Kido Shinji’s eyes snapped open.
He found himself standing on an incredibly familiar street—the very street below his apartment building!
But… it was completely different.
Everything around him was reversed, whether it was text or images.
There were no pedestrians, no vehicles; the world was terrifyingly silent, even the sound of wind had vanished, leaving only his own heavy breathing and his heart pounding like a drum.
“Where… where is this?” Paul looked around blankly, a chill creeping from his bones.
Click… Clack…
A chilling sound of huge joints rubbing together came from not far away!
Kido Shinji whipped his head around, his pupils contracting sharply!
Right next to the entrance of his familiar apartment building, Momoi Reiko’s conspicuous yellow car was parked quietly.
And beside the car, a colossal creature covered in cold, dark green metal armor was slowly approaching the vehicle.
This monster was exactly the giant spider monster he had seen in the rearview mirror!
It raised a huge, glinting scythe-like limb, lifting it high and aiming it at the driver’s seat.
“Reiko Senior—!!” Fear was utterly consumed by instantly ignited fury.
Kido Shinji let out a bestial roar, his body entirely driven by instinct, rushing towards the terrifying monster without a second thought.
“Bastard! Get away from her!”
He was like a human cannonball, swinging his fist, charging with a suicidal madness at the monster’s limb, which was thicker than his entire body.
Bang!!
A dull Tackle sound rang out.
The expected agonizing pain of broken bones and torn muscles did not come.
Kido Shinji looked down in astonishment, realizing that at some point, he was covered in a thick, grey and white armor.
His fists were also encased in metal gauntlets of the same material.
What was this armor?!
As this thought flashed, an irresistible, immense force, like a speeding truck, slammed into his chest.
“Ugh—!!”
Kido Shinji felt as if his internal organs had shifted, and he was thrown high into the air like a softball hit by a baseball bat.
The grey and white armor cut a pathetic arc through the cold air.
Boom!
He crashed heavily onto a pile of discarded metal trash cans, the immense impact causing the twisted bins to emit a series of piercing wails.
The intense pain made his vision blacken, almost suffocating him.
“Hiss—ha—!”
The spider monster let out a triumphant and cruel hiss, its crimson compound eyes Lock-On to this overconfident intruder, its massive body approaching with an earth-shattering Aura, crushing towards Paul, who was sprawled in the trash heap.
The stench of death assailed him!
Kido Shinji struggled to get up, but his body felt like it had fallen apart and wouldn't obey, so he could only watch as the huge scythe-like limb rapidly grew larger in his vision.
Whoosh—!
A black shadow, like lightning tearing through the night, with an incredibly sharp Aura, suddenly cut in between Paul and the monster.
Clang—!!!!
An ear-splitting clash of metal, loud enough to tear eardrums, exploded.
Sparks flew like fireworks.
The scythe-like giant claw, which was about to sever Paul’s head, was forcefully blocked by a jet-black long spear.
The Black Knight!
He was covered head to toe in streamlined, dark blue, almost black armor, with sharp angles on either side of his helmet, like bat ears, pointing to the sky, and his compound eyes glowed with a cold, icy blue light.
He held the huge Wing Spear with both hands, firmly blocking the spider monster, which was several times larger than him, without even taking a single step back!
The spider monster was enraged by this sudden, powerful obstruction, letting out a deafening roar, and its other scythe-like limb swept violently towards the Black Knight’s waist with a piercing shriek that tore through the air.
“Hmph!”
Night Knight snorted coldly.
Moving like a ghost, he flipped his wrist, and the huge Wing Spear, like a weightless toy in his hand, cut a sharp arc.
Clang!
Another explosion.
The monster’s second attack was precisely deflected.
Night Knight stepped and spun with the momentum, the tip of the Wing Spear, like a venomous snake’s tongue, leaving a faint blue afterimage, striking with the speed of thunder towards the relatively vulnerable connection point of the spider monster’s compound eyes on its head!
Pfft!
The spear tip plunged in hard! Dark green, viscous liquid immediately gushed out!
“Hiss-ga—!!!” The monster let out an earth-shshattering shriek, its massive body twisting wildly, and with immense force, it violently flung Night Knight along with his Wing Spear!
Night Knight used the momentum to backflip, landing steadily, his dark blue armor like an indestructible piece of ice in the grey and white world.
“Don’t get in the way!” His cold voice came through his faceplate, a warning and an expulsion.
Kido Shinji, sprawled in the trash heap, watched dumbfounded, and after a moment, as if self-taught, he reached for his waist and pulled out a card.
The card depicted an ancient-looking longsword.
He instinctively inserted the card into the grey summoner slot on his left wrist.
Sword Vent! (Sword Read!)
As the sound rang out, a light suddenly flashed in the sky, and a longsword fell sharply from the sky, landing in front of Kido Shinji.
Looking at the longsword in front of him, Kido Shinji picked it up without the slightest hesitation.
“Oh oh oh!!”
Kido Shinji’s confidence surged, as if he had found his backbone. He gripped the longsword with both hands, its tip pointing directly at the giant spider monster in front.
“Monster! Die!” He let out a powerful shout, taking large strides and charging like Don Quixote.
Night Knight had just absorbed the monster’s impact and stabilized his stance when he saw this grey and white rookie Knight holding a sword, shouting some unclear slogan, charging straight at the giant beast!
“Idiot! Don’t go!” Night Knight’s roar carried a hint of exasperation.
But it was too late.
The enraged spider monster suddenly whipped around, its huge forelimb covered in thick armor, swinging with terrifying, sweeping power.
Time seemed to slow down at this moment.
In Kido Shinji’s eyes, that massive leg, thicker than his waist, with barbs and a metallic glint, rapidly grew larger in his vision like a collapsing giant pillar…
He didn’t even have time to make any blocking or dodging movements.
Bang—!!!!!!
A dull, heart-stopping Tackle sound rang out.
The longsword in his hand snapped in response, and the grey and white figure, like a baseball hit for a home run, once again turned into a miserable meteor, flying back towards Night Knight, who had just stabilized himself, at ten times the speed it had charged out.
Night Knight’s icy blue compound eyes clearly reflected the approaching “human cannonball,” without the slightest hesitation.
Just as the grey and white “cannonball” was about to hit him, Night Knight held his spear and blocked with all his might.
The angle was precise, the force ample.
The target was—the “cannonball’s” side waist.
“Bang!”
A sharper, duller thud.
“Whoa—!”
Paul only managed a short scream of agony, his original linear flight path instantly forcibly twisted ninety degrees!
He was like a soccer ball powerfully kicked, with an unstoppable Aura, slamming hard into the wall of an office building on the roadside.
…
On the edge of the rooftop of a taller building across the street.
You Hong sat there leisurely, already clad in platinum-gold armor.
“Pfft… Haha…” Seeing Kido Shinji’s classic scene, You Hong burst into laughter.
He then looked at the completely broken longsword in Kido Shinji’s hand and sighed.
“Truly the best sword in the village.”