'I wonder, Lady Sylva.' Vaelthir thought as he looked at Van as he faced the 5 generals.
Recalling Van's swearing. His aggression.
'... Was that, perhaps, how I appeared to you?'
He looked to the sky. Seeing her face after he slapped her.
'I suppose,' He took a breath, 'Elves and Humans really are similar, aren't they?'
"Haah, thanks, knight!" Vaelthir heard from behind him. He turned, seeing Sato climbing up with the help of Takeshi.
"S-... Sure…" The knight responded meekly as they came up beside Vaelthir, looking at the scene.
"What the fuck!?" Sato called out as he saw Van, "Who are they!?"
"..." Vaelthir took a deep breath, "The 5 demonic generals."
'No way. These fuckers are?!' Takeshi gulped as he looked at them, 'Whom we were supposed to eventually fight once we got strong enough?! Those guys?!'
'I can tell from all the way here. They're fucking strong..!'
"I can take down one or two in a direct fight," Vaelthir continued, "But… 5 of them all at once. No."
"B… But Van is strong, isn't he?!" Sato asked.
"He is," Vaelthir nodded, "Perhaps with more brute strength than our queen at her prime condition, I daresay."
"Then—"
"But strength or magic alone won't do here. Not with them," Vaelthir folded his arms, "He's efficient. However, I can tell. He lacks experience. These 5 have that in abundance. They've fought for longer than human life-span under the current Demon Lord."
"If he's quick," Vaelthir raised his chin, "He can kill one. Maybe more. Not all of them."
"So," He turned to them.
"Help us when it gets down to it."
"D… Dude," Takeshi gulped, "You're talking as if you're sure he's gonna lose! You saw how strong he is!"
"You're certain he'll win, then?" Vaelthir asked.
Takeshi didn't respond.
"... And there you have it." He sighed, "Get ready. Once they're done with him, they'll rush here most likely."
Sato's eyes widened as he looked at Vaelthir.
'He's… So sure Makoto is going to lose.'
He frowned as he looked at him facing the generals, 'Even though he saw what he just did. Damn it…! There's nothing we can do! Makoto, run!'
'Ah,'
"Vaelthir," Sato called.
Vaelthir turned.
"Uhm… Are elves and demons religious?"
"...? We both serve our gods." Vaelthir replied, "What kind of question is that?"
"N-no, it's just, before… You and that advisor both mentioned that if the other strikes first, they'd get… Smitten by the gods?"
"...."
Vaelthir turned away.
"Yes. We are loyal to our beliefs. Is that a problem?"
"N-no, it's just…"
'Unpractical,' The word came up in Sato's mind, 'The fact that both of them used the Gods as if it was something serious.'
"Is that all..?" Sato added, "like, will the gods actually smite anyone who—"
"Enough. We're religious." Vaelthir cut him off, "You humans also have your customs. What difference does it make? You are at war with the demons. Why should it bother you?"
Sato blinked as he looked away.
'Weird.'
—--------------------------------------------
'Well,' Van looked up at the 5 generals. 'This was stupid.'
"Human," the demonic woman general scratched her head as she looked down at Van, "You're uhm… here now. Came to fight?"
'I don't know their strengths or weaknesses. I just dashed here without a care in the world.'
Van deadpanned.
'Where's those crayons? I think I deserve to eat them right now.'
"This little guy," Deimos, the horned, biggest one, chuckled as he bent over to Van. Wielding a giant greataxe over his shoulder.
"I'm arguably the second biggest idiot amongst us, except this guy," He signaled to Broken, "But you… Just what did you even think dashing here all alone?"
'A whoooooole mountain of crayons is what I deserve.' Van added internally.
"I think he's lost," The smiling, long limbed one returned to spin his horn, "Just say you're lost or go away. Our only target is the forest… Humans come later."
"No," Another one of them, wielding a katana-looking sheath said from afar, "You saw his strength. You."
They all went quiet.
"Run. Or die."
The woman general, wielding a chain connected to a blade, rolled her eyes at the katana wielder.
"What do you even care? Even if we fight, you'd just watch."
"Analyzing is a tool like my sword," Katana demon replied, "Just as chains are yours."
"Whatever you say…"
Van then took a deep breath.
'I'm probably going to die.' He thought, recalling Varlog's attack, 'If those demons are half as competent as that old man was, I'm doomed.'
But then, Van opened the inventory.
'Oh well,'
"Hey, cut that out. Did you not hear me?" Katana demon added, "You will die."
No response. They all tensed.
"What's your deal with those elves anyway with their grudge towards humans?" Broken added.
"Everyone here hates you, human. Give it up and leave."
They all narrowed their gaze as he put his hand into his inventory.
'If I'm gonna die anyway…'
[Music: HAWATARI NIOKU CENTI ]
SLASH.
The head of the bandaged one then flew out of his shoulder. They all widened their eyes in an instant as Van flew past the now-dead Broken, an oddly-engraved sword unsheathed.
'̷̹̈́W̴̮̃h̴̯͛ỳ̵͈ ̶̹͝w̷̡͛a̶̹͛i̵̫̕t̵͓͆…̶͕̇?̴̗̐'̵̩͋
"What…"
"The…"
"Fuck..!?" Sato, Takeshi and Vaelthir chimed as they saw the general die instantly.
The four remaining generals stared at Broken's headless body as it toppled sideways, blood fountaining from the wound in a thick arterial arc that painted the grass black.
Van stood behind the corpse. The Abyssal Knight's Shortsword in his right hand, still trailing a clean red line through the air.
Nobody moved.
'He killed Broken,' the chain-wielder thought, her scar tightening as her jaw clenched. 'In one swing. That wasn't luck. That was a measured cut..! through the gap between the pauldron and the gorget. He knew exactly where to strike…!!'
Deimos was the first to recover. His grin vanished as soon as Van dashed towards him.
"You little—"
He swung his greataxe in a horizontal arc wide enough to bisect a house. Air screaming around his weapon.
'Fuck,' Van thought in his mind, 'I dashed towards him first since he was the biggest. But he's fast, too. Tsk… I won't be able to dodge this.'
'Guess I'll take it.'
The axe blade caught his left side and carved through the armor, splitting chainmail and flesh, stopped short a bit after cutting through his collarbone
"Grrggh…!!" Van groaned.
"Got you, runt!" Deimos growled, smirking.
"VAN!!" Sato shouted, his face paling.
Vaelthir sighed, "It's over. Get ready."
"Wait… What is he…?" Takeshi muttered under his breath as he squinted.
Blood sprayed. Van's body twisted from the impact…
… But his feet stayed planted, and his right arm was moving despite his partially cleaved torso.
Deimos glared.
'What!? I… I can't cut through his bones!?'
Van's Abyssal Knight's shortsword punched through Deimos's wrist.
"GRAHH—!?" Deimos recoiled, his grip loosening on the axe handle.
Van ripped the blade free, took one step forward with his blood sheeting down his left side and then he jumped; driving the sword into Deimos's throat.
"...!!" Vaelthir clutched his arms as he watched.
The demon's eyes bulged.
Van twisted. Pulled. Stepped back.
Deimos fell.
Two generals dead in under ten seconds.
'He walked into the axe,' the katana general thought, his hand frozen on the sheath.
'He saw it coming. He chose to take the hit. He traded a wound for positioning… no, not even that. He didn't trade anything. He just... didn't factor his own body into the calculation.'
'What kind of human… No, what kind of ANYTHING fights like that..!?'
"WE MESSED UP!! GET READY FOR BATTLE!!" The demonic chain user screamed.
On the wall.
"Did he just..." Takeshi started, his visor angled downward. "H… How… Is he still standing..!?"
Sato clutched his abdomen as he watched, trying to swallow the bile climbing up his throat.
"Ma…" He let out before having to swallow again.
An elf had already thrown up at the sight
"... He let the axe hit him," Vaelthir let out, his voice flat. The tendons in his neck stood taut as Takeshi and Sato turned to him.
"On purpose."
"That's insane," Takeshi breathed. "That's not a strategy. That's suicide."
"It is." Vaelthir's eyes narrowed. "I… But you see it for yourself, can't you, human?"
"...?"
"He's victorious."
Sato said nothing. His mouth was slightly open. His restored hands gripped the top of the wall hard enough to whiten his knuckles.
'Makoto... What happened to you?'
The smiling, long-limbed general stopped spinning his horn. His grin was gone.
He flicked his wrist and a volley of dark energy bolts screamed toward Van; six of them, staggered, curving from different angles.
Van was already moving, side-stepping the bolts as [Overgear] kicked in, closing around his sliced up shoulder.
'... Should hold steady for a bit.' Van thought, 'I'll do as much damage as I can before this run's end.'
Cutting the distance at an angle that collapsed two of the bolts' trajectories into each other. They detonated against the dirt behind him. The remaining four adjusted; homing; closing in from his flanks.
He didn't look at them.
'Mage.' The thought surfaced in Van's mind like muscle memory. 'Like that skeleton. But his spells are slower than that… Somewhat. They curve a bit unpredictably, though.'
He changed direction on a dime. One bolt overshot. Another curved too wide. The last two converged on his position.
Backflipped one time, spinned another. His blood spraying across the fields, seeping from his armor as he dodged them time and time again.
'These ones are persistently following me. Tsk. I won't be able to kill that bastard with these on my ass.'
Van planted his foot and stopped.
'Luckily, I have an indestructible sword.'
Both bolts slammed into his sword, blowing up in his face, flinging him a few meters away.
"STUPIDITY, HUMAN! Thank you for accelerating your demise!" The mage howled.
But Van's body was already in motion.
The long-limbed general's eyes went wide.
'His sword's still intact!? From MY spells!? And he's already recovered—..!'
The mage had been too occupied with Van's location to notice…
… A dagger barreling toward him.
'What..?'
'From where did he pull out that knife—'
STAB.
The Abyssal Knight's dagger drove through the mage's eye socket. It was so fast, the wind didn't get to whistle as it cut through it.
The general staggered, tried to raise a barrier — a shimmer of purple energy flickered at his fingertips.
'He's still alive.' Van noted.
'...!!'
A whistling noise, chains crackling through the air.
'The chain user!!'
"YOU BASTARDDD!!!!!!!" She screamed as she shouted while hurling a chain-weighted blade through the air, set on fire.
It whistled past his head as Van slid beneath the wall of flame it created.
'They're coordinated, but it's not a problem right now.' He thought as he rolled away, 'They won't attack recklessly so as to not hurt each other, which means I have more time to react.'
Van recognized the shimmer instantly.
'He's about to cast. Can't let him. The mage has to go out first.'
He pulled out from his inventory…
… A Black Steel chunk.
'Resistant to magic.'
"[HARD SWING]" He called out as he threw it at the general, who just finished casting something against the Black Steel Van threw.
But the rock punched through the shimmer of the spell, crashing against the general's head, right at the eye socket - where the dagger was already stuck in - driving it deeper and crushing his skull.
The general shrieked.
'Double tap.'
Van soon reached the general as he fell to the ground, dodging yet another chain attack by the demonic general, jumping above it, then using his inventory midair to leap off a granite slab that was partially taken out.
"WHAT??!?! WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!" She shouted.
The katana demon, still standing still, gulped.
'He can maneuver himself midair using his inventory..!? Such innovation..!'
Van then brought the shortsword down through the top of the mage's skull, through the other eye socket.
Three.
Van then looked at the rock as he put the dagger back into his inventory.
'Useful stuff, this Black Steel. I wonder if that dwarf's ready yet… Nah, he said it'll take a long time.' He thought, picking it up as well, and putting it into his inventory.
"Holy… Shit…" Takeshi said, gasping for breath.
Another elf that was nearby placed a palm on her mouth as her eyes widened.
"How… Can that human still move like that…!? It's like he's a sentient corpse…"
'Taken the words right outta my mouth..!.' Takeshi gulped, looking at Vaelthir.
"Not experience, my ass!" He shouted, "Dude's a war machine!"
"..."
Vaelthir rubbed his arms slightly.
"It's… Experience. But," Vaelthir took a breath, "Not in the traditional sense."
"It's as if…"
"He fights like his body's not a part of the battle at all."
Vaelthir then lowered his chin.
"Only someone completely not afraid to die can fight like that. With complete disregard to his own life… Repeatedly fought with his life forfeit, over and over and over again…"
The chain user moved.
"Fucking bastard…!!" She muttered under gritted teeth, "You'll fucking pay for that!!"
She was fast. Faster than Broken, faster than Deimos. Black-scaled arms blurred as she threw her chain-blade that wrapped around Van's sword arm and yanked.
'She's faster now!?' Van called as his arm separated at the elbow.
"GRRRG..!!" Van grunted as his arm fell to the ground.
Sato then turned to the side and finally threw up, tears dripping from his eyes.
The shortsword clattered to the ground, still gripped by the severed hand.
Blood sprayed from the stump in a pulsing fountain. Bone gleamed white beneath torn muscle.
"Serves you right, bastard..!!"
The chain user planted her feet and exhaled.
'I'm faster than all of them.' She thought as she looked at Van's arm, 'This will be the end of it…! Broken, Deimos, Albatross… You bastards…! Daring to die before me..!!'
But her fate was already sealed.
The reason:
Muscle memory.
When you take a limb, the enemy falters. Always. Even the strongest warriors freeze for one second when they see their own arm on the ground. That second is when you kill them.
She waited for it.
Except…
'What…?!'
Van didn't freeze.
He didn't look at his arm.
He didn't scream.
His remaining hand was already inside his inventory; and what came out wasn't a potion or a bandage. It was the Abyssal Knight's Greatsword, seven feet of pitch-black metal that he hurled at her like a javelin with his one remaining arm.
["HARD SWING!!"]
'WHAT—'
She twisted sideways. The blade missed her head by inches, carving a trench in the earth behind her.
'If she's half as fast as that goblin, that won't be enough to catch her off guard, even if I threw hard. That's why I used a slow greatsword.'
'Lord Azhar.'
'That's how you got the best of me. I thought about how I killed you a lot, since I hated how it happened. I finally realized how you managed to get me under your spell before I killed you.'
'Distracting me.'
He thought, momentarily looking at the greatsword.
'A distraction, apparently, is quite effective.'
Van was already barreling toward her, one-armed, blood painting his entire left side, closing the distance she'd created. His remaining fist cocked back.
'He threw a weapon he can't even use properly,' the katana general thought from the rear, watching the scene unfold.
'Not as a weapon. As a distraction. To force her to dodge instead of counterattack.'
'Who taught this human?'
"BASTARD!!" She screamed, "You think that's enough to throw me off!?"
The demoness recovered and swung her chain.
But Van ducked under it.
'I was ready for you to be fast. I won't make the same mistake twice.'
The weighted blade of her chain singing over his helmet… and then, he tackled her at the waist.
They hit the ground together.
"GRAHH!!!" She shouted. "YOU FUCKER!!"
Van was on top. One arm. The stump spraying blood across her face, her scales, the dirt. He used his knees to pin her biceps, and his shins placed firmly atop her thighs.
He brought his fist down on her skull.
CRACK.
"GAHH!" she shouted.
Again.
CRACK.
"GRH..!"
"GET OFF—" she added.
CRACK.
"STOP…!"
AGAIN.
Her hands clawed at his armor, tearing chunks of metal free. One claw punched through his side. Another ripped across his neck.
He didn't stop.
"HRM! HRM!" He grunted with every punch.
CRACK. SQUELCH. PLAP.
Each hit drove her head deeper into the churned earth. Her horns snapped. Her jaw dislocated. Teeth scattered like pebbles. The sounds of his punches got wetter and wetter the more time passed.
The elves could no longer look. Even Sato looked at the ground, frozen as he rested on his knees.
Vaelthir kept gulping. Speechless alongside Takeshi, who used his greatsword to hold himself up as if it were a walking cane.
CRACK.
She went still.
Van stayed on top for one more second. Breathing hard. Blood from his stump pooling in the crater he'd made of her face.
Then he stood.
"S… Sato." Takeshi's voice was hoarse. "A…are y… you seeing this?"
Sato didn't answer.
Too stunned to even notice Takeshi called him by his real name.
His eyes were locked on Van. One-armed, drenched head to toe in red and black, swaying slightly as he turned toward the last general.
'That's… That's not Makoto.'
'That thing down there isn't Makoto.'
'So hurry up to come back… Please.'
Van reached into his inventory.
What came out was a bottle. Small. Dark liquid. ¾ finished
He was then walking toward the last general, the one wielding the katana, as he bit the cork off, spat it, and drank.
The stump twitched. Bone extended first.
White, sharp, reaching outward like a root seeking soil. Then muscle spiraled around it, red fibers knitting themselves in real time. Tendons snapped into place with tiny wet sounds. Skin crawled over the surface last, smooth and pale and perfect.
He flexed his new fingers once.
Twice.
Picked up the shortsword from where his severed hand still clutched it, pried it free, and kept walking.
The katana general stood alone.
Around him: four corpses. Broken's headless body. Deimos with a hole in his throat. The thin-limbed mage with a crushed skull and a missing eye. The chain user general, her face a concave ruin.
The horde of abominations still clawing at the walls.
The katana general drew his blade. The steel rang clear; a beautiful sound, almost musical.
"You fight like a corpse," he said.
Van kept walking.
"Your technique is unrefined. Self-taught, yes? Full of openings. Any swordsman worth his salt would've cut you apart six times over if they're prepared for how you fight."
Van's pace didn't change.
"That is me." The general adjusted his stance. Perfect form. Centuries of discipline in a single posture.
"The reason I've watched you kill my comrades is because I want to kill you perfectly. I've learned the way you move. Nothing you do will surprise me now."
Van was ten meters away now. Unflinching.
"You will die by my hands, even if you run."
Five meters.
The general's composure cracked just slightly. A twitch at the corner of his mouth.
"Foolishne—"
Van lunged.
The general's blade flashed; a perfect lateral cut aimed at Van's throat.
'It's over..!!' The general announced in his mind.
As for Van, he simply tilted his head.
The blade sliced his helmet open, but missed the artery by a millimeter.
"You… Bastard….!!!"
'He just lunged forward..!? No plan!? NOTHING!? And the fact he didn't even blink when I drew my sword. He looked at it all the way through…!!'
Van's shortsword drove upward beneath the general's guard, through the gap in his cuirass, between the third and fourth rib.
The general coughed. Blood flecked his lips.
He looked down at the blade in his chest. Then up at Van.
Van's helmet was inches from his face. Blood; his own and four others'; covered every surface.
The visor's eye slit revealed nothing.
[Overgear (EX)] Already working its way, repairing Van's armor minus the missing gauntlets from his severed arm, and his sliced helmet.
"You..." the general managed. His eyes widened as he looked at the darkness within his helmet.
That dead, emotionless stare.
'We've… Been fighting… The abyss itself…'
And frozen.
Van twisted the blade.
The general's legs gave out. He slid off the sword and hit the ground on his back, staring up at the evening sky.
Van stood over him.
'I didn't die. Hm.' He thought as he rolled his shoulders.
Berserk - Forces Metal Remix By ModernWeapons