Chapter 26
To the left of Communicator Erzsebet stood the masked examiners, and to the right stood Gael. Silveryn watched the arena from a distance apart from them.
Gael walked steadily and stood in front of Damian.
She briefly explained the rules of the evaluation, "You need to break through the defense of those Planteras and cut down the flag. The evaluation time is ten minutes. There's a long hourglass next to the examiners, so check the remaining time by the markings."
"Understood."
Gael returned to her position.
Damian slowly entered the arena.
His face showed no fear. He simply looked at the giant wooden puppets, nearly twice his height, with a calm expression.
Before starting, he briefly knelt on one knee and closed his eyes. After staying still for about thirty seconds as if in silent prayer, he stood up and looked at the examiners.
Damian seemed ready.
At Gael's signal, four escort knights simultaneously blew horns to announce the beginning of the Trial by Sword.
The ear-piercing sound echoed through the arena.
The evaluation had begun.
The Planteras reacted by pointing their wooden swords at Damian.
Damian also drew his sword from his waist.
A total of ten Planteras.
With two Planteras in each defensive line, Damian had to break through a total of 5 lines.
Due to the enormous difference in size, even one direct hit could be fatal.
He gradually increased his speed with every step and rushed towards the nearest Plantera, swinging his sword.
Clang!
Damian precisely struck the Plantera's hip joint. Although it seemed he had swung with all his might, it left no scratch, as if hitting steel.
The Plantera immediately counterattacked.
It struck Damian in an upward arc from below.
It was quite a quick reaction for such a massive body.
With a thud, he was lifted into the air and fell face down where he had started.
The examiners let out small sighs, seeing this.
Gael muttered quietly, "Unbelievable."
From her perspective, Damian was swinging his sword in a manner that made it unclear whether it was a sword or a club.
A child whose basics weren't even complete.
She wondered what Silveryn's intentions were for having him take this evaluation.
Damian immediately got up. Thanks to twisting his sword towards his body at the last moment to block the strike, he avoided injury.
He rushed in again without even dusting himself off.
The two Planteras in the first line brought their wooden swords down towards Damian's crown as he came within range.
Damian narrowly avoided this and thrust his sword into the knee joint of the Plantera on the left, twisting it.
The Plantera that momentarily lost control of its knee lost balance and fell.
A Plantera from the second line immediately stuck close and thrust its sword down at Damian.
He stepped back to avoid it as if he had been waiting for this.
Crack!
The rushing wooden sword directly hit and broke the right arm of the fallen Plantera.
The other Plantera from the second line stuck close to Damian to help.
In response, he lowered his body and leaped, sliding between the legs of a Plantera in the third line.
The Planteras from the second and third lines that were following him each tripped and fell together due to their momentum getting tangled.
He cleverly exploited the fact that their center of gravity was biased towards the upper body due to their large size.
Realizing that his sword wasn't effective, he changed his strategy to make them tangle with each other.
"Hmm."
Even Gael had to acknowledge this part. His footwork was concise and efficient, and his combat sense in quickly adopting advantageous strategies was excellent.
The remaining Planteras from the first, second, and third lines rushed at Damian simultaneously.
Damian used his relatively small body to avoid attacks coming from all directions as if performing in a circus. It was a movement close to miraculous.
Seeing this, small exclamations of admiration burst out among the examiners.
But that wasn't enough.
In the meantime, the wooden sword of a Plantera from the third line that had gotten up struck Damian's abdomen hard.
Clang!
Damian's body was pushed back far after barely blocking it with his sword.
The impact was so powerful that even though he blocked it with his sword, the damage seemed considerable. Taking advantage of his momentary sluggishness, the Plantera from the first line, whose arm had been cut off, kicked him away.
Damian's body flew in an arc and fell back to the starting point.
The remaining time was 6 minutes.
Damian got up again.
"Cough."
Blood trickled from his mouth.
The Planteras realigned their formation.
Except for cutting off one arm, everything had returned to square one. Moreover, Planteras didn't distinguish between right and left hands. If one arm was cut off, they could simply hold the sword with the other hand.
As time passed, the Planteras' aggressiveness also increased. Those that had received a lot of stimulation would no longer just try to subdue their foes but would attempt to kill them.
Gael shook her head, sensing that the evaluation would end pathetically.
He won't even get close to Flynn before it ends.
It might be better to give up early than to suffer severe injuries and major aftereffects. Even if he managed to break through the Planteras' gaps with tricks, he would still have to face Flynn's sword aura at the end.
Damian took a moment to catch his breath deeply.
Suddenly, small changes began to occur in his body.
Gael narrowed her eyes.
Glowing eyes?
His eyes were faintly glowing golden.
Whether it was due to an artifact interaction or a special potion he had taken, Gael thought it was insufficient to achieve significant results.
Damian gripped his sword tightly and threw himself back into the ranks of the Planteras.
Immediately, wooden swords rushed towards his shoulders.
And Gael's prediction was completely off the mark.
He lightly twisted his body to avoid the wooden swords.
Damian's movements had noticeably improved.
Although the Planteras' aggressiveness had increased, making them more active in combat, Damian had become even faster and more skilled.
Unlike his previous attempts, where he was barely able to dodge, he began to engage in attacks more aggressively.
While deflecting wooden swords past his head and shoulders, he stabbed his sword into the ankle joint of one Plantera.
Then he pulled his body back to dodge again and once more gritted his teeth and stabbed the same spot.
After three consecutive attacks on the same spot, there was a cracking sound, and the Plantera's ankle broke.
He had concentrated on attacking the weakest point where the most weight was concentrated.
He went deeper and did the same to a Plantera in the third line. After the Plantera fell with its ankle broken, he stood on its body to provoke attacks.
Attacks that missed Damian directly hit the fallen Plantera.
With a cracking sound, the fallen Plantera's limbs were shattered, rendering it completely immobile.
Damian immediately jumped towards the fourth line. The Planteras behind him immediately gave chase.
Gael swallowed.
After three attempts, he had found a strategy. Even students who had received a lot of sword training would typically give up and put down their swords when faced with such a power difference.
But this boy had managed to find a way and was breaking through.
Only then could Gael understand to some extent.
Silveryn hadn't brought him for nothing.
Many students excelled in swordsmanship at the academy. After all, only geniuses could enter in the first place.
What this boy had demonstrated was not swordsmanship but an innate sense for combat itself.
Although he would fail this evaluation due to lack of time, if he combined proper sword training, he could maintain a high ranking at Eternia.
Just that much.
It wasn't the skill needed to reach the Masters Class.
Damian encountered difficulties before even entering the fourth line. This was because the Planteras from the back lines had started to stick to him one by one and unleash attacks in tandem with one another.
No matter how agile his body was, it was impossible to avoid this tremendous offensive.
The remaining time was 3 minutes and 30 seconds.
Considering the engagement with Flynn, he had essentially failed. To break through Flynn, he needed to overwhelm him with his “sword” rather than tricks.
Sensing his limit, Damian immediately rushed towards the Planteras in the fourth line. He lowered his body to avoid a wooden sword once, then stepped on one Plantera's thigh and leaped high forward.
Due to the large movement, Damian was momentarily exposed to attacks.
The hand of a nearby fourth-line Plantera reached out towards his leg.
And before his leg was caught, Damian launched his final strike.
He threw his sword straight at Flynn.
The sword rushed towards Flynn's body, spinning rapidly, and Flynn strongly deflected it.
Clang!
Damian's sword flew away and stuck into the ground too far to retrieve.
Damian, whose leg was caught in mid-air, was thrown like a stone and landed askew on the ground.
He had been thrown back to where the first-line Planteras were after breaking through to the fourth line.
The remaining time was 3 minutes.
Is that his last desperate struggle in realization of his limit?
With the sword completely out of his hands, there was nothing more to see.
The Planteras, whose aggressiveness had greatly increased due to the series of battles, began to approach Damian. If left alone, they would pulverize him.
All the examiners fell silent.
"It's over."
As Gael said this and was about to step forward, Communicator Erzsebet raised her hand to stop her.
"Not yet."
When Gael looked at Erzsebet with a surprised face, she smiled slightly.
"...?"
Damian slowly got up, pushing the ground with his arms. Then, kneeling on one knee, he quietly watched the approaching Planteras.
The Planteras following Damian looked quite fierce as if they had encountered a magic creature.
Despite their threatening appearance, Damian didn't seem to have any intention of running away or avoiding attacks.
Gael, watching this, couldn't understand.
What on earth is he doing?
Damian didn't take any action but simply closed his eyes, just as he had done at the very beginning.
The Planteras surrounded him in an instant.
Then, they raised their wooden swords. And just as they were about to strike all at once.
Light erupted.