Esdeath thought Ottar was amazing—not because she had fallen for him.
It was because the man was strong enough to let her fully vent her power.
He could withstand her attacks. He would not collapse from a single blow, much less fall to his knees immediately. He would not stare at her with that disgusting look of terror before begging for mercy like a dog.
Ottar was silent, resilient, and unyielding, like a piece of iron that had been hammered over and over again yet refused to break.
It had been far too long since Esdeath had encountered an opponent like this.
So she decided to enjoy the fight to the fullest.
"Your strength isn't limited to this, is it?"
Esdeath tilted her head slightly, her ice-blue eyes locking firmly onto Ottar's.
"Show me what you look like when you go all out."
Ottar remained silent, but his presence grew even more powerful.
A deeper, more violent force surged from within his body, carrying the aura of a beast that had been restrained for far too long and was finally being released from its cage.
His muscles swelled slightly. Veins throbbed beneath his skin, and every beat of his heart sounded like a war drum.
His gaze sharpened further, like a blade that had finally had the last traces of dullness ground away.
Esdeath sensed the change and smiled even more wildly.
"Yes. That's it."
She also began releasing her true strength.
The surrounding temperature plummeted rapidly.
With Esdeath at the center, a thick layer of ice formed across the ground within a radius of fifty meters, while fine snowflakes began drifting through the air.
Her long ice-blue hair whipped violently in the freezing wind, and her eyes shone like two burning stars of frost.
"Let me see where your limit lies."
The next instant—
both of them moved at the same time.
They were so fast that not a single spectator present could clearly follow their movements.
All anyone could see were two blurred figures colliding across the plaza, separating, then crashing together again.
Every collision produced a deafening explosion and violent shockwave.
Ice shards and fragments of stone filled the air.
The plaza beneath their feet looked as though it had been repeatedly plowed by some gigantic machine, leaving the entire surface utterly devastated.
Ottar's sword swings became faster and heavier with every exchange.
Each strike carried enough power to cleave apart a hill.
His fighting style was simple and unadorned.
There were no unnecessary techniques.
Yet every slash was delivered at exactly the right moment.
This was not talent.
It was experience accumulated through countless battles after tempering his body and instincts to their absolute limits.
Esdeath, on the other hand, fought in a completely different style.
After learning Ice-Make Magic, her methods in battle had become endlessly versatile.
Cold air and ice became whatever weapons she desired.
Sometimes they formed indestructible shield walls.
Sometimes they became countless ice needles slipping through every opening.
Sometimes they transformed into long whips that cracked through the air.
At other times, they became chains attempting to bind Ottar's limbs.
Every movement Esdeath made carried a cold elegance.
Every attack overflowed with imagination and creativity.
Even Rowan could not help praising her.
How long had it even been?
Yet Esdeath was already using Ice-Make Magic with astonishing mastery.
She was practically comparable to Gray.
Rowan also noticed something else.
The fight between the two was not merely ferocious.
It was a direct clash from beginning to end.
No circling around.
No retreating.
No tactical deception.
Only strength against strength—
will against will.
Simply put, both of them were battle maniacs.
Neither understood the meaning of retreat.
Or perhaps they simply had no need to retreat.
And neither wanted to.
To retreat meant admitting defeat.
Ottar's greatsword shattered layer after layer of ice walls.
Meanwhile, Esdeath's ice left an ever-growing number of wounds across his body.
Blood flowed from his flesh, only to freeze into dark-red crystals in the next instant, clinging to his bronze-colored skin and making him look miserable.
At least Esdeath was nowhere near as battered.
The surrounding adventurers were completely dumbfounded.
That was a Level 7 adventurer.
The strongest member of the Freya Familia.
The ultimate weapon of the Labyrinth City of Orario.
And yet he was being suppressed by some mysterious woman whose origins no one even knew?
Was this some kind of joke?
Where the hell had this monstrous woman come from?
While most of the spectators remained confused and began asking around to find out which Familia this woman belonged to—
the battle between Esdeath and Ottar entered its climax.
Ottar suddenly released a low roar like that of a wild beast.
His body sank sharply, lowering his center of gravity to the absolute minimum.
Both hands gripped the hilt of his sword, and his entire body became like a bow drawn to its limit.
Then—
he unleashed a thrust that completely surpassed common sense.
Driven by terrifying strength, the massive blade transformed into a blurred pillar of light and stabbed directly toward Esdeath's chest.
The speed and force of the attack had reached an unbelievable level.
The air in front of the sword tip did not even have time to disperse.
Instead, it was forcibly compressed into a glaring white sphere of pressure that released a shrill explosion.
Naturally, Esdeath did not retreat.
She did not even defend.
She merely extended her right hand.
Her five fingers spread apart, her palm aimed directly at the greatsword that could easily pierce through her body.
Then she spoke a single sentence.
Her voice was soft—
yet it seemed to sound beside everyone's ears.
"Ice Age."
Time itself seemed to freeze at that moment.
An indescribably extreme cold erupted from Esdeath's palm and spread forward at a speed that exceeded physical common sense.
The temperature was terrifyingly low.
So low that the air itself began to condense.
So low that even light passing through the affected area became subtly distorted.
Under the speechless gazes of everyone watching—
layers of ice crystals began covering Ottar's greatsword from the tip.
The freezing spread rapidly along the blade.
Far too quickly for anyone to react.
Ottar tried to pull his sword back.
But the freezing air had already climbed from the hilt onto his arms—
then his shoulders—
then his chest.
His body instantly lost the ability to move.
A thin layer of frost covered his skin.
Every breath he released became a thick cloud of white mist.
His heartbeat slowed abnormally, almost as though someone had pressed a button to reduce its speed.
Realizing that something was wrong, Ottar suddenly unleashed an unprecedented amount of heat from his body.
Sssssss—
White vapor rose from him.
He seemed to be trying to use sheer heat to resist Esdeath's Ice Age.
But it was useless.
The cold released by Esdeath was simply too extreme.
No matter how violently Ottar struggled, the final result did not change.
There was only one thing he could still accomplish.
Stand.
Even with most of his body frozen solid, Ottar continued gripping his sword with all his strength.
He remained standing.
He continued staring directly into Esdeath's eyes.
His teeth clenched so tightly that they made grinding noises.
He bit through his own lips, and the instant blood emerged, it froze into tiny beads of ice.
He was still standing.
He refused to fall.
Esdeath looked at him with appreciation in her eyes.
This man had not disappointed her.
She knew perfectly well that her ice could crack steel.
It could even extinguish flames through freezing.
Yet it had still failed to freeze his will.
"You're good."
Esdeath looked at him approvingly.
There was no mockery in her voice.
Only acknowledgment.
"Really good."
She slowly walked in front of Ottar and extended one hand.
Her fingertip gently touched his frozen chest.
With only the slightest push—
Ottar's enormous body finally lost its balance.
He fell backward and crashed heavily into the ground with a dull boom.
Ice fragments fell from his body.
His eyes remained open, still staring at the sky.
The faint rise and fall of his chest proved that he was alive.
Still breathing.
Esdeath looked down at him and spoke with satisfaction.
"I enjoyed today's battle."
"I look forward to the day you become stronger and come find me to wash away this humiliation."
"Remember my name."
"Esdeath."
Leaving those words behind, Esdeath turned and walked away.
What remained behind was a boiling Orario—
and countless adventurers staring in disbelief.
…
In less than half a day, news spread throughout the Labyrinth City of Orario that the city's ultimate weapon, the Warlord Ottar, had been defeated head-on by a woman named Esdeath.
From ordinary civilians to the gods themselves—
everyone heard about it.
At first, no one dared believe their ears.
But once the news was confirmed, the gods immediately became excited.
Ever since the Zeus Familia and Hera Familia had been driven out of Orario, the Labyrinth City had entered an era dominated by two kings—
the Loki Familia and the Freya Familia.
Although countless pieces of news emerged from Orario every day under this balance of power, something as enormous as today's event had never happened before.
The Warlord Ottar had lost.
And he had lost to a woman.
This was enormous—
enormous—
enormous news.
The gods living throughout Orario immediately became excited.
At their gatherings, they constantly tried to figure out where this monster named Esdeath had come from.
Some gods believed she had been secretly raised by one of Orario's Familias.
But that theory was quickly rejected.
Because they discovered that before this battle, almost no one had ever seen Esdeath.
That meant the idea of her being "secretly raised" was complete nonsense.
More importantly, whenever an adventurer in Orario advanced to Level 2, the gods would grant them a title during the Denatus.
For example—
Ais's title, Sword Princess.
Riveria's title, Nine Hell.
Of course, those were relatively respectable titles.
There were also plenty of ridiculous titles created purely for the gods' entertainment—
such as the protagonist Bell's Little Rookie.
Rather than calling it a formal naming ceremony, it was more accurate to say that adventurers were routinely used as entertainment by the gods.
Besides, advancing in Level required accomplishing some kind of great feat inside the Dungeon.
With so many adventurers constantly entering and leaving the Dungeon, it was impossible for someone as powerful as Esdeath to have gone completely unnoticed.
Therefore, under normal circumstances, no Familia in Orario could secretly raise an adventurer capable of rivaling Ottar.
Yet Esdeath had appeared.
And almost no one had seen her before.
That meant she had not been raised within the Labyrinth City of Orario.
Most likely, she was an adventurer trained somewhere else.
After all, not every god who descended to the Lower World gathered in Orario.
Gods such as Ares, Artemis, and Vela operated elsewhere in the world.
So now everyone was wondering—
which wandering god's Familia had produced a monster like Esdeath?
~~~
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