It was exactly as the witnesses had described: a giant standing over four meters tall!

  Haruki didn't have time to overthink. He bolted into the woods, his certainty growing with every step that Shizuku had likely run straight into the creature.

  Shizuku was a B-Rank Bzer, but her raw attack power was her weakest stat. Her mana manipution was surgical, not explosive. This meant that while she could easily dominate average human opponents through precision, she was ill-equipped to face a fortress-like enemy with absolute defense. Against a five-meter mountain of rock, her refined water bdes would likely just spsh harmlessly against its surface.

  Even knowing she was a high-ranking knight, Haruki couldn't leave it to chance. He had to reach her before her stamina—her lowest attribute—gave out.

  He didn't hesitate. He reached into the core of his spirit and unleashed the ultimate speed of the Wuju Style.

  "Highnder!"

  WHOOSH!

  Flickering green sparks of energy trailed behind him as Haruki transformed into a localized gale. He tore through the forest at a speed that rendered him invisible to the naked eye, his footsteps leaving craters in the mossy earth as he surged toward the heart of the disturbance.

  Shizuku Kurogane had run far into the forest before her panic finally subsided and her breathing began to level out.

  As she stopped to catch her breath, she reflected on how she had ended up like this. It was all that man's fault—Haruki Aizawa.

  When they first met, she had genuinely disliked him. He was blunt, cked any sense of social tact, and seemed to have a brain made entirely of steel and whetstones. He was a sword maniac who made her brother, Ikki, look like a social butterfly by comparison. Deep down, she had wanted nothing to do with someone so cold and singurly focused.

  But after living with him and watching him train, Shizuku had to admit a terrifying truth: there was something about Haruki that she couldn't ignore. Something that pulled at her gaze and refused to let go.

  What is it about him? she wondered.

  Now, standing in the silence of the woods, the answer was clear. It was his pure, unadulterated "Swordsman's Heart." It was a level of resolve that was willing to sacrifice everything for the path he had chosen.

  Shizuku had been born with a silver spoon and B-Rank talent. She was the "golden child" of the Kurogane family. Because of her sheltered status, she had been blind to the systematic abuse and isotion her brother had suffered for years. By the time she realized what had happened, Ikki had already left home, and the family spoke of him as if he had never existed.

  She deeply regretted her ignorance, but she also knew that even if she could go back, she probably wouldn't have noticed. She didn't have the kind of spirit that looked for things to protect beyond her own comfort.

  Haruki was different. She could feel a weight in his presence that equaled, if not surpassed, Ikki's own resolve. His bde was strong because his heart was unmovable. If Haruki had been in her position, he wouldn't have been blind to Ikki's tragedy—he would have seen it, and he would have likely cut the entire family down to stop it.

  People are naturally drawn to what they ck. Haruki's terrifying strength and absolute conviction had become a beacon for Shizuku, pulling her in even as her pride told her to run away.

  That inner conflict was what had driven her from the camp, and now, she was hopelessly lost in the dense Okutama wilderness.

  "Where... where am I?"

  The towering trees felt like a giant maw waiting to swallow her whole. But the forest itself wasn't the primary danger.

  The ground began to vibrate.

  "An earthquake?"

  Shizuku frowned. The shaking wasn't a rolling tremor; it felt like rhythmic thuds. It happened again. And again. A heavy, localized pounding, as if something massive was striking the earth.

  Thump. Thump. Thump...

  As the noise grew closer, Shizuku didn't panic. She summoned Yoishigure and turned toward the source.

  The next second, her breath hitched.

  Emerging from the treeline was a five-meter-tall behemoth. It was a humanoid shape crudely assembled from massive boulders and jagged stones, its scale rivaling the ancient trees surrounding it.

  "W-What is that?!"

  Even though she had been warned about a "giant," the sheer physical pressure of seeing a literal mountain come to life made her freeze.

  The giant didn't wait for her to recover. It raised a massive arm of solid granite and swung it downward with the weight of a falling building.

  BOOM!

  The force of the impact created a localized shockwave. Shizuku tried to react, but the wind pressure alone sent her reeling. She managed to manifest a water shield at the st second, but the raw physical power was too great. The shield shattered, and she was bsted backward, her body smming into a tree trunk.

  "Gah... cough!"

  The giant continued its slow, mechanical advance, looming over her.

  Am I going to die here?

  As the massive shadow covered her, Shizuku's life began to fsh before her eyes. In that kaleidoscope of memories, one face stood out more clearly than all the others: Haruki Aizawa.

  She finally realized she couldn't run from her heart anymore. She wanted to see him one more time.

  Just as the giant's fist descended to crush her into the dirt, a blur of motion appeared in the corner of her eye.

  Cng!

  Haruki Aizawa stood between her and the monster, his physical bde—the Kujisada—drawn and glowing with an eerie light. He had intercepted the giant's fist mid-air, the earth beneath his boots cracking from the diverted pressure.

  "Are you okay?" Haruki asked, gncing back at her without letting his guard down.

  "H-Haruki...?"

  Shizuku stared at him, her heart hammering against her ribs. He wasn't a hallucination. He was really there.

  Haruki turned his focus back to the stone giant. He had never seen a creature like this in this world. If it wasn't some kind of magical anomaly, it had to be a Bzer's creation. But who possessed the power to animate earth on this scale?

  The giant didn't have a soul; it moved mechanically, drawing its arm back for another strike. Faced with such raw mass, Haruki decided to use the branch designed for absolute destruction.

  "Gore Cross!"

  Haruki ignited his Bloodlust. A violent, crimson energy erupted from his body, coiling around his bde. He swung the Kujisada in a rapid two-hit combo—a vertical ssh followed by a horizontal one.

  X!

  Two massive, blood-red bdes of energy formed a cross in the air, tearing through the giant with the force of a high-yield explosive.

  CRASH!

  In a single strike, the five-meter behemoth was reduced to a rain of gravel and dust.

  Since his csh with Nene Saikyo, Haruki's mastery over Bloodlust had evolved.

  He was no longer a sve to the "Frenzy." He could now modute the output of his life force, using it in controlled bursts rather than a total, suicidal eruption.

  The rock giant was a perfect target for this. Against an opponent made of stone, elemental magic like fire or water was less effective than raw kinetic energy. The Bloodlust branch provided the absolute destructive force needed to overcome such physical density.

  However, the battle wasn't over.

  As the dust settled, the rubble on the ground began to vibrate. Like magnets pulling together, the shattered rocks began to fly toward one another, reforming.

  The debris didn't rebuild the giant, though. Instead, the rocks converged into dozens of smaller, man-sized stone dolls.

  Now that the entities were smaller and more numerous, Haruki's Wave Perception picked up a subtle dissonance. He noticed something he had missed with the giant: thin, shimmering fiments of mana—threads—attached to the back of every rock doll.

  This isn't a natural creature. It's a puppet show.

  Okutama wasn't suffering from a monster outbreak; it was being targeted by a puppeteer.

  "Haruki! Look out!" Shizuku cried, her voice tight with worry.

  The army of stone dolls lunged simultaneously, their jagged limbs reaching for him. Haruki didn't look bothered. He moved with casual grace, his bde flickering like a serpent.

  Ssh. Snip. Crack.

  He wasn't aiming for the stone bodies. He was cutting the threads.

  Every time his bde passed through the air behind a doll, the shimmering mana-fiment snapped. The moment the connection was severed, the rock doll lost its animation and colpsed into a pile of lifeless stones.

  The dolls seemed to realize their weakness was exposed. They hesitated, their movements turning erratic and fearful as they tried to circle away from him.

  "Too te," Haruki muttered.

  He swept through the crowd like a reaper. Within seconds, the entire army was dismantled. However, Haruki deliberately left one doll intact. He didn't destroy it; he simply pinned it to a tree with his bde through its shoulder.

  He wanted to see where those threads were coming from. He followed the shimmering line with his Mind's Eye, tracing the mana back to its source deep within the forest.

  "Stay here, Shizuku," Haruki said, his eyes narrowing. "I'm going to have a word with the person pulling the strings."

  ***********************************************

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