My Goblin System : Levelling up with my SSS Class Devouring skill Chapter 469

Seraphina was suppressed to ten percent. She lasted fifteen minutes at that reduced capacity before exhaustion claid her. This one—Satou—he just arrived. He’s fresh. But he’s still a demon-type creature. The sanctuary will reduce him to one-tenth power just like it did to her.

Valentine’s tactical mind ran calculations: At full power, based on intelligence reports, Satou is roughly equivalent to a lower-tier demon lord. Possibly stronger given how quickly he apparently slaughtered five thousand of my soldiers. But at one-tenth capacity? He becos rely an exceptionally dangerous warrior rather than an overwhelming threat.

I can win this. The sanctuary guarantees it. All demon lords eventually fall to ten-percent suppression. It’s just a matter of ti and technique.

He smiled, genuine confidence in the expression. His divine blessing had never failed him. Every demon lord he’d fought had been crushed by the sanctuary’s suppression, their power reduced to manageable levels.

This will be no different.

What Valentine didn’t know—what his intelligence reports couldn’t have told him because no one in this world understood—was that Satou was fundantally different from every other demon-type creature the Archbishop had ever fought.

Because Satou wasn’t originally from this world.

He’d been reincarnated. Brought here by a goddess. And in that mont of transition between worlds, between death and rebirth, sothing had happened. The goddess’s divine power, used to facilitate his reincarnation, had left traces. Microscopic fragnts of holy energy woven into his very soul, invisible to normal perception but fundantally altering how divine magic interacted with his being.

He wasn’t purely demonic. He was sothing hybrid. Sothing unprecedented.

And Valentine’s Divine Sanctuary, designed to suppress demonic power, couldn’t fully affect sothing that carried divine essence within it.

The forcefield was still active. Still pressing down on Satou’s demonic aspects.

But instead of reducing him to ten percent of his full power, it only managed to suppress him to perhaps seventy percent. Maybe sixty-five percent at most.

And Satou at sixty-five percent power was still far, far stronger than Valentine’s intelligence reports had suggested was even possible at full capacity.

The Archbishop didn’t know any of this.

He was about to learn.

—----------------

[THE OPENING EXCHANGE]

Valentine moved first, his decades of combat experience telling him that controlling the initiative was crucial against powerful opponents.

He crossed the thirty feet between them in a blur of divine-enhanced speed, his right hand trailing golden light as holy magic concentrated into a blade-shape around his fingers.

[Holy Blade Strike - Decapitation Technique]

His hand swept toward Satou’s neck, the holy blade capable of cutting through demon lord scales, the technique perfected through ten thousand repetitions in training and dozens of successful executions in actual demon hunts.

Satou’s head tilted exactly one inch to the left.

The holy blade passed through empty air where his neck had been a microsecond earlier, Valentine’s perfect technique eting nothing but vacuum.

Fast, Valentine’s mind registered with slight surprise. Faster than the suppression should allow.

He didn’t pause. Years of martial arts training ant his attacks flowed into combinations without conscious thought. His left hand ca up in an uppercut palm strike aid at Satou’s chin, holy magic exploding on contact point.

Satou swayed backward, his torso bending like bamboo in wind, the palm strike missing by milliters.

Valentine’s right leg swept low, trying to take Satou’s leading foot, disrupt his balance, create an opening—

Satou’s foot lifted, the sweep passing underneath, then stomped down on Valentine’s extended leg mid-sweep.

The impact should have shattered Valentine’s shin. His divine blessing reinforced the bone, preventing breaks, but pain shot through his leg anyway.

Valentine rolled with the stomp, using the montum to disengage, putting ten feet between them.

He’s not just fast. He’s reading my attacks. Seeing them coming before they land.

Valentine reassessed. Changed tactics.

[Holy Combination - Twelve-Strike Divine Assault]

He launched himself forward again, this ti with a combination specifically designed to overwhelm enemy defenses through sheer volu of attacks.

Strike one: Straight punch to the face. Satou’s head tilted, punch missed.

Strike two: Hook to the ribs. Satou’s torso twisted, hook passed by.

Strike three: Knee to the stomach. Satou’s hand caught the knee, redirected it past his body.

Strike four: Elbow to the temple. Satou ducked, elbow whistled overhead.

Strike five: Backhand to the jaw. Satou leaned back, backhand cut through air.

Strike six through twelve: A rapid-fire sequence of punches, kicks, elbow strikes, knee strikes—every attack enhanced with holy magic, every blow aid at vital points, every technique refined through years of training.

Satou dodged all of them.

Not by huge margins. Not with wasted movent. Just precise, minimal adjustnts that made each attack miss by the smallest possible distance.

Valentine completed his twelve-strike combination and found himself breathing slightly harder, his opponent completely untouched, not even looking particularly stressed by the exchange.

This isn’t right, his tactical mind insisted. The sanctuary should have him suppressed. His reflexes should be slower. His perception should be dulled. But he’s moving like he’s at full power—no, moving like he’s BEYOND what intelligence reports suggested his full power even was.

Satou still hadn’t counterattacked. Just stood there, fla-like eyes tracking Valentine with unsettling intensity, crimson aura blazing around his form.

Then he spoke for the first ti since the battle began.

"Is that it?" His voice was flat, emotionless. "Is this the best you can do?"

The words carried an edge that made Valentine’s combat instincts spike warning signals.

"You’re more skilled than I expected," Valentine admitted, his tactical mind racing through new calculations. "Intelligence reports underestimated your—"

Satou moved.

Not a complex technique. Not a fancy martial arts form. Just a straight punch aid at Valentine’s center mass, moving with speed that made the Archbishop’s divine-enhanced perception struggle to track it.

Valentine’s combat instincts scread and he threw himself sideways, holy magic reinforcing his body for evasive maneuver—

He almost made it.

The punch missed his torso by three inches, passing through the space where his body had been a fraction of a second earlier.