“Well no matter what happens...I can’t quite lose to you.” It was a power a Human Tribe body could not endure, but that was not enough to sway the human known as Yuri Eniastar. That was not enough to sway the Iron-blood spirit passed down by his master. “So rather than me...how about you worry about yourself!?”
He moved his screaming body, the ground below him crumbling underneath his powerful steps. The Beast Tribe’s physical abilities: arms and legs greater than any of the other tribes. Once again, he slipped into Elias’s midst, his sword flying diagonally upward.
“—What idiocy.”
With those cold words, the black blade was this time properly caught by the edge of Elias’s sword. The next instant, a blinding silver unraveled right before Yuri’s eyes.
“Even if you can use Tribe Skills, yours are no more than a sham. Surely you realize they are clearly inferior to the true Tribe Skills we possess...and your power could never hope to surpass us.”
Nine silver tails spread far and wide from his back. Crimson eyes embodied his rage.
“—Release.”
Immediately after a quiet murmur—Yuri took a blunt-force blow to the flank. This wasn’t a swipe from the sword...it was executed with the massive sheath that had been on Elias’s back. Without any chance to react, Yuri took the full force of the blow, forcing his body into an L-shape.
“......!!”
Enduring the dull pain, he used the momentum of the strike to leap back, correcting his posture before he hit the ground. Thanks to a perk of the Dragon Tribe, every bone in his body was covered in a sturdy, bony tissue. As the name literally implied, steel bones gave his bones the hardness of steel, making it so no slash could slice all the way through. This made it impossible to sever him in one swipe.
For this reason, Elias chose not a slash but a battering with his scabbard to inflict internal damage to the organs beyond the bones.
“...You really are strong, Mr. Elias...!!” Yuri said, as he analyzed the damage inflicted on him. He quietly took in a deep breath to get his respiratory system back in the right rhythm.
The wariness in Elias’s eyes grew thick. “...The fact that the damage was lighter than I anticipated means you’re still hiding something.”
“Who can say... Care to find out?”
His movements no different from before, Yuri closed the distance between them. For a fighter on Elias’s level, if he knew slashes wouldn’t work, he would immediately have a backup plan. Fully expecting this, Yuri prepared his own follow-up.
The moon spirit magic he had created in his training with Fram—Lunar Cycle. It was a magic that gradually restored his injuries to their previous state, and as long as he didn’t suffer a lethal blow, Yuri could slowly but surely restore himself without a burden on his psyche.
“Even if they each fall short individually...put them all together, and you have something strong.”
With the Release Skill of the Beast Tribe, he could weave blows that exceeded his capabilities in with his normal attacks. With the steel bones of the Dragon Tribe, he could restrict his foe’s slashes and greatly cut down the damage received. And with his damage kept to a minimum, injuries would be automatically healed, allowing Yuri to stand as many times as needed.
“I’m not going to fall—until I defeat you.”
In exchange, a sharp pain jolted through his entirety, but Yuri would never fold to it. His fighting spirit kept his body in motion.
But...as Elias looked at him, the emotion that seeped into his expression was disappointment. Nothing more, nothing less.
“You seem to be misunderstanding something.” His words were ever so calm and quiet.
Elias was right in front of Yuri the same moment the waves of his voice reached him. Yuri could hardly be expected to react on sight. He didn’t even feel a hint of him preparing to move, his legs so fast they left everything back in the dust.
“I told you I would torment you to death.”
The tip of the scabbard stabbed into his solar plexus, and forcefully smacked Yuri into the ground.
“Kaah...!?”
He spat up the contents of his lungs as he tried to roll to avoid the next blow. However, with the scabbard pinning him down, he was unable to move an inch. If that wasn’t bad enough, Yuri began to pick up the changes happening in his body. His heart pulsed like crazy, and his freedom left him as if he had been paralyzed.
“I once fought a duelist who could restore any injury taken. It looks like this will work on you too.”
The impact sent his heart into a frenzy, rendering him unable to move. Yuri had once used a similar method to deliver an impact to Haring’s heart and forcefully bring it to a stop. In contrast, Elias used a shock to reliably seal his movement and abilities.
Yuri never revealed what exactly he was working with. He was using skills unknown to Elias, multiple ones at that, and yet, by comparing past experiences, Elias could discern the proper ways to counter.
“Perhaps you have multiple abilities to use, but if I look at each of them individually, they are merely degraded versions of abilities I’ve seen before. In which case...I should simply crush them one at a time.”
As if to enact precisely what he had stated, Elias planted a firm stomp into Yuri’s chest. The pressure on his lungs prevented him from even breathing satisfactorily.
“To struggle as a mix-blood with such paltry powers...how conceited can you get?”
Elias’s words resembled a curse. He next lowered the sole of his boot at Yuri’s face. The dull sound of the impact resonated with the sharp snap of the bones in his nose.
“If that’s all you needed, she would have surmounted it. She was far more worthy than you.”
His heel slammed into Yuri’s face again and again, treading over his will. He recalled the despair from when he watched that figure leaving the duel city, slamming in all his regrets.
“A wall she could never cross—then you never stood a chance.”
As his field of vision turned red with blood, Yuri watched Elias’s bitterly twisted face. Grief, respect, regret, remembrance, longing, guilt—an expression of various emotions at war.
Though Yuri had stopped moving, Elias’s foot had not. He stomped on Yuri’s palms, shattered his kneecaps with his heel, crushed his abdomen, slammed down on his throat, and kicked his head. Again and again. Over and over. The sound of flesh smacking and bones shattering resounded through the plaza. Such gruesomeness had the spectators at a loss for words.
Normally, the act of needlessly tormenting an opponent in a duel was looked down upon, but the spectators couldn’t even raise any cries of criticism. Overwhelmed by the ghastly look that crossed Elias’s face—not a single one spoke.
And...his shoulders rising and falling with each breath, Elias finally pulled his foot back.
“It’s the end of the line...Yuri Eniastar.”
Through his hazy eyes, Yuri looked at the object above his head. The white blade of a sword glimmering as it caught the light of the sun.
“You were unable to surpass the walls of a mix-blood.”
His voice waxed over with pity, Elias stabbed the blade at Yuri’s heart.