Chapter 749: Death Match III: Ryo vs Garwin II

Editor: Tseirp

“All right, I’ll accept that I can’t keep up with Ryo’s movements. But if I harden myself, then even if I get cut, it won’t matter! <Full-Body Armor>”

“Full-Body… Armor?”

Garwin’s words reached Ryo only faintly, and he tilted his head.

But there was no time to think.

The next flurry began with Garwin’s leap.

Ryo dodged every one of them.

And then, one strike.

Clang.

But what rang out was not the sound of skin being cut, but the sound of Murasame being deflected by something hard.

“So Full-Body Armor means you harden your entire body like armor? What a total brute-force solution!”

“Now it doesn’t matter where I’m cut.”

Ryo was astonished, while Garwin grinned.

Indeed, Garwin’s arm guards and leg guards could clash evenly with Murasame.

Since they were created by Garwin’s magic, all he had to do was envelop his entire body in the same material… In principle, that seemed to be how it worked.

“Then you should have done this from the start. Why only now?”

Ryo’s question was only natural.

The first reason that came to mind was that he could not maintain it for a long time.

The supply of energy was a limiting factor that applied to everything.

The next reason that came to mind was that it was inconvenient to use.

If it made his body harder but also made it harder to move, then he could not keep it deployed all the time.

Those were the two possibilities that immediately came to mind.

Unless he used some special method like <Calorie Acquisition Heat Absorption Vapor>, which Ryo had used in the battle in the Kingdom, Garwin’s magic power gave the impression of being almost inexhaustible.

Thinking about it that way, the latter seemed more likely than the former.

There was only one way to confirm it…

“We’ll just have to test it!”

This time, the sword clash began with Ryo’s charge.

However, the roles of offense and defense quickly reversed, with Garwin attacking and Ryo defending.

That was exactly as Ryo expected.

Garwin was a fighter who used his bare hands and feet as weapons.

The more compact the weapon, the easier it was to maneuver. In other words, he could seize the initiative and keep attacking.

Therefore, if distance was not taken into consideration, the natural formation was Garwin on the offensive and Ryo on the defensive.

That was precisely where Ryo’s ability to learn came into play.

Ryo dodged Garwin’s flurry of attacks.

And then he became certain.

(Indeed, his attack speed has dropped compared to when he only had the arm guards and leg guards.)

He observed even more closely.

(Yes, the armor around the joints inevitably interferes with itself, which reduces his speed. I understand now.)

Of course, he had still not thought of a way to overcome that.

But problems had to be solved one at a time.

“Observe, analyze, execute.”

He had observed.

He had analyzed.

As for execution… drive the sword in.

Where should he drive it?

“The weak point of armor never changes, no matter what era or what world you’re in.”

That was right, the joints.

But naturally, Garwin, who had generated <Full-Body Armor>, understood that as well.

That was why even with Murasame, landing a slash was difficult.

Then…

Ryo thrust.

Garwin dodged, slipped inside, and threw a right uppercut.

With an incredibly fast reaction, no, with a completely accurate read, Ryo leaped backward to create distance.

Using the distance he had gained, he struck at Garwin’s right elbow, which had extended upward with the uppercut…

Ryo drove Murasame into it!

Even if there was no gap to slash, there was a hole to pierce.

“Ugh…”

Garwin let out a pained groan and leaped far backward.

Djinns did not die. But that did not mean they could not feel pain.

Of course, the injured elbow immediately regenerated.

“So this <Full-Body Armor> of yours isn’t perfect after all.”

“Damn you, Ryo.”

Ryo announced it with a smug expression, while Garwin was furious.

Of course, all he had managed to do was injure Garwin’s elbow through a gap in the armor.

It was nowhere near a decisive blow that could determine the outcome of the battle.

However, fighters had hearts.

Even without damaging the body and reducing combat ability, there were ways to damage the mind and reduce combat ability.

“The gap between you and me over this past year has grown.”

“You bastard…”

“With every battle, that gap will continue to grow. Right now, your wounds are still shallow. Gather your army, retreat, and as promised, never attack again.”

“Don’t screw with me!”

Ryo provoked him, and Garwin’s emotions exploded.

Taking away the opponent’s composure was the most basic of basics in one-on-one combat.

What Ryo had done was in accordance with his usual principle.

Whether or not he could bring the situation into one where that principle could be used had the most direct influence on the overall outcome.

Garwin charged in, driven by his emotions.

His first attack was a right-handed thrust thrown with all his momentum.

It was exactly as Ryo had predicted.

With his footwork, Ryo moved to Garwin’s side and delivered a series of thrusts into the elbow of his fully extended right arm.

And he used Freezing Sword.

“<Evaporation>”

The ice spreading from the point where he had been stabbed was immediately evaporated by Garwin.

But it did not end with one strike.

Left elbow, left knee, right knee, throat, right elbow again…

Moving rapidly counterclockwise around Garwin, Ryo thrust Murasame through the gaps in his joints.

Behind Ryo, fine particles of water drifted…

He thrust again and again.

He circled again and again.

Before long, the speed of freezing surpassed the speed of regeneration and evaporation.

Garwin could no longer remove all the ice in time.

Garwin concentrated even more intensely on removing it.

That was exactly what Ryo had been aiming for.

Round and round and round…

Ryo targeted the throat from directly in front of Garwin.

But this time, it was different from before.

He thrust in, then pushed farther.

Along with the ice that had not yet been completely removed, he pierced deep into the throat.

And he kept spinning.

Even Murasame, which had pierced through, rotated, and Garwin’s neck was severed…

Thud.

Ryo was knocked away.

Garwin himself also leaped far backward.

Garwin’s neck had not been completely severed.

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“Careful, careful.”

Garwin said it playfully.

At that moment, Ryo realized that his strategy had failed, and that the scales of victory had swung sharply toward Garwin.

Certainly, from the beginning of the battle up to this point, Ryo had been in the advantageous position.

But that advantage was a difference that could be overturned with ease.

Because the difference in strength and speed was overwhelming… the advantage Ryo had maintained through his ability to learn and his psychological maneuvering was fragile.

Ryo himself understood that better than anyone.

That was why this entire sequence of attacks absolutely had to succeed and bring the battle to a conclusion.

But it had failed.

By failing, he had given Garwin an important realization.

‘The only way Ryo can beat me is by cutting off my head.’

A realization brought composure.

“As long as I protect that, I can’t lose.”

Garwin smiled sinisterly.

Seeing that, Ryo frowned.

He had no choice but to recognize that the situation was becoming increasingly difficult for him.

In the first place, Garwin had something that had been bothering him since before the battle began, no, since he had fought in the Kingdom.

It was the phenomenon in which, toward the end of that battle, Garwin had become unable to regenerate his own body.

Ultimately, because of that, he had returned to Erwin Ortiz’s body, and after being resisted by Erwin, the original owner of the body, the magic of <Implosion> had gone out of control, and he had been blasted away…

Why had he become unable to regenerate?

He understood that Ryo had probably interfered with his regeneration in some way.

Most likely, it was because he had even taken away Garwin’s magic power… the power flowing in from the ‘shrine’.

What he did not understand was the method.

(Even Richard couldn’t do something like that. And yet that water-attribute magician Ryo went and did it.)

He wanted to know, but however he looked at it, it was clearly the kind of trump card that one did not reveal.

He could hardly expect Ryo to explain the mechanism simply because he asked him to.

In fact, now and then, Garwin tracked the flow of his own magic power.

As far as he could tell, that magic had not been activated.

Against a Djinn capable of regeneration, it was exactly the kind of trump-card magic that could decide a battle.

Why had it not activated?

There was an obvious reason.

The conditions for activation had not been met.

What were those conditions?

He did not know.

Even if he asked Ryo to tell him, he probably would not.

Then what should he do?

“I guess I have no choice but to test it.”

Garwin smiled sinisterly.

And then he chanted.

“Fill everything! <Gravity Rod>”

The next moment, Ryo’s field of vision was filled with countless black needles floating in the air.

They were needles that emitted gravity… though at twenty centimeters long and about as thick as chopsticks, they were far larger than the needles used for sewing.

In any case, the black needles, numbering more than tens of thousands, pulled Ryo from every direction.

As a result, Ryo could not move.

“So you’re going to use that magic after all.”

Ryo muttered with a frown.

When they had fought in the Kingdom, <Calorie Acquisition Heat Absorption Vapor> had continuously stolen the energy Garwin needed to regenerate.

As a result, these black needles could no longer be maintained.

But now, Ryo could not use <Calorie Acquisition Heat Absorption Vapor>.

Of course, that was not a problem caused by Ryo.

Even if he stole Garwin’s energy, the problem was where that energy would go.

When they fought in the Kingdom, its destination had been the ‘coffin’.

There had been a fallen being inside that coffin… a being that, in this three-dimensional world, could, in a sense, store an unlimited amount of energy.

That was why Ryo had been able to draw as much as he wanted from Garwin.

But there was no such convenient existence here.

And even then, although Ryo had been able to steal the magic power required for Garwin’s regeneration and Erwin’s restoration… he had not been able to steal all of it.

That was precisely why, at the very end, Garwin had tried to cast <Implosion> using the magic power that remained inside Erwin’s body…

Garwin’s <Gravity Rod> filled so much of the area that it occupied Ryo’s entire field of vision.

It was the ultimate saturation attack.

There were even more of them than Ryo’s <Dynamic Steam Mine>.

“I’ll cut them all to pieces! <Water Jet 2048>”

Two thousand and forty-eight lines of water moved around Ryo, who could not move.

It seemed that one <Water Jet> could cut ten <Gravity Rods>.

“<Water Jet 2048><Water Jet 2048><Water Jet 2048>”

Lines of water were replenished one after another.

“I’ll smash through it head-on!”

“Interesting! Give it a try!”

And into the space that had been opened…

“<Dynamic Steam Mine II>”

A spell that turns the water vapor in the air into ‘mines’, freezing any magic or target they collide with.

“<Gravity Rod>”

Garwin chanted it again.

The mines and the black needles collided, producing thousands of flashes of pair annihilation.

Ryo and Garwin pitted saturation attacks against saturation attacks.

In the end, both Garwin and Ryo were brute-force types.

(Magic combat is tough.)

But Ryo understood that.

Assuming that neither he nor his opponent would run out of magic power… he could not see a future in which the battle would be decided through magic combat.

At the very least, he could not see one in which victory would go to him.

Piercing the heart through an opening in the opponent’s defenses, freezing him solid, making him disappear… none of those would work against Garwin.

The only possible victory condition was the one that had been established, cutting off his head… but…

(He’s aware of it now.)

Thinking about it that way, he could not see a path to victory at all.

Even when a path could not be clearly drawn, in most cases, the general direction could still be seen.

If he kept defending… wouldn’t a crack eventually appear?

If he disrupted the opponent’s emotions… wouldn’t the course of the battle turn in his favor?

If he bought time… wouldn’t something happen?

Even without knowing exactly what change would occur, there were many cases in which one could still understand the direction of things, thinking, ‘Maybe I just need to keep doing this’.

But now, he could not even see that.

As expected…

(That I couldn’t cut off his head with that rotation was a serious blow.)

Even so, there was no point dwelling on what had already happened.

He had to change gears.

Otherwise, he would lose and forfeit his own life.

He thought again.

Magic combat was difficult… then he had no choice but to settle the battle with his sword.

What did he need to do to bring the situation into one where he could settle it with his sword?

Not ranged magic combat, but close-quarters sword fighting.

Not magic combat with distance between them, but sword fighting at close range.

Even if he unilaterally closed the distance, if the opponent had no intention of engaging in close combat, he would simply be forced back.

The ideal situation was to make the opponent believe that close combat was also the better option.

At present, the magic battle was evenly matched.

Ryo knew that Garwin was not a particularly patient individual.

Yeah, he was rather short-tempered.

If Garwin decided that the magic battle was not going to reach a conclusion like this…

“Damn it, so magic really isn’t getting us anywhere.”

Garwin spat out the words.

“Then what are you going to do?”

Ryo played along.

“It’s obvious. Close combat.”

“Agreed.”

Garwin spoke with a sinister smile, and Ryo agreed with a smile of his own.

Garwin closed the distance in an instant.

Ryo moved to meet him… but.

Garwin was cunning.

Ryo’s movements slowed.

In an instant, he understood that <Gravity Rods> had been generated at his feet, underground, obstructing his movement.

He understood.

He understood, but he was too late.

He saw Garwin’s right fist come into view, its tip sharpened.

It was meant to slash open Ryo’s neck.

Ryo resigned himself to sacrificing his left arm.

He would use his left arm to protect his neck, then use Murasame in his right hand alone to strike at Garwin’s neck. That was his decision.

And then…

Both of Ryo’s arms were sliced off.

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