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Every swing of the halberd caused a gale. Sero skillfully dodged every wave, his blade striking sharply. The sound of the sword hitting the armor was drowned by the loud gales, but they seemed to become sharper each time. Then a tearing sound came out, and Sero gathered all his strength to launch a final attack.

「Hm..!」

Sero’s sword sent the Armor King flying into the air, but soon after he landed on his feet, a few paces aways. There was a shallow cut left on the shoulder of his armor, at which he looked while chuckling.

「That was quite magnificent, leaving a mark on this armor. Even knowing you’re Écarlate Carillon’s leader, it seems I underestimated you… But I won’t cede my victory.」

The reason for his confidence lay on his armor, which seemed to heal the cut by itself while the Armor King spoke, not leaving a mark.

「Self-repairing armor huh, finally a broken mechanic.」

A self-repairing property, likely the strongest type of defense. If it had been discovered during the game period, such an ability would have wrecked the combat balance.

「It seems you understand too, this unmatched power. Such is our technology, the arrival of powers that eclipse anything seen before in this world.」

Chimera Clauzen’s developments were achieved through the sacrifice of spirits. He was right, they were powerful enough to overturn the world. But it was impossible to forgive the path they walked on.

「No, I don’t understand. There’ll never be a need for technology obtained through someone’s sacrifice.」

Sero rejected the Armor King’s words, and pointed his sword to the shoulder he attacked earlier. A moment later there was another violent metallic clang and the Armor King was sent up into the air again.

「Hmph!」

This time he landed less gracefully, his posture broken, but he looked more impressed by the state of his shoulder. The cut from earlier went deeper, though it was already starting to recover, only taking a few seconds to look like new.

「Oh my, oh my, I see. Your famous Resonant Blade. The same skill that earned you the title Sero of the Resonant Blade. I see, I see. Now that I’ve bore witness to it, it’s more impressive than I thought. Sadly it’s not enough.」

Resonant Blade, Sero’s most powerful skill as famous as himself. But even that could barely damage his armor, so the Armor King laughed without much concern. ‘Manifestation’ was an umbrella term for many warrior skills, produced through the focus of fighting spirit. One type was called Resonant Attacks, which formed an invisible follow-up attack after a series of moves from a warrior.

It was a rather low skilled Manifestation, but it could easily double one’s damage output, so all beginner warriors would learn it by heart and use it constantly.

But Resonant Attacks could only target the same place as previous attacks, making it useless against fast enemies. Hence, at a certain point warriors would stop using it and pick from a large variety of other higher level Manifestations. However, there was still one person in this vast world who continued employing Resonant Attacks. That was Sero.

Sero thoroughly researched and studied Resonant Attacks, bringing the skill up to a level equal to other specialized moves. He could control the moment when it would activate at will, amplify its strength, and even attack spots his blade had touched, rather than the space it traveled through.

The Resonant Attacks he used were in a completely different realm to that employed by beginner warriors, becoming a skill of masters. All that was the result of multiple decades of research and training.

The Armor King had successfully defended against Sero’s strongest attack. His armor was far stronger than that of Gregorius who Mira had fought before, focusing entirely on defense and nothing else. This fight against someone like Sero was enough to prove the armor’s worth, and made the Head feel incredibly proud of himself.

「I wonder how much it really lasts though.」

Assured of his victory, the Armor King raised his halberd up, stripping a part of the ceiling away, before swinging it down in an attempt to end the fight. The wind roared, carrying with it the debris from the ceiling like small bullets.

「This looks troublesome.」

The wind limited Sero’s movements, but he still managed to knock the incoming pebbles away with his sword, or move out of the way, while slowly moving forward.

「Ohh, so you can handle this!」

The Armor King repeated the same attack a few times, cracking the ceiling and using the rubble as projectiles. The wind borne from spiritual power was too powerful even for Sero, so he had to move perpendicular to it, while advancing during the short pauses between each swing.

「It’s my turn next.」

Moving through the storm of gales and stone, Sero rushed forward while the Halberd was being raised, swinging his sword with acute precision.

「Hmmm! Truly, you’re swift. I couldn’t see you approaching.」

There were multiple slashes, diagonally down from the shoulder, horizontal through the legs, and straight up. Sero’s attacks were swift, but powerful like raging billows. Each time his blade hit the armor there was an ear piercing of something tearing apart as sparks flew around, leaving dozens of marks all over the armor.

The Armor King was unable to follow Sero with his eyes, merely swinging his halberd randomly, though there was no distress in his movement. His burly armor and its self-repairing properties protected him from feeling any pain, fully dispelling the fear of getting hurt.

In other words, he had no need to worry about taking defensive action, and could fully focus on his own attacks.

「I doubt you’ll manage to escape from this though!」

Not paying any attention to all the attacks he was receiving, the Armor King began swinging his halberd again. Up to that point he had always sent the wind in a given direction, but now he drew a wide arc, which kept elongating until it formed a circle which kept blowing around him.

It was like a tornado contained in the small room. Sero and the Armor King were in the middle, surrounded by a wall of all the debris from their fight, impeding Sero’s retreat.

「You could even say this is a birdcage made of wind.」

Sero looked around after a while of being focused on slashing his head, arms, torso, hips, and legs equally. The whirlwind’s radius was slowly decreasing, and there was so much rubble carried by it at high speed that if it touched Sero, he would likely suffer lethal wounds.

「Yes, I devised this infallible scheme to trap agile warriors like yourself and reduce them to dust.」

He laughed proudly. A cage that destroyed anything near him. Even if his halberd could not reach his opponent, as long as he kept swinging it in circles, he could overpower anyone.

There was almost no one who could resist the wind created with spiritual power. But to him, inside his impenetrable armor, it felt like a mere breeze. That was the only reason why he could use that skill.

「Yeah, you have it all figured out. This much power coupled with that defense is nothing to scoff at.」

Surrounded by that raging tornado, Sero continued striking acutely. The metallic clangs that could be heard rhythmically amidst the wind became more violent. The marks on the armor became deeper too. The Armor King frowned, finally concerned by the degradation of his armor.

「You’re really getting on my nerves!」

The Armor King shouted vigorously, accelerating his halberd’s rotation speed dramatically. He was moving many times faster than before, his halberd finally reaching Sero. The surrounding tornado was so close that it aided the halberd to rotate as well.

Sero instantly turned around, blocking the incoming halberd with his sword. Red sparks flew from the violent hit, and then Sero vanished, carried by the wind. The Armor King grinned, holding his halberd next to him.

「That sword had quite the edge. Even I’m surprised it accomplished this much.」