Chapter 58
#58. Creative Solution
I think hand-to-hand combat should naturally count as part of swordsmanship.
In fact, medieval knights supposedly trained not only simple swordplay but also wrestling techniques and the like, so that wouldn't be wrong.
But if you deliberately make me fight with just one dull training sword and no armor, then answering with hand-to-hand combat would be cheating.
Even if it'd be faster to smash them apart with punches and kicks instead of wasting time fighting with a sword that can't even produce any real power.
Then I wouldn't end up using the sword that actually matters at all.
-Whoosh!
Dodging the shadow puppet's sword, I tightened my grip on the training sword once more and swung it.
The puppet's attack speed wasn't anything special.
Without even needing my Instinct skill, I could handle all of it with pure reflexes.
-Crack!
The dull blade of the training sword struck the puppet's side, but once again it didn't do much damage.
It feels like it hit with even less force than when I struck its temple. But its torso doesn't seem especially tougher.
Is there some kind of condition for dealing damage? Figuring that out comes first.
-Thud!
Another puppet came at me. This new one was wielding a heavy hammer.
Its offensive power didn't seem that impressive, but it didn't look so weak that I could keep taking hits and feel nothing.
So the structure is that one moving puppet is added each time a certain amount of time passes.
By the end, I'll be fighting five at once.
The puppets' skill level is nothing to take lightly, and if five of them rush me all at once, even I won't be able to handle it.
So I need to cut their numbers down somehow before all five start moving.
“Hup!”
Tensing my muscles, I forcefully stomped on the advancing puppet's stepping foot.
-Thud!
Of course, I wasn't actually stepping on the puppet's foot. But I could step through its foot and onto the ground right beneath it.
My stomp caved in the ground, and the puppet charging over that spot had its center of gravity thrown off.
Its waist and knees, as well as its shoulders, shifted out of place, exposing a huge opening.
And then, aiming for that opening, a thrust.
-Crack!
The straight thrust pierced deep into the puppet's chest. A little disappointing, but still a valid hit.
As expected, I don't know the exact principle, but the amount of damage changes depending on my attack motion.
Slashes don't seem to work very well, but thrusts go through relatively easily.
Then from here on out, let's deal with them using thrust-focused attacks.
Pulling the sword free from the puppet's chest, I swung it behind me without looking back.
-Clang!
The axe and sword of the puppet sneaking up behind me collided. The training sword's edge chipped a little.
Damn, out of everything, the durability problem really can't be helped. We hadn't even properly traded blows, and it was already damaged.
If it looks like the sword might break, it's not like they'll hand me a new one, so I need to use it as sparingly as possible.
But this at least made it clear exactly how much force their attacks had.
At this level, that method should work.
**
Holding the slightly chipped sword as close to the hilt as possible, I closed in on the axe puppet.
The puppet swung its axe at the exact right distance. Normally, I'd deflect or parry it with my sword and counterattack.
[Iron Wall]
-Clang!
After activating [Iron Wall] on my left arm, I used my forearm as a shield to block the axe.
As expected, I can't damage these guys by punching their bodies, but I can block their weapons with my own body.
If that weren't the case, their attacks wouldn't even hit me in the first place. I figured weapons would be the exception.
I got a slight cut on my arm from the axe blade, but this much doesn't interfere with combat at all.
-Crack!
I surged straight into the puppet's reach and drove the sword into its chest with all my strength.
The force was still a bit middling, but forcing it in with brute strength made it go in quite deeply.
And by my thrust, the puppet's center of gravity was thrown far backward.
-Swoosh!
I swept my foot across the floor, scraping it. The puppet, with its center of gravity thrown off, caught on the depressed patch of ground and toppled over.
I just need to put my weight behind it and drive in another deep thrust, and that's that.
-Crunch!
The shadow puppet, pierced through the torso, disappeared cleanly.
“No EXP?”
Muttering to myself, I pulled out the sword and turned around. As time passed, four puppets began moving at once.
But they weren't much of a threat. I had already roughly figured out how to deal with these things.
-Clang!
Starting with the puppet that rushed in first, I swung the training sword and knocked its weapon away.
Because of the weapon's durability limit, the blade kept chipping with every clash. But that didn't matter.
-Clang! Clang! Clang!
While trading blows and accepting the damage to my sword, I forced one puppet back all the way.
The puppet's sword and my sword crashed together repeatedly and fiercely, and before long the training sword broke.
One half of the shattered training sword's blade floated up into the air.
I grabbed it as it was and swung it like a dagger, stabbing the puppet's neck.
-Crunch!
What if each hit doesn't have much force? If I just keep stabbing the same spot in rapid succession, shouldn't I be able to make it work somehow?
-Thwack, thwack, thwack, thwack, thwack! -Crack, crack, crack, crack!
With my bare hand, I grabbed the blade and stabbed the puppet's neck again and again. Even if the force was weak, repeating the same spot made it effective.
After burying the blade halfway into the puppet's neck like that, I shoved the broken end of the training sword into the other side of its neck with all my strength.
With blades shoved in from both sides, I kept hold of the sword and did a big tumble, using the rotational force to sever the puppet's neck.
-Crunch!
It ended up more like tearing it off than cleanly slicing it, but either way, I took down another one.
Behind me, the hammer-wielding puppet was closing in fast. I flung the broken blade in my left hand at its face.
Even in a situation like this, my signature throwing accuracy doesn't waver.
-Thunk!
It lodged squarely in its face. It wasn't deep, but that didn't matter this time either.
“Bring it on.”
I jumped straight at the puppet with the blade lodged in its face and hit it with a dropkick.
-Crunch!
I wasn't directly attacking the puppet itself; I was hitting the blade stuck in its face and driving it in deeper.
My full-force dropkick shoved the blade in incredibly deep, and that finished off another one.
After retrieving the broken blade, I broke it into three pieces with my fingers this time.
Using the sharply split blade fragments as daggers or throwing stars, I slipped them between my fingers and threw them.
The two puppets left were the swordsman type, whom I'd already stabbed in the chest, and the spearman type that was still perfectly fine.
All three blade fragments lodged into the spearman's leg.
In order to properly thrust a spear, leg strength and mobility are important too.
Even with its leg damaged, the puppet still managed a fine thrust, but in any case its speed was cut in half and it had become very slow.
-Click.
After clamping the spear against my side, I closed the distance and attacked its shoulder with the broken training sword.
Using brute force, I drove the blade deep into the key part of the shoulder muscle, damaging it to the point where it couldn't hold the spear.
And then I took the spear away just like that.
This spear is mine now.
I threw the stolen spear at the swordsman; with enough durability for me to put real force behind it, it pierced the swordsman's chest clean through.
Whether shadow-made weapons disappear when they leave their owner, the spear vanished the instant it pierced the puppet.
The vanished spear reappeared in the spearman puppet's hand, but with its shoulder and leg injured, there was no way it could beat me.
I finished it off by stabbing its neck several times with the broken training sword.
That took care of all five.
By quickly figuring out how to deal with the puppets and applying it, I brought all five down in different ways.
I hadn't expected I'd be able to fight this well in a situation where my offensive options were this limited.
“Nice.”
It was a method perfectly suited to a solo player like me, because it let me hone my improvisation skills.
But as I thought that, I looked over at Rizmel, who had been fidgeting anxiously in the distance.
“My goodness.”
For some reason, Rizmel was covering their face with both hands and letting out one sigh after another.
**
Rizmel first checked the wound on my forearm where I'd blocked the axe.
Of course, the wound hadn't been deep to begin with, and it had already mostly healed thanks to the [Combat Healing] skill.
After confirming that my forearm was fine, Rizmel let out another sigh and shouted, “That's not how you do it, you stupid brat!”
“Huh?”
“Seriously, it wasn't just that you were using weapons like a brute...!”
Rizmel picked up one of the training swords lying around. Then they tapped the floor with it, summoning the shadows once more.
The exact same shadow puppet I had fought. Rizmel lightly swung the training sword at the puppet.
-Swish!
“What?”
The puppet was cleanly severed by Rizmel's slash and returned to its original shadow once again.
“This shadow is made so that it won't be cut unless you trace a precise sword path.”
Rizmel kept summoning a few more shadows and showed me how they were cut with the training sword.
“Conversely, if you draw a precise sword path, it cuts easily. It's a test that demands delicate swordsmanship.”
Ah, so that was why the damage changed so much from attack to attack.
I thought it was a test of various improvisational abilities using swordsmanship.
“But, haa... you're the first person who's ever beaten it that way.”
Still, well... since I won, isn't that enough?
Still, well... I won in the end, so isn't that enough?