Chapter 148: Stage Three Setsuna, The High-Speed Death-Taint
Grinder, seeing the iconic pink robe, realized that the Reincarnator opposing him was the infamous, newly-risen [Mercenary Tao].
According to the rumors, this man had destroyed [The Fifth Element], caused the death of the elite Reincarnator [Kai] in the Jujutsu Kaisen world, and had even defeated the mysterious [White Mask].
"A man like you has to stoop to begging for scraps in a place like this?" Grinder slowly turned, the foul stench from his body spreading. He sized Kaito up, his eyes holding no fear, but rather a cold, analytical curiosity. He was probing.
Kaito, seeing that Grinder had finally come, smiled. The man's physique was absurd. Swollen to a height of nearly three meters, he looked like a humanoid black bear. The strange odor of sweat and rot was a clear sign that his lineage was likely no longer human.
"Begging for scraps?" Kaito said, spreading his arms, his voice full of sincerity. "That's a rather rude way to put it, Grinder. I came here with the dream of building a paradise." In his eyes, this lawless, tri-border region was, indeed, a paradise exclusively for Reincarnators.
Grinder looked at him, knowing that words alone would not be enough to "persuade" him to leave. He had seen many Reincarnators like this. Every one of them, after gaining a taste of power in the Nexus, developed the delusion that they were the chosen one. They became infinitely arrogant, losing all respect for true power. Just like… he himself had once been.
Grinder took a deep breath, looked up at the crescent moon, and exhaled a great cloud of foul-smelling gas. The breath, like a miasma, began to spread, shrouding the area. He was cautious. He had already used graphite bombs to destroy the compound's power grid and had set up a signal jammer outside. But seeing the cameras that had been installed everywhere, he had become wary. It had happened before in the Golden Triangle: a low-level Reincarnator had used a hidden camera to record a high-level one using a forbidden ability, uploaded it, and gotten them killed. The stronger you were, the more cautious you had to be. That was the law of this chaotic land.
Having done this, he saw that Kaito was still just standing there. He looked down at him and suddenly spoke. "Mercenary Tao. You haven't even broken past the first tier, have you?"
He took a step, and the ground trembled. "Perhaps you don't know. My sense of smell is very sensitive. In my nose, the strong and the weak have different scents. And you… you smell weak."
He stomped his foot. Kaito still felt no killing intent, but he felt the rhythm of the earth shift. With a thought, his body became as light as a feather. As the ground boomed and a sharp earth spike erupted from where he had been standing, Kaito was already floating backward through the air.
Grinder took another step and stomped again.
Kaito, feeling the raw power of his opponent, was ecstatic. He held nothing back and stomped his own foot.
BOOM!
A powerful force erupted from beneath the ground. Kaito himself vanished, his body dropping low and shooting forward. The earth spike that had been about to erupt was shattered by the disruption, and with a dull boom, Kaito instantly appeared behind Grinder, his right hand twisted and coiled.
[Koei Style - Rakshasa's Palm]!
VMMMM!
The air was violently torn. With his Lv6 Martial Arts Aptitude, Kaito's Rakshasa's Palm had become a monstrous technique. Even before he struck, the spiraling force was already tearing the air into a white vortex. When he finally thrust his palm, the sound was like a cannonball.
Grinder tilted his head slightly, having pinpointed Kaito's position. A yellow light flashed from his body. The moment Kaito's palm struck his back, a layer of sand, like armor, materialized, blocking the blow. The Rakshasa's Palm exploded, shattering the sand shield, but the piercing, twisting force had been nullified, unable to penetrate his body and strike his organs.
Kaito had never seen his technique countered in this way before. The next moment, he felt a wall of flesh slam into motion. A body composed of far more than the 639 muscles of a human being began to move, like a bloated, inefficient machine.
WHOOSH!
Grinder spun, his arm sweeping in a massive arc. Kaito raised his own arm to block. An immense force washed over him, but he just lightly leaped, his perfect use of Shaorii now making his movements in combat seem impossible. He tapped the incoming arm, and his entire body spun with the force, not only nullifying it but using it to launch himself into the air, above Grinder's head. His right hand was coiled, formed into a spearhead, and glowing with golden Hamon.
[Sage Art - Great Devil Lance]!
The golden light flared. Kaito's right arm vanished. Grinder had only just looked up when the powerful hand-spear was already upon him.
SPLAT!
Kaito's pupils contracted. The yellowish-brown sand shield had appeared again, this time in front of Grinder's face. He pierced the shield, but his fingers only penetrated half an inch into Grinder's forehead before they were stopped. The sand shield then clamped down, trapping him in mid-air.
Grinder took two steps back. "A martial artist who specializes in both Agility and Strength? For a first-tier, you're not bad."
Kaito, his leverage gone, dropped to the ground. He slammed his left hand into the sand shield, shattering it.
Grinder, meanwhile, slowly opened his palm. A magic circle began to glow. "Mercenary Tao. How about you join me?"
Kaito saw the wound on the man's forehead had already healed. He guessed he was a Constitution and Spirit-type Reincarnator, and that at least one of his stats had already broken the limit. He had an energy system, and a bloodline. This guy was a tough opponent.
But Kaito just sneered. He snapped his dislocated fingers back into place, the Hamon already healing them. He raised his right index finger, forming it into the shape of a gun. A Spirit Gun instantly condensed. The next moment, it fired.
Grinder raised his hands to block.
BOOM!
The Spirit Gun exploded. From within the smoke, Kaito's voice rang out. "Thirty seconds. If you're still alive after thirty seconds, I'll be your subordinate. Fine."
Grinder's expression was calm, but his heart was pounding. His eyes darted back and forth in the smoke, but he couldn't see anything. He slammed his hands on the ground. A magic circle expanded, and a forest of earth spikes erupted from the ground.
When the smoke cleared, "Mercenary Tao" was already fifty meters away, holding a silver revolver.
"A handgun?" Grinder scoffed. "That thing can't even pierce my defenses."
Kaito's smile was brilliant. His heart was pounding. This was the perfect terrain: wide open, no cover, no interference.
He aimed the revolver at the sky. "The timer… starts now!"
BANG!
The gunshot echoed, and at the same instant, Kaito's figure vanished.
Grinder's pupils contracted. He understood. The gun was just a starting pistol? This madman is really going to try and finish me in 30 seconds? Arrogant!
SPLAT!
His sand shield, behind him, suddenly shattered. He froze, then spun around, seeing only a black afterimage flicker and vanish.
Splat! Splat! Splat!
His shields exploded at his spine, his groin, and his throat.
This guy… he's so fast!
Kaito's heart was pounding. But it wasn't fast enough. He needed more.
"Stage Two Setsuna, ACTIVATE!"
BAM-BAM-BAM-BANG!
The sand shields were now breaking faster than they could regenerate. Grinder felt a sharp pain in his chest as a piercing force finally broke through, making his heart stutter. He roared and stomped, the concrete ground exploding as sand and dirt flew into the air, forming a vortex around him.
But it was no use. He couldn't track his opponent's movements. He just felt a rain of fists, and his sand armor was beginning to fail. He roared again, his body now covered in thick, brown fur, as he transformed into a giant brown bear. He slammed his two giant paws into the ground. A yellow magic circle exploded, covering a hundred-meter radius, and a forest of massive earth spikes erupted.
BOOM!
The entire compound was destroyed, and the white office building collapsed.
Grinder turned, only to see Kaito now two hundred meters away, tilting his head and looking at him. The next moment, he laughed wildly and vanished again. The shriek of his movement was like a high-speed train, circling him.
Kaito laughed, his body beginning to swell. "Too slow! You're too slow!"
"STAGE THREE SETSUNA, ACTIVATE!"
The moment he entered 8x speed, Kaito felt a sharp pain in his heart. His body was completely engorged with blood. The world around him became a blur. Sometimes he would shoot past Grinder so fast he couldn't even land a blow. Time itself had slowed. No, it wasn't that they were too slow. It was that he was too fast. Unimaginably fast.
At this moment, Kaito was crossing a hundred meters in a fraction of a second. Sonic boom clouds were beginning to appear in front of him.
He suddenly stopped, right in front of Grinder. The intense pressure wave from his halt was like a physical wall, and it actually triggered Grinder's sand shield.
"A sand-control ability, a demonic beast bloodline, and a limit-broken Constitution… ha." Kaito, in his mind, had already analyzed his opponent. He raised his hands. They vanished.
"Just defending… is useless!"
Thump-thump-thump-thump…
Countless fists slammed into Grinder's body. He suddenly felt a sharp pain in his forehead, and a sense of absolute, mortal dread washed over him. He opened his mouth to roar, to summon his contracted beast, but in the next instant, a cold, deathly black light exploded from Kaito's fists.
In a single instant, countless fists, each one glowing with the light of death, struck his body.
His limit-break trait was [Super Toughness], granting him an 80% damage reduction against physical attacks, at the cost of being unable to wear defensive gear. He could tank a shell from a main battle tank. His defense was his foundation.
Against a first-tier's power… how can I be dying?
[You have been affected by Death-Taint of the Myriad Gods. Performing Instant-Death check…]
Instant Death?!
Grinder's pupils contracted. He felt a jolt of panic. But this very mindset only hastened his demise.
[Check: FAILED.]
The surging magic and chakra within Grinder's body instantly went haywire and then exploded. Countless shards of sand shot out in all directions like arrows.
The nearly five-meter-tall brown bear collapsed to the ground, the light in its eyes rapidly cooling.
At the same time, Kaito deactivated his ability. He gasped for breath, his body now a bloody mess from the numerous ruptured blood vessels.
But he threw his head back, clutched his face, and laughed.
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Guys We cross the 100 power stone goal and as promise here the bonus chapter
Next goal 200 power stone,come on guys you'll can do it, good luck.
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Every 100 Power Stones = 1 extra chapter