Spear Saint Cayden recalled the memory of that day as he looked at Asher standing across from him.
One member of the White Moon tribe that he failed to kill because of a moment’s carelessness.
That little mistake was a memory that had haunted him like a thorn in his flesh to this day.
'I never thought we’d meet like this.'
That’s why the current situation made him happy. It’s an opportunity that came by chance.
This time, he would kill and eliminate the last remaining one and tie a complete knot.
The Spear Saint lightly swung the spear in his hand and opened his mouth.
“I will yield the first move.”
“...”
Asher’s whole body turned white again.
The momentum she radiated was still quite menacing, but unlike before, she had regained her composure to some degree.
Spear Saint Cayden of Santea.
In her memory, he was nothing short of a monster when he massacred her tribe ten years ago.
He swept away even the warriors of such a strong tribe without them being able to fight properly.
Even so, Asher did not think of defeat.
No, she didn’t dare think of such a possibility.
Over the past 10 years, how many times had she overcome and destroyed walls to become stronger?
She didn’t think about how big the gap between them was. Right now, she just believed in herself and raised her fighting spirit.
Swoop.
Magical power that had been purified to the limit with her special ability sped up further and circulated through Asher’s body.
It was an opponent she had to fight with everything she had. Asher raised her power from the start.
Pure white brilliance dyed her sword, and white magical rings appeared vaguely all over her body.
The Spear Saint stood calmly and looked at her like that. Whatever she did, he seemed willing to wait. A blue aura also appeared in his spear.
And in the next moment, the energy from Asher’s sword was fired at the Spear Saint like a flash.
Kwaaang!
The blade of the sword and the spear interlocked with a roar.
The Spear Saint, who lightly blocked the attack without retreating a single step, turned the spear and threw it upward. Asher moved.
She immediately bent down and dodged the attack aimed at her neck, then thrust out her sword again. A blow aimed at his leg. Again, the Spear Saint simply blocked it.
An intense skirmish ensued.
Sword and spear collided nonstop, sometimes cutting through the empty air. The white and blue auras intersected and intertwined in a dizzying manner.
A mighty shockwave arose from each collision. It felt like you would be slashed if you even came a little closer.
Among the spectators, those who were not of high level could not follow their movements with their eyes at all.
They retreated further from the boundary line, tired of the magical impact and shock wave spreading in all directions.
The flow of the battle flowed toward Asher attacking and the Spear Saint defending.
The Spear Saint also counterattacked from time to time, but mostly Asher seemed to push him.
A feeble pleasure welled up in Asher’s heart.
The Spear Saint was clearly strong.
But it wasn’t as overwhelming as she thought. It seemed as though a gap was slowly opening in his defense.
Asher added strength and speed to the limit of her offensive attack.
She just needed to dig a little more, just a little more. Then it really felt like her sword could land on his neck.
However...
“...”
As time passed, Asher’s complexion slowly hardened.
It was because she gradually noticed their gap.
No matter how much she swung her sword, at some point the gap wasn’t closing at all. As if she couldn’t reach him from the beginning.
Caang!
The blade of the sword and the blade of the spear meshed together, and the momentary battle stopped.
Asher met the Spear Saint’s eyes. His eyes were as cold and dry as they were at the start of the duel.
‘Did you know now?’
He seemed to say that.
Only then did Asher realize. From the beginning, she had been toyed with and played in his grasp.
The gap between the two of them was not just a little, but, on the contrary, it was far beyond imagination.
Wow!
He fired a blow at Asher, who was trying to step back with terrifying speed. It was a different speed than before.
Blood spurted down Asher’s cheeks. Barely turning her head to avoid the attack. She had to block the attack that followed without a break.
Swing, stab, and strike. The fight intensified.
The energy in the Spear Saint's spear was similar to that of Asher’s sword. But each blow was incomparable.
He didn’t give Asher the slightest bit of leeway. However, he also didn’t land a blow that would completely end the duel.
Asher could see what he was thinking as she narrowly countered the dizzying rain of attacks.
'...Are you sure you intend to kill me?'
For a moment, reason flew, and she accepted the duel with the Spear Saint, but Asher was not an idiot, so she vaguely understood his intention.
What was the reason for provoking her to reach this situation and bringing it to this point?
The only reason was so he could take her life legitimately through a duel.
But he couldn’t win quickly and show to everyone their overwhelming difference in skill, so he must be adjusting his level of attack in moderation.
Only by feigning such a fierce battle could he gain the justification that he inevitably killed his opponent during the duel.
But if she surrendered now, the Spear Saint would have no choice but to end the duel.
A declaration of surrender obviously overshadowed the outcome of the duel, and he couldn’t do more tricks in front of everyone watching.
But she didn’t plan to do that.
Even if she had to die fighting right here, she didn’t want to.
She knew it’s not a rational choice at all, and it would be just a meaningless dog death.
The words of the Spear Saint about her running away to save her life stuck deeply in her heart like a knife and erased her option to back down.
Asher gritted her teeth.
If her sword couldn’t reach his throat, then she would take at least one of his arm.
The pure white ring around Asher’s body emitted a stronger light.
A method of mana management that divided mana into three cores and amplified them through resonance between them.
Even in the history of the White Moon tribe, no one other than the founding father succeeded in fully mastering this skill, which was extremely imperfect.
Asher activated all three cores to the maximum without hesitation.
Her strength had now surpassed the limit. Even she herself didn’t know how big the price she had to pay for this.
Wow!
The area around the Spear Saint’s eyes frowned slightly after he blocked the sword attack from the suddenly amplified energy.
He, too, energized his spear and parried Asher’s attack.
While running wild like a madman, she moved her eyes here and there to keep track of the spear’s path.
The physical ability beyond the limits, and the senses.
The chaotic lines drawn by his spear, which she couldn’t understand just a moment ago, were more clearly imprinted on her head.
Within seconds of the unsteadily rampaging mana, pain came to Asher’s body. But she didn’t care.
In a battle where even one’s life was lost, a sudden enlightenment came for a moment after she crossed her limit.
She hung on tenaciously to that elusive, faint enlightenment.
Just a bit more...
Despite Asher’s awakening, it was the Spear Saint who still had the upper hand. He had never done his best in the first place.
The spear through Asher’s side with a shallow cut. Next were the legs and shoulders. Her blood spurted out and her sword still did not reach him.
The balance of her body was on the verge of collapsing because of rampant magic, and what held her consciousness was just a momentary superhuman concentration.
A window of ever-changing creativity. The realization that she came across accidentally while teaching Rigon, but couldn’t understand it fully.
It was only for a moment that the small pieces that had been playing separately in her head connected like a line.
Peit.
Blood spurted up the Spear Saint’s face.
Asher stretched out her sword and realized what she had done a beat later. There were fine lines of blood on his cheeks.
...Ah.
In the end, she couldn’t reach it.
It was only a shallow graze.
Asher poured everything into that last attack. She staggered as she felt all the energy draining from her body.
“...!”
The Spear Saint’s face twisted like a demon.
He hurled the spear blade straight at the collapsing Asher. It was so powerful that it could turn her body into a handful of blood in an instant.
Wow!
A spear that stopped mid-air.
The blade of the spear stood still, unable to move further, as if something invisible had blocked it.
The sudden appearance of a man in front of him startled the Spear Saint, and he withdrew his spear and retreated. It was the Seventh Lord.
After accepting the collapsing Asher, he stared at her who had lost consciousness, then moved his gaze to the Spear Saint and opened his mouth.
“The duel is over. It’s your victory.”
The Spear Saint’s eyelids trembled at the fury that welled up inside him.
Victory, it was natural from the beginning.
He was feeling indescribable shame at the fact that even a little of his blood had been shed for such an obvious result.
“Seventh Lord... didn’t you swear you wouldn’t get involved in this duel?”
“And?”
The Seventh Lord said with arrogant eyes.
“What do you want to say?”
“...”
It was as if the other was asking what he would do if he didn’t keep his promise.
The Spear Saint, lost for a moment, glared at the Seventh Lord. That was all he could do.
***
I ignored the Spear Saint glaring at me and looked at Asher’s condition.
Although her mana was unstable, she seemed to have only fainted from exhaustion.
More than that...
I shifted my gaze to Asher’s level.
[Lv. 85]
After a sudden surge of energy, her level spiked mid-battle.
It jumped three levels from level 82 to level 85.
Did she cross the wall during the battle?
It was a fierce battle, so I wondered if there was anything strange about it.
It is one of the representative clichés to gain enlightenment and grow while fighting a mighty enemy. Of course, this was reality and not some webnovel or comics, but...
In any case, it was a great achievement to have landed an attack on someone nine levels higher than her.
I looked at the Spear Saint again. Then I pointed my finger on my cheek, obviously referring to his wound.
“It’s a pity. If it was a little deeper, your mouth would have been ripped out.”
The guy gritted his teeth and said as if he was chewing.
“...I was just careless. If only I had done my best in the first place.”
“Yes, today will be the last time you can make excuses like that.”
It wasn’t intentional, but this made Asher’s growth much faster than the main story in the game.
I looked back and forth between the bastard and the emperor and said in a low voice.
“I assure you. There is not much time left before you pay the price. Both you and the emperor.”
The Spear Saint forced a laugh.
“It was just a once-in-a-lifetime coincidence. The white moon woman’s sword will never touch me again.”
“Even so, nothing will change. If she couldn’t kill you, then you will die by my hand.”
Both the Emperor and the Spear Saint were villains who would pay the price for their crimes in the main story of the game.
It’s just that this was not the right time yet.
At my words, his expression hardened.
“What is that…?”
“So, take good care of the short life you still have.”
The duel was over.
Under the eyes gathered in all directions, I turned around with a sneer while supporting Asher.
***
“...”
When she opened her eyes, she saw the ceiling.
Asher stood up and looked around blankly. It was the room provided to her in the castle of Earth Hill.
“Oh, are you awake?”
A woman was sitting next to the bed, and several maids were standing in the back. The woman sitting there was Seri, the princess of Earth Hill.
It also took aback Asher because she knew who the other was.
Seri explained the situation with a slightly awkward smile.
“You passed out during the duel. I thought you would wake up much later, but you woke up earlier than expected.”
Looking out the window, it was dark because the dawn hadn’t completely broken yet.
Asher searched her memory. The attack of the Spear Saint after her last attack failed, and the Seventh Lord...
Recalling the fact that the Seventh Lord blocked the Spear Saint’s attack and stopped the duel, she closed her eyes tightly.
Again...
Was it because she poured everything into the duel with the Spear Saint?
The emotions that had been burning like a fever until she passed out seemed to have faded and left only the embers.
Rather, she felt guilty that she had troubled the Seventh Lord again by going wild. What face could she show him after that?
Asher looked at herself.
All the wounds from the spear had almost healed. It looked like he gave first aid with a potion.
Rather, the burden on her body was greater because of the reaction of using his ability to the limit. It felt like her whole body was twitching.
She thought about the duel in a daze for a moment, then suddenly came to her senses and apologized to Seri.
“I’m so sorry. I completely ruined the banquet.”
“It’s fine, don’t take that to heart, Sir. Are you feeling better now?”
“It’s okay. By the way...”
Why was the princess looking after her?
Seeing as if she had read her puzzled expression, the Seri smiled and said;
“Don’t mind me. I was just trying to stay here for a while until Sir Knight woke up.”
“Yes, thank you. It must have caused a lot of trouble, moving me here and the treatment as well..”
It would have been cumbersome to move her from the gymnasium outside the palace to her room.
But Seri shook her head.
“Ah, it wasn’t us who carried you here. The Seventh Lord did it.”
“...?”
She got up from her seat with a mischievous look on her face, and stretched out her arms, lowered them, then raised them.
“So, after holding the fallen Sir Knight in his arms like this.”
Then she pretended to let go of her raised arm.
“The Seventh Lord came all the way to your room and put you on the bed and left.”
“...Yes, yes?”
Asher’s face, stuttering in embarrassment, turned red.
