He looked down from above at Zenitsu, who lay amid splintered wood, coughing up mouthfuls streaked with blood. His patterned face had long since twisted into something close to delirious pleasure.
"Whether it's that old bastard's First Form or the pointers that Rokuya gave you, they're all a joke in the face of overwhelming attributes. I'm winning today! That head of yours, full of complaints and crying, will be the perfect gift to celebrate my becoming a true Upper Rank!"
As he spoke, he raised his demon blade overhead again. The dense black light around him slowly gathered. He no longer bothered thinking about variations in his moves. He only needed to use this destructive power, which surpassed his opponent's completely, to cut down the discarded disciple still struggling on the ground.
"Thunder Breathing, Sixth Form: Rumble and Flash!"
The space throughout the enormous room seemed completely locked down by the countless descending pillars of black light. Ferocious, heavy lightning strikes poured madly in every direction, ring after ring, with his body at their center.
But.
In that corner, the blond boy kneeling on one knee amid the wood chips, haphazardly wiping the thick, fresh blood from his mouth with the back of his hand, suddenly lowered his blade to his waist, inch by inch, very slowly and very steadily.
His breathing grew lighter than ever, so light that all the violently exploding black lightning in the room seemed unable to stir even the slightest vibration in his eardrums.
His feet gripped the battered wooden beam beneath him as though rooted there. The lightning trajectories he had practiced hundreds of thousands, millions of times in his dreams suddenly fused completely with the unique new circuit he had spent two years exploring, day and night.
He remembered not only his master's