Episode 56: Jacques Noire (2)
“Amusing, but ultimately insignificant.”
Jacques Noire felt a flicker of anger at Damien’s dismissive words.
The swordsmanship he practiced was not something a low-class fighter could belittle. It was the sophisticated art of the Mirage Sword Technique, a style once mastered by the legendary Swordmaster Mirage a century ago.
Mirage was a renowned figure, even in an empire teeming with masters. When Jacques Noire first acquired the manual for the Mirage Sword Technique, he was so overjoyed he nearly lost his senses. But that joy was short-lived; much of the technique had been lost to time.
Yet, Jacques couldn’t abandon it. The name Mirage carried immense weight. He believed that mastering the Mirage Sword Technique would elevate him to the rank of a master himself. So he dedicated his life to it, painstakingly reconstructing about 30% of the technique. Even that fraction was enough to create illusions that seemed real.
“You seem quite proud of that sword technique,” Damien remarked, his words grating on Jacques.
The Mirage Sword Technique was everything to Jacques, his path to mastery. “Let me shatter that illusion for you,” Damien said, his sword beginning to hum with a resonant sound.
Jacques felt a sense of foreboding. He had never encountered a technique that amplified a sword’s sound like this. Damien flicked his finger against the blade, and the sound exploded outward, sweeping away the illusions Jacques had crafted, leaving him alone.
”…”
Jacques was stunned. The illusions created by the Mirage Sword Technique weren’t supposed to vanish so easily. They required a significant amount of force to dissipate, something beyond the reach of ordinary or low-class fighters.
Yet, a mere sound had erased them all?
“That’s the major flaw of illusion swords,” Damien said, adjusting his grip. “Their weaknesses are as clear as their strengths.”
Jacques’ instincts screamed danger. “Now it’s my turn,” Damien declared, charging at him.
Jacques snapped back to reality. The fight wasn’t over. “Don’t get cocky just because you erased some illusions!” he shouted, furious that a low-class fighter dared to take the initiative against a middle-class one.
Their swords clashed, a flurry of metallic echoes filling the air. “Damien Haxen! You’d better focus now! I’ll show you the true essence of the Mirage Sword!” Jacques cried, creating two more illusions of himself.
Three Jacques Noires attacked simultaneously, each targeting a different vital point. But Damien simply ran his hand along his blade, and the hum erased the illusions, leaving only the real Jacques exposed.
“What?” Jacques was taken aback. The sound was much weaker than before, yet it still dispelled the illusions. In that moment of confusion, Damien’s sword struck, leaving a long cut on Jacques’ cheek.
To be wounded by a low-class fighter was a humiliation that spread through Jacques’ body before the pain even registered. His eyes burned with rage. “Don’t overstep your bounds!” he roared, trying to summon more illusions.
But his magic dissipated before forming anything. No matter how many times he tried, the result was the same. Damien’s sword was somehow disrupting the magic, preventing the creation of illusions.
“This… this can’t be happening!” Jacques stammered, unable to believe that the Mirage Sword Technique could be thwarted by such a simple method.
“Let’s wrap this up,” Damien said, his speed suddenly increasing, his sword’s trajectory multiplying.
“This is impossible…” Jacques barely had time to react, desperately parrying Damien’s strikes.
“Watch out, or you’ll lose an arm,” Damien warned, his blade grazing Jacques’ forearm.
“Focus, or you’ll lose a wrist,” he continued, slicing Jacques’ wrist lightly.
“Don’t just look up. Pay attention below too,” he added, cutting Jacques’ pants and thigh, again only skin-deep.
Jacques’ eyes widened in disbelief. A middle-class fighter like him was being overwhelmed by a low-class one. No, it was worse than that—he was being toyed with.
“This sword technique… it’s not something you can handle!” Jacques shouted in desperation, only for Damien to chuckle.
“You’re making a lot of noise over nothing,” Damien replied, kicking Jacques back. Jacques coughed, clutching his sword for support.
“You… you…” Jacques glared at Damien, who stood at a distance.
“Before I finish you off, let me show you something interesting,” Damien said, stepping forward and leaving an afterimage behind.
With each step, another afterimage appeared, until the ground was littered with them.
“You… how… how can you use the Mirage Sword Technique?” Jacques stammered, pointing a trembling finger at Damien.
“I learned by watching,” Damien said simply.
“That’s impossible…”
“And I can do this too,” Damien added, snapping his fingers.
The afterimages began to attack each other, vanishing as they were struck. Jacques watched, mouth agape. He couldn’t control his illusions with such precision. He could only give them a single command, never multiple.
“Jacques Noire, get a grip. This sword technique isn’t as great as you think,” Damien said, drawing Jacques’ gaze.
“Well, to be precise, it’s a decent technique, but it’s broken. It’s strange. The principles are advanced, but the execution is poor,” Damien continued.
“You probably tried to restore it and failed, turning it into a mess. The original technique must have been different,” Damien speculated, creating an afterimage that walked forward, then split into two, then four, then eight, until the world was filled with them.
”…!”
Jacques’ version of the Mirage Sword Technique could only create illusions where he stood, forcing him to move constantly. But Damien stood still, creating far more than Jacques ever could.
These weren’t mere afterimages. They were clones.
“The original Mirage Sword Technique must have been like this,” Damien said.
Jacques had gathered every story about Mirage, including rumors that he was not one man but many, because his illusions moved so realistically.
Jacques had strived to make that a reality, but he could only create afterimages, not clones. What he couldn’t achieve in a lifetime, Damien had perfected in minutes.
“How… how did you restore the Mirage Sword Technique?” Jacques demanded.
“Just did,” Damien replied nonchalantly. “It just worked.”
With that simple statement, Jacques’ eyes darkened.
As a child, Jacques Noire believed he was a genius.
All the peers who trained alongside him were far weaker. He reached the Low-Class level years ahead of them.
Naturally, he couldn’t help but be deluded. He thought of himself as a “genius.”
That illusion shattered right after he reached the Low-Class level.
He was defeated in a single blow by another knight, also hailed as a genius.
His first defeat.
His first experience of bewilderment.
His first taste of frustration.
A whirlwind of emotions engulfed him. Jacques Noire couldn’t accept his loss and challenged the knight again.
The result was even more devastating. Unlike the first time, when he at least managed to swing his sword, this time he couldn’t even do that before losing.
When he asked how he was defeated so easily, the genius knight simply replied:
“Just because.”
“Just because I could.”
Those words shattered Jacques Noire’s delusion.
Jacques Noire wasn’t a genius. He was merely a bit more talented than others.
From that day on, Jacques Noire threw himself into his sword training with a fervor bordering on madness. He abandoned all pleasures, focusing solely on honing his skills.
Years passed, and Jacques Noire reached the Middle-Class level.
Meanwhile, the “true” geniuses ascended to the High-Class level.
Jacques Noire despaired at the gap that effort alone couldn’t bridge.
It was then that he became obsessed with elixirs and the techniques of masters.
He believed that consuming the highest-grade elixirs, which enhanced one’s senses, would compensate for his lack of talent.
He hoped to gain insights from the knowledge left by masters that he couldn’t grasp on his own.
And so, more years passed.
Jacques Noire remained at the Middle-Class level.
Others might have given up, accepted their limitations, and settled.
But Jacques Noire refused to surrender. He was determined to surpass the “true” geniuses.
Yet today, he heard the same words again.
“It just happened.”
The emotions that had been piling up over the years ignited.
Those emotions were like rotten oil. The flames consumed them and blazed fiercely.
A rage so immense that even Jacques Noire couldn’t contain it surged within him.
“Did you just say… ‘just’?”
His grip on the sword tightened involuntarily.
“Yeah! It just happened, right? Just! Just! That damned ‘just’!”
His teeth ground together on their own. Blood rushed through his veins, threatening to burst.
Geniuses were always like that.
They effortlessly caught up to what he had struggled so desperately to achieve.
And they always uttered that nonsensical “just.”
“It wasn’t a stroke of luck! You were a genius, Damien Haxen! You were a genius too!”
Jacques Noire began to laugh intermittently. Madness seeped into his laughter.
“No, not just any genius! No genius I’ve ever seen could do what you did!”
No genius Jacques Noire had ever encountered could steal another’s swordsmanship like Damien Haxen.
But Damien Haxen not only stole swordsmanship, he wielded it perfectly and restored it instantly.
“Enough. I don’t need anything else. I’ll give up everything to kill you!”
If he couldn’t become a master, he’d find meaning elsewhere.
In this moment, Jacques Noire decided to find meaning in crushing the extraordinary genius Damien Haxen before he could fully bloom.
Jacques Noire possessed more than just the technique of the Master-Class.
He jabbed his fingers into various points on his body.
He stimulated the energy points where his power flowed.
The stimulated points sent his energy into a frenzy. The rampaging energy drew out his latent potential.
The Mad Elixir of Destruction.
A forbidden technique once used by a master known as the God of War, who burned his life away in his final moments.
In terms of level, it surpassed the Master-Class technique, but it was a method that required sacrificing one’s life, making it a last resort.
The technique of mutual destruction was unleashed.
His muscles swelled. His energy raged violently.
Jacques Noire raised his sword. The turbulent energy formed a blood-red aura.
“Die!”
Jacques Noire swung his sword down. The massive slash cleaved Damien Haxen’s body in two.
”…?”
But something was off. Despite being split in half, no blood flowed. The cut surface was pale and empty.
“Could it be…?”
Damien’s bisected body vanished as an illusion.
He had used the Master-Class technique to deceive Jacques Noire’s eyes.
Caught by his own technique.
Jacques Noire’s eyes bulged with blood vessels. The whites of his eyes turned a furious red.
“Damien Haxen! You wretched…!”
At that moment, a sword emerged from behind and sliced through Jacques Noire’s neck.