I Was a Sword When I Reincarnated (LN) - Volume 17 - Chapter 4

Chapter 4:

Fight to the Top

THE SKY WAS clear and cloudless. A fresh breeze was blowing through Ulmutt this morning.

Fran was excited as she made her way to the coliseum. She stretched, took a deep breath of fresh air, and smiled.

It was a wonderful day for sports fans everywhere. Even bloodsports fans.

Was there an ideal weather for bloodsports? Well…better sunny than rainy, I suppose.

Fran probably didn’t mind how the weather was as long as she got to fight against a strong opponent.

“It’s time for the semifinals and we’ve got some promising faces this year! Our combatants have already entered the arena for our first match of the day!”

The seats were packed. Even the empty seats in the VIP and noble sections were filled.

Everyone wanted a piece of the action.

“Fighting her way through the ranks as first seed is Black Lightning Princess Fran! She’s made it to the semifinals for two years in a row! She’s already Awakened and crackling with black lightning as she stands in the arena!”

The roar of the crowd shook the coliseum. They’d been hyped up before, but today they were on a different level. Their sound had the force of a tsunami.

“She’ll be up against Ulmutt’s own guildmaster and A-Rank adventurer, Dragon Twist Dias! I never thought I’d see our guildmaster compete, folks! Will his decades of fighting experience defeat Fran’s youthful exuberance?! Or will the young lay waste to the old?!”

Things were also heating up between Fran and Dias. Their sharp gazes clashed as their bloodlust arose. If it weren’t for the barrier, their bloodlust would’ve been enough to knock people in the audience unconscious.

“A direct confrontation,” Dias muttered, barely audible at this distance. “We’ll keep it simple. Winner wins our bet.”

“Hm.”

That was all that was said between them. But I knew they would start trying to kill each other as soon as the match started.

Dias wanted to win to put an end to his obsession with his own hands.

Fran wanted to win to protect Theraclede and Romeo. She also wanted to overcome the wall of defeating an A Rank.

But we had one little concern on our minds…

Fran, how are you feeling?

A bit heavy.

I see…

Fran had yet to fully recover from the battle with Sibyl. The burden of divine element still deeply fatigued her body. She was exhausted, far from optimal. But stamina management was part of competing in a tournament. We couldn’t let this weigh us down.

We’ll stick to the plan.

“Hm.”

Our opponent was a master illusionist, an expert at disabling his enemies. Meanwhile, we weren’t at a hundred percent. I was ready to forego everything and bet it all on our plan.

“Let the first round of semifinals…begin!”

“Raaah!”

Fran made her move as soon as the match started, putting all her strength into Skycutter. With all our Skills activated, this was the most powerful move we had in our arsenal. Though she could only move at seventy percent of her maximum speed, it was still plenty fast.

Dias was strong. If we let him cast his illusions, he would have us dancing in the palm of his hand.

But if nothing else, we knew where Dias was standing at the beginning of the round.

He couldn’t react. As good as he was, he couldn’t dodge the incoming Skycutter.

I’d noticed during his match with Abbav that his defenses weren’t that high. A direct hit from Skycutter would not leave him unscathed.

Meaning this one attack had the potential to end the match before it began—

“Huh? What?”

Fran?!

Suddenly, Fran’s Awaken deactivated. Her stats plummeted, but she also lost control of Skycutter. She wobbled, losing her balance.

I held her up with telekinesis as the momentum threatened to make her hit the ground.

Are you okay?

“Hm… What happened?”

It’s Dias’s Skill Amnesia!

I hadn’t thought that it could work against Awaken.

Skill Amnesia: Temporarily causes a target skill to be forgotten. Duration depends on skill level and rarity. Max duration of one minute. Cooldown depends on skill level and rarity.

“When a beastman’s Awaken is halted, the leftover mana implodes because it has nowhere to go. I knew you were going to pull something at the beginning, which is why I’m going to seal that ability of yours!”

Dias didn’t react because he didn’t need to. He knew what would happen if Awaken was disabled during a powerful ability.

“Urgh…!”

Fran!

Just as Dias said, Fran’s mana ran wild inside her once she lost control. She barely managed to keep it from self-destructing.

Meanwhile, Dias was making his approach. He smiled, not his usual mischievous smile. This was a smile of a hunter whose trap had caught his prey.

“Tsh!”

“Gaah!”

He easily landed a hit. Just as Fran avoided his illusory fist, he cut her inner thigh.

Fake an attack with an illusion and then follow up with an invisible attack. The bread and butter of an illusionist. But Dias’s illusions were far trickier compared to any illusion we’d seen so far.

He managed to reproduce signs of life, the sound of wind being cut, even smell. His illusion looked just like the real thing.

Fran winced after backing away from him.

“My leg feels weird.”

What?

I checked Fran’s leg. The wound Dias left was not healing.

Signs of Life Magic detected. Regenerative capabilities have been limited for a short time.

You can’t be serious!

Was it Dias’s weapon? I tried checking but Identify didn’t work. Identify only pointed out Skills it could see. Hidden with Illusion Magic, it couldn’t detect what Skill had been used. All I could tell was that the wound came from a slashing weapon.

According to my pre-match Identify, Dias should still have been using his Dragonfang Dagger. He must have switched it out when the match started.

Fran, be careful around his weapon!

“Hm!”

But I still didn’t know the length and shape of it. So much for caution. Dias’s cunning might have been the sharpest weapon in his arsenal.

We continued trading blows, but Fran’s movements were getting worse. Not only was she tired, she was still feeling the effects of having Awaken forcibly ended.

She no longer had the lead in stats—even her agility had been taken away from her.

Meanwhile, Dias’s movements were still crisp and clean. No wasted movements; if it seemed that way, they had been deliberately left there as bait. If we took the bait and attacked, a painful counterattack would be waiting for us.

Teacher, phaser!

Right!

I activated Dimension Shift on Fran’s command. The attack nullification should have allowed us to regain our footing.

But Fran’s neck twisted the moment I used it.

“Hurk!”

Blood gushed out of her nostrils. She had barely avoided an attack aimed at her nose. No, the attack still landed, leaving a cut inside her nostrils. We knew it would hit because of Danger Sense.

“I’ve seen that move too many times!”

“Hrm…”

Dias knew how to deal with Dimension Shift. Timespace weapons were rare, but he might have had one prepared for this occasion. A dagger with both timespace and life elements imbued on it? Was he dual wielding? No, the wound wasn’t healing. It was probably the same weapon.

You okay, Fran?

“I can’t stop bleeding…” Fran snorted through her nosebleed. She couldn’t heal because her regeneration was being disrupted. Blood continued dripping out of her nose, now disrupting her sense of smell.

Dias must have known that a beastman’s sense of smell was a dangerous asset to have against him even with his illusions. I didn’t think he’d actually stab a little girl right in the nose, though! He really wasn’t pulling his punches.

Fran’s mana continued to rage in her body. She wouldn’t be able to use Awaken again in this match. Now without her sense of smell, she was at the utter mercy of Dias’s illusions.

Melee combat might have been a bad idea at this rate. Fran must have thought the same thing, because she switched gears to suppress Dias with magic.

But her spells went around Dias. Lightning and flame missed the mark, whizzing harmlessly past the old guildmaster.

“What?”

What’s wrong, Fran?!

I don’t know!

Was it Dias again? But this flow of mana…

Fran’s senses might have been rendered unreliable because of his illusions. I had enough resistance to deal with Mental Suggestion and Visual Suggestion, but Dias’s Illusion Magic was still a force to be reckoned with.

We couldn’t let him keep pressuring us like this.

I aided Fran in firing spells, but the same thing happened. My aim was way off. He was doing something! But what?

Meanwhile, Dias kept focusing his attacks on Fran’s legs. I activated Dimension Shift again, but he went through it. Again.

Dias was aiming for legs, eyes, and heart. Organs which would prove highly advantageous or lethal when hit.

I’m warping us out of here!

Hm!

I teleported. I thought Dias would pursue us, but he had a surprised look on his face. He wasn’t expecting Fran to teleport. Maybe he had a teleport sealing device on him. Well, it was a good thing I had Seal Immunity ready.

Just like with Winalene, we were still susceptible to moves that disrupted Timespace Magic, but sealing abilities and equipment didn’t affect me.

But my teleport behaved strangely. I was trying to get us to one of the corners of the arena, but instead we were warped into the air. Something was throwing off my aim.

At least this played into our plan.

Fran, time for Plan B!

Hm!

You get that ready.

Got it!

Abbav had suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of Dias yesterday, but he gave us a huge hint with his strategy.

He had tried to defeat Dias by covering the arena with an unavoidable attack before Dias could cast his illusions. We had something like that up our sleeve. Dias had been ready for Abbav’s poison, but he might not be ready for this.

“Taaah!”

Fran opened Pocket Dimension, pouring out a red-hot fluid from within. It was time to make use of Mordred’s lava.

Lava flowed on the arena like maple syrup on a pancake, covering the ground in a flash.

Dias put up a barricade of Earth Magic, but we succeeded in slowing him down.

And slowing him down wasn’t the only thing the lava did.

It disappeared.

He cast illusion spells all over the arena and barrier!

I guessed that he had cast an illusion to alter the levels of the arena ever so slightly while also distorting the view of the bleachers from within the barrier. This was what was screwing up our sense of distance. This was what was messing up our spell aim.

The lava destroyed the illusions, reverting things back to normal.

I’d never anticipated that he would use such a large-scale spell right at the outset. Dias was so good at concealing his mana that I couldn’t detect it.

Time to lay down some spells, Fran!

Hm!

We had him on the run this time!

“Urgh! So, you saw through me!” Dias winced, swinging his sword to deflect our spells. He wasn’t enjoying himself. But considering this was Dias we were talking about, it might all have been an act.

But now wasn’t the time to worry about his strengths. It was time to flex ours!

Let’s do it!

“Hm!”

Multicast Kanna Kamuy!

I fired three bright flashes of lightning. The pillars of electricity crashed into the ground, illuminating everything within the arena with a blinding light.

Last year, we’d defeated Phelms by combining both white and black lightning into one. This attack was similarly charged, and it was coming straight for Dias.

With his unimpressive defenses, Dias shouldn’t have been able to take much magic damage. His areas of expertise were distraction and assassination. Not things that could shine in the restrictions of an arena.

Last year I’d ended up breaking the barrier because I couldn’t control the spell properly, but I had it covered now. If anything, the damage was greater now because it was focused on the inside of the arena instead of being wasted on the barriers.

The only downside was that we couldn’t escape. I had to use Dimension Shift to withstand the backblast of the explosion. Soon, the brilliant whiteness dimmed, the loud crackling subsided.

Dias was lying flat on the ground, barely breathing, body burnt.

“Heh… Not bad…”

His body was then engulfed in light. The light which would revert him back to life.

“We did it…”

Yeah. Even Dias couldn’t survive a direct hit from Kanna Kamuy.

Fran sniffled through her nosebleed, too worried about Dias’s safety to celebrate her victory. Finally, she breathed a sigh of relief.

First, we needed to heal her up. Seeing blood keep flowing out of her nose just wasn’t cute. When would this regeneration blocking effect wear off?

As Fran started healing herself, the commentator started shouting.

“Was that the end of the match?! Your guess is as good as mine, folks! All I can see is Dias lying on the ground after that blinding lightning strike!”

What? Fran hadn’t won yet?

“Urgh!”

After the commentator’s strange comments, Fran was flung to the side.

“You won’t get away!”

Dias!

How?! He was—

An illusion!

Dias had replicated the effects of the Cradle of Time to such a high degree that we let our guard down. He crafted the perfect illusion of death.

The commentator knew that the real Cradle of Time had not yet activated, and he was confused when Dias was seemingly resurrected by the Cradle of Time in the arena.

Dias warped to Fran’s side, piercing a dagger into her neck with his off hand.

She barely managed to get out of the way, her senses warning her of the attack just before it landed. But she couldn’t avoid it completely, and blood was drawn from her shoulder. While her carotid artery was intact, the cut into her shoulder was quite deep. Had Dias damaged her tendons? Her arm seemed heavier than before.

Even as she bled, Fran turned to face him.

“Ugh… That was good.”

“You’re one to talk after dodging a lethal attack.”

“I can sense you easier because of your injuries.”

“Heh… I guess I am getting old.” Dias laughed bitterly at his failure.

But I was surprised to see him still moving at all. Dias’s body had been charred black, blood leaking through cracks in his skin. The wounds we saw in his illusion were merely a reproduction of his own.

And still he managed to conceal enough of his presence to approach Fran from the side.

“Hate to admit it, but it looks like I’ll have to use an item to finish you off…”

Jet, get him!

A chill ran down my spine as soon as I saw Dias take a crystal out of his pocket. It wasn’t just the magic that the thing emanated; there was something “other” about this crystal as well.

I commanded Jet to attack, him being our trump card against attacks which covered a large area.

“Groooaar?”

“Ha ha. Another illusion.”

Dias’s dagger fell onto the ground. It was the only thing real about it.

I was so sure that we’d been attacked by the real thing! Had the illusion hurt Fran? If not, when did he swap himself for the illusion?

The new Dias appeared, similarly burnt. Were his wounds even real?

No, now was not the time to think about that! This kind of confusion was exactly what Dias wanted!

“Storm, destroy all.”

Dias had no more reason to hide. I Identified the item in his hand: a Spirit Sphere. As its name suggested, it housed the power of a spirit, allowing the user to unleash it in a single powerful blast.

It didn’t house an actual spirit, of course, but its power. You needed a sorcerer to make one of those things.

The sphere emitted a green light. One glimpse of it was enough to tell me that we would lose if things went on like this.

The power was immense, like it came from a Greater Spirit…

Of course. Klimt’s Greater Spirit! Dias and Klimt were acquaintances, after all! This was not good!

Jet, protect Fran!

“Woof!”

Oooooh!

Jet covered Fran, shielding her with his gigantic body. Meanwhile, I activated Spirit’s Hand to mitigate the spirit’s power as much as I could.

I had enough experience with Spirit’s Hand to make the best of it. Fortunately, it also behaved a lot like telekinesis.

I covered the Spirit Sphere with Spirit’s Hand to contain its power. It wasn’t working. I could feel the spirit sphere blowing my spirit hand away.

I concentrated harder. If I couldn’t contain it, I could redirect the energy.

I shall shoulder part of the calculations to redirect the energy to Dias. You may concentrate on controlling the energy.

Thanks, P.A.!

Dias winced in surprise.

“Spirit Magic, too? In such a short time…!”

The next moment, the spirit sphere flashed and rumbled. It exploded, releasing the furious winds of the spirit it was made of. Half of its fury was now directed at Dias, but even the aftershock of the storm was like a high-level storm spell.

“Hurk!”

“Grr!”

Unable to maintain her footing, Fran was blown away. Jet chased after her, cushioning her landing before she could crash into a wall or the ground.

Nice catch, Jet!

“W-woof…”

Jet looked like he was about to faint, but he would be fine. He’s a tough boy.

The fearsome winds subsided after a few seconds, revealing what could only be described as a nasty mass of flesh. Dias was utterly destroyed, his limbs torn and his equipment in tatters.

White light enveloped the mess that used to be Dias. We watched, still on full alert, refusing to make the same mistake.

I searched around us.

Was that the real Dias?

The commentator’s voice soon put our worries to rest.

“The Cradle of Time has officially activated! The Black Lightning Princess has emerged victorious!”