readbooksol Chapter 150 - 149 : Villain vs hero (1)
Chapter 150 - 149 : Villain vs hero (1)
Elizabeth’s fingers tightened around two throats at once.
Jasmine and Arina dangled in the air, toes barely brushing the broken ground. Their nails dug into Elizabeth’s wrists, but her grip felt like iron welded to their necks.
Arina could feel her lungs locking up.
Each breath came out shorter, thinner, as if the air was being squeezed out of her chest. The pressure at her throat spread upwards into her skull. Her vision darkened at the edges, sound muffling to a distant hum.
’If this keeps going... I’ll stop breathing,’ Arina thought. ’I have seconds. That’s all.’
She did not waste them.
She shoved the panic down, forced her focus away from Elizabeth’s cold eyes and the searing pain at her neck, and turned it inward.
Toward her blood.
Toward that strange, invisible barrier that had always answered whenever something charged at her too quickly.
Distance Rejection.
Up until now, it had always acted on its own, a passive shield that responded automatically.
This time, Arina grabbed hold of it with everything she had.
’Move,’ she thought. ’Now. Work. Reject her. Reject everything.’
Her bloodline roared to life.
For the first time, she did not allow it to wait for an incoming blow. She pushed it outward, forcing the repulsive force directly into the place where Elizabeth’s hands touched her skin.
A pulse shuddered through the air.
Elizabeth’s eyes widened a fraction.
She felt it—the sudden, violent build‑up of pressure under her palms and along her forearms, as if the very space between her and Arina was trying to snap apart.
"Oh?" Elizabeth murmured.
It happened in the next instant.
The repulsion detonated.
Both Arina and Jasmine were hurled from Elizabeth’s grasp as if launched from cannons. A shockwave blasted outward, catching Elizabeth herself at the center.
The maid shot backward.
She crashed through the outer wall of a nearby building. Stone and wood exploded into fragments. Her momentum carried her through an interior wall, then a third, each impact sending another burst of dust into the air.
Arina hit the ground and rolled twice, coughing as her body finally remembered how to breathe. Jasmine slammed onto her back, skidded, then scrambled onto her side, one hand clutching at her bruised neck.
For several breaths, the clearing echoed with nothing but their ragged gasps.
Jasmine pushed herself up onto one knee, chest heaving.
"Wow," she said between breaths. "That was... amazing."
Arina wiped the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand, feeling her pulse gradually stop screaming in her ears.
"It won’t work twice," Arina said quietly. "We can’t beat her like that again. She understands it now."
Jasmine’s eyes sharpened.
"I know," she said. "But I have a plan."
Arina looked at her.
"What do you need?"
"Just follow what I say," Jasmine replied. "And don’t hesitate, no matter what happens."
Arina held her gaze for a moment, then nodded firmly.
"Alright."
The two of them pushed to their feet and sprinted deeper into the forest‑city, weaving between shattered buildings and broken streets, mana flaring beneath their soles.
Behind them, the building Elizabeth had vanished into groaned.
Cracks ran up its facade.
Then the front half exploded outward.
Stone and wood blasted into the street as Elizabeth stepped through the cloud of dust, brushing a bit of debris from her shoulder. Her expression was no longer bored—it was cold and clearly annoyed.
Her crimson eyes tracked the fading figures of Arina and Jasmine.
’They’re running,’ she thought. ’Good. Makes it easier to separate them.’
She moved after them.
Her strides were unhurried, but each one ate distance in a way that made it feel like the city itself was shortening the path for her.
—
Arthur, still half concealed by a thick tree trunk, barely glanced at the collapsing building.
His attention was locked on the translucent system window hovering before his eyes.
[ Ultimate Scavenger System ]
Target Identified: Damian Stromborn
Detected System: Radiant Valor System
System Type: Heroism / Conviction / Combat Growth / Quest Rewards
[ System Analysis ]
Damian’s system feeds on heroic conviction and perceived justice.
Its main weapon is Valor.
The system does not measure true good or evil.
It responds only to Damian’s belief.
If Damian sees a target as evil, dangerous, monstrous,
or a threat to the innocent,
the system recognizes the battle as a heroic act.
Whenever Damian defeats something he personally perceives as evil,
or completes quests related to protecting the innocent, punishing villains,
or overcoming a perceived threat,
the system rewards him.
The greater the danger, importance, or "evil" Damian believes he has defeated,
the greater the reward.
Rewards may include Valor Points, stat growth, skill upgrades,
combat blessings, or new heroic abilities.
[ Extraction Condition ]
You can extract one random ability from the target’s system.
On fulfilling the condition:
• Damian Stromborn sees you as a lesser evil.
• You must deepen that belief until his conviction fully locks onto you.
• Eliminate Damian Stromborn before he eliminates you from this exam.
[ Completion Rewards ]
- Random Ability Extraction ×1
- Attribute Points +50
Arthur read through the text slowly, then let out a quiet breath that was almost a laugh.
"I knew it," he muttered. "That guy really does have a hero complex."
He glanced toward the distant clash where Damian and Victor were fighting.
’He only believes what he sees,’ Arthur thought. ’So I just have to make sure what he sees is me being the worst option in the room.’
He rolled his shoulder, feeling the lingering heaviness in his muscles steadily fading.
"How’s the bloodline progress?" Arthur asked in his mind.
The system responded at once.
[ Bloodline Assimilation progress: 94% ]
Arthur nodded to himself.
"It’s almost done," he said quietly. "I can already feel my strength coming back."
He shifted his stance, testing his legs. The world no longer felt like it was pressing down quite so hard. The drain that had hollowed out his limbs was slowly reversing.
He turned his attention fully to Damian and Victor.
From a distance, they were little more than streaks of red and black.
Up close, their movements would have been overwhelming to a C‑ranker—too fast, too sharp to follow with untrained eyes.
Damian wielded a spear, its shaft reinforced with glowing etchings, the tip wreathed in faint, burning light. Victor held a sword that seemed to drink in the color around it, its dark edge carrying a subtle, chilling pressure.
They met in the middle.
Spear and sword clashed with a sharp crack that sent a ring of force rippling out. Both boys grinned at each other through the rebound, eyes bright with the thrill of the fight.
Victor’s mana surged.
"Eclipse Maker," he murmured.
The world around them dimmed by a shade.
The ground trembled, then shifted.
What had been relatively flat earth twisted itself in waves—ridges rising under Victor’s feet, trenches forming where there had been none, jagged spires of stone tearing upward like fangs. Even the color of the soil darkened, as if a shadow had seeped into it.
Victor used the new terrain immediately.
He sprinted up a freshly raised slope, then hurled himself down it, sword arcing in a descending slash that used gravity itself to add speed.
Damian met him with a sharp, upward sweep of his spear.
Metal rang.
Sparks flew.
Instead of trying to overpower the force, Damian let it slide past, turning the block into a spin that carried him sideways along a jutting stone ledge.
Victor slammed his sword into the ground.
A patch of earth in front of Damian suddenly went slick and dark, turning into glasslike obsidian. At the same time, needle‑thin spikes erupted behind him, ready to impale if he retreated.
Victor lunged through the narrow gap he had created, blade darting toward Damian’s midsection.
Damian’s eyes narrowed.
Red aura flared.
He drove the butt of his spear into the ground and vaulted upward, using the slick surface as a springboard instead of a trap. His body flipped once, cloak snapping in the air.
He landed sideways on one of the stone spires Victor had created, balancing on a slanted edge as if it were flat ground.
Victor’s sword cut through the space where his torso had been a heartbeat earlier.
"Tch," Victor clicked his tongue.
Damian grinned down at him from the slanted pillar.
"Nice terrain," Damian said. "Mind if I borrow it?"
His aura pulsed.
For an instant, the flavor of mana in the air changed—not entirely, but enough that Victor felt the echo of his own power.
The ground rippled again.
A second wave of transformation passed through the battlefield. New ridges rose beneath Damian’s feet, forming ramps that led exactly where he needed them. Pits opened where Victor had been planning to step, forcing him to adjust.
Damian jumped down onto a ridge that had not existed two seconds ago and lunged, his spear thrusting with terrifying speed.
Victor was not surprised.
He had seen this trick before.
Copy Cat.
Damian’s talent.
The ability to copy any talent he witnessed, molding its structure into his own mana for a limited time.
If anything, it only made Victor more annoyed.
"Copying again?" Victor said, blade flicking out to deflect the incoming spear. "Have you ever tried fighting with your own power?"
Damian laughed.
"Have you ever tried not getting jealous every time someone is better than you?" he shot back.
Their weapons blurred.
Damian’s spear traced sharp, controlled lines, each thrust aimed either at Victor’s vital points or at the small irregularities in the terrain that might trip him if he misstepped.
Victor’s sword answered with elegant arcs, slapping the spear aside and countering with quick jabs aimed at Damian’s wrists, ankles, throat. He used Eclipse Maker to constantly mutate the ground—turning safe footing into sudden slopes, dragging up walls out of nowhere.
Damian adapted with frightening speed.
When the ground crumbled beneath him, he raised a stone plate of his own to step on.
When a spike shot up, he bent the nearby earth to turn that spike into a ramp, running along it and turning the trap into a vantage point.
Victor tried to corner him between a pit and a collapsing ridge.
Damian answered by reshaping the pit into a half‑pipe and using it to slide down, launching out of it with even more momentum than before.
Their auras collided with every clash—red and black energy flaring outward in rough pulses, kicking up dust and vibrating through the stone.
They were both smiling now.
Sweat clung to their skin, chests rising and falling faster with each exchange, but neither looked tired in the way ordinary fighters did. Their eyes were too bright. Their grins too sharp.
They were enjoying themselves.
Like two beasts who had finally found a worthy opponent.
From his vantage point, Arthur watched them, eyes half‑lidded.
’They’re insane,’ he thought. ’And annoyingly compatible.’
A new notification pulsed at the edge of his vision.
[ Bloodline Assimilation progress: 96% ]
Arthur’s lips curved slightly.
’Soon,’ he thought, gaze lingering on Damian. ’Then we’ll see how strong that heroic conviction of yours really is.’