Itto Shura

In the instant that the blade of light fell upon Ikki, he vanished. No, he just jumped fast enough while evading the light that he seemed to disappear.

Stella was dumbfounded after missing her target.

What was that, just now!?

Despite her surprise, she immediately attacked Ikki with a second swing. Katharterio Salamandra created a sword of heat that had no physical body, and it could reach a target more than a hundred meters away. It wasn't something a flesh-and-blood human could simply evade.

But Ikki did.

The second strike, and then the third. Here and there on the battlefield, Ikki kept moving like a windstorm between her flashing strokes, completely dodging each attack. His movements were impossible to follow. Forget her sword, even her eyes couldn't keep up with Ikki's speed. Eventually, Stella could no longer catch even a rough visual of his position.

"Kuh, what's with that strength!? How can you move like that all of a sudden!?"

"Because that's my ability. Just like how Stella-san can control flames, I also have an ability as a Blazer."

Ikki's ability was… doubling his physical attributes.

It was called the worst among all the abilities a Blazer could have, because even without the boosting of physical attributes, a Blazer could gain far more force or mobility by applying magic. Indeed, Stella had used such magic during this match, and her attributes had multiplied five or six times, not merely doubled. In other words, Ikki's ability was a downgraded version of what every Blazer could do just by using magic.

One could say that it was very appropriate for an F-Rank.

"That's a lie! Those movements, that's far more than just doubled! And besides, I've never heard of magic power also rising alongside physical strength!"

While swinging her sword of light, Stella made this protest. A release of magic power that could be seen by the naked eye, and then movements that couldn't? Such things weren't caused just by doubling physical attributes. Even if she was only talking about physical power, Ikki's had surely jumped more than ten-fold.

Ikki, still moving around like a windstorm while dodging Stella's sword, gave a small and boastful laugh at what she was pointing out.

"That's true, but I'm not using my ability the normal way. Instead, I'm using it at full power."

"Huh!? There's no way you would improve like this just because of enthusiasm!"

"No… I wasn't talking about enthusiasm, but the literal meaning."

"Eh…?"

"I've been thinking about this for a long time. Let's say you were to sprint a hundred meters after saying that you'll do it at full power. Even if you did as you intended, you'll still have spare energy afterward. I thought that was strange. If you really ran while using all of your strength, shouldn't it be weird to even stay conscious afterwards?"

How could that happen? The answer was because humans are alive, and living creatures instinctively want to preserve their lives, their instincts give top priority to survival. No matter how much a person pledges to use his full strength, his subconscious would never allow it. Even if he expends all energy, some amount would still remain so that his body continues to function. This limitation was hardwired into living biology.

Because of that limitation, humans didn't normally use even half of their stamina, strength, or magic power. It was an absolute rule.

But what if someone could break that absolute rule? What if someone, using willpower alone, could remove the limiter that keeps him from exerting his full strength?

"You… you don't mean―!"

"Yes. My magic power hasn't increased. I'm just tapping into power I couldn't before, after willfully exceeding my limitations."
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kki lacked talent more than anyone else, and he understood that fact better than anyone else. He couldn't close the gap between himself and a prodigy just by working hard, because prodigies also worked hard, and it was insulting to say that they won only by talent. Insufficient effort could widen the gap, but investing effort couldn't shrink it so easily. A difference in talent was that vital a factor, normally.

If he wanted to close the gap anyway, he couldn't be normal any longer. He had no choice but to become a Shura[9]. Ikki didn't avert his eyes from that truth. Focusing on this realization, he had discovered a way. To surpass talent, he could no longer leave any strength unused.

One minute was enough. It was fine to ignore what happened afterward, but for one minute he'd become strong enough to beat anyone.

That was the answer Ikki Kurogane found, so that his greatest weakness can defeat another's greatest strength. Intentionally using all of his vigor and stamina after breaking through his limits, it was a Noble Art that brought out all of his meager power for little more than one minute and multiplies that power several dozen times.

"Ittou Shura[10]."

Suddenly Ikki, who was moving around the arena with movements that could no longer even be tracked by human eyes, used his astounding speed to appear at Stella's blind side, and ended everything.

With a *slash*.

At a speed that could be neither dodged nor blocked, without even a chance to scream, Stella took a direct hit from Intetsu.

"Ah―"

She felt the ground under her feet dissolving, and then Stella's thoughts fell into darkness. It was a special kind of unconsciousness imposed by an illusionary fatal wound. Just like its name suggested, Ittou Shura felled the Crimson Princess with just one cut, and Stella fainted powerlessly.

"That's enough! Winner, Ikki Kurogane!"

Even though Kurono called Ikki's victory, and the stunning result stood before their very eyes, the students in the arena still didn't quite comprehend what had happened. All they could do was stare at the figure of the Failed Knight silently standing there.

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In response, Kirihara put up one final resistance. Drawing Oborotsuki so forcefully that it creaked, he faced the sky above and shot one arrow that had all of his magic loaded into it. A moment later, the arrow exploded in midair, becoming a hundred slivers of iron shining with light invisible to the naked eye. Overtaking Ikki as a sudden shower, they homed and poured down on him, drilling into and smashing the stone floor of the battleground, heaving it up and smashing it again.

There was no pattern to the destruction. The Noble Art Million Rain[11] was an attack of indiscriminate scope made of more than a hundred pieces of iron. Kirihara had concluded that if his thoughts were being read, he should carpet-bomb the area without thinking. The idea had to be correct, but even so―

"Why!? Why doesn't it hit!?"

―Ikki cleared away the invisible arrowheads, running through the destructive rain without slowing the slightest and darting through the rolled-up cloud of dust. In truth, he had already seen all of it.

"It's useless, you know. No matter how much you try to keep your heart clear, you want to beat me. You want to kill me. The urge for that frightened heart to shout its killing intent can't be restrained. No matter how much you want to attack with an unreadable mind, the killing intent dwells inside you."

And Perfect Vision accurately captured that intent. Attacking an enemy without consciously aiming to kill was a mental state taught by certain martial arts, but it wasn't a skill that someone like Kirihara could use. He had only increased the number of arrows he had shot.

"Whether a hundred arrows or a thousand, my Ittou Shura won't fall to such things!"

Every resistance was already meaningless. Like a superior player who predicts a hundred moves ahead, Ikki had already seen the endgame!