Ch.888Fire and Ice

The masked self-proclaimed Heavenly Demon versus the helmeted so-called Heavenly Demon in fierce combat.

Swords clashed in a whirlwind, scattering thunderous sounds, while dispersed cold air turned into a blizzard, transforming the Small Forest’s training ground into a winter snowfield.

Persiella was strong.

Her mana capacity reminded me of Cardinal Lübitz of the Church of Grimnir, who had nearly infinite mana from sacrificing countless poor people.

Her extreme cold surpassed even the frigid temperatures of the Sky Mountains, freezing dragonborn to death with just a touch.

She possessed enhanced physical abilities from combining the dragonborn’s inherent toughness with strengthening magic, and refined swordsmanship built on that foundation.

How should I put it?

She seemed like what I might have become if I had obtained ice runes instead of flame, and grown stronger based on mana rather than karma.

Not that I thought I would lose, though.

I continued the fierce battle against Persiella, drawing out all my vastly improved physical abilities and the power of my achievements.

—-

“Kyaaaah!”

【 Defying Fate 】

At a distance close enough for our sword tips to touch, I unleashed Defying Fate with a fierce battle cry.

The achievement residing in my soul extended beyond my body toward the world.

“This sensation. That ability again, however—”

The world began losing color. Persiella’s voice slowed like a broken radio before completely disappearing.

I swung my sword toward the snail-paced Persiella—

– Shiver.

An abyss-like cold climbed up my sword. My body approaching Persiella began freezing rapidly from the extremities.

Han-ya (Cold Night).

Persiella’s area attack that freezes everything with extreme cold.

While the cold itself spread outward at a turtle’s pace, the speed at which my exposed body froze remained unchanged from before I activated Defying Fate.

Is the debuff applied to my body exempt from the slowing effect?

‘Damn it…!’

At this rate, I’d become an ice statue.

I gritted my teeth, withdrew my sword, and jumped back to create distance.

The world regained its color.

“—Time compression. Certainly an admirable ability… but once one understands the principle, countering it isn’t difficult.”

Persiella regained her voice as well.

“In the end, it’s an ability limited to the physical body. If I simply deny approach altogether, that’s sufficient, isn’t it?”

Her observation was so accurate it was somewhat irritating.

Regular Defying Fate, unlike Sky Slash, only made me appear faster while maintaining the same power and range as a normal slash.

“Have you no other techniques? Show me more. This is a rare intense battle. Reveal your limits and entertain me further.”

“Aren’t you proud. Just because you blocked one attack.”

I clicked my tongue and twirled my longsword once to shake off the frost.

“If you wish, I’ll block it as many times as needed. Han-ya consumes extreme amounts of mana so I can’t use it recklessly… but your power isn’t infinite either. No, considering the caliber of your ability, it must consume more than mine, correct?”

…This, too, wasn’t wrong.

Despite the difference between mana and karma, comparing wide-area cold dispersion with time compression, the latter was certainly a higher-level ability.

Which meant its power consumption must be enormous.

[ Hmm. Cold is particularly troublesome. If it had been fire instead, you could have ignored it and approached. ]

True. If Persiella had been a fire mage instead of an ice mage, I could have utterly destroyed her even with my power reduced by not using Karma of Murder.

I could have ignored all her main magical attacks.

‘What can I do?’

Unfortunately, Persiella’s specialty was spewing cold to freeze everything around her. Not an attack one could endure with bare flesh.

“Or perhaps, is this all you have? If so, I might be a little disappointed…”

Now she’s saying whatever she wants.

If she loses and dies like this, she’ll be too embarrassed to rest in peace.

“Well, will you even have time to be disappointed?”

I smiled faintly, lowered my stance, and raised my sword. The thunderous sounds that had been ringing in my ears had quietly subsided.

“Tagubongjin! Reposition the formation!”

Diarma’s shout brushed past my ears.

Yes. While I had been buying time by crossing swords with Persiella, the ice spike downpour of Manseolbingcheon had finally ended!

“First line, charge! Support that swordsman!”

“Ooooooh!”

Thirty close-combat practitioners—reduced from sixty—charged toward Persiella with roars full of anger and fighting spirit.

“What? Coordinated attacks in this situation…?!”

Persiella exclaimed, looking around somewhat flustered.

“Why are you so surprised? It’s only natural.”

With two hundred dragonborn surrounding us on all sides, did she think they would just stand there like wallpaper?

Of course we would mobilize everyone for a coordinated attack. That’s what the formation was designed for.

“This is absurd. Do you have no pride or dignity? To allow the interference of all these miscreants during a duel between worthy opponents…!”

She sounds just like Hersella. No wonder she calls herself the Heavenly Demon.

“What are you talking about? Have you read too many martial arts novels? I guess that’s why you call yourself the Heavenly Demon.”

I joined the dragonborn group to engage in thirty-one against one close combat, sneering with contempt.

“This is war. Only a fool would obsess over one-on-one combat!”

This fight started as a group attack from the beginning, with my ambush added on top. Why is she suddenly looking for pride and dignity now?

If she wanted a fair duel, she should have sought a dueling ground, not a battlefield.

“To think you know so little shame…! I have misjudged you!”

Did you ever judge me properly in the first place?

“It’s because of your mask. With your face completely covered, how could you see anything properly?”

I continued my mockery while swinging my sword.

I blocked her frost-covered sword with my dragonscale longsword and immediately counterattacked, focusing her attention on me.

Then,

“Now! Push in from all sides!”

The remaining thirty dragonborn rushed in from all directions as if they had been waiting, swinging and thrusting their metal staffs in an endless barrage of attacks against Persiella.

“How dare you-!”

Persiella continuously swung her left arm, two wings, and tail to block and deflect the rain of staffs. A bloody battle mixed with battle cries, shouts, roars, and screams.

A dragonborn caught in her left hand froze and shattered before he could even scream, and blades of cold swept in all directions.

Frozen droplets of blood scattered like plum blossoms, glowing red.

“Retreat for now!”

“Right!”

The close-combat dragonborn signaled their intention to withdraw as if they could no longer endure.

I nodded and intensified my attack to create an opening for them to pull back.

“Second line, prepare to attack! Light the fires, let the north wind and snow melt into flowing rivers!”

As the close-combat team retreated, the second line’s magical bombardment came flying in. As I had instructed beforehand, only fire-attribute magic.

– KWAAANG!

– HWARARRRR!

Explosions rang in my ears. Giant pillars of flame rose up, repeatedly dying down against the cold only to flare up again.

And so, the endless chain of coordinated attacks continued.

For about thirty minutes.

—-

“Haaah…”

And. Thirty minutes later.

“…So, with two hundred forty mobilized, this is all you could manage?”

In the brief gap created when our swords clashed and bounced apart.

Persiella glanced at my frost-covered left arm and sneered.

“How disappointing. Truly disappointing. If you had trained just a little more, you might have taken at least one of my arms!”

Acting as if she had completely won.

I glanced at my frozen left arm, then looked around at the remnants of the Twenty-Four Tagubongjin Formation.

“Urrrgh…”

Groans echoed continuously.

Of the two hundred forty dragonborn.

After thirty minutes of fierce battle, only about twenty remained standing while the rest lay sprawled on the ground.

Two Manseolbingcheons, seven Han-yas. Even the fierce attacks from the dark faction dragonborn who rushed in claiming the Heavenly Demon was in danger.

At the cost of greatly reducing Persiella’s mana and the Heavenly Demon Palace’s strength, nearly two hundred dragonborn were expended.

An impressive achievement.

If only it hadn’t been accomplished by the enemy.

…Yes, I suppose she deserves to call herself the Heavenly Demon.

I didn’t expect her to endure this much. Even with her racial advantage, how does she have such an endless mana pool?

Is this how my opponents feel when facing me?

“Just one arm? How petty.”

I took a deep breath and infused my muscles with tremendous strength. My body temperature rose rapidly. Boiling blood turned my skin red.

“Why not be generous and give three more? Your subordinates would appreciate it. Especially those without wives and children.”

– Tsssss!

Steam rose like fog and enveloped my entire body. The frost on my left arm melted into water.

“What vulgar words are you—!”

“They’re loyal subordinates playing along with your Heavenly Demon act, aren’t they? You should reward them. Tell them to lay eggs like chickens in a coop. They look like they’d be good at it.”

“You, woman…! Such a foul mouth!”

The mana surrounding Persiella began to fluctuate more violently.

“I’ve decided. I’ll cut off your limbs and give them to my subordinates as trophies!”

Getting so angry at this level of provocation.

Perhaps it’s because of her ice attribute, but for a dark faction leader, her boiling point was remarkably low.

“Chickens in a coop, you say? Let’s see if you can still say the same when you’re locked in a cage yourself!”

Persiella roared and spread her two wings wide.

“Sanglin-gyoryeong (Frost Scale Dragon Wing)!”

Another concept act.

No, since she spoke in anger, it’s not an act but her true nature.

– HWAAAAK!

Frost gathered on her bat-like membrane wings, increasing their size. The dragonborn wings, which had been human-sized, grew to several meters in length.

Massive wings made of frost and ice.

Persiella pulled those wings behind her back and—

“KAAAAP-!”

With a fierce cry, she swung them toward me like a flail.

– KWACHACHACHANG!

The ice wings shattered into thousands of pieces, becoming a shotgun blast of sharp fragments.

It was like witnessing an avalanche of snow and ice.

‘Ah, I can’t block this.’

Too many fragments to dodge or deflect one by one.

It was an attack difficult to counter with just the power I had shown so far.

So…

I have no choice.

“…Kenaz.”

With a whisper too quiet for the enemy to hear, I combined the rune’s flame with the power of Karma of Murder, concentrating it in front of my helmet.

– Wooooong!

In front of my mouth covered by metal plate. A ball of karma fire, compressed again and again until it seemed ready to burst, trembled with sun-like heat.

Karma Art

Karma Fire

Heavenly Demon Destruction Arrow

“KYAAAAAAAA!”

I let out a dinosaur-like battle cry and exhaled the compressed karma fire like a breath.

A crimson flame drew a straight line and collided with the avalanche of frost fragments Persiella had shot.

– KWAAAAAAAA…!

A storm of steam exploded like a cloud.

Ice fragments touching the karma fire’s heat vaporized explosively, scattering high-temperature steam.

– KWAGWAGWAGWA—!

The ground shook.

The pressure from the rapidly expanding steam caused all the surrounding snow, ice, earth, and rocks to explode and scatter with a thunderous roar.

It was like witnessing the collision between a fire dragon’s and ice dragon’s breaths.

“Spitting fire!? And with such firepower…? What are you? Are you truly imitating a dragon?”

Persiella exclaimed in a tone full of confusion.

“Well… maybe I am, maybe I’m not.”

I melted my arm with the remaining heat while being deliberately vague. My tone suggested she could think whatever she wanted.

Indeed, I made the right choice using my mouth instead of my hands.

If I had spewed flames from my fingertips, she would have been certain it was magic or some divine power. She’s perceptive enough for that.

But by breathing fire from my mouth like a dragonborn instead of using my hands, it would be difficult for her to determine whether this was some kind of magic or pure flame like a dragon’s breath or racial ability.