Chapter 83 - Clash Of The Grandmasters V

'He can still keep up with me?! Is he perhaps also a superior stage?'

Owen had also begun second guessing Arthur's realm of existence.

He couldn't match up to Arthur with pure swordsmanship so he added brute force while depriving Arthur of his strength but he still kept up.

He clicked his tongue and activated another rune, this one shone on his forehead. Two more symbols showed in his eyes, same as the one on his forehead.

It would tell him what his opponent's weaknesses were, as well as send him a warning whenever an attack was coming! This rune had an ability allowed him to fight Arthur evenly.

"Mm." 

Arthur furrowed his brow for the first time after Owen dodged his attack.

He couldn't understand Owen again.

Owen shouldn't be at a level that would allow him to dodge all of his attacks, yet he was somehow managing to do just that.

'How about this!?' 

Arthur decided to use something he was not familiar with. 

The power of the law of space.

Coupled with the power of the law of time, he could temporarily deal delayed attacks. 

Arthur swung his sword.

Then, Owen's back felt cold. He instinctively rolled to the side.

**Swish!

A thick line appeared where he'd once been.

As Creusery was quite well versed in the law of space, he showed Arthur this technique once. 

One that made the user's attack come out at an angle the opponent did not expect.

Arthur, however used the power of time to delay the attack, this made the attack come out three seconds after his swing, at an angle that Owen didn't expect. However, Owen had managed to dodge this too!

"Are you psychic or something? Or is it that rune on your forehead?" Arthur asked while putting a hand at his back.

"..." Owen said nothing. He merely stood up and extended his blood red sword.

**Stab!

The blood-red blade sliced through Arthur's right arm, causing it to burst with shards of light.

The rune on Owen's forehead flashed, he clicked his tongue angrily.

'Mirage artifact, one strong enough to fool the rune!'

At that moment...

**SWOOSH

The real Arthur's blade cleaved towards Owen's body with blistering speed.

**Bam!

"Ugh." Owen staggered.

After witnessing Owen's ridiculous evasion, Arthur had come to the conclusion that he'd have to get tricky in order to land a critical blow.

Immediately after he'd come to that conclusion, he put it into effect.

With one had at his back, he fished out a single use mirage artifact. It created a temporary clone that looked like the original while concealing the user's body.

His tactic had worked perfectly.

Arthur attacked the staggering Owen once more.

'Aura Slash!'

The semi-transparent sword flew at Owen, intent on finishing him off.

**Whir!

The back of Owen's palm flashed with the brilliance of another rune.

A circular barrier surrounded him.

**Bam!

Once the sword struck Owen's barrier, Arthur quickly withdrew his sword and prepared his next move.

'Law of Space!'

He gritted his teeth and swung his sword in the air.

As soon as the barrier disappeared, a line was etched on Owen's body.

"Tch!" Owen held his black blade horizontally.

**CLANG!!

Upon contact, a metallic 'clang' rang out.

However, that was just bait!

Arthur forcefully swung his sword, which glowed with golden light.

'Sword or Victory!'

Regardless of his special runes, Owen couldn't dodge everything.

He couldn't dodge Arthur's sequence of attacks.

**BAM!!

The giant, mighty energy devoured Owen whole.

Arthur was panting, visibly exhausted, spider web like cracks had begun expanding from his arm that was holding the sword.

Using the law of time, in tandem with the law of space. Plus the artifacts and the aura he was using.

To top it off, the sword was siphoning part of his energy too.

Even if he had the energy reserves of a legendary, he would be exhausted after all this.

'Stop using the laws, the directors watching are beginning to notice.

And don't forget that I put an energy monitor in your body, I can tell you can't hold that negative energy back for long so finish this quick.'

He heard a voice in his head, Cattleya's voice. She used thought transmission to send him a message from the stands.

Even though the directors didn't think that Arthur could use a law's power, when he used two, there's no way they would not notice.

He nodded in affirmation and decided to end this. He removed the aura augmenting artifact and threw it on the ground.

An action aimed at making the doubting spectators think he had exhausted the stored aura.

He also removed most of the other artifacts he was wearing while stating out of the dust cloud caused by his attack.

'I'm never using sword of victory again, damn thing consumes too much energy.'

At that moment...

Like a flying fish jumping out of the water, Owen soared into the air with his wings.

"Tempest!" he swung the jet black blade. 

A roaring spiral-shaped aura shot out of his blade, and dashed towards Arthur.

**BAM!!

Arthur was surprised at the speed of the attack and delayed in putting up defenses.

He was thrown onto the floor from the force of the attack even though he dodged most of it.

"His highness has fallen!"

"Owen's counterattack worked!"

The spectators became heated.

"Lord Arthur!"

"How dare you!?"

"That bastard!"

Arthur's fans yelled loudly.

***WHOOSH!

Owen ignored this and flicked his fingers, he casted multiple wind magic spells and combined them all into one raging whirlwind. 

The raging whirlwind caused sand to go flying everywhere.

**SWISH!

However, the whirlwind was split in half and disappeared.

***TRAMP.

Arthur walked out, his entire body covered in sand.

His dark wings protruded from his back. 

Silver energy rose from his sword like a haze.

"You forced me to use this sword's ability, I can't really control it as I don't have control over my energy so I didn't really want to use it."

Of course, Arthur was just bullshitting.

The silver energy was not a result of the swords ability, he wasn't even sure if the sword had a special ability in the first place.

Owen stretched out his dark red wings, and darkness exploded from his monsterized body. 

Arthur swung his sword at him. Owen was in the air, so there was no way his attack would hit.

However Owen felt it would hit, the runes he had activated told him so.

**SWISH!

Arthur targeted Owen's wing. He quickly reacted, and dodged the slash.

He swung his sword once more, this time it was filled with the silver aura.

Owen stretched his wings, dodged the aura, and flew right at Arthur.

Owen swung his blood red blade while flying horizontally, Arthur flew up towards him to meet his attack head on.

**CLANGG!!

The collision resulted in a huge 'clang'. It was a sign that the power behind both their blades was tremendous.

Owen landed on the floor. Then, Arthur extended his semi-transparent blade and thrusted it powerfully.

Owen blocked it with a thrust of his own, despite it being the tips of the swords that collided, both of them were pushed back.

Arthur was the first to get back into position and attack.

Owen responded belatedly.

He swung both his black and red swords, but Arthur deflected them and stabbed towards the middle of Owen's chest, he also didn't stop there.

Attack! Attack! Attack!

'This bastard!' 

Owen gritted his teeth.

Arthur's skill with the blade was tremendous. Some 5th and 6th years may not be able to match up to him in terms of pure skill.

"Lightning Veil!"

**CRACKLE!

Sparks danced across the jet black swords blade. Owen also added the power of a rune to that. 

Both his swords began to dance through the air.

Unwilling to be outdone, Arthur began to swing his sword as fast and as powerfully as he could.

***CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!

Their blades continually met, resounding in repeated 'clangs'. Plus, injuries began to pile up on Owen's body.

'The sword is negating my regeneration!'

Arthur's sword was really crazy.

He deflected both of Owen's swords and even managed to find the time to counterattack like it was nothing!

'I can't keep this up for long. I have to finish him off while I still have the chance!'

At this point he didn't care about the consequences anymore, the only thing in his mind was beating Arthur.

Owen rushed forward and barraged him with attacks.

**CRACKLE!

He activated another rune, causing Chain Lightning to shoot out of the black blade.

Swish!

Arthur cleaved it in two with a forced swing.

Then, Owen let out a battle cry and bombarded him with powerful magic.

"Uhaaaa!"

Arthur's handsome face contorted significantly. He also yelled fiercely.

"Haaahp!"

He hesitated for a short moment before deciding to use it, the true nature of the silver energy being radiated from his sword was revealed.

"Divinity!!"

"The sword is a divine artifact!"