponize speed. The momentum of the weapons thrusting from the hands of the two female bandits was fierce.
In a split second, Ragna fused several movements into one.
First, gripping his sword with both hands, he lifted and wound the halberd upward to the left as if pushing it away. Since the flat of his blade remained pressed against it, they were still in a Bind. Having diverted the halberd's trajectory, he thrust straight forward. It was a speed that was neither fast nor slow.
As he stepped forward while winding his sword, the spear and rapier crossed and swept through the space where Ragna had just been standing.
Gritting his teeth, the male bandit with the halberd pulled his weapon back and pushed the thrusting blade away. Ragna, without exerting unnecessary force, took another step closer. He aimed the tip of his sword near the left side of his opponent's head.
The halberd bandit arched his back, but he couldn't dodge it completely.
Slice.
With a chilling sound, half of his ear was sliced off. Blood drenched the left half of his face, streaming downward.
The hands of the two women waiting nearby grew faster. The rapier danced as it flew forward, and the female bandit with the spear swung it in a wide arc to sweep at his feet.
Ragna, immediately after slicing the ear, retrieved his sword, blocked and deflected the incoming rapier, and leaped wide to the side to completely escape the range of the spear sweeping at his feet.
It was an astonishing harmony of distance control and exquisite swordsmanship.
Why?
Watching this, Encrid felt a sense of doubt. It felt as though Ragna was fighting while holding back to gauge his opponents' skills. Right after feeling this doubt, he realized the answer.
He's showing me.
What is swordsmanship? Every movement has a purpose.
Ragna's evasion held a deeper meaning. The spot he had moved to was to the right of the halberd bandit, forcing the female bandit with the rapier to look at Ragna with the halberd bandit standing between them.
Without even taking a breath, he executed a one-handed thrust. Lunging forward by the exact distance he had retreated, he aimed for the halberd bandit's neck. This strike, too, was neither fast nor slow.
To put it more clearly... it was just enough for the opponent to block.
Encrid's eyes grew busy. His mind grew even busier. Every single one of Ragna's movements was a lesson. It was a classroom, a textbook he couldn't afford to miss.
Yet, he couldn't just watch Ragna, because Rem was doing something similar.
"Tsuah!"
With a strange shout, Rem swung his axe in a massive vertical arc. An approaching bandit blocked the axe with his longsword.
Clang!
The sword shattered in a single blow.
"You bastard, my axe is a good one!"
Well, yes, that axe was indeed a good one. It was one he had picked up from a mercenary earlier and given to him.
Rem was also holding back his strength as he fought. Thus, he too was focusing on showing. While Ragna placed weight on an unusual precision and the meaning behind the forms of swordsmanship, Rem demonstrated how to fight rather than focusing on swordsmanship, utilizing his relatively superior strength.
If you didn't exploit your advantages over your opponent, what would you exploit?
It was as if he could hear Rem's voice.
Furthermore, it was about how to fight. He didn't just use his axe to defeat his opponents. He kept his mouth running constantly, grating on his opponents' nerves.
"Was your mother a ghoul?"
He also saw Rem using things he had learned from Encrid. Yet, all the while, Rem's axes delicately deflected, struck, and lashed out at weapons. His unhesitating footsteps craftily secured better positions than his opponents.
And watching the two of them, Encrid realized anew:
Those two are better off showing with their bodies than explaining with words.
Though it was only a brief moment, he already felt like he understood what they were trying to convey. It truly felt that way.