253. Knights of Charlemagne vs Rin - Olivier (2)
253. Knights of Charlemagne vs Rin - Olivier (2)
***
As the Knights of Charlemagne players who weren't competing took their seats in the Colosseum stands.
A massive circle immediately began to form around the two people left in the Colosseum.
The enormous Colosseum existed for team matches. Its vast interior was now being divided to create a separate space for a 1:1 individual match.
As a huge barrier of light formed spectacularly, enclosing the two of them, a duel start notification and countdown appeared in their vision.
—The duel will begin shortly.
-10. 9.
With Serin's single word, "Surely not," Olivier abandoned any thought of further conversation.
He simply gripped the golden hilt of his mythic-grade rapier, Hauteclaire, as if to crush it, his gaze cold.
"..."
Given Olivier's personality of speaking less the angrier he got, his tightly sealed lips now were proof that his fury had risen to the top of his head.
—5.
Even as the countdown continued, the silver-haired woman looked utterly at ease in Olivier's eyes.
In the footage he had seen of her, there had been no sign of her using a sword anywhere.
He had watched the scrim footage against G1, so he hadn't looked down on Serin from the start—he had held a sliver of expectation.
But now, one emotion filled Olivier's mind completely.
'...I will definitely win.'
It was a massive, blazing fighting spirit—the determination to defeat that woman with the relaxed smile no matter what.
—1.
When the countdown ended, both of them kicked off the ground at the same time, neither waiting for the other.
Olivier in his resplendent golden armor launched himself powerfully off the ground, while Serin in her light armor kicked off lightly, gripping a bloodstained blade. The two were completely different, yet they threw themselves at each other as if sharing the same intent.
Olivier raised his rapier toward the front, poised to thrust at any moment.
In contrast, Serin's hand pointed downward, and so her blade also faced the Colosseum floor.
Because both of their armaments were light, their movements were agile, and within seconds they closed the distance.
Realizing that Serin had entered the effective range of his skill, Olivier deployed it without hesitation.
—Pastua.
The moment he stepped forward with his right foot. His right foot rotated as if tracing a spiral, and at the same time his body instantly accelerated, shooting forward at a bizarre angle.
Following his abruptly accelerating form, the golden blade in his hand also blazed with brilliant light, beginning to embroider the empty air at irregular angles.
As the rapier repeatedly shot golden light along irregular trajectories.
Swish.
Serin, who had been watching, responded calmly without any visible disturbance.
As if she had predicted Olivier's skill, she stepped forward composedly and deployed a skill of her own.
—Spiral Form.
As her body rotated rapidly with the forward step, the bloodstained blade that had been aimed at the floor blazed with intense light, tracing a spiral as if revolving through space once.
......
As if the two had deliberately synchronized their movements—Olivier spinning in an instant and tracing a golden trajectory, and Serin, facing him, also spinning as her bloodstained trajectory extended.
—!
The clash of their first skills produced its result the instant they met.
Swish!
The bloodstained blade, spiraling through the air, deftly deflected the strange golden trajectory and carved deeply across Olivier's chest.
The moment they passed each other as if crossing paths. Serin slowly turned her body and immediately lowered her sword again.
Whoosh!
A small spray of blood flew fiercely through the air, following the bloodstained blade as it swept downward, and the blade, shrouded in a blood-red aura, rippled savagely with not a single drop of blood clinging to it.
"..."
Olivier, who had hastily turned around, checked the wound on his chest and swallowed hard.
'How did a Dancer get that timing...?'
That exchange just now had been a perfect counter—and a situation he had experienced before.
It was one of the techniques Jeanne d'Arc had badly punished him with in a tournament. He couldn't forget it even if he tried.
But the woman called Rin had just reproduced that technique, timing it in a way he couldn't even comprehend.
'Was she originally a Knight Class?'
Facing Rin, who handled him like a Knight Class user, Olivier couldn't help but feel an immense sense of dissonance.
Even that deft deflection and slash across his chest just now. It was a level of skill proficiency that was hard to believe had been deployed by a Dancer Class, not a knight.
"Do I still look like I'm playing around?"
As Serin spoke in a voice full of composure, Olivier's expression hardened further in response.
"If you had told me beforehand... that you had played Knight Class before, I wouldn't have had to embarrass myself like this."
The thought that Olivier himself—no, that the team called Charlemagne—was being mocked by someone picking up a sword. That thought had been arrogance.
The opponent now facing him was unmistakably like a single "knight."
And not just any knight—a knight who could find openings that most knights couldn't even imitate.
As Olivier calmly steadied his mind with those thoughts.
"..."
Serin had to forcibly suppress a laugh that nearly escaped.
Right now, she was practicing Roland's movements and trying to reproduce them in scrims, so being told she looked like a knight user was no different from the highest praise.
He probably thought I'd played a knight before after clashing with my skill. That seemed to be what he was thinking.
She wondered what to say about that, but seeing his resolute expression, she forced the emotion back down.
'No problems in actual combat.'
A Dancer Class wielding a one-handed sword instead of a Crescent-Moon Weight shifts to restrained attacks rather than dance-like skill forms. The available skills change to ones similar to a standard Knight Class.
Compared to an actual Knight Class, the number of available skills wasn't large, but that was precisely why it held more meaning.
Her goal was to show the Knights of Charlemagne, who clumsily pursued orthodoxy, what true orthodoxy looked like. And with Roland's movements from her memories, it would be supremely effective against them.
Tap!
Seeing that Serin showed no intention of attacking, Olivier kicked off the ground again.
'I have to treat her as a knight.'
Pastua was a decent skill for surging at an opponent and going on the offensive, but if the opponent could counter like that, it was unusable.
So he had to engage in a frontal fight, but deploy the most destructive skill that would be hardest for her to handle.
'I'll strike at her blind spot.'
Against Serin, who calmly watched until he entered effective range, Olivier pulled his right hand gripping the rapier's hilt back to his chest as far as it would go and lowered his upper body.
The moment he took a stance as if about to be launched, a golden radiance burst from Olivier's form.
—Lupus Teria.
The instant he was suffused with brilliant light, he shot forward like a single beam of light, and the rapier, completely dyed gold, surged rapidly toward Serin's head.
As the brilliant golden light devoured the space in an instant and rushed at her, Serin's eyes widened.
'Fast.'
She had predicted the skill from his stance, but its activation speed exceeded her expectations.
Showing the skill's preparation motion directly to accelerate its deployment speed—that was a move worthy of a pro player.
"...!"
The golden line burst toward her, and she could see its trajectory and where it was aimed, but its speed was insanely fast.
So Serin's thoughts leaned toward dodging rather than clashing.
But suddenly, one movement from Roland's image flashed through her mind.
The moment the enemy knight's sword extended first, when she had thought it absolutely impossible to counter—Roland had displayed an inexplicable artistry in striking it back.
—A Single Line.
In an instant, along the trajectory of the shooting golden light, Durandal, shrouded in a blood-red aura, twisted at a bizarre angle and was swung upward in one motion.
Her hand, swung like that, looked too late.
At the moment when her head seemed about to be pierced by the surging golden line.
Step.
Serin pulled her body back one step the moment she finished deploying the skill.
As if reproducing the sight of Roland from her memories.
——!
Immediately after, a strange phenomenon occurred: Durandal, which had blazed late, caught up to the golden line that had blazed first.
***
BOOM!!
The golden line was deflected by the bloodstained line that had been swung up late, and it could be seen destroying a large section of the innocent Colosseum.
The Knights of Charlemagne players seated in the Colosseum stands all blinked as one.
"Was that actually a timing you could counter?"
Mina asked, sounding baffled, and Hamin replied with a subtle smile.
"Right? It didn't look like a parry, though."
CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!!
Immediately after, Olivier, looking greatly startled, thrust his rapier rapidly again and again, and Rin could be seen countering each thrust with restrained movements, as if she had predicted every trajectory.
Yena, seated near Sihyeon, watched the two clashing blades in a tense exchange and looked at Sihyeon as if amazed.
"I wondered what was going on when she suddenly equipped Durandal instead of the Crescent-Moon Weight, but I'd believe it even if you told me she was a knight user. And at first, I thought Seojin had let his guard down and allowed that first hit."
At Yena's words, Sihyeon let out a hollow laugh.
"...Yena, Seojin never let his guard down."
"What?"
When Yena asked what he meant, Sihyeon muttered something else with a deeply serious expression.
"The first match will end quickly."
The moment he directly observed Rin's movements, Sihyeon felt an indescribable, immense sense of disconnect.
Rin's skill, which he had watched in videos over the past few days, was certainly outstanding.
But he hadn't thought it was at a level where they couldn't exchange swords at all, or where a scrim wouldn't be possible.
Rin showing skill equal to or greater than G1 was certainly surprising, but team matches and individual matches were fundamentally different in nature.
He had thought that in individual skill, they, as Knight Class players, wouldn't be pushed that far by Rin.
But the reality of facing her now was... devastating.
"...It doesn't look like Seojin will be able to win easily."
As Yena spoke with an uncertain expression at Sihyeon's demeanor,
"Seojin has lost."
Sihyeon muttered with a calm expression.
As if it were already fact.