46. Orion vs First Guardian

As if being provoked by Orion's sword, the guardian picked up his own sword and sprinted towards Orion.

Orion watched the guardian come towards him as he activated his absolute defense; his body covered itself in a red glow.

Before long, the guardian arrived in front of him and slashed with his sword.

Orion didn't make a move and only watched.

The slash came towards his right shoulder, but before it could fully touch that part, the sword, including the guardian, was blasted back by an unseen force, his body tumbling down the ground before coming to a stop.

'It's as I thought: the fully covered repelling armour works as an absolute defense against low-level enemies.'

He thought as he watched the guardian get up, but this time the guardian didn't come straight at him, but he held the sword and positioned himself in a particular stance.

Finding it interesting, Orion observed that the stance of the guardian looked similar to the samurai he had seen on Earth.

The guardian stood sideways, a little hunched, and the way he held his sword made it so that the sword pointed straight at Orion.

As Orion observed the guardian's stance, the guardian suddenly moved and disappeared from Orion's field of vision.

Seeing that, Orion didn't frown or panic and just stood there like an idiot.

A moment later, the guardian materialized in front of him, with his sword pointed straight at between his eyebrows.

However, unlike last time, the guardian didn't immediately get repelled, but he held on as his sword moved forward between Orion's eyebrows little by little.

As this happened, the tiles beneath the guardian's feet cracked, and the momentum from Orion's repulsion bore heavily on the guardian as the armour he wore started to get deformed by the repelling momentum.

Yet the guardian still held on, his sword moving little by little towards his target.

On the other hand, Orion stood calm and collected, as if the guardian's sword didn't target him but a huge mountain.

'Even the strongest attack of the guardian didn't manage to touch me.'

Orion felt very satisfied with his absolute defense. Most importantly, he had practiced hard for this in the training he did a while ago. Therefore, seeing its results naturally made him satisfied.

He had this idea of absolute defense since he could only cover parts of his body with the properties of repulsion but had never been completely able to apply repulsion to his whole body previously; however, after all that training he did, it made it possible for him to attain that form.

However, if there was one thing he didn't like about absolute defense, then it would be that it needed a moment of time to cover his body in the repelling armour, which he wouldn't have in the midst of a battle.

Therefore, he would have to activate it first before going to battle. Otherwise, he could only partially cover his body in repelling armour like he did previously if he didn't have much time.

'Time to finish this.'

Moving his right hand, Orion undid the repulsion on it, causing the red glow over the hand to fade away.

Almost instantly, his hand began to release white smoke, and the temperature around him started to drop all of a sudden.

With the hand that seemed to be releasing the smoke, Orion touched the armour of the guardian, who appeared to be trying his best to get his sword between his eyebrows.

In that moment, the guardian's armour began to freeze as layers of frost began to release from Orion's hand that touched the armour.

Slowly but steadily, the layer of frost spread to every part of the guardian, fully covering him, making him stop poking his sword at Orion.

The guardian stood there, his sword still pointing forward towards Orion's forehead, but a layer of frost covered his whole body, making it unable to move.

'Frozen Torment. It's as I thought.'

Afterward, Orion's hand, which was still touching the armor, suddenly turned purple for a moment before returning to normal.

However, when he took his hand off of the guardian, who seemed to be completely frozen, there appeared a purple glow on the frozen armour of the guardian, which seemed to be pulsating like a heartbeat.

At that moment, Orion retreated back a little, and when he appeared at a safe distance from the guardian, he gave a command.

'Explode.'

"BOOM!"

Suddenly, the sound of an explosion reverberated throughout the arena as Orion saw that the guardian's body glowed into a blinding purple before exploding into pieces before him.

However, after the aftermath of the explosion, he went over to see the bits and pieces of the guardian and was surprised to see only armour pieces; he didn't see the one wearing the armour.

'Was it only armour and there was no one wearing it?'

He wondered how something like that could even be possible. But soon he thought of the curse that caused the explosion.

'This Detonating Flesh curse is strange. It makes my body into a living bomb, but due to my own curse—Null Body—it won't explode and gives full control over it like my other curses.'

As Orion thought about his curse, a bright blue light suddenly flashed in front of him, causing him to hold his hands in front of his eyes to block the blinding light.

A moment later, the light died down, and he saw a blue portal appear in front of him.

'Time to leave.'

After making sure he didn't miss anything in there, he walked onto the portal and disappeared from the arena.

***

Back in the temple of souls, the kids were still practicing the Three Divine Ways, but they didn't seem to be making any progress, causing frowns to appear on the faces of Feran and Agnar.

They had expected this kind of result, but witnessing it with their own eyes disappointed them greatly.

But they still held on to a hope, however small, that maybe a miracle would occur and one of the kids might learn the Three Divine Ways and ultimately defeat the third guardian.

It was this hope that made all these souls living in the temple not go mad, even after living their lives here for so long.

However, they might never realize that the hope keeping them sane could be their worst curse, and the freedom they sought might never truly exist.

"Buzz!"

At that moment, the portal made a buzzing sound, and a figure appeared out of nowhere, catching everyone's attention.

The figure belonged to Orion, who came after defeating the first guardian.

'Time to level up.'

Orion thought as he gazed at the ruined portal in the distance.

He had a plan in mind for the stats. Since he couldn't upgrade all his attributes to the max level because of the limited time he had, he would only increase his agility and hope that it would reach a hundred points in the time he had in the level-up area.

Without wasting any time, he went to the portal and disappeared from the hall.