Translator: Haruto.

“We first have to wait for your body to heal, though. So, I don’t want to see you using your divine arms for a while, you hear? Your life energy circuits haven’t healed yet which means that if you use life energy, it might end up harming your body.”

“Got it.”

“Good, I’ll be taking my leave now then. Ah, but one last thing. I’ll leave Aoyama’s punishment to you… Perhaps my age is finally catching up to me, but I’ve been kind of absentminded lately, you know. I probably wouldn’t even notice if a brat like him were to disappear.”

So he wants me to get payback with my own hands, huh.

I think I’ll challenge Aoyama to a duel of honor.

A duel is how fellow members of the Purging Mask resolve their differences.

Thanks to a sacrificial cleric spell, everything returns back to normal when the duel is over, and people don’t get seriously injured.

Or to be more specific, the sacrificial cleric spell takes all the damage instead of you.

A wager is set between both participants before the duel and whoever loses has to pay double that amount.

Now, that’s basically all there’s to know about regular duels, however, duels of honor are a bit more particular in that they only occur when someone’s suffered a great insult to their honor or some kind of injustice.

Unlike regular duels, when a duel of honor is lost, your divine arms is taken away and the victor absorbs your powers, resulting in your dismissal from the Purging Mask.

Needless to say, this applies equally to both the challenger and the one challenged.

I don’t see myself losing, though.

I guess I’ll just demand a million yen from him. Asking for more would even put his parents in a predicament.

Besides, I’m only after his divine arms anyways.  

When you destroy someone’s divine arms, you absorb its skills and that will of course make you stronger as a result.

Dimensional Slash, in particular, is a great skill; I can’t wait to get my hands on it.

Hahaha! I’m coming for ya, Aoyama…!

Now that I think about it, I only know his family name.

Oh well, who the heck cares?!

Feeling chirpy, I focus back on healing my body.

On another note, I suppose my physical age is influencing my mind yet again since being away from my parents for so long took a major toll on my mental health.

Although, what else could I expect from the brain of a child?

I’ll just ask Amane to heal this broken heart of mine.

One more wholesome pretext to hold her in my arms. Nice!

A few weeks later…

With both my body and heart fully healed, I find myself standing before my opponent.

“A duel. I challenge you to a duel.”

“Wow, you don’t learn, do you? Alright sure, I also have a bone to pick with you. After all, it’s all your fault that my family had to waste a ton of money and my parents chewed my ear off.”

“Let’s go to the arena then.”

We arrive at a secret location where duels are held in the Purging Mask.

“Now, if you’d please set the wager, sirs…”

The referee tells us to begin.

“I demand a million.”

“Heh, I want one hundred million!”

Wait, what?! What the hell is this guy thinking?

“Are you sure, sir? People are even banished from their houses when they can’t pay off their debt.”

The referee asks for confirmation.

“Don’t worry, there’s no way I’d ever lose to that guy.”

“If you say so…”

Actually, two hundred two million yen is not such an extravagant sum for purgers.  

After all, the Purging Mask does pay its members. For example, if given the chance, this guy could earn a fair amount of money with his abilities.

Defeating a rank-three calamity can make you one hundred million yen richer.

On the other hand, defeating a rank-four calamity and lower won’t get you much.

Yeah, it’s not a great line of work if you’re looking for financial stability.

At any rate, Aoyama’s parents defeat rank-five calamities on a regular basis so they have some money. As expected of the people who manage a shrine important enough to even have retainer shrines like ours.   

With that being said, it’s not like Aoyama can pay off this debt by himself, being a kid and all.

So he’ll definitely have to rely on his parents.  

I knew he was a moron but he’s exceeded my expectations.

I feel kinda bad for his folks.

“Step forward, please.”

“I’ll end this in the blink of an eye.”

“We’ll see about that.”

At the referee’s signal, Aoyama unleashes Dimensional Slash.

He’s as hotheaded as I remember him.

I activate Circular Slash to accelerate my movement enough to dodge his attack, followed by Ethereal Beauty.

It’d be meaningless to try to distract a moron with murderous intent when he can’t even sense it, so I just fire my attack directly from the front.

Aoyama takes on a defensive stance but my skill goes right through his curved greatsword and lands a clean hit on him.

I held back somewhat.

“Ghaa!”

To my surprise, Aoyama lost his stance despite me holding back.

“Are you serious? So weak!”

My words seem to have hit a nerve since his face turns red, and he decides to use Whirl Slash right after.  

I jump in and counter it with Circular Slash.

Even if I can’t match the raw strength of a curved greatsword, all I need to do is close the distance between my opponent and I, and strike his skill with Circular Slash before it reaches its maximum velocity.  

And just as planned, I managed to fend off Whirl Slash without a hitch.

We both take a short moment to recover our stance.

“I admit it, you’re pretty strong. Alright, you pass! I’ll make you my underling!”

“Come again…?”

What kind of nonsense is that? This guy is a total moron.

I feel anger boiling inside me.

He didn’t even apologize for what he did and now he’s got the nerve to tell me to follow him?

Haa, alright, calm down. I’m dealing with a six-year-old. I gotta be the grown-up here.

“Cut the crap, you fucking braaaaaat!!!”

Before I knew it, I was on top of Aoyama, beating the living daylights out of him.

Yeah, I should stop trying to act like an adult… My past life is nothing more than a distant memory. I’m a child now.

On that note:

Dummy bad. Beat dummy up.

“How delusional can you get?! I went through hell because of you, remember?! Do you have any idea how many months I spent in that cursed mountain?!”

“Eeeeek! Stop! I’m your superior!”

“Like I care, damned brat! Duels are a sacred tradition! Your status means jack shit here! Now listen to me, I had to fight tooth and nail to survive, over and over again! Can you even imagine what it feels like to lose an arm?!”

I vent all my anger on him.

“Of course, you can’t! I mean who could! And if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have come close to breathing my last so many fucking times, and Amane’s mood wouldn’t have soured!”

As more and more words come out of my mouth, my rage continues to increase.  

“Hey, have you ever heard of the Code of Hammurabi? ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ If we were to apply it to our particular situation, it’d be ‘teleportation for teleportation,’ right? Unfortunately, I don’t have any teleportation skills so I’ll just have to use brute force instead. I hope you don’t mind.”

“W-Wait, hold on a second! P-Please don’t!”

I raise my hand without saying a word.

“Circular Slash X Divine-Blood Strengthening 100% X Demon Dance.”

Plasma begins to form around my fist.

The temperature produced by the high-density life energy skyrockets.

“Oops, almost forgot. You see, when I was on that mountain, I spent almost all my time half-naked. So, to make things fair… Chaotic Dance. Let’s rip those clothes off, shall we?”

“Alright, ready…”

“Eeek! Nooooo!”

“Final Skill!! Dimensional Slash!!” [Just your regular ol’ punch.]

Aoyama is so scared he passes out.

But there’s no way I’d let him off that easy.

I smash his face in and send him flying.

I hear a crack when my fist lands on his face but it ain’t my problem anymore!

The sacrificial cleric spell must have taken the damage instead of him anyways… Probably.  

Aoyama has become a shooting star. I wonder how far he’ll go.

I learned from a certain holy woman that “Vengeance gives rise to nothing but pure emptiness…”  

Or something along those lines but…

It feels so gooooooood!!!  

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