Cleaver Of Sin

Chapter 865: Echoing Buzz [GT Ranking Bonus Chapter]

The moment Zis landed on his feet, Teo’s feet also kissed the earth with deft ease. But the instant they landed, Zis Zaitsu was already on the move, the strings of his soul-bound guitar reconnecting themselves as, the very next moment, he plucked a chord. Teo Swig’s senses screamed as the earth beneath his feet rose in defense, but with the force of a speeding truck crashing into a human body, Zis’ sound wave attack tore through the earthen defense as though it were tofu and slammed with pinpoint accuracy into Teo Swig’s body.

Teo was shot backwards in a blur, having been caught off guard. As he was about to slam into a rocky pillar behind him, he twisted and landed on his feet like an agile cat. The moment he landed, he instantly pushed off the vertical surface of the pillar and tore towards Zis with blitzing speed, his glaive wrapped in raging wind and roaring flames.

But the moment he closed the distance, Teo noticed that his own speed had reduced by a small fraction. Zis, manipulating the sound around Teo, had managed to reduce his speed to a certain extent.

And with Teo’s speed reduced, Zis vanished from where he stood. Yet he didn’t simply leave. No, in his place were dozens of musical notes that immediately detonated with maddening force, the power and range of the attack almost razing everything within a one-kilometre radius to nothing but dust and destruction.

As the dust and debris cleared, Teo Swig could be seen standing within a cocoon of water, wind, and flames, having used the three elements together just to tank the sheer force of Zis’ attack.

Teo Swig immediately removed the barriers he had erected and pushed the wind outwards, clearing the smoke as he prepared to launch his own attack. But before he could even take a step, he heard the sound of a guitar being plucked and immediately felt uneasy. His eyes snapped towards the sky, and there, he saw it, thousands of musical notes.

It wasn’t a few. It wasn’t dozens. It wasn’t hundreds. It wasn’t even just a thousand, but thousands.

Zis Zaitsu floated above as he stared down upon the battlefield and everything beneath him, his Astra Energy already half depleted as he channelled most of it into this attack that literally covered the entire sky. There was simply nowhere to escape.

Everyone held their breath as they wondered what sort of apocalypse the detonation of so many musical notes could unleash.

Teo Swig’s eyes narrowed for a moment, his senses and body screaming with danger. But did he take a step back? No. Instead, he stepped forward, his usual calm and expressionless face breaking into a smile, his Astra Energy erupting outwards in full force, causing the air to swell beneath the sheer magnitude of his reserves.

Truly, when the man had told Asher that he had enough resources to throw around large-scale attacks, he hadn’t been kidding in the slightest.

Flames burst forth from his body as though the gates of hell had been thrown open. They sizzled, they burned, they roared as they ignited across his glaive. Wind followed next, perfectly complementing and balancing the flames, increasing both the potency and madness of what he was capable of unleashing.

He entered a martial stance as he pointed the blade of his glaive towards the ground, as it trembled in his hands from the insane amount of power output he was about to unleash.

[The Swigs Martial Technique: Slumbering Dawn]

With that, his Astra Energy roared like a maddened Monster, the air screaming in anticipation of what was to come, space itself seeming to recoil as, the very next moment, Teo Swig moved, swinging his glaive towards the very heavens.

Nothing seemed to happen at first, as though it had all been a fluke. Then, in the next instant, it came, a doom-laden apocalypse surged upwards with civilization-ending might. The lower half of the sky immediately turned a blazing whitish-orange as wind and flames roared outwards and upwards with catastrophic force.

Seeing this, Zis immediately frowned as he detonated his musical notes instantly while activating a skill.

Musical Amplification: Echoing Buzz

His Astra Energy surged once more, his already halved reserves plummeting to less than a quarter, his Astra veins almost running dry, as the skill he had just activated amplified the destructive power behind his musical note attack by forty percent.

And with that, Teo Swig’s attack collided with the musical notes, and an explosion beyond every measurable proportion for students of their strength thundered outwards as though the world itself were ending. The sky seemed ready to collapse, the land turned to lava, liquefying in real time as the terrain warped by the Worldshaper’s Relic was completely erased.

The oxygen only intensified the attacks as towering mushroom-shaped plumes of smoke rose towards the heavens while earthquakes tore through the battlefield. The air became suffocating as dust swirled everywhere, making it impossible to see or breathe. Even Zis, who had been floating in the sky, wasn’t spared.

Nobody could see. Even the students seated above couldn’t.

Both Teo Swig and Zis Zaitsu were covered in injuries that tore through their skin and burned their flesh, as there was simply no way they could withstand or defend against an explosion of that magnitude without paying a price.

But just because people couldn’t see, and because the smoke and dust obstructed everyone’s vision, didn’t mean that some people couldn’t perceive what was happening. Although bleeding profusely and wracked with pain, Zis moved. Yes, he couldn’t see, but as someone deeply attuned to sound, he could hear Teo Swig panting, and he could also hear the steady rhythm of his heartbeat.

Silencing Presence

He activated another skill, erasing every sound he could possibly make as he closed the distance between them like an assassin, his figure appearing behind Teo Swig as he swung his guitar to finish the boy where he stood.

But Teo Swig possessed the Wind Affinity. Even if Zis silenced himself completely, he would still disturb the surrounding air currents, and Teo Swig sensed him through that. However, he pretended as though he were completely oblivious to the incoming attack.

The moment the guitar closed in on the back of his head, his ragged breathing suddenly ceased as he instantly ducked forward while turning towards Zis. He didn’t merely turn. His glaive moved as well, flames and wind igniting around the blade once more as he swung it directly at Zis.

And like a hot knife through butter, Teo Swig’s glaive sliced through Zis’ arm, blood splattering across his face as Zis Zaitsu’s severed hand soared into the air.

Zis didn’t scream in pain, nor did he stand there in shock. He knew he had been played, and he knew he had fallen into a trap. Astra Energy coursed through his body as he increased his speed, creating distance between himself and Teo Swig.

But Teo Swig pressed his advantage. He closed the distance instantly, flames boosting his speed as fire boomed from the soles of his feet like rocket thrusters. Arriving in a blur, he swung his glaive towards Zis’ stomach with wicked force and pinpoint precision.

Seeing this, Zis immediately reacted, calling upon whatever last bit of Astra Energy he could muster. He moved to unleash a blast of compressed sound waves that thundered towards Teo Swig’s chest.

But to Zis’ utter shock, nothing happened. He still possessed the Astra Energy, although barely. The sound waves had answered his command… yet they simply vanished the moment he released them.

Unknown to Zis, Teo, who could manipulate both air and wind, was his natural nemesis to a certain extent. Since sound required air as a medium through which to travel, Teo simply disrupted the sound waves by creating chaotic air currents that distorted and scattered them, rendering the attack completely ineffective.

And with his last reserves of Astra Energy wasted on an attack that had been neutralized, Teo Swig’s glaive tore through Zis Zaitsu’s stomach with gut-wrenching ease, flesh parting sickeningly as the weapon burst out through Zis’ back.

Blood splattered onto the ground, soaking both of their bodies as they stared at one another for a brief moment. Teo Swig then pulled out his weapon, causing even more blood to spray into the air and ground

Zis touched the gaping hole in his abdomen, forced a final smile, then collapsed sideways, his body striking the ground with a heavy thud as he finally fainted from his injuries.

Teo Swig, the Commoner of the Zarethorne Empire, the Elemental Overlord, had won.

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AUTHOR’S NOTE: I almost died after typing 10 chapters. Might need a life support machine.

Thanks for reading, love you all to the moon and back!