41: White (4)
Start analyzing. As fast as you can.
Got it.
"I'm going."
"Don't come."
She ignored my half-hearted reply and teleported right behind me.
The first strike was a simple downward slash with her one-handed sword.
I conjured a weapon in an instant and blocked it.
Swish—
My right arm came off.
The moment she saw my defense, she teleported again and severed the arm with her blade. Estelle picked up the fallen limb and spoke.
"I'll take responsibility and reattach it. Let's stop this and go back."
"No need."
The white terrain, now assimilated with me, rose from the ground and reformed my right arm. The one-handed sword in her grip, stained white by my blood, melted away like it had never existed.
"Ah, that was a gift I got when I was five."
"My arm was a gift I got at birth. Let's call it even."
We traded jokes, but the atmosphere only grew heavier.
It was time to use what I'd been saving.
I activated the artifact Professor Nova had given me. Countless beams of light burst forth, yet instead of flying off they converged on me.
"Alright. Here I come again."
Clad in armor of light, I faced her as she shot toward me like a bullet, a greatsword in her hands.
A feint? Or a direct thrust at my opening?
I had to hold out until Luna finished her analysis. I already had a decent read on Estelle as a person.
I layered the Authority of Domination over Assimilation. The ground heaved violently. The sensation that it had become an extension of my own body made every movement sharper.
White spears erupted from the earth and lunged at her, but she swept them aside with a casual swing of the greatsword. When she closed the distance I parried her blade with swordsmanship stolen from the Pursuers.
"Sloppy."
She shifted the greatsword to one hand and drove her free hand between my arms, pressing down on the flat of my blade. My arms bent in the direction she pushed.
"Why don't you just give up?"
She stabbed at me with words instead of steel, as if she could end my life at any moment. Her eyes wavered slightly. She hadn't been worn down yet. She hadn't suffered enough losses. That hesitation was shaking her.
"Sorry, but a half-wit like me who has nothing else going for him can't afford to give up."
Countless thorns exploded outward from me in every direction. She looked like she wanted to answer, but the attack forced her to dodge instead.
Her Seonghwi had effectively sealed my bow.
She gathered her mana again and charged.
I twisted out of the way of her body tearing through the air, and at the same time she vanished.
Left.
Thanking Luna for the support, I raised a white wall on my left the instant I used the Authority. She only managed to cut it halfway through before leaping back with Seonghwi, her expression unchanged.
"You've gotten tougher. In that short time, too."
"Doesn't that sound weird when you say it?"
She frowned at my crude joke, but quickly realized even that had bought me a moment and continued.
"If we keep this up, I might have to kill you."
"I know."
"Stop and go back. This isn't like you."
"What is 'like me'?"
"At the very least, you never acted without a plan. Be honest. Do you actually have a way to solve this problem? Can you guarantee you'll resolve it for certain?"
"I'll find a way and solve it."
"That's exactly why this isn't like you. You've always only moved when you were certain. Don't put other people's lives on the scale too."
I gave her a bitter smile at those words.
"I wonder. Maybe your words aren't entirely right."
Perhaps I'd been gambling ever since my first plan on the entrance ceremony day—betting the lives of heroes who would save humanity on a goal called an ideal. I was a half-wit. Because I couldn't solve things myself, I dragged everyone around me into it.
"I haven't stopped gambling since that first moment. So I'll gamble this time too. For the sake of the little girl who's stayed by my side."
"I see. You've already made up your mind."
Almost nothing in this world could be cleanly divided into good and evil.
Was she evil for trying to eliminate a threat that could endanger countless lives in advance?
Was I evil for trying to shoulder a risk that might take countless lives away, all for the sake of someone precious to me?
There was no evil here.
We were simply acting according to our own justice and standards.
"Right. You can't face someone who's already decided with half-hearted resolve."
The hesitation in her eyes was gone. She gripped her weapon once more.
"I understand your judgment. And you'll understand mine too."
I looked at her, filled with resolve, and reined in my Authority.
"So, did I buy enough time?"
"You knew."
"Consider it the bare minimum apology for facing you with half-hearted resolve."
Starlight-like mana flowed across her entire body.
"I'll do this properly now."
Behind.
I pulled out a shield and blocked her downward strike.
Right flank.
I caught the side attack with the gauntlet of my armor. In that instant she discarded her weapon and disappeared from my sight.
An attack aimed at my left calf from behind.
It was too late to move the shield again.
I activated the artifact and shifted the armor. Blades like awls shot out and stopped the spear thrust aimed at my leg.
At the same time I saw her swinging a hammer in front of me and reflexively raised the shield.
Behind!
She'd shown herself for a moment as a feint, then immediately teleported behind me for the real attack.
Could I block it?
No.
Could I dodge it?
No.
I thought of a third option.
I concentrated the Authority of Domination. It wasn't on the level of the original since I hadn't absorbed and raised people, but if I focused it I could still push through the resistance of Seonghwi and exert some influence.
Chains burst from the ground and bound her hammer. Without hesitation I thrust my sword at her.
"Ugh."
"Hah, first time I've landed a clean hit without a penalty."
I looked at her as she twisted her body at the last second, leaving only a shallow cut. She wiped the red blood flowing from the wound with her finger. It was barely an attack at all.
The damage from forcing herself to block everything with one arm and breaking bones was probably greater. But my Authority was growing stronger.
Her weapons were melting away, damaged to the point they could no longer function as weapons. When she wrapped them in mana, the destruction slowed—probably because of the Seonghwi.
"Guess today's the day I buy all new weapons."
"Bill the Alchemists."
"I will."
She teleported into my blind spot again and swung the hammer. I barely managed to block it. My reactions were becoming more precise and faster.
She jammed a dagger into the joints of my armor while I swung at her arm. She teleported once more and thrust a halberd at my leg. I blocked it with the shield and raised terrain to stop the follow-up attack.
A massive thorn erupted from the ground and pierced the spot where she'd been standing. Matching her teleport, I folded the terrain as if following her.
The assimilation had progressed enough that the physical debuff from her Seonghwi was weakening.
"I'll guarantee Luna's safety as much as possible. Just so we can remove the Authority."
"And if that doesn't work, can you stop me from erasing Luna? You won't be able to. Not just you—your entire family is involved."
I met her swung axe with my own.
She backed off and pulled out a sniper rifle. Even without proper aiming, she seemed to sense where the bullet would go and pulled the trigger. She teleported faster than the bullet and swung her arming pod at me.
The blades that shot out from the armor blocked the arming sword while the terrain stopped the incoming bullet. Next came the shotgun.
The shotgun roared.
I hastily conjured a shield to block the spread, but my reaction was too slow. The pellets shattered part of my armor and tore into me.
"Firearms are definitely annoying."
I muttered while looking at the melting arming sword. Unlike melee weapons, they never made contact, so the Authority couldn't affect them.
"Says the guy who's regenerating on his own."
I restored the torn flesh with the Authority.
As the fight dragged on, excitement began to show in her eyes. A beautiful purple light, just like her pupils, started to overlay the starlight mana.
"Ah, right."
She changed her grip.
What was that?
I hesitated for a moment at the unfamiliar stance. Then the experiences I'd stolen through assimilation sent a chill down my spine.
The mana gathering around her made me uneasy.
Ah.
A technique trained against large demon beasts.
One that had appeared several times in the original story.
"Crazy."
I had to stop her from swinging that.
I broke into a run to seize the initiative, even shattering the terrain. She dodged my opening attack and swung the zweihander in an unstable posture.
BOOOOOOM—
Her attack erased a mountain.
A mountain—split in half.
I'd been mistaken.
Her usual physical abilities had been adjusted for fighting people. Even though her technique was monstrous, I'd thought her raw power was still within the realm of comparison.
But that wasn't it.
She'd been holding back to match others.
I'd been deluding myself that we were comparable.
Though the strike hadn't hit me head-on because of her unstable stance, I looked at her after she'd blown away half my body.
"As expected, you regenerate."
"Were you trying to kill me?"
"No? Usually demon beasts or devils specialized in recovery can endure as long as the brain and heart remain."
"You don't even see me as human anymore."
I had no luxury to conserve strength for the 'what if' scenarios in the Demon Realm. Since she would recover through the terrain anyway, she employed the obvious countermeasure of pulverizing the terrain itself to prevent regeneration.
Something rose from the ground.
Clones identical to me stood up.
"You're multiplying now?"
She casually destroyed five clones with sword aura.
"Why not? I'm raising the average male beauty of the world."
"Bullshit."
Countless versions of me rushed at her. I couldn't afford to wait quietly for her weapons to run out. I had to actively use the clones to reduce her armaments.
To deny her time to reload and to avoid being swept up all at once by sword aura, I spread them out as much as possible.
The effect of wrapping her weapons in sword aura was clear. Because her mana was stably coating the surface rather than simply being poured into the weapon, my Authority struggled to destroy them.
The silver lining was that maintaining sword aura consumed a lot of mana, so she could no longer use a variety of weapons.
Whether intentional or not, Estelle wielding a zweihander—ideal for chaotic melee—was difficult to handle. The usual weakness of large weapons being affected by terrain became meaningless the moment she could slice through terrain like tofu, and she constantly checked my attempts to gain distance.
Done.
Yeah.
Luna's analysis finished right on time.
The kingdom deploys a domain of whatever size she wants. Inside it, the physical abilities of designated enemies are reduced, instantaneous teleportation is possible, she can detect everyone's location, and until she dispels the domain, no one can enter or leave without her permission.
It was similar to what I'd seen.
Can you deploy it?
Difficult. But I can do the rest.
I teleported and thrust my sword at her. She reacted and poured attacks on me.
"You're teleporting now too?"
"Thanks to you."
While I teleported beside her, one of my clones dropped from the air and thrust a sword.
"Haa…"
She sighed and dealt with me and the clones charging at her.
My sword strikes and the endless clones.
No matter how strong she was, her mana wasn't infinite. After turning the surrounding area into a wasteland, it wasn't strange that her mana was nearly depleted.
Haa— haa—
She caught her breath and looked at me.
Neither of us was in good shape. This area had been reduced to a wasteland with no trace of my Authority left, only scattered wounds remaining. She had also exhausted her mana and weapons, now only able to point the hilt of what remained at me. She had no major injuries, but her stamina seemed spent as she panted heavily.
"It's over now. You can't continue fighting anymore."
"Ah, I was going to return this, but I guess I'll have to use it. Since I gave it to you as a gift, it should be fine, right?"
She pulled out a bow and arrow.
One that looked very familiar.
"What do you think you're going to do in that state?"
"Then give up. You know I'm a genius. I'll find a way."
"I'll take your first failure."
I walked past the exhausted Estelle who could barely stand.
I tried to ignore the voice that forced its way into my head, but reflexively threw myself to the side. A purple-glowing arrow was embedded in my shoulder.
"You dodged."
"What is this—"
Not only her mana but the stars themselves were shining purple.
Seonghwi.
She had revealed her second Seonghwi.
I hurriedly took a stance, but I had no means left to use. Purple arrows fired in an instant pierced my legs, and before I could even register it, she drew a weapon made of Seonghwi and neutralized me with perfect form.
"There goes the protagonist buff."
"I'm sorry."
"If you're sorry, come visit me on the first visitation day."
She nodded silently.