Ch.1245Overwhelmed

Within just a few exchanges, Erzsebet suffered serious injuries and continued to struggle wildly in a frenzy afterward.

As if temporary sealing was possible even if regeneration was difficult, she covered the sword wounds on her upper body with hardened blood and replaced her lost arms with red prosthetics.

Though not precise enough to move joints like real arms, they at least allowed her to grip and swing weapons like swords and spears.

“Come, sárkányvér!”

When Erzsebet pointed at the castle’s spire with her prosthetic hand and shouted, something broke through the spire’s roof and settled into her grasp as if being sucked in.

It was a sword.

A crimson blade that seemed forged from dragon bones and scales tempered in blood, covered with black, glowing rune engravings.

In the grasp of the blood-red prosthetic hand was an ominous magical sword that emitted a suffocating blood scent and pulsed like a heartbeat.

“I won’t leave a single piece of flesh! I’ll tear you to shreds!”

Erzsebet charged at me with that magical sword, radiating savage killing intent.

Blood covered the blade, and as the rune engravings rippled within, dark red beams of light shot up along the blade.

She’s doing something similar to Caljarat. Was this a basic technique in the past? That ridiculous waste of power, swinging pillars of light instead of swords?

No, more importantly.

“You’re coming at me with a sword? Looking like that? Are you in your right mind?”

This woman is clearly a spellcaster type, so what confidence does she have charging at me with a sword? Is she any good with swordsmanship?

– KWAAANG!

Black blood scattered like fireworks. Durandal collided with the pillar of light Erzsebet swung, deflecting her slash vertically with a thunderous sound.

Huh, it withstood that? It should have been cut through immediately, but it only got deflected. That’s quite surprising.

“Not yet…!”

Erzsebet gritted her teeth and spun backward using the rebound, aiming a kick at my chin while simultaneously swinging her magical sword upward between my legs.

“What is this?”

Of all places, you’re aiming there? Just like a blood-sucking woman, that’s disgustingly lewd.

I chuckled as I tilted my head to avoid her foot, and swung Durandal downward with a reverse grip toward the approaching pillar of light.

The idea of using momentum to simultaneously target the chin and lower body was decent, but it’s just a technique that only works when skills are evenly matched.

If I’m faster, it’s nothing more than acrobatics flailing in empty space.

– KWAAANG!

Another explosion followed. This time, even though I didn’t use the power of severance, the same explosion occurred, throwing both of us apart vertically.

‘It explodes again? Ah, I see, it automatically explodes upon contact.’

I understood her trick.

Knowing she’d be cut through space itself in a direct confrontation, she was trying to use explosive rebounds to quickly retrieve her sword or retreat while looking for openings.

Quite clever. Though it’s just a minor trick.

“Think I can’t hit you from a distance?”

I point at Erzsebet with just my index finger while gripping the sword hilt, focusing my consciousness on the rune engraving.

Kenaz.

The released fire rune greedily devoured the surrounding mana and the Karma of Murder within me, forming a crimson flame orb at my fingertip.

“Even if you’re a demigod, you’re still a mosquito, so fire should be your weakness too, right?”

Annihilation Arrow

The extremely compressed flame of murder Karma extended into a fierce beam of heat.

“Kuk…!”

Erzsebet quickly regained her posture and swung the red sword widely.

– KWAOOOO!

Like Caljarat, a beam of light extended more than ten times the length of the blade, drawing a crimson arc in the air.

The collision of the Karma flame beam and the blood-red crescent mixed with dark mana. Transcendent powers mixed and exploded, creating a storm of steam and flames amid the roaring sound.

“Ha, did you see that! Such flames can easily…”

“Be blocked. Of course.”

I never expected it to penetrate anyway.

“But what about this?”

– HWAAAAK!

I plunged through the high-temperature steam and flames, rapidly descending to get inside the magical sword’s attack range, and thrust my blade tip down toward her head.

– POOK!

The blade embedded itself in the center of Erzsebet’s forehead. The strike was so sharp and swift that I felt no resistance whatsoever.

…Wait, that’s strange. Piercing a skull with a sword but feeling nothing, as if stabbing empty air?

“Got you!”

Ah, damn.

– PUEOK!

The moment I hesitated at the strange sensation, Erzsebet, with her head pierced, smiled like a deranged ghost and kicked upward into my abdomen.

I managed to block it by raising my armor with the power of Karma, but the impact was strong enough that my entire abdomen would have been blown away without the dragon scale armor.

Several scales of the armor shattered, and the penetrating impact struck my muscles and internal organs.

“Kuk…!”

My body shot upward toward the ceiling, bent at the waist. The pain was bearable, but the humiliation was considerable.

I actually got hit. Did I underestimate her too much?

“Think you’ll fall for the same trick twice? Carelessness happens once, never twice!”

Erzsebet laughed maniacally with a face like a castrated person who regained fertility, swinging the light pillar of her magical sword toward me.

There was clearly a diamond-shaped hole pierced in her forehead, but the next moment, the cross-section melted like red water, entangling together, and then perfectly restored itself.

Regeneration. If she had truly been pierced by Durandal, this would be impossible.

In other words, this was why she could be stabbed in the forehead yet counterattack without being incapacitated.

She wasn’t actually pierced by Durandal. Just before being penetrated, she created a large hole in her own forehead.

Whether she created a blood blade inside her body and immediately removed it, or she could naturally make her body fluid in that way. Something like that.

In short, my sword didn’t pierce her head; it just passed through a hole that was already there. Like swinging at empty air.

So naturally, regeneration blocking wouldn’t work. That ability only manifests when directly cutting with Durandal.

“Huh… you really do all sorts of things.”

It wasn’t an unfamiliar method. Nor was it novel. After all, hadn’t I fought someone who did the same thing before?

The Winter Wolf, Rurik. That was exactly how he countered Durandal’s regeneration blocking.

Arms, legs, even waist or head. He would cut himself everywhere and regenerate, fighting in a truly bizarre manner.

A desperate measure of self-harm to remove body parts before they could be cut.

If one has absolute confidence in their regeneration ability, they can endure—no, avoid—Durandal’s regeneration blocking ability that way.

Is it because it’s been a while since I fought someone who fights like this? I fell for the same trick I experienced with Rurik.

I’ve suddenly become someone who fell for the same trick twice.

‘But now that I know the reason, there’s no problem.’

No one can fall for the same method three times. This is already the second time, so that approach can no longer threaten me.

I have countermeasures. Three of them, in fact.

The first is to overwhelm them until their regeneration ability, which still consumes something, is depleted. It takes time but it’s a sure method.

However, time is the issue in this fight, so this method is rejected.

If I fought until this woman’s regeneration was depleted, Garmerlic’s fortress would arrive ten times over.

The second is to use extreme sword illusions mixed with feints to confuse them about where to self-harm.

But this doesn’t match my swordsmanship style, making it difficult. Forcing unfamiliar techniques might just create openings.

So I’ll use the third countermeasure. It suits my combat style best anyway.

What method, you ask?

“You’ll avoid my sword with self-harm? Try it again if you can.”

It’s obvious.

“If you can keep up with this speed.”

Just be faster than their self-harm speed. Overwhelmingly faster, to the point where they can’t even perceive the swinging blade.

【 Defying Fate 】

I’ve confirmed she has no spatial interference ability. If she had, she would have used it to block the severing slash.

Time manipulation ability… I haven’t confirmed it, but she probably doesn’t have it. If she did, wouldn’t she have used it before her arms were severed and chest split open?

Therefore, it was reasonable to assume she had no way to counter this technique.

【 Sky Slash 】

The will enhanced by divine power leads me to a world of stillness, and the sword, stronger than anything earthly, cuts that world in half.

The space-time severing slash extended forward, breaking through the light of the magical sword.

“What…?!”

From her perspective, in just a fleeting moment, Erzsebet was shocked by the massive pulse of power that had suddenly appeared before her eyes.