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."

tension within my legs disappeared. Within a split instant, I found

Swooosh-!

my hand thrust toward

However...

moving his head

own

his every move was clearly visible in the eyes of

casual slap of my left hand, his palm

demonic force burst out of his hand, forcing

a futile

his movements ahead of time. The beam soon flew past the side of my

hardened when

attack again, but in the blink of an eye, my hand had already reached out and

doing whatever

his hand, my

"Give up."

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

resistance clearly irritated

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

The Duke's face changed, but my hand

demons crush inside the

me any

tore off of the Duke's body and

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 was really moving

be said for the blood as it remained still

"Huaak!"

twisted savagely as he

out of his body, converging toward the top of his palm in the form of a small

"H..how dare you!"

force was pushed out as a result of

just a casual tap of his hand, the ball flew past my

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

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

felt the mana in

despaired at

my emotions

mana followed after this. Forming a thin yet durable veil that enveloped

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

'...Mana agglomeration.'

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

strength multiplied many times as the armor completely encased

body was flooded with

'Hm?'

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

now. There were a couple of more

that some of the blobs were smaller than

'What's this?'

I tried to make out what was

not important, look

other self spoke. Listening to his words, I sharpened my gaze and paid more attention

It was then...

small circles in the middle

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

Then it hit me.

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

Those are their