CHAPTER 1353: BROKEN RHYTHM, BROKEN BLADES

[Hehehe! You look like you’re strong. But are you strong enough to to resist my new toys?!]

^Puta Madre!^

Once Olstenna had confirmed the presence of powerful enemy kaijin, and that they were getting stronger and stronger with each passing second, he excitedly launched himself forward towards the source with reckless abandon.

He knew damn well that he was needlessly exposing himself to danger, but Olstenna was a big believer of the idea that one should proactively deal with problems before they becoming anything bigger.

Unfortunately, he was a touch too slow.

Olstenna was about a foot away from the source of [Chaos], and was even about to land a devasting blast of Ignarii aether that was empowered by his new fighting style.

But then, one of the [Demon Knights] had charged at him with a trident-shaped [Taboo] and had pushed him back.

The kaijin armed with this particular [Taboo] was none other than Gumba, the fat catfish kaijin of [Despair].

[Hehehe! My new toys are way more powerful than I thought! How great! How grand!] Gumba boasted as he continued to pressure Olstenna with his newly acquired trident.

When Olstenna first saw the [Taboo], he was shocked.

He had hung around Zhen Liu’s kaijin for a very long time at this point, and knew that something like a kaijin wielding a [Taboo] was supposed to be impossible.

Not that Olstenna really cared, he was just mildly surprised at the sudden raise in difficulty. That stated, Olstenna was still fairly confident that his rhythmic fighting style would still be fairly effective against Gumba.

Unfortunately, he was only partially correct.

[Hey, stop that singing! You’re making it hard for me to pierce you with my trident!] Gumba complained as he clearly fell into Olstenna’s rhythm.

’Huh, that’s weird...’

When Olstenna used this technique against some of the earlier kaijin he had fought, they had all fell into his rhythm and had multiple openings that made it very easy for himself to exploit and end the fights in a decisive manner.

Against Gumba, though, he could only dodge.

’Why does it feel like I’m fighting two different warriors at the same...wait...’

[Possession], [Stigma], and [Taboo] were all abilities that kaijin were able to do to enhance or distort the abilities of mortal warriors that they were working with, by essentially providing them an additional cultivation formula to draw from.

Having another formula was like having another soul to draw power from, and a majority of aether warriors only ever had one soul to work with.

Now, Olstenna was under the impression that if he ever got into a situation where he fought Zhen Liu at full strength, that his new fighting system would be the killer solution to win in a decisive. Evidently, that assumption was made with wildly incomplete data.

The way Olstenna’s trick work was by essentially releasing aether-enhanced sound that caused an individual’s formula, their soul, to follow along. In essence, a suped-up version of what happens when someone gets caught up in a song.

This trick also worked against multiple, individual, warriors due to their souls being isolated from one another.

This wasn’t the case against kaijin-empowered ones, though.

Olstenna wasn’t entirely clear behind the principles of it all, but he could sense that the interaction between a [Taboo] and the wielder caused both of their respective formulas to...not resonate or cancel out with another, but instead, remix with one another.

In his head, it was as if someone combined the traditional nomadic music of the Skyfire Plain natives, with the orchestral symphonies that the more urbanized parts of Stampeding Bison seemed to enjoy.

It was bizarre, yet oddly complimentary.

It also made his trick less effective than anticipated.

From what he could tell, he could use his trick to avoid or attack, but not both at the same time.

Which was why Lythero had no choice but to keep dancing around Gumba’s wild trident stabs.

’Every move this fat bastard makes seems to ebb and flow between which formula is dominating the moment,’ Olstenna observed. ’So maybe I need to just figure out the right time to when they’re at equilibrium with one another and then strike...’

Technically speaking, this was actually the correct way for Lythero to counter such a combination.

There were these key moments during the fighting where Olstenna and his taboo were perfectly spiritually aligned, meaning any attack that would hit one would definitely be amplified on the other.

However, such timing depended on both the wielder and the [Taboo] to be the same.

[Alright, if I can’t skewer you, I’ll crush you instead!]

Tired of Olstenna’s dodged, Gumba swapped out the trident-like [Taboo] in his hands for a hammer-like one, completely changing the aura that was coming down on Olstenna’s head, and completely ruined his counterattack plans.

’Damnit!’

... Meanwhile...

’Okay, now I understand why my opponents would get frustrated when I used multiple swords against them at any given time.’

[The way you move suggests that you’re used to wielding even more weapons than the two you’re currently swinging,] Slavina noted. [Why don’t you break them out? It might make things easier for you!]

Lythero knew full well that trying to rush in against that weird surge of [Chaos] without proper preparation was just asking for trouble.

As such, he opted to make things easier on himself and just prepare his guard ahead of time.

This turned out to be a prudent course of action, as he found that his [Black Iron Slab] and [Astra] were subjected to a pair of heavy spiked balls [Taboo] that were being swung around by a crazy kaijin woman made of plants and hatred.

No, not hatred.

[Oppression].

The way this kaijin moved and carried herself mirrored the same arrogant demenaor that Duke Diamoro had, and Lythero absolutely hated it.

He wasn’t entirely sure why, but he had the feeling that unless he managed to overcome this weird plant kaijin, there would be no way in this life or the next that he would enable to beat the Duke in the revenge match.

Of course, that was easier said than done.

[Oh come on, swordsman!] Slavina roared as she decides to switch from the spiked balls [Taboo] to ones that resembled a drill.

New weapon in her vines, Slavina brought it down on Lythero’s cross guard, causing an horrific sound to echo throughout the cavern.

’Shit, shit, shit!’

Despite using [Chaos] to reinforce his blades, Lythero could tell that the attack was able to break through it and began inflicting material harm against Master Tortoise’s legacy.

He could already practically feel the blade cracking and breaking in his hands.

’Fucking hell!’

Realizing the consequences of keeping up his guard, Lythero opted to transform his [Astra] into a copy of the [Trickster’s Fang Pack Kukri] and disappear like an illusion.

[Huh?]

During the brief moment where Slavina wasn’t sure what was going on, Lythero swapped out the [Black Iron Slab] for the real version of the aforementioned kukri and prepared to go on the offensive.

[Dream Hunter!]

From Slavina’s blind spot, Lythero reappeared in quintuplet, each of his clones infused with [Chaos] and armed with their versions of the aforementioned kukri.

If these illusions were empowered by pure aether, they would just disperse the moment they made contact offensively or defensively.

Combined with the power of [Chaos], these clones almost stung as much as the real thing.

Alas, while this trick would’ve worked wonders against someone like Gumba or maybe Delictum, against Slavina...it didn’t amount to much.

Not because the plant-like Kaijin had the ability to sense the difference between falsehoods and truths, but because she had a whole mess of whips at her disposal and precisely zero compunction about caring whether or not she was accurate with her blows.

Especially when the types of whips she could produce has essentially doubled.

[Ooooh, so many little targets! Why don’t we see if lighting needs to strike more than once!]

With a manic laugh, Slavina summoned a whip that appeared to be made of a thousand horse hairs lashed together and infused with the power of thunder and lightning.

Combined with her natural root whips, Slavina unleashed a barrage whiplash attacks that could split an oak tree right down the middle.

Needless to say, these clones didn’t stand a chance against the whip attacks...and neither did Lythero’s sword.

Crack!

^No!^

Through sheer bad luck, Slavina’s whip landed in just the right way to shatter Lythero’s kukri into two clean pieces.

Under any other circumstances, Lythero would be crying out of a mix of anguish and rage. But he was in the middle of a war right now, and that wasn’t the place to grieve.

So he opted to replace the sadness with additional madness.

^You bitch of a weed!^Lythero cursed as he made moves to replace the broken sword with the [Black Iron Slab]. ^I’ll—wait.^

Just as he was about to wield his last sword, he realized it was exactly that.

The last intact legacy of his old masters.

’If this one breaks too?!’

Needless to say, Lythero was hesitant.