Child of Destiny

……

Thirio looked at Shin who was ducking down below him and currently in the middle of unsheathing his sword.

In that situation, he quickly activated his life-saving skill without any hesitation to save himself from that predicament.

Bang!

But despite his fast reflexes, he was still a little slower compared to Shin’s sword and was immediately sent flying by that attack. Though, he was still able to survive due to his quick response.

Bang!

-224, 522

A huge chunk of HP from Thirio’s health bar instantly disappeared as flew towards a huge tree nearby.

Bang! 𝑏𝑒𝘥𝑛𝑜𝑣𝑒𝘭.𝘯𝑒𝑡

The tree couldn’t withstand the impact of the collision and quickly fell to the ground. And while it was happening, Thirio was trying to pick himself up from the ground while shaking his head to shake off the dizzy that he was feeling.

Swoosh!

Unfortunately, Shin had no intention of letting him recover. Right after throwing the previous attack, he quickly stomped on the ground and launched himself forward to chase after his opponent.

And before Thirio could fully comprehend what was happening, a sword was already descending upon his head.

Fortunately, he was still able to respond in time and quickly raised his war axe over his head, blocking the incoming attack.

Bang!

The force accompanying Shin’s attack was so strong that it even forced Thirio to fall on his knees which created a spreading crack on the ground.

Gritting his teeth, Thirio tried to fight back the pressure that was pressing down at him. But to his surprise, Shin was now able to overpower him in terms of strength.

“How?”

Thirio’s eyes suddenly turned as he couldn’t believe what was happening. He was the one who should be overpowering Shin since his class focused more on strength, unlike Shin who needed to spread out his stats.

“This not possible!” shouted Thirio as he activated his two-fold berserk to enhance all of his stats.

Ahh!

And with a hoarse roar, he forced himself to stand up while pushing the sword that was pressing on him. He was successful but what came next was completely unexpected.

The sheath on Shin’s left hand suddenly turned into a longsword before he swung it the exposed waist of his opponent who just stood up.

Clang!

But instead of slicing his opponent into halves, his sword stopped right before it hit Thirio’s body as a thin layer of aura was preventing it from moving forward.

“Don’t take me as a fool! Now you are a dead meat!” said Thirio with a sneering tone as he pushed Shin’s other sword up before throwing a powerful swing downwards.

“I don’t think so,” sneered Shin in response while using the momentum of Thirio’s push to slightly turn his body to the side, barely avoiding the descending axe of his opponent.

Bang!

The war axe fell on the ground, creating a small crater on it alongside a loud explosion. The mixture of dust and rock debris few up, engulfing both Shin and Thirio within.

Swoosh!

Thirio was surprised at Shin’s actions but that didn’t halt his actions and quickly raised his war axe and swung it horizontally which created a strong gust of wind the cleared cloud of dust.

He was also trying to strike Shin with that swing since the latter was just standing in front of him. But to his surprise, Shin was nowhere to be found when the cloud of dust was cleared.

“What?” he frowned his eyebrows when he saw that and quickly looked around, trying to find his opponent.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t find Shin no matter how much he turned his head.

Then, all of a sudden, an intense chill ran through his back as he heard a voice coming from behind. “Is this all you can do?”

Thirio quickly spun around and swing his war axe right after he heard that voice.

But just like earlier, Shin was no longer standing in there since he was already standing behind his opponent once again. “I must say that I am disappointed. I heard that you are a Messenger of the cult, but your skills are no way near Immortal.”

“Ahh!!!”

The veins on Thirio’s temple quickly tightened when he heard those words and quickly stomped on the ground with all of his strength.

Boom!

A powerful shockwave was immediately sent in every direction right after his foot landed on the ground. And at the same time, a huge crater was created on the ground and continued to spread outwards.

When the shockwave lost all of its power and the crater stopped growing its size, Thirio was left alone standing in the middle of a devastated land.

Ta-ta!

In the meantime, Shin landed at the very edge of the crated and looked at his opponent. And after a few moments of silence, he continued his provocation. “I guess I hit the mark.”

“Tell me, will you get kicked out of your position when the other Messengers arrive in this place?” asked Shin, trying to fish out some information.

Swoosh!

And in return, Thirio threw his war axe at Shin as if it was a boomerang.

Clang!

But despite the strong force accompanying that axe, Shin was able to deflect with ease.

“Heh!”

Then he started grinning from ear to ear as he was able to confirm two things from Thirio’s response.

First, the Corrupted Cult indeed had reinforcements coming. And with that, it was pretty clear that they were putting a lot of importance on this operation. This could also mean that they knew what was behind the towering wall of ice at the border of the Sky Deceiving Valley.

Aside from that, Shin was suspecting that the cult would send a couple of their Messengers to ensure the success of this operation.

It was just a suspicion at first, but after seeing how enraged Thirio was, Shin was now sure that it was indeed the case.

‘I wonder who are they going to send here,’ thought Shin to himself. He was not familiar with the experts of the Corrupted Cult but based on what he heard from Arthur and Shiella, the players who had the position of ‘Messengers’ in that organization were pretty strong.

But despite having a reliable information network, Shiella still couldn’t get all of the information regarding the Corrupted Cult. But from what she knew, there was still a ranking among the messengers and Immortal was one of the examples of those guys who ranked on the top.

“I guess that is more than enough for now. It is going to be troublesome if this guy manages to get away and regroup with the other experts of their group,” muttered Shin as he looked at Thirio as if he was nothing special anymore.

After his little duel with Zero that made him reach the state of being one with that sword, he felt that he would no longer lose even against Arthur and Leonard.

He was still trying to adjust himself to that state, so was not sure if he could defeat the two, but he was confident that he would be able to hold himself against them properly this time.

Because of this newly found strength, someone like Thirio no longer piqued his interest.

“Alright, it is time to wrap this up,” he muttered before disappearing from his current position.

*********

Meanwhile, the online forums exploded once again due to a piece of news that was recently posted there.

The players would naturally become interested in that post since its title was quite eye-catching. – “The brewing storm within the Saint Heaven Kingdom.” –

At first, they thought that it was just an update on the ongoing war between the Wing’s Alliance and the HeadHunter Guild. But after reading its contents, they immediately realized that it wasn’t the case.

On the other side of the Saint Heaven Kingdom, on the place that was opposite to the ongoing war, another huge battle was taking place.

The first phrase quickly piqued the interest of the players and started diving into it.

Not no long after, the faces of the players who read that particular post suddenly turned weird because of the particular group that was discussed in it.

Empyrean Talons.

These guys were at it once again!

But despite the ‘complaints’ that they had inside their heads, those players still continued at reading the article and quickly discovered that it was a battle between the Corrupted Cult and the Empyrean Talons once again.

But this time, the battle was no longer between just the two of them. They now had an alliance that could shake the balance of the game.

The Corrupted Cult teamed up with the Hydra Guild and the Blood Carnival. The purpose of their alliance was still not clear but it seemed like it concerned the Sky Deceiving Valley at the border of the Sky Deceiving Valley.

Meanwhile, the other side was the combined forces of the Hand of Midas, Assassin Union, and Empyrean Talons. And on top of this, the post even said that the Sword God Zero was also working with them.

The post immediately exploded and attracted a lot of attention.

But it didn’t last long as it was immediately buried by a particular battle video that Miss Bunny had recently posted.

……