Ark Undead

boom!

It was another clash between heavy hammers.

Their clash has reached its final stage.

Now, it's a matter of who can't hold their breath any longer; whoever can't hold their hammer will have their power completely overturned by the other.

Morton wouldn't give up; he wouldn't stop waving his arms until he ran out of breath.

Parishur will not admit defeat; this is his battle, this is a feast.

Therefore, the moment when the hammers stop colliding is the moment when both sides abandon their last shred of reason.

The hammers grazed each other, both wanting to disrupt the other's rhythm with a slight advantage. At this crucial moment, they both chose to change tactics, aiming to catch each other off guard.

Instead of swinging the hammer around, Morton held it upright in front of him, and like an arrow, used the hammer as a bowstring to kick out with a powerful stomp.

Meanwhile, Parrishue stood still, ignoring everything, and even stretched out her hands to reach for Morton's kick.

His hand swayed from the blow. But Parrish managed to hold Morton's calf firmly in his grasp.

On his face, which was smashed to the ground and covered in blood and gore, a smile as monstrous as a demon appeared.

"Kid, you still need to learn more about close combat!"

As he spoke, he grabbed Morton's legs and pulled them back, then raised his knees and thrust them upwards.

A chilling cracking sound came from Morton's calf, and Morton's calf twisted in the opposite direction as if an extra joint had appeared out of nowhere.

Parishul pressed on, pulling Morton's shin and lifting him up after the kick, lifting Morton's massive body as well. Then, Morton's entire body plummeted down along with Morton's thigh, crashing violently to the ground.

Even flesh and blood were crushed into patties, bone fragments mixed with muscle, Morton's leg was completely useless, signaling the end of the battle...

boom!

Just when everyone thought the battle was over with Morton losing his mobility, a hammer struck Parishul in the chest.

Morton did not give up. He gritted his teeth, took a breath with his last strength, raised his hammer, and in the gap of his fall, smashed it off along with his calf that had been pulled away by Parrish, slamming it into the chest of the Heroic Spirit.

Parrish had not expected Morton to be so resilient. The hammer crushed the already overburdened breastplate, along with Morton's own calf, which had been crushed into a sticky solid, and sank deep into the Heroic Spirit's chest, almost smashing it through.

Parishur's body flew up, the huge impact carrying him several meters backward before he landed on the ground of the Initial Furnace along with the hammer.

The two bodies landed together on the pile of ashes, looking up at the sky obscured by the light curtain.

For a moment, only heavy breathing and the painful gasps of someone could be heard in the entire initial furnace.

Parishur stared blankly at the fireless sky. His chest had been almost pierced through by the hammer, and he could barely breathe. He could only feel his strength gradually draining away.

In other words, he lost.

But he wasn't discouraged.

He is very happy.

"Hahaha!! Cough! Cough..."

A hoarse, dry laugh came from the mouth of the spirit of Parishur.

As he laughed and coughed, his already mangled face became a bloody mess.

The shattered armor and blood ignited together, turning Parishur into a blazing inferno.

Heroic spirits born from sacred relics will also return to the relics after the battle ends; this is their battlefield and their final resting place.

But the giant hammer left behind by Parrishul did not disappear.

It sank into the ashes, becoming one of the many weapons in the sea.

Morton listened to his ancestor's laughter fading into the distance, and closed his eyes contentedly.

He raised his arm, pointing to the sky, his blood-soaked hand clenched into a fist.

Won.

As the battle ended, Morton's body transformed into starlight and gradually disappeared, while his weapon, like the weapons left behind by his ancestors, remained in place.

The warriors vanished, but their weapons remained, serving as the only testament to their existence.

Only then did the cheers and screams from the audience finally arrive.

People waved their arms, their faces flushed.

Especially the Minoans mixed in with the crowd, each one seemed to be on stimulants, with boundless energy that had nowhere to go but to unleash it through screams and shouts.

They witnessed firsthand how the Minoan heroes of today, just as described in the ancient Minoan texts, defeated the Heroic Spirits with their own strength.

Cruel, bloody, yet exhilarating and chilling.

Morton, who had been teleported away from the altar, returned to his lounge.

His body was completely unharmed; the moment he opened his eyes, he saw the ceiling of the lounge.

He sat up abruptly, realizing that he had returned to Yasenus.

The details of that battle were completely etched into his mind.

With this return, he felt an inexhaustible surge of energy within him.

Moreover, right where the royal weapon once stood, a heavy hammer lay there quietly.

That was a reward bestowed by the sacred relic, a reward for defeating heroic spirits.

Morton picked up the heavy hammer and gently stroked the handle and the head.

This is a weapon that Minos has never been able to forge to its fullest extent, containing a strange power that awaits Morton's discovery.

However, he also knew that now was not the time to observe his own changes.

Now that his battle is over, it means that the next Heroic Spirit is about to appear.

That is, just as Morton raised his head and looked back at the center of the altar.

As the cheers of the crowd continued to thunder, another heroic spirit slowly revealed his appearance within the altar covered by the light curtain.

As soon as the heroic spirit appeared, the cheers from the audience outside the arena gradually subsided.

Because he looked so decadent that he didn't fit the image of a Heroic Spirit at all.

Even if one wanted to glean even the slightest description of a Heroic Spirit from him, the only clues could be gleaned from the long sword at his waist.

Her black hair, streaked with a few gray streaks, was tied back with a simple strip of cloth.

His stubble was sparse, and his thin, frail body lacked even decent armor.

His clothes were so shabby it was appalling.

The shirt was torn to shreds, and a strip of cloth barely covered her genitals.

Large patches of rough skin were exposed, and bare feet trod on the ashes-covered ground.

This cannot be called clothing at all; it is merely a fig leaf that barely serves to cover one's body.

Can such a warrior be called a Heroic Spirit?

But the moment he manifested, the immortal straightened up instantly, his eyes becoming bright and focused.

The heroic spirit that emerged from the starlight made no words or gestures of scrutiny.

He simply walked quietly to the fireless campfire and stretched out his left hand.

As the flames swept across the area, another line of white runes appeared on the ground in the distance from the campfire.

Then, he stood there silently, staring at the location of the rune.

At the same time, in the arena of the Temple of Yasenus, a fierce light erupted from a rest room.

People searched for impressions in their memories, pondering which hero was chosen by this spirit.

"Isn't this... that one, what was it called again?"

"That fast break player, is she a girl?"

The moment Yato saw the heroic spirit, his right hand instinctively went to the hilt of his sword at his waist.

With just a glance, she could sense the boundless sharpness and dense death aura emanating from that heroic spirit.

It was her intuition, stemming from her shared love of Eastern swordsmanship, that allowed her to perceive the true nature of a Heroic Spirit.

When she noticed the lounge, she and Doberman both cried out in surprise.

"Melantha?!"

At this moment, the purple-haired Felin girl grasped the straight knife her teacher had given her and pursed her lips.

Without hesitation, she reached out her hand towards the surging flames within the royal artifact.

Walk into the flames.

366. Eight Thousand Blades of the Undying

The immortal still remembered that it was the day he had just awakened.

He defeated the first formidable enemy guarding the path and, amidst confusion and despair, entered the fire-lighting ritual site.

Instead of going straight into the fire-lighting shrine, out of curiosity, they first began to observe the situation around the shrine.

Unlike what I remembered, the fire-lighting ritual site here looked as if it had been meticulously renovated.

His appearance made him lose track of what year it was and under what circumstances he had awakened.

Still dazed, he encountered this man on the side of the sacrificial site.

He was carrying a katana, dressed in tattered clothes, looking like he had been through a battle, with not a single patch of his skin clean.

When the undead approached, he immediately drew his weapon and began to attack them indiscriminately.

The Undead had just awakened and hadn't yet reacted to this sudden turn of events. He was caught off guard and accidentally slashed across the chest with a knife, marking the Undead's first wound.

Even though it took considerable effort to defeat him, the Undead was still impressed by his superb swordsmanship.

It is unknown what his purpose was, or why he was guarding the site of the fire-lighting ritual.

But the Undead admitted that this was a battle he faced after waking up, and he had to muster all his strength to fight it.

Later, when he received the key to the tower from the old woman, he saw the countless corpses in the graves behind the fire-lighting ritual site.