Shadow Battle Axe

"Whew... much better." Rokuya rolled his neck, his bones cracking sharply. He tightened his grip on the Shura Greatblade again, his silver hair stirring in the darkness without a breeze, like a shura demon god descended upon the mortal world.

"A monster... is this guy human or a monster? Why can his wounds heal?!" A trace of panic finally entered the demons' formerly arrogant roars.

"I told you already. There isn't a demon in this world that can kill me." Rokuya sneered, turning into a thunderbolt as he charged into their ranks again. "Now, round two!"

Inside the distant fence, more than a hundred villagers watched, dumbstruck.

They had thought this boy had merely come to his death, that his spectacular opening would be nothing but a fleeting flash, soon swallowed by mountains of corpses and seas of blood.

But what were they seeing?

That slender boy who looked only fourteen or fifteen, that boy carrying a terrifying blade broader than he was, was actually standing firm amid a pack of monsters, like an insurmountable mountain!

He was bleeding.

He was getting hurt.

Yet he had not taken a single step back!

He held fast on the only route to the "Blood Food Farm," keeping every danger and every demon in front of him alone!

"He... he's fighting for us..." The gray-haired old village chief's shriveled lips trembled violently. Tears spilled from his clouded eyes and struck the dirt.

"He could have run. Even that useless fool hanging on the wall wet himself in fear, but this boy... he didn't run! He's protecting us!"

"He's suffered so many wounds... he shed that blood to protect us!"

"Waaah... I'm sorry. I thought he was a madman earlier. I'm sorry..."

The young mother clutched her daughter and dropped to her knees in the muddy water with a thud. Pressing her palms together, she bowed deeply toward Rokuya's blood-soaked, battling figure, oblivious even as her forehead struck a stone and began to bleed. "God! Please bless this man! Let him live!"

"Protect our savior!"

"Sir, please don't die!"

"Even if it means trading my life for yours, please live, our savior!"

At that moment, the cold, dead hearts of more than a hundred villagers, tortured beyond recognition and long since utterly numb, erupted once more with the most burning emotion. It was the purest gratitude that could burst forth when someone looked up from the deepest abyss of despair and glimpsed the first ray of sunlight!

At the same time, system notifications began flooding the retina of Rokuya's right eye like a torrential downpour, accompanied by frenzied chimes!

[Ding! Intense gratitude detected from Villager A. Gratitude Points +5!]

[Ding! Extreme gratitude detected from Villager B (life-saving debt initially established). Gratitude Points +20!]

[Ding! Devout gratitude detected from the old village chief. Gratitude Points +15!]

[Ding! Gratitude Points +10!]

[Ding! Gratitude Points +18!]

To Rokuya, the system's mechanical voice now sounded sweeter than the most beautiful symphony in the world. The number in the upper-right corner, which had stalled at 4,700, began climbing at a frantic pace.

4,750... 4,820... 4,910... 4,990!

"Five thousand! Come on, break five thousand!" Rokuya swept aside two lunging demons with one slash. The blood in his chest churned, but the grin on his face only grew wilder.

Slash! A whip-like demon hand lashed his back, leaving a bloody welt.

But at that very instant, the system's voice suddenly rose in pitch.

[Ding! Collective extreme gratitude detected! Total Gratitude Points have surpassed the 5,000 threshold!]

[Current Gratitude Points: 5,210!]

[Conditions met! Purchase access to the system shop's basic core equipment, [Shadow Battle Axe], has been unlocked!]

"I've been waiting for you... buy it!" Rokuya roared wildly in his mind.

[Ding! 5,000 Gratitude Points consumed. Shadow Battle Axe redeemed and fused!]

Boom-!!!

An indescribably terrifying power erupted from Rokuya's body in an instant! This power was not merely a Breathing Style, but the power of laws acting directly on his muscle fibers, bone density, and Magic Core!

Shadow Battle Axe (Black Cleaver):

+ Greatly increased attack power!

+ Cooldown Reduction (Magic Energy circulation speed and Breathing Style recovery speed increased by 15%)!

+ Increased maximum health (massively enhanced physical toughness and resistance to blows)!

+ Unique passive · Sunder: grants the weapon an armor-piercing law that ignores part of the target's physical defense!

+ Unique passive · Cripple: attacks have a chance to inflict extreme sluggishness on the target!

Rokuya felt his formerly leaden body turn light in an instant, and the capacity for the stamina he had expended expanded enormously. But what delighted him most was the Shura Greatblade in his hand!

The three-hundred-jin Shura had originally had a dark blue blade, but after it fused with the Shadow Battle Axe's laws, an eerie, heart-stopping dark red glow appeared along its edge! That light carried an ultimate sharpness that could tear through any defense!

"What... is this feeling?" The demon closest to Rokuya instinctively sensed a lethal threat and shrieked as it tried to retreat.

"Only thinking of running now? Too late."

Rokuya slowly raised his head. His formerly black eyes were now completely filled with silver-blue light, carrying a cold indifference toward all life.

"Thunder Breathing · Modified · Twin Extreme Blade Flash!"

Shing-!

The air seemed to have been sucked dry in that instant. Rokuya vanished from where he stood.

The next moment, a crescent of blade energy interwoven with silver-blue lightning and dark red, armor-piercing bloodlight erupted in the densest heart of the demon horde!

Slash, slash, slash, slash-!!!

Hair-raising sounds of slicing rang out like a violent rainstorm.

This time, there was no resistance whatsoever!

The demons' iron-hard scales and reinforced bones capable of blocking Nichirin Blades became more fragile than tofu before the Shura Greatblade imbued with the "armor-piercing" law!

Five, ten, fifteen!

Every demon grazed by that dark red blade of light had its arms, torso, or neck sliced clean through in an instant! Blood did not even spurt from the cuts immediately, because the blade was too fast and the law too powerful!

"Aaaargh! My body!"

"Why won't it reconnect?! My Blood Demon Art isn't working!"

"Impossible! This is absolutely impossible!"

With a single slash, fifteen demons instantly turned to drifting ash!

Rokuya came to a halt and looked at the enormous cleaver in his hand, wreathed in both dark red and silver-blue light. He could not help laughing aloud. "What a Shadow Battle Axe! You thought you could push me around, huh? Had fun ganging up on me just now, didn't you? Now it's my turn!"

"Demon Form, possess me!" Although he did not have his ultimate ability, with the Shadow Battle Axe's enhancement, his normal Magic Energy Aura had already grown so dense that it resembled a nearly solid phantom suit of armor.