Chapter 90: The Senior Sister's Strength
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 90: The Senior Sister's Strength
Muen stared at the grim-faced muscle men. After a brief, heavy silence, he pulled a fruit knife from behind his back and barked with a fierce expression:
"Don't come any closer! I'm... I'm really strong!"
He didn't even finish the sentence.
Clack-clack-clack.
The muscle men silently drew their two-meter-long greatswords.
The blades glinted with a cold, lethal light.
They pointed them straight at Muen.
"..."
Muen looked at their two-meter blades, then down at his twenty-centimeter dagger.
He squeezed out a strained smile.
"Don't come any closer! I'm actually really weak! Believe it or not, I'll commit seppuku right here in front of you in ten seconds flat!"
"..."
The muscle men remained silent. They didn't seem like the talkative type, but Muen caught a glimpse of bashfulness in their eyes. Only then did he realize that this group of pure-hearted muscle men simply had no idea how to talk to a girl.
But no matter how pure-hearted they were, they weren't about to let Muen just walk away.
As the muscle men pressed forward step by step, Muen was forced to retreat.
It wasn't that Muen didn't want to use Shadow Step to bolt, but Shadow Step wasn't a true teleportation; he couldn't actually pass through solid objects. Surrounded like this, escaping was proving to be incredibly difficult.
Furthermore, Muen had used Shadow Step during their previous martial arts class. If he used it now and Ariel recognized it, she might figure out his identity...
Recalling the flamboyant, suggestive things Ariel had just said to him, Muen didn't even want to imagine how many pieces she would chop him into once she realized the truth and flew into a fit of humiliated rage.
It certainly wouldn't be a small number.
"What do I do... what do I do... if I get caught now, all my hard work will be for nothing." Cold sweat beaded on Muen's forehead. Before he knew it, his back was against a cold wall. He had nowhere left to run.
With so many muscle men rushing to the upper floors, the defenses below would only get weaker.
That meant the Heroes would break through even faster.
When that happened...
Dying of embarrassment in front of the entire school—anything but that!
"Muen-junior~"
Just then, a familiar voice rang out.
Muen froze for a second, his eyes widening.
A surge of wild joy, like finding life in a dead end, erupted in his chest.
"Senior Sister?"
Muen whipped his head around, looking everywhere.
"Where are you?"
"Don't move, okay?"
A soft, delicate voice echoed right in his ear.
Just as the muscle men were beginning to look confused by Muen’s sudden talking to himself, a snake-like shadow suddenly lunged out from the darkness where the wall met the floor.
It was a long whip.
The whip swayed with a fluid agility, as if it possessed a mind of its own, and lashed out violently at the muscle man closest to Muen.
The man’s reactions were quick; he raised his greatsword in a horizontal block. However, the seemingly supple whip erupted with the force of a thousand catties the moment it struck the blade. The massive sword bent visibly under the impact.
Hit by that immense force, the muscle man let out a scream and was sent flying backward without any suspense.
A gap opened in the encirclement. The whip retracted instantly, coiling around Muen's waist and dragging him through the opening at high speed.
As his body was yanked away, Muen felt a momentary flash of panic from losing his balance. But before he could struggle, he felt himself pulled into a warm embrace.
A familiar, faint fragrance filled his nose, and the soft, ample sensation pressing against his back made his heart flutter uncontrollably.
In the dim corner, Muen felt a pair of soft, tender hands wrap around his waist. A slightly pointed chin rested gently on his shoulder, and warm breath tickled his ear, sending a tingly, numbing sensation through him.
"Junior, you look so pretty."
Hearing his Senior Sister’s little devil-like voice whispering in his ear, Muen felt his heart start to drift.
"Isn't this all because of you, Senior Sister?" Muen gave a bitter smile. "I didn't want to end up like this."
"Is that so? You looked like you were having a great time to me, standing right in everyone's line of sight like that. Were you planning to harvest some popularity first and then debut as the academy idol?"
Anna laughed softly. "I think you've got a real shot. Look at your popularity right now; those underclassmen look like they've been injected with chicken blood just seeing you. If you debut now, it won't be long before you're even more popular than the Student Council President."
"I am not becoming an idol!"
Muen covered his face and shouted:
"I'm a hundred percent pure macho man, okay?!"
"But if you put on a small skirt right now, I feel like you'd be even cuter than me."
"..." Muen was speechless; he’d completely checked out.
"Giggle, alright, I'll stop teasing you."
Anna patted Muen’s head and laughed.
"Let's get out of here while that big guy is distracted."
"Yes, yes, let's go, let's go."
Muen nodded repeatedly, his eyes almost welling up with tears of relief.
After being tormented for so long, he could finally—
BOOM!
Before his first tear could even fall.
A familiar figure was suddenly hurled through the air, slamming violently into the wall right next to Muen.
"Cough, cough..."
Amidst the rising dust, Ariel clawed at the rubble and struggled to sit up, then spat out a large mouthful of blood.
"Damn it... I guess even with a Forbidden Technique to temporarily boost my combat power, fighting someone two stages higher is still too much of a stretch?"
Under Muen’s stunned gaze, Ariel turned her head. Her eyes lit up with joy when she saw him, but then she saw the Senior Sister holding him. She froze for a second before exploding in rage:
"Who are you?! How dare you get your hands on him before me!"
"..."
Muen’s mouth twitched. Before he could figure out what to say, the Senior Sister behind him suddenly let go. She transformed into a blurred shadow and lunged forward.
The High Priest had arrived.
"Oh? Another woman?"
The High Priest gripped his blood-stained greatsword and looked at the approaching Anna, a savage expression crossing his face.
There was a massive, charred wound on his chest that looked like it had been burned by fire, yet he seemed completely oblivious to it, as if such an injury were as insignificant as losing a few strands of hair.
Though, he didn't have any hair to begin with.
"I knew it! Women are nothing but trouble!"
The High Priest snarled in fury and raised his greatsword once more. He swung!
The blade, flashing with a cold light, kicked up a piercing gale. The High Priest had no intention of showing mercy; he moved as if he were simply cleaving a piece of meat on a chopping block in two.
Against that terrifying blade energy, Anna looked as fragile as paper.
But Anna suddenly twisted her waist. It was as if her entire body were boneless; in an instant, her slender frame contorted into a pose that would make a professional dancer sigh in envy, nimbly dodging the High Priest's blade.
In the next heartbeat, before the High Priest could swing a second time, Anna stepped lightly onto the heavy blade that had momentarily stalled after missing its mark. She leapt up with the grace of a black cat, her body tracing an elegant curve in the air. She flipped upside down and pointed a finger toward the High Priest's head.
A rare coldness appeared on her seductive, beautiful face.
"Explosion."
Her vermilion lips parted slightly.
The magic, cast without a chant, constructed itself at her fingertip in an instant.
A brilliant light erupted immediately, accompanied by a terrifying, destructive heat that surged toward the High Priest, who had no time to defend.
Even if the power was significantly reduced due to the omitted chant, at such close range, Explosion Magic—renowned for its raw power—was not something a body of flesh and blood could withstand.
And so.
Flesh and blood sprayed everywhere.
Even though the High Priest managed to jerk his head aside at the last moment to avoid a fatal blow, the heat and flames still instantly consumed a large portion of his flesh. His shoulder was completely blown open, and his right arm, which held the sword, slumped down like a branch snapped by a rowdy child, hanging on by only a few threads of gore.
