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."

the tension within my legs disappeared. Within a split

Swooosh-!

toward

However...

dodged my attack by moving his head to the side. It was by a narrow margin,

with his own palm, pressing it towards my

an open book, his every move was clearly

casual slap of my left hand, his

hand and demonic force burst out of his hand, forcing out a black beam that dangerously aimed at

be a

of my head, having clearly read his movements ahead of time. The beam soon flew past the side of my ear, before piercing through the pale

Duke's face hardened when he saw

to attack again, but in the blink of an eye, my hand

whatever he

grasping his hand, my

"Give up."

body twitched with annoyance as I felt my other's emotions run down my

resistance

funny how you think you can actually do something to me now that we're both in the same ranks again. You couldn't do anything when we were of the same rank before, yet you think a small power-up would make a

my hand continued to

the bones of the demons crush inside the palm

me

tore off of the Duke's body and blood began to slowly

the torn-up hand for a brief moment before throwing it behind me, only to see it stop mid-air and fall down at the same pace time

for the blood as it remained still in the air.

"Huaak!"

face twisted savagely as

energy burst out of his body, converging toward the top of

"H..how dare you!"

out as

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

the ball flew past my head, I heard a voice speak inside of my head. The mana inside of my body started to

one more thing before I end him. Make sure you feel

raised his hand and I felt the mana in

despaired at

my emotions

a thin yet durable veil that enveloped my entire

around my body, it didn't take

'...Mana agglomeration.'

elders at the Monolith. In the years since then, I

multiplied many times as the

was flooded

'Hm?'

even having a chance to rejoice at my newly gained

There were a couple of more colorful ones inside of

that some of the blobs were smaller than others, with the blob representing the Duke

'What's this?'

tried to make out what was

important,

his words, I sharpened my gaze and paid more attention

It was then...

the small circles in the middle of

size of tennis balls tucked within blobs. Additionally, they appeared to be distributed across different areas

Then it hit me.

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

Those