[Translator – Kie]
[Proofreader – Demon God’s male Disciple]
[Quality Checker – Kawaii]
Chapter 7: Training (3)
“Heir Edwin! What’s that supposed to mean now?”
Paul Haksen strongly objected to Edwin’s statement.
“A duel risking lives? This is absolutely unacceptable! What does my son’s life even mean to you?”
“Try touching a single hair of my son’s! I won’t let it slide!”
“Leave immediately! I won’t tolerate any more of this insolent behaviour!”
It wasn’t just Paul Haksen. Even Damein’s mother and sister protested against this.
The only one keeping quiet was Abel Haksen, his younger brother.
“Go and stop them.”
Edwin Ryan Bloom neither attempted to persuade nor engage with the Haksen family. He simply gave orders to the knights.
“Young master, please calm down a bit.”
“Yes, why are you getting so worked up over this pointless matter?”
The knights gathered the courage to speak. Even they could see that the situation was flowing oddly.
At that, Edwin glared at the knights with bloodshot eyes.
“Do you guys want to die?”
Upon hearing this, the knights could only swallow hard.
Having guarded Edwin Ryan Bloom for so long, they knew this wasn’t a joke but a genuine threat.
“Stop the pointless chatter and prevent them from interfering.”
The knights had no choice but to block the Haksen family.
“Step aside now! Do you think this makes any sense?”
“It’s the young master’s orders.”
“Didn’t I say to step aside?”
Paul Haksen tried to push the knights aside.
However, he couldn’t overcome their strength.
Watching his father like this made Damien Haksen feel a complex mix of emotions.
To stand against a Marquis family’s heir for a wretched son like him.
He felt both admiration and guilt simultaneously.
“Damien! Don’t do it! Stop! I’m begging you!”
Paul Haksen urgently shouted.
In this life, he had resolved to obey his father’s words. But today was an exception.
Why should he beg?
The current situation was intended by Damien Haksen.
“You Three, gather weapons. Surely our household isn’t so poor that we lack usable weapons?”
Damien Haksen opened his eyes wide.
He didn’t like asking his family so casually but spoke without much thought.
Just winning the duel wasn’t enough.
He wanted to utterly demolish Edwin’s pride.
Not finding a suitable weapon, he looked around.
Then, something caught his eye on the table.
“…What are you doing?”
Edwin Ryan Bloom asked, unable to understand.
Understandably so, because what Damien Haksen held was a fork, meant for eating dessert.
“Didn’t you say to gather weapons?”
“I said a weapon for the duel.”
Damien Haksen flicked the fork lightly.
“For the likes of you, this is enough.”
“Ha…”
Edwin Ryan Bloom burst into laughter, utterly bewildered.
The laughter continued for quite some time.
Then, with a face filled with intense malice, he growled,
“You, I will surely kill you.”
As his words came to an end, Edwin Ryan Bloom kicked the ground.
He swung his longsword towards Damien Haksen’s head.
But Damien Haksen evaded the strike by slightly adjusting his upper body.
“You dodged that?”
Edwin Ryan Bloom looked surprised.
“Running away like a scared mouse, is that it? Let’s see how long you can keep dodging.”
Edwin Ryan Bloom swung the sword repeatedly.
However, Damien Haksen managed to evade all the attacks with slight movements.
“His habits are just like his older brother’s.”
In a previous life, Damien Haksen had brought down the House Ryan Bloom alone.
At that time, he clashed with the House Ryan Bloom’s Grandmaster.
The Grandmaster was at the level of a Sword Master and was preparing to inherit the marquis position. That’s how talented the Grandmaster was. His skills evolved in real-time during combat.
“Even though I won in the end…”
After a fierce battle lasting for about seven hours, Damien Haksen mastered all the Grandmaster’s skills and techniques. He then exploited this weakness and slit open the Grandmaster’s throat.
“I’ve thoroughly understood the Ryan Bloom family’s sword technique.”
Lion’s Roar Sword. Its name comes from the forceful momentum resembling a lion’s roar.
However, from Damien’s perspective, who was aware of its flaws, it seemed no more threatening than a puppy barking.
“You…”
As the sword kept missing its mark, Edwin’s expression changed.
He realized that something was amiss.
“How are you dodging all my strikes?”
“It’s all about skill.”
Damien Haksen replied indifferently.
A surge of rage distorted Edwin Ryan Bloom’s face.
“Enough of this nonsense!”
With a shout, Edwin Ryan Bloom invoked his mana.
Upon utilizing mana, Edwin Ryan Bloom’s movements visibly accelerated.
“It’ll be difficult to dodge now.”
Thanks to his dedicated training in the past few days, Damien’s basic stamina had significantly increased. His ability to move intensely without gasping for breath was evidence of this.
However, his physique was still too frail.
Edwin swung his longsword downward.
The blade was aimed for Damien’s forehead.
Damien blocked the longsword with a fork.
At the moment of collision, a look of disdain crossed Edwin Ryan Bloom’s face.
A fork, intended solely for eating dessert, couldn’t possibly block a longsword. The fork would shatter miserably, and Damien Haksen’s wrist would be severed.
But when he thought so, the trajectory of the longsword deviated.
The blade, meant for the forehead, veered to the left and stuck into the ground.
It was an incomprehensible phenomenon. Edwin’s expression displayed confusion.
The other knights were equally baffled.
[Translator – Kie]
[Proofreader – Demon God’s male Disciple]
[Quality Checker – Kawaii]
“How?”
Edwin Ryan Bloom swung the sword again, pulling it out from the ground and drew a diagonal line from bottom to top.
Again, Damien Haksen used the fork to block the longsword.
At the moment of collision, once more, the sword’s trajectory shifted.
The blade that traced the diagonal suddenly shot upwards.
Due to which , Edwin almost lost hold of the sword.
“Huh?”
Edwin Ryan Bloom gritted his teeth and swung the sword again.
But Damien could clearly see what he was trying to do.
He inserted the flying longsword between the tines of the fork, and slightly adjusting the angle, he let the longsword slide away.
Edwins pupils widened as if in disbelief.
Alternating between the longsword and the fork, he gazed at Damien with a face that couldn’t believe it.
“H-How… How can you wield such techniques!”
Among the opponents Damien Haksen had fought was a figure known as the ‘Sword Saint (劍聖)’.
This individual had reached an unparalleled level in swordsmanship, capable of redirecting not only flying arrows but also magic.
The pinnacle the Sword Saint achieved was the ‘Ten Thousand Flows Insight (萬流通察)’, allowing them to perceive the flow of all attacks.
Damien emerged victorious after three days of intense combat against the Sword Saint.
“Because I’m a genius.”
He had no intention of explaining the circumstances in detail and replied briefly.
His words enraged Edwin Ryan Bloom.
“I told you to stop with that nonsense!”
Edwin Ryan Bloom adjusted his grip on the hilt.
His overall mana surged more intensely.
“This time, I’ll slice you with my sword!”
Edwin Ryan Bloom swung the sword even more fiercely.
But Damien Haksen effortlessly deflected all the attacks.
“W-What… Am I seeing things?”
“What am I witnessing right now?”
The knights watching this spectacle couldn’t help but be astonished.
Initially, they thought Damien had been lucky to deflect the sword strikes.
But after it happened a second, third, fourth time… They had to acknowledge something extraordinary about Damien Haksen: his exceptional swordsmanship.
“H-Hey, just what am I seeing?”
“I-I don’t know either.”
Even the Haksen family was taken aback.
From Paul Haksen to the rest of the family, they watched Damien with stunned expressions.
“Did he really single-handedly kill all the tavern’s guards?”
While everyone was in shock, Damien himself felt a great sense of satisfaction.
“The effects of the potion are quite impressive. I should grab a few more.”
Despite moving for so long, he didn’t feel overly tired. If it had been ordinary physical training, his stamina wouldn’t have increased so rapidly.
It was precisely when Damien was contemplating something else.
“This… This can’t be happening!”
Was it due to consecutive mistakes? Edwin Ryan Bloom’s expression twisted fiercely.
“As Ryan Bloom’s heir, me! Unable to deal with a lowlife like you! how Does that make any sense?”
Among those present, Damien Haksen was the first to notice a change.
A reddish-brown smoke arose from Edwin’s longsword, terrifying all the knights who witnessed it.
“Young master! Do not summon the aura!”
Aura.
The ultimate weapon that only warriors who have trained for a long time can create.
Cover it over a blade, and it can cut through metal plates like water. Embed it in a hammer, and it can shatter rocks.
Aura was the main reason why humans, a comparably weak race, could dominate the whole continent.
“Let’s see whether you can block this too!”
The sword imbued with aura cut diagonally towards Damien Haksen’s body.
Damien Haksen brought the fork towards the incoming blade.
At that moment, everyone could sense Damien’s impending demise.
They thought the fork would be severed, and his body would be slashed.
But…
“…Huh?”
“Huh?”
“What?”
Nothing changed. Even an attack infused with aura was deflected by the Sword Saint’s pinnacle technique, ‘Ten Thousand Flows Insight.’
At this incredible sight, Edwin Ryan Bloom’s mind momentarily blanked out.
As a result, the hand holding the longsword lost its strength.
Damien Haksen noticed this and applied a bit more force with the fork.
The longsword slipped out of his hand and fell helplessly to the ground.
With the weapon gone, Edwin Ryan Bloom was left defenseless.
Damien Haksen rushed forward.
Before Edwin Ryan Bloom could evade, Damien Haksen aimed the fork at his neck.
A line of blood appeared on Edwin Ryan Bloom’s neck.
At the moment his neck was cut, Edwin Ryan Bloom saw his life’s memories flash before his eyes.
However, despite the end of his life’s journey, he wasn’t drawn into the afterlife.
“…H-huk!”
Edwin Ryan Bloom collapsed to the ground, screaming in horror.
He clutched his neck with trembling hands. Blood flowed, but the wound wasn’t deep.
“I-I’m alive?”
Though not dead, the intense fear made him feel powerless all over.
Edwin Ryan Bloom yelled at the knights,
“W-what are you doing! P-protect me, right now!”
“Stay back.”
Before he knew it, Damien was standing beside him.
“This duel continues until one side dies. If anyone interferes, I’ll kill them first.”
Threatening with a fork used for cutting cakes was absurd, yet no one found it amusing.
“Edwin Ryan Bloom.”
Damien Haksen spoke with a chilling tone.
“I am the victor of this duel. You will not mention the previous incident to anyone as we agreed.”
In his heart, Damien wanted to kill Edwin Ryan Bloom right there. But he wasn’t yet at a level to handle Marquis Ryan Bloom.
“I don’t want to see your face anymore. So, get lost right away.”
After saying that, Damien Haksen placed the fork on the table.
Edwin Ryan Bloom fled from the Haksen estate as if escaping.
“…Damien, I can’t let the incident today slide without asking.”
As soon as Edwin Ryan Bloom left, the family members detained Damien Haksen and questioned him.
“When and where did you learn swordsmanship like this and from whom?”
When they heard about him single-handedly dealing with the tavern’s guards, they dismissed it as a bizarre incident.
But today was different. The Ryan Bloom Marquis was a highly respected knightly family.
To treat someone known as a genius, like Edwin Ryan Bloom, who hailed from such a prestigious family, like a child?
And on top of that, to repel a sword imbued with aura?
“Hmm.”
In response to the family’s questions, Damien Haksen fell silent, lost in thought.
His family wouldn’t believe that he had regressed.
The problem was that he couldn’t come up with a plausible explanation.
That’s how significantly stronger Damien Haksen had become.
Eventually, Damien Haksen gave up on explaining.
“I just realized it on my own.”
At this, his father made a peculiar expression.
“Don’t joke.”
“I’m not joking.”
“Do you think you’ve become a heaven-sent genius? Suddenly realizing such swordsmanship?”
Damien Haksen’s pupils widened.
“How did you know? That’s the correct answer.”
“Damien!”
“Then, I’ll go train now.”
Ignoring his father’s inquiries, Damien hurriedly fled from his fathers room.
[Translator – Kie]
[Proofreader – Demon God’s male Disciple]
[Quality Checker – Kawaii]
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