"What?!" he shouted, shocked. It made no sense. No object should have been
able to stop his claymore. Thus, he swung his second one down as well, and
Hajime blocked that one with Donner.
Sensing danger, Ehitruje immediately teleported away to gain some distance.
"How? How are you able to block my swords?"
"It just took a little Transmutation, that's all."
Ehitruje's claymores used spirit magic to pass through everything except for
the soul of their intended target. With that in mind, the solution had been simple;
Hajime had just given his guns copies of his soul, the same way he'd given his
organic golems fake souls. In doing so, he'd tricked the claymores into thinking
the guns were also him, and therefore targets that shouldn't be passed through.
By the time Ehitruje had figured all of that out, Hajime had teleported right
beside him...and he could feel his Godspeed being blocked.
Hajime took aim at his head and heart with Donner and Schlag. Though
Ehitruje could have teleported away, his pride wouldn't allow him to run.
Instead, he tried to cut down the bullets like he had before, not even realizing
that this attack was a feint.
His focus solely on the gun barrels, Ehitruje was caught by surprise when
Hajime didn't pull the trigger. A second later, he felt a sharp pain in his
abdomen.
Letting out a groan of pain, Ehitruje doubled over as he was sent flying a few
dozen meters back. Hajime had roundhouse kicked him. And with his stats
amplified this much, even a simple kick had as much power as his pile bunkers.
Still, Hajime's kick shouldn't have been able to pierce Ehitruje's barriers when
even his strongest rail gun rifle couldn't. And yet, Ehitruje had taken damage.
"You..." Ehitruje muttered in surprise.
"Looks like it worked."
There was a trickle of blood spilling from the corner of Ehitruje's mouth.
Hajime's kick had gone through his barrier and damaged him directly.
Stunned, Ehitruje looked down at Hajime's boots, which were still emitting
crimson shock waves.
"Impossible...you completely analyzed my barrier in the middle of battle?!"
Ehitruje's barrier was a powerful spell that combined multiple ancient magics
to create the ultimate shield. Aside from overwhelming brute force, the only
other way to break through it would be to use a similarly complex combination
of ancient magic to counteract the barrier's effects.
Indeed, that was exactly what Hajime had done. In the middle of battle, he'd
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created an improvised artifact capable of nullifying Ehitruje's barrier, proving
that it was his abilities as a master synergist that made Hajime so fearsome, not
the ancient magic he'd acquired or the skills he'd absorbed from monsters.
Of course, making improvised artifacts imbued with ancient magic was only
possible thanks to Transcendence, the final derivative skill of Limit Break. There
had only been a handful of people in the history of Tortus to ever acquire the
skill, and among them, Hajime was the only one who was also capable of using
all seven types of ancient magic. There would likely never again be anyone
capable of transmuting ancient magic into artifacts on the fly the way Hajime
could.
Ehitruje had foolishly assumed mass-producing weapons was where a
synergist's true strength lay, but that was only one part of what made synergists
so powerful. A synergist's greatest asset was their adaptability.
Sparks ran down the length of Donner's and Schlag's barrels as Hajime took
aim once more.
"I think I'll call these Godpiercer Bullets."
Hajime had reforged his ammunition to be capable of penetrating Ehitruje's
barrier. Now every single one of his bullets was a deadly threat, capable of
dealing heavy damage. And more importantly, this also meant that Hajime's
god-killer artifact could now easily reach Ehitruje.
Upon realizing that, Ehitruje instinctively took a few steps back...and when
he realized he was cowering, he glared at Hajime. His furious expression ruined
Yue's good looks.
"Damn you, Irregular! Just how much were you holding back until now?!"
Ehitruje wasn't just referring to the new artifacts Hajime had started creating.
Hajime's stats were also much higher than they had been a few minutes ago.
That was the reason a simple kick had been able to actually damage Ehitruje.
Overload was the strongest version of Limit Break as far as stat increases
went, and there shouldn't have been any way of multiplying one's stats further
short of sacrificing their own life force. But somehow, Hajime's stats were over
tenfold what they had been at the start, and he looked healthier than ever.
In other words, when he'd first activated Overload and told Ehitruje he
wouldn't be holding back, that too had been a lie.
"You must be pretty stupid if you actually believed anything your opponent
said," Hajime stated with a shake of his head, then went on the offensive.
Of course, Ehitruje thought that first activation of Overload had been a bluff,
but in truth, Hajime had actually used Overload there. What was increasing his
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stats even further now was the same artifact he'd handed out to every soldier
fighting for Tortus back on the surface. His own Last Seele. There was no way
he'd make an artifact that powerful for other people and not keep one for
himself. Naturally, he'd ingested a few CheatMates as well.
By combining his Last Seele with his own innate Overload skill, Hajime had
been able to magnify his stats beyond what would normally be possible. That
was what was allowing him to match Ehitruje's godlike specs.
At the level they were fighting at, the light apostles and spheres Ehitruje's
magic circle was mass-producing could barely even do anything to intervene.
Hajime's high-speed movement and constant teleportation, combined with his
highly polished gun-kata fighting techniques, forced Ehitruje to focus all of his
attention on close combat, not giving him time to do anything else.
As they fought, Ehitruje noticed one other anomaly.
"Your wounds, they're..."
Indeed, they were healing at an unbelievably fast rate. The numerous burns
and lacerations that had covered Hajime's body were mostly gone, and his
breathing was steady. At first, Ehitruje thought Hajime must have made another
healing artifact, but he didn't sense any restoration magic being used. There was
only one other explanation for why Hajime was healing so fast.
"So you lied about that vial of Ambrosia being your last one too," he said
with a frown.
"Well, it was the last one in my Treasure Trove."
Of the two Hajime had left, he'd put one inside a capsule and swallowed it so
that it was sitting in his stomach. Eventually, his stomach acids had melted the
capsule and the healing liquid had started spreading through Hajime's system.
Claymores and guns clashed, sending sparks flying everywhere. His eye
twitching with barely suppressed rage, Ehitruje asked, "Why save it for so
long?"
"To make sure I would win. From the very start, I knew not to underestimate
your strength."
Hajime's god-killer artifact could only be used once. Thus, he couldn't afford
to use it until he knew the full extent of Ehitruje's capabilities. In order to make
sure his trump card would hit, he needed to be sure he'd seen all of Ehitruje's
powers and devised suitable counters for them. What Ehitruje had been trying to
do Hajime for fun, Hajime had also been trying to do to Ehitruje, though for
entirely different reasons.
In truth, Ehitruje's strength had still surpassed Hajime's expectations, and
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he'd felt the specter of death looming over him more than once during their
fight, but in exchange for most of his artifacts and a great deal of pain, Hajime
had finally succeeded in making Ehitruje show off all of his skills. Meanwhile,
he'd managed to preserve the most important of his own trump cards.
"If you're so certain you haven't underestimated me, let's see if you can
handle this! Behold the full might of a god!" Ehitruje shouted, creating a series
of spatial explosions all around him. It was a desperate attack, one hardly
befitting someone who claimed to be a god.
Hajime quickly neutralized the explosions near him with a series of mana
shock waves and used Diamond Skin and Aideon to block the ones that got
through. Though he was able to avoid taking any damage, he was still forced to
stop moving for a few seconds. And in that time, Ehitruje used Heavenstep to
return to the center of his three-ring halo.
A second later, there was an explosion of platinum light as the halo that was
also a magic circle began to glow. The three rings also started to pulse, growing
in size. Once they were over a thousand meters in diameter, the second and third
rings started rotating in reverse.
The light apostles and spheres started flooding toward Hajime to try to slow
him down while Ehitruje intoned, "This is the true divine might! The light of
destruction that not even my brethren could stand against! There's nowhere for
you to run, Irregular!"
Platinum light filled the room, blotting out Hajime's vision. The wave of
light that spread over a kilometer wide made its way to him like an avalanche of
epic proportions. This was Ehitruje's ultimate trump card, the move he'd used to
overturn the game board whenever things weren't going his way. And yet, in the
face of such destructive might, Hajime simply grinned.
"Well, if I can't run, I'll just punch right through it."
He took a resolute step toward the almighty light. He then rocketed forward
at tremendous speed, turning into a crimson blur, and took out yet another
artifact that he'd kept in reserve. This artifact looked like a huge lance, but its
pointed tip had spiral grooves in it, and it was rotating at high speed like a drill.
The tip was also quite wide like an umbrella, covering most of Hajime's body.
This was Hajime's lance drill artifact, Laobenschiram. He'd used the
majority of his remaining sealstone to coat the surface of the drill, and the
superdense alloy that made up the rest of its volume was enchanted with all
seven types of ancient magic, making it the strongest offensive and defensive
artifact in his possession. It had the power to drill right through anything,
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whether it was physical or magical.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"
The light was so powerful that it stripped away the sealstone coating in
seconds, and though the restoration magic in the artifact repaired it nigh instantly
and spatial magic protected Hajime from as much of the impact as possible, he
still took a serious amount of damage from the shock waves that erupted as his
drill slammed into the tsunami of light. Many of his wounds reopened and blood
spurted in all directions as slivers of light grazed him. Even his internal organs
took a good amount of damage, and he coughed up blood as he screamed.
Hajime's muscles tore, his bones cracked, and his skin was ripped off. But
even so, he kept charging forward. Screaming as he went, he didn't let the light
slow him down for even a second. It didn't matter how overwhelming Ehitruje's
might was; Hajime would push through it with sheer force. That was how he'd
overcome all obstacles in his path so far, and he wasn't planning on stopping
now.
"Your power's mine!" Hajime shouted, and a second later, Laobenschiram
began to glow with a platinum light.
"Impossible! This is the pinnacle of god's might! How could you possibly
have appropriated it for yourself?!"
Laobenschiram had been enchanted with spirit and metamorphosis magic to
make it half-alive, just like Hajime's golems. Its sole purpose was to absorb
whatever ultimate final attack Ehitruje might attempt and make that power its
own. While it had been drilling through Ehitruje's light, it had also been
breaking it down and analyzing it with evolution magic. And now, Hajime had
enchanted Laobenschiram with Ehitruje's own power.
This was the culmination of Hajime's magical talent and synergist skill.
Plunder Transmutation. The ability to analyze an attack he was hit by and
immediately incorporate that same attack into his own artifacts.
Normally, something like that would have been impossible, but the
Transcendence skill combined with his massively boosted stats had allowed
Hajime to do the impossible in just seconds. Creation magic was all about
creating new artifacts. And though Hajime had possessed no affinity for the
other six types of ancient magic, creation magic had been different.
Creation magic was practically made for synergists, and it synergized with
Transmute in a way nothing else did. It was the one field of magic that Hajime
had any natural talent for, and he'd utilized that talent to its fullest. Thus, right
now Ehitruje's Divine Will was being countered with his very own Divine Will.
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"Ah!" Ehitruje gasped in surprise as his light was destroyed, and Hajime
glared at him.
Though he couldn't hear Hajime from this distance, he could tell the young
man was saying,
"I have you now."
Fear seeped into his every pore, and he instinctively tried to run away.
Ehitruje activated Heavenstep, but of course, Hajime wasn't about to let him get
away. He used Laobenschiram's gravity magic to charge forward at breakneck
speed, then fired Donner and Schlag in rapid succession.
A second later, the space around Ehitruje began to twist and warp. These
were yet another of Hajime's special bullet types, the Spatial Distortion Bullets.
They possessed no offensive power, but they destabilized the space around
where they exploded. Heavenstep required extremely precise spatial coordinates
to work, which Hajime was fully aware of, so these bullets did a perfect job of
preventing Ehitruje from using it.
Moreover, Ehitruje wasn't capable of using Godspeed either because Hajime
had also fired Delay Bullets at him. These bullets were made with fragments of
the Hour Crystal and prevented anything they hit from using time manipulation.
"Ngh! You still have other artifacts left?!" Ehitruje roared, his expression
stiffening.
Hajime kicked Laobenschiram's handle, launching it like a ballista bolt. It
shot past Ehitruje and slammed into the three-ring halo behind him. The halo
then began to flicker, and Ehitruje turned back just in time to see Laobenschiram
blast apart a chunk of it, causing the light of destruction to stop pouring out of it.
The monster of the abyss had completely and utterly defeated god's strongest
spell.
Shocked, Ehitruje turned back to Hajime. Hajime's glare pierced right
through him, and Ehitruje swung his twin claymores down with all of his might.
He was well and truly desperate now.
Unfortunately, his twin blades cut through only air.
"An...illusion?!"
The image of Hajime he'd sliced through broke apart like a pane of shattered
glass, and Ehitruje's eyes went wide.
Until now, Hajime's illusions had only worked when he was within a foot or
so of them, and Ehitruje had swung over such a wide area that even if the
Hajime he was seeing was an illusion, he should have hit the real him too. But
this time, the real Hajime was a good few meters behind his illusion.
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Looking closer at the shattered illusion, Ehitruje noticed that this one had a
small blue crystal floating at its center. This was another of Hajime's artifacts,
the Ghost Doll. It augmented the Ghost Projections Hajime could make by
increasing their effective range.
By the time Ehitruje realized he'd been tricked, it was too late.
"Raaaaaaaaaaaah!"
In his shock, he'd stopped moving for a second, which was a fatal mistake.
With a spirited battle cry, Hajime charged at Ehitruje. The fingers of his
prosthetic arm extended forward, looking like a skeleton's bony digits. He
grabbed Ehitruje by the collar and slammed him into the three-ring halo, which
was already beginning to fall apart. The force of the impact shattered it
completely, and Hajime continued his charge, heading straight for the ground.
His clawed metallic fingers kept a tight hold on Ehitruje, keeping him from
escaping. Hajime even shot out tiny spikes from his fingertips, trapping
Ehitruje's upper half in a makeshift iron maiden. He also shot a spirit-magic
shock wave out of his arm to shake up Ehitruje's soul and used spatial magic to
trap him in place even more securely.
"How dare you, lowly human?! Unhand me!" Ehitruje screamed.
"Shut up and die."
Ehitruje tried to cast a spell, but Hajime unleashed a superdense blast of pure
mana at him, disrupting the flow of mana in his body and interrupting his
attempts to cast. Hajime had retrofitted his mana cannon into his prosthetic arm
for this very purpose.
Finally, the two of them hit the ground, and there was a thunderous roar as
cracks spread out across the pure-white space. The two of them had slammed
into the surface like a meteorite, and both of them were momentarily stunned by
the impact. However, it was Hajime who recovered first. Straddling Ehitruje, he
took aim with Donner. A single bullet wrapped in an overpowering sky-blue
aura appeared in the air. He had reshaped the god-killing dagger he'd received
from Miledi into a bullet. Supposedly, it had the power to harm god and only
god's soul.
Hajime could sense Ehitruje's trembling through his prosthetic arm. Though
Ehitruje glared at Hajime, there was more fear in his eyes than anger.
Hajime spun Donner's chamber, loading the god-slayer bullet. He then
pressed the revolver's barrel against Ehitruje's chest.
"Let's see how you like the taste of the god-slayer artifact the Liberators
made while drunk off their ass. This is checkmate, you bastard."
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"Wait—"
The sound of a single gunshot reverberated throughout the pure-white
dimension. At long last, Hajime had hit god with his trump card.
Ehitruje's body bucked, and after a small moan, he closed his eyes and went
limp. In the distance, the three-ring halo dissipated into particles of light.
Silence filled the room, and after a minute that felt like an eternity, Yue's
eyes opened. She looked up at Hajime, who was covered in wounds from head to
toe, and said, "Too bad, Irregular."
"Agh!"
A second later, Hajime's prosthetic arm shattered, and he was sent flying,
blood spraying from a new hole in his chest.