4819 Descent
The sword slash unleashed by Ketis did more than cut through a bunch of transphasic energy shields.
After she removed all of her distracting thoughts, ignored irrelevant environmental factors and squeezed out all of her latent potential, the strike she produced not only incorporated her best techniques and theories on force application, but also cut on a deeper and more conceptual level than before.
Ketis felt as if she had entered a dream.
The attack produced by leveraging of the strength Ketis had left in a profound act of desperation had shocked all of the combatants into silence!
After a small and unnaturally strong delay, everything that she had cut collapsed.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Thousands of dismembered parts and pieces of debris simultaneously fell onto the floor.
An enormous amount of blood spilled from all of the severed body parts. The transphasic stone floor became drenched with hundreds of organic red patterns. Anyone who looked down onto this floor from above would be able to appreciate a unique work of art that could only be produced in the most exceptional combat scenarios.
No art would ever be able to reproduce this unique and shocking display of transcendent power!
"What… happened?"
Not just everyone else, but the swordmaster herself grew confused at what had happened.
She had worked hard over the years to develop the ultimate cut. Just like Venerable Dise, she became increasingly more burdened by the increasing demand of coming up with a means of breaking through transphasic defenses.
The easiest way to do that was by using transphasic weapons, but that was a luxury only reserved for the rich.
As a swordmaster and a mech designer, Ketis despised the easy solution of resorting to expensive gear to solve her problems.
The most admirable way to overcome transphasic defenses was by relying on ingenuity to overcome the need for expensive transphasic weapons.
This was a steep challenge and one that caused many Master Mech Designers to slam into a wall.
Ketis also experienced her setbacks, but she never faltered in her goal.
The success of Venerable Dise had given her an enormous amount of encouragement.
Even so, the Phase Cutter technique had only reached a rudimentary stage. Summoning a river of stars that could corrode transphasic defenses over time could hardly be called a true cut.
It also did not match Ketis' personal style.
This was why she kept working on trying to refine her own technique. She wanted to fully leverage her advantage in sharpness to develop a way to cut through all of the dimensional nonsense of phasewater!
In other words, she wanted to create a sword technique that not only allowed her blade through the material dimensions, but also cut through anything important in the higher dimensions!
Ketis wasn't supposed to succeed at this time.
She recalled that she was far from completing this technique. There was still an enormous gap between theory and her desired result.
Just wishing really hard that she could cut through all of the transphasic defenses in her next attack was not enough to make it happen.
Ketis was not that powerful.
The only possible explanation why she was able to burst with power far in excess to what she contained was the weapon that currently graced her armored hand.
Even if she wasn't able to hold the hilt with her naked palm, she recognized the heft and feel of the Heavensword as if she held it only yesterday.
As the strongest and most reality-defying sword she had ever come in touch with, the legendary relic from a past age could not be mistaken for any other blade.
The previous sword she used to kill a lot of pescan opponents was like an unpretentious knight. It was a brave, combat-oriented product that could reliably cut what it was designed to fight against. The nameless blade could endure a lot of abuse and would not easily falter after a day of heavy fighting.
The Bloodsinger that originally came to life as a CFA service weapon issued by the Starlight Megalodon was like a duke that had earned a lot of victories and continually expanded his domain. Ketis or more precisely Sharpie had attuned with it for many years, causing her to become familiar with every single nuance.
Compared to the two weapons that she had forged herself, the Heavensword was like an emperor that ruled an entire planet! Its boundless might and its endless potential were barely contained in an old but solid form of a white and spotless sword. Holding it was like holding a part of the authority of all of reality!
Was this what it was like to be an omnipotent god?
The power was intoxicating!
If Ketis hadn't reaffirmed her conviction and sharpened her willpower to the point where it had become stronger and more resilient, she would have gotten lost in the rush of wielding such a mighty blade!
Where did the Heavensword come from? The last she heard, the legendary sword should still be in the possession of the Heavensword Saint!
Despite the man's age, the sword saint was still in decently good health. Wielding the Heavensword exacted a toll on the wielder's life, but it was not an excessively cruel weapon.
There was no way the Heavensworders would ever agree to transfer their greatest heirloom to the Red Ocean. Its symbolic value alone was indispensable to the state that carried its name.
Aside from that, the Mech Trade Association would never permit the powerful and unrestrained grand work to enter the shark pool that was the new frontier.
The damage it could do whenever the Heavensword followed its own whims were minimal and inconsequential in a marginal region like the outer borders of the galactic rim.
The story was much different in the Red Ocean!
The dwarf galaxy was much more compressed compared to a proper galaxy like the Milky Way. The distances between the lower zones, middle zones and upper zones were much shorter.
Humanity only captured a small slice of the Red Ocean so far, so there was an exceptionally high concentration of pioneers in occupied human territory.
The chances that the Heavensword would get exposed to all kinds of powerful and ambitious people and organizations were much higher if it ended up in the Red Ocean!
Given all of these factors, Ketis immediately ruled out the possibility that the Heavensworders had brought their precious relic through the greater beyonder gate.
The only explanation that made sense was that the Heavensword appeared in the Red Ocean on its own initiative!
What was even more impressive was that it had probably appeared in an instant!
From the moment Ketis initiated her ultimate cut technique, she still recalled that she held her previous blade.
That meant that the Heavensword chose to descend in her hands while her blade was just about to cut through the transphasic energy shields!
This capacity far exceeded anything humanity could reproduce through the technology it had mastered!
As Ketis held the Heavensword, she sensed that the weapon had taken the initiative to open itself up to her. She gained a rudimentary amount of authority and comprehension of its long list of abilities.
One of the abilities that its creator imbued in the weapon was the option to teleport to its wielder or anyone that received its heavenly gift!
It was at this time that Ketis finally recalled the odd ball of heavenly energy that the ancient sword had bestowed upon her during her visit to the Heavensword Association.
Now that the Heavensword had appeared in such a high-minded manner, Ketis could finally sense the gift in her body.
She could sense that it had been hiding inside her heart all of this time!
It had not been staying idle all of this time.
The Heavensword took the initiative to explain to her that the ball of energy had accompanied her for several years. Her strong will and emotions steadily caused it to become more familiar with her presence.
In other words, she imparted it with her imprint, thereby making it more compatible with her. If this did not happen, the ball of extremely high-quality energy would have assimilated her by force and transformed her into the next successor of the Heavensword Saint!
Ketis was very grateful that the Heavensword did not override her swordsmanship.
The goal of imparting this ball of energy was to monitor her and maybe learn from her activities.
The mark of the Heavensword also assessed whether she was worthy enough for the Heavensword to intervene when her life came under threat.
The weapon did not explain its judging criteria to her, but obviously Ketis had managed to prove that she had earned its approval!
Of course, that was not enough. The Heavensword was too powerful. Rashly using it in combat would do more harm than good.
If Ketis' willpower wasn't firm enough, then forcibly swinging the grand work would cause her force of will to crumble into mist and her body to explode due to an inability to contain so much power!
Only through stimulating all of her willpower and emotions did she manage to activate it somehow, causing it to be drawn out of its hiding spot and active a predetermined routine.
This ball of energy was the principal reason why the Heavensword was able to bridge over a hundred-thousand light-years and instantly appear in her hands.
The ball of energy also helped her harness the sword. As a grand work that contained an immeasurable amount of might, Ketis had no qualifications to wield the Heavensword in battle!
It was only because the Heavensword took measures to reduce its requirements, supply its own energy demands and exert the power of heaven on her behalf that she managed to unleash a gigantic blade of sword energy earlier!
Unfortunately for Ketis, the Heavensword could not be used without limit.
The more she exerted its power, the more the ball of heavenly energy depleted itself.
Ketis was not the Heavensword Saint, let alone a sword saint. Once her borrowed energy reserve ran out, she no longer possessed the qualifications to exert the Heavensword's power!
According to her current estimates, she could only wield the Heavensword for a couple of minutes at most.
"That is enough!"
Though Ketis still reinforced her body with the sharpness of her own domain, the overwhelming aura of the Heavensword had flooded the entire floor and several more besides!
The version of heaven propagated by this ancient relic was not impartial. It could be as comfortable as paradise or as judgemental as divine punishment depending on the individual.
To the humans who had previously been fighting against the aliens, the aura not only granted them bliss, but also lifted their exhaustion and even healed their lighter injuries!
To the aliens that sought to beat down the humans that resisted their own captivity, the Heavensword oppressed their will and made them feel guilty for spilling human blood!
While the pescan soldiers were still caught off-guard by the dramatic developments that had just taken place, Ketis reaffirmed her desire to demolish all of the aliens and resonated harder with the Heavensword!
At this time, the Heavensword had allowed Sharpie to enter a shallow layer of its deep and unimaginably vast internal space.
Although Sharpie was too weak to influence the Heavensword, her visitation at least enabled Ketis to resonate with the overbearing weapon on a superficial basis!
This was enough.
She grinned under her helmet.
She bent her knees and lowered her stance.
With the power of heaven covering her body and armor, she feared no attack!
Ketis even believed that had become as powerful as a mech at this time!
This was just a fraction of the strength of a top swordsman!
Every second she became exposed to the Heavensword's incredible power and ingenious energy transformation allowed her to learn a lot about the mechanics of this transcendent weapon.
However, she only spared a tiny part of herself on these observations. She could store all of the data she recorded today and revisit them at a later date when she was not preoccupied with other matters.
Right now, she had a battle to win!
Now that she had taken stock of her current condition, she no longer held back any longer.
With a powerful explosion of force, her body turned into a blazing white comet as she dashed her body forward!
An instant later, the crippled transphasic tank that the pescans desperately attempted to repair under the cover of their soldiers parted in half!
Ketis had reached the other side of the tank. The Heavensword glowed with solidified light even as a wake consisting of shards of metallic components trailed after the heaven-blessed swordmaster.
The mighty alien war vehicle did not stand a chance!
"Heaven shall punish the wicked!" She declared!
