Chapter 306

Chapter 306: Chapter 306

That pattern continued through the next two floors.

Apollo Familia stopped trying to defeat Rayleigh in isolated exchanges and concentrated entirely on slowing him down.

They filled rooms with smoke, taking visibility away from both sides; coated staircases with oil; blocked narrow turns with heavy furniture where Shinsō could not extend freely; and attacked through holes cut into the walls instead of standing in front of him.

The strategy worked, at least to a point.

The fifteen-minute collapse of the outer fortress became a far slower climb through the keep, and Rayleigh had to give each step his full attention.

A hidden crossbow bolt grazed his shoulder when an adventurer fired through a hole behind him.

A Magic Item exploded beneath one staircase, forcing him to raise Benihime’s barrier against the collapsing ceiling, while another group nearly caught him between two falling gates and flooded the enclosed section with sleeping gas.

Rayleigh escaped with Shunpo before the gates shut completely, but the attempt earned a quiet nod from him.

Apollo Familia was weaker than many of the enemies he had faced, but they were far from incompetent.

By the time he reached the third floor, he decided that Sakanade had given him all the advantage it was going to.

The defenders had begun adapting around the illusion, and maintaining sensory inversion across so much of the keep consumed Reiatsu without offering the same return as before.

He stopped at the foot of the next staircase and resealed the blade.

The unfamiliar fragrance faded, and throughout the keep, Apollo Familia members suddenly found their senses returning to normal.

Rayleigh returned Sakanade to his waist and drew Benihime properly.

From here on, a more direct approach would do.

...

The defenders on the fourth floor had been waiting for precisely that moment.

As soon as their senses returned, the entire formation shifted.

Orders carried cleanly through the hall; archers began calling targets, mages coordinated their chants, and shield teams abandoned the guide ropes as they rushed into position.

The remaining fighters stopped giving ground from room to room and gathered in the central hall.

When Rayleigh stepped through the doorway, nearly thirty adventurers were waiting for him.

Apollo Familia had deliberately gathered most of its remaining force in one place, with a broad staircase leading toward the final floor behind them.

Hyakinthos was nowhere among their ranks, and Rayleigh understood the plan at once.

These people did not need to defeat him.

They only had to wear him down before he reached their captain.

When the front rank charged together, Benihime caught the leading sword near the guard and forced it aside as Rayleigh stepped past its wielder, driving an elbow into the man’s stomach.

He turned before the adventurer struck the floor and blocked two more weapons on the flat of his blade.

The second rank surged around their fallen allies, but Rayleigh used Shunpo to move beyond the formation before they could surround him, then swept Benihime through the air.

A crimson arc of energy cut across the hall.

It struck shields rather than bodies, hurling six defenders backward and breaking the formation without cutting them down.

Rayleigh went through the gap at once, and his swordsmanship did the rest.

He targeted wrists, shoulders, legs, and weapon guards, applying only enough force to disable rather than kill.

The defenders fought well together, filling openings as soon as one of their number fell, but none could match his speed on their own.

Even so, their numbers continued to pressure him.

A spear scraped across his back as he turned away from an axe, and a shield slammed into his side hard enough to shift him half a step.

From the rear, one mage completed a spell and launched a concentrated blast into the center of the melee despite several Apollo Familia members still fighting there.

Rayleigh sensed the attack through its spiritual pressure before he saw it.

He caught the nearest defender by the armor, pulled him clear of the line of fire, and raised Benihime.

A crimson barrier formed just before the spell struck, and the explosion filled half the hall, throwing everyone nearby from their feet.

Rayleigh remained standing behind the shield.

The defender he had pulled aside stared up at him from the floor.

"You saved me?"

Rayleigh lowered Benihime.

"You’re an opponent in a War Game, not Evilus."

He guided the man toward the edge of the room and returned to the fight before the exchange could become anything more.

The remaining members of Apollo Familia had heard him.

Several of them had expected the Yōtōsai to be ruthless after the stories surrounding the Great Feud and the destruction beneath Orario.

Instead, the man dismantling their entire Familia had deliberately avoided lethal blows from the start.

That restraint did not make him easier to fight; if anything, it made the gap between them more obvious.

Rayleigh accelerated.

Benihime knocked one sword into the ceiling, his sheath struck another adventurer across the chest, and a low kick swept the legs from a third.

He slipped between two spears, caught both shafts beneath his arm, and dragged their owners into one another before letting go.

Three archers fired from the stairs.

Rayleigh drew Shinsō with his free hand, and the silver blade flashed out three times.

Each arrow shattered in midair, and Shinsō had already retracted before the fragments reached the floor.

The archers discarded their bows and reached for their sidearms, but Rayleigh appeared at the foot of the stairs in a Shunpo.

The nearest man had time only to widen his eyes before Rayleigh struck him with the pommel; the other two lasted a few seconds longer.

When they fell, Rayleigh looked back across the hall.

Most of Apollo Familia’s remaining combatants were unconscious, bound, disarmed, or too badly hurt to continue safely.

The few still standing hesitated as he lowered both swords.

"You’ve done enough.... The flag is upstairs."

No one moved at first, but then one of the senior adventurers looked over the people already down and slowly lowered his weapon.

He understood Hyakinthos’s orders from the beginning: once a position had been lost, there was no reason to throw away more people.

"Let him through."

Several younger members looked furious, but none disobeyed.

The formation parted, and Rayleigh walked between them toward the stairs.

...

Across Orario, the mood had changed completely.

At the start, the War Game had seemed like an absurd spectacle—one Level Four blacksmith challenging an entire Familia.

No one watching was laughing now.

Ais followed the broadcast without taking her eyes from Rayleigh’s movements.

She had trained with him often enough to recognize when he was serious, and what held her attention most was how little of his strength he had actually revealed.

There had been no Bankai, no Hyōrinmaru, no large-scale Senbonzakura attack, and no high-level Kidō.

He was defeating an entire Familia through control rather than sheer destruction.

Finn had noticed the same thing. "So far, Apollo Familia has learned more about how carefully Rayleigh can fight than about what he can truly do."

Loki glanced at him. "Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

Finn did not answer. It probably should not have.

Elsewhere, Freya watched in silence from Babel.

She had seen enough to know Rayleigh would reach the top.

The only remaining question was what Hyakinthos would do once he got there.

...

Apollo stood beneath the flag beside Hyakinthos.

The keep had grown quiet enough that no messenger was needed to explain what had happened: every defensive line below them had fallen.

Apollo looked toward the closed doors of the final hall, and the anger he had been suppressing since the outer wall broke finally surfaced.

"He came here alone, and my entire Familia couldn’t stop him."

Hyakinthos adjusted his grip on his sword.

"They slowed him down, that was their task. Mine begins now."

Apollo turned to him.

The captain’s expression remained calm, although he had listened to reports from every floor.

He knew which swords Rayleigh had drawn, which injuries he had suffered, and roughly how much energy the climb must have cost him.

None of it changed the obvious truth: Rayleigh was stronger.

That did not mean Hyakinthos intended to step aside.

"When his sword rejected me in the workshop, I blamed him for humiliating me," Hyakinthos said, his eyes fixed on the doors.

"For a long time, I told myself the trial had been unfair, because it was easier than admitting the sword had found something lacking in me. I still serve you, and I still intend to win this War Game. But I don’t want another sword handed to me because we forced the smith to make it. If I ever carry a Zanpakutō, I want it to accept me because I earned that right."

Apollo said nothing, and for once, Hyakinthos did not need an answer from his god.

Footsteps sounded on the other side of the doors, and the handles turned. Rayleigh entered the final hall with Benihime in one hand and Shinsō sheathed at his waist.

A shallow cut crossed one shoulder, dust covered his coat, and several small burns marked one sleeve, but his breathing remained steady.

His eyes went first to Hyakinthos, then to the Apollo flag above them.

Apollo stepped away from the center of the room.

There was no one left to place between the two adventurers.

Hyakinthos raised his sword. "I know you’re stronger than you were when we first met, and I know the Level beside your name doesn’t explain what you can do. But I’m still the captain of Apollo Familia. I won’t cheapen everyone downstairs by surrendering after they fought to give me this chance."

Rayleigh understood him better than he had in the workshop years ago.

He lowered Benihime into a ready stance.

"Then don’t fight for the sword I refused you. Fight because this is your Familia and you chose to stand here."

Hyakinthos’s grip tightened. This time, there was no anger in his expression at the mention of that rejection.

"That’s exactly what I intend to do," Hyakinthos said, and then he moved first.