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Over the Infinite – Chapter 5 (6)

 

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Translator: mii

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I see, the limit was shortened because of the poison.

In addition, we could shorten it even more if we could do additional damage. The old man should be especially telling us to encourage us.

「By the way, uncle, I have a little question.」

「What?」

「Is poisoning just making damage to HP? …Usually, doesn’t it affect the body itself?」

Was it something that he should ask now?

I was also curious about that, but there wouldn’t be any effect on the current situation even if I knew that…

…No, this guy was buying time. …Really, this was also good. What an imprudent guy, do this more.

「…About that, it’s not like there is only one kind of poison. The effects of the poison as status abnormalities are all the same, but in addition to HP reduction, effects that don’t appear in the status will also get applied, depending on the type of the poison.

Actually, my power is still weakening now… eh, you brat! You’re buying time, right?」

「You’re too late to notice that, uncle!」

After saying so, Yuki threw something that he already took out to the ground.

It generated a lot of smoke the moment it was slammed to the grou… a smokescreen!?

「Uwoh, oi, you’re playing dirty!」

「You’re noisy, uncle. This is right as long as we win!」

Yuki threw something again at the old man who was surprised by the smokescreen.

「Gahh!」

It seemed like the old man whose vision was getting worse had been hit directly in the middle of the smokescreen. I couldn’t see him, but he screamed.

We moved quickly from that place to another place with thin smoke.

「Gyahhh!! I-it hurts! My eyes hurt! What the heck is this!! You brat, what did you do!?」

「They are eggs packed with lots of stimulants, nin nin.」

What’s with that nin nin, seriously. Why was he suddenly acting like a ninja anyway?

「T-this brat, I will ki- it hurtsss!!!」

I could hear the old man’s scream from the smoke.

We moved slowly in the smoke.

「Yuki, say what you like, but aren’t you a little bit too cruel?」

「There’s no damage done to him anyway. Won’t we earn one minute with this!」

Yuki shot a bow in pursuit. He’s really cruel.

「Uwahhh, that’s dangerous! What are both of you doing?!!」

「I will restraint him while moving around. When the smoke clears, we will fight.」

「Got it.」

Yuki disappeared into the smoke.

Anyway, what’s with this smoke ball? It produced a huge amount of smoke, really unbelievable.

Oh no, if I stayed here for too long, that old man would pinpoint my location. Let’s move away just in case.

－５－

After a while, the smoke began to clear.

There was more than a minute left until the time that the lizard old man was talking about, but it would be difficult to earn more time just by relying on the smoke.

In fact, I could see the old man’s appearance now. There were around three arrows stuck in his skin. They were probably Yuki’s doing. Also, there was something strange stuck on the old man.

How did he hit this old man even though he shouldn’t be able to see his target in the smoke? I said this several times already, by he was really amazing in a lot of ways.

「Fu, fufufu… I will kill you.」

The old man’s body changed color, probably because of the poison. But he didn’t seem to mind, his voice filled with anger.

Of course he would be angry. Even I would be angry if I was in his position.

But Yuki also did nothing wrong. He just took the means he could take.

Yuki was standing diagonally across the lizard old man.

Since it seemed like our opponent was weakened by poison, it would have been better to start attacking with Yuki at the same time, but I was worried about his various boosts.

This was probably the right tactic for me to stand in front of him with Yuki as the shortstop.

In fact, Yuki also looked at my position and appealed so… or that’s how I felt.

「Now then…」

We were back to the square one.

I held my tattered sword which was the result of exchanging strikes with each other and closed my distance with the old man.

「Ahh, both of you are not bad. That’s the right thing to do if you’re stalling for time. But this is the first time that I have been fooled by a rookie.」

「No, I’m not at fault here. He’s the culprit.」

「You’re also the same, you brat!!」

The old man jumped towards me.

His movement was not as brilliant as before, but his speed was much higher, probably because of the support magic.

His curved sword emitted full light as if he intended to kill me with the first strike. It was probably the so-called skill.

「Gwrahhh!!」

――Action Skill《 Power Slash 》――

The slash from this old man’s sword was indeed fast.

The speed of his sword was probably impossible to avoid by confirming the occurrence. At least, it was the case for the current me.

But it was a different story since I knew the strike that would come. I just needed to avoid it at the right time.

Although the speed of his slash was increased by his support effect, I still succeeded in evading his attack in my hair’s breadth.

By the way, if he had other option to use another skill or could increase his speed even more, it would be a game over for me even if I was struck directly like this.

This was a bet on the assumption that he could only do this much because of the restrictions. You could say that this was gambling that would only work on this test.

After I avoided the old man’s power slash just barely, I immediately swing my sword horizontally like scything down to him, so that I could clinch a victory at the counter that I have been aiming for.

The uncle was surprised. He most likely didn’t expect me to avoid his attack.

My attack in which I aimed for the short period of rigor after he activated his skill hit the old man and cut his HP. This was the first clean hit I did to him in this battle.

I couldn’t see how much HP did I cut from him so I wasn’t sure, but with this, I should have shaved out time even further.

「Ugh!!! …Well, this is definitely not the first time you saw it and I had no other attack variations, but how could you avoid it!!」

「No, it was only by chance.」

「You are obviously aiming at the counter!!!」

Alright, not only that this simple provocation worked, he was losing his cool. It would be helpful if he could lose sight of Yuki in this condition.

It was my job to fight him straight. Let’s make him look at me just like this.

I calmed down and gripped my sword.

There was no need for me to especially attack him first. As long as he was not bluffing about the poison, we would win if the time passed.

…Looking at his staggering state, it was hard to imagine that he was just bluffing. I felt somewhat apologetic in a lot of ways.

The old man was probably panicking because of the time limit, and he attacked me first. Although his speed and power were increasing, it was much easier to see it than at the beginning.

Perhaps thanks to the effect of《 Posture Control 》, my sense of stability of my posture when I was swinging my sword was increasing. I could even recognize the slightest change in posture that I hadn’t noticed before.

The skill effect of《 Sword Technique 》increased my accuracy furthermore, and I could recognize more accurately where to point and draw my sword.

Despite having my opponent as a veteran, I had become strong enough to be able to fight equally with the old man with restricted ability.

If he had no secret weapon, it would be over with just him exchanging strikes with me like this.

Of course it was not easy to overtake the wall of this old man’s sword, but I could also avoid him for striking fatal injuries to me. If he attacked me with desperate Power Slash, I would counter it.

Also, Yuki wouldn’t stay silent to our current state of antagonism.

「Haa!」

Just right after I thought of that, Yuki’s sword appeared at the old man’s blind spot.

I was antagonizing him alone. Yuki’s sword which speed was way ahead of me increased by one, no, two, and the old man wouldn’t be able to handle this anymore.

Despite them being two short swords, the two-sword style shouldn’t be a technique that could be mastered quickly, but he looked appropriate with it for the time being.

What made me think that we could do this now was probably because we already had the foundation and just lacked strength.

The wall of the old man’s sword, which seemed to be an iron wall at first, began to break down little by little with each of our strikes.

I understood this when we continued to attack him. This old man was a monster after all. We certainly hit him, but his thick HP and scales wall hindered our attack, and we couldn’t do any more clean hit.

Being able to persist with two people when his movement was growing full showed the old man’s abnormalities.

Don’t put out this kind of monster in a trial!

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