kscans

Chapter 592 - The Acrobat's Explanation: Part 4

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"Oops."

As I was deflecting their exasperated reactions with a careless laugh, a small system notification icon suddenly started blinking in the corner of my vision.

The sender's name was a familiar one.

Guessing the general content from that alone, I opened the 'letter'... and sure enough, the message was exactly what I had expected, causing a weary smile to escape my lips.

"Hey, what's up? What happened?"

The message window I opened with a thought command was, by default, invisible to other players. So, to Mi-na, who was swaying along with me on top of my head, I probably just looked like I'd started laughing for no reason. She let out an annoyed voice, as if complaining that her 'table' was unstable.

I should just fall backward and crush this pipsqueak.

"Ah, it's nothing... no, it's not nothing. Something of an errand just popped up—so sorry, but I'm gonna have to speed up this explanation."

"What?! You're gonna speed through the most confusing part?!"

"Ah, ah, shut up, stop making a racket on my head. I'll tell you what I was doing, and if you watch it in slow motion, you'll probably get the gist of how I lost, anyway."

Wondering why she was in such a good mood, I'd been cutting her more slack than usual, but she clearly didn't know or care. Ignoring the threat of punishment, the red-head continued to complain. I deliberately sent another tremor up to her and, for the explanation, started the screen that I had paused a moment ago.

A little while later, the scene where I took a direct hit from Irori's 《Shiguruma》, and was finally caught in the instant freeze of a fully-formed 《Hyouka》... and then a little while after that.

The moment my first publicly-unveiled Shifu Itto—the second strike, 《Shizuku (Droplet)》—shredded the ice prison.

"This is the first... no, the second Art recognized by the system. As I mentioned before, it's the culmination of the technique of storing power in the separated 'Outer Force.'"

"'This,' you say, but..."

"We can't see what's inside, so we have no idea what you're doing."

"I know, right? That's why I'm going to show you now."

Tetra and Mi-na's points were valid, and I had no intention of explaining it to that extent. So, I paused the video again and, using the borrowed power of 《Anhelmia》 that was still being lent to me... this time, I also made full use of the 'Memory' gift to manifest a slightly more complex phantom.

It was none other than my own figure.

..............................My... figure...?.................?

"...Do I look like this?"

""Hmm...""

I have seen 'myself' in videos within Arcadia like this a few times before. So the benefits of the gift should certainly be working, but there's an indescribable sense of wrongness to the 'me' I've drawn with my perfect memory ability...—

"Drawing a phantom is a little different from drawing a picture. It's not just 'memory' and 'technique,' it's also strongly influenced by 'emotion,' so it's difficult to accurately draw yourself."

As I tilted my head along with Teto-Mina, Ri-na-sensei, while stroking my knee, gave me a footnote. Huh, I see...

I'm very grateful for the lesson, but it's super ticklish, so could you please stop?

"Well, a knockoff me is fine, I guess...—Then, let me show you what I was doing inside with this guy."

When I drew [Samidorizuki] in the phantom's hand, its appearance was of a quality that was completely indistinguishable from the original. The [El-Gran Stasia] that my knockoff was wearing was also perfectly reproduced, so as Ri-na said, it seems 'oneself' is special.

Anyway, there's no problem with moving it.

"First, as a premise, recently I've been splitting my 'Outer Force' into two and using them for 'regular use' and 'technique use'—...And I'll state this as a solid fact, but the absolute difficulty of this is lower than the Sword Saint's 'Shukuchi.' So don't look at me like that."

I deflected the suggestive gazes of the black, red, and blue eyes and, while keeping ninety percent of the 'Outer Force' aura on the phantom's body, I floated the remaining ten percent as a 'sphere' next to its body.

"The part I kept is the resource for basic combat movements and 'Matoi.' The little one on the side is the separated 'Outer Force' for techniques."

"It's small."

"Is that all?"

I nodded back at Mina-Rina's questions and started spinning the separated 'sphere.'

To make it easy to understand, I made it orbit the body... and to make it even easier, I gradually increased its size. The 'sphere,' which gradually increased in speed and size, eventually swelled to a size far exceeding the resources left on the body.

"I'm storing it, so it's fine to start small. And this size is about the limit of my control technique, so frankly, there's probably no upper limit to how much I can store."

Well, the size is just an image, anyway—and on that note,

"Also, I'm showing it outside the body to make it easy to see, but in reality, it's like this."

With that, I compressed the giant sphere rotating at high speed around the body and threw it into its stomach.

The confused voices of "Huh?" "Hm?" and "Eh?" were to be expected. It was a strange state of inviting the separated 'Outer Force' inside... but well, this image was the easiest for me to work with, so it couldn't be helped.

"Hey, is that, okay? No, it's not okay, right? 'Outer Force' is fundamentally a force that moves the body, so if you put that inside and spin it..."

Arcadia's avatars probably don't have internal organs, but the realistic 'sensations' are implemented.

Perhaps imagining something gruesome, Tetra winced, but I shook my head.

"'Outer Force' is, more accurately, 'something that can become a force to move the body.' It's not like it's a simple lump of energy itself. How should I put it... like a law from another dimension that can be mutually converted between image and energy?"

"""...???"""

"Okay, just go with the gist. Just the gist."

Anyway... layering it doesn't cause your organs to be shaken up or your body to explode in a gruesome splatter.

Well, it does happen, but if you control it properly, it's no problem.

Anyway, I said "separate," but I can't maintain the roundabout thought process of letting it spin endlessly away from my body during combat.

Therefore, in the depths of my stomach, a small 'fragment' independent of the main 'Outer Force' spins quietly, violently, like a top—concentrating its power to the extreme.

And the technique that returns that 'power' to the body and unleashes it is Shifu Itto.

"《Shizuku (Droplet)》 is like this."

Right hand in a standard grip, left hand in a reverse grip. Hands on the pommel and the hilt end, respectively, firmly fixing the blade in the stance of the second strike, 《Uchigane (Striking Iron)》—a grip with a slight arrangement based on that particularly unusual form within Kesshiki has become the basic form for all my Arts.

An ultra-high-speed movement that surpasses the speed of sound, making it impossible to even swing the sword.

If that's the case, then instead of just the body, I'll swing with all my movements, including my steps.

The phantom's stance blurred, and a sword flash drawn with a light beam for visibility erupted in a spiral. I slowed the movement down considerably, so the three of them should have been able to just barely see it.

"The second strike is, as you can see, 'rotation.' To put it simply, it's an area-of-effect attack that indiscriminately shreds everything in a full circle with blades of sword pressure, or rather wind pressure, generated by a breakthrough spin speed."

"...Could you say that again, simply?"

"An area-of-effect attack that indiscriminately shreds everything in a full circle with blades of sword pressure, or rather wind pressure, generated by a breakthrough spin speed—"

"Okay, that's enough, you can be quiet now, mister. ...Ah, this is the most I've felt like 'this is a game' since starting Arcadia. My head hurts..."

How rude.

It may sound like I'm doing something crazy, but I established this step by step, even learning Kesshiki's 《Ekou (Heavy Light)》 to achieve extended range without 《Water Enchant》.

Kesshiki's sixth, 《Ekou》, is a long-range sword technique that was the basis for Irori's skill 《Ekou (Wisdom Light)》. It's a fantasy sword technique where the Sword Saint herself achieved a long-range attack with a single sword, based on the incomprehensible principle of scooping up the wind and placing it on the tip of her sword.

In other words, I desperately pursued the outrageous to achieve the outrageous—oh, even if they're exasperated, I don't have a leg to stand on, do I???

Well, whatever. Let's move on.

Last is the main event. The one moment that brought the desperate struggle to a close.