Book 9 - His Fame Shakes the World - 9 – Linley vs. Olivier
Olivier’s explosive shout still echoed in the Colosseum, but Linley seemed to be deaf to it. He remained on one knee besides his younger brother’s side, discussing something with his younger brother, seemingly not having heard Olivier’s shout at all.
Olivier, standing in mid-air, couldn’t help but frown.
“What is Master Linley doing? Didn’t he hear it?”
“Impossible. Maybe he is afraid of Olivier?”
.....
The people in the Colosseum were puzzled by Linley’s lack of reaction. After letting out this angry shout, Olivier fell silent, staring coldly from mid-air at Linley.
After finishing his conversation with his little brother, Linley turned and glanced upwards at the mid-air Olivier. In that instant...
Their gazes met! One on the ground, the other mid-air.
Their gazes seemed to clash in the air like physical blows.
“Olivier.” A hint of a smile was on Linley’s face. He calmly said, “Ever since arriving in the O’Brien Empire, I’ve heard people praise you as the Prodigy Sword Saint. To tell the truth? Given that you reached the Saint-level at age forty, I don’t see what makes you a ‘prodigy’.”
Olivier’s forehead furrowed slightly.
The combative nature of Linley’s words caused all 80,000 onlookers to grow excited. Good heavens. These two geniuses were really being antagonistic towards each other.
This would be the true duel between geniuses.
A duel between Linley and Olivier would clearly be on a totally different level from the duel between Blumer and Wharton. The battle between the older brothers definitely would be a duel between two of the utmost geniuses in the entire Yulan continent.
This duel was about to start at any moment.
Linley suddenly rose directly into the air above the dueling platform. Only after he came to a stop did the blur beneath him slowly disappear.
What terrifying speed.
“Rumble...” Black draconic scales quickly covered Linley’s entire body, and ferocious spikes erupted from his spine, his knees, his elbows, and his forehead. That black, scale-covered draconic tail flashed with a cold, gloomy light.
Floating in the air, Linley stared at Olivier with those dark golden eyes.
This was the first time he had seen such a terrifying transformation. Even the normally calm and composed Olivier had a flash of surprise in his eyes, but he quickly returned to his usual calm.
“Saint-level Dragonblood Warrior?” Olivier looked at Linley, a terrifying aura of battle-lust emanating from him. “You aren’t at the Saint-level pre-transformation. It seems that your current condition isn’t the most powerful condition and time for a Dragonblood Warrior. Pity...such a pity...”
Olivier truly wanted to have a battle with one of the legendary peak-stage Saint-level Dragonblood Warriors.
“Olivier, a person should know their limits.” Linley’s cold voice rang out in the Colosseum. “Do you think the likes of you are a match for the Supreme Warriors?”
The two genius Saint-levels stared at each other in mid-air. Everyone held their breaths, carefully watching this never-before-seen battle.
“Linley!”
Olivier extended his hand to his back. On Olivier’s back, there were two longswords; one of them, a translucent sword, appeared very similar to Icedream. The other sword was pitch black.
“Against you, using the Lightshadow Sword technique is enough.” Olivier drew the longsword that was as translucent as a block of ice. This sword really was identical to Blumer’s; it was also an ‘Icedream sword’.
With a flip of his hand, that devilish-looking Bloodviolet flexible sword appeared.
“Enough talk. Power is demonstrated through actions, not words.” Linley paid no attention to Olivier’s arrogance at all.
A hint of self-confidence was in Olivier’s eyes. Staring at the Icedream sword in his hands, he murmured, “After I reached the Saint-level and defeated Dillon, I have roamed the various countries. In total, I met eighteen Saint-level experts, and won each battle. Unfortunately, not a single one of them was able to match me in speed.”
A series of surprised murmurs from the 80,000 onlookers.
No one had known that Olivier had subsequently done battle against eighteen Saint-level experts.
Olivier looked at Linley, a hint of self-confidence in his eyes. “In general, someone who cannot match me in speed will definitely lose.” As he spoke, the Icedream sword in Olivier’s hand began to shine as a white light began to swirl about the surface of the sword.
Seeing this, Linley began to grow cautious.
Linley could remember clearly how when Blumer used this Lightshadow Sword technique, the light on the Icedream sword had been golden. Only afterwards, when Blumer had used the ‘forbidden’ technique, did Icedream carry a hint of white light within it.
Although it was just a hint of white light, the attack power of Icedream had multiplied several dozen times.
Originally, Icedream had not been able to harm Wharton, but afterwards, it had been able to pierce through Wharton’s palm, and then pierce past the scales on Wharton’s chest. And that was just a hint of white light.
But Olivier’s? It was pure white.
“The power of this attack is most likely far more powerful than Blumer’s all-out desperation attack.” Linley naturally was prepared for this.
“Linley, I’m afraid that today, the world will have lost another genius.” Olivier said in a quiet, calm voice, and then the white light began to flash repeatedly.
With each flash of white light, another shadow-Olivier appeared in the air above the dueling platform. The power and efficacy of this white light clearly was much higher than Blumer’s technique; in the blink of an eye, 108 shadow-Oliviers had appeared in the sky.
Everyone was shocked speechless.
“Third bro.” Yale and Reynolds were so nervous that they had begun to sweat already. Wharton, Barker and his brothers, Rebecca, Leena, and Jenne also watched nervously as well.
The injured Blumer, by contrast, watched with confidence.
“Blumer, your older brother’s Lightshadow sword has already reached the perfected level, filling the skies with his shadows.” The seated judge, Monolithic Sword Saint Haydson, smiled calmly at Blumer.
Blumer’s face was filled with confidence.
.....
The demonically ferocious-looking Linley, standing in mid-air, was now surrounded by 108 shadow-Oliviers. Linley had to admit that this speed was absolutely astonishing.
“Linley, are you ready?” Olivier actually gave Linley a warning.
Clearly, Olivier was feeling extremely confident.
Linley only chuckled calmly.
A sudden white flash, utterly piercing to the eye. Even Linley had to squint, but right at that moment, the Icedream sword, covered with white light, reached Linley’s head, piercing directly through it.
“Ah!”
Everyone let out simultaneous cries of alarm. Did the mighty Linley die just like that?
But not a hint of blood came out from Linley’s head, despite having been pierced through by Icedream. Suddenly, ‘Linley’ slowly disappeared. It had just been a shadow!
“You are indeed quite fast. Unfortunately, in front of me, you aren’t qualified to be arrogant about it!” Linley’s voice rang out from the air a hundred meters away.
Olivier stared at the distant Linley, his face growing solemn.
“How incredibly fast!” The eyes of the Monolithic Sword Saint Haydson, watching from the judge’s platform, shone brightly. Linley’s speed wasn’t one whit inferior to Olivier’s.
A wave of surprised murmurs filled the Colosseum. And then, silence once again.
The viewers all felt as though their very souls had been shocked by this exciting battle.
“Is that so?” Olivier’s face grew cold. He had never met anyone faster than him. As for someone on par with his speed, the only one to date had been the Monolithic Sword Saint. He didn’t believe this youngster Linley could match him.
After all, his speed was so fast that it had already exceeded human limits.
This sword technique and movement technique was based on Olivier’s insights into the Elemental Laws of Light. This movement technique, in principle, could reach the speed of light itself. However, due to the limits of his body and his battle-qi, he could only reach his current level of speed.
“You don’t believe me?” Linley chuckled.
Another flash of white light. Linley began to move as well, as both reached a terrifying level of speed.
Shadowed blurs everywhere!
Countless shadows and blurs appeared everywhere. The 80,000 watchers felt their vision grow blurry. They simply couldn’t tell which of the shadows were the true bodies of Linley and Olivier. The two had simply reached an absolutely terrifying level of speed.
“What astonishing speed.” As they really began to compete, Linley couldn’t help but feel surprised. “If it wasn’t for the fact that I had cast the Windshadow spell in advance, I wouldn’t be able to match this Olivier in speed.”
Linley was fast, true.
But the insights which Olivier had gained into the Elemental Laws of Light were extremely powerful. However, supported by the most powerful speed-enhancing spell, the Windshadow spell, Linley’s speed had been instantly raised to a level equivalent to Olivier’s.
“Swish!”
A deep gouge suddenly appeared on the dueling platform; clearly, it had been cut by a longsword. But then in the blink of an eye, a huge crater appeared with a thundering sound.
The 80,000 viewers stared fixedly with wide eyes, not wanting to miss a thing.
“Motherf*cker, this is real speed. Our Academy’s teacher keeps on bragging, but compared with these guys? He’s just a child who has barely learned to walk.” Watching this battle, a youngster was so excited that his eyes were turning bloodshot.
These 80,000 viewers had perhaps never seen this sort of high-speed battle before in their entire lives.
This sort of battle would only occur when the two combatants were equally matched in speed. If one of them was too slow, the battle would have ended instantly.
“Bam!”
Linley’s black draconic tail brushed past Olivier’s clothes, viciously smashing against the dueling platform, causing every single inch of the platform to crack. In the next instant, Linley and Olivier both disappeared.
The battle was so high speed that the onlookers could only barely see some shadows and blurs when the two lowered their speeds to exchange blows. But once the combatants returned to their maximum speed, not even their shadows could be seen!
“Whoosh!”
A tornado seemed to have sprung into being out of nowhere in the middle of the Colosseum. As the wind howled, the 80,000 onlookers could just barely make out two hazy figures standing in the middle of the wind, staring at each other.
The fierce wind gradually died down.
Olivier looked solemnly at Linley, the Icedream sword in his hands gleaming with all seven colors of the rainbow, like a beautiful illusion.
As for the demonic Linley, his draconic tail quivered behind him, and the Bloodviolet sword in his hand was covered with a strange violet light.
A suppressive aura filled the Colosseum.
“I admit that your speed is no lower than mine.” Olivier spoke out.
Linley’s dark golden eyes were fixed on his opponent. He said calmly, “And your speed isn’t any lower than mine either.” After having competed just then, these two experts found that neither could gain an advantage over the other based on speed.
If they continued to compete in such a manner, there would be no end.
“Dare you face my attacks head on?” Olivier stared Linley, a surge of an aura of battle-lust erupting forth from him.
“Why wouldn’t I dare?” Linley’s body began to emit that same ferocious battle-lust.
The 80,000 onlookers were so excited that they were beginning to quiver. Good heavens. These two experts were going to fight head on now. Even the Monolithic Sword Saint, Haydson, was watching carefully.
As for Blumer, Wharton, and the others, they were each eager to see their older brother achieve victory.
Linley and Olivier stared at each other in mid air. In the same instant, the two of them moved in a direct line towards the other.
“Bang!” Sudden sonic booms erupted from them as they reached a terrifying level of speed.
While charging at Linley, Olivier’s body seemed to have fragmented into seven or eight people, and the Icedream sword in his hands had transformed into ten million sword-shadows.
“You want to compete in sword speed?”
The Bloodviolet sword in Linley’s hand flickered, then in the blink of an eye, Linley’s body seemed to have been surrounded by a tornado while at the same time, countless flashes of violet light simultaneously struck at Olivier.
“Clang!” “Clang!” “Clang!” “Clang!”
Countless clashing sounds could be heard, and then, Linley’s iron-whip-like draconic tail turned into a blur as well, smashing viciously against Olivier.
“Clang.” The Icedream sword in Olivier’s hand slammed against Linley’s draconic tail, then he flew backwards at high speed.