Soon, a nearly visible glow of mana lit up around Reinhard's body.
Before his enemy—his "grandmother"—could make a move, Reinhard used the instant mana surged and sword energy flared to grant himself the Divine Protections of the Sword Saint, Evasion, Acceleration, First Strike, First Sight, Reincarnation, and the Blue Sky, among others, taking the basic precautions needed to face an enemy.
After all, he knew the person standing before him was the previous Sword Saint of the Astrea family, a family of Sword Saints. She was his grandmother, and an extraordinarily powerful Sword Saint!
Though he didn't yet know what had happened to her, how much of her strength remained, or whether she had somehow grown stronger, Reinhard knew only this: he had to give it everything he had. Facing her with something like reverence and unwavering resolve was surely the right thing to do.
"..."
Whoosh!
Suddenly, Theresia van Astrea attacked.
Without the slightest warning or a word to Reinhard, she abruptly became a bolt of lightning, thrusting her sword straight at his throat. It was a vicious, deadly attack from the outset. She seemed determined to take the life of her own grandson.
"!!"
In the blink of an eye, Reinhard saw a sword tip moving so quickly that an ordinary person would never have noticed it.
The Divine Protection of First Sight activated!
If he could see an attack, his opponent's first strike was guaranteed to miss him.
His opponent was Theresia van Astrea, and he was Reinhard van Astrea. They came from the same family, shared the same lineage of swordsmanship, and were both Sword Saints. Of course Reinhard knew what kind of move she had used.
So it was no surprise that he easily read her attack and narrowly let the strangely angled, merciless sword