Chapter 161: Bound Flesh, Unraveling Flow
The monster's mouth hung open. But the dozens of threads sewn through it allowed only a low whisper to seep between the strips of flesh.
[The strands of the scale…… Are being pulled. Darkness stirs. Yet you do not follow.]
It groped blindly through the air with its twisted gaze. Black gravestones rose from the ground, and the sll of rotting blood drifted around the plain. Into that space, a man who had yet to draw his sword walked slowly forward.
The wraiths writhed and clawed at him, but crumbled before they could draw near.
The Surging Wall soon understood.
That human stood apart from the countless strips of flesh his master had bound together—and from the absolute laws that governed them. A primal terror made the throat that had once belonged to a person tremble.
The voice dropped lower.
[Does not co…… Does not reach…… Only shatters.]
The dozens of forearms attached to its body trembled in fine shivers.
At that mont, Calix stepped out from the shadows. He passed the soldiers and Helmut, and planted his feet in the dark-red dust. The air felt as though it split apart in fine cracks under the taut, razor-edged tension.
* * *
Calix's mana raced through the neural accelerator's circuits. His bloodstream and neural network flared as though electrocuted.
The air pressed down heavily, sealing his ears. With each ordinary step, the dust on the ground fanned outward in a spiral. And even those scattered motes drifted slowly, suspended in the air.
He turned his gaze toward the enemy.
Dozens of weapons fell toward Calix. At a glance they seed to leave no room to dodge, filling every inch of space—but they were crude.
He tilted his head back and twisted his torso, deflecting the enemy's attacks with those two motions alone. Pillars of stone surged up from the ground in quick succession, yet posed no threat whatsoever.
'They said it was under Legion Commander Verhas.'
The power was formidable, certainly—but there were gaps scattered throughout. Each attack seed threatening on its own, yet taken together, sothing felt lacking.
A spear tip grazed past his ear, and he simply twisted his head aside to avoid it.
There was no need to flail as he once had. Instead of fighting against the current, he let that force carry him along. It wasn't simply that he had grown faster. He stood one beat ahead of the flow.
Grrrk.
Calix steadied his breathing and deflected a jet-black blade with his scabbard.
He had yet to draw his weapon.
In that instant, a dark black shockwave burst outward like a wave. The air and light warped, and the slowed world shuddered—rippling like glass heated over a fla.
An alarm sounded from the neural accelerator, and the dust drifting through the air lurched to a halt.
'Sa thing that hit Helmut. It's interfering with dark mana.'
Calix's brow furrowed.
Then, from deep below his sternum, a familiar pulse resonated. Two cores. The mana of chaos pushed back the shadow pressing in from outside.
The enemy's invisible force shattered without resistance. The senses that had been scattering found their place again at once. Axes, maces, the occasional shield. The enemy's attacks slowed once more, tracing their steady trajectories.
Ssrrrk.
Calix exhaled briefly, then drew his sword. In his field of vision, the monster thrashed in desperation. As a vast darkness heaved in every direction, friend and foe alike had fallen well back.
The stitching connecting The Surging Wall's forearms pulled taut. The threads sewn through its limbs twisted and groaned loudly.
The darkness—dozens of forearms—lunged outward all at once. Forearms of different lengths and thicknesses knotted together, swinging in erratic arcs as they closed in.
Boom!!
The ground split apart and stone dust erupted upward.
Nearby soldiers stumbled back from the shockwave. Helmut opened his mouth to shout a warning, but Calix had already taken his step forward.
Through his accelerated senses, he saw the world branching along several paths.
The microscopic tremor of muscles contracting. The faint shudder of the ground splitting just before a stone pillar rose. Calix threaded those signs into a single line.
The first axe blade that ca flying let out a shriek of tearing air. He stepped to the side and sidestepped it one beat ahead. The enemy's forearm slashed emptily through the air.
Imdiately after, three branching arms from the right closed in simultaneously. At the point where their trajectories crossed, Calix extended his sword.
Swish—
The pieces of tal locked together for an instant, then rebounded.
Just as the ground was about to crack beneath him, Calix's foot had already moved away. The black gravestone that erupted a beat too late shattered nothing but the surface of the earth.
Wraiths reached out their hands through the empty space and rushed in; between them, The Surging Wall's elbow twisted and changed direction. Like a broken doll. The speed at which it swung its weapons was deeply threatening.
And yet it didn't land.
In the end, it could not match Calix's speed. The wicked darkness stained the earth black, but it circled the outside of him and could not penetrate within.
And then, in that mont, the beating of his heart grew quiet. He stopped swimming. If enduring the most dangerous stretch as a diver ant survival, then the next step was to mine the mana stone.
Swordsmanship was no different.
Color bled into Calix's vision. What had begun as a point beca a single line. The enemy looked as though it had truly beco a doll—like tangled seams, all gathered into one.
An indeterminate light spread faintly, bleeding along that line.
His eyes narrowed.
'Now.'
His left foot moved half a step forward. The blade that had been silent until now responded to its master's will and moved.
The first cut.
Rather than pouring in excess force, it flowed out smoothly and gently—as though parting a current.
Sliiick—
Starting from the wrist of the outermost arm, it was severed in two and thudded to the ground. The mont the sutured section was cut clean through, a thick forearm toppled straight down.
A shriek tore from the monster. Black liquid sprayed like a fountain from the severed point.
Calix's expression did not change in the slightest.
Things like Geomhwa, or the Apex of Annihilation—he paid them no mind any longer. He felt as though the enemy's weapons were drawing his in, but he did not consider it particularly significant.
He shook his sword lightly and advanced several more paces.
The Surging Wall scread and swung its countless arms even more savagely. Though they hadn't even collided, the mana of chaos and darkness clashed and sent a trendous detonation rolling outward. That motion alone sent a storm howling through the heart of the battlefield.
Soldiers hunched their bodies down. A curtain of dirt and dust surged upward, then curled inward and cut off the view.
But even that turbid environnt was part of the flow in Calix's eyes. The chaos flowing out from his core condensed faintly at the tip of his blade. There was no waste.
He drove half a step into the space between the corrupted souls and the reaching hands of the wraiths.
He rolled his shoulder to slip the massive hand crashing down from the right, and let the blade falling diagonally from the left pass by—folding himself around it as though pulling it into an embrace.
At the end of that, he saw his destination.
The monster's core.
A dark-crimson heart pulsed with an eerie light beneath the nape of its neck. Beneath the translucent, faceted surface, fiber-like filants wound together, resembling veins.
Calix's sword shot out without hesitation.
An upward diagonal cut.
Shrk!
Kraaaaaaah!!
Chaos annihilates all that stands in its way. The core that had appeared so solid crumbled to the grain—like soil drained of all pressure.
Then, from The Surging Wall's flank to its back, following that thick line, it burst apart all at once as though unraveling. The few remaining forearms reflexively swung their weapons.
Calix allowed not even the final death throes. He twisted his blade and cut once each—cleanly—at the spear tip that ca flying from the left and the iron shard that ca crashing from the right.
The severed limbs buried themselves in the dust. The jet-black forearms only then recovered their flesh-tone. They had clearly once been parts of a person.
By that point, the monster's cries sounded less like screams and more like a final exhaled breath.
Its body did not take long to collapse.
Its legs buckled, strips of flesh burst of their own accord, and the countless forearms fell away before they could even be cut. The dark mana that had been massed together lashed outward like a scream across the entire southern region. The wraiths dissolved into the air as though they had finally found their freedom.
What remained was only the head of The Surging Wall.
Degurerreu.
Calix looked down at the head rolling at his feet. It was ugly with stitch marks all over it—but a realization about his own abilities had co before any of that.
What is strength?
It was not being faster or more forceful—
'It is the power to command the flow and take responsibility for it.'
And both of those things were now held in his hands. Until now, he had been swept about by chaos. But henceforth, he intended to master it by his own will.
"Calix!"
It was ti to clean up the battlefield.
* * *
The victor had been decided, but there was no room for relief. When The Surging Wall fell, its subordinates fled in every direction or ran amok in a frenzy.
"Advance! Push forward!"
Calix commanded the allied forces like extensions of his own body. Volga with the banner, Marik holding the center of the battlefield, Royce leading the cavalry to the right flank, and more. With the Mountain Rabbits at the core, the remaining enemies were swiftly dealt with.
From the enemy's perspective, they had failed their ambush and lost in single combat as well.
As such, unavoidable losses there were, but the battle line never collapsed. While the infantry held firm, the cavalry pressed down on the flanks and rear.
A perfect victory.
The Mountain Rabbits then proposed pursuing the enemy remnants, and Helmut Barben along with his knights followed at their heels.
But Calix remained with the main force.
"Direct contact is dangerous. It's different with you. Ordinary knights…… no, others—divine assistance is essential."
"They'll also need to know the ground can give way at any mont."
"The darker the shadow, the more sinister the area around the gravestones. We must sever the central axis first."
Sier, Yelayen, and the priestess Ella. They drafted new rules for survival. Fortunately, the dead had not risen again, but it was a different matter from facing Kohtan.
Calix absorbed the advice of those around him deeply. But before that, the gazes of the allied soldiers gathered first.
They had watched Calix's calm, composed manner. Outwardly, he looked pristine—as though not a single drop of blood had stained his sword. Even the rise and fall of his chest was so still that, had it not been for the sll of blood hanging over the battlefield, it would have looked like a single painted scene.
But everyone knew.
The Mountain Rabbits, the celebrated knights, even Helmut—all held their tongues. He was the one who had led the battle, and the one who had finished it.
The soldiers' eyes held a mixture of fear and reverence, and the young knights unconsciously bowed their heads. As though giving thanks simply for having survived.
Just then—
"There's…… sothing here!"
Volga, who had been clearing the wreckage, called out loudly.
Where all eyes turned, the severed head of The Surging Wall lay. The place where the darkness had departed. Both eyes were white and blank, and the mouth was sewn tightly shut with stitches. Between them, a piece of tal protruding near the temple caught the eye. A silver shard, as though soone had sewn it in by force.
Hadiya carefully knelt down and picked it up.
"This looks like a relic of the Elvra Holy Empire."
As though corrupted from within, a murky light flickered across it and was gone. On its surface, the mark of the Order remained faintly.
One of the clergy drew a sharp breath.
"To embed a thing blessed by divinity into the flesh of a monster!"
"Verhas…… that wretch—not content with darkness, he is desecrating the Goddess's remnants."
Even as Sier let out a groan, Adrian quietly inserted himself into the conversation.
"If the enemy is making use of divinity, then the Beacon of Souls cannot be considered unconditionally safe."
Silence fell again. By then the sky had cleared, but a chill crept along the spine. Calix took a brief look around.
Hardened bloodstains, broken spears and swords, and the faces of soldiers caked in dust. His eyes grew one degree harder.
Then—where would they go from here?
He had to give an answer.
"We seize the south first."
His voice was not raised, but it drove itself deep into the ears of the warriors. If one victory was not enough, he would simply repeat it as many tis as needed.
For the larger battle ahead.
'No longer a battle where we follow. We choose the battlefield.'
Calix pointed to where they would march.
User Comments
0 comments from readers