Solo Cultivating in Superhero Academy
Chapter 113: Give it all

Chapter 113: Give it all

The white humanoid tiger’s ability, the Durability Break — was absolute.

It wasn’t just for show.

His wind arcs could destroy anything — flesh, bone, steel, spiritual artifacts — over time, anything solid and tangible would break under the continuous stress.

It was a force of inevitability.

Nothing lasts against it.

Nothing.

And yet now, the weapons before him, the swords Elius was using, showed no signs of surrender.

Not even a scratch.

The tiger’s breath hitched for just a fraction of a second.

His pupils constricted to thin slits.

"This is wrong," he thought, his mind racing, claws twitching with suppressed anxiety.

Another furious storm of wind arcs tore through the arena—but no matter how many he unleashed, no matter how hard or fast they came,

Elius’s swords remained like stars orbiting in a night sky, untouchable, invincible.

The tiger’s attacks grew frantic now, losing some of the measured control he had earlier.

His feet shifted awkwardly.

His breathing quickened.

For the first time, the confident beast began to look—restless.

Elius noticed it immediately.

Through the haze of energy and the torrent of chaotic winds, he caught that tiny crack in the tiger’s composure.

The slight tremble in his claws.

The heavy, labored breaths.

It was a moment.

Barely a blink.

But it was enough.

The tiger lunged forward again, claws flashing, arcs of wind spiraling from his arms like tornadoes—but his movements lacked the precision they once had.

He was distracted.

He was frustrated.

And Elius, ever perceptive, seized the opportunity.

Without hesitation, he mentally commanded one of his swords a sleek, narrow blade — to break formation and strike.

It shot forward like a silver bullet, slicing through the chaos, aiming low.

Straight for the tiger’s exposed knee.

WHOOSH!

The tiger, mid-attack, sensed the incoming blade too late.

He twisted awkwardly to dodge —but the tip of the sword grazed his knee.

It wasn’t a deep cut.

Barely a scratch.

Just a whisper of steel across flesh.

But the effect was immediate.

TING!

A strange tingling sensation exploded up the white tiger’s leg.

His momentum faltered, his weight shifted wrong, his balance broke.

He stumbled.

His claws flailed wildly in the air as he tried to catch himself but then it happened.

SPLAT!

A thin line of blood, bright red and glistening, splattered across the tiger’s white-furred face.

It wasn’t a deep wound — not by a long shot —but it was humiliating.

The great Target Locker — the invincible, the arrogant, the invulnerable —injured.

Visibly.

Publicly.

His breathing grew ragged.

His shoulders hunched slightly.

His eyes widened in a mixture of disbelief and growing rage.

Elius hovered silently a short distance away, his swords swirling protectively around him, his body exhausted, his heart pounding,but his eyes —his sharp, brilliant eyes, was watching.

Watching as the great beast realized he had bled.

The white humanoid tiger stood there, hunched, his breathing ragged and broken, as he stared at the faint line of blood on his palm and knee.

His wide golden eyes flickered with growing disbelief and panic, the once proud glint completely shattered.

"Why...?" he muttered at first, the words tumbling out of his mouth in a broken growl.

Then louder, "WHY ISN’T MY ABILITY WORKING?!"

His voice cracked through the cracked and battered arena, echoing violently off the steel walls.

He clenched his claws tight and looked at Elius, but it was as if he wasn’t seeing the boy at all. His mind reeled backwards,

falling into memories—

He remembered.

How once he had used these very claws and Durability Break to shatter the armor of an invincible dragon beast.

A creature said to have scales harder than mountain rocks and yet, after just a few slashes — its glorious armor crumbled into powder.

He had fought against enchanted relic shields blessed by Supreme Mages — indestructible divine barriers —

and yet under his barrage of wind blades and tearing claws, they had turned into dust.

The strongest city walls?

Sundered.

The holy swords of the sacred guardians?

Shattered like glass.

Nothing, nothing survived once he got serious.

Once his ability began to chip at the enemy’s defenses, there was no stopping the inevitable collapse.

It was a curse.

An erosion of existence itself.

No matter the material, no matter the magic, his attacks guaranteed destruction.

And yet—

Here.

Now.

The boy’s five flying swords spun around him without even the slightest scratch.

No crumbling edges.

No faltering.

No hairline fractures.

Nothing.

The tiger’s hands trembled.

"Impossible..." he whispered again, his voice thick with denial.

Across from him, Elius floated midair, calm and steady, his flying swords orbiting like celestial bodies.

He crossed his arms casually, his black eyes glinting mischievously.

A faint smirk tugged at Elius’s lips.

"So that’s how it works,"

Elius thought silently.

"His power isn’t some overwhelming strike; it’s corrosion, decay over time. No wonder he kept shouting for me to build up a defense. If I tried to block him with something normal, I’d be torn apart before I even realized it."

Elius almost chuckled aloud.

What a sadist.

If he hadn’t had his particular flying swords — artifacts that could only be broken after being denied blood for years —then Elius was sure he would have been split in half already, probably diced into bloody chunks before he could blink.

It wasn’t luck.

It wasn’t a coincidence.

It was pure, calculated advantage.

A plot armor? Could be.

"My swords... they saved me," Elius thought with a deep inward breath.

He tapped two fingers against his chin mockingly, pretending to ponder the situation.

"Thanks for the tip earlier, old man," Elius called out, grinning wider now.

The white tiger’s body jerked as if struck.

"No... NO!" he growled, panic rising like a flood inside him.

Without any more words, his instincts pushed him into a frenzied state.

He slashed his claws through the air desperately, sending a wild, screeching wind blade racing toward Elius.

SWOOSH!

A blade of compressed wind pressure, as sharp as razors and heavy like a hammer, screamed through the broken arena space toward Elius.

But Elius didn’t even flinch.

Three of his swords immediately pulled tighter, forming a shimmering defensive spin.

CLANG!

The wind blade crashed against the spinning swords, scattering harmlessly into dissipating winds.

Not a dent.

Not even a shake in the formation.

The white tiger gnashed his teeth and roared in frustration.

He slashed again —

and again —

and again!

Wind blades surged in chaotic torrents, slicing deep scars into the ground, exploding tiles, making the entire floor a chaotic hellscape of broken stone and twisted steel.

BOOM!

SLASH!

CRACK!

Yet every single time, Elius’s three swords absorbed or deflected the attacks with a sound like metal singing under stress.

At the same time, the two free swords began to dance forward with lethal precision.

"Tch!" The tiger barely managed to dodge one, the other grazing his side and drawing another line of blood.

Every time the tiger thought he had a window—a split second where Elius’s defenses might have a gap—he would swipe his claws and unleash another desperate wind blade.

And every time, the defense was immaculate.

The rotation of the three defensive swords was getting tighter, sharper, more vicious.

Their spinning formed an ever-flickering cocoon around Elius, practically invincible under the white tiger’s furious attacks.

"Why can’t I break through?!"

the tiger screamed inside his mind, as sweat poured down his forehead.

Meanwhile, Elius’s two free swords kept hounding him.

A relentless hunt.

A stab toward the leg.

A sweep across the ribs.

A flick toward the face.

Nothing fatal — but relentless, like mosquitoes gnawing at a giant.

The tiger swiped at the attacking swords, trying to fend them off, but every time he moved offensively, another wind blade from his own claws would fly— and again get nullified by Elius’s shimmering shield of swords.

"This... this can’t be!"

the tiger roared mentally.

His muscles bulged.

His veins popped.

"I am Target Locker! I am the breaker of all defenses! How is this brat dancing around me like this?!"

Finally, pushed to the very edge, the white humanoid tiger threw back his head and let out a deafening, desperate roar that shook the very walls of the training arena.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRGHHHHHH!"

"I’LL GIVE IT MY ALL!"

he bellowed furiously.

His claws glowed with an intense, blinding greenish-white light, the surrounding air folding and buckling around the power he summoned.

Elius’s expression sharpened.

He could feel it.

Something massive was coming.

The white tiger slammed his foot down with earth-shattering force, and the ground beneath him cratered violently.

And then —

he slashed both claws forward simultaneously.

SSSSHHHHHHHHHAAAAA!

A massive, monstrous blade of compressed wind, easily taller than a four-story building, erupted from his claws,

howling toward Elius with terrifying speed.

The sheer pressure alone was enough to make the atmosphere crack and screech.

The shattered remnants of the arena floor were sucked up into the raging gale, spinning like debris caught in a hurricane.

Elius reacted instantly.

He compressed his three defensive swords even tighter around him, forming an impregnable, glimmering shell of flashing metal.

The monstrous wind blade slammed into him with the force of a tsunami.

BOOOOOOM!

The arena exploded into chaos.

Dust, debris, and broken stone filled the air.

The world around Elius seemed to vanish under the storm, and his silhouette disappeared in that wave.

His figure inside the hurricane of destruction remained steadfast — a single, unmoving stone in a raging sea.

The white tiger, panting and wild-eyed, stood in the distance, watching, his heart pounding against his chest like a war drum, his mind screaming:

"This... has to break him...!"