Chapter 271

Chapter 271 – Astonishingly Beautiful

The blade of a warrior who has touched the absolute peak can, at times, appear far more miraculous than actual sorcery.

The execution of the swing remains unseen, leaving behind only the concrete reality of a completed cut.

Aeviron’s gaze darkened considerably when confronted by that precise slash.

The perception of the grand archmage split the passing moments into miniscule shards. His awareness detected dozens of individual sword strikes converging at once.

Tzzzzz—

As the frozen moments thawed, the atmosphere thickened tightly around Aeviron. This was his trademark manipulation of the gale.

Immediately after, a hail of force erupted from the pressurized ether.

Bang! Boomboomboom!

A multitude of these flying bolts smashed into the oncoming slashes and broke apart. The strength of the sword strikes diminished, yet the gale-born projectiles kept coming.

Ping! Pibibibibing!

An unceasing torrent of air bolts completely nullified the incoming blades before dying down, and shortly after, Aeviron’s figure drifted backward as if sliding on ice.

The patch of ground he had occupied just a moment before was cleanly partitioned.

The fabric of space itself had been torn…

Shwick—!

The sound of the tearing air lagged behind the action.

It was a terrifying display to behold. Yet Aeviron evaluated the circumstances with unparalleled composure.

Rather, to be more precise, he scrutinized his adversary.

Their engagement had lasted only a handful of exchanges, but it offered ample opportunity for Aeviron to understand the nature of his enemy.

‘……Seasoned.’

And incredibly calculating.

Intentionally closing the gap with measured strides rather than closing the distance in a single leap, blinding his vision with an array of dozens of strikes when a solitary blow could suffice.

A true veteran of conflict.

……And specifically, a survivor of battles against legendary powerhouses.

However, Aeviron, who had endured the ancient eras of warfare, was by no means defenseless in a battle of intellects.

Tzzzzz……!

Shine’s form was abruptly hauled backward by a bizarre distortion.

Despite being dragged by this artificial gravitational pull, Shine assessed the situation without panic. He fearlessly pivoted away from Aeviron to pinpoint the source of the suction.

The origin of this anomalous gravity was a pocket of dense air.

Could a simple condensation of atmosphere generate such immense pulling force?

The skepticism lasted only a fraction of a second.

“Where are you directing your gaze?”

Shine indifferently returned his blade to its scabbard upon hearing Aeviron’s voice. And… clack!

The numerous wind bolts Aeviron had unleashed detonated with a sharp bang! in that microscopic window. He had already carved every single one of them to pieces.

Even so, his physical form was still being reeled toward the pressurized vacuum.

‘……’

Shifting his approach, Shine braced his posture while still suspended in the air.

The dense vortex pulling him was cleaved apart with a sharp shwick immediately after.

Thud!

Dropping back to the earth, Shine instantly whirled around to lock eyes with Aeviron. The moment he faced forward, he surged ahead. A devastating detonation rippled directly behind him!

The localized vacuum had collapsed, its explosive release swallowing every other sound across the field.

Eeeeeeeee—

A mute landscape dominated entirely by high-pitched ringing. In that splintered progression of time, Shine accelerated forward, outrunning the reaching grasp of the blast. In this state of supreme concentration, the world narrowed down to just himself and Aeviron.

Shine mapped out a conceptual trajectory toward his target, Aeviron. A multitude of tactical paths flooded his consciousness in that selfsame moment.

Should he sever the fabric of space? A direct thrust? A diagonal sweep? A horizontal cleavage? A leaping assault aimed at the throat? Or perhaps release a wave of raw ether.

Lingering deliberation creates hesitation in execution, but Shine experienced no such delay. This entire process transpired within a single heartbeat of reflection. To Shine, this level of cognitive processing was as instinctive as drawing breath.

Naturally, it had not always been this effortless.

Then why now?

Aeviron von Prauksen. This adversary was formulating dozens, even hundreds of potential outcomes in the span of a single respiration. Inevitably, Shine’s own mental calculations had to keep pace.

Consequently, within those finely partitioned fragments of time.

Shine and Aeviron exchanged hypothetical fatalities.

……A single clash.

Shine’s blade cleanly parted his rival’s neck. A spray of crimson erupted just as the opponent’s spell pierced directly through Shine’s heart.

‘……Once more.’

Shine adjusted his mental stance and formulated a different approach.

……Another clash.

Crunch!

His body was dragged into the enemy’s vacuum trap. The instant his bones and flesh began to buckle, he broke free from the constriction, and his released ether sheared the old man in half.

……Another clash.

This particular sequence defied analysis. His blade undeniably found its mark in the adversary’s chest, but the subsequent reaction remained unreadable.

Thus, within the theater of their minds.

Shine and Aeviron perished and slaughtered one another repeatedly.

If the opening gamble failed to resolve the duel, then the second, the third…… The theoretical engagements grew progressively more violent.

It took mere heartbeats for their mental sparring to exceed dozens of rounds.

Yet no definitive winner materialized, because neither could fully anticipate the hidden depths of the other’s repertoire.

Even seemingly flawless executions on the adversary felt untrustworthy. A triumph achieved too effortlessly was naturally treated with suspicion.

Therefore, the two combatants traded dozens, hundreds of mental maneuvers, hunting for a resolution they could both deem plausible.

Even for entities of their transcendent caliber, this was an exhausting endeavor.

Though simulated, every perceived demise dealt an indirect toll upon the psyche.

The hyper-accelerated perception within those fractured seconds imposed a staggering weight on the mind as well.

Ultimately, it was Aeviron who brought the imaginary warfare to a halt first.

“We could perpetuate this cycle indefinitely.”

Bang!

A localized detonation went off directly in front of the advancing Shine.

Tap, tap-tap.

Shine fell back two paces, training his deeply shadowed eyes upon Aeviron.

‘……Old codger.’

He had initially dismissed him as a loudmouth possessing nothing but a lofty boundary, but the man was undeniably a formidable opponent.

Shine harbored a sentiment very similar to what Aeviron had discerned in him moments ago.

‘I presumed this level of strength would be sufficient.’

In instances like this, he felt a twinge of longing for the absolute pinnacle of power from his days among the living, a realm he had not yet entirely reclaimed. In those days, he could have effortlessly dismantled any concealed techniques.

But that trace of self-pity was fleeting.

Shine’s gaze shifted briefly toward the rear.

A lizard was crawling sluggishly toward the collapsed Aster. Aster was repeatedly coughing up pools of blood, attempting to patch up his ruptured internal organs, and the process looked incredibly grueling.

……Their window of opportunity was vanishing.

‘There is no alternative but to wager everything on a single strike.’

The torrent of ether that had been violently radiating outward suddenly fell dead silent.

Tzzzz……

The energy condensed—or rather, imploded inward.

A battle of strategies? It mattered little now.

Regardless of how the adversary chose to counter, he would utilize an overwhelming torrent of might capable of pulverizing everything in its path.

As he sank into his offensive stance, his torso pivoted. Along with that rotation, his hips, knees, and even his ankles shifted their orientation. The soles of his boots adjusted to the altering center of gravity, promptly gouging shallow tracks into the dirt with a harsh grrrrk.

And Shine was not the sole combatant determined to gamble everything on this final exchange.

“Are you aware? This old man commenced his magical journey quite late in life. Consequently, rather than plodding along the conventional track, I pursued shortcuts. Perfecting a single aspect to its absolute limit naturally yields revelations in all adjacent disciplines.”

On and on he went.

……What a deeply unpleasant old man.

There was an obvious motive behind prattling about his personal history while they actively sought to end each other’s existences.

It was a calculated attempt to fracture his opponent’s concentration.

Of course, Shine was far too disciplined to let his focus be disrupted by such transparent stratagems. He promptly sealed off his auditory senses and plunged into a state of hyper-focus. Concurrently, the transcendence he had withheld during the earlier phase of the battle unfurled completely.

Zzzzzzt, zzzzzzzzzzt—

His field of vision warped and became unsteady.

Was it due to this transcendence being forged during his existence as a mortal? Unveiling it while inhabiting a vampire vessel generated this severe mismatch. At the very least, it was vastly more stable than when he had first tried it.

And so, entering the state of transcendence.

Aeviron, who had been speaking without pause, pulled his focus tight as well. He comprehended that his petty psychological maneuvers were yielding no results.

There would be no further probing maneuvers either. Doing so might hand the adversary a critical vulnerability.

Aeviron activated his own state of transcendence. While his domain did not manifest, a domain was merely one facet of a transcendent being. The heightened state of awareness brought about by his awakened transcendence hoisted him into a far superior tier of existence.

Time fractured once more.

Within the simulated landscape of their minds, the pair collided once again. Yet this confrontation was distinctly altered from the previous ones.

There were no intricate feints. It was purely an assessment of whether a single, definitive blow could utterly crush all potential counters from the opposition.

……And so.

The monstrous swordsman and the ancient sorcerer stood poised, locking eyes with one another.

The raw pressure naturally radiating from the two transcendent entities collided, distorting the surrounding air. Even the starlight filtering down from the midnight sky seemed to shudder within the current, as though the boundless wilderness—the entire world—was pulling inward toward these two individuals.

Aeviron capitalized on the first available window.

Roooooar—

The sky and earth churned unpredictably. As if an invisible colossus were gathering all the atmospheric mass of the world within its titanic palms, the air condensed tightly around Aeviron. No wind stirred. The environment merely simmered, resembling the oppressive stillness preceding a cataclysmic storm.

Aeviron concentrated the converging air down into a solitary coordinate. Devoid of any embellishment, this absolute compression was designed exclusively to extinguish a single life.

Pure intent saturated the magic.

……Aeviron reflected.

This would be more than enough.

His adversary was radical and full of pride. This was glaringly obvious from the fact that he was betting everything on a solitary, decisive blow.

However, these types of life-and-death exchanges were precisely where Aeviron excelled. How many instances of near-fatal peril had he navigated during his younger days?

‘It is unfortunate, but……’

The Sword Circle Lord would leave his remains in this soil. Claiming the life of the Tower Lord would preserve more than enough of his reputation.

Crunch, cruuunch.

When the pressurized sphere finally diminished to the microscopic scale of a single grain of millet.

Aeviron’s forefinger snapped forward, pointing directly at the Sword Circle Lord.

—Thung.

The minuscule orb erupted from his fingertip, promptly slicing through the distance with a violent whoooosh. Its trajectory led straight toward Shine’s heart.

It moved with such velocity that it appeared to penetrate Shine’s chest the exact millisecond it was unleashed. At the very least, Aeviron held this conviction without a shadow of a doubt.

No blade technique could hope to deflect it. Even if it were somehow blocked, the subsequent shockwave would prove entirely fatal.

‘I must direct my attention toward the Tower Lord instead.’

Aeviron grew anxious that the residual shockwave of the detonation might inadvertently claim the Tower Lord as well.

……All of this transpired within a microsecond.

But in the next instant.

“……!”

Srrrring—

An inconceivable melody echoed with absolute clarity in his ears. Within the fractured progression of time, Aeviron was utterly incapable of suppressing his astonishment. Only his cognitive processing had been accelerated, so…… by what method was that blade traveling at such an impossible velocity?

It was nothing short of a celestial execution.

A trail of steel so exquisitely beautiful it evoked a sense of profound reverence.

Staring at that sweeping arc as if completely hypnotized, a sudden realization struck Aeviron.

……Beneath the surface of that mask.

The Sword Circle Lord was wearing a grin.

It was nothing more than a passing intuition, yet…… Aeviron felt absolutely certain of it.

And concurrent with that realization.

Shwick—!

The blade cut cleanly through the world.