---
The roar of the confused crowd was a distant murmur as Sarah and Kenta stood amidst the frozen wreckage of the arena. The Glazier Cult was gone, escorted by nervous royal guards towards the castle to claim their prize. The promised gold felt like ash in their mouths.
"They played us," Sarah whispered, her fists clenched. "The entire tournament was a stage for them."
"And we were the supporting actors, meant to make their victory look legitimate," Kenta finished, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. The look the cultist—Phantom—had given his sheathed katana was seared into his memory. It was not the look of a warrior, but of a covetous collector. "They have what they wanted: sanctioned access to the royal family."
Before they could formulate a plan, the sharp clank of armored boots approached. A knight captain, his face grim beneath his helm and his armor gleaming with the royal crest, stopped before them.
"Sarah Yamazaki. Kenta Yazuru. By the direct order of Princess Alessia, your presence is required in the castle immediately. The matter is of utmost urgency." His tone brooked no argument. It was not a request.
They exchanged a single, knowing glance. The princess was no fool. She had seen the same threat they had. The charade was over; the real battle was beginning.
---
The throne room of Gelber Castle was a study in gilded tension. Princess Alessia sat upon her high seat, posture impeccably regal, but the knuckles of her hands gripping the throne were bone-white. Flanking her were a dozen royal guards, their hands resting on their sword hilts. Across from them, an island of chilling calm, stood the six masked members of the Glazier Cult.
Eclipse stepped forward, his voice a silken threat wrapped in false courtesy. "Your Highness. We have come to claim the divine blessing promised to the tournament's victors."
The air grew heavy. Alessia's heart hammered against her ribs. She was a songbird trying to stare down a pack of wolves, bound by royal decree to reward the very monsters she knew intended to tear her kingdom apart.
"I presume you have come for your… 'blessing,'" she said, her voice cool and steady, a testament to her royal training. It betrayed none of the fear coiling like a serpent in her gut.
"Indeed," Eclipse replied, a mocking smirk audible in his tone. "We are most eager to receive the gods' favor."
Swallowing her fury and her fear, the princess stood. "Very well. The ceremony must be held in the sanctity of the royal church. Follow me."
She led the procession out of the throne room, her guards forming a tight, nervous cordon around the cultists. The walk through the marbled halls was a silent funeral march. As they entered the grand, candlelit church, a group of five senior priests in white and gold robes awaited, their faces a mixture of reverence and apprehension.
Turning to face Eclipse, the princess made her final, desperate play. She had to bind them with their own ambition.
"There is one, non-negotiable condition for a blessing of this magnitude," she declared, her voice echoing in the vast space. "You will each swear a magically-binding oath of loyalty to the crown—to never harm me, my family, or seek to destabilize this kingdom—before the blessing is bestowed. The divine power will reject a treacherous heart."
Eclipse let out a low, condescending chuckle that seemed to suck the warmth from the room. "You dare make demands of us? The rules of your tournament stated no such condition."
"It is not a demand born of the tournament, but of the cosmos," she countered, her gaze unwavering. "It is the immutable price of the power you seek. Refuse, and you leave with only your gold."
For a tense moment, they stared each other down, the will of a princess against the cold resolve of an assassin. Finally, Eclipse gave a curt, dismissive nod. "So be it. We swear it." The lie was as smooth and treacherous as black ice. There was no magical binding, no ritual; only empty words he had no intention of honoring.
Alessia's heart sank. She had run out of moves. She nodded to the High Priest.
The ceremony began. The priests chanted in an ancient tongue, their voices rising in harmony. A soft, divine light emanated from a sacred statue of the goddess above the altar, a warm, golden radiance meant to bless the worthy. It descended towards the cultists.
But then it twisted.
The light, pure and seeking, was violently drawn not to the cultists themselves, but to a strange, obsidian prism Eclipse produced from his robes. The artifact glowed with a hungry, violet light, sucking in the divine energy, amplifying and corrupting it, before funneling the now-raw, volatile power directly into the six figures. They shuddered as the energy flooded them, their auras darkening and intensifying.
The princess watched in utter horror. She hadn't just failed to stop them; she had actively empowered them. She had given the wolves sharper teeth and claws.
The moment the last drop of light was consumed by the prism, the pretense shattered completely. The comforting atmosphere of the church was replaced by a killing chill.
"Thank you for the power, Princess," Eclipse said, his voice now devoid of all mockery, filled only with absolute, cold intent. "It will make purging this stagnant kingdom… efficient."
He didn't even look at her. He nodded to Phantom and Mirage. "Clean up this refuse. We have a schedule to keep." With that, he, Zephyr, Nocturne, and Shade turned and strode from the church, their mission accomplished. The real work was elsewhere.
Before the first priest could scream, Phantom moved. He was a blur. One moment he was by the door, the next he was amidst the guards, his movements a series of silent, lethal flashes. Four royal guards fell before their swords could even clear their scabbards, their throats slit by a blade too fast to see.
Simultaneously, Mirage raised a hand. With a sound like shattering crystal, blades of solid ice formed from the moisture in the air itself, hovering for a heartbeat before shooting forward. They impaled the remaining guards and the five priests where they stood, pinning them to the ornate walls like grotesque butterflies. The church fell silent, save for the drip of blood on the stone floor.
Princess Alessia fell to her knees, surrounded by the slaughtered remains of her protectors. She squeezed her eyes shut, awaiting the final blow.
---
The grand, oak doors of the church exploded inwards, splintering off their iron hinges.
Sarah and Kenta stood frozen on the threshold, their lungs burning from their sprint through the castle. The scene before them was a vision from a nightmare: the blood-splattered walls, the fallen guards and priests staring with vacant eyes, and the trembling princess on her knees amidst the carnage.
Their gazes instantly locked onto the two cultists who had remained—Phantom and Mirage.
"Well, well," Phantom sneered, wiping his blade on a fallen guard's cloak. His eyes, visible through his mask, immediately and hungrily found the second, still-sheathed katana at Kenta's hip—Yami no Hikari. "The tournament pests. I told you we'd meet again. That's a fine blade you have… its darkness calls to me. It will look far better in my collection."
Mirage said nothing. She simply turned from the princess and, with a graceful, deadly wave of her hand, manifested ten glimmering swords of solid ice in the air. They hovered between her and Sarah, a wall of certain death reflecting the candlelight.
Her cold, calculating eyes fixed on Sarah. "You will be an interesting test subject for our new power," she declared, her voice as sharp as her ice. "But you will fall like all the rest."
The fight for the princess's life—and for their own—had begun.
---
Sarah stood firm, her body already a canvas of fresh, stinging cuts from the tournament, but her spirit a hardened piece of steel. "I won't go down so easily. Not to the likes of you."
With a flick of Mirage's wrist, the ten ice swords shot forward like a volley of arrows. Sarah became a blur of motion, her newly enhanced SS+ rank speed allowing her to dodge and parry. The clang of her own borrowed sword against the magical ice echoed through the bloody church like a frantic bell. But the sheer force behind each conjured blade vibrated up her arms, a stark, painful reminder that a single misjudgment, a single slow parry, meant being run through.
They're so strong, she thought, her mind racing even as her body twisted and weaved. The blessing amplified them. I can't find an opening. She's not just throwing swords; she's controlling them, herding me.
Across the room, Kenta fought his own battle against a phantom. His opponent was a nightmare given form, his body flickering in and out of sight, using the church's pews and pillars as staging grounds for strikes from impossible angles. Kenta's katana, Hikari no Ha, met empty air more often than steel, his frustration a slow-burning fuse.
"You're stronger than I thought, boy," Phantom taunted, his voice a whisper from the shadows behind Kenta. "But let's see how long you can last against a man who has mastered the art of the kill."
Kenta gritted his teeth, his focus narrowing to a pinprick. He was a duelist, honed for direct, honorable combat. This was an assassination dance. He couldn't win a battle of attrition against an enemy who refused to fully engage.
Back with Sarah, a misstep proved costly. Distracted by Kenta's struggle, an ice blade sheared past her guard, slicing a deep gash along her arm. She cried out, stumbling back, her sword arm momentarily numbed by the impact and the freezing cold.
Mirage smirked, advancing slowly. "You're looking a little worse for wear. Those injuries must be slowing you down. Can you keep up, little girl?"
Sarah clenched her jaw, pushing through the fiery pain. "I can keep going all day…" she spat, her breath misting in the suddenly frigid air. "I just didn't expect I'd have to use the System again so soon."
Mirage's smirk vanished, replaced by a flicker of genuine confusion. "A System? What are you talking about?"
It was then that the familiar, sterile text appeared in Sarah's vision, a lifeline and a curse.
[WARNING: Host body integrity critical. Significant blood loss detected. Auto-Battle Mode is available. Activate?]
It was a risk. The pain and exhaustion afterward would be excruciating, leaving her vulnerable. But seeing the princess trembling on her knees, seeing Kenta hard-pressed, she knew there was no other choice. Survival was the only priority.
Do it.
Her consciousness receded, pulled into a backseat of her own mind. The fear, the pain, the doubt—all were muted. Her eyes glazed over, shifting to a vacant, luminous silver. The System took direct control.
The change was instantaneous and terrifying. Sarah's movements, once driven by human instinct and emotion, became fluid, precise, and utterly, coldly efficient. She didn't just dodge the next volley of ice swords; she calculated their trajectories to the millimeter. She snatched one of Mirage's own blades from the air and, using it as a tool, deflected the others with impossible, geometric parries, sending them shattering against the walls and ceiling.
In the space of a single, skipped heartbeat, she closed the distance. The stolen ice blade was now poised directly at Mirage's throat.
Mirage's eyes widened in sheer, uncomprehending shock. "What—?! How did you—?!"
Panicked, she threw both hands forward, summoning her entire remaining power. A storm of a hundred needle-sharp ice shards materialized and shot towards Sarah in a wide, inescapable cone.
It was a futile gesture. The System-controlled Sarah didn't try to escape. She weaved through the storm like a phantom, her body contorting in ways that defied human anatomy, the ice shards grazing her clothes but never finding flesh. And in a move too fast for the eye to register, she was behind Mirage, the ice sword plunging deep between her shoulder blades.
Mirage gasped, a choked, wet sound. The ice shards clattered harmlessly to the floor. Her knees buckled, and she collapsed forward, the cold of her own magic finally claiming her.
The moment Mirage fell, a simultaneous wave of oppressive, soul-chilling darkness erupted from the other side of the church. Kenta, seeing his opening as Phantom was momentarily stunned by his partner's defeat, had finally given in. His hand fell to the dark leather hilt of Yami no Hikari.
As he drew the blade, a shroud of palpable shadow flowed outwards, snuffing out half the candles in the church. His eyes burned with a malevolent crimson light.
Phantom faltered, his arrogant smirk replaced by pure, primal alarm. The aura pressing down on him wasn't just power; it was hunger. "What... what is this power?! This isn't the same boy from the arena!"
He never got an answer. Kenta became a blur of black steel and crimson intent. He didn't flicker; he simply was there. Phantom, for all his speed, was frozen for a critical millisecond by the overwhelming darkness. It was all the opening Kenta needed. A single, perfect horizontal slash cut through the air, and Phantom's head was separated from his shoulders before his expression could fully shift from alarm to terror.
---
Silence descended, thick and heavy, broken only by the ragged breathing of the survivors and the drip of melting ice. The Auto-Battle Mode released its hold, and Sarah collapsed to one knee, every muscle screaming in fiery agony. Across the room, Kenta stood panting, the dark aura around him and his blade receding like a tide, leaving him pale and swaying, his own wounds seeping blood freely.
They were both battered to the brink, but their enemies were defeated.
Sarah forced herself to stand, stumbling over to the bleeding, but still breathing, Mirage. Kenta joined her, his expression grim.
"Who are you?" Kenta's voice was a low, tired growl, but it held the sharp edge of a demand. "What is the Glazier Cult's real goal? Where has Eclipse gone?"
Mirage, coughing up blood, spat a weak, bloody laugh onto the stones. "We… we are the future… The Glazier Cult will overthrow this weak kingdom… and establish a new world order… where the strong—those with real power like us—rightfully rule…"
"Rule?" Sarah shot back, her voice cold with fury and exhaustion. "You mean terrorize. You murder and call it strength."
"Our leader, Eclipse… has a vision you cannot comprehend!" Mirage insisted, a fanatical light dying in her eyes. "And we are closer than you think… The artifacts we possess… will ensure our victory…" Her voice failed, her body slumping as she deliberately let death take her, the location of their base—the ancient cave—remaining her final, unspoken secret.
As her life faded, a familiar surge of power washed over Sarah and Kenta, mending their worst injuries and flooding their cores with newfound strength.
[LEVEL UP!]
[Congratulations! Host has defeated two SSS+ Rank opponents.]
[All Parameters Increased!]
Status: Sarah Yamazaki
· Strength: SSS+
· Speed: SSR+
· Endurance: SSS+
· Intelligence: S+
· Potential: S+
· Rank: SS+
Status: Kenta Yazuru
· Strength: SSS+
· Speed: UR++
· Endurance: SR+
· Intelligence: C+
· Potential: SSR+
· Rank: SSS
The power was a welcome balm, but it couldn't wash away the horror of the scene. They turned to Princess Alessia, who was slowly getting to her feet, her face pale but her eyes filled with a hardened resolve she had not possessed before.
"They are gone to the Sunken Temple of Al'Kameth," the princess said, her voice trembling but clear. "It is an ancient place, long forbidden, said to house a primordial power. Eclipse believes he can awaken it with the artifacts they have collected." She looked at them, her gaze pleading and regal all at once. "You are the only ones who have stood against them and lived. I cannot command you, but I beg of you. Stop them. Before they unleash a horror that makes this…" she gestured at the carnage around them, "…look like a gentle dream."
Sarah and Kenta looked at each other. The tournament was far behind them. They had their gold, they had their levels, and they had a lead.
They had won the battle in the church. But the war for the kingdom was just beginning, and its next battle would be fought not in a sunlit arena, but in the depths of a drowned and forgotten temple.