Chapter 43: The Dark Knight
Charcoal black and Multicolored Sword auras danced like thin flames. In a world that seemed like time had stopped and darkness had descended, only a little girl moved with certainty.
"Where is your knight's clergy, you shameless dog of Zal'kitana?" Kyriaki muttered coldly and pushed her sword with great strength.
If she was to rewind everything that happened a minute ago it would start with The Death Knight, who targeted the weakest among them.
Thanks to her extremely cautious nature that has been highlighted by her stigma, Kyriaki already had those doubts. And so, she was able to act before something happened.
She flung towards Ethan and stopped the great sword that was about to descend over Ethan's head, trying to split him in half. Her reaction speed boasted of her superior stats where almost everything above B rank. Her only flaw was that her core was only D+ rank.
"...Die." An unpleasant voice, as if it had been made of dirty water and scrapping metals hurt her ears. Kyriaki's eyes widened in genuine shock.
'It can talk.'
It was the Death Knight's voice. Ancient and unpleasant. It looked like it had been thousands of years since he had last used it.
Kyriaki put more strength to her arms and pushed back the great sword before her. The armored hands of the monster trembled slightly. And finally, it was thoroughly pushed away as Kyriaki grabbed Ethan by the collar and tossed him away like a rag doll.
Realizing his attempt failed, the Death Knight vanished again.
But alas, the agility of a C+ rank monster was easy to follow with a pair of dragon eyes, even if their stats were below that rank.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Behind Levana.
Clang!
Over the pile of skeletons.
Clang!
Near tinted windows.
Clang!
Everywhere but near the throne. They collided fiercely as their swords tried to dominate one another.
While they did so, Kyriaki took the image of the Dark Knight into her mind as if engraving it.
He was at least two meters tall. A dark armor that looked like something out of a ghost story covered his entire body, hiding the bones of the skeleton inside. The Dimensional Crystal proudly made its presence known on his chest, like a gem embedded like a brooch.
It was very rare for a monster to hold the Dimensional Crying in its body. In usual cases, the Crystal should be hovering inside the boss room, protected by the boss monster. Not embedded into the body.
Taking note of this unusual situation, Kyriaki's attention soon landed on the blade it wielded.
The great sword he held, Kyriaki knew in one glance what it was made of.
Abyssal steel.
If Divine Diamonds were the most strongest metal in the omniverse, then Abyssal steel could be seen as the strongest steel unique only to the Abyssal Plane of Mitherr-ge. Monopolized by Demons as it could only be found in the Abyssal Plane, the weapons made of Abyssal steel are said to rival the rare Cosmic steel of Frerland.
Each thrust and each slash was sharp. To top it all, the one wielding the weapon also seemed skilled.
Kyriaki gathered all the information she could.
The Death Knight has consciousness. It could talk. It has the Dimensional Crystal. It was skilled at swordsmanship, enough to have Sword Aura. It also seemed to have emotions as she insulted his Goddess, it looked very angry.
Those were all his weaknesses she could take advantage of.
"Noir!" Levana's voice, calling for her spirit, caught Kyriaki's attention. A black crow spirit soared high in the air.
Clang!
Kyriaki took a defensive stance, her eyes narrowed in desire to catch every single image unfolding before her.
Then, a soft mumble swallowed her whole in an instant with a darkness so pure that it appeared to rival the space she saw everyday when she looked up at the sky at the time she was living in Selene Palace.
Clang! Clang!
Thud! Swoosh!
Just as the spell suggested, it only lasted one second. But within that second, Kyriaki recognized a few familiar sounds.
The sound of metal hitting together twice, the sound of something hitting flesh and the sound of something cutting through the wind made her heart beat faster. She had a rough idea what had happened.
The darkness faded as fast as it descended. Kyriaki saw unconscious Levana on top of groaning Ethan. A thin steam of red blood dripped from her clear forehead. Getting hit by a C+ rank monster directly, on the head no less, seemed too hard for the little elven girl.
The spirit spell
There wasn't even a small scratch on the dark knight. Kyriaki felt no positive emotion. Not because Levana failed, but because she realized something.
Kyriaki bit her lips in dissatisfaction as she bluntly realized she was incapable of protecting her first ever friend. But she had no time to worry about someone else.
She held her blade high, pouring her most sincerity and strength into her sword. The sharp tip of the long sword was pointed only at the enemy before her.
The way she slightly bent forward and put strength to her back leg, the way she crossed her arms and gripped the hilt with both hands…everything screamed familiarity.
Then, a dreamy voice like tinkling bells rang pleasantly.
[Colors Of The Spring: Seventh Color: The Spring Festival]
A warm shockwave of Multicolored Aura speared within a circle's shape.
The alluring spring chased away the darkness and bloomed beautifully.
The most beautiful yet deadly spring swallowed the Dark Knight within seconds. If one saw it firsthand, they might have wondered; how could such a thing be so terrifyingly beautiful?
However, neither the beauty nor the terrifying attack could faze the monster.
At the end of all, it stood unharmed.
Few scratches graced the dark armor. But that was it.
Even if the Sword art itself was SSS+, a D+ ranker wielding it to defeat a C+ monster in one shot was hardly possible.
Kyriaki bit her lower lip and used her footwork to dodge an attack. She elegantly moved her body, holding her word in one arm and placing the free hand behind her back like a dignified noble.
However, her condition wasn't that good. She poured too much Aura into that single attack. The first time she used the Seventh Color of her sword art was when she faced The Twin Headed Zombie King. At that time her goal was to experiment both the sword technique and the opponent she was facing, so the amount of aura she poured was low.
Unfortunately this time Kyriaki poured half of her aura into that single attack in hope of good results. She wasn't naive enough to believe in a one shot kill. But she hoped for at least a deep injury.
Yet nothing came.
"Don't use higher tire sword arts!" Kyriaki shouted. Euclid nodded briefly and launched a series of basic sword attacks on the Dark Knight.
Kyriaki began to calculate her time which would restore her aura full in her core. Her final decision was to use one of her trump cards.
To a dragon made of mana, turning it into Sword Aura and filling half of her core wouldn't take as much effort as a human.
No, it wouldn't even take as much effort as an elf or any other higher species.
"Let's hold him back for half an hour!" In fact, a D+ rank core wouldn't take that much time anyway.
"Roger." Euclid performed a graceful backflip and shot mana missiles towards the monster.
It did nothing, actually. But it was enough of a distraction. Kyriaki unleashed her Whip-sword. The blade turned into a true whip made of steel and clashed on to the monster.
It slithered and hissed in metal as if a sly and wicked snake had possessed it. After all, It was a sword with a bloody history behind it. And because it was also made of Abyssal steel just like the Dark Knight's great sword, sparks flew out whenever steel met steel.
Kyriaki meticulously counted each second in her head, checking her core from time to time. Her golden gaze sometimes landed on the unconscious Levana and the useless elf boy who looked like he didn't know what to do.
The two hatchlings' persistent attacks had made the monster unable to move as it wished. That fact alone made Kyriaki somewhat grateful.
However, her >Stigma of Chaos (Caution)< held her back from feeling relief or any kind of emotions related to it. Her beast-like caution was indeed closer to chaos. A chaotic mess of emotions that wasn't controlled properly.
She felt the appointed time slowly approaching. When it was only a second away, she commanded with a hint of urgency.
"Use your most powerful attack!"
Euclid immediately obeyed her words without questioning.
[Thunder Blade: Second Strike: Lightning Capture]
His feets got wrapped in a thin and crackling electric aura. In an instant, Euclid vanished. Kyriaki could still see his movements, but his agility had been greatly boosted somehow. It wasn't this great even when he used
Euclid lowered his Duel Blades down and leaned forward, circling around the Dark Knight in super speed. To a normal eye, it could be seen as a blurry image of something short circling a giant.
Then from the tips of his blades, a thin sky blue aura leaked like threads, weaving a net around the monster.
Srizle. Crackle.
Electricity and lightning danced.
Boom!
The moment they touched the monster all together, an explosion erupted. Euclid was sent flying by his own sword technique. Kyriaki had to grab him by the arm like a mean teacher kicking a weak child out of the classroom.
Euclid flashed a charming smile, but Kyriaki rolled her eyes, looking back at the place where the monster once stood.
The dust slowly calmed down. Kyriaki held back her urge to curse as she let go of Euclid. Her eyes never left the monster that stood still, glaring at her as if she was a heretic who should be burned alive.
In some places, the dark armor had cracked. In some other places, it had only scratched. The Dimensional Crystal was unharmed, glittering in space violet hue. Both Kyriaki and Euclid couldn't help but click their tongues.
"Tsk"
"Tch"
"Hey, how much Aura do you have left?"
"None."
"...Dammit"
"What's the next plan?"
"If I faint, we all might die here. Right? "
"...? That's obvious."
"Then make sure I won't faint, even if this plan fails, got it?"
"...Don't you think that's too much? How am I supposed to keep someone from fainting?"
"I don't know, figure it out yourself."
After a ridiculous short exchange, Kyriaki kicked the ground and made a huge backflip to the far back. She landed right on the empty throne.
"...How…dare…you!" The empty eye holes seen underneath the dark helmet flashed in a neon black sword aura, as if malice itself manifested into something solid, something far more sinister.
The monster furiously slammed his leg and tried to close the distance between her and him. His purpose was clear. It looked like he wanted to cut down Kyriaki right then and there for committing a crime he cannot forgive even in death.
Kyriaki's lips curled up in a wicked and cold sneer.
Euclid's continuous spell attacks distracted the monster from reaching her. Even if Kyriaki didn't say anything, he accurately read her intentions and acted accordingly. It was as if he was born to understand and follow her.
Their teamwork was similar to those of two people who had fought alongside together for years.
She took a deep breath, closing her eyes gently. Her right foot naturally stepped forward as she bent her right knee slightly. She clenched her left hand and lifted it up. Slowly, deliberately. Just under her eyes, over her nose with only a few centimeters distance, it paused horizontally. Then she elegantly placed her sword over her left arm diagonally, barely tracing her ear and loose golden hair.
A second passed.
[Whip-Sword Art: First Form: Last Melody Of The Weeping Piano]
Multicolored Sword Aura burst out of her body. In half a second it formed an illusion of a grand piano over her head. A thin veil of aura surrounded the entire cathedral. Her sword blade began to vibrate softly. And as if some invisible hand intervened, the keys started to play on their own.
One key.
Two keys.
Together and longer.
A tragic story in the form of a piano melody conveyed heartbreaking emotions.
And then, brilliant golden eyes were revealed. Kyriaki kicked the throne as if it was a worthless foot supporter and soared high into the air.
Each and every single living being, including the monster who bore his own consciousness and emotions, paused. They all looked up at the little girl.
No, perhaps, they wanted to see the source of that tragic and sorrowful melody.
Kyriaki spun around in mid-air. Her long sword elegantly transformed into a long Whip-sword. Just as fast as it transformed, five circles of the 10 meters long Whip-sword surrounded her like a shawl of a young dancer.
An excellent piano piece…tragically beautiful and bewitching, strangely fit with the gloomy cathedral.
If musicians were to hear a glimpse of its painfully soft and lonely melody, they'd have fallen deeply in love with it. Their hearts would have ached, their eyes would have teared up.
The silent cries, cold unjust and lonely sorrows would have broken their hearts with emotions so transparent that the melody would have made those emotions their own, like a hidden curse.
Even amidst the falling sword strike that seemed so deadly, no one thought the one wielding the Whip-sword was unleashing a dangerous and mysterious weapon art.
No, in their eyes the golden girl wasn't an assaulter.
She was a pianist.
Sitting on a stool and running her soft fingers around diligently over a piano.
She was a tragic pianist telling her story to the world.
Perhaps it was her past life, perhaps it was supposed to be her future. And yet, no one doubted it wasn't hers.
A lost love, stained by the cruel world that broke her pure soul to pieces beyond repair. The more heart breaking it was, the more beautiful it became.
Ah, the overwhelming sorrow of a pure heart so very lost and broken, abandoned by everyone and everything.
So yes, she was a pianist. A pianist performing her last show just before her broken soul faded into oblivion.
Slash!
The melody came to an end.
So did the whip-sword.
Everything went silent.
The sobbing from a few places broke the short silence.
Clang!
Something metallic fell on the ground.
With that, the pianist, now having taken her true place as a warrior, lifted her face in her one leg knelt position.
Drip. Drip.
Golden blood slowly dripped down from her nostrils, but soon, they transformed into Mana and disappeared.
Kyriaki slammed her sword, which had been automatically transformed back into a long sword, on the floor and leaned in. She did her best to maintain her poker face as she endured the twisting and turning of her insides.
Everything ached, just like it did when she first invented this weapon art. But something else has changed. She wasn't bleeding heavily from all of her holes—quiet literally. And her passive skill
With a mere nosebleed, she was able to properly perform her own weapon art for the first time.
But the outcome?
"Hahaha…" Kyriaki's resentful laughter brought everyone back from their trance-like state.
The elves who had regained their senses at some point were crying their hearts out until then. Euclid too hid his moist eyes with an awkward expression. And the monster…
It staggered. The wound that started from his left shoulder and reached his waist was deep. So much so that it cost his entire left arm. But The Dark Knight stood tall as if it didn't matter.
After all the struggles and strains she put on her own body to pull out a powerful attack, this was the outcome she received.
The monster was alive.
Very much so.
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