At the end of the rocky area stood an abandoned outpost.
Only half of the stone wall remained, but many fresh footprints were left at the entrance. Lin Yuan followed the footprints and saw two players retreating in front of a sword-wielding skeleton in the courtyard.
The skull's sword blade glowed red.
"That move again!" one of them hurriedly raised his shield.
A flash of red light, and the rusty sword didn't strike the shield; instead, it lifted it from below. The round shield was flipped open, and another person quickly swung their sword to cover, but the skeleton had already retreated two steps away.
The two chased after them for a step, only to find three more skeletons rising inside the courtyard wall, so they had no choice but to turn back and retreat from the outpost.
Lin Yuan stood behind the broken wall and did not stop them.
He came here because he could see an old road leading north behind the outpost from a high vantage point. Since monsters were blocking the way in the courtyard, he figured he might as well clear them out.
The skeleton that had attacked first turned to him, its rusty sword held horizontally across its chest.
Lin Yuan drew his black short sword.
Unlike the wild boar and the gray wolf, the skeleton did not pounce immediately. It moved around Lin Yuan, always keeping the tip of its sword between them. Lin Yuan tried to take half a step forward, and the skeleton retreated, stopping him just outside the edge of the sword.
It can judge distance.
Lin Yuan continued to press closer, feinting with his short sword towards its shoulder.
The skeleton raised its sword to parry, and red light simultaneously spread from the hilt to the tip of the blade. The first sword deflected the short sword from below, and the second sword followed immediately with a diagonal slash at Lin Yuan's chest.
There was almost no gap between the two swords.
Lin Yuan stepped aside to avoid it, not in a hurry to retaliate.
The skull's third sword strike did not follow the same trajectory. Seeing that Lin Yuan had already moved to the right, it rotated its wrist and changed it into a short, close-range thrust.
Lin Yuan blocked the thrust with the spine of his sword.
The black dagger trembled slightly, and the skeleton's arm was lowered. With just a little more force, he could smash the skeleton and its rusty sword into the ground.
But he let go.
The skeleton staggered two steps, then raised its sword again.
The two players only saw the upward slash. They assumed the skeleton would repeat the same set of moves every time, which is why they were forced back by the subsequent changes. It is still governed by the established rules, but it will choose one of several combos based on the opponent's position.
This is much more interesting than a beast's straight-line charge.
Lin Yuan held his short sword horizontally in front of his chest, deliberately leaving an opening on his left shoulder.
The skeleton indeed drew its sword.
Lin Yuan didn't block, but only moved half a step to the left. The second diagonal slash grazed past his shoulder, and the third sword turned into a short thrust again.
He took a step back.
Lin Yuan remembered that when he first learned the Boundary-Severing Blade, he always tried to compensate for the distance of the sword strike with its length. Erza tapped him several times with her wooden sword until he finally agreed to look at his feet before swinging the sword.
The skeleton in front of him was the opposite. The length of its sword strikes remained constant, but it would change the distance between Lin Yuan and the sword tip by moving.
This world taught him not greater power, but how to find the true point of impact within a predetermined sword strike.
In the next round, Lin Yuan left his right side open. The skeleton started with a slashing attack, but changed direction for the second sword, and then pressed towards his retreat route with the third sword.
Several pebbles at their feet were pushed aside by the wind from the sword.
Lin Yuan looked at the wrist bone where it gripped the sword.
What's fixed isn't every single sword strike, but the shift in weight after the first strike. The skeleton's ability to perform sudden stops and changes of direction, which are impossible to execute with the system, means that if players only remember the red light and the move names, they will overlook where the sword actually comes from.
As the third round of combat began, Lin Yuan took a step forward to meet him.
The skeleton's sword had just risen when his short sword pierced through from below along the same trajectory. There was no red light, nor did the system adjust his movements; yet the blade precisely blocked the rusty sword's weakest point.
The skeleton is preparing to change its tactics.
Lin Yuan had already retracted the tip of his sword.
Erza once said that after a sword is swung, one must know where it should return to.
Using the momentum of sheathing his sword, he twisted his wrist to dodge the skull's second strike. The short blade pierced between his two arms and stopped in front of the pulsating blue core.
Just one more inch and the skull will shatter.
At that moment, three other skeletons arrived in the courtyard.
Lin Yuan drew his sword and stepped to the side, using the first skeleton to shield his companion. Three red lights flashed one after another, the sword blades clashing from different angles.
He finally stopped holding back.
The black short sword slashed through four cores in succession. The first skeleton was still in the position of raising its sword, while the next three had already turned into blue light fragments.
Lin Yuan sheathed his sword and glanced down at the blade.
The durability remains intact.
Footsteps echoed from outside the broken wall. The two players who had retreated earlier peeked out, their gazes falling on the lingering blue light fragments that filled the courtyard.
"All four have been dealt with?" the shield-bearer blurted out.
Lin Yuan didn't answer. They hadn't witnessed the entire battle; they only knew that someone had cleared out the monsters first. By the time the two entered the courtyard, he had already circled around the back wall and disappeared.
He walked towards the old path behind the outpost, rearranging the three sword strikes in his mind: deflect the opponent's weapon, change direction by retraction, and then leave the shortest thrust for the exposed vital point.
Players will use swords.
Monsters do too.
The next time he encounters an even stronger enemy, he can learn even more from it.