Soul of Negary
chapter-53

〖 Although my willpower has become solidified to the point that it would not change even after a hundred or thousand years, I still fully believe that my willpower is nowhere near enough to become the dominator of all things. Your character of persisting to your own beliefs no matter how much you are tempted is truly the thing I require most 〗

Negary looked at Smick and grinned: 〖 As a reward of my praise to you, I shall suppress my physical prowess and limit myself to only the limit of what a human can possess. I shall also not use my telekinesis abilities, if you can truly win against me, I will let you go, I might even consider cooperating with your king 〗

"Stop your lies!" Smick was obviously standing far away, but his voice came from right next to Negary.

〖 So you haven't learnt your lesson yet? 〗Negary's right hand morphed. The metal eating germs gathered at his wrist to form a pale-white blade that blocked an invisible weapon.

Negary suddenly tilted his head as a wound abruptly appeared on his face. The black germs underneath could be seen writhing as some white mist scattered to the air, but naturally, this wound was quickly healed.

"You managed to discover me thanks to the things floating in the air, didn't you?" Smick's voice came: "They exist everywhere, so even if I conceal myself, you can use their positions in the air to determine where I am and even my movements"

"But I've already seen through this little trick of yours, Negary!" Smick quickly retreated and revealed his figure again, at the same time, numerous more Smicks appeared out of nowhere.

"[School of Light], Light Illusions!"

Through channeling the rhythm of light, he created illusions of himself everywhere. At the same time, it wasn't as though the light couldn't deal any damage. While these Light Illusions appeared to be human, they would appear as bright miniature suns within one's perception, the rhythm of the light quickly burned all the germs that got close to the illusions.

"This way, you won't be able to tell which one of me is real" 10 Smicks stood at different locations and spoke at once. His voice also seemed to have undergone some sort of special alteration as one couldn't use it to tell where it was coming from at all.

〖 How impressive, Smick 〗Negary praised: 〖 Now, let me force you to exert more of your potential and bring out more taste in your soul 〗

Negary put his hand up as he walked towards the group of Smicks. He was actually keeping his promise and suppressed his body to the limit of humans, although he was still unimaginably fast, it was no longer so fast that one couldn't react to it.

The 10 Smicks advanced all at once. These illusions were very realistic, to the point that Negary couldn't tell who the real one was, the real Smick was among them, so one wrong move could cause him to be hit.

As the first Smick charged straight at Negary and swung his cutlass at him, Negary raised his arm sword to block, but that Smick simply passed right through, revealing it to be an illusion.

Taking advantage of when Negary raised his arm, the other Smicks all raised their cutlasses and attacked from different directions. Parrying one strike meant he couldn't parry another, and if he happened to choose the incorrect one, the real Smick would be able to attack the defenseless Negary.

But almost immediately, all 5 of Negary's left fingers exploded and turned into a liquid that accurately shot towards each Smick's head. All the liquids passed through without trouble, confirming that all these Smicks were illusions.

〖 So careful? 〗Negary commented, almost sighing. He already thought of this method of finding the real one as soon as he saw the illusions. If the real Smick was actually among those illusions just now, Negary would have landed a critical attack and taken his life without hesitation.

Smick didn't answer him, his 10 illusions quickly shuffled among one another, occasionally even overlapping and changing directions abruptly, obscuring the real one among the fake, then attacked from different directions in groups of 2.

Before confirming which was the real one, he had to treat it as if he really was fighting against 10 Smicks at once. A blade also grew from Negary's left wrist, allowing him to parry with both hands at once, any Smick that got close to him would be slashed first before they did anything.

As the illusions' attacks became more rapid and concentrated, Negary appeared to be occupied with defending.

His blade slashed at another Smick, after confirming that the blade passed through him without trouble, Negary pulled his hand back to attack another illusion, but this illusion continued to attack Negary with its cutlass. If one could pay close attention, they would notice that there was an overlap on this cutlass.

When Smick believed that he was about to win, Negary's body abruptly shifted, completely ignored all the illusions, blocked the cutlass with his left arm while his right hand thrust forward without hesitation.

At the very last moment, Smick noticed something was wrong and immediately adjusted his rhythm without hesitation, causing his body to shift its momentum and jumped backwards, half-crouching down and clutched the side of his hip, there was a wound about a fingertip deep there.

Seeing the blood on his blade, Negary shook his head. If Smick had reacted a bit slower, the blade at his wrist would've pierced through his heart and not his hip.

Smick glanced at the white bones beneath his feet, swung his cutlass and cut a piece of bone apart to see a piece of black flesh inside.

〖 Your illusions seem very real, but a fake is still only a fake. Among them, you were the only one that had actual weight 〗Negary smirked and explained: 〖 And so, I gathered a large number of germs inside the bones, making it so that even your Light Rhythm couldn't kill them all right away. When you stepped on them, the germs shifted and revealed your location 〗

Naturally, there was something else that Negary didn't explain to Smick. Smick's [School of Light] was completely useless against his field of perception, a simple change in light couldn't fool the field of perception.

Which meant that from the very start, Smick already had no chance of winning against Negary. He was purposefully orchestrating to the situation to make his opponent feel like that they could win if they tried just a little bit harder to trigger them into unleashing more potential, but in truth, Negary had always been in control of how the battle went, he already held both sides' trump cards tightly in his hands.

It was because he had this absolute advantage that Negary did something like purposefully triggering his opponent's potential and hold so much of his strength back. There was no such thing as a [Protagonist Aura] here, under the suppression of this world's misfortune attribute, the only thing that one could rely on was pure power and wit.

〖 So, Smick, go on, unleash more of your potential, I'm looking forward to it quite a bit 〗Negary grinned: 〖 Or you can give up right here and surrender yourself to me 〗

Smick continued to breathe and adjust his own rhythm, looked up at Negary, then stood up and prepared to fight once again. He wasn't willing to lose himself, so he chose to continue to fight.

It was this determination and persistence that caused Negary to grin even more joyfully.

1. for anyone who forgot, as a remnant soul, Negary perceives things with a field of perception instead of his organs and can manipulate the things inside, which manifest as his interference force.