Come Here, Take a Hit (3)
Come Here, Take a Hit (3)
Two of the knight villains had already gotten their heads busted.
Ian swept his gaze across the arena.
Among the remaining knights, the one waiting to face him—the "Low-Kick Villain"—had already locked in his semifinal spot and was glaring this way with genuine murder in his eyes.
'Yeah, I can feel it. He fully intends to snap my leg.'
A match against that guy would be interesting, but first: the quarterfinals.
Ian's quarterfinal opponent was a rather agile-looking woman wielding a longsword.
The higher he climbed through the bracket, the more apparent it became—the number of genuinely skilled fighters at 4-Star and above was steadily increasing.
"Hup!"
He slipped in using [Leap], but his opponent, relying purely on instinct, managed to raise her wooden sword and block—albeit sluggishly.
Then she fired off sharp shards of ice.
- Thud-thud-thud
Ian instantly reshaped his wooden sword into a shield and blocked them.
The ice shards pierced clean through the wood, eerily sharp.
"Whoa. Wouldn't a direct hit from that kill someone?"
The woman, her hair the deep shade of coffee, retorted sharply.
"You're not dead, are you? What kind of man whines about something like that?"
"......"
Ian was learning firsthand.
The game's setting held true: Northern women were beautiful but had absolutely rotten personalities.
'Guess it wasn't just Sharon Pierce.'
With that thought, he put generous mana behind his fist and swung with everything he had.
- BOOOOM!
The opponent was blasted clean out of the arena, ending things rather anticlimactically.
That ice shard ambush must have been her last resort.
"Count Kano's Lady Ameriais is out of bounds! Victory to Ian Blackangus!"
Cheers erupted at the referee's declaration.
"Waaaaaah!"
"Fists and magic! What the hell even are you?!"
What was he, exactly?
A single spectator's cheer suddenly plunged Ian into deep thought.
'Come to think of it... can I even call myself a mage?'
He'd felt this way for a while now, but for a mage, he fought hand-to-hand far too much. Sure, it was all for mana efficiency, but still....
He really did need one or two long-range attacks—something he could use to snipe arrogantly from a distance.
"Hoo."
While he was catching his breath, Danya came scurrying over, right on cue.
She rattled off a string of compliments, then hopped to her feet.
- Swish, swoosh
She began trying to demonstrate something, like a boxing coach drilling her fighter.
He snorted at the sight, and she got predictably pouty.
After managing to soothe her, Ian asked,
"Oh, right. Is Rina doing well?"
"She's already climbed all the way up there, meow."
He followed Danya's pointing finger and spotted a red-haired girl who had somehow worked her way all the way up to the tier just below Hermann's spectator seat.
Which meant she'd started from the bottom and chatted her way up, one person at a time.
"... Who the hell has that kind of social superpower?"
"Social superpower?"
"Never mind. She's seriously amazing."
Was this just how heroines were? Going by her sociability alone, she'd blow right past the 5-Star threshold. Ian let out a small murmur of admiration.
Watching him, Danya pushed her lips into a pout.
'Hmph!'
She could acknowledge that Rina was impressive...
But a tiny spark of dissatisfaction flared at Ian, who only had eyes for Rina when she herself was right here, standing beside him.
'Well. I'm magnanimous.'
Just as Danya was about to offer Ian the [Snow Welcoming Flower]—
"By the way, thank you, Danya."
His gratitude came at a moment she hadn't anticipated at all.
The truth was, Ian simply had a habit of saying thanks whenever he received something...
Swish.
Danya sidled right up to him, close enough to touch.
Then she subtly presented the top of her head.
Ian, who'd reached out to take the flower, was thoroughly bewildered.
'... What's this?'
As he stood there flummoxed, Danya took hold of his fingers.
- Soft.
Then she placed them on her crown. She stared at the ground and muttered.
"Pet me, you idiot."
"Oh. Uh, sure."
Stroke, stroke.
Ian's hand, stiff as a plank at first, gradually relaxed into petting Danya's head with ease.
'This really does feel like petting a cat.'
What was this sensation? That unmistakable feeling of having been chosen by a cat.
Either way, thanks to Danya, both his mana and his mood had been thoroughly healed.
- Those advancing to the semifinals, please prepare!
Time for the semifinals, then?
One more win, and he'd capture the undivided attention of the Grand Duke of the North's second daughter—the Frost Queen Yergina herself.
Whoever his final opponent turned out to be, a proper fight wasn't happening there anyway.
Still, anyone who'd reached the semifinals would naturally be formidable.
The heat inside him began to steadily rise.
◆
The announcer signaled the start of the semifinals.
- Sir Lambert, Guardian Knight of Count Limkshu!
The announcer worked the crowd, milking them for a reaction.
"Ooooh."
"A knight in the semifinals. Looks like Count Limkshu recruited a promising guardian knight this time."
Amid the decent reception, a knight clad in plate armor took his position at one side of the arena.
And then the next participant.
The announcer introduced him as he stepped into the arena looking half-exhausted—though that was simply how his face worked.
- Representing the Imperial Princess, Ian Blackangus!
"Waaaaaah!"
The cheers for Ian were far louder.
On an entirely different scale.
- To your positions!
The circular arena.
Standing at one edge, Ian looked across at the knight on the other side.
His opponent: the "Low-Kick Villain" from the hopeless trio of knight villains.
Ian hadn't forgotten the man's boast that a single low kick could snap his leg clean.
"I've waited for this moment. Looks like you managed to crawl your way up here after all."
The low-kick knight struck a pose out of nowhere.
Ian narrowed his eyes and studied him.
Now that they were face to face, he really was a big, burly man—exactly the build to back up that talk about snapping a leg with one low kick.
In other words, a thug who swaggered around, utterly confident in his own strength.
A sudden curiosity struck Ian.
"Mister, does your name happen to have a 'Sichi' in it too?"
"It does. How did you know?"
"... Oh, just a feeling."
Ian rubbed his forearm.
'Wow, that gives me the creeps.'
Sure enough, the name "Sichi" seemed to carry some kind of curse. Anyone with "Sichi" in their name was, without exception, a villain. He'd need to stay wary of all Sichis going forward.
"You lucked into some profound footwork manual, I see. I'll grind you down all the same."
"What's your grade, mister?"
"I broke through mid-4-Star not long ago."
"Hm. Fairly high."
"So prepare to take your beating quietly. I haven't forgotten what you did to my boys."
Ian felt genuinely wronged.
They'd been the ones to pick a fight first, yet when he'd defended himself, they acted like he was the aggressor. The sheer absurdity of it was staggering.
Swish.
The moment the referee dropped his arm to signal the start—
— Fwoosh!
Ian immediately used Leap to close the distance.
"I see you!"
— Clang!
Though both weapons were wood, the impact rang out like clashing metal. Sir Lambert, the Low-Kick Villain, raised his sword and blocked it cleanly.
"Hoh. Not sword aura, then. You're using some bizarre ability."
Ian checked his metal-reinforced wooden sword. The spot that had collided with Lambert's blade was caved in.
"Seems like you know how to use sword aura yourself."
"This is nothing. Take this!"
— Whoosh!
With a battle cry, the knight charged.
His sword flashed as it thrust from every direction.
Tracking that blade, Ian formed a rough idea of what the man was after.
'He wants to win as flashily as possible. Put on a show for the crowd.'
The thing about people like that was, they didn't know how to roll with the punches.
All those promising prospects watching the match. His liege and the Grand Duke's eldest son overlooking him from the stands. Countless young noble ladies, too. He'd want to flaunt his swordsmanship brilliantly before all of them.
And Ian's deduction was correct.
'I'll corner him just like this.'
Lambert had observed every one of Ian's matches with absolute focus.
It was easy for him to see that Ian wasn't proficient with a sword.
The swordsmanship he now displayed was a style built on flamboyant unpredictability.
Flashy, while boasting a wide attack range that would make slipping away difficult.
Blocking it was out of the question. He planned to corner Ian and, as promised, deliver a proper low kick straight to that parasitic gigolo's leg.
"Prepare yourself!"
Just as Lambert stepped forward to press the attack even harder—
— He staggered.
Lambert's relentless flurry of sword strikes came to an abrupt halt.
He'd lost his center of gravity, his stance crumbling.
'What the?'
He glanced down.
A mound of dirt had risen right where he'd planted his foot.
The most basic principle of footwork: always check the ground you step on.
'... It was definitely flat just now?'
The moment he raised his head in confusion—
— CRAAASH!
He barely managed to raise his wooden sword and block a vertical overhead strike crashing down on him.
"Kuh!"
Realizing his wrist had gone numb, Lambert stared at Ian in disbelief.
"You're not even a knight...!"
No time to speak. Another thrust shot toward him.
The form was clumsy as ever.
But was it because of that uncanny footwork?
The speed and power behind that blade were absurd for someone who wasn't a knight.
— Scraaape!
Lambert barely managed to deflect Ian's attack sideways.
"Damn it!"
Still, all he was facing were thrusts and overhead swings.
Attacks that even a toddler just learning to walk could manage if you handed them a stick.
Frustrated that nothing was going right, he tried to retake his stance with a surge of anger—
— He lurched!
The ground bulged up once more.
'Not this again!'
He lost his center of gravity a second time.
Just as he twisted his waist to right himself—
— Crack!
Ian's wooden sword slammed into his ribs.
Pain ripped through him as if his waist had been severed.
But he could endure this much. He was a knight, wasn't he?
'If I can just get my stance right again!'
Lambert immediately tried to regain his balance. Tried to, that is.
"Think you can?"
"Wha... guh!"
This time, the ground erupted upward like a detonation.
The recoil launched his legs into the air.
'I can't get my footing!'
Lambert immediately spun his body a full rotation in the air, attempting to land.
As his face came around, his eyes met Ian's—
"!"
Something that looked like a demon stood there.
The corners of its lips were curled up in an utterly chilling grin.
Spurred by Ian's peculiar posture, Lambert immediately looked down.
Simultaneously.
— SNAP!
The sound of something breaking filled the entire arena.
Lambert's stout body flew out of the ring.
His leg was bent backward.
"......"
A deep silence enveloped the surroundings.
Ian raised his head and looked up at the stands.
Hermann Pierce was looking down at him, his gaze impossibly heavy.