Sword Master With One Strike Kill - Chapter 167

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

One-Strike Kill Swordmaster Episode 167

Episode 167. Outsider Hunt (4)

* * *

The Imperial Palace was engulfed in darkness.

A massive shadow completely covered the sky.

The Outsider’s shell twisted the entire space with its mere presence.

Kuguuuuuu──!

The air grew heavy and oppressive.

Even breathing became difficult.

My stomach churned, and my head felt like it would split apart.

The overwhelming pressure that pierced even my ‘MAX’ mental strength seeped into my very soul, inducing fundamental despair.

Ding, ding, ding-!

〔Mental Strength ‘MAX’ cannot resist the opponent’s overwhelming pressure.〕

〔Cannot resist.〕

〔Cannot resist.〕

“….”

Right.

The Great Ones hadn’t abandoned this land and fled to the Heavenly Realm for nothing.

A world that even gods had turned their backs on. A world where everything had surrendered before the apocalypse.

Endless darkness devoured everything. Overwhelming despair blanketed the world.

Even the survivors could only resign themselves to fate.

『Overflowing monsters. A world where all of humanity’s great civilizations had fallen.』

That ashen reality whispered to me.

To give up. To run away. That there was no need to endure any longer.

‘But….’

Clench-!

Even if the entire world forced me to give up.

‘…I will never fall.’

─I swear that all my future actions will follow this premise.

To be precise.

I couldn’t fall.

─I will save this world from the apocalypse.

Running away in the face of the apocalypse itself would violate the sacred oath.

Above all, the oath was the reason I had been summoned to this world.

Clench-!

I gritted my teeth to the very end.

With all my strength, I gripped the Feather Sword and stared directly at the despair that even gods had turned away from.

‘3, 2, 1….’

And then.

The moment the countdown I had been keeping since entering this trial finally reached its end.

“Pean.”

…I muttered in a low voice.

“Now.”

Kuuuuuung──!

A thunderous roar as if the sky was collapsing.

It was finally the signal that the「Heavenly Laws」had been established.

Simultaneously, the world was plunged into pitch darkness.

A darkness different in nature from the Outsider’s shadow that had covered the Imperial Palace.

It wasn’t simply the absence of light.

Complete nothingness where no sound, color, or even warmth existed.

A silence where everything had been erased quietly blanketed reality.

A space created by a heretic who had lived with darkness for thousands of years. A sanctuary of silence that no being could invade.

Pean the Sword Master.

It was the moment his Transcendent Spirit was being unleashed.

* * *

Outsiders are beings that transcend the laws of the world.

However, the moment the Heavenly Laws are established is an exception.

Before the absolute binding force that banishes divine power outside the Lower Realm, even the mightiest Outsider must have their power temporarily constrained.

That moment was exactly what we needed to target.

─The moment I give the signal, unleash your「Transcendent Spirit」.

Those were the words I had given to Pean immediately after arriving on the surface.

Upon hearing this, Pean asked cautiously after a brief silence.

─Do you know about my「Transcendent Spirit」…?

Pean had never explained his Transcendent Spirit separately. He had never used it in front of me either.

Yet I had given the command without any hesitation, as if I naturally knew about it.

Pean must have been bewildered.

He had no way of knowing that I had repeated 200 cycles and learned everything about him.

‘Anyway.’

Transcendent Spirit.

The ultimate technique that only Sword Masters could manifest.

The ability where a lifetime of honed sword philosophy and combat principles twist the laws of reality and project into space.

A realm that brings absolute dominion, once only possible in imagination, into reality.

Its nature varied completely from Sword Master to Sword Master.

Because each had pursued a completely different path of the ‘sword.’

However.

Pean’s ability was literally anomalous even among them.

【Ebony Forest】

Literally translated, it means the Forest of Darkness.

In the domain where Pean’s transcendent spirit unfolds, all senses are completely blocked.

Sight, hearing, and even mana detection become meaningless.

A space where you cannot sense your opponent’s presence unless they move first. A world where no one can see anyone, and no one can be seen by anyone.

When all senses suddenly disappear in the midst of fierce battle, most would panic and reveal their presence.

That’s why Pean could always seize the initiative within his transcendent spirit.

In that moment when the opponent wavers and moves, the battle is already over.

Saaaaa─.

However, this time the situation was different.

An eerily quiet space.

Despite being trapped within Pean’s transcendent spirit, that thing didn’t reveal any presence first.

Right.

No matter how much of a shell it might be, an Outsider was never an easy opponent.

‘It seems to have grasped the nature of this space instantly.’

It was hard to believe that just moments ago it had been emitting tremendous pressure that broke through ‘MAX’ mental strength.

The Outsider had completely erased its own presence as if it had never existed from the beginning.

The greatest advantage of the transcendent spirit 【Ebony Forest】, the initiative, had completely disappeared.

“….”

Originally, I just needed to hold out until the Heavenly Laws were completely established. In the game, the key was to survive by buying time against the weakened Outsider.

It was a difficult trial, but at least for me, it was a difficulty level I could clear.

But I didn’t choose such a passive method and instead trapped the Outsider within the transcendent spirit. To hunt it in reverse.

‘Of course, if that thing really wanted to, breaking this space would be nothing….’

The moment that happens, the Outsider would consume massive amounts of power. It would be immediately banished according to the Heavenly Laws while weakened.

The Outsider knew this fact too. That’s why instead of destroying the transcendent spirit, it decided to kill us inside here.

“….”

The situation had changed.

Whoever senses the opponent’s presence first wins, and whoever moves first loses.

I had to somehow pierce through this darkness and find the opponent first.

The Outsider understood this rule perfectly too. So from now on, a pure psychological battle would unfold.

Deception using afterimages. Throwing bait to induce the opponent’s real attack, then attempting a counterattack through that gap.

A high-level battle of nerves to find the opponent’s weakness.

In this silent standoff, a single mistake meant death.

“…!”

Right at that moment.

A bone-chilling killing intent swept by from somewhere.

Along with heart-crushing hostility, the sensation of a massive ‘will’ striking down toward me.

But I didn’t move. Because 【Ultra Intuition】 was warning me intensely.

A translucent afterimage flashed through my mind.

If I reacted even slightly to that killing intent, the Outsider appearing from elsewhere would take my life.

‘That’s fake.’

The Outsider is hiding somewhere else.

What I was feeling now was merely a scarecrow made using only mental projection.

The bait it threw didn’t work.

Then, now it was my turn to move.

“….”

The opponent is an Outsider.

Half-hearted moves will never work.

I have one chance.

I must pour everything into that one strike.

Ding-!

〔Authority Skill: 【True Ritardando】 has been used.〕

Tick, tick, tick, tick-.

In the quiet darkness.

The sound of a second hand coming from all directions was particularly clear.

The world slowly sank down. The flow of time began to collapse.

However, since this was a world filled only with darkness and silence, that change felt much fainter than usual.

Ding-!

〔Active Skill: 【Ultimate Killing Intent】 has been used.〕

I immediately activated the second skill.

Absolute pressure poured with sincerity. The aura of heart destruction spread throughout all space without choosing targets.

My killing intent covered the entire Ebony Forest.

In the darkness where no senses could reach, only the will toward death dyed the space blood red.

[…!]

There was a ‘being’ that immediately reacted to such distinct killing intent.

An attack filled with all power, without even doubt.

An overwhelming response of destruction that erases life with will alone.

However.

In the endlessly stretched time….

Ding-!

〔Authority Skill: 【Avatar Manifestation】 has been used.〕

Buuuuum-.

The lightly floating ‘consciousness’ instantly escaped from the ‘body’.

I looked down.

In an instant, I saw my physical body collapsing to the ground, blood pouring from every opening.

‘…Got it.’

One chance. One opening.

No matter how fake it might be, it was uncertain whether I could cut down an Outsider with just 【Soul of the Sword Master】.

Unlike the other enemies I’d met so far, that thing wasn’t bound by the rules of this world.

That’s why….

I created the perfect situation.

Ultimate killing intent.

An enemy bewitched by the aura of heart destruction.

A transcendent strike delivered to a careless opponent at the moment they’re convinced I’m dead.

Ding-!

〔Sword Energy: 0/10〕

〔’Yeonwoo the Feathered Sword’s’ mana has been completely depleted.〕

〔Insufficient consumption value.〕

〔Skill: 【Avatar Manifestation】 will be canceled.〕

Kuguuuuuuuu-!

In this new body, the will that had been with me for a lifetime took root.

At the very end of endlessly confined time.

The familiar sense of omnipotence began to course through my entire body once again.

The sensation of dominating absolute moments. The conviction that time, space, and even fate itself seemed to be grasped in my hands.

A wondrous thrill climbed up my spine, as if all the laws of the world were being reorganized around me.

─Outer Gods are not simply ‘strong enemies.’

What Emperor Tarosk, Pean, and Yeonwoo the Feathered Sword had all warned me about in unison.

─They are absolute beings who twist and distort the very laws of this world. You can’t defeat them just because you’re somewhat skilled with a sword.

God-slaying was impossible.

Because those beings transcended physical laws. Because they ignored cause and effect.

No matter how powerful a strike might be, it was all meaningless before beings who could shake the very laws of the world.

‘However…’

I know.

That this ability I possess is not merely some simple strike.

‘Roel’s system does not lie.’

Though it may be extremely unhelpful, all truths are contained within it.

━━━━━━━━━━━━

You are the one with the most outstanding talent among tens of millions, no… hundreds of millions of Sword Masters.

━━━━━━━━━━━━

The ability gained by sacrificing everything. Soul of the Sword Master.

The ‘core’ of this skill was not in that sentence.

A world that even the gods had turned their backs on.

A fate stumbling forward toward the single future of destruction.

200 deaths encountered within that fate.

200 defeats.

200 despairs.

Yet never giving up to the very end, rising again and again to see the true conclusion…

〔The forgotten Harmonizers bless your path forward!〕

…The final blessing of the ancient gods, given to one player.

━━━━━━━━━━━━

So hold your chest high with pride. No threat whatsoever will be able to break you.

━━━━━━━━━━━━

Right.

No threat whatsoever could break me.

Even if it was an Outer God.

───!

Without a moment’s hesitation, I thrust my sword forward.

A single streak of sword light that cut through the darkness tore through the world as it advanced.

There was no sound.

No sensation of blood splattering, no feeling of flesh bursting.

Only, within that silence, everything was quietly split in two.

The Outer God belatedly recognized my attack.

But it was already too late.

Even a being capable of twisting the laws of the world could not reverse a result that had already ‘ended.’

The world split apart.

Following the trajectory traced by my sword, the darkness lifted and the Ebony Forest slowly crumbled away.

Through the gaps, the scenery of the Rashutku Ruins began to reveal itself once more.

Collapsed stone pillars. Destroyed floors. Miserably distorted statues.

Everything was the same as before.

But at the same time, everything had changed from before.

The massive shadow that had covered the world no longer existed. The overwhelming pressure, the suffocating despair—all of it had vanished.

“…”

I witnessed everything clearly.

From beginning to end. From the moment the Outer God was trapped in the Ebony Forest to that instant when it was split in two by my sword.

I burned every single reaction into my eyes and remembered it perfectly.

A strike that was more perfect than ever before, more absolute than ever before.

Soon after.

Countless notification windows began to cover my field of vision.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————