Ch.219After the Play Ended (2)

#219

Dexter swallowed but remained tense.

The speed and power of the punches coming from that slender frame were more impressive than he’d expected.

-Paang!

Olivia’s fist didn’t just cut through the air—it seemed to teleport instantaneously, appearing in space with blinding speed.

When she swung, it wasn’t like something flying toward him; rather, like a fighter jet breaking the sound barrier, white ripples formed in empty space.

‘As expected from her aura… Whoa.’

The moment his mind wandered even slightly, Olivia’s fists came flying, targeting his vital points.

Struggling just to block, Dexter felt a drop of sweat roll down his forehead.

‘I’ve never faced attacks like these before.’

This wasn’t something he could handle by simply blocking and targeting weaknesses. Her fists, wrapped in an aura that moved at cutting speed, were terrifying to merely block or dodge.

‘I thought her secretary was formidable enough… but she’s clearly on another level.’

Olivia looked at Dexter with an intrigued expression and said:

“Not bad, you’re blocking well?”

-Paaang!

Olivia’s teleporting fist aimed for Dexter’s face.

‘Damn it!’

He barely managed to dodge.

Though Dexter’s dynamic vision and quick reflexes helped him avoid it, he knew these makeshift evasions wouldn’t work forever.

Stamina wasn’t infinite, and senses would inevitably dull.

‘But I can’t just keep taking hits like an idiot.’

Dexter tried to forcefully push aside Olivia’s drill-like punch. It felt like trying to push away a thick log with a child’s hand.

Dexter was startled.

Olivia’s fist didn’t budge.

“What’s wrong? Is my fist different from others?”

Olivia’s nameless fist technique—an unnamed martial art and skill—was both highly irregular and ferocious.

It seemed to target the left but would strike the right, and when you thought it was slow, it would suddenly accelerate.

Such a technique might be manageable if the practitioner lacked skill or if the punches were weak, but Olivia possessed neither of these shortcomings.

This was a true martial art wielded by a master, forcing Dexter to block Olivia’s fierce attacks with unprecedented concentration.

Then Dexter accidentally allowed one of Olivia’s punches through.

“Ugh.”

It hit his shoulder.

The fabric around his shoulder tore to shreds, exposing Dexter’s bare skin where he was struck.

The torn clothes were concerning, but the real issue was the pain.

Beyond a tingling sensation, there was a moment of numbness followed by a complete loss of strength.

‘My shoulder won’t move. Could it be…’

If she were fighting purely for destructive power, he might understand, but Dexter recognized what Olivia was doing.

Leaping backward to create distance, Dexter said:

“Are you going easy on me?”

“Why would I go easy on you?”

‘She’s not?’

Dexter looked at Olivia with suspicion, while she appeared inwardly displeased by his question.

As feeling returned to his shoulder, Dexter faced Olivia again, thinking:

‘Olivia’s martial arts are high-level, but compared to their level, the power is…’

Dexter pushed away Olivia’s arm with his forearm while using his leg.

Attempting to break Olivia’s stance, he kicked at the back of her knee with his shin.

‘Ugh!’

A sharp pain shot through his shin.

Despite her smooth curves, it felt like kicking a stone pillar. Dexter gritted his teeth, enduring the pain.

‘…She’s not weak. But something’s different.’

Her body was like steel, and each punch was potentially lethal if it grazed him.

Yet when struck by Olivia’s fist, he simply felt his strength draining.

The weakness was real when his strength drained, but it returned after a short time.

If he’d been truly injured, that would be one thing, but Dexter was confused by this unfamiliar type of damage.

Of course, it could be Olivia’s mistake, but Dexter had no intention of deliberately taking hits to test that theory again.

The fundamental principle remained: avoid getting hit and target weaknesses. But Dexter was gradually being pushed back by Olivia’s accumulating momentum with each block.

‘Damn it.’

Meanwhile, Olivia continued her attacks with a twisted smile.

“You’ve gotten a lot quieter than before, Dexter!”

As Olivia aimed for his face again, Dexter deflected her punch with more force than usual and said:

“Talking won’t make my attacks any weaker!”

“Hmph, so you really don’t want to say any last words?”

“If I win, I won’t need last words!”

“Preposterous!”

-Swaaack!

With those words, Olivia spun around, extending her leg to target Dexter’s neck.

‘Leg technique!’

Olivia’s kicks were not only fast but sharp—her entire body was a weapon.

Dexter barely avoided it by forcibly bending his neck, but the collar of his combat uniform where Olivia’s leg had grazed was cleanly sliced as if cut by a blade.

‘How can a leg cut so cleanly, as if it were a sword?’

Dexter carefully observed Olivia’s leg as he dodged another attack.

She wasn’t just wrapping her fists in energy—her legs were also enveloped in a blue aura.

This might technically be called a leg technique, but the name didn’t matter.

‘Names aren’t important.’

Olivia’s leg techniques were diverse.

This meant her attacks were more omnidirectional than her punches, and with doubled power as she targeted Dexter.

His arms, which blocked Olivia’s attacks, felt like they would crack after just a few more hits.

To avoid such damage, he needed to hold his arms at an angle, deflecting attacks rather than taking them head-on.

-Pueok!

Yet the damage accumulated, and Dexter clenched his teeth against the tingling pain in his arms.

“I asked why you’re so quiet, Dexter!”

“Who talks during combat!”

“That’s unfair!”

Olivia laughed.

-Tadak, Tak!

A rapid exchange of heavy blows followed as fists collided.

Dexter was pushed back slightly but blocked several attacks with his arms, while Olivia maintained a light smile and poker face.

“So you really do have Howard Hughes’ genes?”

“What are you talking about?”

“If you defeat me, I’ll tell you!”

‘She’s truly insane.’

Dexter recalled Olivia’s previous statements.

Based on what she’d said so far, Olivia would be a distant relative sharing the same ancestor as Dexter.

‘To think someone like her is my relative.’

Olivia lowered her stance, drawing back her fist deeply for a decisive blow. Seeing this, Dexter tensed his legs.

‘That’s not something I can just defend against.’

As soon as the thought crossed his mind, Dexter leaped into the air and flipped forward. Olivia’s fist rose to follow him closely.

Unless one had rockets attached, it was difficult to change position while suspended in mid-air.

Like a fish cutting through water, Olivia pushed off with her toes, lifting her body upward. Dexter held his breath, imagining what would happen when he was hit.

As Dexter’s body moved forward without defense, Olivia’s fist struck the center of his chest.

-Kwang!

“…Heurk.”

Dexter momentarily floated before his back violently hit the ceiling. As artificial gravity pulled him back toward the ship’s floor, Olivia continued her fierce assault.

Head, chest, solar plexus, lower abdomen.

Olivia’s fists and feet relentlessly pummeled Dexter’s entire body.

In response, Dexter tried to minimize the impact.

Crossing his arms and curling his body, he waited for a chance to rise again.

-Puk, Peobuk, Peobeobuk!

All of Olivia’s attacks were effective hits.

But amid the physical pain, Dexter sensed something strange.

‘This should be agonizing… but why?’

Olivia was experiencing a similar feeling.

‘Every time I land a solid hit, I’m losing strength…!’

Dexter felt intense weakness in the areas where Olivia’s attacks had landed, while Olivia found that her internal energy wouldn’t flow properly the more she struck Dexter.

Their eyes met.

And they shouted simultaneously:

“Dexter Hughes, what have you done?”

“Olivia, what are you doing?”

After those simultaneous exclamations, a few seconds of silence followed.

‘She didn’t intend this?’

‘She seems genuinely confused?’

Springing to his feet, Dexter stepped back a few paces and said quietly:

“Olivia, you feel something strange too, don’t you?”

“…Even so, I can’t stop our final duel.”

“Who said anything about stopping?”

Dexter wiped blood from his split lip and said:

“Let’s face the facts. This duel might be stuck in a stalemate forever.”

“…What do you mean?”

“Why did you stop attacking? If you’d continued for a few more minutes, I might have died.”

Olivia hesitated at Dexter’s words, then charged again.

“Heuut!”

Dexter had no reason to simply take the hits.

Reflecting her unstable mental state, Olivia’s attack pattern was chaotic, but her strikes lacked proper force and felt light.

Dexter had recently experienced this kind of weakness—after depleting his nanobots and scraping together his remaining energy to attack Cloud, his secretary.

Drawing on that experience while defending against Olivia’s attacks, Dexter could read one emotion in her:

‘She’s desperate.’

Olivia’s formal smile and poker face had crumbled; she was now gritting her teeth and unleashing attacks at Dexter.

‘Just as I felt something strange, Olivia must have felt it too. What could it be?’

What would make someone who had been overwhelmingly dominant stop attacking?

Dexter pondered this question while continuing to defend.

As if she’d never been so emotionally entangled before, Olivia’s attacks were gradually becoming more erratic.

Dexter didn’t counterattack but maintained passive defense, engaging with Olivia to understand everything about her.

‘Someone with a sword stops attacking only when they encounter a problem themselves.’

Moreover, as Olivia herself had said, this was a “final duel”—something she considered extremely important.

Dexter wondered what had made Olivia feel threatened enough to pause her attack, and why he could now block her attacks with relative ease.

‘From what she said earlier, it worked well when she harmed other researchers, and with this level of martial arts, she must have practiced extensively. Why can’t she maintain her momentum?’

Olivia must have been successful until now.

Even if she had lived on the Zhongyuan planet where the Celestial Demon resided, someone with Olivia’s level of combat ability would have experienced more victories than defeats.

Why could Dexter, barely reaching the peak level in Zhongyuan’s martial standards, block attacks from Olivia, who was close to the supreme level?

‘What’s the difference between me and the others Olivia has defeated?’

As Dexter searched for differences between himself and Olivia’s countless victims, one possibility emerged:

‘Genes.’

Both Dexter and Olivia had inherited Howard Hughes’ mutated genes.

Dexter didn’t know the exact mechanism of Howard Hughes’ mutated genes.

‘And Olivia probably doesn’t know either.’

It was clear that the mutated genes provided advantages to descendants who inherited them.

But there must also be disadvantages.

Just as he felt weakness when attacked by Olivia, she too seemed to experience negative effects when attacking him.

‘People who inherited the mutated genes can’t properly fight each other.’

Dexter didn’t know the exact reason.

But he could form a hypothesis.

If Dexter’s superior stamina and dynamic vision came from the mutated genes, Olivia’s abilities would be similar.

‘If the mutated genes helped Olivia become a supreme master.’

If the mutated genes provided survival advantages but also recognized other carriers as allies to spread the genes further.

That would explain why her attacks weren’t fully effective against him.

When an unstoppable spear meets an impenetrable shield, no one knows what will happen. But when a stoppable spear meets a penetrable shield, the outcome is predictable.

‘In that case, a proper fight can’t happen.’

Dexter smiled.