A long wound had appeared below the sharkman’s chest, blood welling steadily from it.

But the wound wasn’t deep. It hadn’t reached the bone.

This was Anliexi’s handiwork. He’d meant to kill it with one strike.

Against a human, a sword thrust from that angle would’ve pierced the heart.

But the sharkman’s gray-white, horny skin was as dense as steel, and slick with the lubricating effect of water.

Taken together, these factors meant the rapier had only sliced through a thin layer of flesh beneath its skin.

The sharkman lightly touched some of the blood and put it in its mouth, its expression disbelieving.

But it remained remarkably calm. It didn’t fly into the rage Anliexi had expected.

Without a doubt, it was a veteran warrior.

“I am Sha Wu, a warrior of my tribe. You’ve made me bleed, so you’re worthy of dying beneath my trident.

Human, tell me your name. I’ll take your head and grant you an honorable death worthy of your strength!”

The sharkman was speaking in human language.

Its words were unclear, with a slight nasal tone, but it enunciated each one as it declared its intentions.

Its attitude was no longer dismissive. It had grown more and more cautious.

It believed the person before it deserved to be taken seriously.

But it hadn’t expected its opponent to ignore it completely.

Turn, sprint, leap—after completing the sequence, Anliexi quickly put distance between them.

The king had fled!

He knew that his Sea Tribe opponent was simply too powerful.

If his own strength was “ten,” then his opponent was at least “fifteen”—perhaps even “twenty.”

The enemy’s overwhelming advantage in strength made Anliexi realize one thing:

He absolutely couldn’t face it head-on!

Sha Wu didn’t seem to have expected this. After a long pause, it suddenly let out an enraged roar.

Its roar boomed like thunder, rolling across an unknown distance.

Then it stomped the ground and shot after him like an arrow loosed from its bow, the earth rumbling beneath it.

Each time it landed, water streamed beneath its feet, making its landings utterly silent.

“Coward! You don’t deserve a warrior’s glory. I’ll twist your head off and smash it to pieces. You can’t escape your fate!”

By now, Anliexi’s sense of danger had developed to the point where he could use his mind to gauge the danger from different directions.

For instance, he’d already realized that there were far more sharkmen assisting the Imperial Army than the few he could see.

Once the signal was given, more than twenty thousand sharkmen gradually closed in around the Royal Army.

Clearly, this had all been planned in advance. The Sea Tribe enemies encircling them from every direction were more than ordinary soldiers could handle.

In the end, Anliexi had still underestimated the enemy’s intelligence—and Inran’s determination to win this war.

Still, although the encirclement was thorough, it had a weakness.

According to Anliexi’s senses, the fewest Sea Tribe soldiers were closing in from the direction of the sharkman leader. That might have been due to Sha Wu’s pride and overconfidence.

In fact, Anliexi had chosen this spot to break through only after noticing all of that.

But that didn’t mean he had it easy. In the face of Sha Wu’s strength, the so-called weakness in the encirclement was no longer a problem.

Anliexi sensed more pressure from Sha Wu than from any other enemy on the battlefield.

Sha Wu was a typical strength-type warrior, but it wasn’t slow.

Especially with the special water-element technique it used while running. After leaping, it could silently glide more than a dozen meters, almost as if it were skating on ice.

A Sea Tribe combat technique: Water Glide!

For hundreds of years, the Sea Tribe had kept little contact with other races and lived in relative peace.

But that didn’t mean its people were all unskilled in combat.

In fact, when their race first rose to prominence, the oceans where the Sea Tribe lived were, in some ways, even harsher places to survive than the lands where humans gathered.

It was easy to understand why. The sea held no fewer dangerous creatures than the land.

There was something else, too.

Even today, the Sea Tribe held a powerful allure for humans.

Merfolk, for example—many nobles and members of royal families hoped to see them.

These were creatures most people knew only from legends, and they fascinated humans of both sexes.

If the Sea Tribe hadn’t been skilled in combat and killing, it could never have become the ruler of the ocean, let alone driven human hunters away by force.

If that had been the case, some humans would’ve enslaved the race long ago.

For the sake of survival alone, the Sea Tribe had to grow stronger.

Their combat skills had been passed down and taught from generation to generation. The Sea Tribe of today had mastered them quite well.

“Water Glide,” for example, was a technique born from combining the water magic “Torrent” with the speed magic “Rapid Impact.”

By spreading a layer of water element across the ground, the user could slide farther after a rapid charge.

At that moment, Anliexi was being chased in a sorry state.

He had to keep his distance from Sha Wu, guard against its ranged attacks, and watch out for ambushes and obstructions from the enemies around him.

In fact, he was nearly as fast as Sha Wu. If he hadn’t been more agile, it would’ve caught him already.

As he fled, he danced like a nimble magpie, dodging attacks at the lowest possible cost.

Several times, he’d had no choice but to take a Sea Tribe soldier’s attack head-on—or use the force of one of Sha Wu’s magical attacks—to gain more distance.

This was where “Instinctive Evasion” proved invaluable.

At the most dangerous moments, instinct would guide his body and help him avoid fatal attacks.

Anliexi couldn’t avoid being wounded. By now, he was covered in blood and looked terrible.

And yet, like a cockroach, he just wouldn’t die!

The chase went on for a while. After circling the flagship again and again, Anliexi had no idea how far he’d run.

By now, his body was covered in countless wounds, and blood had soaked his clothes.

Worse still, his stamina was beginning to run out.

He was panting, his lungs pulling at every breath. His pace slowed, and Sha Wu had closed much of the distance between them.

“Enough!”

Sha Wu roared and leaped into the air. Its two webbed feet swept through the air, sending ripples like water across it.

It crossed several meters in an instant and brought its trident slashing down over its head.

The sheer, terrifying force sent the air into a frenzy, forming a blade of wind tens of meters long that came crashing down on Anliexi!

For a moment, it stared at its opponent, seeming to see fear in the eyes of the coward before it.

But on closer inspection, it saw nothing but mockery in his eyes.

The blade of wind crashed down with a thunderous boom. Nothing stopped it.

Everything within dozens of meters along its path was cleaved in two.

The ground split open again, leaving a massive gash—but Anliexi’s figure vanished as if it had been an illusion.

Ten meters away, Anliexi caught his breath, his body hunching slightly despite himself.

He’d stacked several speed spells to achieve a terrifying burst of speed, successfully dodging the attack.

This method could greatly increase Anliexi’s speed for a short time, but it came at a heavy cost.

Given his physical constitution, he couldn’t use this move often.

And that sharkman clearly wasn’t going to let things end there.

For his subordinates, and for himself, he knew a fight to the death was inevitable.

But fighting inside the enemy’s encirclement was tantamount to asking for death. Anliexi had to choose the battlefield himself.

Relying on his keen senses, he searched for the least dangerous spot, then lured his opponent into unleashing its full strength.

The opening left by the attack was the opportunity he’d been waiting for.

Inhale. Exhale. Explode.

With ghostlike footwork, Anliexi’s figure blurred and surged forward, trailing layer upon layer of afterimages.

A faint glint ran along his rapier as his attacks crashed down like a sudden downpour!

At last, it was time to risk everything.

The hardest part of fighting an opponent stronger than you was enduring the suppression of their superior abilities across the board.

Every move Sha Wu made put immense pressure on Anliexi.

In its hands, the trident was used for simple slashes, chops, and thrusts. Its attacks weren’t fast or frequent, but their power was astonishing.

Anliexi didn’t clash with Sha Wu’s weapon. He even had to avoid the pressure of the wind it kicked up head-on.

He relied entirely on his agility to dodge, making evasive maneuvers so perilous they could hardly have been closer.

When he couldn’t dodge, he used speed magic to move at high speed over short distances.

He spun around his opponent like a top.

They were so close that it looked as though one person were dancing against another.

His rapier flashed at the limits of its speed. Sword techniques flowed from him as he pleased, each transition utterly smooth.

One thrust, then another, then another—it really was like a storm.

One second, the blade came chopping down hard from the front.

The next, the rapier struck again and again like a serpent flicking its tongue, thrusting out silently from behind.

A second later, fire magic coated the blade, forming a flame edge. It darted out from beneath the arm, carrying a thin, keen sliver of sharpness.

Close-quarters combat had always been one of the most dangerous forms of fighting.

It relied entirely on the combatants’ reflexes and experience. There was no time to think.

More often than not, instinct and a sense of danger far outstripped precise calculation.

Anliexi was fighting for his life. His heart pounded at high speed, forcing blood through his body and replenishing his hungry, exhausted flesh.

Sha Wu was thoroughly frustrated.

Its trident was a long weapon, awkward to use at close quarters. Often, before it could put half its strength into a blow, it was forced to change its move.

Its opponent was as agile as a monkey, attacked at a speed like a downpour, and had the instincts of a beast. The combination made Anliexi incredibly difficult to deal with.