Zhang Liao moved again. Faster this time. Ten afterimages swept across the lake at once, compressing a hundred paces into a single step. Zhang Liao appeared in front of Chongyue, to his left, to his right, above his head, and behind him simultaneously.
"Consecutive Sucker Punch · Ambush from Ten Sides!"
Ten slashes descended from ten directions at once, each carrying armor-piercing power capable of cutting through Admiral-level Armament Haki.
Chongyue spread his Observation Haki. Unlike Zhang Liao's, his did not rely on sensing auras, but on sensing water. All the water in Black Tortoise Lake was an extension of his senses. The faint ripples Zhang Liao's blade stirred on the surface as it cut through the air, the changes in pressure as his feet touched the water at high speed, the trajectories of the splashes as his blade skimmed the surface during his slashes-all of them conveyed attack information precise to the millisecond.
An instant before the ten slashes landed together, he abruptly pressed his palms together before him, stepped half a pace outward with each foot, and brought a dense array of pale-black tortoiseshell patterns to the surface of his body. Every pattern was coated in Dark Steel Armament Haki, forming an invisible hexagonal defensive barrier.
"Tortoise Shell Protection."
The ten slashes struck simultaneously.
Clang, clang, clang, clang, clang-
The dense metallic impacts merged into a continuous din, like a downpour beating against a steel plate. Every clang was piercing, every collision sending towering sprays up from the lake. Chongyue's tortoiseshell patterns shuddered violently beneath the Sacred Sword's continuous slashes, hairline cracks appearing across the surface of every pattern.
But not a single pattern actually shattered. All ten slashes were blocked.
"That armor-piercing power is indeed far stronger than an ordinary Great Swordsman's attacks." Chongyue's voice emerged from