Osian looked at Alpha. The guy was spewing out murderous red energy dripping from his sword. Compared to Lupona, his handling was crude beyond measure. That wasn't the important thing.
'The problem is that the guy uses the killing star sword.'
Using starlight while simultaneously using the killing star sword might seem physically impossible, but it wasn't necessarily so. Right now, Osian himself was using three characteristics simultaneously. The killing star sword wasn't a force opposite to the starlight sword. It had merely transformed - the killing star sword was also starlight. Since it was a knight's power, there was no reason the guy couldn't handle it.
'The important thing is that the guy is even using Lupona's power.'
Now he understood why Cromwell had been so confident. Having put in something like this, he couldn't have imagined defeat. That Lupona girl. Had she been carelessly shedding hair while going around? Osian felt displeasure.
The behavior of the guy who had been hiding such power was quite impressive too. If it hadn't been disadvantageous, he had truly tried to face him with only pure knight's power.
Did he desire a fair fight? Or was it arrogance? Whatever it was, the guy had revealed his hidden card.
'The problem is that what he's hiding isn't just this one card.'
Alpha used force field wings, one of the mutant psychic abilities. That meant the guy could use other mutants' abilities too.
Bang!
The guy stomped with true footwork. The power that erupted from his sole exploded. The explosion's shockwave changed direction and spread toward Osian in a fan shape.
'An ability to redirect impact force or kinetic energy?'
He wasn't surprised. He had already seen a similar power once before. It was the ability of the second of the Blood Brotherhood, Kudan. More precisely, it was the ogre bloodline ability mixed in his blood. It could offset external impacts and conversely amplify or compress outgoing impacts.
'That's not all.'
The moment he blocked the wave-like surging shockwave with stellar silk, a killing star sword flew at him from right in front. When he blocked with his starlight sword, light scattered with the collision sound. The ground the two were standing on couldn't withstand the impact and cracked like a spider web.
Originally the killing star sword's output was higher than starlight, but this collision was twice as strong as before. Crack! Osian's legs dug into the ground. At the same time, his body began to be slowly pushed backward.
Screeeech.
His two legs, buried up to the ankles, slowly slid back, carving furrows in the ground. Alpha was pushing him back with some mysterious force, not just pure physical strength.
'I had suspected from the fact that he has super-regeneration, but it seems they've crammed all kinds of powerful beings' genes into his body.'
Osian let out a hollow laugh. What Knight Alpha Prime? Without the name of a knight, wasn't he just a hodgepodge of everything mixed together?
"Let's check this out."
Osian deliberately didn't resist the force pushing him. When he relaxed his body and entered a state of perfect relaxation, his body moved smoothly. It was flexibility unbelievable for someone wearing armor. From Alpha's perspective, it felt like Osian had momentarily become liquid and was flowing.
Like uncatchable water, like wind that seeps everywhere. In an instant, Osian escaped from the torrent of pushing force and got close to Alpha's face. Alpha tried to create a red force field from his whole body. But Osian was faster.
Whack!
The elbow not holding a sword struck the guy's jaw. Though he hit without holding back, the guy only swayed slightly but was fine.
'Damn tough. What else is he wearing inside that armor?'
But he succeeded in shaking the guy's brain. Osian got even closer to the guy who was staggering back.
Alpha raised a sun behind his back. It was a reflexive action to somehow shake off this side. The blood-red sun, Eclipse, glowed ominously. Since the sun ring had already been pierced once, choosing the more destructive Eclipse was reasonable.
But the guy, though he could handle power, still didn't know how to properly control it. If it had been Lupona, would she have made the same choice as Alpha? Osian was certain she wouldn't have.
Lupona had also experienced large and small incidents while staying in Tirna. She was close to being Osian's alter ego. Though she had become a separate being, what formed her foundation was the current Osian.
Lupona's talent was real and she had grown at a tremendous speed. Therefore, there was no naive period of her lacking experience. But Alpha was different.
The guy acted and fought based on externally injected information and data. He had memories, but they weren't embodied in actual combat.
"Sometimes there are things where the body moves first, ahead of what the head knows."
Spinal reflex actions that don't go through thought are habits and instincts embodied and settled in the body. The guy had unknowingly been swept away by them.
"Eclipse is a good technique for delivering wide-area attacks, but it can't be effective when stuck close like this."
Osian didn't keep distance from Alpha but got even closer. Though the guy instinctively gripped his Eclipse sword and thrust forward, he lightly parried it with his starlight sword. Then he took out a shield from subspace, equipped it, and wrapped it in starlight before striking the guy's head hard.
Whang!
Alpha’s head spun around. He would have tried to dissipate the force as much as possible, but he had taken a direct hit from a shield wrapped in starlight. Alpha staggered again.
Crack. The helmet Alpha was wearing on his head cracked and shattered into pieces. Disheveled hair flowed out from inside. Alpha turned his head and glared at Osian with unfocused eyes.
Indeed, using this side's genes, Alpha resembled Osian enough to be believed as his brother. The difference was that his hair was grown wildly, making it much longer.
But Osian had no intention of going easy just because his opponent looked exactly like him. Rather, he felt a kind of anger toward Alpha who had copied his face and was showing such an unseemly appearance.
Whang!
The shield struck upward briefly, hitting Alpha’s jaw. Alpha's head jerked back greatly. But he didn't fall there.
Grrrowl.
A low sound rumbled in his throat. Osian frowned inside his helmet. Alpha’s head, which had been thrown back, returned to its original position. By then, scales had grown on his face. Long horns on both sides of his forehead, and flames writhed in his open mouth.
Whoosh!
Magma-like sticky flames poured out of Alpha's mouth like vomit.
A rock dragon's breath. Osian immediately raised his shield to block it. He had thought the guy was unusually tough when hitting him, and it turned out he had even put dragon species genes in his body.
Alpha, who had barely gained distance with his breath, fired lasers from the Sail floating in the air. The sun of death concentrated heat rays toward Osian. Osian sprinted at high speed, avoiding the heat rays while trying to close the distance.
Seeing this, Alpha swung the Eclipse sword in his hand horizontally in a big arc. Following the trajectory, a huge blood-colored wave swept through. It was a high-heat strike that would melt everything it swept up.
However, Osian was no longer there. Having jumped high, he had put his shield back into subspace and taken out the moonlight blade instead.
The moonlight blade and starlight sword merged into one. A blue energy rose tall from the center of the pure white sword light. The two forces mixed harmoniously, transforming into a larger and sharper sword.
[Azure Rainbow Piercing Sun]
It was the technique that had once defeated Lupona, newly improved and deployed in real time. Osian's sword cut through the red beam in reverse and even split the Eclipse beyond it in half. The ominous blood-colored sun split in half and set.
Osian's sword didn't stop there but continued its dance. At the end of the trajectory disturbing the air was Alpha's neck. Alpha gritted his teeth while blood flowed from his lips due to the shock of Eclipse being forcibly released. Starlight rose again from Alpha's sword and blocked Osian's sword.
Perhaps because the hastily deployed starlight sword's stance was unstable, Alpha's body was greatly knocked away.
Crash!
Like a stone skipped with all one's might, Alpha's body bounced off the ground several times as it flew. From within the dusty cloud that rose, Alpha staggered as he got up. Broken bones and torn muscles quickly healed with super-regeneration.
Whack!
But Osian, who had somehow followed close behind, kicked his abdomen. Alpha, while being hit, spewed breath from his mouth, deployed force fields, and raised his starlight sword in resistance.
Additional hidden cards were revealed. Crackle! Electric current formed in the air and then fell toward Osian as spears of lightning. It was powerful enough to cause paralysis or even electrocution death to a knight if hit.
However, Osian naturally parried the lightning spears as if he had expected this. Alpha raised his empty hand high into the sky. At that moment, the flames of the starlight sword Osian was using were sucked into his palm instead.
He remembered it. When resolving the Goldiron family matter, it was the psychic ability used by the mutant there.
"So what about that?"
The starlight that was being half-sucked returned to Osian. Alpha was flustered. He probably hadn't expected his ability to fail.
"Back then I was caught because my power was insufficient, but do you think I'd fall for such a crude ability now?"
Alpha gritted his teeth. He rolled his eyes and then, looking at Osian's sword, seemed to make some kind of resolution.
"No way!"
Cromwell exclaimed from afar. He had guessed what Alpha was trying to do.
Alpha released all abilities. He maintained only the starlight blooming on his sword. It meant he would release most abilities and focus only on the technique he was about to use.
Whoosh.
Cold energy rose from Alpha's body. The guy was drawing up moon scar energy in his other hand while holding the starlight sword.
Thus, a moonlight blade was created in one hand. Osian watched this scene with interest.
"Using two characteristics simultaneously. Looking at your expression, you don't seem relaxed, but still, impressive. For something created, it's quite an outstanding achievement."
From the fact that he could handle starlight, moon scar, and sun ring all together, Osian had vaguely guessed, but Alpha had finally succeeded in deploying starlight and moon scar simultaneously.
Of course, the guy's expression wasn't good. Blood overflowed from his tightly closed mouth. The wound from being hit in the abdomen would have already healed with super-regeneration. That was evidence that the recoil of deploying two forces simultaneously was eating away at his body in real time.
But Alpha didn't stop. He merged the moonlight blade and starlight sword into one, succeeding in creating the same sword as Osian.
Osian looked at the guy anew. Though he was nothing more than a being that imitated him, his will to follow him was worth rating highly.
"Kraaaah!"
Alpha charged. His movements were sluggish compared to the beginning, but the sense of pressure was on a different level. The star-moon combined energies collided. Along with a flash, highly cutting cold energy scattered in all directions.
Cromwell was quite surprised by the fact that the artifact's protection was rapidly worn away just by the aftereffects. This was something not in his data.
"Is this what they call the power of ancient times?"
Heat dwelt in his eyes as he watched the two knights' battle.
Meanwhile, the struggle between Alpha and Osian continued. Alpha tried not to back down while spitting blood from his mouth. Osian quietly watched Alpha, then exploded flames once to create distance backward.
The moment Alpha tried to charge again without losing momentum. Alpha unconsciously stopped in place.
More precisely, he stopped after seeing the three emblems floating behind Osian's back.
Sun-Moon-Star God. The three energies beautifully embroidered Osian's back in perfect balance with each other. Alpha looked at this scene with dreamy eyes as if bewitched and dreaming.
"How about it? Can you do it too?"
At Osian's provocative words, Alpha looked down at his own sword. Then he hardened his expression and raised a sun ring above his head.
Was it confidence that if the original could do it, he could too? Or was there some purpose he absolutely could not retreat from?
The moment the sun ring floated up and the moonlight blade and starlight sword in both hands each emitted light.
"Kugh!"
Alpha roughly spat blood and then knelt on one knee, collapsing.