-433- Death

"Splurt! Splurt!"

On the crimson steel-like square, the sound of blades cutting into flesh rang out continuously, ceaselessly.

Rozen and Heathcliff were both exerting all their strength on their weapons, glaring at each other, attempting to deplete each other's HP.

In this situation, both of their HP were being reduced significantly and had already approached the bottom line. The outcome was about to be decided in the next few short seconds.

However, during these brief moments, Heathcliff, who had been closely monitoring both their HP bars, confirmed something.

"I've won."

Indeed, it seems that Heathcliff had won.

Because in the constant descent of HP, Rozen's decline was undoubtedly much faster than Heathcliff's.

This was only natural. In order to reduce the burden and allow his inventory to carry more items, and for the sake of mobility and agility, Rozen had mainly chosen lightweight cloth equipment with the lowest defense.

Despite being produced by master-level crafting players and heavily enhanced, Rozen's cloth attire had defense capabilities comparable to armor.

Heathcliff was superior to Rozen in this regard, as he didn't primarily rely on cloth attire and thus had naturally higher defense.

What remained to be seen was the difference in levels and skills. After all, the higher the level, the more HP a player had. Unfortunately, in terms of levels, Heathcliff was no less than Rozen. Both were level 99, just one step away from reaching level 100.

As for skills, Rozen had already fully mastered "Battle Healing" and had the skill "First Aid," which accelerated HP recovery when it entered the red zone. He was now recovering HP in seconds, allowing him to last a few more seconds.

However, Heathcliff not only had fully mastered "Battle Healing" but also possessed the skill "First Aid." He even had the rare skill among tank-type players, "Damage Mitigation." The effects of this skill were self-explanatory.

Heathcliff not only mastered the "Damage Mitigation" skill. He had four other fully mastered skills in total: "Holy Sword," "Battle Healing," "Damage Mitigation," and "Light Metal Armor."

Thanks to these skills, Heathcliff's HP was decreasing at a much slower rate than Rozen's.

With this advantage, Heathcliff could confidently declare his victory.

"It's truly regrettable, Guild Leader Rozen," he said with a composed tone.

"In the end, the victor will be me, and you will be exiting here."

In other words, players would lose their greatest hope. No one would be able to guide them through the various floors without any casualties, organize strategies for the Clearing Group, work for the benefit of lower and middle floor players, or stop the misconduct of red-named and orange-named guilds.

Players in SAO would suffer this painful loss, remembering Rozen's virtues while lamenting the loss of hope.

"But there's no need to worry. Humans are creatures that can be reborn and grow stronger in adversity. Without you, they may endure much pain, they may make sacrifices, and they will lose many protections, but there will always be someone who will shoulder all of this and advance, ultimately standing before me,"

Heathcliff said with a tone of regret, compassion, and optimism.

"I will wait for their arrival in this Ruby Palace, once again becoming their obstacle. Whether the hero who obtains 'Dual Blades,' the 'Flash' rapier user, or any others who come before me, it will be the same."

In the end, Heathcliff prepared to observe everything with a god-like perspective.

Once Rozen died, would his words all become reality?

After losing Rozen, players would endure the pain, make many sacrifices, and lose a lot of protection.

But if it were Kirito, Klein, Agil, and others, they would surely shoulder these burdens and advance, facing Heathcliff in another showdown.

The only worry was for Asuna. Could she bear Rozen's death? This seemingly strong rapier user might crumble under the weight of the blow and choose a path of self-destruction.

At least, Rozen had this intuition. So...

"Don't speak your farewells too soon, Heathcliff."

Rozen lowered his head and forced out these words.

"Do you think I would just sit here and await my demise?"

Saying this, Rozen slowly raised one hand.

That's right.

He raised his hand.

Heathcliff had one hand holding the hilt of the crystal sword, and the other wielded the cross-shaped sword, leaving him with no free hand.

But Rozen was different.

Using only "Azure Abyss," he had one hand free.

"Clang!"

With Rozen clenching his fist, the sword skill's effect enveloped his hand like a vortex.

"----!?"

As if Heathcliff had just realized this, he finally showed a shocked expression.

"The smarter someone is, the easier they are to overlook simple things because they often prefer to focus on the challenges."

Staring at Heathcliff's shocked expression, Rozen grinned and said, "This punch, you've owed it to me for two years!"

As he spoke, Rozen's fist turned into a flash of light and shot straight at Heathcliff's face.

"Boom!"

The impact exploded on Heathcliff's face, scattering the dazzling effect light in all directions.

"Guh!"

Heathcliff grunted, and his entire body was sent flying by the powerful impact. He released his grip on the cross-shaped sword and Rozen's crystal sword. He flew backward, losing all his weapons, crashing heavily against the crimson steel-like wall, and sliding to the ground.

The blow caused Heathcliff's HP to plummet rapidly.

Rozen shouted and stomped the ground, continuing his violent charge towards Heathcliff.

"Clang!"

The crimson effect light once again appeared on Rozen's crystal sword.

With the radiance of "Vorpal Strike," Rozen unleashed a final strike towards Heathcliff, pouring out all of his pent-up emotions.

"Hah!"

Heathcliff instinctively tried to dodge, but at this point, there was no time left.

"It's over!"

Rozen declared as he unleashed the final strike.

However, it was futile.

The cross-shaped sword still inside Rozen's body finally took away his last bit of HP.

"Bang!"

Right as Rozen reached Heathcliff, his sword tip at a distance of just one centimeter from Heathcliff's, his entire body turned blue and shattered into polygonal fragments, exploding into pieces.