Shiki speculated that it should be a Catalyst, given its religious nature.
After unleashing his power, Balladeer followed the hole created by his release and made his way to the surface. The reason for doing so was, naturally, that he couldn't fully exert himself underground.
He could also summon lightning storms like a Archon, and furthermore, the surface provided a larger area, allowing him to freely use these six different weapons.
"Don't run!"
Shiki stepped on the Akasha, and with each step, golden Tomo River patterns appeared beneath her feet.
After acquiring the Nine Words Thunder, she gained many abilities, and these Akasha steps, similar to Raiden Ei's, were one of them.
Shiki didn't want Balladeer to run off to other places. There were still villagers on Yashiori Island, and who knew if they would be affected?
However, as soon as she reached the surface, a katana came slashing at her.
Her pupils slightly constricted, and Shiki quickly bent backward, narrowly dodging the slash. Then, she performed several somersaults to stabilize herself.
As expected, one shouldn't expect any martial ethics from Balladeer. As soon as he came up, he squatted at the entrance of the hole, just waiting to deliver a blow to her.
"Not bad, not bad. What about this then!"
Balladeer swung the jumonji yari in his hand, and at the same time, he slammed the vajra into the ground. Violent lightning instantly covered an area of a thousand meters.
Seeing this, Shiki leaped high from the ground, and the Nine Words Thunder instantly glowed with golden light. Immediately, dark clouds in the sky began to churn rapidly, and dozens of golden lightning bolts descended from the heavens.
Tomoe's Lightning!
Boom!
The lightning bolts all struck Balladeer, but with his extremely high Lightning element resistance, Balladeer still blocked them. However, a large portion of the lightning he had spread on the ground was dyed golden.
At the same time, Shiki adjusted her posture in mid-air, then flew towards Balladeer like a golden wheel.
Clang!
Balladeer manipulated the shield to block the Nine Words Thunder, then controlled four different weapons to begin swinging.
Ding, ding, ding...
Facing four different weapons simultaneously, Shiki was momentarily suppressed by Balladeer. Each weapon employed a different attack method, so one can imagine the immense computational load of four.
However, this was relative. Balladeer controlling so many weapons also required a considerable amount of mental effort, so he couldn't maintain such a swift offensive indefinitely.
Either he would slow down his actions after a while, or there was a fixed routine involved, allowing him to reduce the thinking process by following a cycle.
Shiki was like a cat, deftly dodging Balladeer's attacks, only blocking those she truly couldn't avoid.
Finally, after five continuous minutes of dodging and blocking, Shiki summarized a pattern in Balladeer's offensive.
Just as she thought, everything is relative. Aside from terrain factors, if the defender needs to expend a considerable amount of effort, then the attacker is the same.
Balladeer's naginata and katana attacked again, and this time, Shiki was ready to counterattack.
'So, the next weapon is… a spear!'
After judging the next weapon based on Balladeer's movements, Shiki stepped on the naginata with one foot while parrying the katana that came from the left.
And as she expected, Balladeer swung the jumonji yari, thrusting it towards her cheek.
Seemingly unavoidable, Shiki, however, utilized Balladeer's subconscious desire to lift the naginata, and directly arrived above his head.
"What!?"
Seeing this, Balladeer quickly activated the vajra, enveloping himself in a layer of lightning shield, while controlling the shield to ram the girl to the side.
Unfortunately, it was still a step too late.
The slender blade pierced through the lightning shield like a needle, while the shield was still on its way. Helpless, Balladeer had no choice but to tightly grip the blade of the Nine Words Thunder with both hands to prevent it from directly piercing his head.
Shiki wanted to press further, but at this moment, the shield had arrived. She reluctantly transformed into lightning and withdrew.
"Hmph!"
Balladeer looked at his bloodied hands and snorted. He never expected that the technique he had spent hundreds of years researching would be broken by his opponent in just a few minutes!
In this exchange, Shiki could be said to have a slight advantage. Balladeer still had too many hands, and even if a weakness was found, the attack window was only a brief moment.
If she overshot, she would be hit by the opponent, and she was not some tank-type fighter; taking a hit would basically result in a loss of some combat capability.
So, it's time to reveal the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception!
If you have too many hands, I'll just cut them all off, won't I!
The rainbow-blue interwoven Mystic Eyes were not conspicuous in this world of gold and purple, but they caused Balladeer's figure to pause, and then he quickly widened the distance from Shiki.
They were now on the surface, and Balladeer was unsure if the ley line anomaly still affected the girl, so when facing these dangerous eyes, the best response was to create distance.
In fact, the surface was still within the range of the ley line anomaly's influence, but for Shiki now, it no longer had any effect.
Black and red lines were clearly visible on Balladeer's body. Now, no matter what, nothing could affect her.
A smile, gentler than ever, appeared on Shiki's lips. Then, all the injuries she had sustained during the previous battle were completely healed.
Finally, she returned to her previous indifferent expression.
Feeling her body no longer sluggish, Shiki knew that she had arrived.
"Thank you."
Shiki thanked the empty surroundings, then held her sword with one hand and charged towards Balladeer.
"Get lost!"
Balladeer controlled his weapons to unleash one lightning bolt after another, trying to maintain a safe distance from Shiki.
After all, just seeing the lines of death is useless; you have to cut them.
However, what Balladeer didn't know was that lightning... also had lines of death!
Time seemed to stand still in Shiki's eyes. The lightning, which flashed by in an instant for ordinary people, was clearly visible to Shiki. She could even see the root-like lightning constantly spreading.
In this strange state, Shiki swung her sword and cut through the rampant lightning, but at the same time, the elemental power in her body was rapidly depleting. Clearly, the consumption in this state was significant.
But, it was enough!
Shiki bit her silver teeth, trying her best to adapt to this different sensation. Being able to see is one thing, but being able to react in time after seeing is another. When the difference between vision and bodily reaction is too great, it's easy to create the illusion that one's body is also very fast. This illusion is very fatal in combat.
Shiki had to ensure that every one of her slashes landed at the correct timing, otherwise, at her current speed, she would have no room for correction!
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