Author's Note: Fair warning to all of you Ikki Fans, there's going to be a bit of suffering for our sword boy in this one. Read, Review, Favourite and Enjoy!
Chapter 81: The World of the Sword Hero
Malty had gotten smarter since their last clash, or at the least her sense of self preservation sharpened, probably a consequence of being turned into charcoal, though that didn't seem to be a problem currently. It appeared that in addition to the Cal Mira like bonus field this place also has a Cal Mira like hot spring as well. She bailed on the argument with the official that wanted to publicly execute him in order to make a example out of him before his mana recharged enough to break free. Malty was wise to run, he would've killed her if he hadn't lost track of her. The mistake here however was doing nothing about the information baggie she left behind.
"Where is she?" Ikki watched the power of pride enter the official's eyes from the knife in his liver. Credit where due, he didn't respond until the cursed power had fully taken him over, that's will power for you.
"In the new capital... Makina's town house." Ikki would've gotten more information out of him but in one final act of defiance the man had bit off his tongue and spat it at him.
"Ugh." Ikki ripped out the blade as he limped towards the exit. Yep he still hurt. He wondered if there was any water or support type magic that would do something about the the soreness he felt right now. No, no he'll have to put such thoughts in the back of his mind along with the pain, because just to further stall him Malty had at some point in time told every guard in this shit hole of a country that he had broken free and to go kill him. "I should probably warn you guys." Ikki swapped the pride dagger for the Sitera Stone Katana. "I am absolutely livid right now."
At himself mostly, the jaunt with the magic potion left him too sore to be able to move fluidly, which made all the points he sunk into speed rather counterproductive right now. First chance he got he and Ake were going to go invest in some serious defence, and his Mana and Spirit power were both currently too low to simply magic or skill his way out of this situation. No matter.
"Die!" One of the men in front, a whale man, did the 'steal all my subordinates stats' thing and charged at Ikki swinging his spear. Well credit where do: the stupid fuckers stopped using swords against him. Still trying to take him one on one though so only half points. Partly because he was still too sore for grand acts of violence, partly because it made the most of his pitifully small defence and partly because it unnerved the stupid shits Ikki instead stood his ground with his sword facing forward and only parried the attack using the minimal amount of action necessary, and when he noticed the sloppy and angry nature of the thrusts he even found time to secure his escape route to the ever screaming protests of his arms. So the question became which had the bigger backlash? Ikki's stunt with Ittou Rasetsu and Yggdrasil, or forcibly cramming all of your subordinates stats into your body and expecting something not to break?
"RRRAAAWWWRRR!" The whale was fast with the spear, repeatedly sending sharp part forward as Ikki repeatedly smacked it aside. The frustrated whale eventually retracted the weapon looking for a opening, spinning it and the flag attached to the end of it trying to distract Ikki for a opening. And Ikki gave one, to the confusion of the enemy before him as he simply stabbed the blade into the ground and leaned on it as he would a cane.
"Looking tired big guy? Your movements were so sloppy I even found time to make a little doodle." Ikki stated as he suddenly fell through the hole he carved in the floor in the perfect shape of a star. "Ugh!" Said hole was too small for the whale to simply chase him through and the hallway he came through was blocked off by his various barely conscious subordinates he drained for power. Even weakened as he was Ikki should get away safely if he can make it into the bush and hide for long enough to get away.
"RAGH!" The fanatical screaming, sound of breaking wall above him and rapidly expanding shadow told Ikki that he had miscalculated. Instead he back tracked several inches just in time for the hulking sea monster to land so that Ikki could grab onto his back with both of his blades making foot holes running them through the meat wall's lungs.
"Gah!" Another miscalculation, as the whale decided the easiest way to get Ikki off of him was to jump backwards and body slam him with his full mass, sore as he was Ikki wasn't able to clear him in time and his leg suffered as a consequence. "UGH!" It wasn't much, but it would have to do. "Single Blade!"
Ikki's latest mile stone had him take the opposite approach, rather than making more blades for him to fling at his enemy he was instead greeted by a singular mass of concentrated, fuel efficient, spirit power above the head of the enemy. "Change Blade: Yggdrasil Blade!" The mass of spirit energy changed it's shape into a dagger that looked like it was made out of a potion bottle and was promptly stabbed into the ground, the whale dodging the blow with a roll while the equip bonus of the blade healed Ikki up and got his leg into working order before he booked it again. Assuming that this would be like fighting Sadeena was a mistake, because Sadeena makes use of lightning magic in combat, this prick on the other hand froze the ground in between them and slid across it like the world's ugliest penguin just to close the distance with him.
"Really need to invest in a pain killer sword!" Ikki's response was to stab his sword to intercept the angry wall of meat sharp end first. "First Enchant!" Ikki sucked the cold from the ice and allowed it to go into his body, numbing the pain on mass. The ice gave way in time for the whale to tumble forward and Ikki took advantage, jumping over him, letting the stupid brute touch the tip catching his momentum and blinding him with frost in the process, before Ikki took that offensive power and slashed through the whale's back leading to both of them to tumble into rolls in opposite directions to kill their momentum, Ikki making it closer to the woods where he would attempt to ditch his pursuers. Well there went what mana he had managed to bring out, and what spirit power, and this guy looked like he was still ready for three more rounds. "Ugh. I've decided I hate this country."
Ikki noted as he saw the bloody juggernaut on ice skates charging at him again, and here Ikki was fresh out of ice in his sword to numb the agonising pain throughout his body. So instead Ikki rolled once more, letting the monster slam head first into a tree behind him while Ikki used Intetsu to chop the head off of the spear. Now that he knew he wasn't going to get his powers taken away the moment that he traded in for another weapon form Ikki switched over to the Soul Eater Blade and stabbed it into the whale's back, mucking about in his organs even as the bastard got back up to throw Ikki off, but he got some spirit power back at least.
"What was that?" The whale asked for the first and last time.
"The end of my patience." Ikki's blade changed into the giant saw that Naofumi had gotten from the Colosseum in Zeltoble and promptly used it to instantly reach up two stories into the air and jump back into the building that the whale had tore open, with all of his baggies of extra power inside.
"NO!" Massive as it was to Ikki the saw was as light as a feather, and to everything else it was a hot knife to butter as Ikki cut the building and all of the people inside in half. Outside the Whale collapsed from his injuries as he no longer had borrowed power to support them, and Ikki once again remembered that there was pain all over his body because he had the living crap beaten out of him. Ikki resisted the urge to rest because there were people coming to kill him right now and he had to run.
"You kid's sure ain't subtle, I'll give you that much." Sadeena looked at the carnage, at the building ripped in half and at the dead bodies rotting in summer heat. If it were anymore obvious that Ikki had been here there would be a giant swatch of graffiti written in blood saying 'Sword Hero was here!' "Well they certainly ain't taking you prisoner next time." It was impossible to say how far Ikki had gotten on foot since he decided to stab his way out of enemy fortress. The bodies were too far gone to tell how long ago he had killed them, and she had no idea what kind of state Ikki was in to know how far he could get, nor what he was going to prioritise what needed stabbing most in order to figure out what direction he went in. There was a reason it took her so long to get here though. "You give the worst directions ever." Sadeena concluded looking at her sister who had been bound to her via Slave Seal.
"Excuse me if I don't want to escort a foreign invader through my homeland!" Shildina snapped angrily. Wherever and however her shitty parents raised her evidently it didn't include a lot of training for one's sense of direction because damn was she horrible at this. She wasn't even doing it on purpose either, the seal made sure of that much.
"We need to rethink this." Sadeena thought about the situation before coming to what might be considered a bad decision. "That oracle thing, extracting soul fragments and taking them in. Can you do that here?"
"Easily." Shildina stated her tone of voice questioning why Sadeena was asking such a ridiculous question.
"Follow me." Sadeena found where Ikki had been tied up, and the ropes that were used to tie him. "Tell me about the person these were binding."
Shildina prepared the paper and extracted Ikki's essence. He left a lot of it, he must have sunk magic into the rope until it rotted. So Shildina took the essence left behind into the paper and slapped it onto her chest.
The snow had gone up to his waist, not a hard task considering how short he was, the rest of them were still in the house for the new year's celebration, they wouldn't chase him, none of them would. They would have to care first to do that. He had no where to go, he's never seen the world beyond the window of his bed room. The snow was beating down on him hard, but it didn't matter, dying here and now was better then dying 10 years from now on the same stuffy futon he had since he was born.
"RRRAAAGGGHHH!" I let out a frustrated scream as I fell to his knees in the snow. What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What sin have I committed? What did I do to deserve being treated like this? I have begged time and again asking what I have done wrong so that I may make up for it, and every time I have gone ignored! The crunching of the snow indicated that someone was approaching me. Come to drag me back? Or come to make sure I died?
"Are you Frustrated, kid?" Ikki turned eyes up at the old man, glaring. "To the fact that you're the weakest one?"
Weakest? I understood that I was the weakest, this was made painfully, obviously, clear to me the longer time went on. As the invisible chains that tied me down grew ever tighter and tighter. No it wasn't that I was weak, there are lots of weak people in the world that's why Blazers exist in the first place. It was that people act like I don't deserve to exist because I am weak.
"If so, hold on to that feeling. That's proof you haven't given up yet on yourself."
I didn't know how but the old man's words spurned me on, powered through the snow as I eventually made it through the woods. I found a man in a black uniform on the other side and I told him my name. After he took me to his work place he called my family, my father's words bit like a stab in my guts.
"I've never seen this boy before in my life." It was the foster home after that.
Ouma started to learn how to fight since he was three, I started at six, my fellow foster brother's were eager teachers. We got to watch blazers fight on the TV together, it was my second teacher, I got to see the styles of battle, the mistakes the loser had made, the styles of the sword, and before I knew it I had started to train. Not in swordsmanship mind you, yoga, calisthenics's, Isometric exercise, I set out to become master of my body. I ran away from my first foster home at age ten, entered another two weeks later under a different name, continued to practice brawling throughout elementary, started dojo hunting once I hit middle school. Half the time they saw right through me, either somehow given prior notice prior to my coming or the masters were just that good, the other time all the students ganged up on me because I was a Blazer and they were normal, but I got what I came for. I soon realised that I didn't even need masters, just witnessing them in action was enough.
Of the Seven Blazer School's Hagun was the only one whose intuition was free, because they were on the bottom rung and were desperate enough for results that they didn't care about who they took in. Well didn't care enough mind you, I only got in because I won the bet with the examiner, I wasn't allowed to participate in the classes thanks to my father, and I had a massive target painted on my back. Literally, I still have the scar there from when 'the Hunter' decided to carve a bullseye out of my flesh. No matter. I was still getting what I needed, blood was just the currency I used. Then as life was about to crumble around me for one final time, that shitty directer lost his job because he was a shitty director, Mrs. Shinguuji had the thankless task of trying to pull a 180 on the situation and so she gave me a chance to prove myself. And you know what? I lived up to that expectation, I got to meet people who gave a flying crap about me, and evidently someone else thought so too because here I was, no idea how far away from those people that cared about me were because they don't come up with a unit of measurement for universes! At first I appreciated that, the feeling of being needed, of being cared about. Except that they didn't. I was a disposable weapon of mass destruction. A instrument of political landscaping. A tool for other people to accomplish their goals my opinion be damned, even for the other tools.
"If you're tired of being on the bottom rung, then why not aim for the top? Are you on the bottom because you can't climb up? Or have you just not tried hard enough yet?"
I found the bitch who started all of this, and I wasn't leaving without her head in my sword.
Shildina inhaled sharply, at some point in time Sadeena had moved in front of her and now she was desperately trying to suck air.
"Shildina!" Sadeena shouted, and not for the first time either.
"Water Dragon!" As much of 'dear god' insert as she was addressing the one herself. "What did you bring into our country!"
Oh it wasn't just that, if it was just about will power it would just be a matter of being put under their control but there was more too. For a time there she thought she was Ikki Kurogane. That it was her who ran away in the dead of night to die. That it was her who was never good enough. That it was her who was constantly being pushed to the brink of death and sat there and took because she couldn't see the end of the tunnel. She thought as much because it was her.
"Are you okay?" Sadeena asked looking at her concerned.
"He's wounded, he needs medical attention to recover but he's not looking for it. He caught a glimpse of some red head and now he's after her head." Shildina sucked deep, still quite shaken up about what she was just sucked into, it nearly ate her alive. "I know where he's going but I'm not confident I can take you there." Shildina looked down at the card holster Sadeena had confiscated off of her, the deck topped by a golden hammer. "But I think I know someone who can."
Well Ikki was not finding this Makina or her town house by himself. And he certainly wasn't doing it with every bone in his body out to kill him. He needed hot water to make his muscles relax, luckily though his fancy shape shifting sword came complete with the power to make water his bitch. So Ikki made use of the Hundred Swords + Spirit Potion Sword combo to accumulate spirit energy and after that the Hundred Sword + Mana Potion Sword combo. After being fully recharged Ikki used the shovel sword had to dig a hole, and he used magic to fill it up with hot water. After that it was stripping naked and ahhhh because he needed that for so many reasons today.
"Okay Ikki think, Malty is a coward: She'll flee before she fights. So how?" Portal skill obviously. He shattered the barrier on the capital so that wasn't cutting her off anymore. That isn't to say that there wasn't a barrier in place though, he knows this very clearly as he had Raluva put it back up before he left their base. And it was much easier to drop the barrier then it was to maintain it so how does Malty do that? The capital?
'One of the Legendary Heroes is here and he's come to kill me.'
Yeah, that wouldn't fly with him either.
'A Legendary Hero has come to destroy another Sitera lumina tree! Let me through!'
Then smash and portal away. No that shit wouldn't fly either, those things are guarded by Destiny stone weapons and she's exactly the scenario those things were made to prevent. Wait? How did she get here in the first place with the barriers in place? She portal here but the only one who should've been able to set the portals before her was...
"Takt. Okay so what do I know about him?"
Unreasonably high level. Self Proclaimed Genius. Chronic skirt chaser and man whore. Hmm? The Sitera Lumina gave out a bonus field similar to Cal Mira so of course Takt would come here a lot, and if it was like that then it means he had somewhere outside of the of the barrier field that he could go into. Not inside of the new capital, outside the barrier of the bonus field.
"I need to get up high." And that's what Ikki did, riding one of his floating blades of spirit energy after getting dressed, stretching out and drying off, he looked around the area for any sign of anywhere that might not be within the bonus field. "That's Malty for you." Ikki spotted a mansion built on the top of a rather large hill that was just tall enough and just far away enough to peak outside of the bonus field. "Subtle as a hand grenade."
The moment she realised the sword hero was leaving that place alive Malty booked it, hopped onto a carriage the first moment she could and was now making her way to Takt's exit in the mountains. Another few feet and she'd be able to escape this admittedly somewhat nice country for some place she might enjoy less. Well she's a hero now, it's not like there's anyone in the world that will treat her poorly.
"Hello Bitch, fancy seeing you here." Ikki stated sitting on the road in front of the mansion. Well, almost anyone.
Review Section:
RonaldM40196867: To be fair Naofumi played a lot of games back in his world, it's just that he spent a lot of his time online applying the smarts he got in business school effectively turning his hobby into his homework. But if he told that idiot that he would completely ruin his point he was trying to make. You'll see a pretty good idea of what I've got in mind in a few dozen chapters in Cute Heroes.
ReviewerDJW: She's sitting out these affairs in the pile of tied up people that Naofumi and the others prepared. Killing Motoyasu's companions seems like a pretty appalling way of getting him to cooperate to them.
drmcgraw186: As Naofumi has pointed out on more than one occasion, no one chooses a weapon for it's defensive power, if you wanna be a tank then you pile on the body armour, which only makes it more confusing that Motoyasu still wears light armour. Like they said before, Video games are not created for the sake of the people in them, they're created for the sake of the people playing them. Itsuki is the Jewel Hero in this universe.
DBoblivion: Think all of their redeeming points removed and replaced by some kind of crippling social problem, all of their worst qualities amplified, and throw in a 'Die and got isekai'd' back story in a modern day, non-magical boring as hell Japan which only serves to exacerbate all of their worst issues.
Kisame Hoshigaki: Don't worry, the source of Motoyasu's weirdness will be revealed in a suitable epic manner.