This was bad.
He was far more terrifying than I’d expected.
There was a reason he was called the strongest rcenary in Switzerland. A cavalry sword with its short reach was ill-suited against a halberd. As I was weighing my options, Leto’s upper body lurched slightly forward.
Fiel had gripped his cavalry sword in reverse and slamd it hard against the back of Leto’s head. But Leto’s body only wobbled a little before he imdiately swung his halberd in a wide arc.
A low sweep aid at the legs. Fiel quickly maneuvered his horse and leaped clear. His mount was a thoroughbred with excellent reflexes too. An ordinary war horse might have been lost right then and there.
Leto’s attacks were terrifyingly fast and powerful.
Up close, the sheer pressure from his swings felt as though it could send you flying.
Swift mobility was a cavalryman’s strength, but against an opponent who swung a long-reaching halberd with brute force, staying mounted beca more of a liability. I had no choice but to sheathe my cavalry sword.
I entrusted Mont Blanc to Anton, then drew my longsword.
Fiel also dismounted, handing his horse off to a Steinhof knight. It had been a while since I’d seen him with a longsword in hand. Together, we closed in on the Executioner of Zurse from front and back.
It felt as though only we existed on this battlefield.
Our n rcilessly cut down any enemy who tried to approach.
With the rear devolving into chaos, the battle had turned into a grueling brawl. The key was whether Viktor could capture the Count of Basel while Fiel and I kept the Executioner of Zurse pinned down.
Benjamin had stressed to Fried that the Euz levies needed to hold the line while the Basel command post was raided. Now it was our turn to hold the line for Viktor, who’d gone after the count.
Huff, huff.
Up close, I could hear the Executioner of Zurse’s murderous breathing. The force behind his halberd swings was absurdly powerful. And he was astonishingly fast, not sluggish in the least.
I settled into Ochs stance and focused on the intense tension I hadn’t felt in a long ti and on the monstrous opponent before . Strangely, Leto didn’t seem concerned about his rear at all, fixing his gaze solely on .
A chilling wave of killing intent made dodge to the right. Crash! The halberd had already slamd into the spot where I’d been standing, radiating savage force as it buried itself in the ground. A split second slower, and that axe blade would have smashed to pieces.
Was it thanks to the 200% Courage Scroll?
Crash! Crash!
They were crude, brute-force strikes hamred down with the halberd, but they were so fast and powerful that I couldn’t even think about parrying. It was close every ti, but the attacks were straightforward enough that dodging wasn’t too difficult.
The halberd ca down in alternating diagonal strikes from left and right, and just one clean hit would be the end of . The craters in the ground were proof enough of that. The sheer destructive force was staggering.
But the Executioner of Zurse had been too focused on , completely exposing his back to Fiel. Naturally, Fiel spotted the massive opening and pounced like a predator.
Wham!
"Guh!"
The instant Fiel lunged for a strike at the joints, Leto jabbed the butt end of the halberd shaft into Fiel’s torso and sent him flying in a flash. Animal instinct? Or maybe it had been a trap to lure Fiel in all along.
I seized the opening created when Leto’s attention shifted to Fiel and advanced quickly. But what ca at first was the halberd’s spear tip. I barely managed to catch it head-on with my longsword.
Screech!
Damn it, he was overwhelmingly stronger.
But thanks to the scroll, I wasn’t pushed back helplessly. I barely held my ground with the strength in my core. We were locked in a contest of strength in a bind, but I broke the balance first.
Using a winding technique, I rotated along the halberd’s blade, turning my longsword to press down the upper portion of the halberd in one motion. The mont the balance of force collapsed and the halberd was driven into the ground, I closed in on Leto.
A longsword couldn’t cut through plate armor. I quickly reversed my grip on the longsword and swung it with centrifugal force at Leto’s helt. The move was so swift that Leto couldn’t defend against it.
Clang!
His upper body rocked hard, and just as I aid the longsword’s tip at the gap in his helt for a thrust, the halberd ca hurtling toward . I ducked, but only by a hair’s breadth.
Whoosh!
Crash!
Leto spun the halberd in a wide arc and brought it down with centrifugal force. I threw myself into a desperate roll. Rolling in plate armor wasn’t easy, but desperation makes anything possible.
The instant I got back up, Leto was about to press the attack, but his body suddenly lurched. One knee buckled and hit the ground. Fiel had struck the back of Leto’s knee joint with his longsword from behind.
Then Fiel hooked his longsword around Leto’s head like a grappling hook.
"Hraaah!"
Thud!
With a battle cry, Fiel wrenched him backward, and Leto’s staggering body toppled completely. Fiel tried to thrust his longsword through the gap in Leto’s helt as he lay on the ground, but was struck by the halberd shaft that ca swinging at him. Fiel went flying.
I rushed in to follow up the attack, but my sword caught the axe blade instead of the shaft, and the impact was too much. I was sent flying and tumbling across the ground. In that ti, Leto got back to his feet.
God damn it!
What a monster! No, he was the very definition of a monster.
I couldn’t even rember the last ti I’d struggled this much. My lip must have split because the taste of blood was thick in my mouth. But I had to stay sharp. The halberd’s axe blade was coming straight for .
If I hadn’t used the Courage Scroll, I might not have been able to parry at all. But in that split second, I instinctively struck the halberd shaft just below the axe blade with my longsword, deflecting it.
Ching!
A heavy jolt of pain seed to send a numbing shock through my entire body, but I managed to send the halberd veering off in a completely different direction. Through the gap in his visor, Leto’s eyes widened.
What I saw was the armpit, the universal weak point of all plate armor. Armpits were typically protected only by thick leather. I thrust the longsword tip toward it. But Leto caught it in his hand.
My longsword was ripped away in an instant.
I never imagined he’d be able to snatch the sword at that mont, but before the despair of losing my weapon could even register, my eyes caught a small opening. The halberd was swung with trendous force to cleave my body in two.
Whoosh!
I threw myself into a forward roll and drew my dagger quick as lightning, stabbing it into the weak point behind his knee joint, hidden beneath thick leather. Leto let out a groan, but kicked away with one of those massive legs.
Wham!
Ngh!
I’d scored a hit, but the kick knocked the wind clean out of . I barely gathered my wits and raised my head only to see the halberd coming down on . For the first ti, my entire life flashed before my eyes.
My domain, Feuzen.
Michael and the Gale Knights.
The retainers of House Streit.
And... Hilda.
Crack!
My eyes squeezed shut, and silence fell.
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