Aelia was facing the training grounds, but her mind had already drifted off to who knew what corner of outer space.

Unlike the spectators, she lost most of her interest in the match the moment Charles refused her help.

She had never bothered to look into Charles's exact combat strength. To her, Charles was the same as everyone else.

Small fry.

As for that bastard Hero, judging by his reputation alone, he should at least have twenty to thirty percent of her strength. Beating a mere Charles should've been easy.

So she had already started thinking up the next way to make Luke embarrass himself.

But after a while, the cheers around her still hadn't died down, so she had no choice but to pull her attention back to reality.

And the moment she saw what was happening in the arena, her heart bloomed with joy.

(Hahahaha! Who would've thought you, the Hero, were such trash? You idiot, Charles... ah, no, Big Bro Charles, go! Crush him for me!)

In the arena, Charles swung his greatsword and casually beat back Luke's attacks again and again. On the other hand, whenever Charles attacked, Luke could only dodge in a panic. Even when he managed to block once or twice, he was still sent flying.

Clearly, Luke was at a disadvantage.

(He really is pretty impressive.)

The Messiah Kingdom was only a lower-middle-tier nation. Its nobles and officials were rotten and cruel, and rebellions had broken out repeatedly over the years. At one point, even a quarter of the kingdom's territory had been occupied by rebels.

And yet the country still stood to this day. The rebels could only cling to life and stir up nothing much.

The reason was simple. Someone had been holding the kingdom together by sheer force.

Ever since Charles first appeared, other people's evaluation of him had always been the same: violent, insane, battle-crazed... and at first glance, he really did seem to fit that image.

But as mentioned before, Luke's mind-reading ability was SS-rank. If all it could do was skim a few shallow thoughts, that rating would be a joke.

In truth, although it was called mind reading, it wasn't mind reading in the narrow sense.

People were simply used to calling it that. But humans think with their brains, so mind reading was really the act of reading a person's active thoughts.

Luke's ability went deeper than that. Thoughts, memories, traces... he could read all of them.

Rather than mind reading, it was more like reading the target's information directly, without the troublesome step of turning their body into a book.

So whenever he doubted whether someone's inner voice was genuine, he could lock onto that person and trace back through their memories to gather more information.

After doing this kind of memory-tracing read on more than ten people, Charles's true situation gradually came to light.

He handled matters swiftly and decisively. Fairness came first. Whether they were nobles, commoners, or slaves, he treated them all the same.

Anyone who dared defy law or basic morality would be dealt with by him. It didn't matter if they were outside his jurisdiction. It didn't matter if they were high-ranking nobles or officials. He would still throw hands without hesitation.

You might ask how a thorn like that hadn't been crushed by the nobles long ago.

The answer was simple enough.

Charles had plenty about him that made people unhappy, but at the very least, he was loyal to the throne and devoted to the kingdom. And whenever rebellion broke out and sending anyone else would just get them killed, dispatching Charles would solve the problem with ease.

Of course, that also came with its own issues. Charles often killed only the ringleaders while letting a large number of lesser followers go. Then, while he was at it, he would raid the local powerful clans and nobles, accuse them of being the true masterminds behind the rebellion, and execute them first, report later.

So later on, the king had no choice but to keep Charles shut inside the royal palace. He only escaped prison because the Saintess had spoken on his behalf. Then, whenever he was needed, they would open the gate and let the hound loose.

To the outside world, they also spread word of his brutality and bloodthirst, lest his achievements overshadow the ruler and earn him too much public support.

But if you asked Luke, the king was overthinking it. Charles had never once considered betrayal, nor had he really thought about loyalty to king and country.

"Hero Luke, is this all you've got?" Charles roared after knocking Luke flying once again. "With this level, you think you can take Lady Aelia away?"

That wasn't to say Charles's integrity and sense of justice were fake. Quite the opposite. It was precisely because he possessed those qualities that he understood just how hopeless this country really was.

That was why he spared the common people who had been forced into rebellion, and mercilessly slaughtered those utterly vile officials.

The reason he had never betrayed the Messiah Kingdom was simply because hope still remained within it.

Saintess Aelia.

He believed that this beautiful and kind Saintess could change the country. He believed that as long as she was there, the kingdom would get better.

(This trashy pink-haired girl is seriously toxic. She's actually got everyone around her completely enchanted.)

Even though he was already used to it, Luke still couldn't help grumbling inwardly. After all, in the hearts of the people of the Messiah Kingdom, a certain someone was practically on the same level as the Goddess.

And right now, that same someone was hopping around outside the arena, inwardly wishing for the two of them to fight even more brutally, even more bloodily. Luke truly wanted Charles and the others to hear those thoughts, just so they could reevaluate how well they judged people.

"Relax. I'm about to get serious."

That was what he said, but from the information he'd gathered through mind reading, Charles had actually guessed long ago that Luke was hiding his true strength.

The reason he had proposed this duel was to judge what kind of person Luke was through his fighting style and the details of his combat, and from that, determine his character.

That wasn't uncommon among highly skilled warriors. The Sword Saint Luke had met before in the southern military superpower liked to judge people through combat too.

Worth mentioning was that Charles's combat strength wasn't much weaker than that Sword Saint's. He had already reached the level of a top-tier warrior from a powerful nation. Only the Messiah Kingdom would waste someone like him by making him nothing more than a mere vice captain of the knight order.

For all these reasons, if Luke wanted Charles's approval, then he had to win fair and square. He had to defeat Charles so thoroughly that the man would accept it from the bottom of his heart.

He had to beat him in the field Charles was proudest of.

But after that series of tests just now, Luke had to admit something.

If he didn't use intermediate magic, defeating Charles head-on really wouldn't be easy.

You ask, wasn't intermediate magic allowed?

Simple.

Charles's martial skill was exceptional, but his magical ability was weak. At most, he could use low-level body-enhancement magic.

Since that was the case, Luke naturally couldn't very well use intermediate magic against him.

You ask if there was really any need for him to accommodate Charles that much?

True, he respected the man, but only to a normal degree. What he was doing now really was a little excessive. It almost looked like he was deliberately trying to win Charles over.

And that was exactly his goal.

Luke glanced at a certain someone outside the arena, and the corner of his mouth lifted slightly.

The underling she had placed such high hopes on would end up won over by her enemy, then turn around and speak well of that enemy instead...

Just imagining what kind of expression she would make upon seeing such a beautiful scene filled Luke with anticipation.

So he charged forward once more and unleashed another fierce barrage with his sword.

And once again, he was knocked back.

But this time, Charles's movements slowed, and surprise appeared on his face.

"This is... my technique?"