Road to Mastery: A LitRPG Apocalypse
Chapter 353: Conclusion of the Duel

“What is a duel without betting some Dao stones?” Marcus asked, his lips curving. “I’m thinking a small amount. Thirty?”

The surrounding people instantly shot him disgusted looks. In their eyes, he was already going too far by challenging Jack from five tiers higher—adding a bet on top of that was just being shameless.

Marcus knew that, but he’d made his decision. In for a penny, in for a pound.

Jack cupped his chin. “I don’t know…” he said. “Isn’t thirty…a little embarrassing?”

“Embarrassing? What do you mean?”

Marcus was prepared for this. He only said thirty so Jack would haggle it down to twenty or so.

“I would expect a high-ranker like yourself to be a little more generous,” Jack replied. “Thirty is too boring. How about fifty?”

Marcus’s eyes widened. “You want to bet fifty Dao stones against me?”

“Yeah. Why? Are you afraid?”

“Hmph! I’m only afraid of what people are going to say after this…but, if you insist, so be it. Fifty Dao stones.”

Jack grinned. “You said it.”

The crowd was only getting more and more stunned. Thirty Dao stones were already a large amount to them…but fifty? That was just obscene! Even Marcus shouldn’t have that much, let alone Jack. They thought this was the high-ranker bullying the low-ranker, but now it was actually Jack who increased the stakes?

Could it be that…he thought he could win?

In truth, Jack did feel some confidence. He had fought the three-fruit Cranxiao at the peak D-Grade. If every fruit was a tier, and the gap between D and C-Grades was roughly three tiers, that meant Jack had leapt six tiers to battle, and it hadn’t been too difficult either. His current gap with Marcus was only five tiers—in theory, he should be able to handle this.

While Marcus was undoubtedly extremely talented himself, it couldn’t be too much. Otherwise, his ranking wouldn’t only be 281.

Jack had an eighty percent confidence he would win. Let alone fifty, he would even bet a hundred Dao stones if he had to.

“Make your move,” Jack said, clenching his fists again. “Unless you want to bore me into forfeiting.”

“Hmph! Let’s see if you can even make me draw my sword.”

Speaking to here, Marcus did not reach for the handle of his weapon. Instead, he stretched out two fingers. Jack raised a brow. “You’re joking.”

Marcus slashed out with his fingers. He looked a bit ridiculous—not only was he not using a blade, but he was also striking empty air, as he and Jack remained a hundred feet apart.

As Jack was about to mock him, however, the smile froze on his lips. Marcus’s sword fingers looked simple, but they contained a deep Dao of the Sword. The moment he slashed with them, a raging river of energy flew towards Jack, crossing the hundred feet in an instant. Each Dao particle vibrated at a unique frequency, combining into a sharp flow that could slice him to dust.

Jack punched out. His fist exploded against the mighty river, splitting it like a steady rock. The energy flew to his left and right, carving up deep trenches in the ground.

“Good!” Marcus exclaimed. “Again!”

His fingers slashed out thrice. Each attack was no weaker than the first; they swept at Jack like the slaps of an angry god, but he fought back. His fists were few but strong, easily breaking the energy as it came. The Dao in their battlefield became chaotic, a combination of sharpness and brutality, while the ground cratered.

The crowd cheered. A battle between high-rankers was a very rare sight!

While both fighters specialized in melee combat, they were still fighting from a distance. To Jack, it was a form of practice. When he first arrived at the Cathedral, even a full-power Meteor Punch could only go a few feet before dispersing—now, he could easily shoot his punch a hundred feet away.

Plus, he was using this time to adapt to his new power. His Dao felt lively, explosive, far more purposeful and aligned. It was the difference between a water bomb and a water jet—his might was simply incomparable to before.

A dozen strikes later, he’d had enough. He smashed a Meteor Punch into Marcus’s attack. The world was sucked inside his punch, then exploded—the sword energies rushed back, forcing Marcus to wave his hand and easily split them around him.

“Well done!” Marcus shouted. “Again!”

“Draw your sword, dickhead!”

“You are not qualified!”

Jack snorted coldly. Marcus’s strength would rise tremendously when he used his weapon, but Jack also hadn’t activated the Life Drop—he didn’t want to go all-out first. However, this was getting annoying. The energy inside him was madly yearning release, and he could barely wait. He needed to know how strong he was.

He was about to activate the Life Drop when a different thought entered his mind.

Wait a moment. Isn’t this the perfect moment for…

His new class came with a Dao Skill—Titan Taunt. Its description said nothing that its name didn’t. It was a taunting skill. Therefore, this was a fitting moment to use it.

Jack willed the skill to activate, letting it suck a tiny bit of his energy. The mini System core inside him guided his mind, body, and Dao to execute Titan Taunt.

Jack felt his mouth open and heard his own voice say, “Your mother is a fat pig.”

Marcus paused his attacks. “Excuse me?”

“No wonder your wife came to fight me first. You never ‘draw your blade’ for her either.”

Hearing these, the crowd froze for a moment, then erupted into laughter. Even Ley Vice was stunned. Marcus lost his words, and as for Jack himself… He was actually the most surprised of all! He hadn’t wanted to say these things; he just activated the skill and his mouth moved by itself!

Motherfucker! he thought, fighting hard the urge to clamp his own mouth. The skill of a mighty C-Grade class…was elementary school-level curses?

I have been scammed!

Before Jack could recover himself, Marcus’s face darkened to the extreme. “Good, very good. I thought you were a man of honor, but you are just a clown. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself, Jack Rust?”

“Isn’t your mother ashamed of you? Don’t answer—I know she is. She told me yesterday.”

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Jack’s mouth kept running! He quickly cut the flow of energy to the skill, deactivating it, but the harm had been done. Marcus Williams glared at Jack like he wanted to eat him alive, while the crowd struggled to believe what was happening. A moment later, their cheers returned amplified.

Their big bro had a dirty mouth…but so what? This was a great show!

Jack was panicking. It can’t be. There is no way my skill does just this. Sure, it seems to be working, my opponent is enraged and the crowd is excited…but come on! This is just too embarrassing! I refuse to believe a C-Grade skill is only this!

There has to be some mystical Dao aspect I haven’t figured out yet.

Marcus’s gaze was dark and stormy. He relaxed his two sword fingers, slowly reaching for his handle. “Since you want to die, let me fulfill your wish. Any last words?”

Jack was torn. Whatever. How much worse can it get? He reactivated the skill, hoping to get some insight on the mystical principles behind it.

His body moved by itself. His hand raised a finger, while his mouth said, “Yeah. Sit on this.”

Jack wanted to die of shame. That’s it. Never again. He quickly deactivated the skill and lowered his hand, trying his hardest to keep his face straight. No matter how embarrassed he was, he wouldn’t admit it mid-battle! He had to seem strong!

Marcus’s face split into a feral grin. “So be it.”

His sword left its sheath. There was only a sharp, ringing noise. Jack saw nothing but instinctively jumped aside—a crescent moon of energy swept through his previous location, slicing the air itself as it impacted a distant hill and cut it in two.

Marcus’s sword slowly returned to a neutral position. Its blade was completely dark, a stark contrast to his clothes, while the hilt was white. From afar, it looked like a white flower on a pond of darkness—and the increase it offered to Marcus’s battle power was wild.

Jack didn’t dare delay. He activated the Life Drop, growing larger and stronger as two new arms sprouted out below his armpits. At the same time, his perception sharpened, and his reflexes quickened—those invisible slices wouldn’t surprise him any longer.

The crowd cheered. More people had arrived by now, streaming in from the nearby village and beyond—news had quickly spread. This crowd grouped up far to the side of the duel, not wanting to be accidentally sliced in half by Marcus’s energy attacks.

“Show me what you got!” Jack roared, raising his fists. The crowd cheered harder. Marcus dashed. His sword swept out, a movement so fast it was barely perceptible. Jack didn’t dare block it. He leaned sideways, letting the energy blade fly past him, then charged himself.

In the instant it took them to cross a hundred feet, Marcus had unleashed five attacks. They were simply incomparable to before. His sword fingers had released raging streams of sharpness, but only a small part of their energy had hit Jack—most of it dissipated into the void. Wielding his sword, Marcus was like an entirely different person. Every strike contained the same amount of energy as before, but concentrated to a ridiculous extent. There was almost no leakage, which was why they were invisible and near-imperceptible. If they were only slightly more concentrated, Jack couldn’t detect them and would have no choice but to be cut.

When those tremendous streams of energy were reduced to a hair-thin line, their slicing power could be imagined.

The two fighters reached each other. Marcus slashed down. Jack bellowed as he planted a foot into the ground, throwing a powerful straight punch at the incoming sword. He galvanized his Dao, pushing it into his knuckles to enhance their durability.

Punch met blade. A ribbon of blood flew out—Jack’s hand had been sliced to the wrist, revealing a gruesome spectacle. The audience gasped, but Jack was relentless. This was acceptable. He’d sacrificed a fist to block the strike—that left him three more. As they shot out, surrounding Marcus from all directions, the swordsman’s eyes narrowed. Space parted around him like a curtain. He disappeared.

Jack disappeared as well. The two fighters blinked into existence to clash and disappeared again, swimming through space. Their forms blurred, their movements so fast they left afterimages. Every impact was a resounding explosion. Their battle shook the void, and the ground below their feet was half-sliced and half-cratered. Sword and fist energies washed over their surroundings, forcing the crowd to back off again.

Marcus had contained his Dao into his blade, no longer sending out energy slices to avoid harming the onlookers. As a result, his black blade had turned even darker, pulling in the gaze of anyone looking. Every strike was deadly.

Jack was fighting him equally. Every time they clashed, he either dodged the blade or met it with his knuckles. The shattered hand regenerated quickly. At the same time, his other three fists looked to strike Marcus, forcing him to fight in a bee-like manner.

Jack specialized in strength and durability, not speed. In truth, while their battle seemed chaotic to most onlookers, Marcus was moving and teleporting twice as much as Jack. Jack mostly remained in place, defending against Marcus’s attacks and trying to catch him. His punches were destructive—if even one landed, the battle was over.

Actually, in this battle, the one pressured was Marcus. He was walking a fine line, using extreme skill to remain in the game. Jack couldn’t help but admire him; he was certainly a bright swordsman, the master of a generation.

Due to the gap in their cultivations, Jack had to admit that his Dao was inferior. Marcus had more and stronger energy and was better at controlling it. However, Jack had an extremely powerful body that could make up for his Dao deficiency.

He was titanic.

The battle heated up. The crowd could only see flashes, Jack’s and Marcus’s bodies appearing at random spots and disappearing again. The space of their battlefield had turned into a sieve, and the ground below them was finely carved up.

After a thousand exchanges, no winner had appeared. However, Jack wasn’t spending too much energy—most of it came in the form of regeneration, generously provided by the Life Drop. In contrast, Marcus was teleporting all over the place and dancing on the razor’s edge.

Finally, Marcus realized he would be the one to reach exhaustion first. He gritted his teeth, reappearing stably to glare at Jack.

“You have skill!” he exclaimed. “However, I refuse to lose to someone five fruits below me! Receive my strongest attack—if you can block it, I will admit defeat!”

This was clearly taunting. Jack only sneered, not replying. He had the upper hand—he would block or dodge as he saw fit.

Marcus raised his blade. A colossal amount of energy was sucked in from its surroundings, like the sword was a bottomless whirlpool. The Dao in a radius of several miles was disturbed, flying over to enter Marcus’s blade—its edge became even darker than before, like nothing could escape it, not even light.

The power of this coming strike was evident. Jack had no illusions of blocking it.

Finally, the blade reached saturation. Hints of darkness escaped it, like black ribbons tied to the sword, dancing wildly in the angry winds. Contrasted with Marcus’s white clothes and loosely floating hair, he resembled an angry god.

“Taste my blade!” he roared, struggling to control his own move. “Certain Death!”

A gutsy name.

His sword came down. Jack stared at it until Marcus teleported, appearing behind him to complete his swing.

Black energy washed over the world. Marcus and Jack were shrouded in darkness that blocked even Dao perception, leaving the audience wondering what had happened. No further sounds came. No clashes, no energy shockwaves. In the darkness, one of the two fought no longer.

The darkness cleared. The audience craned their heads to look, finally making out two warriors with their bodies intertwined.

“Heavens!” Osmu Sosmu cried out. “Is he holding the blade!?”

“No,” Dorman replied in an incredulous voice. “He’s pinching it.”

The darkness dissipated fully. The scene that was revealed etched itself deep into the hearts of everyone watching, ensuring they would never forget it.

Marcus’s sword was stopped mid-swing, only half a foot from his opponent’s face. Jack’s four hands were holding it in place. His fingers had grabbed the sword not by the edge, but by the flat part.

Relief played on Jack’s eyes. In truth, this was a last-minute inspiration. It could have gone horribly…but, luckily, his estimations were correct.

Jack possessed extraordinary stats. His titles were far wealthier than Marcus’s. He also had six hundred extra points in Physical due to his previous tempering, and his body was further augmented by the four-armed battle form. Moreover, Marcus specialized in Dexterity, not strength. Even including the extra levels he had over Jack, Jack’s strength was far superior to Marcus’s.

He could have never caught the blade if not for this being Marcus’s all-out strike, which also made it more predictable and a little slower than his other attacks. At the same time, all the energy of this strike was condensed on the very edge of the blade, which made it the only truly dangerous spot.

All these factors had combined in Jack essentially catching Marcus’s blade.

The swordsman looked like he’d lost his soul. His eyes were askance, and his jaw was trembling. He hadn’t moved a muscle. To a swordsman, there was no greater shame than this.

Moreover, even if he did want to recover his sword, he couldn’t. Jack was far too strong. Marcus was essentially disarmed.

“Had enough?” Jack rumbled, his gaze piercing into his opponent’s.

Marcus clenched his jaw. He refused to let go of his sword, but no matter how unwilling he was, the result was clear. Fighting himself every step of the way, he opened his mouth and muttered, “I admit defeat…”

The crowd erupted in cheers.