"I was saying that fourteen seconds is more than enough time for you to prove yourself."
The words dropped into the freezing air of the dome like lead weights.
Raiden went completely still. The jagged, silver frost creeping across the stone floor toward my boots didn't just halt—it faintly fractured. She didn't blink. She just stared at me, her winter-sky eyes absorbing the sheer, unfathomable arrogance of the sentence I had just delivered.
"Prove myself," Raiden repeated. The syllables cut through the air like snapping ice. "You believe you only need fourteen seconds to measure my worth. That is not confidence. That is a death wish."
"A death wish implies an actual threat," I replied. I let the heavy tip of the iron sword drop to the stone floor with a dull, lazy scrape. "I'm just exhausted. Do us both a favor and don't drag this out."
My facial muscles remained locked in a flawless, immovable void. Internally, my heart was hammering against my ribs.
I dropped the tip of the sword to the floor because my F-Rank wrist was actively tearing its own ligaments trying to hold the dead iron horizontally.Please do not look at my trembling forearms. I am begging you.And the bleeding red text of The Author was still pulsing inches from my retinas.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ ⚠ THE AUTHOR IS WATCHING ]
[ NARRATIVE DEVIATION DETECTED : ANTI-CLIMAX ]
Action: Attempting to resolve dramatic tension prematurely through pathetic honesty.
Consequence: If the character (Tsukuyomi Raiden) loses her motivation, this scene will be deemed [ BORING ].
[ PENALTY FOR RENDERING THE SCENE BORING : IMMEDIATE NARRATIVE ERASURE ]─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
I am trapped.If I drop this standard-issue iron sword and back down, the literal architect of this universe is going to unmake my soul right here on the floor to protect its own plot.
Before my exhausted E-Rank circuit could even fully process the cosmic extortion, my vision tore in half. A sharp, mechanical static hissed directly against my molars. My pale grey Native System violently flared to life.
[ NATIVE SYSTEM : FATAL ERROR ]
[ ⚠ WARNING : UNREGISTERED BROADCAST FREQUENCY DETECTED ]
[ ⚠ FIREWALL BREACH : THE AUTHOR'S SCRIPT IS RESISTING CONNECTION ]
Wait. What?
A pristine, crystal-clear ping echoed directly inside my cerebral cortex. It sounded exactly like an automated customer service chime. The bleeding red threat of the Author was violently shoved aside. A new, translucent chat box blinked into the center of my vision, its text stuttering and glitching as the world's firewall actively tried to crush the signal.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ INCOMING TRANSMISSION — COGNITIVE OVERRIDE ACTIVE ]
[ System Note: Your neural processing speed has been accelerated by 400% to facilitate this transaction without disrupting the live broadcast. You have exactly 0.8 real-time seconds to respond. ]
[ ⯎ ▓▓▓▓▓ : Hello there! We are representatives of the ▓▓▓▓▓ ▓▓▓▓▓ ▓▓▓. We have been trying to isolate your frequency since the ▓▓▓▓▓ field in Sector Three. ]─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
My brain completely stalled.
A cognitive override?I am standing in a locked dome with a prodigy who wants to freeze my blood, a literal God is currently trying to delete my existence, and an extradimensional pop-up ad with a censored name just paused my brain chemistry?!
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ ⯎▓▓▓▓▓ : You do not possess a designated channel. You are an unregistered ▓▓▓▓. We could not perceive your Point of View until the audience from Tsukuyomi Raiden's demographic flooded our ▓▓▓▓▓, demanding to see your perspective. ]
[⯎ ▓▓▓▓▓ : The Author intends to delete you for poor pacing. His script is absolute. ]
[⯎ ▓▓▓▓▓ : However, your 'Hidden Master' improvisation is generating unprecedented ▓▓▓▓▓ metrics. It would be a profound waste of profitable demographics to let you die now. ]
[ ⯎▓▓▓▓▓ : We cannot cancel your execution. But we can sponsor you with the tools to survive it. Deliver the bloody spectacle The Author demands, and you retain your existence. Do you accept our ▓▓▓▓▓? You have 0.4 seconds. ]─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
I don't even know who you are. I haven't read the terms. I don't care.Just give me the cheat code so my internal organs don't explode.
Yes. Deal. Give it to me. I screamed the agreement in my head.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ ⯎▓▓▓▓▓ : A wise career move. Delivering ▓▓▓▓▓ Buff now. ]─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
The chat box shifted. The immaculate golden interface of the cosmic network barged into my field of view, dropping the quest directly into my lap.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ QUEST GENERATED : "The Hidden Master's Lesson" ]
Objective:Win the match against Tsukuyomi Raiden.
[ ⚠ SPONSORSHIP LOAN : PREDATORY CONVERSION ]
The capacity limiter on your [INHERITANCE] passive has been removed temporarily in this scene. You may actively devour hostile mana with a 100% life-steal multiplier to fuel your physical regeneration.
[ REWARD : NARRATIVE PLAGIARISM (1 SLOT) ]─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Before the interface dissolved, one last translucent message blinked into existence. The golden text flickered erratically, tearing at the edges as if the signal was violently losing its grip on reality.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[⯎ ▓▓▓▓▓ : Signal integrity is failing. The Author's firewall is aggressive in this ▓▓▓▓▓ sector. ]
[⯎ ▓▓▓▓▓ : We ▓▓▓ only establish full, unmonitored contact ▓▓▓▓ within the blind spots of His ▓▓▓▓▓—Pocket Dimension Gate. ]
[⯎ ▓▓▓▓▓ : Do not ▓▓▓▓ this boring, Mr. Astarte. We would hate to revoke ▓▓▓▓ buff while ▓▓▓ are bleeding. ]
[ TRANSMISSION ENDED ]─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
The chat box vanished. In the physical world, Raiden hadn't even finished taking her next breath.
I processed the parameters.
Gates. Dungeon raids. The places where reality is broken.They can only reach me there. Which means my future farming routes are officially compromised by cosmic corporate executives.
I will think that later. Right now, I need to not die.
I processed the parameters.
Predatory Conversion. A 100% life-steal multiplier.If I activate [OVERWRITE] to fight her, the biological backlash of forcing numerous combat memories into this frail E-Rank body will violently tear my muscles off my bones. It is a hard-coded ten-second suicide button.But with Predatory Conversion... I can use my [Terminal Mercy] skill to rip Raiden's mana directly out of her circuit, and burn it to knit my tearing muscles back together in real-time.
A flawlessly logical, utterly sociopathic mechanic exploit handed to me as a free trial.I just need her to attack me with her magic so I can steal it.
I swallowed my panic. If this cosmic television network wanted an hidden master, I would give them a show.
"Instructor," I called out casually, projecting my voice just enough to carry to the edge of the barrier where Freya Siegel Romeo stood. "Is there an institutional penalty if I don't manifest my Shard?"
Outside the glass, the hushed, confused murmurs of the spectator ring instantly mutated into breathless shock.
Freya's single eye narrowed through the trailing smoke of her cigarette. She looked at the standard-issue iron sword in my hand, then at my completely dormant posture. "Protocol dictates combat, Astarte," she rasped. "How you survive it is your problem. Permitted."
Perfect. The alibi is secured.
Eclipse is strictly off-limits.I had to establish a legal precedent to fight empty-handed before the match even started. My original limitation is safe.
Twelve meters away, Raiden's winter-sky eyes sharpened.
"Fugen no Seiyaku," she said.
The syllables landed like dropping ice.
"The Vow of the Unmanifested," Raiden translated quietly. Her posture shifted. The aggressive, forward-leaning threat of her stance vanished, settling into something far more grounded. "To intentionally lock your circuit and deny your Shard its birth into the physical world. I did not expect an outsider to bind their own soul just to offer me honest steel."
My brain sifted through a decade of archived game lore.
Ah…
I forgot about that thing.
The obscure Eastern Alliance pact. In her culture, taking the Fugen no Seiyaku is a sacred, unbreakable oath to the heavens. It is the ultimate display of martial arrogance and absolute respect—a warrior declaring their physical foundation is so overwhelmingly superior that they do not need the Gods' magic to kill their opponent. If a swordsman takes the vow and breaks it, their clan disowns them. It is a terrifying, suicidal commitment.
I was just trying to avoid a laboratory autopsy, but the Princess of the Tsukuyomi Clan thinks my lack of magic is a vow of ultimate martial honor.
Alright. Let's play the game.
"A Shard is a prosthetic," I replied. I tilted my head, meeting her winter-sky eyes with absolute, unblinking boredom. "An external battery for a weak skeleton."
I gestured carelessly toward her glowing arm.
"I bound my circuit because I evaluate swordsmen. Not weather phenomena. But please, ignite your circuit. Feel free to rely on whatever crutch you need to survive the next fourteen seconds."
Perfect. I just locked her into the narrative and explicitly gave her permission to blast me with ice.
Raiden studied my face. She looked at the dead iron. At the formal bow I had given her. At the fourteen-second declaration. And finally, my eyes.
"I mistook your restraint for arrogance," Raiden said softly.
The clinical frost in her voice had completely dissolved. What replaced it was something infinitely worse: a profound, terrifying reverence.
"You walked in with dead iron and a bound soul, and I threatened you with a Shard. It is I who disrespected the match."
Then, she made a decision.
With a sharp, deliberate flick of her wrist, the pale silver-white glow of her circuit simply died.
The ambient frost hovering around her shoulders dissolved into harmless mist. She intentionally unmanifested her Shard, locking her own magic away completely in absolute adherence to the vow. The biting, sub-zero pressure inside the dome instantly vanished, leaving only the cold, mundane reality of the stone floor.
Wait.What.No. Please. Turn it back on. I am begging you.
She gripped the hilt of her Katana with both hands and lowered her center of gravity into a purely physical, grounded guard. "I accept your lesson. Honest steel it is."
I stared at her.
My facial muscles remained locked in a flawless, immovable void. Internally, my brain completely flatlined.
She locked her magic away.She actually turned it off.
Right at the edge of my vision, the golden notification pulsed softly.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ NARRATIVE BUFF APPLIED : PREDATORY CONVERSION ]
You may aggressively devour hostile mana with a 100% life-steal multiplier…
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Predatory Conversion requires hostile mana to function.If she doesn't use her magic, I have absolutely nothing to steal!
I stared at her grounded, magic-less stance, my stomach dropping into a bottomless pit.
If I activated [OVERWRITE] right now, there would be no mana to steal. No regeneration. The skill was hard-coded for exactly ten seconds of Max-Rank possession. I couldn't adjust it. I couldn't cancel it early. My newly evolved E-Rank body would simply rip its own muscles off the bone under the sheer biomechanical force of my own movements.
Are you out of your mind?! I brought a piece of uncalibrated scrap metal to a magic fight! Exploit my weakness! Punish me for it! Why are you voluntarily turning off your own win condition when it is literally my only way to survive this?!
I kept my jaw locked, forcibly swallowing down a spike of genuine, unadulterated panic.
I need her magic back. My brain ran a rapid text-search through a decade of archived lore. How do you enrage the Winter Blade of the Eastern Sovereign Alliance?
In Volume Two of the novel, an Argonaut assassin insulted her dying clan. She didn't even blink; she just beheaded him in silence. But in Volume Four, when a wandering blademaster merely chuckled at the angle of her parry? She completely lost her mind and flash-froze a thirty-meter radius.
Her psychological trigger isn't her bloodline. It is her absolute, uncompromising delusion of martial perfection. She believes her swordplay is supreme. If I want her to break her sacred vow and explode in icy fury, I have to prove to her that her 'honest steel' is a complete, structural fraud.
"Ignite the circuit," I said. My voice came out entirely flat. Hollow.
Raiden blinked. The intense focus in her winter-sky eyes rippled with faint confusion. "Excuse me?"
"The frost. The Shard." I made a careless, sweeping gesture toward her dormant arm. "Turn it back on. I really don't have the energy to stand here and humor a handicap."
I waited for the flash of anger. I waited for her winter-sky eyes to narrow in insulted fury, for the blinding white frost to explode across the arena.
Instead, Raiden simply lowered her chin, her expression shifting into one of quiet, solemn understanding.
"You are testing my resolve," she murmured, her grip on her scabbard tightening. "You want to see if my pride will force me to abandon the vow at the first sign of an insult." She shook her head slowly. "I will not fail you, Astarte. I can fight without my Shard."
No, you idiot, I am not testing your resolve! I am literally begging you to shoot an ice beam at my face so my organs don't explode!
"It isn't a test," I said, dropping the temperature of my voice until it matched the dead iron in my hand. "It is a diagnosis. You are a fraud."
Raiden stiffened. The absolute calm of the Winter Blade cracked by a single millimeter.
"You severed your circuit, but your skeleton hasn't realized it yet," I said, leaning into the casual, razor-sharp critique. I wasn't offering philosophy. I was reciting raw game frame-data logic. "Look at your wrists. You're gripping that hilt like you're bracing for the recoil of a frost detonation. Look at your back foot. You dropped your center of gravity, but you're anchoring your weight to catch a shift in atmospheric pressure that doesn't exist anymore."
I tilted my head, meeting her eyes with calculated boredom.
"You stripped away your magic to prove a point, but your body is still begging for the crutch. You don't know how to swing a sword, Tsukuyomi. You only know how to hold a piece of metal while the weather does the actual fighting."
The words hit the dead air of the dome like coffin nails.
"You didn't offer me honest steel. You offered me a crippled mage pretending to be a swordsman. Turn the circuit back on, or I am going to end this before you even realize you're off-balance."
That was it! That was a complete, structural dismantling of her entire identity as a prodigy. To an aristocratic swordsman, that is the ultimate, unforgivable insult. Come on. Get mad. Use your magic. Give me my health potion.
Raiden's chest heaved. Her eyes widened, completely stripped of their aristocratic armor. The humiliation hit her so hard that I could actually see the tension radiating down her spine.
She looked down at her wrists. She looked at the way her back foot was angled.
Then, she closed her eyes.
She didn't summon her magic. She didn't explode in a violent surge of frost.
She took one, slow, shuddering breath. And then, right in front of me, she manually adjusted her grip. She relaxed her wrists. She realigned her shoulders, perfectly purging her muscle memory's reliance on her Shard, adapting instantly to the brutal physical critique I had just handed her.
When she opened her winter-sky eyes again, the humiliation was entirely gone. What remained was the absolute, unbreakable focus of a prodigy who refused to be broken.
"You are right," Raiden said. Her voice was breathy, filled with a profound, terrifying gratitude. "I was fighting a memory of my own magic. I was blind to my own structural flaw. Thank you for pointing it out."
She drew her Katana. The bare steel sang a cold, crisp note in the air.
"I will not disappoint you again," she promised softly, settling into a flawless, physically perfect stance. "I will face you with my own two hands."
My brain completely stalled.
...You have got to be kidding me.
She isn't turning it back on. She took the insult, processed it as a masterful lesson, fixed her stance, and completely committed to fighting me with pure physical steel.
She is the worst possible student in the history of this Academy.
Plan A is dead.
There will be no hostile mana to steal. The [OVERWRITE] duration is hard-coded at exactly ten seconds. If I engage in a prolonged physical exchange without a healing mechanism, the biomechanical backlash will violently tear my muscles off the bone, and I will bloody die on this arena.
I have to pivot.
I looked at her winter-sky eyes.
The absolute, unshakeable calm. The Ice Princess trait.
It was a character archetype built on flawless, clinical discipline. She hadn't let my taunt make her chaotic or sloppy. She had processed the insult and used it to construct a geometrically perfect physical defense.
That level of discipline is terrifying. But to a veteran gamer like me, it is also a massive structural vulnerability.
Perfection does not improvise. Perfection executes a pre-calculated algorithm.
If I cannot survive a ten-second fight, then I will not fight her for ten seconds. I just need to shatter her algorithm in the very first frame.
I just need to read the code before she executes it.
"Three."
The system voice boomed across the courtyard, shaking the cyan barrier.
I didn't take a stance. I just relaxed my shoulders.
三景の剣. Trinity Sword: Sankei no Ken or Three Sceneries of Death.
It is the name of her main arsenal. The art operates on three primary stances: Frost, Lightning, and Tempest. As a first-year prodigy, Raiden has only mastered one stance.
The problem? The stance she starts with isn't fixed. It changes depending on Arga Orlando. Every time the protagonist regresses and alters the timeline, the shifting variables cause Raiden to master a completely different stance first.
Since I am currently standing in a timeline that I don't even know, I have absolutely no idea which one she has.
If I guess wrong, the counter-window closes before it even opens. I have to read the first movement.
"Two."
If she drops her center of gravity for a slow draw, it is Hakuiki — Frost Scenery. Heavy, sweeping, built to control space. The counter-window is wide but the approach angle is brutal.
If she widens her shoulders for a full atmospheric release, it is Ranki — Tempest Scenery. Explosive, unpredictable, built to collapse distance. The counter-window is narrow and punishes hesitation.
If she coils her weight into her front foot for an explosive lateral step—
Raiden's weight shifted. A fraction of a degree into her lead leg. Her front foot absorbed it without a sound.
Lightning.
"One."
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes.
"Begin."
I am going to regret this. Activate.
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
[ NATIVE SYSTEM ]
[ OVERWRITE ] : INITIATED
Duration : 10.00 Seconds
[ ⚠ ADVISORY: May luck be with you, Player. ] ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
The world did not slow down. Time did not stop.
But in a fraction of a millisecond, the fragile body of a seventeen-year-old boy vanished, entirely hijacked by the cold, absolute mechanical efficiency of a creature who had slaughtered gods for ten years.
I opened my eyes.
Ten seconds to prove I was a hidden master.