The Hero's Sword (1)
“Wooooooah!”
“We believed in you, Julian!”
The two fairies clenched their fists and shot upward in excitement.
It wasn’t Pam and Ham.
It was Ram and Sam.
Boooom!
They cackled with glee as Julian drove Belzera into a corner.
“Not only did he find Belzera right away, he’s actually pushing her back like this!”
“Exactly! My chest feels so clear~! It’s like ten years of built-up indigestion just vanished!”
The pair who had only cheered for Kang Hae-il finally seemed to see the light after switching to Julian.
Damn. Becoming Julian’s constellation makes things this easy…!
So this is why everyone keeps chanting Julian~ Julian~.
Even as they celebrated, they felt it deep down.
Julian was far superior to Kang Hae-il.
Even in the most brutally difficult situations.
He only shone brighter the deeper he fell into danger.
Like a hero awakening every time he faced mortal peril.
“The number of constellations gathering right now is exploding! They must have heard the rumors!”
“For real?! That’s aweso—wait, no. That’s actually insane.”
Ram finally snapped back to her senses.
Having constellations swarm toward Julian couldn’t possibly be a good thing.
“That can’t happen! What the hell is Hae-il doing?!”
“I-I don’t know… We stopped watching him too…”
Even Ram and Sam had unconsciously stopped paying attention to Kang Hae-il at some point.
There simply wasn’t any reason left to watch him in this story board.
Current Viewers: 2,609 Constellations
The number of constellations watching Julian kept climbing.
“It’s fine, Ram. This is only temporary. The strongest gate. The strongest enemy. Of course it would draw curiosity. But from what I can see, if it’s only level 50… the current Julian should be able to kill it. Once that happens, this phenomenon will end soon…”
That was when it happened.
Fwooooosh!
As Belzera transformed into Belzerak, she revealed her true form.
Belzera was a demon of deception and bewitchment.
She always hid her real appearance, and the combat power she displayed in that state was only one-third of her true strength.
“L-Level… sixty?!”
Ram’s eyes looked ready to pop out of her skull.
“Fuck… how the hell… how are we supposed to clear this?!”
Even from her perspective, the gap looked impossible to overcome.
Julian hadn’t completely dominated the level 50 Belzera.
He had only gained a slight edge in speed and tactics, which snowballed into an extreme result.
In pure combat power, he had never held absolute superiority.
“The level difference of ten… isn’t that too much?”
“It is. Especially since the level system creates an exponentially larger gap per level the higher you go… Between 50 and 60, the difference is…”
Sam hammered away at her keyboard.
Tap tap tap tap.
“…Triple.”
“What?”
“The difference is three times.”
“……”
So the difference is about three times.
Junil focused mana into his eyes and observed.
Belzerak’s magi had risen roughly three times higher than when she was still Belzera.
On top of that, she had converted the energy she used to control the knights back into her own combat power.
The difficulty of the fight had just skyrocketed well beyond triple.
The beginning is still the only window of opportunity.
The situation was similar to before.
If he could overwhelm her in the early phase, there was still a chance.
Seize the psychological advantage and then…
Huh?
“You won’t die so easily, Julian. I really, really want to play you.”
Lick.
The moment Belzerak ran her tongue across her lips—
“!”
Swish—
Something flew at him without making a sound.
It was her main weapon, the whip.
The reason it made no sound was simple.
Center.
The speed was so fast the sound couldn’t even keep up.
Only after the whip struck the center and Junil’s sword shattered did the deafening roar finally explode outward.
——Kwaaaaaang!!
If he hadn’t paid extreme attention to her hand movements, he never would have blocked it.
“Huh? You blocked that?”
The whip wasn’t the only thing that was fast.
With one flap of her wings, Belzerak’s figure vanished.
Paht!
She instantly reappeared behind Junil.
She swung the gleaming blade she had drawn from behind her waist.
To anyone watching, it looked like Junil still hadn’t reacted at all.
Behind. Upper section.
Claaaang!
As if he had foreseen it, he spun around, pulled a new sword from his inventory, and parried.
“Ha?!”
That wasn’t all.
Separate from the Belzerak who had appeared behind him, the whip shot forward from the front as if it had a mind of its own.
It was similar to the feint Junil had shown earlier.
Because of that?
Kwaaaang!
He twisted his body back into position in an instant and knocked the whip away.
“…What?”
The newly drawn sword shattered again.
But the whip never touched his body.
The constellations couldn’t even understand how he was doing it. His reaction speed had reached a superhuman level.
Even taking the fantastical elements into account, it was incomprehensible.
Of course it was.
I’m not reacting at all.
He wasn’t blocking with pure reaction speed.
His body wasn’t capable of that.
“I can predict everything. All of it.”
It was prediction.
How they would fight, what they would aim for, every word, expression, and movement from Belzerak—he had read it all.
“What…?”
The relaxed expression on Belzerak’s face crumpled violently.
Not because of his taunt.
Mana Punch
Devastating shockwave strike to the abdomen
Thud—
Junil confirmed the hit and shouted.
“This isn’t the end yet?!”
Just as he said, it wasn’t over.
Mana Pop
Internal detonation via mana injection
The same technique he had used to kill the Death Knight.
It injected his mana directly into the enemy’s body to cause an internal explosion.
“Mana, gushing out~!”
The Mana Pop was unleashed alongside the punch.
A strike that already specialized in internal damage, now combined with an internal explosion.
Baaaaaaaang!
Her eyes rolled back as her body lifted into the air.
With a tremendous roar, her figure shot backward.
Crash!
She slammed hard into the wall, shaking the entire building.
“Wooooooooooooah!”
“Isn’t that the legendary Julian revived?! A hero who just arrived can fight like this?!”
“His mastery over mana is on another level!”
“Demon be goneeeeeee!”
Both the nobles and the constellations were shouting in excitement.
But—
Huff… huff…
Despite the relaxed lines and expression, Junil’s breathing was growing increasingly ragged.
He had claimed he could predict everything.
But there’s a limit to that.
Even a professional Go player could only read a few dozen moves ahead.
As the layers of psychological warfare piled up and grew more complex, reading moves became impossible.
There was a limit to how far prediction and reaction could take him.
On top of that, his body was slowly reaching its limit.
It had been an unwinnable fight from the start. Still, he had gritted his teeth, acted humorous, and pretended to be relaxed.
He had even shown some showmanship.
Only then would more constellations gather and give him even the slightest hope.
But—
She probably noticed already.
Crackle…!
Blue sparks began flickering from Junil’s hand.
It was proof that he could no longer properly contain his mana.
Like pouring too much water into a small cup, it was starting to overflow.
Damn it. The early fight was supposed to be the decisive moment. The Mana Pop didn’t land properly.
Because of that, the damage from Mana Pop hadn’t gone through fully either.
Mana Pop was originally a technique meant for empty corpses without any mana of their own.
A demon’s body was packed full of its own magi.
Forcing his current level of mana into such a body to cause damage was extremely difficult.
The accumulated damage was probably far less than it looked.
That was when it happened.
“Bloom!”
Hssssssssss…!
Pink smoke began rising around Belzerak.
Black rose flowers bloomed wildly along the smoke.
She was beginning her full magical deployment.
Dreamlike Mirage
High-level illusion spell
Creates multiple identical clones
Impossible to distinguish real from fake
Belzerak’s figures began appearing all around him.
“Hahahahaha…!”
“Ahahaha?!”
“Hey, Julian?”
“Not bad. This is fun.”
“I really want to play you.”
Countless Belzeraks walked toward him from every direction.
She noticed.
Grind.
Junil bit his lip.
The fact that she had deployed this spell meant she planned to drain his stamina.
She had already realized his mana sustainability was extremely low.
Dozens of mirages.
Only one was real.
I can’t possibly tell them apart.
But trying to distinguish them was exactly what the spell wanted.
That’s the entire premise of this illusion.
The foundation beneath an illusion spell was crucial.
This spell didn’t have any particularly powerful effects, but its core premise was that it was absolutely impossible to tell the illusions from the real one.
In other words, the only way was to cut them all down until he found out.
He needed to keep that in mind and conserve his strength, but—
Whip!
The whip came flying.
Not just one.
Over a dozen lashes shot toward him at once.
Don’t try to figure out which is real.
He only needed to think about where Belzerak would want to hit.
Instead of distinguishing and blocking, he would only block the spots where impact was expected.
Here.
Claaaang!
The whip bounced away and the sword shattered.
First one down.
Hsssss…!
The black roses bloomed more pink clouds, narrowing his field of vision.
They came flying again.
Clang!
This one he couldn’t block.
It was better to dodge them all.
Flash St—
The moment he tried to use Flash Step.
Slaaaaaash!
Junil’s back took a direct hit.
At this point, even Flash Step wasn’t fast enough to dodge.
Crash, tumble…!
With a tremendous impact, Junil’s body rolled across the floor.
Fuck. That hurts like hell, doesn’t it?
It felt like half his back had been torn off.
The illusion was amplifying the pain.
“Kuh… huff…!”
Junil gasped and writhed in agony.
But he didn’t even have time for that.
Claaang!
Clang!
The whip attacks came pouring down even harder.
He tried blocking with his sword again.
But the whips had grown stronger. They now shattered his swords and still pierced through.
Claaaang!
“Kuhuk! Uuugh…!”
More and more attacks were landing.
The mirage clouds fed on Julian’s blood and pain, growing thicker. Even the fake whips now delivered pain that felt completely real.
Clatterclatterclatter!
It felt like all dozen whips were striking him at once.
It’s fake. It feels real but it’s fake.
Junil kept repeating it to himself.
There would definitely be an opening.
Those illusions would disappear if they were hit by anything containing even a small amount of mana.
Junil rolled to avoid one whip strike, slammed the ground, and sent stone fragments flying.
Thud!
Shards shot up and he knocked them forward.
Papapaht!
Several illusions actually vanished.
It’s not enough.
This wasn’t going to cut it.
“Ahahaha! How cute!? I’ll play you even more!”
Claaang!
Another strike landed on his back.
“Grrrrr…!”
“That sound is just wonderful!”
Junil grit his teeth and thought.
If I were just ten levels higher, fuck…
Even if it was only twenty-five percent of Julian’s power, if he could use it for a long time, he might have stood a chance.
No, he might have even overwhelmed her.
But his body was in terrible shape.
Damn level…!
Suddenly he hated Kang Hae-il.
That bastard was S-rank, so his level shot up no matter how he lived.
This lowly rank was holding him back even here.
Archidia was his spiritual homeland.
Yet here he was, showing such a pathetic sight again.
He really hated it.
And probably…
Someone who remembered him felt the same.
He had gone beyond sympathizing with Julian and had begun to feel pure rage.
That was the last message.
Ding.
◈ Grants infinite mana capacity to the wielder
◈ The legendary blade of the hero from ancient tales
An unknown constellation has sponsored you with the Hero's Sword.
A blinding light burst forth, completely blinding his vision.
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
In the center of that brilliant light was a familiar sword.