Chapter 1426 - The Hunter, the Swordsman, & the Monk (12) (Patreon)

The raindrops dripped down the corporeal bloodlust energy as the monk stood with a defensive stance, having pulled the aura closer to himself, all six arms and three heads ready to face the swordsman who’d transcended beyond his form and taken on a whole new appearance.

“Perhaps I should have been more worried about you,” the Eastbound Monk said, narrowing his eyes. “I’d believed that banishing you and waiting out your  Transcendence would be a sufficient strategy. Turns out no one knew the true nature of your Transcendence.”

“Jake did,” the Sword Saint smiled, tilting his head slightly. “Though why don’t you try sealing me away again, assuming you can.”

“Ignoring whether that would even work, I’m uncertain that time is on my side this time around,” the monk sighed. “Something you seem to realize, which is why you’re not attacking.”

“Perhaps in part,” the Sword Saint chuckled, raising his sword and looking at it with a smile. “Though, truthfully, I just want to enjoy this moment for as long as I can. Victory is still my goal, and if I win through cutting you down or through being favored by time, both are acceptable. Could even call it fitting for Aeon’s Chosen to win by having time on his side in a battle between two people who’ve both gone well beyond their limits.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t find such a conclusion acceptable,” the monk said, switching his stance slightly. “And I would argue that while time does favor you in the long term... don’t be so sure you can survive till then.”

The passive berserker skills of the monk would usually have been capped out a long time ago, as they effectively scaled with health lost and how large his total health pool was. Except right now, the monk didn’t die even after his health pool was depleted. His existence would remain as long as the Wheel of Samsara continued undergoing its next revolution, even if his health pool ended up looking like something impossible.

Such as going into the negative, making the monk’s status menu look quite ridiculous:

Status

Health Points (HP) -1,521,694/913,820

When the hunter had broken the virtual world and nearly consumed the monk in the process, he’d lost more than a million health points. It had effectively killed him instantly, and if not for his anchored existence, he would have truly died. Not to say that it hadn’t weakened him. Having parts of his Soulshape erased had resulted in his power falling, despite his boosting skill continuing to provide him with more and more power, even as his health points continued dropping.

There was a limit, but the monk had yet to reach it and simply embraced the seemingly ever-increasing power boost as he stepped down and charged toward the swordsman who was prepared to receive his blow.

However, as he propelled himself forward, his eyes opened wide after noticing his movements weren’t as fast as they should be, and the swordsman easily stepped to the side and avoided his blow before proceeding to stab toward the monk’s chest.

The arms of pure bloodlust energy moved to block, but were once again slower than expected. He couldn’t feel anything negatively affecting his body, yet something clearly delayed all his movements, ultimately resulting in only one of the arms moving to block in time. It was stabbed through, but at least he managed to divert the blade slightly, resulting in him only getting stabbed in the side.

With a twist of his wrist, the Sword Saint sent a spurt of blood flying as he cut his blade free and attacked yet again, not giving the Eastbound Monk the slightest reprieve. Fortunately, he’d adapted somewhat and managed to block in time by pouring more energy into the fists that moved to block, allowing him to stop the blade and push himself back.

That action helped him finally realize why his movements were off. Despite being pushed back by the swordsman’s blade, he didn’t fly back as quickly as he should have, meaning it wasn’t necessarily his movements that were slowed down; it was his time.

“It’s the rain,” the monk muttered to himself in realization. The rain had been falling upon the world seemingly harmlessly ever since the Sword Saint had used his Transcendence, and while the monk had been suspicious of its effects, so far its only purpose had been to bring greenery back to a destroyed world. It clearly contained some form of life energy, so it had been a good guess that would perhaps help restore the swordsman’s wounds, and while it was still possible it could do so, it clearly also had the effect of affecting time.

Erupting with greater power, the monk attempted to push back the rain, but quickly concluded it was useless as they continued exchanging blows. The rain was ever-present, and while he could try to defend himself against it, doing so would consume more power than he could handle. While his health points were currently in the negative and could seemingly continue to be so infinitely, his mana and stamina weren’t the same. If those ran out, he would be unable to move and thus unable to defend himself in any way. Considering his virtually unkillable state, that shouldn’t be a problem; however, he was right now facing another Transcendent who had seen through how the Wheel of Samsara worked.

Within his Soulspace, it was slowly turning, and as the monk failed to fully dodge another slash and was cut, it suddenly skipped forward a little, sped up by the swordsman’s blade. Every time the monk was struck didn’t merely damage his physical body, but his – for lack of a better word – time.

Seeing this, the monk should perhaps have been more defensive, but instead, he did just the opposite. He barely dodged a slash by splitting his body into three incarnations before attacking with full force, billowing out bloodlust energy as he did so.

All six fists flew in a flurry of blows, forcing the swordsman to block and teleport back. He was scraped by one of the hands, leaving a small scratch that nearly instantly healed when the rain fell upon it, proving that it could indeed also heal just as the monk had first surmised. Still, it had to be limited, and if the swordsman lost his head or a limb, it wouldn’t be so easily mended.

Both fighters charged at one another immediately after, neither willing to back down or lose momentum as a dozen attacks were exchanged in moments. Crescent waves of water and blade energy cut through the bloodlust as the monk was slashed across his chest, but not without also ripping flesh from the Sword Saint’s arm, exposing the bone beneath.

Even so, neither moved away, as they stayed within only a few meters of one another. Despite only having a single sword against’s six arms, the Sword Saint didn’t lose out in the slightest, his blade seemingly splitting into two at times, with his speed overall far surpassing that of the monk.

In the realm of technique, things were more complicated. The Sword Saint was no doubt an absolute genius with his blade, but the Eastbound Monk hadn’t gotten to where he was due to luck. He hadn’t killed every single other person in his Tutorial because he was weak, and he hadn’t been deemed the top scorer of the Myriad Paths event for nothing. He was another living example of the utterly monstrous generation taking part in the ninety-third universe’s integration.

However, as their exchanges continued, a difference began to emerge. The monk found it harder and harder to land anything, and while the slashes didn’t get faster, they became slightly harder to deal with as they exploited minuscule flaws in the monk’s fighting style. One reason was certainly the monk’s lack of experience fighting with six arms, but another was the simple fact that the Sword Saint was improving and adapting at a quicker pace.

Of course, what the monk couldn’t know was that the Sword Saint had a skill allowing him to experience time differently than everyone else. On the surface, it appeared to be a competition over who was more talented, but in reality, it was rigged from the start.

All something he couldn’t know, as all the monk saw was that despite his best efforts and his stats even growing slightly with every passing second, he was quickly losing momentum. Cuts started to accumulate on his body as the sword kept finding a way through his defenses, forcing him to change the status quo yet again.

Striking with his left side, which was composed entirely of energy, the monk managed to blast the swordsman back with a large explosion of pure bloodlust energy. Changing his stance, the monk breathed deeply as he moved all six arms above his head before slowly lowering them. As he did so, they seemed to multiply, and at the same time, the projected figure with three heads grew to be several dozen meters tall yet again, as it now had twelve arms on each side.

“What a corrupt and unsightly image of a bodhisattva,” the Sword Saint muttered and shook his head. “Inspired by it, perhaps? Records bleeding through to new universes is truly a curious thing.”

The monk didn’t respond by attacking as one of the fists exploded forward, erupting with a powerful shockwave of pure bloodlust at the end of the punch, pushing the Sword Saint further away. With a single step, the monk gave chase, intending not to let up his assault as long as he could keep his current state going.

However, the Sword Saint wasn’t deterred as he raised his sword toward the sky, and as he did so, the rain answered and started collecting around his blade. In an instant, a whirlpool formed around his body before transforming into a long rain dragon coiled around the swordsman.

Right before the monk reached his target, the Sword Saint also charged forward with a stab as the dragon surged into motion. The Eastbound Monk focused on the dragon and moved to destroy it, but right as he did, it suddenly split into a hundred different streams of water, losing its form entirely as the swordsman continued stabbing toward his opponent.

Seeing no way to block in time, the Eastbound Monk committed to his attack toward the stabbing swordsman while focusing on strengthening the bloodlust energy around him. The many streams of water pierced into the bloodlust aura, tearing into it and weakening its stability as more than a dozen fists were about to clash with the swordsman... only for him to disappear and reappear in the place of one of the streams of water that was just about to strike the monk’s avatar of energy.

The already weakened avatar couldn’t stand up to the swordsman as he slashed his way inside and came straight for the monk’s real body. Reacting as quickly as he could, the monk lifted a palm and blocked as the sword struck it. A shockwave sent the Sword Saint flying out of the avatar of energy again as the monk gritted his teeth and struggled to disperse the energy through his feet. Small cuts appeared down the length of his arm, down his side and thigh, before the energy was finally dispersed out of his foot as one of his toes entirely exploded from the energy.

A monstrously powerful concept of sharpness had been embedded within the energy, to the level where it was impossible for the monk to handle it in his currently heavily injured state. He tried to keep a steady mind, but the exhaustion was starting to show, and while he could resist bloodlust energy, doing so still drained mental energy.

Meanwhile, the Sword Saint was in the prime of his youth as raindrops gathered around his body and created swords of water that were immediately shot toward the monk. There was simply no time to rest, and all the monk could do was respond in kind.

Fists of pure Bloodlust and swords of rainwater collided repeatedly, as, for once, the monk was capable of pushing back the Sword Saint. The monk barely defended himself, as even if his avatar body of pure energy was ripped apart, he didn’t care. His time was running out anyway, and he needed to finish off the swordsman before that could happen, or everything he’d done would be in vain.

His attacks got faster, more erratic, and the Sword Saint was soon unable to properly block or deflect everything. Despite his speed and power going up significantly after fully unleashing his Transcendence, there was still a wide gap between them due to the broken berserker boosting skill and the fact that the monk had higher base stats from the beginning.

The barrage of fists fell like raindrops as the monk punched, ripped, and tore away at the swordsman, who kept cutting the bloodlust energy construct apart while defending himself as best he could. Alas, fully defending himself simply wasn’t possible as he was struck several times and launched down into the ground, where the monk gave chase and continued pummelling.

It was a simplistic and almost embarrassing method of fighting that only relied on pure power and the many conjured arms to unleash a relentless assault. There was more to it, as the strikes formed a net sealing in the Sword Saint, making it impossible, or at least costly, should he attempt to escape the area of attack.

Several seconds passed as the terrain was torn asunder by the constant attack, the land rearranged as the ground shook and broke apart. Within the epicenter of blows, the Sword Saint constantly dodged, blocked, and parried the large hands, occasionally finding himself struck. He attempted to learn the pattern and adapt, but the other side simply had too many hands while he only had one sword.

Needing a way out of the situation, the Sword Saint took a gamble as he switched his stance and swept his blade upwards. Doing so left him exposed as a fist struck him in the side and sent him flying toward a clawed hand seeking to tear into his flesh, but right as it was about to reach him, the entire avatar of bloodlust energy was struck as the ground itself rose to oppose the monk.

The countless raindrops that had soaked into the broken soil and rock shot towards the sky like millions of tiny swords. Each raindrop was too weak to penetrate the dense bloodlust energy surrounding the monk, but collectively they were powerful enough to forcibly move him.

Despite it working, the Sword Saint still ended up struck one more time as the Eastbound Monk launched a final fist as the arm extended while he was sent flying. The Sword Saint was blasted into the already broken ground, his body, which had been looking pristine after unleashing his Transcendent Skill, now quite a mess.

Still, despite it all, the man smiled as he raised his sword toward the monk and spoke the name of a skill he felt he hadn’t used in a long time. It had turned mostly passive or been too weak to be of use, but now, in this form, it was back on the menu.

“Rainblade.”

A faint shimmer of water covered his blade, and as the Eastbound Monk charged, not wanting to lose all momentum, the Sword Saint slashed upwards. His blade extended into a large crescent wave of thin rainwater, which the amalgamation of bloodlust energy raised several arms to block, only for those arms to be cut off and dispersed, making the monk within the avatar open his eyes wide.

The blade of rainwater had weakened after cutting through arms and failed to reach the monk within the avatar, but that didn’t give the monk any time to rest as another three waves were already flying through the air, seeking to cut him apart. Focusing on defense despite really not wanting to, the monk poured bloodlust energy into his arms and strengthened them as much as possible while blocking the crescent waves.

One of his arms was severed by the first one, fully severed, while three other arms were deeply cut into by the second, and when he met the third, he realized it was by far the strongest, allowing the Eastbound Monk to only block it after losing six arms. Breathing heavily as he tried to restore the avatar, the monk only realized too late that he’d lost sight of the swordsman.

His danger sense screamed at him from behind, and while he tried to strengthen the bloodlust energy as much as he could, he was a step too slow as the Sword Saint had teleported up behind his avatar and unleashed another slash that cut through bloodlust energy that had been weakened after he'd focused its intensity elsewhere.

As a final gamble, the Eastbound Monk raised a palm to block the wave, which he successfully did, only for the Sword Saint to be one step behind the crescent wave of rainwater, having flown straight into the avatar of bloodlust energy.

For a brief moment, the eyes of the monk met those of the Sword Saint before the blade rose and the one remaining arm of the man was sent flying before exploding with all the energy he’d just absorbed through his palm.

Twisting his body, the monk roared as he exploded with bloodlust energy, trying to expel the swordsman, who grasped his sword with both hands and took a deep breath as his aura pushed back the bloodlust, and he swung down with a single word:

“Stormslash.”