Under Yamamoto's sharp old gaze—hawk-like, wolf-like—his eyes dropped straight toward the ground…
The green Nen flowed like a precise healing spring, seeking out every wound on Roy's body.
Not Kidō…
Kidō wasn't that fast, nor that flexible. In the end, it still required a person's will and incantation beforehand.
But Roy's method—self-healing without incantation—clearly had far greater utility and adaptability than Kidō.
And its effectiveness was obvious.
Three breaths later,
on the ground,
beside the human-shaped crater Roy had slammed into, the boy stood up straight again. His back was upright, his caved-in chest restored. He pinched off a thread of Nen, transformed it into Water Release, and splashed it over himself…
All the dirt on his body was washed away. He looked as fresh as ever again.
Even [Eclipse], which had nearly flown from his hand, turned red once more, ignited, and burst into blazing flames!
"Again!"
A sharp shout suddenly rang out.
Roy lowered his center of gravity, stepping into a bow stance. He reversed his grip and held [Eclipse] by his waist.
For an instant, the sword went strangely still.
Then he drew it again.
Roy lifted his head to the sky, locked onto Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni with deadly focus, and suddenly slashed upward!
The flames went out in an instant.
In their place came a spiraling force of magnetism that brushed past Yamamoto's nose and shot straight into the heavens, crossing the atmosphere in the blink of an eye, passing the moon, and racing into the cold, lonely void beyond—
where it chose a meteor, tens of kilometers wide.
Buzz—
A low hum began to drift down faintly from beyond the sky…
Feeling that strange rhythm, Yamamoto's white brows rose, and his gaze followed the magnetic force into the night sky.
Boom—
A tiny black dot appeared in his vision. His old eyes narrowed immediately. With a flick of his wrist, he spun Ryūjin Jakka through a flower of steel, then looked back down at Roy from the side.
"That wasn't a slash of fire."
[Gravity Blade: Rising Dragon]!
The sword technique Roy had once used in the garden against his father Silva appeared again.
On the ground,
Roy held his finishing stance and said calmly, "Of course."
"This is a slash of the sun."
Yamamoto's white beard stirred. Invisible ripples seemed to rise in those old eyes weathered by years and battle, and his grip on Ryūjin Jakka tightened.
"The sun… Have you truly already chosen its path?"
As the black dot beyond the sky grew larger and larger, memory flickered through him like wind-blown petals…
Back when he was young, he had dreamed more than once that one day he might unlock his Zanpakutō with the concept of sun—so that it would possess not only scorching fire, but also brilliant light, raging magnetic storms, and violent solar flares…
If that had happened, perhaps the man he became would have been different.
Perhaps even the opposite of what he was now.
Rumble…
It was close now.
The meteor tore through the atmosphere, catching fire from the friction of the air, dragging a long tail of flame behind it.
At last, it became a blazing star on the horizon, caught by countless pairs of eyes filled with shock, terror, and disbelief!
"What is that?"
"Why is it so bright?"
"Could it… be another sun?"
"What is going on tonight? Why is one bizarre thing happening after another?!"
Cries of alarm, confusion, and sharp intakes of breath rose and fell one after another, forming a picture of fear and helplessness across the whole Demon Slayer world.
On Mount Sagiri,
Giyu Tomioka held his Nichirin Blade down firmly. He could feel it starting to pull upward again, influenced by that strange force of [magnetism].
The current Water Hashira, clad in his red, yellow, and white haori, silently watched as the meteor became a star and came crashing down toward Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni.
His cold pupils shrank to needlepoints.
For the second time in his life, an overwhelming sense of helplessness rose inside him.
The first time had been the day he watched his older sister Tsutako be killed and devoured by a demon while protecting him.
Clang… clang… clang…
"The swords are moving again!"
The meteor drew closer. Its thunderous roar shook the sky. The flames burning across its surface were infused with Roy's Nen, all transformed into [magnetism], radiating rings of spiraling purple magnetic waves in every direction.
All iron lost control at once.
Breaking free of their owners' hands, it all flew toward Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni!
Kitchen knives, tailoring needles, butcher knives, blacksmiths' hammers, tongs, shears—
piece by piece, tool by tool, amid people's cries of alarm, they turned into several torrents of steel surging toward Yamamoto from all directions!
Sabito, Makomo, the other senior and junior disciples, and even Urokodaki himself gripped their swords—or carving knives—with all their strength, just as before.
At this moment, they could all clearly feel it:
In terms of scale, Roy's [Gravity Blade] might not have matched Yamamoto's casual vertical slash, honed over two thousand years.
But in terms of raw pulling force,
powered by the [magnetism] granted by the [sun],
swordsmen like Giyu Tomioka, Kyojuro Rengoku, and Sanemi Shinazugawa found it far harder to suppress their blades than they had before.
"Namu Amida Butsu. Be still."
On the eastern outskirts of Kyoto, beside the old ruined temple,
chains rattled violently as Gyomei Himejima's axe-and-flail weapon tried to rise into the sky. Halfway up, he yanked it back down with brute force and pinned it beneath him again.
Seated on the moss-covered temple steps, the monk's right arm bulged with muscle, exposing half his powerful chest. He murmured a Buddhist prayer—
then looked up at the sky, tears streaming from his blind eyes.
From the monstrous force tugging at his Nichirin weapon, he caught something strangely familiar.
"Praise the Sun… is that you, Lord Eiichiro?"
The monk, whose strength far surpassed ordinary men, had clearly sensed the difference between the two forces of attraction.
If Yamamoto's "pull" was the manifestation of sword intent refined over two thousand years,
then Roy's "pull" was pure [magnetism] in the physical sense.
One was idealist. One was materialist.
And yet both were producing nearly identical outward effects.
"What's the name of that slash?"
The old man's voice drifted down slowly.
Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni stood in white haori over black Shinigami robes, with the moon at his back and the meteor roaring down over his head. He glanced at Roy and asked.
Roy's flame-red hair swayed in the wind. He too held his sword横 across his body and looked up as the meteor grew larger and larger, bringing with it unmatched heat and magnetism. Its shadow alone swallowed the moonlight over the entire region.
Smiling, he answered, "Rising Dragon… Gravity Blade: Rising Dragon."
Drawing the blade toward heaven, like a dragon diving into the abyss.
For once, Yamamoto nodded. "A fine name. It fits."
Then he did not even bother to look up again.
He simply turned his wrist lightly.
And Ryūjin Jakka let out another piercing sword cry!
With his back still turned upward, Yamamoto gave the lightest slash into the sky.
Pssht—
The black line appeared again.
But compared to the earlier vertical slash, this one was both slower and faster. Before a blink could even pass, it was like it had teleported—
abruptly appearing before the meteor from behind Yamamoto.
Then—
one became two, two became four, four became eight, eight became sixteen…
In an instant, countless sword-lights burst forth and stabbed into the meteor.
Crack!
Visible to the naked eye,
the meteor—dozens of kilometers wide, not much smaller than a small asteroid—suddenly stopped.
Then its surface split apart, covered in countless cracks. Blade-light gleamed from within, darting back and forth—
and in the next instant,
the entire thing was cut to pieces!
Whoosh… whoosh… whoosh…
The meteor exploded apart,
instantly broken down into countless tiny fragments that rained down like a magnificent meteor shower!
"This… a miracle… it has to be a god… it must be! The gods have descended to save us!"
The meteor that had come without warning was shattered just as suddenly by equally impossible sword-light.
The torrents of steel still racing toward Yamamoto lost their main body the instant the meteor broke apart and fell into chaos.
Cooks who had lost knives, butchers missing cleavers, blacksmiths robbed of tools—
one after another came out of their homes and fell to their knees.
On Mount Sagiri, Giyu, Sabito, Makomo, Urokodaki, and the others all quietly let out a breath.
Their swords had stopped trembling. Calm had returned.
They looked at each other in silence, not knowing what to say.
[Notice: Because many of your believers mistakenly assumed Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni's slash was your divine technique saving the people… [Faith Power] +0.0005 +0.007 +0.0007…]
On the ground,
beside the human-shaped crater,
Roy held his sword in a strange sideways guard. In the next instant, he seized the moment when Yamamoto's old force was spent and new force had yet to arise. His body turned to light, and with another glance—
he burst out of the moonlight itself, already right in front of the old man, driving his blade forward in a vicious thrust—
[Shinsō]!
That bizarre movement,
that suddenly extending blade—
instantly made Yamamoto's eyes narrow.
The first word that flashed through his mind was:
[Shunpō]!
[Slash], [Fist], [Step], [Demon Arts]…
[Slash]: swordsmanship, all techniques using a Zanpakutō.
[Fist]: Hakuda, hand-to-hand combat, like Yamamoto's own [Ikkotsu] and [Sōkotsu].
[Step]: movement techniques, like [Shunpō], closing distance through high-speed movement.
[Demon Arts]: Kido, spiritual arts cast through incantation—generally broken down into offensive Hadō, restraining Bakudō, and healing Kidō.
Famous examples included… [Hadō #4] Byakurai, [Hadō #31] Shakkahō… [Bakudō #73] Tozanshō… and all the Kidō techniques that Unohana Retsu mastered.
Light—
light at point-blank range—
bloomed in the old man's eyes along with Roy's sword-light.
If Yamamoto weren't certain Roy carried the scent of a human,
if he hadn't already investigated him,
if he weren't sure there wasn't the slightest trace of that nauseating Quincy stench on the boy—
then in that instant,
Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni might have believed Roy was the reincarnation of the dead King of the Quincy, the son of the Soul King, Yhwach himself, reborn in human flesh!
"Too bad your spiritual pressure isn't strong enough."
"And your soul has existed for too short a time."
"Otherwise…"
"that thrust might just have brushed the edge of my robe."
Clang!
The Shinsō that pierced through empty space struck Ryūjin Jakka head-on. Yamamoto had read its trajectory in advance and moved later despite acting later, blocking it with perfect timing!
The old man narrowed his eyes and locked gazes with Roy.
His beard stirred.
Then, with a reverse motion, he forced Roy back, followed with a horizontal slash toward Roy's waist—
and the pitch-black line appeared again.
Roy's palm split open and healed at once. Instead of retreating, he pressed forward, forcibly halting his own movement halfway.
Then he kicked off the empty air,
melted back into the moonlight,
and met the black line with his sword.
Cling—
A crisp note rang out through this abnormal midnight,
beginning the true prelude of battle.
Clang-clang-clang…
One strike,
two strikes,
three strikes,
…
[Notice: "Swordsmanship" +100 +100 +100…]
The two streaks of light collided again and again,
flickering in and out,
like two dim stars caught between storm clouds—bright, dark, bright again, impossible to follow—
leaving those kneeling below and those standing to watch with mouths hanging open, throats tight, unable to say a single word!
At the Ubuyashiki estate,
Kagaya patted his wife Amane's hand and asked her to take Kanata, Hinaki, Kiriya, and the younger children back inside. Now only he and Kyojuro remained in the courtyard, squinting up at the sky in silence.
As the weaving sword-light illuminated half the heavens,
Kagaya saw nothing clearly at all. He was completely lost in it.
He simply did not want to miss this battle.
After a while, he suddenly asked Kyojuro, "Kyojuro… what level do you think one would have to reach to truly witness this battle?"
"To witness it?"
"You mean… to actually see it?" Kyojuro asked.
"Yes." Kagaya smiled lightly. "I know I'll never catch up to that point in this life. I'm just curious. I want to know the answer."
Buzz—
Kyojuro layered even more Nen over his eyes.
Standing with his hand on his sword, maintaining [Gyo], he stared into the heavens. All he could vaguely make out were two sword-lights crossing back and forth endlessly.
He was silent for a long while before finally shaking his head.
"My apologies, my Lord. I can't give you an answer. But…"
His yellow hair with red-dipped ends moved in the wind as he turned to look at Kagaya.
"My instincts tell me Lord Eiichiro is a hundred times stronger than I am."
"So perhaps… perhaps only after becoming fifty times stronger than I am now would I even be able to keep up with their silhouettes."
Kagaya Ubuyashiki fell silent.
The leader of the Demon Slayer Corps slipped both hands into his sleeves and sighed with a smile.
"That really is absurd…"
Then he looked up again.
Beneath the moon,
after a fierce exchange,
the two "stars" broke apart from each other at once—
and suddenly stopped moving.
Whoosh—
A gust of wind swept through.
Pshh—
A jet of blood burst from Roy's chest.
The boy was drenched in blood.
In the span of a few blinks, he had already traded dozens of blows with Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni.
Now, relying on [Blooddrop Rebirth] to barely keep himself alive, he leaned on his sword, gasping, and asked Yamamoto:
"Why did you stop?"
Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni was completely uninjured. Not even a corner of his clothes had been cut.
He said nothing at first, only stared at Roy.
After a long pause, he finally said:
"You… are wrong somehow."
Roy suddenly laughed.
It was a bright, open laugh.
At the same time, he glanced at the panel.
[Notice: "Swordsmanship" +100]
[Current "Swordsmanship": Lv4 (99940/100000)]
[Note: 60 points remain before breakthrough to Lv5]
Which meant—
one more strike.
~~~
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