Chapter 164: Confess Before You Get Skewered!
Even after injuring Edelweiss, Shiro did not stop.
Instead, like a character clipping through an object in a game, his entire body passed straight through hers and continued flying for some distance.
After stabilizing himself, Shiro turned around.
Edelweiss was staring at the wound on her left arm with knitted brows and slightly parted lips, clearly unable to understand what had just happened.
It was the first time Shiro had ever seen genuine surprise on her face.
They had known each other for a long time, and plenty of unexpected things had happened before.
Yet with Edelweiss's extraordinary talent, events would always somehow end up developing in the direction she wanted.
So seeing that rare expression made Shiro slightly smug, even though he knew he had only succeeded because she was unfamiliar with his new sword technique.
"Well? I got the inspiration for this from your [Twin-Wings Sword Style]."
"I specifically prepared it for you."
"If you want to know how it works, I can make a special exception and tell you after we finish fighting."
Like a child showing off a new toy to a friend, Shiro proudly flaunted the sword technique he had created.
He had spent several months developing it at Hagun specifically to defeat Edelweiss.
Judging from the result, it had certainly not disappointed him.
'The first time my new sword technique appeared, it defeated Hagun's student council president.'
'Now it even injured the world's strongest swordswoman.'
'Damn, I'm amazing. Hold on, I need to put my hands on my hips for a moment.'
Shiro proudly puffed out his chest.
Unfortunately, Edelweiss's next sentence froze the smile on his face.
"Desperado... right?"
"Heh. I knew you wouldn't be able to figure out the secret behind—eh?!"
"Wait. What did you just say?"
"That sword technique was developed using the characteristics of a Desperado, wasn't it?"
"Ahaha... Edel-chan certainly has a vivid imagination."
"You know as well as I do that fate manipulation is almost useless against another Desperado..."
A bead of cold sweat slid down Shiro's temple.
He forced a smile onto his face to make his words seem more convincing.
Unfortunately, to Edelweiss, it looked painfully unnatural.
"Exactly."
"So you didn't use the power of fate on me."
"You used it on yourself instead, didn't you?"
Edelweiss raised her head and looked directly at Shiro, a teasing smile appearing at the corners of her lips.
"Normally, every Desperado can distort the causality of the planet beneath our feet."
"You could compare it to [Gravity]."
"Even when ordinary people realize a Desperado is altering their fate, they can only watch helplessly as that gravity drags them along."
"Only by becoming an existence that also transcends causality can they resist it."
Just as Edelweiss said, a Desperado could alter the fate of the entire world through sheer will.
Against ordinary Blazers, they could even skip the process of fighting entirely and force the result of an injury directly onto their opponent.
But that method was nearly useless in a battle between Desperados.
Both sides existed on the same level.
Unless one possessed overwhelmingly greater will than the other, altering another Desperado's fate was practically impossible.
And among those who had broken into the realm of Desperados, aside from natural exceptions like Stella and Shiro—Whose will could truly be overwhelmed so easily by another?
"But you used a different method."
"When you swung your sword just now, you reversed the way a Desperado's power is normally used."
"It was closer to [Repulsion]."
"While attacking, you used that repulsion to push your own fate outside this world."
"Only the result of your slash remained behind."
"And that result was what injured me."
"Guh..."
Edelweiss's words were like a merciless sword piercing directly through Shiro's heart.
She had completely figured it out.
'As expected of the world's strongest swordswoman...'
'She only saw it once and already deciphered almost everything.'
Just as Edelweiss said, this was a sword technique that only someone who had reached the realm of Desperados could use.
When activating it, Shiro used the power of fate to temporarily detach his existence from the world.
His entire body became something resembling an illusion.
Visible—
But impossible to touch.
The reason he could still inflict damage was because, at the moment he swung, he used fate to preserve the result of that slash.
However, the technique possessed a small weakness.
Because it preserved the predetermined result of the attack, Shiro had to complete the slash along its original trajectory.
If he deviated from it, no damage would occur.
It was similar to controlling a character in a game.
When an attack began, the computer had already calculated how much damage it would deal.
But if the attack animation was interrupted before the strike actually happened, naturally no damage would be inflicted.
Without the [Process], there could be no [Result].
Unfortunately, if Shiro remained detached from the world's fate for too long, there was a risk he would disappear from existence entirely.
Otherwise, the untargetable phantom state alone would have made the technique nearly invincible.
Since everything except the phantom serving as his anchor disappeared from the world when he activated it, Shiro had named the technique—
[Traceless].
Perhaps noticing Shiro's frustration, Edelweiss's smile grew even brighter despite the blood still dripping from her left shoulder.
"Would you like me to praise you a little?"
"Hey! What's with that sudden tone you use to comfort a child?!"
"You were practically wearing 'Praise me!' across your entire face."
The girl revealed a playful smile.
Combined with her beautiful features, it was undeniably adorable.
Unfortunately, the words coming from her mouth irritated Shiro immensely.
Fine.
If she wanted to play like that, he would fight back.
So Shiro immediately began stomping all over Edelweiss's greatest sore point.
"At least I properly prepared for this fight."
"What about you?"
"Don't tell me you spent these past few months doing nothing."
"Your desserts are delicious, sure, but remember to exercise."
"You wouldn't want to turn back into how you looked in that photograph."
The photograph Shiro mentioned was the one sitting on the table inside Edelweiss's cabin atop the sword peak.
It showed Edelweiss as a child.
She had desperately tried to stop Shiro from seeing it.
In her own mind, she looked unbearably fat in that picture.
But after Shiro's endless pestering, combined with an offensive involving strange ingredients from another world, she had reluctantly agreed to show it to him.
He still remembered how tightly she had gripped the album when handing it over.
Yet when Shiro finally saw the photograph—There was nothing embarrassing about it.
It simply showed an adorable little girl smiling brightly at the camera.
Afterward, Shiro repeatedly told Edelweiss that she had not been fat at all as a child.
If anything, she had been extremely cute.
Edelweiss herself still cared deeply about it and absolutely refused to let him see the picture a second time.
Perhaps in her mind, only round and chubby things deserved to be called cute.
As expected, after Shiro repeatedly danced across that land mine, Edelweiss's beautiful face immediately darkened.
"If you want to see so badly, then I'll show you the results of my hard work over these past few months."
"Go die!"
The instant her voice fell, several silver arcs tore through the air toward Shiro like bullets.
Facing the sudden attack, Shiro tightened his grip and answered with a diagonal slash.
Slash—!
The silver arcs split apart and flew past both sides of his body.
Two deep marks resembling sword scars appeared across the ground behind him.
'That was... wind?'
Shiro stared at the marks.
He had fought Ouma only moments ago.
There was no possibility of mistaking it.
Edelweiss's attack had unquestionably been [Vacuum Blade], one of the most common techniques used by wind manipulators.
But Edelweiss's ability was [Testament].
Why could she use a wind manipulator's ability?
"It's not over yet."
Before Shiro could think further, Edelweiss's voice reached his ears again.
The ground beneath him suddenly began trembling.
Something seemed ready to erupt from underground.
Sensing danger, Shiro immediately used [Unbound] and flew into the sky.
But the instant he took off, Edelweiss followed.
As though she truly possessed a wind manipulator's ability, she flew after him.
Her two platinum-white swords transformed into streaks of light and appeared before him in an instant.
Facing Edelweiss's relentless assault, Shiro did not evade.
He responded with the same swordsmanship.
Boom—!
Boom—!
Boom—!
Their blades collided dozens of times within a single second.
Even the clouds overhead were casually split apart by the sword pressure created during their battle.
In the air, Edelweiss used her exquisite technique to steadily compress Shiro's available movement space to the absolute limit.
She knew he would seize any opportunity to escape by severing the distance between himself and another location.
But she only needed to trap him for a few seconds.
Those few seconds would decide the battle.
Rumble—!
At that moment, the earth split apart.
Cracks spread rapidly across the ground like a spiderweb.
The disturbance below stole a fraction of Shiro's attention.
'Now!'
Edelweiss seized that once-in-a-lifetime opening.
Clear and chilling Sword Intent erupted from her body and pierced the heavens.
At the same time, she pushed her power over fate to its limit, interfering with Shiro so he could not activate [Traceless] and escape.
Then countless stone pillars erupted from the earth like spears thrusting toward the sky.
Edelweiss above.
Stone pillars below.
Both attacked Shiro simultaneously.
The situation reversed in an instant.
Only moments ago, Shiro had held a slight advantage through his new sword technique.
Now Edelweiss had completely surrounded him in midair.
Putting aside the question of how she could suddenly use so many different abilities—Shiro had a much more immediate problem.
Every technique he could normally use to escape had been sealed by Edelweiss.
The only option remaining was the ultimate technique of Ayatsuji Ittou-ryuu—
[Ten'i Muhou].
But even if he blocked Edelweiss, there was no way to deal with the stone pillars behind him in time.
Shiro had only two choices.
Take Edelweiss's sword head-on—Or let the stone pillars behind him run him through.
Whichever he chose, he would unquestionably lose all ability to fight.
Edelweiss would never give him another opportunity to stand back up and resist.
In other words—He had only one chance.
Forced into a corner, Shiro made a decision Edelweiss had never anticipated.
He smiled faintly.
Then he suddenly slashed toward her.
Clang—!
The instant their swords collided, Shiro twisted his wrist.
Using [Ten'i Muhou], he forcibly trapped Edelweiss's blade against the right side of his body.
Then he accelerated and charged directly into her.
Naturally, Edelweiss would not allow him to break through so easily.
Her right-hand sword drew a circle through the air and slashed toward him, intending to force him back.
She knew that strike alone could not defeat Shiro.
At most, it would push him back to his original position.
But that was exactly what Edelweiss wanted.
The instant the stone pillars reached his back—She would deliver the finishing blow.
However, to Edelweiss's surprise, Shiro did not raise his sword to block the attack coming from his left.
His right-hand sword remained firmly locked against her other blade.
Instead—Shiro concentrated every trace of magic in his body into his left arm.
The next instant—
Slash—
Blood exploded from Shiro's left arm.
Through the wound, Edelweiss could faintly see that his radius had been completely shattered.
Even after pouring all his magic into protecting it, how could the sword of the world's strongest swordswoman be blocked so easily?
The bones in Shiro's left arm were utterly crushed by the slash.
Without immediate treatment, he might never again be able to use that arm for anything requiring strength.
Yet even under those circumstances—Shiro smiled.
Because Edelweiss's left-hand sword was currently trapped by his blade.
And her right-hand sword—Was trapped by his left arm.
For this single instant, Edelweiss was completely open.
Gritting his teeth, Shiro slid his left hand along her blade.
Blood sprayed outward and dyed the entire left side of his face crimson.
He ignored the agonizing pain being transmitted from his hand to his brain.
Then he pulled Edelweiss tightly into his arms.
Shiro rested his head against her shoulder and whispered softly beside her ear.
"Hey, Edel-chan."
"Eek?!!"
His warm breath brushed gently across Edelweiss's ear, making her delicate body stiffen instinctively.
The situation was not romantic in the slightest.
If anything, the horrifying amount of blood covering both of them made the entire scene somewhat terrifying.
But this was probably the only method Shiro could use to make Edelweiss hold back enough that they would not both die here.
So—
He said it anyway.
"I love you."
And in the instant after his confession—
Shlk—!
Shiro and Edelweiss remained tightly embraced.
Then the stone pillars erupting from below pierced through both of their bodies at once.
…
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