Living Life As A Game: Through And Through 78 Disturbing The Demon

"Huh? Little girl..." Again before Jhan could finish his train of thought, Elizabeth interjected, saying, "There's no debate. I'm next." She never stopped looking at her suturing work, as if doing so was humiliation her pride could not take.

"...Who do you think you're talking to?" At last, Jhan was fed up with Elizabeth's disrespect as he lashed out with a portion of his killing intent to pressure Elizabeth into knowing her place. Alas, Elizabeth treated the pressure as if it were nothing more than air even though she didn't use a speck of energy to defend herself.

"Ho? Rambunctious children like you… should respect their elders!" Jhan doubled the pressure upon Elizabeth's body but the result stayed the same; adding an extra layer of air wouldn't make anyone the slightest bit uncomfortable, after all…

"Mhmm? You're every bit the talent I thought you were! Hahaha… This alone makes my decision worth giving up a purple card! Now, let's see how long you can last. Hahaha..." Every couple seconds thereafter, the pressure on Elizabeth would double, yet she never seemed to care.

Eventually, Jhan neared the extent of his killing pressure, and with not an itch coming from Elizabeth, he suddenly chose to cut loose and see what would happen if ALL of his slaughter intent was concentrated on her body. He could kill regular people with less than half his max output, and even formidable Pawn Stage Practitioners would faint if he hit them with the entirety of his killing intent at once.

Alas, Elizabeth was in a very delicate state at the moment, with her insanity brewing behind the scenes, the sudden shock of being pressured by someone at least at the King Stage, finally induced a reaction out her, though it probably wasn't what Jhan hoped for…

"Fuck off! You're ten-thousand years too young to challenge ME!!!" It was like purgatory had descended as a ghastly plain of death manifested within the room and brought about the numbingly cold death of Hell's innermost circle. That trifling amount of pressure Jhan tried subduing Elizabeth when compared to the astronomical levels generated by Elizabeth wasn't even leagues apart; it was like they were playing different games entirely…

Elizabeth stopped after reattaching Carlos' arm back onto his body. Even she herself didn't know if it was by will that her demonic killing intent died down, as she was too busy thinking of the prospects her fight held. As Elizabeth stood up and walked over to the ring, she spoke evidently calmer than before asking, "Since I'm being offered up as a prize, I presume there's no problem in me fighting the next two battle, right?"

"...If that's what you want, I'll withdraw the two other people I planned to fight for your stead..." Atid spoke slowly and with a slight hesitance in his voice. As a veteran Practitioner with decades upon decades of experience, he understood fully well that killing intent could not be faked. With the most standard way of increasing killing intent being the slow methodical murder or hundreds or thousands over the course of a lenghty period of time, his own personal killing intent was forged with the blood of tens of thousands after all the wars he'd been through. Jhan was a tad bit more extreme, his killing intent developing into that of a monster with well over 50,000 lives claimed by his hands. But Elizabeth? That lass that had around for less than two weeks, who had come to him to train in his dojo without even knowing how to throw a punch… Her killing intent felt like it was created from killing millions, perhaps even billion as impossible as it seemed.

However, as unfortunate as it was, Elizabeth's killing intent didn't accomplish much aside from jolting Jhan into vigilance. If not for that fact that Elizabeth was severely underpowered when compared to King-level combatants like Atid, Luca, and Jhan, there was absolutely no chance that her killing intent would only cause them a slight scare.

Though a bit out of his element by the sudden change, Jhan quickly discarded the serious look on his face, as the eyes he looked at Elizabeth with, expressed profound greed; now more than over.

Jhan said, "You want to fight the last two fights yourself? That's fine with me~ If you want to tire yourself out and fight someone well above your Stage, It'll only help me out in the end." Now after experiencing that beautiful killing intent, Elizabeth had won a bit of his respect, so instead of sending the Peak Pawn Stage black belt clad man to finish Elizabeth of as soon as possible, Jhan didn't put up any resistance, electing to switch up the order and called Irene to test Elizabeth's strength. He had high hopes for Elizabeth after displaying that nightmarish killing intent, and would very much like to see the extent of her abilities as soon as possible.

Elizabeth walked in to the ring, her demonic grin remained unmoved as she waited for her opponent to do the same and for the match to begin. Elizabeth recalled that this girl had once tried to maim her as well, and had it not been for Sun taking the hit in her stead, she might have suffered gravely. With thoughts of Sun's previously bullet-ridden torso taking on the full powered kick of this girl with lightning powers, the grin on Elizabeth's face cracked to show her teeth; a gesture that made her look more beautiful to those watching from the sideline and more threatening to Irene.

To everyone watching on, it seemed like Elizabeth had gotten a bit too full of herself as she didn't even take an appropriate stance after Irene entered the ring and prepared on her side. Only Atid knew Elizabeth was rightfully arrogant after previously testing her strength and confirming her strength to be around the Mid to Late Pawn Stage. Though he wished she took this more seriously as the possible twists and turns of a real battle might rock even the best Martial Practitioners around, he felt confident that Elizabeth wouldn't just offer herself up when she'd already shown so much distaste for Jhan.

If only Atid knew that Elizabeth strength of today was not even close to what it was yesterday. More so than anyone present, Elizabeth acted with absolute confidence in herself as she had already probed Irene and felt not a hair of threat from her.

[Status

Name: Irene Gilavante

Sex: Female

Level: 5

Rank: Peak-Phase Mortal

Strength 23

Endurance 19.8

Speed 23.5

Defense 21.75

Intelligence 17

Luck 9

Inner Strength: 778

Affection Rating: Hateful

Description: You are the source of her latest grievance. Not ending up captured, and responsible for Sun injuring her, Irene was "punished" as a result by her master and is now being offered up as a sacrificial pawn to be traded in for you. Though her affection for you hasn't crossed the point of no return — both of you aren't exactly enemies that can't live under the same sky — trying to recover your prestige in her eyes will be difficult.]

"Hahaha..." Elizabeth quietly laughed to her side as she read Irene's Affection Rating towards herself. 'You're Hateful against me?! This cunt really has the nerve to hate ME after attacking without provocation? Fine! If you're going to be hateful, I'll give you a REAL reason to be hateful...' A bit disturbed by Elizabeth random laughter, the same referee from the previous match waited for Elizabeth to stop before yelling "Fight!" once more, prompting the start of the show.

Seeing Elizabeth still without a proper stance of any kind, Irene didn't waste time as she moved to end the fight as soon as possible. Though she hated the position she had gotten herself in, she wanted to do her best to improve the negative impression she had left on Jhan. More than anything, she wanted for the malicious Slaughter King to notice her talents and train her personally. Leaving her family's territory and going overseas just for this opportunity, it was natural for her to hate Elizabeth after causing her last mission to fail and for Jhan to look at her like nothing more than trash.

Irene accelerated as much as it could in the enclosed fighting ring as she took off from the ground and attempted to end the fight with a single flying kick. The purple lightning aura coating her entire body, especially glowing around her kicking leg emphasized that intent to finish clean and fast as Mortal Stage Practitioners were known for their exceedingly small amounts of Inner Strength.

Staring at the incoming flying kick as if it were a video being played in slow motion, Elizabeth didn't even have to activate her Timeworn Eyes to keep pace and easily dodge or even breakthrough the attack to end the fight in one fell swoop. But, even if she didn't need Timeworn eyes, it didn't mean she didn't use them…

As a truly disturbed demon with her mind at the brink of devolving back to its most primal state, Elizabeth wasn't in a forgiving mood at the moment. Her lower body stayed static as if deigning to move for a "trifling" Mortal, the tips of her right hand's fingers began to blaze with invisible neutral Inner Strength as her left hand caught Irene's kick.

Then, as if the aura of lightning covering Irene's kick didn't exist, Elizabeth didn't even use the entirety of her Strength to pull Irene's body in closer as her right hand stuck a devastating palm strike, launching Irene back almost to the edge of the arena. Obviously, the fight had ended right there and then as Irene was thoroughly disabled.

Chapter end