The martial arts tournament had finally reached its last day.
Today was the finals.
Either
The strongest had naturally made it this far.
If
Well, regardless, the fact that Gobta had made it to the top four was still real.
But Gobta ranking fourth overall…
He had surpassed
Then again, now that he could synchronize with
He hadn't fully mastered the ability yet, but it seemed like he would get there before long.
After all, just one night after gaining the ability to synchronize, he had optimized the fusion technique known as "Demon Wolf Unification."
Asking for mastery over power control on top of that would be aiming too high.
Gobta had given his all.
Of everyone in this tournament, he might have been the one who grew the most.
Now, then, today's match.
You could say Benimaru had been fortunate with his opponents.
He had put up a good fight against Souei, but his other matches against Gozuru and Gobta were practically walkovers.
Diablo, on the other hand, had faced three powerhouses.
First was
All three were Demon Lord-class fighters, and he had crushed every single one of them.
If Benimaru won today's match, he would indisputably be called the strongest in the Monster Nation.
Well, let's see how it plays out.
Today's commentary was being handled by
Milim had already dragged Gobta away.
She had said something about putting him through a full day of retraining, so she probably had no interest in watching the finals.
Whether that was good or bad for Gobta, I wasn't sure, but getting personally trained by Milim was an exceedingly rare opportunity. I could only hope he gave it his all.
Apparently, she was training Lion Mask — that is, Carrion — at the same time, so if they became good friends out of it, that would be a nice bonus.
Well, I'd keep an eye on the match while hoping Gobta came through in one piece.
"Then — the final match! The finals, begin!!"
The finals… Benimaru vs. Diablo.
At Souka's signal, the match commenced.
Kufufufu.
Deep within his heart, Diablo was overwhelmed with rapture — a joy bubbling up from the very core of his being.
What a truly, truly magnificent Master he had been summoned by.
He had lived for an age, but never before had he encountered a battle that set his heart racing like this.
For him, battle had always meant conquest.
Nothing more than slaughtering the weak, grinding them beneath his heel.
After all, those who could wound him — a denizen of the spiritual world — were vanishingly few.
On the rare occasions he manifested in the material plane, slaughtering every living thing in the area during his stay was trivially easy — including whoever had summoned him in the first place.
To summon Diablo — a superior being — without knowing one's own place…
It was an act of stupidity for which death was no injustice.
After all, what manner of race were the demons?
In the distant past, when the spirits of Light and Dark were first born, the egg of an angel sprang forth under Light's blessing, while seeds of demons were scattered by Dark's vibrations.
With the birth of the Spirit of Time, the egg hatched and the seeds sprouted.
As conceptual beings, born without Physical Bodies — pure energy — they came into existence.
Those were the progenitors of the Angel Race and the Demon Race.
Strangely enough, despite being born in the same way, the Angel Race and the Demon Race did not get along.
Whenever they met, battle was inevitable, and their wars stretched across eons.
However, because the scale of their clashes was too devastating, a Pact was eventually established: they would fight only once every five hundred years, for seven days at a time.
For Diablo, who found joy in battle, the periods when he could not fight were unbearably tedious.
They had no Physical Bodies, and thus no power to interfere with the material world.
That was precisely why he had been overjoyed when a new Demon Lord summoned him — heralding the end of those dreary stretches.
The Demon Lord had declared: *"I've prepared a Physical Body for you. Come forth, Demon General. Be useful to me!"* Even now, the memory made him tremble with excitement.
He had instinctively known — the one calling was addressing him directly.
He had effortlessly slaughtered all the other demons trying to jump the queue and manifest first, then appeared with an air of nonchalance.
And in doing so, he had gained two things: a new body, and a Master worthy of his loyalty.
That body resonated with him perfectly, and he poured without hesitation all the Magicules he had been stockpiling over the ages — never once spending them — into transforming it into the shape he desired.
Moreover, his Master had evolved into a true Demon Lord, and the influx of energy was so overwhelming it was as though the spent Magicules were being replenished in kind.
And the decisive factor had been receiving a name.
The body he had crafted over millennia from accumulated Magicules, filled to the brim with an infusion of energy sufficient to saturate every last corner, had all been stabilized the moment he was named.
For him, battle had always meant conquest.
That was why he had never cared about strength. He had no memory of ever being pushed hard.
Even his wars against the Angel Race had been nothing more than massacres from his perspective.
As a result, having consumed all his stockpiled Magicules, he had become a powerhouse equivalent to a Demon Duke.
One of the supreme rulers of the demon realm, of which only a handful existed.
Now, with the experience he had accumulated over countless ages wielded stably and at full power, he had become an existence comparable to a true Demon Lord.
Yet even Diablo could not see the bottom of his Master Rimuru's strength.
Diablo recognized for the first time that there existed beings above even himself.
And though he had never cared about strength before, spurred on by the monster comrades around him, he too had begun to seek power.
First in rank.
That was the proof of being the highest-ranking among all the demons under Demon Lord Rimuru.
The mark of one who was most trusted, most useful.
What a sweetly thrilling sound those words made.
No matter what, that seat of first rank would be his — so Diablo had decided.
As for Shion, who had also made claims about rank, Diablo had already defeated her in their previous battle.
But the opponent in these finals was the strongest demon even Shion acknowledged.
He could not afford to be careless.
*(Kufufufu. But the one who will win is me!)* Diablo looked forward to the battle with absolute certainty of his victory.
"…The finals — begin!!"
At Souka's signal, the finals commenced.
All that remained was to defeat Benimaru with everything he had.
Without any tension, Diablo released the full power dwelling within him!
Benimaru observed Diablo and thought: This demon was insane.
Rimuru's subordinates were full of absurdly powerful individuals — like sudden mutations.
But this demon was in a class of his own.
By Benimaru's own estimation, if Shion and he clashed head-on, Shion would probably win.
The reason was simple: he excelled in group combat, while Shion excelled in one-on-one.
Concentrating the same amount of energy on a single target yielded far greater power.
In that sense, he had considered Shion to have the advantage in a一对一 fight.
Yet the Diablo standing before him had defeated Shion.
In a head-on clash, no less — and dominated her.
Benimaru understood that in a straight fight, his chances of winning were slim.
However…
"…Begin!"
Reacting to Souka's call, Benimaru instantly put distance between himself and Diablo.
Petty tricks and small techniques were meaningless.
He had watched the fights of Lion Mask and Shion and concluded that the correct approach was to challenge with his absolute strongest technique at full power.
He would settle this in one exchange!
"Black Flame Prison!"
A fist-sized black orb of fire rocketed toward Diablo.
Diablo showed no attempt to dodge. A Magic Circle deployed with flawless speed, and a three-meter-diameter hemisphere formed around him.
Unlike before, Black Flame Prison had been imbued with tremendous demonic power and successfully compressed — its destructive force was now incomparable.
Though Diablo, like Benimaru, appeared to have resistance to natural elemental effects, nullifying the dark-attributed black flames was impossible.
The moment the hemisphere was complete, Benimaru's victory should have been decided.
"Kufufufu. Taking this attack head-on would be dangerous, wouldn't it? Temptation of Time!"
At the sound of Diablo's voice, the surrounding time froze.
Before the black flames could consume the hemisphere, the movement of Magicules was halted, cutting off the generation of heat.
It seemed that a single glance had been enough for Diablo to discern the technique's nature and devise a counter.
This was the effect of Diablo's other Unique Skill, "Great Sage" — but that was beside the point for Benimaru.
It was a skill with performance equal to the "Great Sage" that Rimuru had possessed, and for Diablo, who wielded it with complete mastery, slow-to-activate techniques simply would not work.
This was precisely what made Diablo terrifying — a seasoned fighter who used his abilities without a shred of carelessness.
Even Diablo's willingness to deliberately receive an opponent's technique was partly to make his analysis and appraisal more certain.
For certain techniques, merely seeing them was enough to steal them.
"Tch. You figured out how to shut me down just by watching, huh…"
In the frozen world, Benimaru grumbled at Diablo.
His first move had been sealed, but he was already thinking about his next countermeasure. There was no panic.
He had known from the start that Diablo was the superior fighter — that insight saved him now.
But in pure physical combat, he estimated they were evenly matched. Without a decisive move, however, that meant nothing.
His Physical Nullification effect meant slashing attacks could not deal damage.
A Battle Aura sword would work, but neither of them had the power to land a fatal blow with one.
If anything, Benimaru had been expecting that Diablo's ability activation might lead to his own defeat.
"Kufufufu. Do stop being stingy.
You still have trump cards left, don't you?
If you don't get serious against my techniques, you'll die!"
As Diablo declared this, he moved to launch his attack.
A transcendent technique that surpassed Shion's ultimate move — "World Collapse."
Deciding there was no time to think, Benimaru unleashed the Sword Saint technique he had learned from Hakuro.
"Misty Flowing Water Slash." It flowed like running water, deflecting everything and reflecting it back at the opponent.
Like an intangible phantom, it confused and disoriented the enemy — the absolute pinnacle of swordsmanship.
"World Collapse!"
"Misty Flowing Water Slash!!"
With World Collapse, the time that had been frozen by Temptation of Time began to flow once more.
The shockwave of World Collapse pierced through Benimaru's entire body with searing pain.
The energy that Misty Flowing Water Slash could not fully deflect had torn through him.
"Kufufufu. Not quite enough yet. Or would you like to surrender?"
As time resumed, Benimaru was blown backward and sent tumbling across the ground.
Despite having
Diablo asked in a casual tone, but Benimaru no longer had the composure to respond.
In fact, to have taken a World Collapse fired within Temptation of Time and still be standing was the abnormal one.
Yet regardless, Benimaru felt a bitter sense of his own inadequacy.
His swordsmanship had improved to the point where he could fight evenly with Hakuro. His use of magic in combat had also grown more versatile with improved concentration.
But… in one-on-one combat, he was inferior to Shion. In large-scale battles, he was inferior to Ranga.
In the end, was he — someone specialized in viewing the whole picture and commanding from above — simply incapable of breaking through the wall of strength?
That was the doubt that gnawed at him.
As a military commander, he could be useful to Rimuru. But as things stood, could he even serve as Rimuru's shield?
That unease plagued him.
And so…
*(Wait — what the hell am I talking about?! Why should I, of all people, be sitting here fretting over this pointless garbage?!)* His irritation was building.
He was naturally short-tempered, and while he had matured recently and learned patience…
His innate personality did not change so easily.
The sense of responsibility that came with being a commander had merely led him to seek harmony with those around him. That was all.
*(Enough. This is pathetic. This isn't like me at all — agonizing over things endlessly is a waste of time.
The answer is simple: I win. And if I can't win yet, I'll just have to make it happen!)* Benimaru's mind cleared.
Without answering Diablo, he rose to his feet and drew his blade.
Seeing this, Diablo judged that combat would continue and smiled faintly.
"Kufufufu. Now that's more like you, Benimaru!"
As he spoke, twisted blades extended from the gauntlets on both arms.
Three claw-like protrusions on each side, perfectly symmetrical.
Each claw was roughly one meter long, forming a double-edged blade.
This was the custom weapon Diablo had commissioned from Kurobei — the Claw Shear Blades.
A murmur rippled through the arena as Diablo, who had never used a weapon before, revealed his specialized armament.
The air grew thick with anticipation, charged with excitement.
Benimaru had cast aside his hesitation and focused his mind.
After all, plenty of people grew during battle. Recently, Gobta was one such example.
If that idiot could do it, there was no way he couldn't! That was the simple conclusion Benimaru had reached.
*(I'll show you. Don't you dare look down on my strength!!)* Then, with his mind perfectly calm, he circulated his refined Battle Aura throughout his body. He activated "Demon Flame Transformation," repairing all damage to his body in an instant.
Simultaneously, his refined aura and black flames merged into one.
A flawless black-crimson Battle Aura covered his entire body without so much as a flicker — preparations complete.
The entire process had taken less than a second.
"Next time, I'm going all out. Don't blame me if you die."
"Kufufufu. I don't mind that confidence one bit."
Their gazes crossed, and in the same instant, both unleashed their ultimate techniques.
"Harvest of Life!"
"Misty Black Flame Funeral Break!!"
Diablo's claws — which reaped all life — met Benimaru's crimson-stained blade at the moment of intersection, and were deflected.
With the rebounding stroke, Benimaru slashed at Diablo, driving surging black-flame aura into him like a hammer blow.
Not deflecting like flowing water, but engulfing like a conflagration — burning everything to nothing.
This was the ultimate technique Benimaru had forged in this very moment.
Benimaru's blade could not endure the heat and impact — it shattered and melted.
Diablo's Claw Shear Blades, having taken the full damage of Benimaru's sword, also fused into useless slag.
Naturally, Diablo himself had sustained a massive wound to his chest and collapsed to the ground.
"K-ku… fufufu… Magnificent. For the first time in my existence… I have tasted defeat…
What is this bitterness? I have no desire to taste it ever again…"
"I sure as hell… don't plan on fighting you again…"
Benimaru dropped to one knee as well, utterly spent.
"A-ahem… The victory goes to Benimaru!!"
Souka's declaration marked the definitive conclusion.
The champion had been decided.
The long battle, spanning several days, had finally come to its end.