NOVEL WEB Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen: The Causality of the Sacred Domain (Seeking Flowers)
“BOOM!!”
The immense force crushed everything in its path, leaving a deep groove in the airship and blasting through the bulkhead in front of Ace.
Thick smoke billowed as electric arcs surged everywhere, the astonishing power of the Railgun left everyone in awe.
“Wow, that’s… incredible…”
Tanjiro watched the destruction caused by Ace’s attack, his breath catching. “So this is Sister Mikoto’s power?”
“Sister Mikoto?”
Bai Luo awkwardly patted Tanjiro on the shoulder. “By the way, Ace is actually only 14 years old.”
“Eh?”
Tanjiro’s face froze for a moment; at fifteen, calling a fourteen-year-old girl ‘sister’ was indeed somewhat embarrassing.
“But age isn’t an issue, after all she’s Ace.”
“Ace? I see!”
Tanjiro had never understood Bai Luo’s nickname for Ace until now, seeing her Railgun in action. He nodded in understanding: “Truly worthy of being called Ace!”
“Don’t call me Ace!!!”
Caught off guard by Bai Luo’s provocation, Ace turned angrily back toward them, shouting with displeasure.
Before Ace could continue, electromagnetic sensors detected an incoming force from behind.
“What?!”
Ace leapt to the side. She looked up to see the Colorless King charging straight at her.
“Unscathed?”
This made the young girl increasingly serious. ‘I should have hit him already.’
‘That means his Sacred Domain barrier can withstand even my Railgun?’
“Tsk!”
Misaka Mikoto muttered irritably, “How annoying.”
“Ding ding ding~~”
While dodging the Colorless King’s storm-like punches and kicks, Ace pulled out several coins again.
Thus, close-range high-frequency Railguns were fired in rapid succession!
And this time, Ace saw it.
An invisible barrier enveloped the Colorless King, blocking all her Railgun attacks.
All explosions and lightning were converted into colorless particles by this barrier, unable to harm the Colorless King in the slightest.
“My abilities… are being broken down?!”
What Misaka Mikoto witnessed left her truly astonished: “How am I supposed to fight like this?”
Currently, Ace has not yet participated in subsequent events, so her combat experience and mental state during battle were still quite immature.
Realizing that her abilities couldn’t harm the Colorless King, the young girl began to consider retreating.
“Can he nullify both energy and physical attacks?”
Kurumi Tokisaki observed thoughtfully, “It certainly is a troublesome technique.”
Kurumi wasn’t worried about Ace.
Any observer could tell that the Colorless King’s martial arts were poor. Despite seemingly chasing after Ace, he was actually being toyed with by her.
The only problem was the Colorless King’s Sacred Domain.
From the causal and conceptual level, the Sacred Domain could nullify any damage to the Authority Holder.
“So…”
Kurumi stepped forward with a smile. “Let’s try this one.”
“City of Time Consumption!”
As she spoke, a dark gray intangible field expanded around the girl, instantly covering the entire airship.
“Huh?”
Adolf K. Wiesmann seemed to sense something. He looked at his body glowing with silvery light, then glanced at the distant Colorless King who was also faintly shining.
“What’s going on?”
Electric arcs crackled on Ace’s forehead, indicating her body had sensed some kind of abnormal interference, triggering self-correction mechanisms.
“Not effective?”
“No, there is an effect, but it’s been significantly weakened to only about ten percent of its normal strength.”
Kurumi frowned deeply. Her City of Time Consumption had successfully captured everyone.
Of course, allies like Tanjiro weren’t affected by her ability to absorb their time—her target was solely the Colorless King.
However, the protection offered by the Sacred Domain was too comprehensive. Even time and space-level damages were partially negated.
Still, it wasn’t absolute.
Despite differing worlds, Kurumi’s Pokémon powers were no weaker than the Power of Authority.
Thus, the Colorless King couldn’t completely immunize himself against the absorption of the City of Time Consumption; the damage was merely reduced to a relatively low level.
Moreover, the Silver Sacred Domain of Adolf K. Wiesmann was clearly stronger than that of the Colorless King.
Kurumi had a premonition that even if she fully activated the City of Time Consumption, it would be difficult to shake Adolf K. Wiesmann’s Sacred Domain.
To counter him, only the bullets of the Kukkuruki Emperor could negate the causality of the Sacred Domain.
“What exactly is happening?”
“This feeling… something inside my body is being drained.”
The Colorless King wanted to pursue, but the sudden heaviness in his body sent shivers down his spine.
The City of Time Consumption belonged to a class of abilities known as barriers. Once deployed, it would continuously consume the time of anyone stepping into it, making their bodies heavy and weak.
“What did you do?”
Taking advantage of the Colorless King’s momentary confusion, Ace retreated back to Kurumi’s side.
She noticed Kurumi’s ability but didn’t know exactly what she had done.
“Did you cancel my City of Time Consumption?”
Kurumi looked at Ace with surprise; the electromagnetic forces within her interfered with the City of Time Consumption, preventing her from being absorbed by Kurumi’s Pokémon power.
This reminded Kurumi of the AST units pursuing her. Their mechanical armor had similar effects, capable of briefly resisting the erosion of the City of Time Consumption.
“Ace’s abilities essentially belong to a type of magic.”
Bai Luo explained at this point, “When the barrier of the City of Time Consumption meets Ace’s superpowers, the latter automatically generates electromagnetic interference to counteract it.”
“As for the result, it will lead to minor loss of control over abilities, much like a leakage of electricity.”
“Is there such a setting?”
Ace encountered this situation for the first time.
But since Bai Luo said it, it must be true.
Apart from the irritating habit of calling her Ace, Bai Luo was generally reliable.
“Hmm.”
Bai Luo nodded, “The difference lies only in the degree of loss of control over abilities, which sacrifices control over abilities to immunize against rule-based, environmental, and mental interferences.”
“Damn it!”
Listening to Bai Luo’s authoritative explanation, the Colorless King could no longer suppress the anger building up inside him.
“I’m a king!!!”
With a roar, the Power of Authority erupted violently.
Centered on him, the Colorless Sacred Domain swept out like a storm, forcibly pushing back Kurumi’s City of Time Consumption.
Thus, taking the center of the airship as the boundary, the City of Time Consumption and the Colorless Sacred Domain were mutually separated, neither able to overcome the other.
“Next, it’s my turn, right?”
Kurumi smiled as she stepped forward, replacing Ace for the second round of confrontation with the Colorless King.
But this time, the Colorless King was no longer as rampant.
The power of Pokémon and the Sacred Domain canceled each other out. Facing Kurumi’s spirit bullet, the Colorless King was thoroughly at a disadvantage.
If it weren’t for the causality of the Sacred Domain guaranteeing that the Colorless King wouldn’t die at Kurumi’s hands, the Colorless King would probably have been dead long ago.
What Kurumi paid most attention to was the strong resistance the Colorless King showed against her spirit bullets.
This forced Kurumi to expend more spiritual power to achieve only fleeting effects on the Colorless King.
For example, the Seven Bullet, which could stop time, would be weakened by the Sacred Domain before hitting the Colorless King, and the only thing that could ultimately land on him was the small amount of temporal power contained in the bullet.
Even so, the time the Seven Bullet could immobilize the Colorless King was only a brief instant.
How to explain it?
The spiritual power contained in the bullets was limited, whereas the Sacred Domain surrounding the Colorless King could receive continuous replenishment.
What troubled Kurumi even more was that whenever she tried to deal fatal blows to the Colorless King, various accidents would occur.
For instance, her flintlock gun jamming suddenly, bullets turning into duds, losing control over the temporal power, or the floor collapsing beneath her feet, as if the whole world was preventing her from killing the Colorless King.
This made Kurumi’s attacks increasingly ferocious, constantly finding ways to break through the protection of the Sacred Domain and assault the Colorless King.
In a short while, the Colorless King suffered greatly.
Once the power of the Sacred Domain was broken, the weaknesses of the Colorless King were immediately exposed.
Martial arts, superpowers, combat experience—none of these things did the Colorless King possess.
Even fighting willpower was pitifully weak.