Hide gulped and took a deep breath. Even though he did a show of confidence. He was not used to fighting with these new weapons.
Well... it didn’t matter now and it was a good chance to use them.
"Die, you lower-block freak!" the Vice Leader roared, his face contorting into an ugly, swelling mass of pure rage.
The purple mana surrounding his form violently imploded, condensing back into his palms. This was his primary talent, that allowed him to compress raw environntal mana and bend it into any weapon configuration he desired, granted the manifestation remained in physical contact with his skin.
With a tallic CLANG, the purple energy over his right fist expanded, transforming instantly into a massive, heavily spiked gauntlet.
He lunged forward, throwing a devastating straight punch aid directly at Hide’s skull.
Hide stepped inside the trajectory, his left blade slicing a defensive arc that deflected the gauntlet sideways. The impact cracked the stone walkway beneath their feet, but before Hide could counter, the Vice Leader’s grip shifted. The spiked gauntlet instantly dissolved, its purple mass elongating into a ten-foot-long, serrated mana whip that hissed through the air like a striking serpent.
CRACK!
The whip lashed across the plaza, cleanly severing two massive pillars near the pronade. Hide backflipped smoothly over the sweeping arc, his hair catching the violet static.
Mid-air, his eyes tracked the whip as it condensed once more, snapping back into a rigid, broad heavy lance that thrust directly toward his sternum with terrifying puncturing force.
CLANG! CLANG!
Hide crossed his twin blades, intercepting the point of the lance. The sheer physical force of the impact slid his boots back five ters across the smooth marble, leaving long, blackened burn marks on the masonry.
The Vice leader was not by any chance weak. Even if he didn’t have too strong of a talent, his body that he had cultivated to reach A-Rank was sothing hide could not match as of now.
By now, the commotion had drawn a massive, suffocating audience around the plaza. High-end corporate executives, off-duty upper-district Exterminators, and citizens had spilled out from the neighboring skyscrapers.
Dozens of automated surveillance drones hovered overhead, their lenses tracking the battle. Hundreds of onlookers pulled out their communicators, their fingers scrambling across the interfaces as they live-stread the catastrophic confrontation directly to the dostic network boards.
"Is that the Vice Leader of Green Horn?"
"Who the hell is that silver-haired kid parrying a Commander’s attack with such ease?"
"Look at the ticker registry—the kid is an independent Individual Operator for NEA!"
The online comnt feeds were mutating into a chaotic ss of public ridicule. Hide was deliberately holding back, keeping his movents restricted to a purely defensive layout.
He was intentionally dragging out the encounter, parrying just late enough and weaving just enough to look like he was struggling, yet never taking a single microsecond of true damage.
To the caras and the crowds, it looked like a national A-Rank Commander was throwing the absolute peak of his high-density arsenal, sweating and screaming through multiple weapon transitions, yet completely failing to overpower an E-Rank teenager whom no one had heard about.
The public humiliation was absolute, tearing through the Vice Leader’s corporate prestige with every second that ticked by on the live boards.
The guards dared not step in between.
Suddenly, deep within Hide’s mind, a crisp, tallic chi resonated and the screen lit up.
[Adaptive Override — Adaptation Complete]
Counter-Skill Generated.
[Phase Shatter—B (Passive)]
– Renders the Host’s physical strikes capable of disrupting, destabilizing, and instantly shattering environntal mana- connections upon physical contact.
Hide’s lazy smile returned, his blue eyes gleaming with absolute, predatory certainty.
The Vice Leader, completely blinded by narcissistic rage and public embarrassnt, drew his arm back, transforming the lance into a wide, jagged broadsword pulsing with the highest concentration of purple mana he could muster.
He brought the blade down in a massive, overhead cleaving strike ant to bisect Hide clean through the center.
Hide didn’t parry with his swords this ti. He casually stepped forward, extending his bare right hand directly into the path of the descending sword.
"Looking for death, you fool!" the Vice Leader shrieked.
CRACK!
The mont Hide’s palm connected with the edge of the purple mana blade, Phase Shatter activated instantly.
A subtle, invisible ripple of disruptive static surged through the weapon’s frequency. The high-density sword did not cut through his skin; instead, it violently ruptured like thin glass sword hit on a rock, exploding into a harmless cloud of dissipating purple mist that floated away into the afternoon air.
The Vice Leader’s montum stumbled forward, his hands completely empty as he stared down at his bare palms in complete, horror-struck paralysis.
His entire technique had been rendered entirely useless with a single touch.
Screeech!
Before Hide could strike, two heavily armored transport vehicles bearing the glowing green insignia of the Green Horn Agency tore through the periter, their sirens wailing heavily.
Doors flew open, and two squads of ten professional Exterminators deployed into a defensive layout.
They must have been nearby to co so quickly after hearing the noises and the commotion happening and with the videos going live, it didn’t take much ti to know what was happening.
"Commander! We will suppress the target! Fall back!" the squad captain barked, preparing to unleash a strike.
"STAY THE HELL BACK, YOU FOOLS!" the Vice Leader scread, his voice cracking into a manic shriek as his head snapped toward his own reinforcents.
His face was entirely flushed red, his eyes bloodshot with an unmitigated, psychotic bloodlust. "If any of you take a single step into this plaza, I will execute you myself! He is mine!"
The soldiers froze in absolute terror, their weapons wavering under the suffocating madness radiating from their superior officer.
Turning back to face Hide, the Vice Leader reached up with a trembling, white-knuckled hand, violently ripping open his silk collar. Gripped firmly between his fingers was a heavy, ancient runic necklace crafted from a single, pulsing piece of deep golden cube.
"You think you can play gas with , you little parasite? You think you can take away what is mine?" the Vice Leader hissed, his teeth grinding so hard blood began to leak from his gums. "I will show you the difference between a rat and a god!"
He channeled his mana directly into the cube.
BOOM!
A blinding, cataclysmic explosion of pristine golden light erupted from his chest, forcing the surrounding crowd to scream and shield their eyes as the sheer atmospheric weight in the area quadrupled.
The activation of a high-tier, priceless S-Ranked Artifact shook the entire block down to its foundation.
Within the heart of the golden inferno, a massive, hyper-dense set of gleaming golden armor began to systematically materialize around the Vice Leader’s body, locking into place with the heavy, definitive echo of an unstoppable machine.
"Run where ever you want to..." The Vice leader froze mid sentence, blinking in confusion.
So was everyone in the plaza.
Hide was gone... from where he was just a second ago.
BOOOMM!
A completely dark scaled hand connected squarely with the Vice Leader’s face, not letting him complete the transformation.
The Golden armor retreated back before it even had a chance to manifest.
Hide had used the skill of the phantom, Petra, the skill that allows the user to travel close to the speed of sound.
"Run?" Hide chuckled. "Who do you think needs to run?"
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