80. The Master's Dregs
80. The Master's Dregs
Since Adolph Roang became a Master, the last time he had been beaten this badly was twenty years ago, at the hands of the Empire's fledgling Master.
It was true, he had let his guard down.
It was because, ever since ascending to the realm of Master, every opponent who appeared before him had always been weaker than himself.
A world where everyone you saw was weak and yawn-inducing wasn't half bad, though.
Being the strongest person meant you could lord it over everyone, after all.
Even now, the Sword Saint felt nothing from Atlas standing right in front of him.
He seemed to have a bit of a temper, but that was about it.
He had appeared out of nowhere without a trace, holding a rare sword made of Adamantium, and had even received or parried his strikes, but... that was about it.
He felt nothing beyond that.
Now that he thought about it, it seemed it had been the same when he had faced the 'Empire's Greatest Sword' on the battlefield.
Even after being beaten so badly, the Sword Saint hadn't acknowledged it.
The fact that the small academy student standing before him was on the same level... no, possibly even greater than him.
He didn't even want to entertain the thought.
The fact that wet-behind-the-ears youngsters had reached a realm he had barely achieved after turning sixty... before they were even forty. The fact that he could no longer even properly sense a Master's presence.
The fact that things that should have been a given no longer worked.
The Sword Saint clenched his teeth and raised his sword again.
He was the Sword Saint.
There was no way a green young brat like that could be stronger than him.
"I'll admit it, I let my guard down... but it won't happen again. I'll show you the difference in our levels."
"You got beat up that badly just before and you still want to duel with swordsmanship, no Aura Blade? Fine by me."
The Sword Saint felt a surge of rage at Atlas's relaxed demeanor.
Despite standing before a Master, Atlas remained utterly composed, as if it was nothing.
He was emitting a killing intent that would make even Experts flinch, yet it wasn't doing any damage at all.
The Sword Saint took up his sword and charged forward again.
He still couldn't understand the bizarre movements Atlas sometimes displayed, but just standing around wouldn't change anything.
The Sword Saint's power was functioning normally.
An invisible force was pressing down on Atlas.
Atlas might look relaxed, but it was all a bluff.
He had dashed in, judging that Atlas was in a state where moving even a single step would be difficult.
Seeing the Sword Saint, Atlas finally drew his sword properly.
The Sword Saint thought he had to be at least a top-tier Expert to be able to move rather than just stand there enduring it.
And right after that, Atlas vanished from his sight, and the force that had been applied lost its hold on him.
"Uwoot?!"
Atlas, who he thought had disappeared, reappeared right in front of the Sword Saint's nose.
He barely dodged the fierce thrust of the jet-black, ink-colored long sword.
Atlas's relentless assault started anew from there.
An exchange of offense and defense too fast for even the Experts to properly see flashed by.
They slashed and stabbed at incredible speeds, aiming for each other's openings, and the Sword Saint struggled against Atlas's attacks, which stabbed from completely unexpected angles below his field of vision.
Then, the moment their cross guards locked, the Sword Saint forced a contest of strength on Atlas.
In a contest of strength, Atlas, with his smaller stature, would inevitably be at a disadvantage because his center of gravity was lower.
He had no intention of bluffing against a Master—that would only work if his opponent was several levels below him.
But just as the Sword Saint tried to force the contest, Atlas 'stepped on the empty air'.
The Sword Saint couldn't believe the sight unfolding before his eyes.
Atlas had risen into the air.
It felt different from levitation magic.
'Th-... this is...?!'
There were plenty of spells that could produce a similar result.
But magic always left traces of mana.
In the act of Atlas stepping up into the air, no mana could be felt at all.
And Adolph, as a Master, knew exactly what that meant.
"There's no way!! What kind of trickery are you using?!"
The Sword Saint tried once more to activate his power and press down on Atlas, who was floating in the air.
The ornaments on the Sword Saint's blade, which was in contact with Atlas's sword, began to glow.
Seeing the glowing ornaments, Atlas clicked his tongue.
"How pathetic...!"
Once again, the power the Sword Saint manifested tore through the empty space.
And Atlas's voice rang out from right behind the Sword Saint.
-Seogeok!
"Kuk?!"
His side was sliced.
It wasn't a deep cut.
The clothes he was wearing had multiple magical treatments, and underneath them, he wore chain mail as well.
But had it not been for those precautions, his guts would have spilled out.
"You... how did you cut through this without even using an Aura Blade...!"
"You of all people should know that best."
He had prepared defenses that could even block an Expert's Aura Blade, so the fact that Atlas had pierced through even the chain mail without using an Aura Blade was a shocking revelation.
The fragments of various information converged into a single conclusion.
The bizarre movements he couldn't understand, the level of swordsmanship that was similar to or exceeded his own as a Master, and... the strangely sparse use of an Aura Blade despite being at least a top-tier Expert...
The conclusion being that Atlas was also a 'Master'.
"There's no way... No, it doesn't matter!! Whatever you might be!!!"
The Sword Saint retreated with a large step backward and raised his sword toward the sky.
A sharp sonic boom echoed from the blade as it began to spew aura.
"I'll just crush it all!!!"
The torrent of aura erupting from the sword shot wildly into the sky, smashing through the ceiling before soaring up to an unknowable height.
---------------------------------------------------
Fragments of the ceiling rained down from all directions, but thankfully, they hadn't been underground this time.
After batting away a few pieces of debris, the sky was visible through the gaping hole in the ceiling.
'Holding a title like Sword Saint, I wondered how amazing he'd be... but he was only good enough to lose to the Director.'
He was a character who died not long after the original story began, so I hadn't expected much, but he was worse than I imagined.
Maybe he had been stronger in the past.
"You've been broken."
"What are you talking about...!!"
Seeing the dregs of what once was a Master, pathetically groveling after perhaps having his spirit broken by his defeat to the Director, I even felt a pang of pity.
Even watching that torrent of power that looked ready to swallow anything whole, I felt nothing.
A sight that would make an Expert's legs tremble just from looking at it appeared to a Master as nothing more than a herbivore puffing itself up to threaten a predator.
It seemed he sought a flamboyant display to hide his weakened essence.
"Hey, old man... every Master has their own 'Law'. Use it. Why, can't you 'use it' anymore?"
"You knew about that too... but you'd already had a taste of it several times.. to think you didn't even notice it.."
"That's just gravity magic being manifested from your sword. You call something like that a Master's Law?"
The Sword Saint's face reddened.
He must have been struck right at the heart of the matter.
The technique the Sword Saint had used several times to make my body heavier was magic.
Magic that intensified the gravity of a designated space... And he didn't even cast it himself; he used the power of an artifact.
At first glance, his wild flying through the sky might remind one of the Director riding his sword, but that too was thanks to the cloak fluttering on his back, an artifact enchanted with flight magic.
I had been suspicious the entire time since we clashed.
I've fought against Masters more than once or twice, so it made no sense to be this relaxed.
With physical abilities and combat sense on an entirely different level from an Expert, plus the unique Law one acquires upon reaching the realm of Master, a normal fight should have us both sweating and struggling.
But crossing swords with the Sword Saint left me eerily calm.
"You... are no longer a Master."
Yeah.. it felt like fighting against an Expert.
"I'm not a Master..? You've never even become a Master, so you wouldn't know what realm a Master is! Look! This is the Aura Blade of a Master..!!"
The Sword Saint emphasized his Aura Blade, held aloft above his head.
It certainly was an Aura Blade with incredible output.
If he brought it down like that, its power was enough to easily capture a fortress.
"That's not a Master's Aura Blade. Your mental image isn't evenly refined, so you can't even control it. Any Expert can show off power like that."
The Sword Saint's expression changed with every word I spoke.
Each word I uttered was a dagger gouging at the Sword Saint's heart.
"How pitiful... So your spirit was completely broken after that defeat."
This was the first time I had seen a case like this.
A tremendous ego is required to reach the realm of Master.
The realm of Master can only be reached by possessing an ego so powerful that you can assert, even if not against the whole world, that 'this is the right way'. And yet, his spirit was broken, and as a result, he lost a part of his Master's abilities...
This was content that would make scholars faint.
"You ended up thinking you couldn't win with your own power... that you'd win by borrowing the power of a different medium, not yourself..."
"No... what would a mere brat like you know..!!"
The Sword Saint brought his Aura Blade down.
The Aura Blade, possessing enough force to tear down an entire castle wall, descended with a fierce sound.
"It might not be the direction you wanted, but you'll leave your name in history. As the first Master to lose the realm of Master."
I tightened my grip on my sword as I watched the scene.
If I wanted to dodge, I could avoid it easily with a single use of Shukuchi, but I couldn't do that now.
Liber was behind me, and... I had to show the truth to the Sword Saint, who couldn't admit he was no longer a Master and was struggling desperately.
I had to make him realize what he had forgotten.
"You seem to have already forgotten, so I'll show you again. This is the Aura Blade of a Master who has reached the extreme."
A pure white flash erupted from Squete.