"Bang!"
A steel greatspear powerful enough to pierce a divine beast was casually smashed mid-shaft by Sai Akuto's fist. It bent in the middle, twisted through the air, and crashed into the wreckage of another plane that was in the middle of transforming, blowing it to pieces.
"Boom!"
The roaring steel beast, the shuttle car, charged in, only to be struck in the "abdomen" by what looked like an offhand side kick from Akuto.
That enormous body, reinforced with high-strength alloy, looked as though it had been hit by a ten-thousand-ton hydraulic press. It caved in and burst apart instantly. The machinery inside let out a shrill metallic wail, and the entire hulking frame flew backward, carving a deep trench through the ground before collapsing into total ruin.
Shhk! Shhk! Shhk!
Countless steel wheels and chains came slicing in at high speed, but the moment they entered the three-foot radius around Akuto, they were effortlessly knocked aside and shattered by the battle aura barrier naturally circulating around him. They turned into useless scraps of metal that rained from the sky.
And Tony's fatal demonic sword thrust, hidden within that torrent of steel, was intercepted at even greater speed. Akuto precisely caught the tip of the blade between two fingers.
"What?!" Tony's pupils contracted sharply. He felt as if his sword had stabbed into a black hole. All of its power, all of its concept of "rending," was being effortlessly absorbed and neutralized by those two fingers.
Akuto's fingers tightened slightly.
Crack!
A crisp snapping sound rang out. The tip of the demonic sword, silvered by the Authority of the Rending Silver Arm and sturdy beyond compare, was crushed. A small piece broke off under his grip.
Tony felt like he had been struck by lightning. He jerked his sword back and retreated, staring at the chipped blade in disbelief. His demonic sword. His Authority. Damaged by nothing but raw physical strength?
"Just with his fists and feet...?"
Tony stared at Akuto as he strolled through the storm of steel as if taking a leisurely walk, dismantling his steel army into scrap metal with every casual movement. A helplessness he had never known before surged into his heart.
The power he prided himself on, the Authority he used to slay gods, looked pitifully weak in front of this man.
His strongest blow had been stopped one-handed. His steel army had been torn apart by an even more primitive violence. This was no longer a fight. It was a one-sided crushing.
"Damn it... it's not over yet!" The arrogance in Tony's bones had been completely ignited. It was the kind of madness that only grew fiercer when cornered. He suddenly raised his head and looked toward the sky, a flash of resolve in his eyes.
"If the swords on earth can't reach you... then try the fury of the stars!"
He raised his silver sword, now webbed with cracks, and chanted his words of power:
"I am the one who severs all things! The brilliance of the stars, the core of the earth, all shall become my blade! In my name, I call upon the falling star. Become the demonic sword that pierces the endless sky!"
Authority - the ultimate application of the Rending Silver Arm. He was applying the conceptual power of "severing" to a star beyond the heavens.
In an instant, the sky darkened.
Not because clouds had covered the sun, but because the atmosphere itself had been forcibly shoved aside by some terrifying existence.
A meteor, blazing with white-hot fire, tore through the atmosphere. Drawn by Tony's Authority and reinforced by the concept of "severing," it plummeted toward the airport, toward Akuto, at a speed beyond imagination.
As it fell, Tony's Authority forcibly reshaped it into an incomparably massive stellar demonic sword burning with the flames of destruction. The blade split the sky open and left a searing trail behind it. The pressure it radiated made the earth tremble, and space itself let out a groan as if it could barely endure the burden. This was a true sword of heavenly punishment, one that carried the terrifying power to end all things.
Tony's face turned deathly pale. The spell power in his entire body poured out like floodwaters bursting through a dam and flowed into that stellar sword. This was a strike wagered with his life.
Faced with that world-destroying blow, Akuto finally stopped fighting bare-handed. He slowly raised his right hand, palm facing upward, as though he meant to support the falling star itself.
"Tony, you really are a decent opponent. You gave me a chance to stretch a little."
Akuto's voice rang out calmly, clearly piercing through the thunder of the meteor's descent.
"But games end eventually. So let me show you exactly how far you are from that White Horse."
The next second, a single point of blazing white light suddenly flared to life in Akuto's palm.
That light was incomparably pure, incomparably sacred. It was like the first ray of light at the dawn of creation, and also like the core of a cosmic furnace.
Authority - White Horse!
But the White Horse descending at this moment was utterly different from Verethragna's ordinary incarnation.
It was no longer just the fire of the sun. At its core flowed an even older, holier, more resplendent brilliance. It bore the added blessing of the sun god Mithra and Verethragna's Authority.
"In the name of Mithra, and by the covenant of Verethragna, descend. The light of my sun shall cleanse all impurity and scatter every darkness."
Akuto's voice sounded like divine revelation as it shook heaven and earth.
Boom!!!-
The point of white light in his palm instantly expanded into a pillar of pure white radiance that connected heaven and earth.
Within that pillar, four magnificent white heavenly horses could vaguely be seen, neighing proudly as they galloped on streams of light.
Endless light and heat exploded from within. Its temperature had long surpassed the concept of mortal flame and entered a domain capable of purifying gods and demons alike.
This was no longer fire that burned cities.
This was solar flame that purified the world.
The pure white pillar of solar fire struck first despite being unleashed later, and met that stellar demonic sword burning with annihilating flame head-on.
There was no earth-shaking explosion.
Only silent annihilation.
Under the dual blessing of Mithra and Verethragna, the solar flame cut into the weapon like the sharpest knife slicing through butter, effortlessly purifying away the violent destructive energy and physical structure of the meteor sword's outer shell.
That stellar sword's terrifying momentum and destructive force, enough to pierce through a continent, melted and disintegrated like snow under the sacred solar flame.
The gigantic meteor blade began to crumble and vaporize the instant it touched the pillar of solar fire, turning into harmless drifting stardust and scattered motes of light.
The terrifying stellar demonic sword that could have destroyed a city was dissolved by Akuto as casually as brushing dust away.
But... it was not over.
After purifying the stellar demonic sword, the White Horse's solar flame did not stop. Like a spear of divine punishment, it descended toward Tony on the ground, whose spell power was nearly exhausted, carrying with it the lingering force of something that could cleanse all creation.
"Haaaaaahhh!!"
Tony let out a beastlike roar. Survival instinct drove him to erupt with the last of his strength.
Clutching his broken sword, he crossed both arms in front of himself. His skin instantly turned bright silver, gleaming with metallic luster. Countless ancient and mysterious runes flickered wildly over the surface of his body like living things, racing, overlapping, and stacking atop one another.
Authority - Steel Protection. Full activation.
Hundreds of runes imbued with the concepts of defense, hardness, and regeneration were triggered in an instant, constructing the greatest defense of his life.
Boom!!!
The pure white solar flame completely swallowed Tony's figure.
The blinding white light lasted for more than ten seconds before slowly fading away.
In its place remained an enormous crater, its edges flowing with molten glass.
At the center of the crater, Salvatore Tony was still standing in a defensive stance.
But his clothes had long since been burned to ash. The silver metallic sheen covering his body had dimmed to the extreme, and it was now covered in spiderweb cracks. The runes that had once flickered across him had completely died out and vanished.
Now Tony's entire body had taken on a lifeless gray color, like a statue instantly fired into being by an unbearable heat.
There was no longer even a trace of spell power coming from him, nor any sign of life. Only a heartbeat so faint it was nearly impossible to detect proved that he had not completely died.
The King of Swords, Salvatore Tony, had been defeated. He had only barely preserved his life by turning his whole body to ash-gray stone and falling into a deathlike suspended state.
Akuto slowly lowered his hand, and the terrifying solar flame around him faded with the motion. He walked to the edge of the crater and looked down at Tony, who stood there like a stone statue, his eyes calm and undisturbed.
"...A fine will. But this is where it ends."
Akuto gave the quiet evaluation, then turned and swept his gaze over the members of the Italian magical societies in the distance, all of whom had been completely stunned by the heaven-shaking battle.
A large portion of Italy's magical societies had already thrown themselves into Akuto's camp, but the people who had stayed by Tony's side knew nothing about what had happened to him.
Take Andrea, for example, the man known as the King's Butler. He had imagined scenes where the King of Swords might lose. But he had never imagined that the King of Swords would lose so easily.
Sunlight once more spilled down over the devastated airport ruins. It illuminated the broken wasteland and the lone figure still standing at its center.
Andrea understood.
A new king had arrived.
Lord Akuto would most likely become an existence standing above all Campiones.
...
On Akuto's side, as Tony faced the White Horse's solar flame, a system panel suddenly popped up, accompanied by the system notification.
[Ding!]
[Congratulations, Host, for completing the plot mission - Instill Fear in Tony.]
[Mission Requirement: Thoroughly defeat Salvatore Tony and make him understand the gap between the two of you. Put an end to his idea of seeking you out for duels whenever he feels like it.]
[Mission Rank: Red.]
[Congratulations, Host. Reward obtained - Heavenly Dragon Twelve Divine Fists (Red)]
[Heavenly Dragon Twelve Divine Fists: A supreme martial arts manual corresponding to Luo Hao's Twelve Divine Palm Strikes in the Campione world.]
Unlike it, the Twelve Divine Palm Strikes only gained the evaluation of "divine martial arts" after several centuries of tempering by Campione Luo Hao. The Heavenly Dragon Twelve Divine Fists, however, already surpassed the tempered Twelve Divine Palm Strikes in innate quality, and still possessed the potential to break through to even greater heights.
Originally a gold-rank existence, after fusing with the Heavenly Dragon Soul power of the Red Dragon Emperor and the stacked enhancement of the system reward, it had become a red-rank close-quarters combat skill.
Strength, power, the whole crowd cheers. Heavenly Dragon Divine Fists, every punch lands with crushing force, capable of directly striking at the origin, soul, and divinity of a living being. If dragon and phoenix sing in harmony, an even stronger advanced art will awaken.
Note: The complete moves are:
Dragon Roar Splits the Mountain, Dragon Eyes Pierce the Court.
Dragon Claws Shatter the Soul, Soaring Dragon Falls.
Rising Dragon Breaks Dawn, Golden Dragon Calls the Scales.
A Host of Dragons Seizes the Pearl, True Dragon Thousand-Pound Force.
Dragon God Elephant Form, responding to wind and the balance of yin and yang.
Dragon and Phoenix Soar Together, Heavenly Dragon Shatters the Mirror.]
...
"Oh? It has a coordination effect with Luo Hao's palm art too? So this is pushing me toward husband-and-wife mixed doubles?"
Reading the system description, Akuto raised an eyebrow.
"Strength, power, responding to wind and the balance of yin and yang... what kind of weird phrasing is that?
Though... beating Luo Hao properly really is the right approach."
For a woman as unwilling to admit defeat as Luo Hao, there was no method more effective than beating her into genuine submission.
(End of Chapter)
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