At the time when Claire and the Boulder forces were thinning out the monsters.
The human and monster confrontation at the eastern border of the Kingdom of Astley had begun. The number of hostile monsters was less than ten thousand, which was also the number of human participants.
Claws and swords clashed on the plain right in front of the entrance to the Great Forest of Darkness. The strengths of both sides were almost identical, so it needs a balance breaker to break the stalemate between the humans and the monsters.
In front of thousands of monsters, Mylene Raevender stood with her relic-grade adamantite rapier, which she got from a dungeon, in her hand. Her legendary-grade weapon was hanging from her waist, but she could not waste its effects on a random target.
“Okay. I hope this sword could withstand this technique.”
Golden light enveloped the adamantite rapier of Mylene. Her tremendous fighting spirit materialized onto the blade of her sword, extending the length of its grasp up to a hundred meters.
She held her rapier upwards, and the blade’s radiance illuminated her spot, attracting the attention of both humans and monsters.
“Decimation!”
Mylene swung her hundred-meter blade at the swarming horde of monsters in front of her. The way she swung it was light, as if she were just swinging a normal-sized sword.
A single swipe of her elongated blade slew hundreds of monsters. All things that were in its way were smoldering to dust: monsters, trees, boulders, and so on.
But her attack didn’t finish in one swing. After clearing the first wave, Mylene jumped herself over the unrecognizable monster corpses and slashed her shining sword towards the monsters once more, taking another hundred monster lives.
Mylene repeated the process again and again until she successfully executed ten godly strikes, fragging the lives of more than five thousand monsters, or more than half of the hostile beings.
The lives her sword took could not be revived due to the power of the technique she used. The techniques of her Ultra Skill, Divine Sword Art, were imbued with soul damaging properties.
Decimation was a Level 3 technique of the Divine Sword Art. A technique that unleashes Sword Art Level 10: Heavenly Strike ten times in a row, with each strike smiting the soul.
“Good! My sword managed to endure it!”
Mylene felt happy to see her adamantite rapier still in one piece.
The last time she executed a Level 2 Divine Sword technique using an orichalcum blade, it was a failure. After the technique, the blade of her orichalcum rapier melted and deformed.
“The monsters have been annihilated, but we could find the reason why they formed an army.”
Mylene was baffled by the unnatural behavior of the monsters. If it remained unsolved and unattended, it would cause unnecessary damage in the future.
For that reason, Mylene set herself off from the battlefield and flew fast towards the forest, following the route the monsters tracked.
She left the remaining monsters to the soldiers and knights of Astley since she had already turned the table for them.
Mylene headed to the place where she and Claire first discovered the marching monsters. But what awaited her was a huge swarm of countless monsters. They were besieging an individual that seemed to be the mastermind behind the monster invasion.
“So that’s the one who was commanding the monsters. But getting any closer seems to be difficult.”
Mylene estimated the number of monsters to be around fifteen thousand, almost triple her previous battle.
But there were significant differences between this and the previous one. This time, the monsters were more organized; each individual imposed strength that was superior to the invading force.
The sheer number of monsters alone slightly uneased Mylene. No one with their minds would ever charge themselves all alone towards a lion’s den. But Mylene still wanted to move forward and confront the monsters.
Mylene was alone; her partner in life was still fighting in another country at that time. Without a comrade accompanying her, Mylene unhesitatingly flew herself towards the center of the swarm.
Only a few monsters managed to sense the presence of Mylene, who has been concealing herself up above the night sky. The mastermind, on the other hand, had noticed Mylene’s presence since she arrived.
Mylene hovered her body a hundred meters above the center, peering down on the countless monsters. She opened her palm upward and poured out a humongous amount of mana for her large-scale spell.
An enormous golden magic circle spread a kilometer above the ground. With a measurement of three kilometers in diameter, it is wide enough to cover the entire monster force.
“Blue Lightning! Superbolt!”
A beat later, an indefinite amount of lightning bolts rained down from the magic circle, directly hitting each lifeform below the influence of Mylene’s spell.
Each streak of light was, in fact, Level 8 Lightning Strike. In addition to her Blue Lightning, the temperature and voltage of each bolt were higher than what they were supposed to be.
Thousands of scorched and charred corpses of monsters surfaced once the dust and smoke subsided. More than a dozen thousand monsters were burned to crisps with just a single spell.
“What a powerful spell you have. So you are the one who has been annihilating my army.”
A voice resonated around the area after the subsidence of the Level 10 Lightning Magic spell. Mylene directed her full attention to the source of the voice to find a woman standing along with the surviving monsters.
“I never expected that someone would come and attack us directly. I admire your bravery, but you have to die for ruining the plan.”
As per the woman’s order, half of the thousand monsters, who had survived the first attack, shot their attacks towards the hovering Mylene.
Mylene effortlessly evaded and repelled all of them. She landed on the ground to conserve and restore mana; her last spell consumed over two-thirds of her mana reservoir, which she gradually felt depleted.
“Haaa!”
To conserve her stamina as well, Mylene refrained from using any techniques as she was dancing under the moonlight, killing every monster obstructing her way.
It did not take long for Mylene to wipe out all the A ranks, which comprised more than sixty percent of the swarm. All left was left were the hundreds of S-rank monsters that were guarding the woman, who was the mastermind behind the invasion.
“A very powerful magic swordswoman under a purple armor… You definitely fit the description of this so-called Sword Saint.
With just her mental command, all of the S-ranked monsters charged towards Mylene. The total strength of those monsters was too much for Mylene, which is why she immediately boosted her body.
“Purple Lightning!”
Lightning writhed her entire body as she dashed faster than high-hypersonic speed, slicing tough skins, scales, and exoskeletons in the process. Every time purple lights entered their visions, the monsters who saw them lost life.
“You’re strong, I admit it. But I am not going to let you do as you please.”
The mastermind and the SS-ranked monster, Fire Archdragon, which she has been riding, blasted into the sky. But as they peered down, an incredibly long, fast, and sharp wave rapidly approached them.
“?!”
The woman instinctively got off the hovering dragon hair’s breadth before the Level 9: Sky Tearer technique of Mylene scratched a deep cut on the tough ruby scales of the dragon’s throat.
The dragon dropped from the sky as the woman watched its fall. The woman hovered in midair using the pair of black feathered wings sprouting out of her back near the hips.
“So you are not an ordinary demoness at all; you are an evolved succubus! The legendary Nightmare!”
Mylene soared to the sky to face the Nightmare ready to strike her with her blade. But her adamantite sword was stopped by the weapon of the woman.
“What?!”
“Do you really think you are the only one who has a legendary weapon?”
The Nightmare’s weapon was tightly coiling around Mylene’s rapier. Mylene tried to pull off her blade but was shocked at the result; her adamantite blade was shattered to pieces by the Nightmare’s green whip.
“Who are you?! Why do you have that kind of weapon?!”
“Take this!”
The demoness lashed her whip at Mylene instead of answering her, which she evaded. Mylene unsheathed her legendary-grade weapon after losing the relic. The fight had become a battle between two legendary weapons.
But there were factors that pushed Mylene into a disadvantage; her opponent had the upper hand in the air.
No matter how fast Mylene maneuvered in the air, she couldn’t catch up to the Nightmare. Even if she activated her Purple Lightning and enhancements from Martial Arts.
Mylene couldn’t catch a glimpse of her opponent, who had been constantly inflicting damage on her. The speed of her opponent was way beyond her grasp.
Though it was still bothering her mind, the Level of her opponent. Mylene had leveled up to almost 1400 after she annihilated all the monsters that night.
Her opponent was around Level 1000, but her stats were almost double what her level was supposed to be, and they kept rising the longer they fought.
Mylene thought that her defeat was certain if their fight prolonged. Which was why she had resolved to gamble and risk herself in order to gain victory.
“Overdrive!”
Mylene resorted to casting a Level 10 Martial Art to boost all of her stats by twofold. Her flight speed dramatically increased as she pushed her body beyond its limits.
In addition to her Purple Lightning, Mylene managed to travel several hundred times faster than sound. With her utmost desire to surpass her opponent, her extra skill, “Supersonic,” underwent multiple evolutions.
<Proficiency fulfilled. Extra Skill: Supersonic successfully evolve to Unique Skill: Hypersonic.> ．
<Proficiency fulfilled. Unique Skill: Hypersonic successfully evolve to Unique Skill: Godspeed.>
After hearing that, everything around Mylene was slow. No, her brain activity has been racking several dozens of thousands of times faster than normal.
By making full use of these powers, Mylene was able to read all the movements of the Nightmare. It was only through this power that Mylene was able to chase her opponent and cut her down.
“How…?”
The Nightmare uttered her last word as the purple blade, which was enveloped in the golden aura of the Divine Sword Art Level 1: Soul Slash, impaled her heart from the back.