Chapter 136: Vlad vs Puppet Knight
The dark ceiling with embedded glowstones was the first thing Vlad saw as his eyes slowly opened.
"My arm!" he shouted, jolting to a sitting position, his head snapping to where his arm was severed. It was there, attached to his body as if it had never been cut in the first place. The diagonal slash on his torso, the injuries on his legs and face, everything had been healed with no mark left behind.
It didn’t take Vlad much thinking to understand how he had fully healed, his eyes shifting to the silver bracelet he wore. "It must be because of this artifact."
The puppet was standing still a few metres away from him with its one arm extended forward, the sword slicing the ground beneath while its one leg was lifted high in the air. It was the exact same posture it was in when it last slammed into Vlad.
His brows furrowed, his fist tightening as the humiliating defeat replayed in his mind.
Taking a few seconds to pull himself together, he noticed that the large circular ring on the stone floor, which was glowing when Vlad was fighting the puppet, had also vanished.
He cautiously stepped forward to confirm a theory. After a few steps, the floor glowed in a circular ring again and the puppet activated, rushing at Vlad in an instant.
He immediately stepped back, outside the ring. The glow vanished and the puppet stopped again.
"So it only attacks when I am inside the ring," Vlad murmured, confirming his doubts.
He moved back and sat leaning against the wall, his eyelids half open, eyes fixed on the ground below.
"What have I been doing till now?" he muttered, his voice slightly cracking. "Weakling... I am a fucking weakling."
He punched the ground in frustration. It was the same shitty feeling he had back then.
"Can you do it, runt?" the voice echoed in his mind again, the same arrogant words that he had never once forgotten. "It is the only way you can have what you want. Tell me, kid... can you become the Legendary Knight?"
His eyes suddenly opened, his knuckles cracking as his nails dug into his palm.
He slowly rose to his feet, muttering, "It was never about ’Can I’. It was always ’I must’."
He drew the Dark Heart from his storage ring, an abysmal mana spreading on the blade from his arm, hiding the steel inside. Shadow-like flames emerged from the weapon as he stepped inside the ring.
’It’s only a puppet,’ Vlad murmured to himself, calmer. ’Although all of its sword strikes follow a different path, in the end, it’s a machine with a fixed number of patterns.’
His crimson eyes fixed on the puppet as it dashed at him at an incredible speed. ’I just need to analyse all of its patterns and find its weakness.’
Not even for a second did Vlad remove his gaze from the incoming swords.
The hall continued echoing with the sound of metal clashing and steel slicing through skin and bones. In less than an hour, Vlad was kicked out of the ring by the puppet after the sword pierced through his abdomen.
This time when Vlad woke up, instead of immediately rushing at the puppet, he sat cross-legged on the floor and closed his eyes.
Every moment the puppet had taken, the way it moved, the swing of its swords, the decisive move that defeated him, replayed in his mind together with the counter he could have come up with.
Only his talent with mana was low. His greatest strength had always been his ability to analyse a battle, identify his mistakes, and adapt faster than his opponents. The same ability was the reason Vlad first won the spar against Chloe after one hundred and fifty-two defeats. After that victory, he won most of the countless spars he had with her.
After about ten minutes, he opened his eyes, grabbed the sword, and went inside the ring once more.
Even though he still could not manage to land any meaningful hit, this time the battle lasted longer, defeating him with a pattern completely different from the previous ones.
Thanks to the bracelet he had, he was not worried about the injuries he suffered. Still, he tried to avoid them as much as possible. If he adapted to this bad habit of letting himself get injured just to have a chance of landing a hit, it would be fatal in the real world, where he wouldn’t be able to regenerate. Not to mention, the wounds, although they could heal, still hurt, and Vlad was not a masochist.
---
"It’s an incredible puppet," Vlad said as he woke from meditation, rising to a standing position. "I have fought it for a hundred and seven times, yet its sword path remains unpredictable. What might be the skill of the person who made this puppet?"
Over the past five days, Vlad had learned a few things.
When his injuries become too fatal, the puppet always throws him out of the ring instead of killing him.
The time it took for his injuries to heal depended on its severity. Still, even the most fatal wound was healed within less than an hour.
But the most important discovery was... Vlad could clearly feel that he was improving, yet the reason his blade still could not reach the puppet was because... the puppet was also growing stronger. Or more accurately, it was not fighting Vlad at its full potential. As Vlad improved, it was gradually unveiling more of its strength, always remaining just beyond his reach.
"Let’s see how far you can increase your level," Vlad declared as he stepped inside the ring, now holding Éclair in his hand. He was continuously switching between the two weapons to hone both his Umbra and Electro Mana.
It was only on the sixteenth day of the second month since Vlad had entered the dungeon that he finally managed to land a meaningful hit after countless duels.
The crimson lightning flickered around his forearms as he blocked all six blades that came at him at incredible speed, guiding each of them away with precision to create a slight opening. The speed of his swings had increased beyond the capabilities of his physical body thanks to the new application of electro mana he had learned. He could increase the movement of his arms by channelling the electro mana through them. Although this method, combined with Mana Blade and Lightning Steps, consumed a lot of his low mana reserves, it was the only way he could manage to keep up with the blinding swings of the puppet.
His strategy succeeded. A brief opening appeared at the chest of the puppet. He didn’t miss the opportunity. Channelling all of his remaining electro mana into his arms, he thrust the sword forward.
The tip struck the puppet knight square at the centre of its chest, followed by the loud sound of metal meeting metal.
"Y-you gotta be kidding me," Vlad gasped, his eyes widening in shock.
Forget about stabbing through, not even the outer layer of the puppet’s armour was damaged even though the sword was laced in Mana Blade.
What followed next was even more brutal. A rune that was not there before began glowing at the helm of the puppet. The mana on one of its arms increased terrifyingly, turning sharper, more oppressive, and greater, reaching double the size of the blade.
"S-sword Aura," Vlad exclaimed, the mana extinguishing from his blade as he had already used most of it in his last strike.
The puppet raised the sword covered in Sword Aura as Vlad whimpered, "Senior... have some mercy."
Bam!
Dust and debris flew everywhere, followed by the flying body of Vlad, his torso going to one side and his severed legs to the other.
---
"The fuck? It can also use Aura," Vlad shouted in exasperation as he rose to a sitting position. His gaze shifted to the puppet that stood menacingly in the ring as he continued, gulping, "since it has activated Aura on one sword... does that mean it can also cover the other blades in Sword Aura as well?"
The thought alone sent chills through him, and why wouldn’t it? It was draped in indestructible armour that could not even be damaged by Mana Blade. If the other blades could also be laced in Aura, didn’t that mean he had to fight six Sentinel Knights at once?
"I understand now," Vlad murmured as he rose to his feet. "The first floor of the Ascension Dungeon was designed to teach me Mana Blade. This floor... is meant to teach me Sword Aura."