The Living Monument’s form was larger than Yuriko remembered, but she didn’t miss the glint of gold around his neck. A collar similar to the Crimson Apes though it was thicker. The gigantic daemon’s grin was strained, and his grip over his quarterstaff tight. 

“How long has it been?” Yuriko asked idly while she condensed her Anima and left only her perception outside. 

“Years? Decades,” the Living Monument growled. “Decades, and because of you…” He hissed, “Hrrr, I sense you’re weaker than before…let us see by how much!” 

Decades? It was barely a couple of years since she was in Irvalla, right? Yuriko frowned, shook her head, and leapt back when he jumped to cross the distance between. His staff raised high, came down like a lightning bolt and slammed into the ground right in front of her feet. She retaliated with an Invisible Edge, but she half expected her foe to see and defend against it, or dodge. After all, the Living Monument had been one of the strongest foes she faced, and she had not been able to defeat him back then. 

The skin over his shoulder split open and blood spurted out. The daemon blinked in surprise but shook his head and swung sideways. His strike was fast but was so easy to read she wondered if he was testing her. She bent backwards but sprang back up as soon as the staff passed over her body, and at the same time, flicked another Invisible Edge aimed at the first wound. That slash only opened a gash half an inch deep, and when the second Edge hit, it dug down by the same depth. Even a full inch wasn’t enough to get past the Monument’s thick hide, however. 

The next few seconds involved Yuriko ducking and dodging out of the way. The Monument’s swings, thrusts, and slams looked painfully slow, but they were anything but that. Objectively, they may actually be faster and stronger than the time she dealt with him before, but his progress was…minuscule…if that was how she could put it. But then, the Monument was old. Daemons were…immortal? The higher levels were, probably. She didn’t know about the ones at the bottom of the hierarchy, though perhaps they shared the same mortality as everyone else. 

She had forgotten, or perhaps she simply filed away the memories in her mind palace, and she hadn’t realised that the daemons she encountered in Astoria, and Dragon Fall City, were part of the same…classification? It couldn’t be race since the daemons she encountered there varied and had little in common other than the whiff of energy she called daemonfyre which she admittedly derived from the whiskey she drank in one of Junktown’s taverns. 

What about the darklight the Monument used? The darklight he hadn’t used since the start of their altercation? 

Her ease of handling his attacks had more to do with her advanced skills, probably, rather than the daemon weakening. Every dodge was accompanied by an Invisible Edge that struck the same spot, though every subsequent strike seemed to do less damage than the first. She’d managed to dig past the layer of hide after half a dozen consecutive strikes, though she couldn’t use her Anima perception to get an accurate measure since his own aura pushed hers away. 

Anima rested within the body, and that held true even if the skin was split, or the muscles, torn. Those who trained and strengthened Anima inadvertently strengthened the body, too, if only because the Anima reflexively protected it. Increasing Anima density within the body was a natural consequence of progress, and what made an Ancient different from every other discipline was the capability of expanding the Anima as well as increasing density…ah, that was it, what her true body was deficient with. Hmm, no, that hadn’t been much of an issue, wasn’t it? Anima expanded, and the farther the reach grew, the higher the volume it occupied. She was certain her incarnation’s Anima, which was three point one times as dense compared to her true body’s, would not have the same Anima strength as someone with twice the reach, but had normal density. Plus, Yuriko knew how to manipulate her Anima density uniformly across her reach, so there wasn’t much difference. Ah, her consciousness strand was rambling too much. 

The Living Monument was growling with rage as none of his attacks came closer than an inch from her skin. Her Anima perception covered the battleground and he was well within her detection range, hence, every minute movement allowed her to see how he intended to act. It made it a trivial matter to move before he did. She wondered how duelists who both had the same capability would fight. One reacted to how the other intended to move which would touch off the other’s senses, allowing them to adjust. Which would probably provoke the first, and the cycle would continue, until the less skilled one failed and lost. Would that mean fights on the highest level devolved into two parties staring at each other while simulating their moves and reacting to each other? How boring should it come to pass. 

Or perhaps she had a flawed understanding, which wouldn’t surprise her.

The heights could not be understood if one stood observing from the foothills. Bits of insight pooled in her mind and she shoved them into her mind palace. She would sort them out later at leisure, but she could already feel some minute changes to how she fought and reacted. It was a pity the Monument was not a fit dance partner, at least for the music she wanted to play. 

And that realisation alone illuminated her thoughts. There were different sorts of music and different dances to fit them. What would fit one might not fit the other, but an underlying mastery of one could help master the other. She felt her two Ennoias of the Sword subtly shift. Where once there was nothing in common suddenly showed, under a different light, a thin thread connecting them. And the first step was always the hardest. 

She’d wracked her brains on how to combine Radiant Flying Swords with the Bladeless Sword, and the best she could come up with was allowing Invisible Edge to come out through sunblades. And she’d tried it with her true body. It wasn’t all that much better than using Invisible Edge from her own body or her Anima reach. The only real advantage was shooting the Edge from an unusual angle. But then again, Invisible Edge was already hard to detect. A Radiant sunblade drew attention, firing an Edge from it was incredibly obvious. 

Doing it the opposite way would have been great, but she had no idea how to do it. Forming a sunblade outside of her Anima reach was impossible so far. Could she anchor the necessary Intent and Will through an Invisible Edge? Could she…? It couldn’t be that easy. 

“Stop dancing around!” Monument roared as he jumped back. The wound on his shoulder started to close and Yuriko clicked her tongue. Without an infusion of Radiant energy, nothing was stopping him from healing. Her Radiant reserves in her incarnation body left a lot to be desired. 

Yuriko smirked. “And you say you’re stronger?” Her voice was tinged with mocking doubt, and the Monument roared in anger, grey-skinned face purpling with apoplexy. “Then, sure, give me your best shot.” She planted her feet and wagged her fingers. At the same time, her eyes darted towards her companions. They were still pushing against the bridgehead and made no progress getting out. “Tsk.” 

“Graaaah!”

The Living Monument swung parallel to the ground, head height to her. The ground underneath his feet shattered as it bore all of his weight and power, and the stone quarterstaff shattered the air and left vapour trails behind. 

Yuriko raised her left forearm and condensed her Anima around it, then created threads that wrapped around her body and stabbed into the ground. She created platforms of Animus beneath her feet and tendrils to spread the kinetic force, and she finished her preparation a fraction of a second before the quarterstaff slammed into her.

And it stopped dead. All of the force was either transferred to the ground, which made a crater and an explosion of dust beneath her feet or absorbed and ablated by her Anima. The quarterstaff shattered an instant later, and Yuriko pushed off and slammed her right fist into the Living Monument’s wide-open gut. 

Boom!

A shockwave appeared behind the Living Monument’s body and created a thunderous noise. Yuriko clicked her tongue in exasperation. Most of the force of her punch went through the Living Monument’s body and was wasted when he staggered back. It couldn’t be helped. Despite knowing how to fight with fisticuffs, Yuriko was not a pugilist. Sure, she enjoyed fighting barehanded every now and then, but at this level of fight, her comparatively meagre skill wasn’t up to the task. She cracked some of the Living Monument’s bones and tore some flesh, but that was about it. Well, it also stunned the daemon for a little while, which was an advantage either way. 

She felt a twinge of pain in her left arm. Despite her defences, the Living Monument was not unskilled when it came to Ennoias. The blow bypassed some of her Anima’s defences, struck her arm, and maybe cracked the bone. She used her perception to check and huffed when she saw only some bruising. That was good, at least. She started the process to repair the damage but kept most of her consciousness towards the giant. Her eyes told her what her perception couldn’t parse. Glimmers of darklight crawled all over his broken skin and repaired the cracks. The collar around his neck flashed with golden light, and she saw more darklight seeping from it into his body. 

Her eyes widened when she recognised the metal. It wasn’t gold. It was orichalc, the same alloy that made up Fri’Avgi. Runescript lines flared with power and gave her a glimpse of what it said. Her heart fell as she realised that the Living Monument was also chained, though his shackles weren’t quite as stringent. 

Even as she observed all of that, her body was already moving. Radiant sunblades took too much energy to form, so she was left with either using Invisible Edge or her limbs. Perhaps she should have brought a weapon along, since with one, even a kitchen knife, she could infuse it with Radiant energy. She could do the same with her fists, or perhaps sword fingers? 

Or should she infuse Radiance into her Invisible Edges too? Ah, she’d been too enamoured of how discreet using Edge was, but it was a way to project Radiance effectively without having to form a sunblade. 

She infused a mote of Radiance into her fingers and snapped out an Invisible Edge…only, it wasn’t quite invisible. Tacking of Radiant energy was anything but easy considering the opposing natures of both Ennoias, although the Colligia of Radiance could work with anything…or rather, Radiance will consume anything. However, Radiance was never, ever subtle. It was a good thing that the Bladeless Sword also focused on cutting. 

A sickle of golden light, not quite the same shade as Radiance, emerged from her fingertips. It careened across the couple of paces between them, and sank into the Monument’s torso, over where she assumed his heart would be. 

The Edge burned through his body, pierced out the other side, and because it had her Radiance in it, curved around and struck a second time, where it dissipated when it passed through. 

The Living Monument staggered back, his eyes wide with shock. But a moment later, his expression softened and he looked at her with gratitude…? Blood seeped out as well as the blacklight. Was it some kind of refined daemonfyre? Possibly. 

And the orichalc collar drew in the darkness and spat out power. He gasped as he drew another staff from the earth. His expression changed back to rage when he felt his wounds knit back together, and without another moment’s hesitation, he slammed his staff towards her.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep