Chapter 26
Chapter 26
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: True Detective
Chapter: 26
Chapter Title: Three Absolutes (5)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Six months ago, the day Yuri first tasted the bitterness of defeat.
Splash—
Amid the crisp echo of rain inside the cave, Johan's voice flowed calmly.
The reason he had forced her into a spar she couldn't win.
The misery of defeat and the desperation it could forge.
Yuri listened intently to Johan's words.
She took in everything he meant to impart without filter.
As his voice, which had droned on for so long, began to fade...
Rustle.
Johan rose from his seat.
"You said you never wanted to lose again?"
It was the quiet vow Yuri had muttered to herself.
Turning it into a question, Johan picked up his sword and stepped forward.
Thud. Thud.
The falling rain soaked Johan's hair and shoulders.
Splat.
Standing on the wet earth in the downpour, Johan turned to Yuri.
A wry smile played on his lips.
"I felt the same."
Twenty-five years ago, when Johan was forty.
The Sword Lord of the same age had conquered the world.
Believing he could do the same if the Sword Lord had, Johan challenged him.
A genius deemed matchless save for the Sword Lord himself.
The clash between the acknowledged top dog and the runner-up drew massive attention.
Even busybodies buzzed that this might finally be the time the Sword Throne changed hands.
In the midst of overwhelming interest, the showdown of the century unfolded.
The result?
A crushing defeat for the challenger.
The loss of the man said to be the world's second strongest reaffirmed the Sword Lord's presence, which many had momentarily forgotten.
Why he was called the Sword Lord.
How he had seized the world.
The Sword Lord's aura, grown hazy with time, was revived by that duel.
And no one suffered under it more than Johan.
"Have you ever faced a wall you couldn't climb? One where no matter how hard you clawed your whole life, the summit stayed out of reach... where one misstep could send you plummeting from dizzying heights? A cliff like that."
Plunged into despair by his first defeat, the Sword Lord had become exactly that for Johan.
Misery, helplessness, frustration.
And fear, bestowed by the Sword Lord.
After that day's loss, Johan had to fight fiercely to overcome the Sword Lord who loomed as a massive wall in his mind.
He struggled alone to keep his spirit unbroken, to find the drive to rise again.
At long last, after ages of struggle, Johan broke the Sword Lord of his imagination.
He vowed then:
"I decided one defeat was enough. I etched into my bones the resolve to never lose again."
After that, he drove himself mercilessly.
He honed his weapons to prepare for battle with the Sword Lord.
Ten years passed like that.
Fully prepared, Johan once more pointed his sword at the Sword Lord.
The Sword Lord laughed.
[Interesting. You're the first to cross blades with me and survive, but you're also the only one whose spirit didn't break.]
The Sword Lord accepted Johan's challenge with immense delight.
In their second duel at last, Johan burned everything.
Thinking this was his final shot, he poured out all he had.
The result...
"I lost again. Pathetically, ridiculously so. Heh."
The defeat came so hollowly, rendering ten years of effort and resolve meaningless.
Having given his all, Johan couldn't even twitch a finger.
He gazed at the sky and calmly accepted death.
Dying by the Sword Lord's hand didn't seem like a bad end.
But the Sword Lord took something else instead of his life.
Slice.
Blood spurted from below Johan's right knee.
[Let's see if your spirit holds this time.]
That day, Johan lost a leg as vital as his life.
[If you can run faster than before even in that state... come find me again. I'll give it back then. Hahaha.]
The Sword Lord took Johan's severed leg and left laughing.
A truly humiliating defeat.
The worst situation, compounded by losing a leg.
Yet for some reason, Johan didn't despair like before.
He felt relieved, even.
"I poured everything into it, but I still couldn't touch the Sword Lord. Laughably, that very fact showed me the way."
Johan realized.
No matter how much he polished what he had, he could never surpass the Sword Lord.
So he searched.
For a way to defeat him.
"What that monster pursues is destruction rooted in utmost power and utmost speed. There might be someone stronger or faster than the Sword Lord... but no one surpasses him in both. That's certain."
Utmost power and utmost speed.
Having just one would lead to the same fate as his; surpassing both was impossible from the start.
"So, what method do you think could catch that monster?"
Shing.
Johan drew his sword and quietly extended it forward.
Drip. Drip.
Gazing at the clear raindrops bouncing off the silver blade, he continued.
"The Sword Lord's avatar is the Red Dragon cradling crimson flames."
In the legends of the Layment Continent, the Red Dragon symbolized power and destruction.
A fitting avatar for the Sword Lord, indeed.
"Legend says the Red Dragon's fire destroys all. Too strong and fast to block or extinguish—how do you face such flames?"
From earlier, Johan had kept asking Yuri how to face the Sword Lord.
But these weren't questions for her.
He was merely revisiting and reexamining the puzzle he'd solved himself.
"My answer was simple. It was..."
He trailed off, and his sword began to move.
Swish.
Slowly at first, like a dance weaving through the raindrops.
The blade, which had shimmered with sharpness, lost its form at some point.
Rustle.
Only silver trails lingered around Johan.
* * *
Just as Johan's sword had danced through the rain, so did Yuri's.
Then, at some moment, the sword's shape vanished.
In its place, rippling silver lines bloomed around Yuri.
So serene and beautiful, it seemed someone had painted in the air with silver thread.
Rumble—
Mu Chi's ferocious assault plunged down in crimson trails, clashing with the illusory silver painting enveloping Yuri.
The contrast was so stark it felt alien.
And at last, as Mu Chi's red spear reached Yuri's head...
Rustle.
The raindrops falling around Yuri halted.
As if time had frozen.
For a moment, the stopped rain reversed, rising from earth to sky.
Splash.
The bizarre phenomenon of rain flowing upward unfolded around Yuri.
With it, Mu Chi's red spear touched the silver trail.
[The answer I found was simple. It was...]
Yuri recited the way to counter the "monster's fire" that Johan had taught her that day.
[Returning the monster's fire.]
"Returning the monster's fire."
No sooner had she murmured it than the silver trail touching the spear reformed into a blade.
Yuri blocked the downward spear thrust with an upper guard.
Boom!
A fierce gust erupted between them, concentric ripples spreading across the dirt from Yuri at the center.
And that was it.
No massive explosion, no shockwave from clashing mana.
Nothing.
Yuri, having withstood Mu Chi's attack, looked utterly at ease.
One second later, Yuri's sword began slowly pushing Mu Chi's spear aside.
At the same time, a change rippled through Mu Chi's spear.
Rumble— rumble—
From the point of contact with Yuri's sword, the spear began to waver oddly.
Rumble— rumble—
"Huh?!"
Mu Chi panicked at the spear wriggling like a snake.
But unfortunately for him, that was just the beginning.
Rrrumble.
The wavering intensified, eventually turning into violent vibrations.
"U-Uwaaah?!"
Even the calluses and grip strength honed over a decade wielding the spear couldn't hold against the escalating tremors.
Yuri smiled and said,
"If you don't want your arm broken, you'd better let go."
Rrrumble.
Realizing the vibrations' fury meant her warning was no bluff, Mu Chi knew.
'I have to let go!'
His instincts screamed it.
Holding on would shatter more than just his arm.
Pale as a ghost, Mu Chi released the spear and flung himself aside.
It was an excellent decision.
Ziiing.
Even after he let go, the spear thrashed wildly in midair, crimson aura blazing.
At last, the red energy it held backlashed explosively.
Boom!
The crimson blast shot straight in the direction Mu Chi had stood, sweeping through the forest in its path.
Crack— crunch.
It demolished a full twelve massive trees before dissipating.
* * *
Ralph and Johan's eyes couldn't tear away from the aftermath of the crimson blast's rampage.
In the heavy silence, Ralph's pupils quivered.
And small wonder—Yuri's feat was something even he, with his vast experience, had never seen.
'That flying red energy was definitely the mana from Ice Wall Splitter... but what was that technique that bounced it back? A deflection?'
Among martial arts techniques, there were defensive moves that redirected an opponent's force to minimize damage.
At first, he'd thought Yuri's move was some variant of deflection.
But he soon shook his head.
'No, you can't deflect Ice Wall Splitter.'
No matter how weakened Mu Chi's version was, Ice Wall Splitter wasn't the sort of technique you could casually deflect.
Countless had tried and been crushed.
Dodge or counter with greater force.
Those were the only ways to handle Ice Wall Splitter.
Ralph had expected Yuri to use Brain Strike to overpower it.
That was what he'd schemed for, even resorting to tricks.
But no.
Yuri had raised her sword and blocked it.
Even granting she deflected Ice Wall Splitter, the redirected force from that stance should have gone into the ground.
Yet the power had flown off in a completely different direction.
'It definitely redirected Ice Wall Splitter's force mid-way.'
Without any preparatory stance, she'd taken it head-on.
Even freely altering its direction.
'It was like... using the opponent's power as her own and sending it back?'
Unable to square it with his common sense, Ralph had no choice but to ask.
The one who'd created the bizarre technique.
"What... what the hell was that?"
At Ralph's question, Johan gave a faintly hollow smile.
"Three Absolutes..."
The fifth head of House Redner, who created Brain Strike, elevated the family to prestigious status.
Ever since, House Redner had possessed only two ultimate arts: Fate Step and Brain Strike.
They neither created nor collected the sword arts, fist arts, or other martial techniques that other great houses boasted in dozens.
Mastering those two was plenty.
Indeed, with just them, House Redner was hailed as the strongest house.
For hundreds of years after the fifth head...
An unparalleled genius of House Redner birthed a third ultimate art.
The third absolute, born from the obsession to counter the monster's fire.
An incomplete technique crafted to command all flows in the world.
Johan named it:
"Demon Flow."
The flow of the demon.