Ch.319Half-Destroyed

Haschal was honestly dumbfounded.

Escaping karma flames by simply detaching the head. While not impossible with a hero-class werebeast’s regenerative abilities…

‘What is he, some kind of lizard?’

It was quite disappointing for her. One of her carefully preserved tactics, karma flames used at the most effective moment as a surprise attack… only for it to be rendered useless so easily.

If he could respond like that, attacking him with karma flames wouldn’t be very meaningful. She didn’t think the same method would work twice anyway.

‘Maybe if I could somehow set his head on fire directly…’

But Rurik wasn’t a fool, and if karma flames targeted his head, he would immediately block it.

He could simply extend his arm to block it, then cut off that arm afterward.

“You use a strange power. Unquenchable fire… I thought the Ka’har avoided sorcery?”

“It’s not sorcery, it’s a technique!”

Haschal shouted back as she charged toward Rurik.

It wasn’t entirely wrong. What the Ka’har defined as sorcery were arts manifested through mana, holy power, and dark mana.

Karma flames, burning through the medium of karma, could arguably be considered a technique like the Tale of Heroes.

[What sophistry. Anyone can see it’s sorcery. You were spewing mana before awakening and utilizing karma.]

Of course, given that the source of the rising flames was the rune engraved on her right wrist, her words were mere sophistry as Hersella said.

“…Well, it doesn’t matter. Come, let’s fight again! Surely this isn’t your full strength!”

“Why, would you go easy on me if I were weaker than you?”

Haschal sneered as she threw off her coat, now reduced to rags.

Rurik smiled fiercely, spreading his fully regenerated claws.

“Of course not. The weak are merely prey!”

“That’s exactly why you lot need to die!”

Haschal charged toward Rurik with a growl.

Longsword and claws danced, spitting sparks.

Haschal swung her sword to deflect Rurik’s slashes and twisted away from his stabbing claws with Frosting, fighting like a madwoman.

The resulting shockwaves shook everything around them, and droplets of blood scattered like red dew across the ground.

[Dodge however you can! Even I can’t block everything!]

It was Hersella’s role to intercept attacks that Haschal missed.

Red chains wrapped around Rurik’s limbs to slow his attacks’ speed and power, while layers of murder karma shrouded Haschal’s body like armor.

Being unable to attack the enemy while focusing on defense was nothing short of humiliating for her, but there was no choice.

Although her body had become stronger than before, taking Rurik’s attacks—which matched or perhaps exceeded her own power—head-on would be suicidal.

If she didn’t want to die with her entrails spilling out, she had to block them somehow. She didn’t have a werebeast’s regenerative abilities.

“WOOOAAARGH!”

“KYAAAAAAAH!”

The two beasts roared as they collided and were thrown back, over and over.

They ran horizontally along the castle walls while swinging their arms, using falling debris as stepping stones to clash in mid-air.

They crashed to the ground, tearing up the earth, then sprang back up, growling again.

To both werebeasts and humans alike, it seemed impossible that these fighters belonged to their respective species.

“Throwing him into ice water would be impossible…”

Frider van Faelrun, fighting Oleg, muttered with a hollow laugh.

Even to her, who had reached master level, this was no human fight.

The way they smashed everything—walls and ground alike—whenever they collided and were thrown back looked like two dragons entangled in a rampage.

At this rate, the historic Faelrun Castle might become ruins. The towers and buildings inside the outer wall were already half-collapsed.

They were clearly creatures made of bone and flesh like herself, but they certainly didn’t look like it.

When a tower collapsed upon impact and brick houses shattered to pieces, yet they emerged unscathed—how could such beings be considered living creatures?

It was more like massive iron balls tearing through everything in their path.

Fortunately, Haschal had been avoiding populated areas as much as possible; otherwise, the casualties caught in the aftermath would have created a sea of blood.

—-

Haschal, buried in the ruins of a warehouse, shook her head and stood up again.

Blood seeped from her torn wounds, staining the fur she wore red.

Without the armor Asha had modified for her, her bones would have been broken. The once-gleaming silver armor, now with most of its scales torn off and split, looked like a butchered fish.

‘This isn’t easy.’

Haschal exhaled a steamy sigh. Her overworked body was burning up. Her blood felt like it was boiling.

The enemy was stronger than expected, and the fight was lasting longer than she had anticipated.

For Haschal, Rurik was actually an opponent with poor compatibility.

Her fighting style wasn’t just swordsmanship alone, but a barrage using all her limbs, combined with karma tentacles and karma flames.

It was a method of overwhelming enemies with various means and powerful output.

However, against Rurik, most of her methods were effectively blocked.

Any wounds inflicted by means other than her sword regenerated instantly, rendering them meaningless.

Meanwhile, Rurik was actively utilizing his regenerative abilities.

He avoided shallow cuts with just his movements or endured them, while absolutely preventing any potentially fatal attacks.

If his arm was about to be cut off, he severed it himself before it could be cut; if his neck was targeted, he pulled off his own head and threw it far away.

Even if Durandal’s slash could disrupt regeneration, there was no problem with regeneration if he preemptively amputated the targeted part.

By now, severed limbs and headless bodies were scattered throughout the castle.

‘No matter how well he can regenerate, who would have thought there’d be a madman who pulls off his own head…!’

Haschal glared at Rurik in the distance with an expression of utter disgust.

His first impression had seemed surprisingly cold and calculating, but fighting him revealed a madman like no other.

‘Even the werebeasts in the original work didn’t do such things.’

However, she couldn’t deny that it was an effective tactic.

She had several opportunities to inflict fatal wounds, but each time he avoided them like that, leaving Haschal only able to inflict superficial cuts on his skin.

Although there was a slight opening whenever he regenerated major damage, he would create distance beforehand, making it difficult to exploit.

Still, Haschal’s injuries were relatively minor considering how many times she’d been thrown into things.

‘…Should I use the Defying Fate sword?’

Her Tale of Heroes, Defying Fate, was a technique that compressed time to create slashes that maintained their power while increasing speed. With that, she could likely cut down Rurik before he could sever his own body parts to escape.

The problem was that, like karma flames, once revealed, the opponent might find ways to counter it, and after using Defying Fate, she would inevitably expose a momentary opening.

That’s why Haschal was saving her technique until a decisive opening appeared.

She had several opportunities to attack his neck, but considering Rurik’s toughness, merely inflicting a sword wound on his neck wouldn’t be enough.

Unless she could completely sever it, if her blade only penetrated halfway through those thick neck muscles, he would certainly survive for a while rather than die instantly, and in that case, Haschal herself would be in danger.

‘At best, we’d both die together.’

Haschal had absolutely no intention of journeying to the afterlife alongside such a wolf.

To use the Defying Fate sword, she needed to either get close enough to take his head or create a situation where he couldn’t counterattack at all.

—-

While the two superhumans battled with enough force to reduce the castle to ruins, the castle walls were becoming covered in dark blood.

Beast blood and human entrails mixed together, flowing down like streams, and fallen bodies piled up like hills.

On the cracked and torn-up walls, soldiers and half-blood werebeasts, knights and pureblood warriors, masters and champions clashed endlessly, seeking each other’s lives.

Karl gritted his teeth at the battle situation, which could hardly be called favorable.

Thanks to the Baron of Median’s efforts, the power gap had been somewhat bridged, but that alone wasn’t enough to guarantee victory.

She had neutralized four champions.

The black wolf whose head had been severed couldn’t rise again, and the hyena werebeast who had been throwing spears had retreated to the rear after suffering a fatal wound… but the remaining two were a problem.

One had lost a leg to an exploding spear, but that meant just one leg was severed.

Even with silver-inflicted wounds, enough time had passed for recovery.

In fact, the snow leopard werebeast Abigeyl, whose arm had been blown off by Millia’s silver arrow, was already swinging dual swords with her perfectly regrown arm.

Demian was swinging his greatsword and Millia was shooting arrows at openings, but defeating the werebeast seemed far from achievable.

– KWAAANG!

A thunderous boom. The twisted and dented castle gate screamed.

As Karl had predicted, Basili and Viktor’s injuries were almost completely healed. Their attacks had begun to crush the gate.