Chapter 58: The Duel and The Execution (1)

The day to execute the strategy came.

Everything had to be perfect.

Even though it was a countermeasure, I wanted to understand ability of that…High-class armor that Radomkos wore on a daily basis…It seemed to prevent the activation of magic inside and weakened the magic on the surface. I wanted to see if my magic worked against it. I also had to prepare the equipment for the duel.

As a result, I found that it could not be activated at all nor did it decay. Therefore, no measures, or should I say countermeasures, were taken.

As for the equipment for the duel, I just prepared the equipment of the F-rank so that it wouldn’t be suspicious. Moreover, nobody would say that I won because of the powerful equipment if I ended up victorious in the end.

「Radomkos is heading to the square. I think he will arrive in about 5 minutes. 」

「Roger that! 」

A person from the Coal Mining Association who ran from the Lord’s residence contacted me.

It was quicker to do an aerial reconnaissance, but I wanted to rule out the possibility that someone could accuse me of being a strong wizard that could fly.

Until the duel, I had to act like an ignorant and overconfident E-rank adventurer.

Maybe Radomkos’ legs were slower than expected. After about 6 minutes, Radomkos finally appeared in the square.

It was obvious because he had a prominent appearance. He wore a dark blue armor called “Ark Mithril”. The decoration was too much. He had a really bad taste.

Besides, there were even knights escorting him from behind.

I also came to the square and talked to Radomkos when he approached the center of the square.

「Hey, are you that fella Radomkos? 」

「Hmm? What are you? How dare you talk to me like that, you lowly commoner? Do you want to die? Call me Radomkos-sama*.」

He had a strong asshole aura…

However, he seemed easy to provoke, or actually, he was actually inciting me to provoke him, which was weird.

Anyway, the provocation continued.

「Shut up, I heard from Ginta-san about your deeds. You’re going to get rid of things by increasing taxes for no reason, aren’t you? Withdraw it.」

「What did you say? There’s a reason for it. In fact, everyone should be happy to pay more taxes for me as my noble servants.」

What was he talking about?

「Huh? Who would be happy to pay taxes to a crazy and stupid nobleman like you? Are you nuts?」

「…What did you just say? 」

Radomkos put his hand on the sword hanged at his waist.

It was really easy to provoke him. It actually worked fine since he had an empty head.

In the first place, if he were smart, he wouldn’t say that he raised taxes like that just for the sake of making him happy. That was an idiotic thing to say.

I gave another push.

「Is that so? Do you think that you, an idiotic nobleman, can beat me Suzumiya, the strongest adventurer of the E-rank?」

I was not lying.

「E-rank? Ah, okay, let’s engage in a duel. I will show what happens to those who turn the noble me into an enemy.」

There were a lot of people around me. I took a distance of about 3 meters from Radomkos and noticed that there was almost a circular crowd of people.

For some reason, the knights that escorted him also joined him, but did they have to protect their master so obviously?

…On the contrary, when I looked closely, one of the knights looked familiar. Was he the one whom I talked to when we got rid of the thieves?

He knew my strength, would he stop the duel?

When I sent a gaze, the knight reciprocated.

The knight gave an okay-like gesture towards me.

I wondered if he hated Radomkos as well.

Radomkos didn’t even notice that and kept staring at me.

Not surprisingly, since his full-faced armor narrowed his field of vision.

「Well then, let’s have a duel. If you want to run, now it’s time for it, got it? 」

「There’s no way that a noble like me would do such a lowly thing… Hey, you over there, be a witness.」

With that said, Radomkos pulled the knight who was in the okay-like gesture towards us.

「I understand. 」

The knight had a solemn look on his face, but when I looked closely at his face, I noticed that his eyes were laughing.

Well, we had to decide the conditions before the duel.

「I want you to withdraw the tax increase if I win this duel. 」

「If I win, I’ll take away all your properties and feed your corpse to the monsters. Honestly, you are no match to a noble like me, but since you’re asking for this, I shall show you the powerful me. I will be the one who wins anyway, and of course, the winning condition is to kill the opponent. 」

I was wondering how much my total fortune was.

「OK, I’ll kick your ass. 」

「Will you entertain me a little more even though you’re from the E-rank? Don’t forget that I belong to the D-rank. You really don’t stand a chance.」

Were D and E that different?

Which was stronger, the strongest E-rank or the weakest D-rank?

At least, if I were the strongest E-rank now, I could assure him that I was much stronger than his weak D-rank status.

「Well then, let’s get started. 」

Yes, as soon as I said those words, Radomkos held the glittering silver sword in the upper row and ran towards me.

For the time being, I waited and saw while deploying the magical armor to be just in case. Then, I held the sword sideways and received his offensive strike.

…It was supposed to be a fierce clash of swords, but the opponent was too weak.

I shook the sword with the intention of receiving the enemy’s sword, but perhaps, I pushed back the sword too much, since it was swung down from the top and hit my opponent’s head.

「Gah. 」

Radomkos made a painful voice, but the sword was repelled by his armor.

Or rather, the performance of the equipment was too different.

The sword he had was now partly dented, causing the blade to spill apart.

On the other hand, my sword seemed to be safe without any scratches.

It was not about martial arts or swordsmanship, but the hardness of the equipment was too different in the first place.

It was like cutting a Japanese sword with a plastic sword.

「What kind of power do you have…? What cowardly means did you use…? 」

「No, you’re just too weak. That’s all. 」

While saying that, I slammed his broken sword against Radomkos’ body armor.

Since the sword couldn’t stand it, I had to smash it with momentum before it broke completely.

「Gyahhh! 」

The armor got dented, and Radomkos blew away at about 2m.

In order to avoid it, the circle of people spread around.

Radomkos was struggling while lying down on the spot.

The fall could be due to the weight of his armor, but the damage seemed to be enormous.

「The winning condition was…to kill the opponent, right? 」

It couldn’t be helped since he was the one who decided that rule.

Actually, I originally planned to do that.

Goodbye Radomkos. You’re not longer needed in this world.

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*Sama (さま), the more formal version of san. Usually used to refer to customers who are deserving of the utmost respect status in Japan, people of higher rank, or somebody you admire.

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