1 A Broken Dark Knight

Weathered ruins stood high amidst the chilly wind, blocking out the rotten smell.

Whoosh!

A sharp whistle sounded, and a stream of silver light flashed through the air before it disappeared just as quickly.

Click.

A very subtle sound could be heard. It was as if some sort of delicately placed mechanism had been triggered. A flash slashed through a stone wall, drawing a diagonal line from the top to the bottom, immediately followed by a rumbling sound. The top half of the stone wall began to slowly slide down along the slash, and scattered bits and pieces of sand and stone fell to the ground.

In an instant, only half of the seemingly thick stone wall remained. The other half of the wall had collapsed to the ground.

Smoke and dust filled the air.

"Damn it. This does not make any sense!" A young man, who had been hiding behind the stone wall, cursed.

The young man seemed to be only around 22 or 23 years old. He wasn't particularly eye-catching, but his satin-like black hair was appealing. Although he had cursed and the situation seemed rather dire, his face did not show much panic. His eyes were calm, and a unique charm emitted from his entire body.

He did not choose to remain hidden behind the stone wall. Instead, he picked up his only weapon and ran away quickly, and not a moment too soon, as half of the stone wall proceeded to rumble and almost collapse. He then hid behind another wall nearby.

"Sean! You big liar!" The slightly immature voice of a child suddenly rang through the otherwise quiet space. Perhaps it was because the owner of the voice seemed a little anxious and nervous, but the voice sounded a little sharp. "I do not want to trust you anymore!"

The owner of the voice was hidden not too far away from the young man.

The voice seemed to belong to a young girl.

Her skin was fair and delicate. Even though children's skin often was delicate, hers was particularly so. Her features were as exquisite as the features of models for legendary works of master sculptors, and her long blond hair turned a bright gold under the rays of the sun. All of these traits combined to paint a picture that the girl's identity was not as simple as a commoner. At least, in the opinion of the young Sean, who looked a little disheveled, the young girl's bloodline was aristocratic.

However, right at that moment, the expression on Sean's face was a little ugly. "You idiot! I thought I told you to hide better than that!"

Sean lifted his head so he could see over the wall he was hiding behind and saw that the enemy, who had been targeting him the entire time, had turned their head around to face the little girl.

"Damn it! I still have not established a stable hate, but now you have pulled all the hate towards you!" Sean cursed. When he saw the enemy walking towards the little girl, Sean quickly picked up a stone and threw it at the enemy. "Cecilia, hurry up and run! Find a place to hide!"

Ding.

The stone hit the helmet on the enemy's head. It bounced off and fell to the ground.

It did not do any damage, but it was a good enough method to attract its attention and keep it away from Cecilia.

The enemy that stood in front of Sean was a soldier. It was wearing black full-body armor. There were already many signs of damage on the armor, and because of the prolonged lack of maintenance, the armor was dull. It had probably been that dull for a very long time. While it was worn, it could only protect some parts of the body. Interestingly, the places on the body that were protected by the armor had very little protective value, as hitting them would not cause death. The areas with actual protective value, the parts the body that could instantly cause death when harmed, were exposed.

Just from looking, it seemed that the armored soldier was an Elite Soldier who had been withdrawn from the front line of the battlefield.

However, in reality, it was a Dark Knight.

[Name: Broken Dark Knight]

[Race: Undead Spirit]

[Class: Dark Knight (Rank Five)]

[Attributes: Strength: 16; Agility: 8; Endurance: 13; Wisdom: 0; Will: 5]

That series of data was all of the information Sean could currently find through his eyes about the monster that was standing in front of him.

Under normal circumstances, a rank-five Dark Knight was not a monster that Sean would have been able to deal with. However, the Dark Knight that stood in front of him had suffered severe and irreparable damages. Therefore, right now, it was only a rank-one Dark Knight. Even though that was the case, for most people, a Dark Knight was by no means an easy monster to deal with because it retained its innate fighting ability of the Undead Spirit even when severely injured.

But that instinct was everything that it had left.

Under the influence of that instinct, it would decide who to focus its hate on. That was done according to the specific strength of the enemy within its line of sight. Its hate allowed it to focus on one individual to attack.

Sean saw that the Dark Knight's line of sight had finally stopped and rested on him before it began to walk towards him. Sean frowned as he clenched the long sword in his hand and came out from behind the stone wall. The current situation was a little different from what he had originally planned, but at least it would not deviate too far, as the situation was still under his control. If Cecilia had not suddenly come out and ruined his plan earlier, then it would have been a lot easier to deal with the Dark Knight in front of him.

"Bring it!"

Sean glanced at the longsword, which was emitting a chilly blue light from the hand of the Dark Knight and took a step forward. A split second later, he rushed towards it.

Sprint!

Sean and the Dark Knight were only six meters away from each other. That was the maximum distance the sprint could reach.

However, although Sean's sprint was fast, the Dark Knight's reaction was not slow.

Almost exactly when Sean started sprinting, the Dark Knight waved the longsword in its hand, working entirely on instinct.

The same sharp sound that was heard earlier, which had made Sean's head numb, was heard again. The Dark Knight swung the long sword in its hand in a half-circle. A light blue brilliance as clear as a crescent moon appeared. The sword's speed was going as fast as it could, just as Sean was. Given the timing of the two movements, if Sean did not adjust something soon, then as soon as he approached the Dark Knight, he would become a headless man. Just from looking at their instincts, it was clear that the Dark Knight's fighting strength was above Sean's fighting strength.

However, something unexpected happened. The exact moment the Dark Knight's longsword would have hit Sean's neck, Sean paused. His entire body went from going at extreme speed to complete stillness. The strong reaction force distorted Sean's face, clearly showing a pained grimace. It was obvious that it was not a pleasant experience for him, but the movement had allowed Sean to completely avoid the danger of being decapitated by the Dark Knight. In the next moment, the ordinary iron sword in Sean's hand ruthlessly pierced the heart of the Dark Knight. Sean pushed the sword in as far as he could, making sure there was no way the Dark Knight could fight back.

Roar!

Suddenly, two red lights were emitted from the Dark Knight's helmet. Sean had heard a transmission of sounds, but instead, there was the sound of an angry roar. It seemed to have come directly from within the soul of the Dark Knight, penetrating the still air with its gruesome sound.

Even so, there did not seem even the slightest bit of fear in Sean's eyes as he clenched the sword and continued to stab it deeper into the Dark Knight. It went so deep that the tip of the sword penetrated the dead and stiff muscles in the Black Knight and stuck out its back. In the next second, Sean released his right hand, which had held the longsword. The moment he let go of the hilt, a pale white glow appeared in his right hand. He put his right hand up against the right hand of the Dark Knight. "Distribution of proficiency points. One towards strength, one towards agility, and one towards endurance," Sean said to himself.

The light on Sean's right hand flashed and then disappeared, but the strange thing was that no one could see the light except Sean himself.

The right hand of the Dark Knight, which was holding the long sword, had swung according to its instincts. However, the scene of fresh blood splattering everywhere that the Dark Knight had expected had not appeared, confusing it slightly. It only felt a slight change and strangeness in its right hand. However, the specific degree of the change was not distinguishable by the completely dead brain of the Dark Knight.

Sean took a step back, now holding a longsword in his right hand. The longsword was the one that was previously held by the Dark Knight in its right hand.

[Verification successful. The weapon belonging to the opponent has been successfully seized.]

The Black Knight glanced at the sword that Sean was holding in his hand. Then it looked down at its right hand. It could not understand why the sword that had originally been in its hand was gone. However, as a severely injured Undead Spirit with zero intelligence, it did not have the brain capacity to think about how or why that had occurred. It only lowered its head and looked down at its chest. It saw the sword sticking out of its chest, so it reached out, grabbed the sword, and pulled it out.

When the Dark Knight lifted his head once again, it was welcomed with a shower of attacks from Sean.

The series of continuous attacks from Sean would not have been enough against the Dark Knight if it were in prime condition, as they were normally much stronger. However, right now, it was enough to deal with a damaged Dark Knight that had only one-third of its fighting instinct left. Even though the damage from Sean's attacks was not particularly serious and most of the damage from the decisive attacks was protected by the armor on the Black Knight, Sean's attacks were still very smooth. Every set of three consecutive strikes was a method of attack, and the sets of attacks were continuous, like a storm or a well-oiled machine.

From the very beginning of the attacks, the Dark Knight could only defend itself for a moment before completely falling to a disadvantage. It was completely suppressed by Sean. Although the Dark Knight tried to fight back, the ordinary longsword that was held in its hand was nothing compared to the longsword that Sean had, which had been previously seized from the Dark Knight. After just a few confrontations between them, the long sword that the Dark Knight was holding completely broke apart. That was the main reason why the Dark Knight had been completely suppressed by Sean.

"Cecilia!" Sean shouted out.

"I know!" The little girl with blond hair, who had hidden in the distance, answered loudly. Sean hoped that she would do what he needed her to do.

In the next moment, Sean bent down and dodged a swing from the Dark Knight. Then he pounced fiercely to one side and jumped to the spot two meters behind the Dark Knight. He rolled to his feet. Right at that moment, a loud explosion suddenly sounded. The scorching heatwave and the impact of the current that was set off made Sean stagger a few steps. Cecilia had done what she was supposed to.

Fortunately, his reaction was fast enough, and he quickly steadied himself once again.

When he lifted his head and looked up, the Dark Knight in front of him had turned into a human torch, but the tenacious vitality of an Undead Spirit prevented the Dark Knight from being killed. Instead, a roar was emitted from the depth of its soul.

Sean would never allow the monster in front of him to have any chance to counterattack.

He quickly rushed up in front of the Dark Knight and waved the longsword in his hand. A blue crescent appeared as it swept across the Dark Knight's neck. The still-burning head of the Dark Knight flew up into the sky, its black helmet still attached surely to it.