“Tch! Yaaargh!”
“Hah. That’s a mighty sharp point you got there.”
“Hurrgh!”
“Come on, you’ve almost got me.”
After Colbert dodged his first attack, Hilden intensified his assault. His rapid stabs were powerful and violent, and I could easily see him perforating an ogre. But the crowd went wild when Colbert dodged Hilden’s stabs with a single step. You would think that Colbert was pressured into playing a defensive game, but you would be wrong.
Colbert was still completely calm, while Hilden looked more frantic with each missed strike. As stuck-up as the aristocrat spearman was, he knew that he was outmatched. Understanding this, Hilden shouted with rage.
“Aaaargh! You damned adventurer!”
“Huff.”
“What?!”
Hilden brought his spear down on Colbert’s head, but his frustration made him easier to read. Colbert blocked the tip of his spear with his right elbow. He didn’t even need to dodge to begin with. Their difference in ability was like the difference between an adult and a child. Colbert used the momentum of Hilden’s spear to drop into a fighting stance. The knight had nowhere to run.
“Doesn’t matter if you’re a knight or an adventurer. Strong is strong,” Colbert stated before driving his fist right into Hilden’s solar plexus.
“Oomph!”
The punch sent the larger man flying across the arena with a loud thwomp. Impressive, considering that Hilden was decked out in full plate armor. The scene was familiar to us. We did it all the time.
“Get stronger before you start talking trash, punk.”
“Urk…”
Colbert won the match with a ring-out and a knockout.
He really is strong.
Yeah. Fast, too.
Aside from that, he fought like an orthodox martial artist.
He focused on dodging his opponent’s attacks instead of blocking them, and exploited the gaps in their defense with his fists. Our main problem was going to be figuring out a way past his evasion.
Amanda was up next.
“She has annihilated all her opponents with a single stroke so far. Will Amanda the Hariti do it again?! Her challenger is a hulking mass! His body is his introduction! The C-Rank with the strength of a B-Rank: Wicked Arm Shin!”
The crowd applauded the giant of a man. Gaudartha was big, but Wicked Arm managed to be even larger. At over three meters tall with muscles bulging all over his body, he looked more ogre than human. He might actually have been, too, since he was apparently a half-beast. Perhaps one of his parents was a rhino beastman like Gaudartha. As his nickname suggested, his arms were as thick as tree trunks.
“Bwa ha ha ha! Puny woman. I can crush you with my bare hands!”
“Are you saying you want to touch me? What a nasty thing to say.”
“Hah! That’s what they all say! They all call me big and slow! Well, I’m big, but I’m a lot of other stuff, too!”
Shin wasn’t exaggerating. He had high HP and Defense and was decked out with Harden, Regenerate, and Rush—there was no stopping him once he made his charge. Shin could rush his opponent, knock them down, and bring them to a swift end with his gigantic hammer. I couldn’t imagine how much that hammer weighed. The groove it left as he pulled it off the ground was as deep as a ditch. Even an A-Rank would have trouble dodging that, but Amanda maintained her calm smile.
“Well, you sure sound confident.”
“Har har! I can’t wait to hear your screams! All the women I’ve fought squeal good when I crush them!”
“Ugh…why do I keep getting matched up with weirdos…?” Amanda groaned as she readied her whip.
She maintained her cool, but a storm was building up behind her words. I didn’t think any woman could keep her cool for long after being mocked like that.
The commentator signaled for the start of the match. “Begin!”
“Ha ha ha! You think that tiny whip can penetrate my thick muscles?!”
Shwoop! Thwack! Poof!
“Wha?”
Shin was dumbfounded. He looked at his hands, wondering where his giant hammer had gone. A heavy thud came from the stands followed by the panicked screams of the audience. Amanda had sent the hammer flying right into the wall. A single crack of her whip was enough to fling it all that way! I knew Amanda was good, but this was ridiculous. Then again, she was able to deal significant damage to the giant Linford back in Bulbola, so this wasn’t even close to her full strength.
“Wh-wha—”
“Now, let’s see how long you last.” As Shin was still processing what had happened, Amanda cracked her whip.
“Gah! Ack! Oof!”
“Come on, now!”
Ten seconds passed, and a bloodied mass of meat lay twitching in the center of the arena. Amanda hadn’t moved an inch. She was whipping up a Mach Five storm. Shin had no way of escaping or blocking her lashes. He was forced to take all of them head on.
“I guess you really are big and slow.”
Amanda was strong. That was not news.
Amanda’s so good!
She is.
The match lit a fire in Fran’s heart, but considering her love for battle, it only added fuel to the blaze. The round continued to the final match of the day.
It’s between Elza and a guy named Jakusho.
Amanda hadn’t won her block yet. Elza was still in play. Now there was a fight we wouldn’t miss.
“Our next contender comes all the way from the far eastern continent of Capur! Hailing from the Hagane archipelago, a swordsman who has dedicated his life to battle: Jakusho!”
Hagane archipelago? I’d never heard of it. Jakusho looked like a samurai. I had seen people clothe themselves with something like a hakama, but Jakusho looked like a ronin right out of a Kurosawa Akira film. He was thin-faced, wearing a long sleeved haori over his shoulders. The black haori looked quite dashing paired with the light blue kimono underneath.
He’s using an actual katana, too. That 500 Attack value is no joke.
His blade was
