The Protagonist Already Knows

Chapter 44: Day 4 [3]

Looking at the sword piercing the air, diagonally into my defenseless stomach, I couldn’t help but wonder: what image would my weapon art project?

What did I want my weapon art to symbolize?

"ah..."

The reality was...I didn’t even have a choice.

At that moment, I felt an overwhelming sense of déjà vu flood my body, time slowing as the tip of Han Li’s sword inched closer and closer toward me.

I could tell...my weapon art image. It was being created right now.

Thus, I remained lying on the sand, making no desperate attempts to avoid the incoming sword.

It was then that my entire body went numb, a sharp pain striking my abdomen before instantly vanishing.

The entire world turned a muted grey and white, like a 1900s movie, as I looked at my stomach, which now had a bloody sword sticking out of it.

Ah...with my death element, it was quite fitting that my sword art’s image was an impaled corpse.

However, at that moment...

*WHOOSH*

*WHOOSH*

Two streaks of purple lightning streaked across the grey world, momentarily blinding me.

The arrows, their shafts covered in sparkling dark-purple particles, flew right above my head and at Han Li’s figure.

Forced to dodge, Han Li retrieved his sword from his chest and leaped backward; however, in the next moment, his entire body began trembling uncontrollably.

The dark purple particles lying on the ground beneath Han Li instantly surged upward, covering his legs before he could even react.

Barely managing to move his body despite the constant electrocution, Han Li dropped his sword, a dark-blue water mana sphere appearing in its place.

*BANG*

The sphere instantly imploded, the water bursting backward to cover Han Li’s body and flood the sand below him.

Suddenly, as the water evaporated, the purple particles covering Han Li’s body vanished, leaving only his body and hair drenched.

Feeling my body’s control slowly return, I managed to glance downward, seeing a bloody hole in my stomach.

However, despite everything, my lungs and all the vital organs in my stomach were surrounded by a light-blue hue, completely undamaged.

As soon as my weapon art’s image had formed, I honed my intent, attracting the mana within my body toward my stomach, horridly imitating the fourth stage of mana mastery where one covered their body in mana.

It was as if...I could feel and control every particle of blood inside my body and command them with my mind.

This was Martial Arts: the strengthening of the mind-body connection.

However...beyond that, I glimpsed something else. A small golden orb, the size of a golf ball, motionlessly resting inside my body.

Like a heart, the golden orb circulated my blood throughout it.

However, I could feel the blood pouring out of the golden orb was completely different in some way from the blood before entering.

It felt...more familiar to me.

I had become "A Loose Thread."

As I slowly staggered onto my feet, blood still leaking out of my stomach’s wounds, I glanced backward.

I saw myself...a corpse with a sword impaling its stomach lying in the sand behind me.

As I gripped my Dao with all my strength, the impaled corpse shuddered for a moment before halting.

However...beyond that hologram, I saw someone else.

A figure with neck-length brown hair and matching amber-brown pupils standing a few steps away, bow in her hand.

For a moment, the thoughts of "Why was she here!?" and "This didn’t happen in the novel!" overtook my head, but I instantly marked Han Li, instantly feeling more confident.

Meeting my eyes, Carissa simply tilted her head.

However, in the next second, she muttered angrily and looked away, talking to the air.

"That bastard sent you, didn’t he? Really? When I was standing right next to him!?"

As she continued angrily muttering incoherently, she simultaneously knocked two arrows and instantly fired them.

The arrows, devoid of any mana, flew...straight above Han Li and past him, aiming at the semi-circle of students pouring mana into the formation to maintain the ice-lake.

"I guess you can use that tactic too..."

Clicking his tongue, Han Li raised his left hand, a mana sphere instantly forming.

However, in that moment of casting, I sprinted forward and thrust my sword forward at his chest.

As Han Li stepped to the right to avoid my Dao, his mana sphere instantly collapsed.

"AHH"

"AHH"

The two arrows struck two students and sent many others stumbling toward the ground.

*WHOOSH*

*WHOOSH*

Two more arrows flew right above Han Li and my head, far above our reach.

However, after managing to retrieve his weapon from the ground, Han Li didn’t hesitate to slash at my head with his broadsword while cursing.

"You again!?"

I raised my sword to parry the slash, but at the last second, Han Li’s sword easily shifted its trajectory, now aiming at my left leg.

Another sword impaled the corpse behind me, while I felt my entire left leg explode with pain, my eyes involuntarily closing.

And yet, I blindly stabbed my Dao forward.

*CLANG*

Re-opening my eyes, I found my sword slammed against Han Li’s...but this time, I didn’t lose my balance or fall back.

*WHOOSH*

*WHOOSH*

Disengaging, Han Li leaped backward as two more arrows aimed at the remaining students around the formation.

But before he could even raise his sword to parry the arrows, I raced forward, slashing my sword downward at his left shoulder.

The corpse behind me, now impaled by two swords, also managed to sit up straight, watching my back from behind.

His voice now a yell, Han Li screamed while stepping back, forced to watch as the arrows knocked over more students.

"HOW ARE YOU NOT ELIMINATED!?"

As various cracks appeared on the frozen lake’s surface, I opened my mouth...but nothing came out.

Ah... right, everything... every single part of my mind was focused on my sword. I had switched off everything useless to maintain my lucidity.

I was a dead corpse fighting.