Chapter 301: Assassination Plot (3)
“……”
Lennok’s brow furrowed faintly at the young man’s words.
Had such strange rumors been circulating again during his brief absence from the city?
While reputation was inherently prone to exaggeration and inflation, the speed at which the rumors about Adamant Thunder were increasingly deviating from reality was too fast.
Talk of him preferring blood over money, being obsessed with combat… At this rate, it wouldn’t be surprising if he were mistaken for a berserker rather than a wizard.
But the young man, completely oblivious to Lennok’s feelings, continued leisurely.
“Getting stabbed with a knife or shot with a bullet leads to the same end. Why would we be scared by a reputation?”
Whoosh—!!!
At that moment, a ferocious surge, like a waterfall, burst from the young man’s body.
An immense pressure that even slightly surprised Lennok. The expressions of the organization members behind him, who felt that raw mana, changed instantly.
Bending his waist and casually stretching, the young man muttered.
“Now that I’m back, we don’t need guys like that in the organization.”
“I see.”
Lennok nodded.
“So, the Bardiche Brotherhood’s Vice-leader who successfully broke out of prison was you?”
“Yes. So, before we get too old to fight, let’s see who lasts longer.”
The young man grinned and said,
“It’s awkward to say this, but I’m pretty confident in my brawling skills.”
He didn’t need to say it; Lennok could already feel it.
His mana was incomparably robust, far beyond the man who first picked a fight with Lennok.
And the incredibly solid core built within it.
The extreme of 6th-level Property Transformation. Perhaps a strong individual knocking on the threshold of 7th level.
Considering he was a physical combatant who used his body, it wouldn’t be strange if he had already opened his Miniature Universe; he was that powerful.
Having reached this level, he must have known Lennok was his opponent, yet he didn’t stop his pursuit.
It wasn’t surprising.
It was common for organizations with a certain reputation in this underworld to have one or two such specialized forces within their ranks.
In fact, considering what Lennok had been doing, clashing with such powerful, unauthorized military groups felt somewhat belated.
He had merely ended up dealing with large-scale affairs due to his entanglement with The Triad.
Originally, those who should have been vying for interests in Vulcan’s underworld were precisely these kinds of individuals.
“Good.”
Crackle—!!!
Lennok nodded, scattering pale blue electricity from beneath his coat.
It wasn’t surprising. This underworld wasn’t entirely populated by cold-blooded individuals who only calculated gains by sizing up their opponent’s reputation or level.
Wasn’t this unvarnished, ugly greed, openly coveting what belonged to others, the true face of this underworld? Being so bluntly challenged and confronted with such avarice now felt almost refreshing.
Lennok, holding his spear loosely, slowly tilted the shaft.
“How good your brawling skills are, I’ll compare it directly to Antares for you.”
“You don’t need to compare me to a monster like that, someone of your level…!!”
CRACK—!!
At that moment, the young man twisted his shoulder and shot forward, instantly vanishing from Lennok’s sight.
His speed was so fast that he momentarily escaped Lennok’s sensory range.
When the young man reappeared behind Lennok’s left side, his series of movements to set his stance were already complete.
By the time Lennok perceived the young man bending his waist and slightly pulling back his fist, twisting his knee, the first strike had already landed.
Stonia Fist Chain One-Form
18 Forms, One-Flow Straight Punch
Whizz—!!
An extreme compression process where the stance and the punch were delivered almost simultaneously.
The shorter the interval, the denser the power packed into a single punch.
With a single strike that seemed to grasp the entire space, three overlapping shockwaves extended, slamming directly into Lennok’s back.
KWAH-AAAAAH—!!
An immense pressure that tore away the old cement floor where the two stood.
“Huuugh…!!”
But it wasn’t Lennok who let out a pained groan first; it was the young man who had thrown the punch.
Not only was the skin on the back of his fisted hand torn away entirely, but blood burst forth from his elbow, splattering on the floor.
“It’s a bit different from what I heard. I didn’t hear that your offense and defense were so balanced?”
“That was a while ago.”
Lennok heard the young man’s muttered words, then slowly turned his body to reply.
“I got tired of constantly getting broken… so I made a lot of adjustments.”
Crackle—!!!
Only then did a faint outline of a shield become visible amidst the electricity surrounding his coat.
“It’s going to hurt quite a lot if you touch it directly.”
Lennok had succeeded not just in enhancing the barrier’s durability, but in imbuing the shield’s very properties with electricity.
The difficulty of improving a shield that constantly protected Lennok and remained active 24/7, unlike other spells that were used sporadically without considering their duration, was extremely high, even for Lennok’s understanding of magical theory.
However, Lennok had steadily found clues to improve the shield through consistent research and discussion with Aris.
As a result, immediately after finishing his work in the fortress, he had thoroughly reformed the shield’s properties itself.
[Chain Lightning] and [Bolt] were layered around it, and the moment the shield shattered, the layered electricity would instantly Translocate and shock the opponent.
This was an improvement focused not on dramatically increasing the shield’s durability, but on anticipating its destruction and inflicting proportional damage.
Instead of inefficient modifications that simply boosted durability, the direction was shifted to increase power conditionally upon destruction.
“Even protecting my hands with mana, it’s this much… I’ll have to refrain from direct strikes.”
The young man clicked his tongue, then grinned, shaking off the blood pooled on his hand.
The hot blood splattered on the ground dried up and burned away quickly.
Lennok watched the young man, then, as if a thought had occurred to him, asked,
“Are you acquainted with a mercenary named Adam from the Plato Office? Your way of handling mana seems quite familiar.”
It was difficult to know the exact principles behind the young man’s fist arts, but the very rhythm of his mana handling remained in Lennok’s memory.
Unlike the vastly different combat styles of warriors and sorcerers, systematizing mana-based techniques and passing them on required setting certain rhythms and patterns, and constructing an order.
In that sense, the rhythm of Adam’s fist arts Lennok had seen in the proxy war and the flow of the young man’s current brawling certainly shared a similar rhythm.
To be precise, the young man’s technique was much more fluid and faster, but it wasn’t so fast that Lennok couldn’t discern the faint patterns embedded within.
Monsters who had gone beyond completing their Hierarchy and begun to transform their own inner selves would not have their origins read like this, but neither Lennok nor the young man have yet reached that level.
“Adam? That’s not a name I know at all.”
The young man grinned, pressed his wrist to stop the bleeding, and nodded.
“But Plato… well, I roughly understand what you’re talking about. I wondered what he’d been doing all this time; seems he was playing around in a place like that.”
“…You don’t seem to have any intention of properly explaining it.”
Lennok chuckled and raised his hand.
“Let’s smash your limbs first, then hear you out slowly.”
“Is that even… something you say?!”
KWOOONG—!!
Heavy mana surged from the young man’s raised right arm, violently rotating around his elbow.
The manifestation of mana, which was originally without physical substance, combined with strong rotational force, pulverized even bare asphalt like paper.
The young man’s body, lightly bouncing off his knees, shot forward like an arrow from his spot, immediately clashing with Lennok, who had brought down his lightning-charged shield.
KWAGWA-KWA-KWA-KWA-KWA—!!
As the two thrust their hands in all directions, pale blue flashes of lightning and shockwaves surged like waves, and scorching explosions burst forth from the ground, indiscriminate of friend or foe.
Each time Lennok blinked, the young man’s movements changed violently as if frames were skipped, and his fist arts darted through the air, digging into Lennok’s vital points from various angles.
“Huuup!!”
Stonia Martial Arts
25 Forms, Wolf’s Carving
Crackle—!!!
As the deeply inhaled young man’s elbow rotated violently,
A twisted mana construct, following that momentum, greedily bit into Lennok’s shield like the maw of a beast.
At first glance, it seemed like he was merely grasping and swinging mana, but it was an art that exquisitely twisted the very ends of the mana at the fleeting moment of a punch, maximizing its sharpness.
The mere fact that he successfully executed such difficult applications during the brief exchange with Lennok proved the young man’s level.
Yet, Lennok, far from retreating, absorbed the fierce onslaught entirely, walking forward and swinging his hand.
Crackle—!!!
[Thorn Lightning Cohesion]
Sharply refined electricity rotated from all directions, converging to a single point, entirely seizing control of the chaotic back-and-forth exchange.
[Thunder Confinement Coffin]
Weeeeeeeng—!!
Immediately after, a vortex of electricity exploded right in front of him, drawing a massive hexagonal form, twisting the young man’s limbs and attempting to bind him along with the space itself.
“……!!!!”
The young man’s brow furrowed, and he instantly withdrew the mana he had been unleashing, stepping back for a moment.
[Flying Azure]
Shweeeeeeek—!!
A pale blue flash, glinting from the end of Lennok’s sleeve, sharply curved, defying the young man’s gesture, and pierced his left shoulder.
“Khhhhat…!!”
CRACK—!!
At the moment he used Wolf’s Carving to twist the combat situation, three counterattacks shot forth like lightning.
If he hadn’t pulled his body back in that fleeting moment, it wouldn’t have been strange for him to have died instantly. It was natural for a chill to run down the young man’s spine.
If it had hit just a little lower, it would have directly pierced his heart. With this level of firepower, his heart would have contracted for a brief moment, and his cardiovascular system would have ruptured.
Retreating, the young man quickly massaged his shoulder, clicking his tongue.
“You’re crazy. Lightning magic used in such a violent way…!”
The brief, fleeting skirmish. But in that short time, the exchange between the two superhumans was fierce, almost a hundred blows.
At that moment, the young man realized how Lennok was resolving the gaps in his offense and defense that his shield couldn’t cover.
Originally, lightning-type magic had the disadvantages of high mana consumption and very short duration, despite its intense firepower and speed.
But Lennok compressed the casting speed of such lightning magic to its extreme, swinging it in sync with incoming attacks, accurately intercepting the opponent’s offensives.
It was an act of madness, like preparing hundreds of sharp knives that would break with a single swing, and going into battle with them.
It was a gamble where if he missed the timing even once, the entire exchange could fall apart.
Had the wizard before him succeeded in this tightrope walk with death every single time?
It was something that couldn’t be understood by normal common sense, but precisely for that reason, the young man understood.
If this wasn’t the reason a wizard with no close-quarters combat ability could survive countless confrontations with warriors head-on, then what was?
“You have good eyesight. Did you see that with your own eyes and figure it out?”
Lennok, who had twisted two bolts of lightning to form a sharp arrow, chuckled.
Among those who had directly clashed with Lennok and perished, most had failed to notice how Lennok performed close-quarters combat.
At the very least, the young man was definitely on a different level than them.
“Let’s see how far you can see.”
Lennok pulled his left finger, forming a hand seal, and then drew it down the inside of his right wrist.
A lightning arrow, thick as an forearm and twisted in a double helix, was drawn forth and glinted in Lennok’s hand.
Shzzzzzzzzzzz—!!
The air around them crumpled, dried, and heated up due to the essence of piercing magic, which rotated so violently it seemed ready to burst forth into the air at any moment.
Even though it was perfectly controlled while rotating in Lennok’s grip, one could still gauge its immense recoil.
“Haa, seriously…!!”
Attempting to dodge would be a loss. The young man quickly concluded this and set his stance.
Instead of observing Lennok’s magic with his eyes, he covered his left hand with his right and sharply hunched his body.
Simultaneously, mana rotated from deep within his body, and slow, successive waves emanated outwards.
Whoooong—!!
The form of the waves, layered and spreading back along his left elbow, was extraordinary.
It was proof that the young man, though immaturely, had completed his Hierarchy and developed his Mind Imprint into a concept.
It meant he had reached a state where he could interfere with physical laws not merely with his body, but with his will and mind.
The time taken for the two superhumans, facing each other, to refine their Mind Imprints was fleeting. Yet, the total amplified power during that interval was incomparably ferocious compared to before.
[Woven Lightning]
As the spiraling arrow blossomed from Lennok’s hand and shot forth, the young man too lowered his bloody right arm and swung his left fist.
At the tip of that fist, the highly compressed, overlapping waves of mana extended outward, drawing a massive spiral.
“Haaaaaaah!!”
Stonia Martial Arts
4 Forms, Straight Punch
9-Layered Bursting Star Cannon
KWAH-AAAAAAAH—!!!
The colossal wave of air, extending in a straight line, swept through the spot where Lennok had stood, crumpling nearby containers like paper scraps.
A single strike of such power was unbelievable for a human body, using only two fists.
It was atmospheric manipulation on a level that gathered and swung all the air in the vicinity.
The destructive power was such that it wouldn’t be strange to consider it the manifestation of a top-tier airflow manipulation spell.
Fzzz-zzzz—!!
However, amidst the indiscriminate storm of wind that shattered everything around, the light of the lightning piercing through its core never extinguished.
Despite the scale of the bursting strike, which seemed to overturn the entire dock area, the Woven Lightning shot by Lennok clearly pierced through it and embedded itself directly into the young man’s shoulder.
CRACK—!!
“I-Igh…!!”
Precisely the spot where the young man had first taken a hit. It was a level of coincidence impossible without intent.
Unlike the first lightning strike, this one was impossible to endure with his body.
The moment he realized, his shoulder was already completely pierced, and blood was gushing from it.
Yet, despite this, the young man clutched his shoulder and sharply yelled out.
“Now!!!”
KWA-GWAA-GWAA-GWAA-GWAA—!!!
At that moment, the Bardiche Brotherhood members, who had been observing the two-person battle, simultaneously began to unleash a barrage.
The gunfire from those who had surrounded them on the ground, the old tanks and armored vehicles waiting behind them.
Helicopters and aircraft hovering in the sky simultaneously rained down all their armaments, as if to melt the ground.
High-firepower projection, without any regard for their Vice-leader’s safety.
While Lennok, shielded, wouldn’t suffer significant damage from such bombardment, what about Meyer, who was hidden somewhere…
In the fleeting moment Lennok’s thoughts reached that point, the young man, having just passed by Lennok, muttered as if he had been waiting for that exact moment.
“They say when a person is cornered, they first look to the most urgent place.”
“……”
“The direction you first looked when I sent the firepower projection signal to this area just now. I confirmed it.”
Before Lennok could reply, the young man’s body vanished from his sight.
Shweeeek—!!
As if he had no lingering regrets about the exchange they had just shared, the young man began to sprint in the direction Lennok had glanced.