The Author's POV

Time stopped.

The world within my vision came to a halt.

From the crowd to the noise. The only thing that stood in front of me was Duke Azonech.

Carefully placing my hand on the ground, my body slowly stood up.

In parallel with this, Duke Azonech's face changed dramatically. In a mutter, he opened his mouth.

"…Y..you were hiding your strength?"

He slowly took a step back.

He appeared to be in shock and fear.

"Not really."

My mouth automatically opened and answered.

"That's impossible!"

In a state of trembling, he screamed.

"Do you really expect me to believe that you weren't hiding your strength?"

"...You call this hiding my strength?"

I suddenly felt a wave of disgust wash over my body as I sensed my other self's emotions.

I found my head slowly rising up.

My eyes soon met with the Duke's.

"Is it really worth hiding this little amount of strength?"

"Wh...what?"

While the two were conversing, I was secretly trying to grasp what was happening around me.

It had to be noted that currently, time was flowing at a much faster rate than reality. For the two of them to be able to converse properly...just how fast were they?

Not only that, the world around me. It looked different. Everything looked a lot more colorful as I was able to catch a glimpse of the mana in the air.

There wasn't much, in fact, there was barely any mana in the air, but it was still there.

Regardless, that wasn't what attracted most of my attention.

'...Limit Breaker?'

These words...

This was the first time I had ever heard of these words, and my curiosity about them was at an all-time high.

Unfortunately, I didn't have the luxury to ponder over those words as my head glanced around the frozen space, and I suddenly found my calves tensing up.

My mouth soon opened.

"My time is limited. This amount of strength will suffice for now."

legs disappeared. Within a split instant, I found the Duke's face

Swooosh-!

together, my hand thrust toward

However...

my attack by moving his head to the side. It was by a narrow margin, but he was still able to

with his own palm, pressing it towards

him, like an open book, his every move

slap of my left hand,

and demonic force burst out of his hand, forcing out a black beam

a

self to avoid the attack was a simple movement of my head, having clearly read his movements ahead of time. The

hardened when he saw

the blink of an eye, my hand had already reached

whatever he was planning

his hand, my mouth then

"Give up."

annoyance as I felt my other's emotions run down my

resistance clearly

the same ranks again. You couldn't do anything when we were of the same rank before,

squeezed his hand. The Duke's face changed, but my hand continued to squeeze before it compressed it completely and I was

feel the bones of the demons crush inside the

me any

my hand back, the hand tore off of the

at the torn-up hand for a brief moment before throwing it behind me, only

blood as it remained still in the air.

"Huaak!"

the Duke's face twisted savagely as he

energy burst out of his

"H..how dare you!"

was pushed out as a

he could read his mind, with just a casual tap of

flew past my head, I heard a voice speak inside of my head. The mana inside of my

more thing before I end him. Make sure you feel how I control the mana inside of

I felt the mana

Duke despaired at

my emotions

convergence of mana followed after this. Forming a thin yet

itself around my body, it didn't take me long to figure out

'...Mana agglomeration.'

once before, back when Monica was fighting the elders at the Monolith. In the years since then, I had been deeply impressed with her gallant

already tremendous strength multiplied many times as the armor completely

body was flooded with

'Hm?'

my vision completely shifted without me even having a chance to rejoice

I could only see a series of black blobs now. There were a couple of more colorful ones

of the blobs were smaller than others, with the blob

'What's this?'

tried to

not important, look

my question remained unanswered as my other self spoke. Listening to his words, I

It was then...

the small circles in the middle of

of tennis balls tucked within blobs. Additionally, they appeared

Then it hit me.

'Wait, don't tell me...'

right. Those are their