Chương 405: Chapter 394 - The Hangman

The knight finally stopped resisting and surged toward Imani with full force. Yet Imani's stance held. An immovable core. A star the world bent toward. The creature feinted high, steel flashing toward Imani's visor, then twisted at the last instant. A kick drove into his flank, followed by a shield bash aimed at his ribs. BAM! The impact detonated against his armor. Sand burst outward. Stone fractured beneath his boots. Imani absorbed it. His biocapacitors drank the force.

Muscle fibers compressed, storing the violence instead of yielding to it. Pain flared across his side, sharp and real, yet he did not retreat. He stepped into it. His hammer came up from low guard in a brutal arc. BOOM! The head connected with the knight's shield, the collision blasting dust and shards of stone into the air. The creature slid half a meter back, boots carving trenches through sand and cracked rock. But it did not fall.

It rotated with the momentum, longsword snapping toward Imani's exposed shoulder in a tight, efficient cut. Steel rang. Imani shifted just enough, letting the blade glance across reinforced plate instead of biting deep. Sparks scattered. He felt the vibration run through bone. Stored force peaked. He released it. The recoil from the earlier strike burst through his frame and into his next blow. The hammer slammed down again, faster this time, heavier. BAM!

The knight deflected, angling its shield perfectly, bleeding most of the impact away into a sliding pivot. The ground cratered beneath them both as the redirected energy split the stone in a spiderweb fracture. Still, the armor dented. Still, cracks began to spread. They closed distance further. There was no room now for wide arcs or measured footwork. It became brutal and intimate. Shield against shield. Blade scraping along reinforced edges. Hammer smashing into vambrace, into greave, into cuirass. BOOM! BAM!

Each collision tore the arena apart. Sand lifted in spirals around Imani's gravity well. Broken fragments of plate scattered across the ground. The knight orbited him, circling within the warped field, searching for a gap, testing angles with rapid, precise cuts. Imani did not chase. He turned with it. He remained the center. Every strike he received fed him. Every blow charged his capacitors further. Bruises formed beneath steel. Blood warmed inside his armor. His breathing deepened, steady despite the punishment.

The knight drove forward in a burst of speed, longsword thrusting straight for his throat. Imani caught the blade on the rim of his shield, metal shrieking, and stepped through the line. He headbutted the creature. CRACK! The helmet snapped back. His hammer followed immediately at point-blank range, powered by the full release of stored kinetic force. The explosion of impact shattered a section of the knight's chestplate. Metal caved inward.

The shockwave ripped outward, blowing sand and debris into a widening ring around them. The knight staggered. Yet it did not fall. Its response was immediate. The longsword carved a diagonal line across Imani's thigh, biting through layered armor and drawing blood. A shield edge smashed into his jaw, snapping his head to the side. Pain flared white. Imani did not step back. Neither did the knight.

They stood within arm's reach now, breaths heavy, armor fractured, ground beneath them reduced to shattered stone and compressed sand. It was no longer about skill. It was Will against Will. The spectral Guardian Star burned brighter, gravity deepening, pressure mounting. The knight's movements slowed under the weight, every adjustment costing more. Its once-fluid arcs grew heavier, more desperate. Imani advanced again, hammer rising. The knight roared. A sound like rope snapping under strain.

Behind it, space tore. A dark silhouette formed in the air, the shape of a hanged corpse suspended from a twisted tree. Limbs limp. Head bowed. The rope around the knight's neck flared with black light as the phantom tightened. A surge of hostile Will exploded outward. The oppressive pull around Imani trembled. The outline of the burning sun flickered as a wave of darkness pushed back against it.

Sand blasted away from the knight in a violent ring as its presence expanded, tearing through part of the suppression field. Imani felt it then. The creature was finally serious. Blood trailed from the corner of his mouth. A deep cut along his thigh strained his stance. Sections of his armor were cracked and bent inward, edges biting into flesh. Yet he did not flinch. He stood where he was. Whatever the creature had in store… he would take it. He was the shield. He was the flame that endured.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. His eyes burned brighter, pain feeding his Will, the Guardian Star flaring again as it pressed against the knight's expanding darkness. Then the air shifted. There was no warning. No visible movement. Something tightened around his neck. His body jerked upward as if yanked by a noose from the sky. His boots left the shattered ground. His throat constricted with crushing force, veins swelling as blood flow was cut. He was being… hanged?

He swung his hammer blindly, shield scraping through empty air. There was nothing to strike. No rope. No chain. Only the suffocating effect. The knight stood below, unmoving, its Will burning in the shape of that hanged silhouette behind it, the phantom corpse swaying in silent judgment. Imani forced his own Will to surge. The star roared brighter, gravity deepening in a desperate attempt to counter the unseen force. For a moment, the pressure eased. Then it tightened again. Stronger.

His vision darkened at the edges. His lungs burned. And then— Something else entered the arena. A rhythm. At first it was faint. A pulse beneath the suffocation. A low beat, like distant drums echoing through earth. Thud Thud Thud The cadence grew clearer, steady and rising. Imani felt warmth stir in his chest, like a heat from within. His heart began to match the tempo instinctively. The rhythm sharpened. There was flow in it. Motion.

A rising melody threaded between the beats, fierce and alive, like fire given breath. The darkness pressing around his throat faltered. The noose loosened. The music intensified. Each beat struck the air like a kick against stone. Each note cut clean and bright through the knight's oppressive Will. The rope vanished. Imani dropped. He landed heavily, boots cracking what remained of the arena floor, instinctively reaching for his bruised neck. The knight was no longer facing him. It had turned. It was fighting.

Steel clashed again, but now the rhythm of battle had changed. The sound in the arena pulsed stronger, faster, vibrant. It rolled through the shattered stone and torn sand, threading through dust and blood alike, rising in layered cadence. Music woven into Will itself. Each beat struck with purpose. It drove back the dark aura. It carved space through the suffocating pressure. It set his blood in motion again. Imani stood still for a breath, listening. The tempo climbed. Fierce. Exultant. Alive.

The melody arced upward like fire guided by a master's hand, every strike flowing into the next, every step balanced between grace and impact. Motion met force head-on and bent it aside, rhythm slipping through gaps that brute strength could never force open. Imani felt the pain in his body shift beneath it, heat replacing ache, strain turning into fuel. His lips curved before he realized it. The music pulled him forward. To stand. To fight. To burn brighter. And he did.

His star flared again, its pressure layering over her Will as they faced the darkness together, gravity and flame intertwining in the fractured arena. For he was the shield. And the fist… had arrived.

Ayu stood calmly as she watched Imani fight. At first he held his ground well, shield steady, hammer striking with weight. But it was obvious to her almost immediately that he was at a disadvantage. The knight was simply the better fighter. She recognised the resolve in Imani's stance, though. The sheer will it took to stand in front of something like that and not step back. The defence he had pulled off was impressive. But she had known from the start. Him fighting alone would end in failure.

The others knew it too. Leonie's grip had tightened. Pablo's summon shifted. Chiara's eyes sharpened. And yet, when Leonie was about to give the order to intervene, Alonso shook his head." Let Imani temper his Will." Leonie had looked surprised for a moment. Ayu hadn't. She understood immediately. There was only one way to temper fire. You let it burn. So she observed. She watched as Imani stood against something stronger than himself and refused to ask for help.

She watched him take the hits, answer them, refuse to break as his Will, the burning sun that embraced him, shone brighter and brighter. It was his moment. And she respected that. But when the knight's own Will manifestation flared, everything shifted. The imbalance deepened. Leonie stepped forward and exchanged a brief look with Alonso. He gave a small nod." Let's wait for the critical point," Leonie said, calm and firm." Ayu takes it." She turned to her, gaze sharp." Be ready." Ayu met her eyes and nodded once.

I've got this. She stepped forward without hesitation. Her bare toes pressed into the sand as she rose lightly onto the balls of her feet. Her weight began to shift in quick, rhythmic bounces. Left. Right. Forward. Back. Loose. Relaxed. Her shoulders rolled. She closed her eyes. Her head tilted gently from side to side, slow at first, then finding tempo. Her arms lifted, fists loosely clenched before her face.

Her heart began to thrum. One beat. Then another. Then faster. Each pulse stronger than the last. She did not push for it. She let it rise. She let her body fall into the flow that had always been there. The flow that guided her elbows, her knees, her steps. The flow that burned in her when she smiled at danger and stepped in anyway. A flow that was uniquely hers, born from the very core of who she was. Her breathing aligned. Her hips loosened. Her stance narrowed. She felt it. That inner heat. Untouched by anger.

Unaffected by rage. Something brighter. A fierce joy. She held it inside her. She watched as Imani's sun was forced back, as he was lifted into the air like by an invisible noose. She watched his Will flare and fight, only to be met with a heavier, cruel counter from the knight. That was enough. Leonie's confirmation came. It was time. In that instant, everything she had kept contained— she let it burn free. And the world answered her. Her Will did not rise as a towering image or crushing weight.

It did not glare at the eyes. It reached for the heart. It moved. It pulsed. It flowed. Her Will was tempo. Her Will was rhythm. A rhythm that spread from her chest into the very air, threading through sand, steel, breath. For this was who she truly was. This… was her song. Will Manifest— —A Song of Fire