'You shouldn't underestimate her.'

Gee, mysterious voice. You don't say?

I gave up on my spear to keep my hands free and ignored my throbbing face. Instead, I kept my eyes on the mysterious woman who appeared in a random invade.

She didn't move after kicking me off the pillar, instead staring down at me as if waiting for my reaction.

A test.

Right, she mentioned wanting to see who I took after more. That, plue the whole bit about the world not surviving if a hero didn't appear-

'Block it.'

Block wha-

An invisible ripple. Shockwaves formed from pure sound, somehow hypercompressed and directed right at me.

My eyes widened and I reflexively swung my arm out to use Energy Manipulation to disperse it.

But it didn't work.

Instead, the blast rocketed me towards the ground while letting out a screeching sound.

"This crazy...!"

At the speed I was moving, I'd be flattened between the ground and the shockwave. And if it was any ordinary person, that was the inevitable outcome. But for me...

I grit my teeth and clenched the open air. At least, that's what it would have looked like to an outsider. In truth, Energy Manipulation let me grab onto the blast. I couldn't rip it apart, but if it was just moving it, that was doable.

So.

A split second before I crashed into the ground, I spun while hugging the blast.

An explosion erupted, sending rubble and debris in every direction. At the same time, the force sent me flying as if I had jumped onto the ground with a giant inflatable ball before bouncing up.

Hurt like hell, but I wasn't dead. And now...

A hushed whisper. Words being spoken at a rapid pace, completely unintelligible- No. A rapid elegy quickly rising to a crescendo.

'Block.'

I pulled out another giant pillar and slammed it against the ground to get some footing before scanning around-

What the fuck?

'Block everywhere.'

The woman hadn't moved. She was still standing there on the pillar and looking down at me.

...But she had also raised her sword to the sky and was gathering blinding white light in every direction while glowing white feathers descended from the sky.

She met my gaze and then smiled before saying four words.

"Cry, holy bell tower."

"God-"

I cut off my words and focused. As much as I wanted to curse out the freaking Dark Souls invader that appeared out of nowhere to powercheck me, there wasn't time for that.

Block everywhere. That was my objective.

And I could see why. In every direction I looked, mana was boiling, fractions of a second from bursting.

Was it because I was on the verge of death? Because I leveled up? Or because Quantum Magic and Compilation were a hell of a cheat?

I didn't know, but time was slowed to a crawl right now, giving me a brief moment to think.

Not that it helped much.

The amount of mana surrounding me was already enough to crush me. But the quality of that mana too... I couldn't even quantify it.

Which was bullshit considering I could manipulate Divine energy. But it seemed like the more you leveled up, the more bullshit an adventurer became.

Yeah. Definitely needed to start scrounging up contingency plans for when some other cheat showed up. Also needed to start considering that the higher level adventurers could be getting stronger in different ways since I'd *definitely* been underestimating people.

Dammit. Please don't tell me there's some crazy people that can eat statuses or something too...

'Focus.'

Right. Focus.

Rant against the world rigging itself against the MC and pulling shenanigans to keep up to my power level later.

Right now...

My body was frozen. I couldn't actually move because it wasn't that I had stopped time, but that my perception had moved beyond time.

Probably as a result from directly using Energy Manipulation to affect the synapses of my brain or something. Whatever the case, it was working.

And...

xxx

[Crafting System]

>Please describe the item you wish to create and allocate the resources.

xxx

...Yep. That was still working too. I thought so since my inventory had frozen time.

Though, that message was new...

More on that later though.

Right now...

An out of body experience. Like I was staring at a video of my fight instead of living in it.

With just a thought, I could pan the camera around and check the surroundings.

Again, probably from Energy Manipulation. It seemed to be an evolution from the time I used to maneuver with Black Demon...

And side-tracking.

The strangely familiar woman was staring at me with an expectant gaze, her sword still raised with her left arm.

Blinding light was spreading in every direction, linking each feather. A chain explosion moments from occurring.

Fortunately, the space around me was clear. Probably around... three meters? The woman seemed to have cast her spell with the assumption that I would try to escape.

Well, that was my guess. She certainly seemed capable of making those feathers emerge wherever she looked, so...

But anyway, running no good. Definitely couldn't disrupt any of that too since it felt even more ridiculous than the fire mana in the ring that my lovely daughter gave me.

There was just something slippery about the mana that wouldn't let me grab it- No, something corrosive that was making Energy Manipulation fail.

More reminders that I definitely needed a status update ASAP.

But for the moment, I had to figure a way out with what I had.

And what I had was my Inventory and my Crafting System.

...Looks like it was time to pull out a card from my Defense Catalog.

xxx

[Crafting System]

>Selecting <Absolute Territory Field> from stored blueprints.

>Designating all the stored magic stones as resources.

>Drawing inspiration from all barriers previously experienced.

>Compiling...

xxx

Huh. Guess the part about Shounen MCs getting BS power-ups out of the blue applied for me.

Not sure what's going on, but I'll take it.

Time sped back up. The feathers and bubbling white light started to spread.

But before they reached me, another light spread, starting from the shield on my left arm.

Overlapping triangles woven together to form a sphere, traced out in crimson. Impossible geometry twisting space itself for a brief moment.

And then the world vanished in an explosion of light and sound.

For a split second, I thought I was dead.

But then I realized that the fact that I could think meant that wasn't true.

And the moment after that realization, a black sword sliced through the crimson geometry in front of me, splitting it apart and racing towards my neck.

I took a step back and drew a sword from my inventory, swinging it in the same move.

A loud clang. The sword being batted aside with my attack... wasn't what happened.

Instead, I was the one who moved, the force of my blow sending me flying in a different direction while careening through the air.

With that, I could see it.

The entire city had been leveled by that attack, completely ground away into dust.

But at the same time, it hadn't.

Like looking at one of those weird 3D stereoscopic images, I could see that we were fighting in a place separate from the real Orario. The actual city was still there beneath the one I was moving around in, but it was transparent and hazy. Something I could barely make out right now.

Which meant that whoever the hell I was fighting was complete and utter bullshit.

Seriously. I hadn't even begun to start thinking about how to make Reality Marbles, Bounded Fields, Subspaces, or anything like that, but some random woman pops up and can just seal an entire city block?

No, wasn't she a variant War Shadow at first? But she wasn't now... So was she just hiding as a variant War Shadow? Or did a variant War Shadow evolve?

I finished my freefall through the air undisturbed and landed on the ground in a cloud of smoke.

The woman lowered her sword and stared at me in the distance, a faint smile on her face.

...Wait. Why was she smiling?

'Left shoulder, groin, rib, neck, heart.'

My eyes widened and I quickly raised my hands.

A flash of silver. The woman instantaneously closing the distance.

There wasn't enough space to swing a sword. And I definitely couldn't swing as fast to parry her attacks. So instead...

A quintuplet of metallic staccatto notes.

I took a step back and shook off my numb arms, mentally thanking the fact that I made sure to make a crafting skill as well as thanking Dungeon-chan for letting me realize the benefits of using Killing Intent as material.

The woman took a step back as well and carefully evaluated me.

A tense few seconds passed before the woman said, "You have grown much stronger since we last fought."

I finished shaking the numbness out of my arms before raising my hands. "I could say the same to you, Miss War Shadow."

The woman smiled and rubbed her face with her free right hand. "A War Shadow... I suppose that is a fitting moniker for what I have become."

"I don't appreciate cryptic messages, Ma'am."

Her smile grew wider. "Then prove it to me. Prove to me that you possess the power of a hero."

'Get ready. Don't stick to one fighting style or weapon.'

GIVE ME MORE DIRECTION THAN THAT, MAN!

I wanted to strangle the bastard who kept calmly commenting in my head without relaying useful advice. But I ignored him for now and focused.

The flow of events was typical for a story scenario like this. The 'Hero' had to prove himself to the big bad and either tie or break out of an impossible fight.

...Usually, the MC's friends would break it up with reinforcements, but I had a feeling I wouldn't last long if I just tried stalling.

The woman was strong. Not only that, but she clearly expected something from me.

A test. If I was worthy, she would acknowledge me and give some answers... Probably things like who my biological parents were as well as my grandfather.

Didn't really care about that right now, especially since it was just probably something like having divine ancestry or being the orphaned son of some top tier adventurers.

Not like it would help much anyway to know. If anything, that would just be opening up Pandora's box. Especially if it turned out that my parents were insanely powerful adventurers who died fighting a big bad and my grandfather took me in because I was the seal of some great evil demon or something.

But it wasn't like I was a ninja trying to be Hokage or something, so that wasn't likely.

Anyway...

The woman wasn't moving. Instead, she was just standing there with her sword casually held at her left side.

I wanted to believe it was because her last few attacks tired her out. But...

'If it was from before, they would have. But those limitations are gone now.'

...Okay, dude. We *seriously* need to chat when this is over. You have a *lot* of explaining to do.

For now though...

I took a deep breath and focused.

The woman was stronger than me. Faster too. Not only that, but I couldn't do my usual strat of spamming projectiles. And I had a feeling that even if I took out something ridiculous like Welf's wind sword he made or the ring Fina gave me, she would just cut through it all and take off my neck.

There wasn't any killing intent though. Instead, there was just a heavy pressure. As if she was an angel of destruction looking down upon the entire world.

And considering the state of the surroundings, she basically was.

...I'm going to snuggle with Tia as soon as this is done. Freaking random plot points, people who want to watch the world burn, and backstory shenanigans...

I pulled out a spear from my inventory before lacing it with mana.

The woman tilted her head, staring directly at my spear- No. From her gaze, it looked like she was watching the flow of mana moving inside of it.

Dammit. Don't tell me she could see mana too?

'I won't.'

Fuck off, asshat. I'm focusing. Don't need your sass.

'She can copy your movements at a glance. Be careful.'

Oh, so NOW you give me useful advice. Just fuck off already and let me cook up a plan.

The woman shifted her gaze back to me, staring with those mismatched gray and green eyes of hers.

...Come to think of it, now that I could get a good look, she was kind of similar to Fina. My daughter looked a lot like Tia, of course. But I could see faint traces of her features in that woman's face too. Not to mention the fact that they both had heterochromia...

...She wasn't my mom or something, right?

...Nah. Couldn't be. She looked a bit too young for that. I was fifteen and she was in her mid-twenties.

...Unless she had her age stopped or was appearing in her ideal form or something.

'Definitely the "or something."'

"Again, don't need your sass. Now..."

Killing intent. Mana. The 'Falna' serving as a core for energy and translating that energy into phenomena, physical and otherwise. The physical connection formed by the blood granted from a divine being to create that Falna...

It was still just a hypothesis. A theory that needed a bit more workshopping before it was reliable.

But it should definitely be enough to smack that woman in the back of her head at least once.

'*snort*'

...

I decided to ignore that voice again. Instead of reacting to it, I shifted my spear to my right hand and then focused.

There was mana scattered everywhere. The mana in my spear was under my absolute control. The Falna translated 'stories' and 'experience' to reality. And my <Liar's Phrase> made it so that if I believed it could happen, it would.

So...

xxx

[Crafting System]

>Selecting <Cursed Spear of Reversed Causality> from stored blueprints.

>Checking qualifications...

>Error. Insufficient Skills and Developmental Abilities.

>'Spearmaster' has not been acquired.

>'Mystery' has not been acquired.

>'Luck' has not been acquired.

>Drawing from recorded recollection and experiences.

>'Spearmaster' has been substituted with 'Jack-of-all-trades.'

>'Mystery' has been substituted with 'Energy Manipulation' and 'Quantum Magic' implementing wave function collapse.

>'Luck' has been substituted with 'Beloved by the Eternal Flame.'

>Compiling...

>Congenital magic 'Gungnir (False)' has been acquired.

xxx

Alfia stared at the boy- No, the young man standing in front of her.

She hated him. She hated how much he took after that cowardly bastard. How he shared the same crimson eyes. How he acted so flippantly with women and charmed them.

So she hated him.

At least... Alfia thought she would hate him.

But...

Crackling magical energy that was kept under tight control, just like her own.

A cold and analytic gaze on a calm expression that Alfia had seen countless times reflected in the blades of her opponents.

Monstrous talent in both magic and combat as well as the intuition to be able to read and block both <Satanas Verion> and <Genos Angelus> the first time he saw them.

He was nothing like Meteria. Although he was supposed to be the atonement for Alfia's sins, the child born for her sister who could not have one due to her illness.

Although they were twins, meaning Alfia's child was as much her younger twin sister's as he was her own.

Although she should despise him for being the spawn of that lecherous bastard who she tolerated only for Meteria's sake...

*Promise me you won't hate him, Alfia. This child... He's your son as well. So please...*

"...I suppose you were right, Meteria."

A pair of glowing crimson cores over the young man's chest and abdomen mimicking the way monsters used their magic stones. His crimson eyes glowing the same color, sparking with mana and seeming like they could peer into all of existence. A spear forged of mana compressed in the same way she used <Silentium Eden> to seal and keep her 'noise' within herself.

The young man stepped forward and swung his arm.

A blur. Countless streams of mana shot forward to try and pierce through Alfia.

It didn't work.

The spear crashed against <Silentium Eden> and broke apart.

But that wasn't the end of it.

As if it wouldn't stop until it succeeded, the spear reformed.

Once. Twice. Three times. A dozen. A hundred.

Countless attacks happened in a fraction of a second as the spear attempted the impossible.

But it failed.

The potential was there, but her son was still too green. It was an attack that could threaten the current era of Adventurers, but against the monsters of the past and the monsters he would face in the future...

"Dammit." Her son cursed and then pulled out a sword from thin air. "Close combat it is."

A crimson blur. Crackling mana overloading his body, but being kept at bay by those dual cores. An artificial 'armor' like her own, but used for offense instead of defense.

Clashing steel and bright sparks.

Alfia easily stopped her son's attacks.

It was impossible. A lower ranked Adventurer couldn't hope to stand against her, let alone a fresh adventurer like her son.

And from how his arms trembled as their swords clashed, the stat difference was clear.

He recognized it.

Even so, he continued to fight.

Abandoning the sword for another spear. Bare fists. Knives. Retreating to attack with archery. Closing in with dual blades.

A means of fighting that no adventurer should be able to do.

Alfia had met many who fought with multiple weapons. Even many self-proclaimed masters in various fields.

But they fell short.

Against her, who could immediately parse and dissect fighting styles in an instant and find the counter, it wasn't enough.

Zald had once mentioned how irritating it must be for people to fight against someone like her who could adapt in an instant.

...Alfia was beginning to understand what he meant.

Like a blade being tempered- No, like excess stone etched away to form a masterwork sculpture.

As Alfia swept her blade out to attack the flaws in her son's attacks, those flaws quickly closed. At the same time, the textbook attacks he used grew sophisticated.

Sword slashes lashed out before changing to a spear thrust. A motion to throw a knife shifted to a one-handed slash with a blade. A step back to dodge turned into a thrust with a rapier.

...Was this it? The pride that a parent should feel at seeing their child's growth? Happiness that the enemy she failed to kill in the past would be cut down by her son's hands instead?

Schadenfreude that the coward's son who both he and Zeus said took after him so much had turned out to take after her instead?

Alfia didn't know. But...

"Dammit!"

...She decided.

Before, she chose 'Evil' and left him behind. Quashing the faint regrets, she dedicated the remainder of her life to serve as a springboard for the next generation of heroes instead of the traces she left behind.

But since she was granted a miracle-

Power that felt like Arcanum but lacked the divine weight behind it.

As Alfia turned to look towards it, a golden beam of light split apart the 'Hollow Ataraxia' she had formed to contain her test.

And the source of that...

"Bell! You good in there?"

"Shut the fuck up and back me up already you bastard! What kind of bro are you to take so long when you can make Overgeared weapons?!"

A young man with crimson hair and steely blue eyes holding a golden sword. Standing beside him, Lady Hephaestus with a sword of her own. Behind them, Lady Freya whose eyes were gleaming violet. And next to her, a goddess Alfia didn't know, but whose black hair was slowly turning crimson as her blue eyes coldly scanned the surroundings.

It was a brief moment.

Recognition from Hephaestus and Freya. Shock from the former and contemplation from the latter.

Fury from that unknown goddess.

Confusion from the crimson-haired young man.

And as for her son-

*CRACK*

A black sword in his hand. Her own, somehow taken without her realizing it.

A thrust towards her heart, meant to be fatal but falling short due to his stats.

But even then...

The sound of shattering glass.

Both her Hollow Ataraxia and <Silentium Eden> falling to pieces from the clash between her own powers matched against each other.

"Still not enough?!"

Alfia stared at her son who was cursing at falling short yet again.

An impetuous expression. One that looked like Meteria's... No. One that must have been how she looked when she was upset.

Alfia smiled and then took a step back, sinking into the shadows. "You win, my son."

"Oi!" Her son raised his pilfered sword and said, "You can't run away now after- Wait. Son?"

Alfia let out a refreshed laugh and then waved. "I will see you soon. Say hello to my grandchildren for me."

"W-Wait. Hold on! You can't just-!"

Whatever he wanted to say next vanished as Alfia plunged into the sea of darkness that had become her domain after her miraculous revival.

Now... Since she had accepted her son, as a mother, Alfia should shelter him a bit from the oncoming storm, should she not?

And to do that... Well. What better way to block a storm than to snuff it beneath a greater typhoon?

xxx

"Bell?" Welf walked up to me and placed his hand on my shoulder. "You good, Bro? Did you get hurt?"

I didn't respond, still processing the latest bit of information I learned.

'Good job. I told you that it would work out.'

Hearing that matter-of-fact voice, I snapped and shook my fist at the sky. "Show yourself already, you crazy bastard! I swear to god, the moment I find out where the hell you're hiding, I'm going to tear you to shreds!"

xxx

Hiding in the shadows of a building overlooking Daedalus Street, Enyo let out a smirk beneath his mask and said, "Then I will look forward to it, Mister Kranel. Let us enjoy this play for a while longer, shall we?"