Ruler Vol 3 Chapter 17
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Author: Anit666
Editor: Weasalopes
【Sam’s POV】
“So be it. Now come at me, Demon King- no, Leticia Zi Lamperouge!”
“I am coming for you, Samuel Hayden!”
She screamed as she jumped and slammed her sword on the ground I was standing on a few moments before.
Why the fuck is she using her sword as a hammer? Please respect your weapons.
“This is the end, Leticia. So I hope you’ll give it your all.”
Haaaah. Although I gave her a warning just now, I couldn’t help but mentally sigh at the current situation. If I put aside all the burning emotions everyone is feeling right now, then practically speaking this situation is utter bullshit. What the heck am I even doing? I’m pretty sure there were other, easier ways to do this.
But my fundamental way of doing things prevents me from taking those easier options. I fight not to win, but to avoid defeat. And this- whatever the fuck this situation is- was the only option where the probability of defeat was lowest.
“You don’t need to remind me of that, Samuel!”
Leticia raised her voice as she collected mana to use a magic spell. In response to that, I used Demolition.
“What?!”
She exclaimed in surprise at the failure of her magic spell, which created a short window for me to attack.
“Godspeed.”
I used the magic which raised my speed and kinetic vision and lunged at her with my sword which she unfortunately parried beautifully. She jumped back to create some distance and I tried to follow, but a wall of stone rose from the ground in my path and stopped me.
“I see, so you can even dispel magic spells. Then what if I increase my casting speed huh?! Ultraspeed!”
Shouting out your plans to your enemy in the heat of the moment isn’t a really good idea, is it? Oh well, to each their own, I guess.
The wall in front of me crumbed revealing Leticia coming at me with full speed. The burning sword in her hand created a line behind her. She attacked me diagonally from above which I parried to hit the ground with minimal movement. As I cocked my gun at her abdomen and fired, she twisted her waist at an impossible angle to dodge it which in turn broke her stance.
I slashed at her from below but she tilted her head backward to dodge it. But before I could follow with another attack, two lances erupted from the ground aiming for my head which I dodged by jumping in the air. Unfortunately, the lances followed me in the air causing me to fall back even more.
Leticia regained her position swiftly.
“O Demon God, I beseech you to grant me the power to destroy all those who stand before me!”
And started the chant for a magic spell. A large grey magic Areia, the technical term for the magic circle or formation, appeared in the air in front of her. Leticia clenched her fist and stood before the areia in a position to punch it.
Shit! I tried to invoke Demolition once again but before the mana bullet could reach the magic one of the lances interfered in its path and cut the mana bullet, also disintegrating in the process.
Damn it, the lance was made of magic! It was not to attack me but to stop me from using Demolition!
“Hmph, I have seen through your trick. Now see what real magic is like. Extermination ray!”
Leticia then punched the areia from behind, causing the areia to glow furiously. The next moment, it fired an ashen-coloured beam from it. The air around it trembled as it made its way towards me.
“Goddamnit!”
I propelled myself through magic and got out of its way, but that fucking ray also changed its direction mid-air and followed me. Using all my might, I flew through the battlefield to escape from the ray but it was as tenacious as me. In fact, it was already catching up to me!
Why do all of her magic spells have a homing feature?!
The only way to escape from this was to destroy the areia that was producing this ray. Demolition wouldn’t work on an already completed magic, so instead I decided to break it through brute force.
So I used my strongest magic spell, the mass-energy conversion spell Schlachten. My target: the stones lying around the areia. But this spell needed a bit of time to cast, so I was left with no other choice but to fly around recklessly while preparing the spell. Finally, when the ray was just about to hit me, the spell was completed.
“Ha! Take this!”
I shouted in excitement- wait, excitement? And used the spell on a lone stone lying behind the areia. Lightning crackled around the stone.
“This is?!”
Leticia shouted in shock and quickly backed away from that place. Tch. The next moment, the stone glowed and turned into pure energy, which manifested itself as a blast of intense heat. The areia resisted against the explosion for a moment, but couldn’t withstand the sheer force behind it and disintegrated. With it, the ray following me also vanished and I heaved a sigh of relief.
But that relief was short-lived. The next moment, a large fireball came at me from the smoke and dust that had risen due to the explosion. Ah right, Leticia was still alive. I dodged the fireball which thankfully didn’t have any homing feature. But the moment the fireball passed by me, a black sword came out from it ready to slice my neck.
“What?!”
I ducked at the last moment but the sword still cut my hair.
“You still dodged that, huh.”
Leticia sighed as the fire around her vanished. What a vile woman: she suppressed her mana signature by covering herself in her fireball. I aimed my gun at her and fired, but her figure vanished. My battled senses honed to the very limit immediately found her and so I used a small explosion at my back to propel myself forward. Had I not done so, I would have been cleft in twain.
“Teleportation?!”
“Of course. But you still dodged that, barely.”
She smiled as she flicked her sword to wipe out my blood. My back had been slashed. Though the cut was shallow, and I had already healed it through Overhaul.
“Playtime’s over Samuel. I’ll be coming at you for real now, so at least entertain me.”
Playtime?
At that moment, she once again vanished. And once again, she appeared behind me. Since I knew that she was going to be there, I gripped my sword in a reverse grip and thrust at my back. However, the sword only cut thin air as Leticia was already in front of me, her burning sword on its way to poke a hole in my forehead. I twisted my neck to avoid the blow which caused my neck to creak in pain, but I still got my cheek slashed.
I backed off, ready for her to follow me. But she unexpectedly didn’t. Just then, I sensed a magic spell coming at me from behind. I turned around to intercept it, but the spell was faster.
“Arrgh!”
I groaned as lightning hit me, thus numbing me. From my half open eyes, I could make out Leticia standing on the ground with a staff in her hand, the magic stone on top of which was letting out an eerie crimson glow.
Her teleportation is really troublesome damnit! However-
“I see, is this your first time experiencing the cloning technique?”
A creepy voice whispered in my ear.
What?! Leticia was on my left, but the Leticia with the staff was also there. A clone?!
“It wasn’t a coincidence that I survived the fight with Balgaar, you know?”
As she said this, she slashed at my vulnerable back with her burning sword.
“Gaah!”
I was blown away from my position and plunged into the ground with a boom. Leticia’s attack had caused a deep cut to form on my back, but thanks to the fire from her sword my wound was cauterised. However, as I was regaining my balance, a large boulder dropped on me from above.
“Shit!”
I rolled around and barely escaped, but was once again blown away when the boulder fell. Shit! This was all the doing of the other Leticia who held a staff.
Wait, since it’s a cloning technique, the other Leticia ought to be made of mana. So, demolition should work on her. A bit expectant, I used Demolition on the Leticia-with-the-staff. However, nothing happened to her.
“Wrong! I am the real Leticia!”
She announced mischievously and hurled another lightning attack at me, which I nullified by using the same magic spell as hers.
If that isn’t the clone, then the one with the swords should be the one. My eyes swam to find her, which I did, but at my side.
Ah right, she still had her teleportation.
I thought as her blinding fast kick sent me flying once again. The kick was so strong that I vomited out blood. But while I was being blown away, I managed to cast Demolition on her.
“Wrong! I’m real as well!”
“Nani?!”
She shouted and followed me. She appeared above as I was still in the air and slammed her black sword (just how many swords does she have?) on me. I managed to protect myself, but was slammed into the ground in the process. Also, my right arm and sword had been broken.
I hurriedly used Overhaul to heal my arm, but the healing was definitely slower this time.
“Mana Zone.”
Leticia-with-the-staff murmured. Damnit! Mana Zone is a high-level magic spell which lets the caster control all of the mana in a specified area around them. No wonder my healing was slowed.
And so, using my left hand, I pushed myself to roll around to evade the ice lance closing in on me. I did evade it, but the moment it hit the ground I was on before it exploded and a terrifying cold air erupted from it, thus freezing the right side of my body.
I tried to melt the ice away but due to Leticia’s Mana Zone the things I could do simultaneously had decreased.
Fuck! This wouldn’t have happened if I still had the Tzeeneth with me! And I would have been able to use it if I had not fought Balgaar in that dungeon. Once again, fuck you Phiria!
As I was cursing the woman who got me in this situation, the Leticia-with-the-swords appeared beside me and kicked me in the guts, once again sending me flying, which conveniently put me outside the range of her mana zone.
I quickly healed my broken arm and thawed my right side and decided to back off a little to form a strategy. But both the Leticias were having none of it. The ground I was standing on caved in as if I were in a quicksand and my legs were submerged in it. The next moment, the ground hardened back and I was stuck.
The Leticia with the sword dashed at me from her place. But the next moment, a teleportation portal appeared in front of her and she vanished into it. And then another teleportation portal appeared in front of me.
“Shit!”
But it was too late. Leticia appeared from that portal with her black sword and thrust it into me. I barely managed to protect my heart and got ready to use Overhaul for the moment Leticia would pull out her sword. But she twisted her sword once, let go of it and stepped back.
But before I could pull the sword out, the mist surrounding the black sword invaded my body and my mana ran amok.
“Demolition?!”
This was the same magic as mine?! With this, my use of Overhaul was effectively cut off for a moment. Then the sword started vibrating, and it exploded while being lodged in my chest.
“Kheoakk!”
I threw up blood as the explosion destroyed my right torso and heart, and I fell down.
“Goodbye, Samuel. You can rest now. I’ll handle the rest from here.”
Leticia ruefully whispered and turned around. My vision started to fade as the imminent death was approaching and I fell down.
I am afraid.
I don’t want to die.
I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die!
I don’t want to-
⟦Stop acting, will you?⟧
A deep, nasty voice resounded inside me.
⟦Oya? Am I that bad of an actor?⟧
I was caught this easily?
⟦For me, yes. That’s why, stop acting and let’s get on with this.⟧
Maxwell sighed.
During my fight with Balgaar, I had died once. The first reason was that he had invoked the Ritual of Blood which rendered Maxwell unable to help me, while the second was that he had gone to extra lengths to make sure that I died.
Leticia had destroyed my heart, but I was still alive, even if only for a brief moment. And that moment was all Maxwell needed to invoke my original physical capabilities and heal me.
⟦ What a spoilsport. Fine then. Execute protocol alpha zero.⟧
This time, it was Maxwell’s turn to be surprised.
⟦The alpha zero? Are you sure?⟧
⟦Of course.⟧
⟦Fine. The alpha zero has been initiated.⟧
To be honest it’s commendable how Leticia managed force me to use the alpha protocol. But since the protocol has been initiated, I guess I have no choice but to ruthlessly destroy this pathetic farce.
Well then, time for a second round.
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