Chapter 304: Jude Bayer (3) (1/2)
Some correction: The Sword of Wind was actually created by a Bayer family ancestor and not Jude’s father, Count Bayer.
A strong wind blew.
A burst of lightning followed.
The Sword of Wind sharply cut the world, and the burst of lightning roughly tore the surrounding area.
The ultimate skill of the Sword of Wind.
The Sword of Wind that the Bayer family ancestor created after he reached the sword horizon in the past. The path of wind and lightning that he left behind.
A series of strikes unfolded.
Lightning burst in succession and twelve sword strikes led to one.
Elio mentally screamed.
He focused and concentrated in stopping the Sword of Wind that was raging in front of him.
He read the wind. He withstood the lightning strikes.
Bababababababang-!
All sounds were muted by the loud thunder.
Elio’s sword followed the trajectory of the Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes with difficulty.
But he couldn’t keep up with all of it. Elio’s sword deviated at the time when he blocked the fifth sword strike because of the lightning that was added to the wind. It was hard for him to withstand the power of the sword. Every time he blocked a strike, his hand trembled and his arm suffered from strain.
‘No, this is not all!’
The Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes was not just a series of slashing attacks.
The sword contained something.
There was a mysterious inner essence hidden in it that made the trajectory of the sword hard to read and impossible to block, causing him to miss.
Elio who was close to becoming a Grand Sword Master was able to realized that instinctively.
But that was it.
Even he whose swordsmanship was outstanding among the Sword Masters was powerless in front of such a sword.
His own sword had already been shaken by the Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes.
Claclaclang!
He couldn’t properly stop the sixth strike.
From the seventh strike onwards, he was almost just forcing himself to block it.
He couldn’t even hold his sword by the tenth strike.
His sword’s trajectory shook, his arm twisted, and his grip on his sword was released.
Eleventh strike.
Twelfth strike.
He lost his sword but he tried to endure.
He tried to dodge by pulling his body back, but it was impossible. The prison of wind created by the sword strikes of Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes did not allow him to do that.
He was sucked in.
He was bitten by the teeth of the ferocious wind.
“AACK!”
He couldn’t even scream properly. The thunder swallowed Elio’s scream. The rough wind tightened around his body even more.
And Jude prepared for the last thirteenth strike. He pulled his sword-like hand filled with the energy of the black dragon, and turned his wrist to strike down vertically. Staring straight at Elio who had been imprisoned by the wind prison, he performed the last strike of Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes.
The true Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes.
Twelve strikes that prepared for the final slash.
He swung his sword-like hand.
He cut his opponent down.
But it wasn’t just a slash.
It split the atmosphere, the space, and the world.
Elio who was imprisoned in the wind prison collapsed with a silent scream instead of bleeding and splitting into two.
And as if to replace Elio, everything behind his back was split into two.
It was an instant, but it gave an illusion that the world itself seemed to split and crack.
“Haa…”
Jude exhaled as he stopped moving. The black sword he had created from the energy of the black dragon scattered and disappeared, and Jude coughed blood.
It was the price of forcefully opening the seventh door.
But Jude wasn’t that worried. His current body was able to endure such injuries. Rather, he was more concerned about something else.
‘The sword’s inner essence.’
What was contained in the Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes.
An illusion he saw in an instant, a power that only those who had reached the horizon of the sword could obtain.
It scattered and disappeared.
As if his strikes were a midsummer night’s dream, it left Jude’s hands.
But the feeling remained.
It was impossible to completely forget the swordsmanship he had unfolded with his own hands.
The road leading to the horizon.
The man who stood on that road.
The Sword of Wind that Jude received from that man.
[My successor! My successor!]
Valencia’s voice made Jude come to his senses.
It woke up his consciousness that was aimlessly floating around, and made him see reality.
“Cordelia.”
The most important person of his world.
Jude softly spoke and turned around.
And met the gazes of numerous people who were looking at him with stunned faces.
Dumbfounded elves.
Terrified demonic humans.
Cordelia blinked with her mouth wide open as she looked at him, and reflexively gave a thumbs up when she realized that their eyes had met.
Awesome.
My Jude is seriously awesome! Really awesome!
He could see Cordelia jumping from her spot as she let out her admiration. So Jude laughed. It was right after he had coughed blood, and he had used up all his energy into the Wind and Lightning Flurry Strikes, so his remaining strength was low. He said as he slowly raised his sword-like hand.
“Shall we continue?”
If Scarlet was next to him, she would have crossed her arms and asked him why he kept surprising people, but it looked completely different to those who were present.
The elves felt fear.
The demonic humans had already began to flee.
And Cordelia covered her mouth with her hand and began to tremble.
‘Y-you’re so cool!’
How can my Jude be this cool?
Kyaaa!
Cordelia who blushed because of her love filter was going ‘kya-kya’ in her mind, and the elves and demonic humans who could not overcome their fear began to disperse.
Some elves tried to take Elio who had collapsed, but all they could do was try.
The moment they made eye contact with Jude, they squeezed out their entire courage and opened their mouths, but Jude gave them a reason to run away.
“I won’t kill you. I don’t want to fight all the elves.”
At Jude’s words, the elven knights gritted their teeth and looked troubled before they turned around and began to flee.
And their reaction convinced Jude of one thing.
‘As I thought, it’s only Elio who betrayed.’
It wasn’t the will of all the elves.
Then, as he thought, they would be able to secure their safety once they got out of the Orange Gate that was under Elio’s jurisdiction.
‘He didn’t use the power of demons.’
Elio only used the power of spirits.
In other words, it meant that he was in a pure state without any contract with a demon.
‘As expected, he was deceived.’
He must have thought that the Chancellor he joined hands with was using the demon followers as his hunting dogs rather than the Chancellor belonging to a group of demon followers.