Chapter 48

Kiana was flustered as she watched Yumeji standing frozen in place before the advancing wave of ice.

"What kind of stupid thing is he trying to pull!?"

Just as she dashed forward to rescue the lunatic seemingly resigned to his fate, his hand suddenly moved. With lightning speed, he thrust his sword forward.

It wasn't flashy or elaborate—just a straightforward thrust, something anyone could execute.

But there was one critical difference. That thrust carved out a flawless line, completely unimpeded, not even for a millisecond. It gave the impression that the attack had been launched instantly.

That instantaneity seemed to distort space itself, shattering the wave of ice into countless tiny crystals.

Witnessing the spectacle, Chiyou merely smirked mockingly.

"Oh, not bad, I'll admit~ But it's only 'not bad.'~"

With a single stomp, she launched herself forward like a slicing gale, her blade arcing straight for Yumeji's neck.

Anticipating the assault, Yumeji tilted his body, intercepting and deflecting her sword to the side.

"Oh!"

Chiyou appeared genuinely surprised by his decisive movement. She attempted to withdraw her blade and execute a horizontal slash at his shoulder. However, before she could follow through, Yumeji had already lowered himself, shifting his weight and angling his sword downward. The tip drove into her foot.

"Agh!!"

Chiyou winced in pain, her expression darkening. Twisting her body, she aimed an elbow strike at the back of his head. Yet Yumeji sidestepped swiftly, evading the blow before spinning upward to deliver a sharp uppercut that sent her flying.

"Oh! Oh!"

Suspended momentarily in midair, Chiyou sensed imminent danger.

Seizing the opportunity, Yumeji followed the uppercut with a front kick, then transitioned into a high kick aimed at her chin, keeping her airborne. He spun sharply, delivering a powerful roundhouse kick to her face, sending her spinning like a top. Finally, he hurled his entire body forward, driving a thunderous elbow strike into her abdomen and sending her crashing dozens of meters away.

Nearby, Kiana watched in awe, her voice filled with admiration.

"That must've hurt like hell."

After being smashed into the wall and buried under rubble, Chiyou's expression changed dramatically. Her frivolous smirk was replaced with a cold, murderous glare.

Crushing a stone in her hand to dust, Chiyou stepped forward, the sound of crumbling debris following her.

Gripping the sword embedded in the ground, she yanked it free and raised her hand skyward as if summoning something.

Elsewhere, on a different front, Himeko and Mei were locked in pursuit of the Black Armored Warhorse, a formidable foe whose incredible speed and physical power had kept them on their toes.

-Clang! Clang! Boom!-

"You goddamn nag! Why do you run the moment things don't go your way?! Get back here!"

As the Black Horse turned tail, it suddenly switched directions, charging straight at them with a piercing neigh and the deafening clang of metal.

"Oh crap! I said stop, not charge at me!"

With a slightly panicked expression, Himeko quickly dodged to the side.

-Crash!-

The horse slammed into the cave wall behind her, leaving a massive dent in the stone.

"Wow. What a wild beast," Himeko muttered, scratching her head as she observed the damage.

"Major Himeko," a voice called out. Turning her gaze, Himeko saw Mei already standing nearby.

"Oh, Mei! Can you do something to stop that damned horse from moving around so much?"

"…I'll try, Major," Mei replied calmly.

She placed her hand on her sword's hilt, lowering her stance into an iai position.

As the Black Horse rose from the rubble and turned its gaze toward them, Mei pushed the blade slightly out of its sheath with her thumb and launched forward like a bolt of lightning.

Simultaneously, the horse stomped the ground, sending chunks of stone flying into the air.

With graceful precision, Mei sliced through the obstructing stones with fluid, clean cuts. Using the falling debris as stepping stones, she propelled herself back and forth at incredible speed, attacking the horse from all directions. Sparks flew in a relentless cascade as metal clashed against metal.

-Clang! Clang!-

The Black Horse thrashed wildly, attempting to slam its body into Mei to disrupt her chain of swift strikes.

-Creak…-

Strangely, the horse's movements began to slow, almost as if frozen in time.

Though the earlier attacks had left only superficial scratches, the creaking sound grew louder, and the beast's movements eventually ground to a halt, leaving it motionless.

…

It turned out Mei had been infusing her strikes with frost energy all along, freezing the joints of the horse.

In one final leap, Mei retreated and unleashed an upward slash infused with frost, freezing the ground beneath the Black Horse's hooves and encasing its limbs in ice.

"Major!" Mei shouted.

Responding instantly, Himeko stomped the ground and launched herself forward with a powerful strike.

-Keeeeenggg!-

The clash between Himeko's blade and the Black Horse's armored body sent a spray of sparks into the air.

Though initially blocked, Himeko pressed harder, channeling more strength into her arms and hips. The ground beneath her feet cracked under the immense force, her veins bulging and muscles straining as she powered through.

"DIE, YOU DAMN BEAST!"

With a final surge of energy, Himeko's blade tore through the horse's armor, cutting deep into its body. She then lifted the beast, spinning it with centrifugal force before hurling it away.

-Boom!-

The Black Armored Warhorse crashed violently into the distance, now reduced to a heap of lifeless scrap.

Himeko exhaled heavily, wiping the sweat from her brow.

"Phew! That was exhausting!"

Though she wanted nothing more than to collapse and rest, the battle was far from over. With that in mind, she turned her gaze to the other half of the battlefield alongside Mei.

In the distance, lightning storms raged, tearing through the air as if determined to destroy everything in their path.

"This looks more like a natural disaster than a fight," Himeko muttered.

The cavern they fought in was at least twice the size of a football stadium, yet the lightning covered nearly half of it.

After exchanging a glance, Himeko and Mei tightened their grips on their weapons and rushed toward the storm to assist their comrades.

******

"Ouch! Ouch!!! Damn it!! What did she eat to live that she's so overbearing!"

"You ask me that, how would I know!? Didn't you provoke her to this point!?"

"Shut up!! I didn't know she was so narrow-minded! She's a thousand years old and yet she still uses all that power to beat up kids who aren't even old enough to be her grandchildren, like us!"

"Bronya advises you two to take care of your defense properly, defend tightly or you'll surely die."

After a few moments of inspiration and giving her a few painful blows from me, who would have thought that she would reveal her super VIP Pro power when she was cornered, as if she was the main character and we were the lowly villains.

As the rain of lightning mercilessly ravaged the battlefield, we couldn't dodge and could only roll on the ground to defend like turtles hiding their necks.

Bronya created a multi-layered Honkai energy barrier for herself, Kiana dug up a giant rock from the ground with her ability and hid behind it to defend. I curled up in a whirlwind dome created by my sword.

It sounded easy but our shields were instantly shattered by the lightning, forcing us to roll on the ground repeatedly using the same method to create similar layers of defense before they were broken again not long after.

And who told her to only strike our faces with lightning, as soon as the lightning stopped, a firestorm came.

I was fine because I had Cloud Flame to neutralize the attack but Kiana and Bronya were sweating profusely.

The amount of smoke after that fire was extremely dangerous, if I didn't use the wind to clear the air, we would have suffocated and died.

As soon as the heat storm ended, she immediately swept her sword and then another, creating an ice tornado that shot towards us.

The ice spikes shot out along with the icy wind, freezing everything in our path, making us shiver, not knowing whether it was from the cold or from fear.

Luckily, thanks to an improvisation, I was able to help everyone escape this disaster.

I cut my sword blade on my hand, sprinkled my blood on the blade, and swung my sword, creating a hurricane.

Due to the nature of the Cloud Flame, the drops of my blood were swept away with the tornado, quickly exploding and turning the tornado I created into a fire tornado.

As soon as the two tornadoes with two opposing elements collided, the pressure generated from the explosion blew us all away.

Steam billowed up and covered the entire cave afterwards.

As my vision was obstructed by the steam, a dark figure approached me and swung its sword.

-Kengg!

I looked up and saw Mei barely blocking the sword strike aimed at my neck.

I gulped as I thought that if Mei had been even a little late, I would have been a cold corpse with my head separated from my neck.

"Tsk!"

Chiyou clicked her tongue, then pulled her sword away and knocked Mei's katana back before kicking her in the stomach again.

But the leg Chiyou used to kick Mei in the stomach was held back by Mei using both hands, then she lowered her body a little.

Kiana who rushed forward immediately used Mei's shoulder as a support and leaned forward, then gave Chiyou a powerful knee to the face that made her want to twist her nose and scream loudly

"Don't you dare bully my beloved Mei-senpai, when I'm right here!"

"Ugh!"

Chiyou, who had just been pushed back by Kiana, angrily covered her face with her hands to fix her broken nose while blood was flowing down her face.

"YOU DAMN BASTARDS!!!"

She looked at us with bloodshot eyes.

"You're too open, former hero."

At some point, Miss Himeko had circled behind Chiyou and slashed at her with the greatsword in her hand.

"Don't be so rude to me, brat!"

"Are you kidding me, you blocked that with your bare hands!?"

Chiyou used only one hand to block Himeko's slash before knocking her away by releasing a Honkai energy pulse.

"OH MY GOD!! She still has so much energy!! Doesn't she know what fatigue is!?"

Kiana shouted loudly, making me want to scream in admiration.

"Is this her full power now!?"

It sounded like a joke, but the Honkai energy wave she released now was much, much stronger than when she showed us at the beginning of the match.

"Is she Frieza or something, she has so many hidden cards!"

"Huh, what did you just say?"

As soon as Kiana asked me back, I immediately realized that I had just said something stupid that could attract a dangerous force to beat me up.

"No, it's nothing, just talking nonsense, don't pay attention to it"

I quickly made excuses and focused on the transformation of that mighty emperor-level villain.

As soon as she finished energizing, she raised her hand, and an iron ball flew towards her from somewhere.

"Damn! Isn't that the Black Horse that I smashed into scrap metal earlier!? Is she trying to revive that thing!?"

As soon as I heard Himeko-san say that, I immediately added another sentence

"I'm afraid things will get worse."

"What's so scary about that."

Himeko-san said that before her eyes widened at the scene before her.

The iron ball was compressed into a large round ball with a radius of 5cm by the enormous energy.

After that, Chiyou removed the red crystal attached to her chest armor and replaced it with a black ball dense with Honkai energy

Immediately after she attached it to the armor, a Honkai energy vortex was released and enveloped her.

As soon as the tornado dissipated, the figure that stepped out was no longer the adorable and crazy Chiyou girl, but instead a cool black armored knight 3m tall, with a battle uniform and appearance that looked no different from a superhero coming out of a Tokusatsu series.

And then, I had to fight the full-armored villain.

THIS DAMN WORLD! WHY DOES IT LIKE FINDING WAYS TO PREVENT ME FROM HAVING SUCH A PEACEFUL LIFE!?