Clatter, clatter!!
"Nothing's impossible. I'm a damn genius."
Chains rattled as Igarashi Amaha firmly locked down one of Yokoyama's arms with his right hand.
Then he lowered his waist and violently yanked Yokoyama backward, flinging him straight into the enormous tree behind him.
Before Yokoyama could react, Igarashi Amaha turned sideways and kicked, pinning his foot firmly against Yokoyama's neck.
Then he gave a bloodthirsty smile and mocked, "Say goodbye to your five-fingered girlfriend. Heh."
Yokoyama's eyes widened at that, and he instantly understood Igarashi Amaha's intent. But just as he tried to use his Cursed Technique to escape, he discovered that his entire body was suspended in midair, trapped firmly between the tree behind him and Igarashi Amaha's leg, unable to touch the ground.
He began to panic, all his earlier arrogance gone, and started pleading, "N-no, don't, please don't, aaaaaah!" Unfortunately, the pressure against his throat left him unable to make a sound.
Igarashi Amaha exhaled a stale breath, his muscles bulging as the flames surging over his body danced wildly. He wrenched his arm with all his strength. "Haaaaah! Tear the hell off!!"
"Please, please, don't!!!"
Rip!!
Under Yokoyama's despairing gaze, his arm was torn clean off. The piercing agony instantly drained his face of color.
"Here, you can have it back."
The chains dispersed. Igarashi Amaha glanced at the arm in his hand, blood streaming from it, and tossed it to Yokoyama with some distaste.
Kneeling on the ground, Yokoyama looked deathly pale. His eyes, riddled with hideous blood vessels, stared fixedly at the severed arm lying in the dirt, and he lost all reason.
"Bastard... I'll kill you! Aaaaaah!!!!"
Clutching his bleeding wound, he let out a heart-rending roar. Yokoyama stamped one foot against the ground, shattering the earth for dozens of meters around him. Countless cracks formed a spiderweb pattern, and then countless spikes of rock burst out one after another, flying into the air and stabbing toward Igarashi Amaha in succession!
"Oh? A dying counterattack? Fine, let's end this here. I've more or less adjusted to the ability anyway." Igarashi Amaha stood at a distance with his hands in his pockets, his eyes narrowed as he spoke.
He took a deep breath, extended both hands, and bent his body slightly. The power of flames began gathering wildly beneath his feet, compressing over and over until wisps of white smoke even began rising from the ground.
Having already lost his reason, Yokoyama gave it no further thought and sent the rock spikes hurtling toward him.
"It's over! Bastard!"
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Several rock spikes stabbed downward like lightning.
"Hah..."
Just as the spikes came within mere millimeters of Igarashi Amaha's eyes, a hum rang out! A ripple surged from within him, and everything around him froze in place, as though time itself had stopped!
Igarashi Amaha opened his eyes and exhaled a wisp of white smoke. The instant the earth thundered, he vanished from where he stood, leaving behind only lingering flames and... a severed arm that had suddenly appeared?
Whoosh!!
The spikes did not pierce Igarashi Amaha as Yokoyama had wished. Instead, they stabbed into the ground and the severed arm.
But Yokoyama saw none of this, because a ghostlike figure blocked his view.
"Yes, it's time to end this..." A cold voice rang out.
Looking at Igarashi Amaha, who had suddenly appeared before him, Yokoyama's mind crashed. Before he could speak, a dazzling white light engulfed him completely.
-Piece Summons: "Fall"
-Maximum output!
...Boom!!!!
Rumble!!! Rumble!!!
The palm pressed against Yokoyama's chest instantly unleashed towering flames. A white light blazed as though it would devour everything in the world, annihilating Yokoyama and the dozens of li of forest behind him into nothingness.
Pitch-black smoke rose, enveloping the entire area.
As the black smoke cleared, Igarashi Amaha's figure emerged. The flames and feathered mask on his body had already disappeared, leaving only a pair of torn trousers to cover his last shred of dignity.
"So this is the power of the 'Knight'... Surprisingly good..."
Over the past few days, he had eaten all the Cursed Spirits within dozens of li of Kitano Village. With the addition of Aoki, who had already been a Grade 1 Jujutsu Sorcerer, he had unlocked the power of the "Knight."
He had thought the "Knight" would simply enhance his five senses and strength like the "Pawn," but it had actually turned out to be a skill. What an unexpected delight.
-Ability explanation:
"Piece Summons" was an Extension Cursed Technique of "Way of Resentment, Free of Worry." Its principle was easy to understand. Put simply, it could be understood as an ability activator, using "Piece Summons" to activate the powers contained within the various chess pieces.
Of course, the Cursed Techniques within the pieces could still be activated without using "Piece Summons," but that would greatly increase the windup time before releasing the technique-in other words, its startup.
With the intervention of "Piece Summons," however, the complicated process of releasing a Cursed Technique was replaced. All that was needed was to mobilize Cursed Energy and will it.
As for the "Knight's" ability, it compressed time within a five-li radius centered on Igarashi Amaha and performed a "swap"!
First came time compression. The principle was to squeeze time within a five-li radius, forcibly squeezing himself out of that point in time and appearing in the world one second later, thereby gaining nearly one second of "nothingness"-in other words, invincibility. Finally came the swap. It could be understood as "Boogie Woogie" with a five-li range and one second of invincibility.
No cooldown, moderate Cursed Energy consumption.
Back to the matter at hand: after unleashing that strike, Igarashi Amaha was already panting. Using his last ounce of strength, he flashed over to the still-dumbfounded Sato and knocked her unconscious with a chop of his hand.
Once that was done, he collapsed straight onto the ground and stared at the azure sky, gasping for breath.
"Huff... huff... huff... Damn it, I feel completely drained. If I'd known, I wouldn't have used so much Cursed Energy. What a waste."
"But killing someone like Yokoyama, whose Cursed Energy stat was maxed out, should get me quite a lot of Cursed Energy. Huff... At least the effort wasn't wasted. Heh."
Half an hour later, beneath the sunlight, Igarashi Amaha slowly rose, his stamina mostly recovered. He stretched languidly, his joints crackling crisply like frying beans.
"Whew, that's about enough. Time to earn my airfare."
With that, Igarashi Amaha dragged the still-unconscious Sato over beside him. Then he extended a hand, and with a thought, a flame ignited in his palm. Under his control, the flame began compressing, only stopping once it had formed a palm-sized sphere.
Igarashi Amaha toyed with the sphere for a moment, then placed it against Sato's forehead. The next second, the sphere began melting like a drop of water, merging completely into her head.
"This much power should be enough, right?"
Sato's body trembled, and then she slowly opened her eyes. Just as she was looking around in confusion, a voice jolted her fully awake.
"What's this? Looks like you slept pretty well?"
Sato turned and saw Igarashi Amaha's handsome face. Countless fragments flooded her mind, the final image among them being the sight of Yokoyama turning to ash.
The fear of death instantly enveloped her. Her face went pale, and her body began trembling uncontrollably. Without any further hesitation, she immediately dropped to her knees and began kowtowing with all her strength. Tears covered her face, and she was on the verge of a mental breakdown as she repeated, "Igarashi Amaha, I know I was wrong. I'm sorry, I really know I was wrong. Please, forgive me. I know I was wrong."
Looking at Sato in this state, Igarashi Amaha crouched down, looked at her, and shook his head. "You only knew you were going to die."
Please support me in every way you can. I'd be endlessly grateful.