The Golem Mage

It was then that everyone watching realized he hadn’t been injured at all, the Qi-manifestation armor around him seemed to carry a strange property, one that allowed solid matter to pass through him.

Still, no one knew the limits of that ability, whether it had a strict duration, a cooldown, or some type of hidden condition to activate, because a special ability that absurd had to come with a price or restriction.

While the crowd speculated, Aeron already knew the truth: he knew he couldn’t last much longer, he was burning through the last of his mana, and once it ran dry, the armor would vanish, leaving him exposed and unable to keep fighting.

So he surged forward, determined to end things fast before he ran out of mana.

Out of nowhere, he manifested a kukri in his right hand as the Qi manifestation energy coated the weapon immediately it appeared in his hand, while he dashed at the Takeda who he’d just disarmed.

Takeda flicked his right hand outward—

-As a kunai dropped from a hidden compartment in his hand guard into his palm, and he thrust it forward to meet Aeron’s momentum.

But it didn’t go as planned, as Aeron slapped Takeda’s right hand aside with his left, then slipped in, and from there the kukri did most of the talking.

Holding the kukri in an inverse grip, Aeron flowed straight into a sequence, staying low as he carved a clean slash across Takeda’s belly, then dropping further to cut behind the knees, severing the tendons and forcing Takeda down.

Before Takeda could recover, Aeron clamped a hand on his head and pressed the blade lightly to his neck.

This was a dangerous move—yet not quite fatal to take his life, as Aeron was betting that if this was the real Takeda then it meant that he bled, the next second, the body dissolved into smoke as he seems to have surpassed a certain threshold that was needed the Takeda body clone could take.

Aeron exhaled, frustration flashing across his face for a moment, as he started to feel as if Kaelus would be the one to take the glory of finishing the real Takeda and taking them to the next round.

Not that Aeron truly minded, after all he was fine staying in the background, he had these thoughts because he felt if the two he’d just cut down earlier were clones, then the Takeda facing Kaelus had to be the real one.

And in that moment he decided to dismiss the Qi-manifestation armor, after he did he felt like every trace of strength was being drained out of him, his limbs went heavy, his vision blurred, and all he wanted to do was sleep, but he still forced himself to lift his head, curious to see how Kaelus would finish it.

He watched to see Kaelus drive Takeda out of the battle ring, with his katana still lodged in his chest, and Aeron smiled feeling that they had won it all, until the body Kaelus had just “defeated” turned to smoke as well, dissolving the same way the others had.

Bewilderment settled on Aeron’s face as he stared ahead, unable to process it, there had only been three Takedas, and he started to feel if he had killed two out of those three, then why was the last one dissolving into smoke instead of spilling blood?

Then a thought hit him like a hammer, that what if all three of them had been clones all along, he started to feel they’d been deceived from when Shin-Jae Hyun threw those smoke bombs to block their view.

But before he could even open his mouth to call out to Kaelus concerning his thoughts, a soft breeze stirred behind him, even the spectators noticed it—the wind around Aeron warped unnaturally, bending into the outline of a doorway.

A door made of nothing but air, and then someone stepped out of it.

An arm hooked around Aeron from behind, and a Katana blade drove into his stomach, the attacker’s movement didn’t pause there at all, knee, sweep, cut.

The figure bent low, and tore through the back of Aeron’s knees, and dropped him in one clean sequence, as he fell, the figure pressed his katana lightly to his neck.

It had all happened in a blink.

Aeron couldn’t even feel the pain properly yet, but he understood one thing instantly: this had to be the real Takeda, the execution was completely identical to his own, exactly what he just did a couple of seconds ago—same angles, same rhythm, same ruthless efficiency, as if the attacker had studied every move he made.

All Aeron felt was his body moving towards the ground from being pushed, but the moment his back touched the floor, what he saw made his eyes widen in shock.

There were two different Takedas standing over him. Aeron didn’t understand what was happening anymore.

Before their battle with the School Of Silent Night his team’s every attempt to dig up records on the School of Silent Night had been shut down, as all information bounced back or were said to have vanished, so all they’d managed to learn came from tournament matches they had been fought just these few days, however in all they were able to get none of the informations even mentioned half of anything they had faced in the few minutes they had stepped on the battle ring.

He watched the katana-wielding Takeda, the one who he believes had put him in this state, crouch calmly in front of him.

“Seriously, I’ll admit you surprised me, but you need to understand something, you never had a chance of winning.” the katana Takeda said.

“Tell me the truth, are you the real body? Because with moves like that, there’s no way you’re a clone.” Aeron asked with a rasped voice.

Before the crouching Takeda could answer, the one with the greatsword resting on his shoulder threw his head back and laughed.

“Fine, let me let you in on a secret before I deal with your partner. This is my real body.” the katana Takeda said, his voice steady.

Aeron let out a tired sigh of defeat after the words of confirmation he heard, as he felt relieved that he didn’t fall in the hand of a clone, he felt now he could stop holding back his fatigue and sleep, but Takeda wasn’t finished talking.

“And that,” Takeda added, pointing to the bulkier version of him with the greatsword,

“is also my real body.”

This time Aeron’s eyes widened as his drowsiness cleared up slightly.

“There are three more real bodies as well, the clones are just a cover for the main five. Five bodies—one existence. I won’t bother explaining the details, all you need to know is this: you were never going to win this match.” Takeda continued.

He leaned closer, almost casual.

“The moment your team stepped into this ring, you were only here to show me how far you could push me, because you were never fighting a five-versus-five.”

Takeda’s smile sharpened.

“You were fighting five versus ten, this is not even talking about the fact that one of the main bodies can summon clones with about seventy percent of my strength... and those clones can produce their own copies at seventy percent of their strength.”

His gaze drifted toward the battlefield, cold and certain.

“And the funniest part? Until now, me and the other four main bodies didn’t even think you’d be able to draw us out.”

“But congratulations—here I am. You did draw me out. Just so you know, each body matches the others in strength, only with different battle styles, which means your team wasn’t facing one captain-level fighter... you were facing five.”

The katana-wielding Takeda flashed a wide smile.

“Now do you see why I said you were never going to win?”