"You damn heretics… You're all going to burn in hell!!"
With a fanatical cry, a young man wielding a Western sword charged straight at Rias's group. His eyes were bloodshot, his face twisted in hatred and madness.
Rias narrowed her eyes. "A swordsman?"
The moment she muttered that,
"Get back, Rias!"
"Rgh!"
With a sharp shout, Ikki dashed forward. He drew his sword in a single, fluid motion and parried the attacker's blade.
A piercing sound rang out, like steel shattering.
"Wha…!?"
The attacker froze in disbelief.
Clang.
His broken sword fell to the ground, its blade snapped clean off from the force of the parry. The man's eyes widened, trembling as he stared at the shattered remains.
"Y-You... heretic...!"
The man tried to curse at Ikki, but his voice caught in his throat. What terrified him wasn't the strength that broke his sword, it was Ikki's presence.
Ikki hadn't shown a hint of killing intent. No hostility. No anger. Yet he stood like an unwavering blade. Silent. Absolute.
The man instinctively stepped back.
"W-What the hell is this guy…!?"
But his body wouldn't move fast enough.
With one silent flash of movement, Ikki closed the distance.
"Too slow."
A side slash struck his opponent's torso. Ikki held back enough not to kill, but the force still sent the man flying with a sickening thud, his back slamming into the garden wall.
"One down," Ikki murmured.
There was no time to breathe.
A barrage of magic bullets and flaming arrows shot toward them from the school rooftop. Xenovia immediately stepped in front.
"Leave this to me!"
With a fierce cry, she swung Durandal. A surge of divine power erupted from her blade, blasting away the incoming projectiles with a shockwave. The explosion rocked the rooftop, blowing away several attackers.
On the ground, the enemy swordsmen scattered into combat positions, weapons drawn.
"Kunou! Kuroka! Guard the staff and students!"
Rias called out. The two nodded instantly.
"Got it, nyaa!"
"I'll make it flashy."
Kuroka's body blurred as she vanished, reappearing next to a charging enemy. A burst of purple youjutsu energy exploded around her, sending the man flying.
Ravel took to the air, flames dancing from her fingertips as she joined the fray, shooting down enemy spellcasters on the roof with pinpoint accuracy.
"Sorry for the mess, everyone," Ikki muttered to no one in particular as he stepped forward again.
Another wave of attackers rushed in.
"Fools."
With one smooth motion, Ikki disappeared from view.
"Wha—!?"
His blade danced like silver lightning. One enemy down. Two. Three. Not a single wasted movement. In mere seconds, the frontline collapsed.
Watching from above, Serafall whistled in admiration. "Wow, and I thought Sairaorg-kun was strong. That one's a monster."
Azazel folded his arms, his face grim. "The Hero Faction picked the wrong festival to crash. Let's move."
Anyway, just standing around making wisecracks wouldn't get us anywhere, so we all sprang into action.
Xenovia borrowed Ascalon from Issei and charged toward the Anti-Monsters with Yuuto by her side. Azazel-sensei donned Fafnir's golden armor and engaged Cao Cao in combat. The two of them fought fiercely as they gradually moved away from the immediate area, likely because they both understood that continuing the battle here would be problematic for everyone.
As I watched them disappear into the distance and was about to move myself, Issei's voice rang out.
"Kiba, can you hear me? Use your power to create light-devouring swords and hand them over to me, Asia, and Xenovia! We'll use them as emergency shields if needed! Xenovia, protect Asia and Kunou! Ikkie and Irina, you're our frontliners! Asia, here's a proxy promotion card. I'm promoting you to 'Priest'!"
Whoa. Seeing Issei actually using his head for once is... oddly moving.
I had no objections to the plan, but just to be sure, I sent Izuna to Asia and Kunou's side and split it into clones to provide 360-degree surveillance. With no magic specialists on our side right now, relying on just Xenovia for defense made me uneasy.
For now, I focused not on slicing the Anti-Monsters apart with my Sacred Gear but on grabbing them and hurling them toward the enemy, directly into where the Hero Faction members were gathered, or at other Anti-Monsters. Even if we took them down, they'd just get replaced. Neutralization over elimination.
The sheer force of my throws sent the enemy scrambling. Apparently, the Anti-Monsters were allocating most of their energy to firing beams of light, which made their movement sluggish. That made them easy to toss.
I even threw one at Leonardo, but he blocked it with a mist barrier at the last second. So I shifted tactics, aiming to scatter their forces by throwing these things to separate groups of enemies.
Some of them definitely got crushed. Forget targeting the Anti-Monsters, hitting the squishy humans is more effective. Unlike those things, they don't respawn.
Eventually, the Anti-Monsters around me started avoiding me entirely. When I tried to throw one at a target Yuuto was fighting, it dispersed mid-air and reformed elsewhere.
Guess they caught on, but I did take down a few, so I'll call that a win.
"Impressive, Arima Ikki. Prioritizing the weak, there's something familiar about that. Why not join us, the Khaos Brigade? You'd be welcome."
A white-haired man with multiple demonic swords hanging from his waist tried to recruit me.
"Sorry, I'm not interested in terrorism. And calling yourselves heroes while doing this kind of crap? Sounds like a delusional middle-schooler's fantasy. Count me out."
"Haha! Ouch, that stings. Still, most of our members genuinely believe they're doing justice, you know? Of course, we nudged them in that direction, but still."
As he laughed, Xenovia suddenly raised her voice in alarm, having apparently recognized him.
"I thought I'd seen that face somewhere before! Everyone, be careful! That man was once considered one of the top swordsmen in the Church across all factions. He wields multiple demon swords. If I remember correctly, his title was 'Chaos Edge', Siegfried the Demonic Emperor!"
"That's right. I now belong to the Khaos Brigade. Descendant of the hero Sigurd. Though my comrades call me Siegfried, feel free to use whichever name you like."
Before he could say more, Yuuto charged at him with righteous fury.
"If it's a swordsman, then leave him to me!"
Siegfried drew his blade just in time to meet Yuuto's strike.
"This is Gram, the strongest of the demon swords. Not even a Holy Demonic Sword can break it."
"Then how about this!"
Yuuto conjured another sword and switched to dual wielding. If he couldn't beat him in quality, he'd go for quantity.
Siegfried countered with dual swords of his own.
"This one's Nothung, a legendary sword from Norse mythology."
He narrated every weapon like a catalog, but Yuuto wasn't done. He summoned magic circles around his feet and in the air, launching Holy Demonic Swords from every angle.
Siegfried responded with a third sword, this one enveloped in a tornado-like aura. It tore through all of Yuuto's projectiles like a living vortex.
"Careful, that one's Balmung. Also a Norse demon sword."
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