Ch.740Professor Hashar’s One-Shot Lecture

“…movement that ignores inertia?”

Demian seemed not to understand what I meant. Perhaps the word “inertia” was too unfamiliar an expression for him.

So, I continued with a detailed explanation using simple analogies that even a child could understand.

“Hmm… if you’re riding a horse and stop suddenly, your body would lurch forward, and if you’re swinging a sword downward with full force and then try to change to a horizontal slash, the trajectory wouldn’t be at a right angle but diagonal, right? All moving things have a stubbornness to maintain their direction. That’s what inertia is.”

This should be enough for Demian to understand what I mean. He may lack emotions and be oblivious, but he’s not stupid.

“But your technique is free from such constraints, isn’t it? Then you should make good use of that characteristic.”

“I sort of understand what you’re saying… but what exactly should I do?”

To Demian, who tilted his head questioningly, I laid out the improvement plans I had thought of after hearing the explanation of his Tale of Heros. From the most basic aspects to the direction he should pursue in the future.

“There are roughly three ways to improve a Tale of Heros. Efficiency, power, and versatility. How little Karma you consume, how powerful an effect you demonstrate, and how diversely you can utilize it. The gap between heroes usually begins there. Millia, you should listen carefully too.”

“Um… alright, Haschal.”

Facing the two with puzzled expressions, I continued with detailed explanations, giving examples one by one.

First, efficiency. Unless your Tale of Heros aims for a one-hit kill, this is something you must pay attention to.

If you don’t learn how to achieve maximum effect with minimal effort and waste Karma recklessly, you might lose due to lack of stamina even against weaker opponents.

In my case, I’ve practiced adjusting the output or range of Defying Fate as needed for this purpose.

When there’s no need to move my entire body, I compress only the arrival time of the slash like before, or adjust the duration or output of Defying Fate according to the opponent’s speed.

The same goes for other heroes.

“Have you heard of Aishan-Gioro Orhan’s Tale of Heros, Unyielding Flesh? In his case, he doesn’t constantly maintain Unyielding Flesh, but briefly activates it only right before an enemy’s attack touches his body, then withdraws it to conserve strength. You should train in a similar way.”

Don’t maintain “Skywalk” the entire time you’re flying through the air.

After accelerating in one direction, withdraw Skywalk and rely on inertia to move, then activate it again only when you need to change direction.

In Demian’s case, just doing this would dramatically increase his combat duration. As for Millia, since she only manifests her Tale of Heros when shooting arrows, there wasn’t much advice to give regarding efficiency.

—-

“The only way to enhance power is to accumulate Karma, so let’s skip that… As for enhancing versatility… I think there are about two methods.”

I showed my thumb and middle finger as I spoke.

“Two methods?”

“My Tale of Heros, Defying Fate’s blade, doesn’t limit its manifestation range to just the blade but expands it to my entire body to achieve impossible acceleration. Thanks to that, I gained versatility that can be used for ambush, evasion, attack, and defense—all actions.”

Well, to be honest, it’s quite different from acceleration.

If it were an acceleration-type technique, when speed doubles, power should quadruple… but Defying Fate has no such power increase.

The essence of Defying Fate is not acceleration but compression of arrival time.

To explain using a game analogy, it’s similar to executing a movement that normally requires 12 frames in just 5-6 frames.

The damage itself is no different from when not using Defying Fate.

If other heroes manifested such a Tale of Heros, they might complain about lack of power… but that doesn’t apply to me. When I swing my sword with full force, even Dragonborn can’t withstand it and break apart.

Thanks to the blessing of divine blood and enormous Karma, my attack power was already sufficient, and thanks to Rotholandus’s blessing and winter armor, my defense was also sufficient.

So, for me, auxiliary-type Tales of Heros like Defying Fate are more useful than those that enhance attack or defense power.

…My thoughts wandered. Anyway,

“In your case, Demian, contrary to me, you could find improvement by narrowing the manifestation range of Skywalk.”

“Narrowing the range?”

“Yes. For example, remember the vertical-horizontal slash I mentioned earlier? You should be able to do that. If you limit the manifestation range of Skywalk to just the slash, you could change the direction of your sword without any resistance.”

And not just slashes.

You could swing your fist straight ahead and then suddenly change direction to strike sideways, or a retreating sword swing could transform into a thrusting lunge in the next moment.

That’s what it means to ignore inertia.

“If you utilize this well, couldn’t you demonstrate swordsmanship that’s so free and complex that ordinary people couldn’t even imagine it?”

“Just hearing about it doesn’t give me a good sense…”

Demian tilted his head.

“That’s how it is. How could improving a Tale of Heros be possible overnight?”

Even I took months to expand the power of Defying Fate to my entire body, so how could Demian, who just awakened his Tale of Heros, grasp it merely from someone else’s explanation?

This is something you ultimately have to experiment with through trial and error using your own body.

“Hmm… I’ll remember it for now. So, what’s the second method?”

Something a hundred times more difficult than the first improvement plan I just mentioned.

“You said earlier, right? Rather than flying through the sky like a bird, it feels like moving your body itself to where you want. Focus intensively on that aspect.”

If the first improvement plan was a concept that maximized the advantage of ignoring inertia during direction changes, the second was one that maximized the characteristic of coordinate movement.

“Your current flight method is… let’s say, similar to drawing a line in the air. Moving your body straight from the starting point to the destination. Am I right?”

I raised my index finger and drew a line in the air as I spoke.

“Um… isn’t that obvious?”

Yes, it’s obvious. For normal flight.

But a Tale of Heros is a technique that realizes the unobvious, the realistically impossible.

“Don’t be bound by what’s ‘obvious.’ The essence of a Tale of Heros lies in transcending that ‘obviousness.'”

Realizing the unobvious as if it were obvious—that was the qualification and privilege of a hero.

Not being trapped by the common sense of the world, but believing and acting as if the unobvious is possible—that was the prerequisite for properly utilizing a Tale of Heros.

“Whether straight or curved, the movement of objects tends to draw a line. That’s the obvious thing. …But what you need to draw isn’t a line.”

I raised my finger again and began to stab the air. Moving my arm slightly sideways, densely and tightly.

So that countless points would connect to form a line.

“This is the direction you should go. Instead of moving by drawing a line, move from the starting point to the destination by dotting the air. And… gradually reduce the number of those dots.”

“Reduce the number of dots…?”

“Yes. At first, it might seem no different from drawing a line, but later…”

I continued stabbing the air, drawing consecutive dotted lines of the same length. Gradually reducing the number of dots.

If you place a thousand dots within a 10cm interval, it would look no different from a straight line.

But what if there were a hundred dots? What if it decreased to ten?

And finally… what if only two remained?

“So, Haschal, what you’re saying is…”

“You catch on quickly. That’s right. If you refine your Tale of Heros ‘Skywalk’ to the extreme, you won’t even need to fly through the air. The moment you manifest your Tale of Heros to head somewhere, you’ll already have reached that place.”

Spatial teleportation.

That was the ultimate destination of coordinate movement ability.

“…Is that possible?”

“There’s no reason it shouldn’t be. That’s the nature of a Tale of Heros.”

Demian seemed skeptical, but I nodded with a confident smile.

It can’t be impossible. Absolute certainty dwelled in my mind.

Why?

There’s no need to ask. Of course I can be certain because I’ve actually used it.

Among Demian’s Tales of Heros that vary depending on how he’s raised, when he manifests a movement-type Tale of Heros… around the latter part, he starts moving by transcending space.

He becomes a blinking swordsman, that is.

Having given up on attack-type Tales of Heros, without a holy sword or with poor control, he’d be nothing more than a no-damage front-line blinker… but there’s no need to worry much.

I can give him a holy sword this time, and as for control… that is, his skill level was already superior from the beginning. Except for his incurable jumping mania.

—-

Unlike Demian’s Tale of Heros, for which it was simple to point out improvements and directions, I didn’t have much advice to offer regarding Millia’s Tale of Heros.

A Tale of Heros that compresses the volume and mass of objects in hand to arrow level and shoots them, Eternal Rain.

Thanks to the characteristic that the shot arrow returns to its original state just before hitting the target, it was a technique whose power varied greatly depending on what object was transformed into an arrow.

“…Can you only transform things like walls or pillars into arrows, or can you also transform living creatures into arrows? For instance, people…”

If the latter were possible, it would be a formidable killing technique that could instantly kill an opponent just by touching them. I wonder how it actually works.

“Um… I’ve never thought about that, so I don’t know.”

Millia shook her head with a slightly disgusted expression. As if she had never even dreamed of the idea of compressing a person.

—-

As a result of experimentation, we concluded that Millia’s Tale of Heros works best when targeting inanimate objects without will.

It’s not that compressing living beings is impossible, but perhaps because they can resist with their own will, it takes quite some time to compress them into arrows and consumes a lot of energy.

Grabbing an enemy and attempting compression is not only inefficient but also carries a significant risk of counterattack.

If an enemy resists compression and swings a sword, Millia would have to block it with just one remaining hand. It was an excessively dangerous method.