The crowd is silent. Only Master Wang seems to enjoy the fights. Three people challenged me. Three people are lying in a pile of blood and broken bones. There were no attempts to get healers, nor did anyone ask if they could take them away.

I figured the Ken family wouldn't be brutal to their members, but I was mistaken. I wish the next person would hurry up and receive their beating since I don't have all day. I'd rather fight a generation's worth of Ken members at once than drag the fights along.

My next opponent is a large, almost obese man wearing an armored Gi and wielding a blade as long as his body. Armor should be banned, but since it's a part of his Gi, it's technically legal. I have to commend him for finding a loophole.

"Are you going to announce your blade and fighting style too?"

The man is less chatty than the woman who came before him. He slowly walks up to me and swings down. I let him.

-290

The sword leaves a thin line across my body. Blood leaks out and spatters against the sands. I'm sad that my resistance didn't grow. [Iron Hide] increased my resistances equal to my level, and since I'm ten levels higher than I was for quite a long time, my resistances, in turn, grew as well.

My opponent doesn't move, so I swing my sword down on him. For a brief moment, I wondered if my [Colossus Slayer] would help, but I don't think this guy meets the requirements.

-1453

The man starts hemorrhaging blood as my blade cuts through the armor he wears and scrapes his ribs. The barbs pull on the flesh and cause the wound to be sloppy and mangled. The armor slowed the blade's momentum, but the damage would be critical - or even lethal - to any of the other opponents.

"Brother Aegis, never once stepped back during a spar or fight. His feet are more connected to the ground than mountains are!"

"Show that barbarian that you can outlast him, that you are stronger than him in his one strength!"

"Brother Aegis, don't back down!"

This guy seems to be a celebrity among the Kens.

My [Unwieldy Tanto] does additional damage equal to ten percent of my health. At max health, every swing of my sword deals over 1,400 damage. Without my [Might] stat or any other damage bonuses, I deal enough damage to murder a man with 280 [Vigor], albeit only if they don't have any health bonuses as I do.

And I'm nerfed right now since my health at its full potential would add another 100 damage to that total. My sword is rank-A blade through and through.

Just by his condition and the lack of damage, I reckon he sports roughly the same amount of armor as the [Verdant Dragon] - over 200 - and has about 2/3rds of his health remaining. I open my arms and reveal my chest. He can take another swing if he wants.

And he does. And it's critical.

Critical Hit!

-1390

[Resistance: Slashing 700 > 701 (811)]

Instead of slashing down like before, he goes for the jugular. His blade swings horizontally in an act to decapitate me. I see his attack coming, but I want to see what will happen.

His blade cuts through my neck muscle only to be stopped at the bone. My vertebrae vibrate as the sword touches the only thing keeping me from turning into two parts. I grab the blade to keep him from going any farther. I give him a toothy grin.

My blood-coated teeth shine at the swordsman as I give him a thumbs up. I pull the blade from my neck as the man looks on with horror. As soon as the sword is removed, I lose my body weight in blood as it torrents out of my body and floods the saturated ground around me. This would be the perfect time for Rain to come collecting, but she stays rooted to her seat.

For the first time today, I deliberately heal myself.

[Mana: 1400/1400 -> 1140/1400]

I'm topped off as my passive healing takes care of the rest. I feel slightly queasy and light-headed, but I'm fine blood-loss-wise. I should really check my blood pressure after today. I clear my throat and address my opponent.

"One for one, right?"

The man steps back, but I'm already swinging. My attack meets the wide part of the swordsman's blade as he desperately tries to protect his neck. The sword absorbs most of the impact, probably due to an enchantment. However, enough force was transferred to the big guy's hands, allowing me to strike again as the sudden impact delayed the man's motor skills.

I swing my blade on the other side of his neck. The swordsman doesn't have enough time to maneuver his blade to block my blow, so he tries to stop my attack with his arm. I'll give him credit for the fact that it's armored, but it looks like he's chosen to make a sacrifice.

His arm is torn off his body. Reattaching it would be impossible due to the nature of the wounds my sword leaves... Unless I stepped up and healed him myself. My blade didn't stop at his arm. It continued until it sank into his shoulder, breaking his clavicle and mangling the flesh.

My blade is impractical to retrieve, so I go to punch him in the face. He manages to block the attack with the chappe of his sword, negating the damage entirely. I kicked him in the knee but missed and hit his shins. My unarmed attacks are only enough to bruise instead of dismember.

I'm too close for the swordsman to attack with his blade effectively, and one of his arms is practically disabled. He's running on fumes and will collapse from blood loss any second, but he still won't surrender. It's so curious that these people don't know that word? What will I have to do to get a member of the Ken family to back down? Besides death, that is.

I forgo attacking and grip my still-embedded sword with two hands. I look my opponent in the eyes and the horror he has been feeling increases by a fold. I take the desperate punches to the head, the meek slashes of the sword, and the shoving attempts head-on and push down on my blade.

Instead of retrieving my blade, exacerbating the swordsman's injuries and causing him to bleed out, I push down and cut deeper into him. Ribs crack, and organs start spilling out as I get farther down. My blade meets the base of the spine. That should be good.

The mountain of a man died almost immediately after I started to cut him in half the long way. The crowd is deathly silent, except for the hooting of Master Wang and his quips at the Elder's expense. It looks like I've been bathing in blood-not just my own. I don't bother flicking the blood off my blade as I drag the body and sword to their respective collection, causing the crowd to get shaken out of their stupor.

"..."

"Oh. My. Gods."

"Blood-soaked barbarian."

"Brother Aegis was split... By a runt half his level. Has the world gone mad?"

"Haha, fuckers. Look at my disciple go! This isn't even ten percent of his power, and you are all weaklings quaking in your boots. Go home to Mommy and polish your swords instead of trying to challenge us!"

I look up innocently at the elders and the crowd of bystanders below them and ask a question.

"Are we done yet, or should I start fighting two people? Maybe three at a time? Maybe someone three times my level will have to stand up to me?"

The elders don't retort, but a few members of the Ken family take my words as consent and provocation. Which isn't incorrect. Two people approached me at once, each color-coded differently.

Their swords match their masks. One has a chilling blue blade, and the other a fiery red. These don't seem to be the Ken family members I had a lawsuit against, but a different pair with the same colors. 'Without announcing their swords, fighting style, or level. They attack me in tandem.

The red swordsman burst into flames as their counterpart gets coated in a layer of frost. They both attack me, one coming high and the other going low.

A flaming sword attempts to stab my eye out, so I move my head down and take the blow to the forehead instead. The tip of the blade gets stopped by my head without even leaving a mark. The flames lick my face, and I can't help but get annoyed by the sudden warmness.

-0

-0

The other swordsman's attack hits one of my knees. The sword does no damage, but the frost it carries hurts. Out of all the elemental energies, I'm least resistant to the cold. The blood coating my body freezes on impact and hinders my movements.

-0

-91

They seem to notice my reaction to getting hit by the cold and doubles down on their efforts to freeze me. The blue swordsman uses some martial skill to attack me with a flurry of blows while the red swordsman keeps going for my eyes. The fire of the red swordsman doesn't oppose the ice. If anything, it makes it colder.

Of course, I'm not just going to let them freeze me over, but I'm tempted to put on an act and farm [Ice] resistance. Unfortunately, I'm at a bottleneck, and he'll have to deal with one big move rather than a bunch of annoying small ones.

The blood drenching me makes it hard to do anything. I break my left leg free, and my right one freezes over. I free that one, and the swordsman tries to freeze my head. I deflect that blow elsewhere, but my sword arm is frozen. I'm annoyed. Not to mention the other guy constantly trying to blind me.

As the fight drags on, I get more bored. Do these swordsmen have a higher [Spirit] stat than I do? It's an overlooked stat if you aren't a magic caster or a tamer. Since I want these fights to end sooner rather than later, I use [Royal Decree] to non-verbally command both to stop attacking me.

Their movements stop entirely. They strain against my will as they struggle to keep their blades moving. I casually break off all the ice on me and stretch my stiff muscles. I can feel them squirm under my [Spirit].

This could be a learning opportunity. I approach the ice boy and swing my sword at his frozen figure. As soon as my attack started, he broke free from my will. That makes sense since the ability won't force my targets to take harmful actions.

Inaction in this instance would've been harmful, to say the least. The swordsman slide back as ice forms under their feet, assisting their movements. They catch their breath as they stare at me. I wonder how many shocking events the Ken family has seen today from me? I wonder how many fuzes would be blown if I showed them my magical doorway mansion.

The red swordsman is still firmly locked in my ability, so I try another command on him while the other swordsman plans their next move. I command him to surrender, admit defeat, lay down their sword, and live another day. And you know what? He resisted my commands.

I felt my control shatter as soon as the notion of forced defeat entered their mind. The concept of giving up is harmful to these people... What the fuck does the Ken family do to these people behind closed doors. That red swordsman joins his brother in arms in their one-sided stare-down.

I point at them, and they avoid it, almost like they expect me to start shooting lightning out of my fingers at this point. They circle me, talking to each other in hush tones. If I approach those two, they scatter and reconvene as far as they can away from me.

What to do now? How can I end this fight if they stay out of my range and stare from a distance? Fuck it, I already proved myself. It's up to them to claw back the Kens family's lost honor, what little of it remains.

I let out a yawn and stabbed my sword into the ground. I lean against my sword, clasp my hands behind my head, and kick my feet on the corpse pile.