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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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The heaviest staff in the world moved and it wasn’t just about its physical weight.
With every swing, Sharcal’s staff reshaped the very landscape around him.
The weight of its responsibility was immense.
Like raindrops falling on a watercolor painting, everything in front of me blurred and distorted.
I swiftly cut Ares’s restraints with my sword and pulled him to his feet.
“Hold on tight!”
I tightened my grip on the sword, my muscles tense.
Ares and Rin, though confused, nodded and clutched my clothes.
Then, a wave of pressure, like a raging waterfall, crashed down on us from the rippling space.
“Ugh… Aaargh!”
Blood vessels burst in my eyes, turning my vision red.
But I gritted my teeth, planting my feet firmly like an ancient tree, refusing to yield.
I had experienced this crushing sensation once before, but I never wanted to go through it again.
Yet here I was.
At least this time, my body wasn’t riddled with injuries from battling through the Demon Realm Forest and I was young.
I had no idea how much time had passed, but I managed to endure it.
Ares, summoning his mark’s power, lent me a small measure of support.
My knees trembled as I struggled to stay upright, leaning heavily on my sword.
My vision blurred, and I realized the liquid trickling down my forehead wasn’t sweat, but blood.
“Gasp… Huff…!”
A pathetic gasp escaped my lips but there was no time to rest.
This was just the beginning.
Sharcal, his expression impassive, raised his staff again.
I clenched my jaw, steeling myself for the next attack.
I couldn’t let him dictate the pace of the battle.
I channeled all my strength into my legs, pushing off the ground with such force that the floor beneath me cracked.
Muscles screamed in protest as my body twisted and contorted.
The air rippled, and I surged forward with a speed that made Rin and Ares cry out in surprise.
A memory flashed through my mind.
It was like this when I first met Sharcal.
Outmatched in terms of range, I had tried to close the distance after the first blow, but my legs had buckled under the pressure.
But things were different now.
I had grown physically stronger.
I wasn’t the injured sherpa who had roamed the Demon Realm Forest.
I was a student, nurtured in the safe haven of the academy.
Clang!
My sword intercepted Sharcal’s staff.
A flicker of surprise crossed the silver glow within his skull mask.
“I won’t let you swing that freely!”
“How intriguing.”
For most mages, staffs were tools to enhance their magic or channel their mana.
It wasn’t impossible to cast magic without a staff, but the precision, casting speed, and power would be significantly diminished.
However, Sharcal was different.
He couldn’t cast magic without his staff.
His power couldn’t be defined as mere mana, it was twisted and chaotic, too brutal and bizarre to be considered conventional magic.
If he cast magic without his staff, he would be consumed by his own power.
In other words, casting magic without his staff was equivalent to suicide.
So, all I had to do was stop his staff.
Easier said than done, of course.
It was practically impossible unless I could catch him off guard.
The only reason I had managed to close the distance was because we were already inside the banquet hall.
Otherwise, I would have been hit several times by now.
Fortunately, unlike Kurika, who fought with his full strength the moment he acknowledged someone as a warrior, Sharcal wasn’t going all out.
He was arrogant, and he underestimated those he considered weak.
That was my only chance of defeating him.
‘I have to kill him in one blow!’
This was my only opportunity.
If I failed, there wouldn’t be a second chance.
I swung my sword, aiming to cleave through his staff, but…
Crack.
A chilling sound reverberated through my hand.
This was it.
An opportunity that might never come again, in this life or the next.
As someone who relied solely on physical strength, my chances of killing Sharcal were practically nonexistent.
And in this moment of opportunity…
Fate smiled upon me.
A crack appeared on the point where my sword had struck the staff.
Then, my sword shattered, crumbling into pieces as if it had never existed.
‘The first attack took too much out of it!’
The sword Diana had given me had served me well.
It was an excellent sword for its price, considering how much I had used it.
But it had reached its limit.
No matter how diligently I had maintained and cared for it…
The first blow from Sharcal’s staff had pushed it past its breaking point.
‘I was too focused on Sharcal!’
Blinded by the thrill of potentially defeating my nemesis, I had failed to assess the condition of my weapon and think rationally.
The obstacle blocking his staff was gone.
Sharcal, without hesitation, swung his staff, and…
“……!”
An invisible wave of energy washed over me.
He was the Master of Distortion.
It was mana, yet it wasn’t.
“Ugh!”
I was flung backwards, my body lifted off the ground.
Rin and Ares rushed towards me as I crashed to the floor.
“Daniel!”
Rin, her voice choked with tears, tried to heal me with her restoration magic, but…
“My-my magic…?”
She couldn’t sense any mana.
She waved her hands frantically, but there was no mana in this space.
Or rather, there was mana, but it couldn’t be called mana anymore.
This was why he was called the Master of Distortion.
This was why, even with Arianna’s flower, the treasure of Kurika that absorbed all mana, I couldn’t defeat him.
Sharcal’s mana was immune to Arianna’s flower.
The power to invert the properties of all surrounding mana.
Whether it was a natural talent, a skill honed over centuries, or the result of relentless effort, I didn’t know.
But he possessed a power that placed him at the pinnacle of all mages.
“I-I’ll try.”
Rin, her face pale with fear, desperately tried to gather mana, but Ares reached out his hand from the other side.
The marks of Helios on his hands glowed, and a warm energy flowed into me.
Unlike restoration magic, which felt like applying ice to reduce swelling, this was a gentle, soothing warmth that enveloped my body.
It was far more potent, and I was able to get back on my feet quickly.
“Daniel!”
“Ugh… I did it!”
Rin embraced me tightly, while Ares groaned, clutching his head.
It seemed he wasn’t entirely confident in his new technique.
I wanted to thank them, but I immediately pushed them away and readied myself for battle once more.
I had expected Sharcal, a mage of his caliber, to unleash a barrage of devastating spells, but…
To my surprise, he wasn’t swinging his staff.
He was sitting on his throne, watching me with an unreadable expression.
It was so unexpected that I was momentarily stunned.
“How did you know?”
Sharcal asked, his voice serious.
“Daniel, was it? You knew that I couldn’t cast magic without my staff.”
“……”
“That’s why you took the risk of closing the distance and blocking my staff. If your sword hadn’t been so worn, it would be me lying on the ground right now.”
I unconsciously clenched my fists.
His words meant that I had come incredibly close to victory.
He shook his head, a rare sigh escaping his lips.
“A victory achieved through the mere miracle of a god holds no meaning.”
Sharcal, who despised the weak and never showed mercy to the defeated, was brutally honest when it came to victory and defeat.
He had reached a conclusion.
In his eyes, he was the loser of that battle.
“But I have one question. How did you know that I cannot cast magic without my staff? No one knows this but me.”
“……”
“You have no answer?”
“If you acknowledge me as the victor, I will exercise my right to withhold it.”
Sharcal chuckled, seemingly pleased with my response.
He nodded vigorously.
“Ah, excellent! The victor has the right to do as they please.”
I steadied myself, glancing at Rin, who was glaring at Sharcal as if she wanted to kill him.
How did I know about Sharcal’s secret, something even Kurika didn’t know?
To learn that he couldn’t cast magic without his staff, I had to witness his death.
And I had seen it.
I had witnessed him trying to take down the Earliest Apocalypse, sacrificing himself in a desperate attempt to destroy the calamity that threatened to engulf the continent.
In my past life, Sharcal had been killed by the Earliest Apocalypse.
Even his final, desperate attack had failed to harm the Apocalypse, who emerged from the explosion unscathed.
“I have one more question.”
“This is getting expensive, but I accept.”
Sharcal seemed to be enjoying himself, energized by the fight against a worthy opponent.
He was surprisingly lively, considering his usual gloom and doom demeanor.
‘Is it because he felt the threat of death?’
The possibility of dying meant he was still alive.
Perhaps his long-dormant survival instincts had been awakened, making him a bit more human.
“Why are you in Nirva? And what’s going on here?”
“Hmm?”
Sharcal tapped his staff on the ground, about to answer my question, when…
BOOM!
A massive explosion shook the mansion.
Half of the building collapsed, and a giant boulder, like a meteor, crashed down on Sharcal’s throne, obliterating it.
He wouldn’t be killed by something like that, but I didn’t have time to worry about him.
A wave of murderous intent, far more threatening than the falling boulder, washed over us from outside.
Through the gap in the shattered mansion, we saw a werewolf with a black mane sprinting towards us along the streets of Nirva.
His speed was incredible, so fast that it created an optical illusion, making the space around him ripple and distort.
“…Kurika?”
The Emperor of the Demon Realm Forest, Kurika.
He had arrived in Nirva.
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[Oh shit bro fought the miniboss and now he has to face the boss]
Holly shit, Kurika really seems like a complete beast xDD