The Royal Military Academy's Impostor Owns a Dungeon [BL] Chapter 1225: A Perfect Hit

The moment his thrusters erupted, Ivan poured far more spiritual energy into his mecha than he would normally dare to use.

He couldn’t afford to underestimate Owen Mylor.

In fact, judging by the grim look on his face, one would’ve thought he was charging into a do-or-die battle rather than participating in a licensure examination demonstration.

His mecha shot forward.

Then seemingly split.

"?!"

Several identical figures suddenly appeared around the true figure, each one moving along a slightly different trajectory as Ivan rapidly shifted positions and manipulated his mecha’s movements, making it increasingly difficult to tell which one was real.

Avid fans watching on Star Net recognized the technique almost immediately.

And judging by the sudden uproar sweeping through the stands, so did most of the people watching live.

It was one of Ivan Zorath’s signature maneuvers.

Even one of Owen’s instructors visibly paled before slowly lowering himself back into his seat.

"Oh, stars."

Because this wasn’t some flashy trick Ivan used merely to confuse opponents.

The mirages existed to hide the real attack.

And right now, all of them were converging on Owen.

One from the left.

Another from above.

Two more rapidly closed in from opposite directions while several others flickered in and out of existence, making it nearly impossible to tell where the real mecha would emerge.

Yet the golden mecha didn’t move.

Not even slightly.

"Why isn’t he dodging?!"

Someone in the audience practically shrieked the question everyone else was thinking.

Owen’s mecha remained exactly where it was, wings spread behind its back, almost arrogantly allowing Ivan to close the distance.

Inside the cockpit, however, the supposedly arrogant pilot was frozen in absolute terror.

"BROTHER!"

But it was already too late.

One of the mirages disappeared.

Then another.

And another.

Until the real Ivan suddenly emerged from Owen’s right.

The Silver Serpents’ guild leader had already twisted his mecha’s body in midair, pouring spiritual energy into one leg as he swung it forward with enough force to send a visible distortion rippling through the surrounding air.

The entire arena seemed to slow.

Everyone could see the foot coming.

Then, halfway through the kick, the armor surrounding Ivan’s lower leg suddenly shifted.

Mechanical plates separated.

Segments rotated.

Part of the foot rapidly narrowed and extended forward, its armored sections shifting and locking into place until what had once been an ordinary mecha foot transformed into a long, pointed drill.

"!!!"

Several people shot to their feet.

They knew that weapon.

More importantly, they knew what normally happened whenever Ivan successfully landed it.

There was a reason opposing pilots were usually evacuated immediately afterward.

Once that drill punched through a mecha’s armor and breached the internal structure, continuing to operate the machine became far too dangerous.

And Owen still hadn’t moved.

"DODGE!"

No one knew who screamed it.

Maybe several people did.

But the warning came far too late.

Ivan’s drill slammed directly into the golden mecha’s upper right chest.

The impact sent a violent shockwave bursting outward.

For one horrible instant, everyone thought it was over.

Ivan had hit him cleanly.

At that perfect angle, with that much spiritual energy poured into the attack, there was practically no possibility of the drill failing to penetrate.

Even Ivan felt it.

The initial impact traveled straight through his mecha, and his eyes sharpened as he instinctively waited for that familiar sensation of resistance giving way.

Except it didn’t.

His expression changed.

The drill was still spinning.

It was pressing directly against the golden armor with enough force that the entire surrounding space seemed to tremble from the friction.

But it wasn’t going in.

Not even a little.

Ivan’s pupils slowly contracted.

Something was wrong.

The resistance he felt wasn’t that of exceptionally thick armor gradually buckling beneath his attack. By all accounts, a strike like that should’ve pierced straight through and thoroughly rearranged whatever internals happened to be on the other side.

Instead, it felt like he’d driven the drill straight into something impossibly solid.

Then, before Ivan could even think to pull away, all the tremendous force he’d thrown into the attack seemed to have nowhere else to go.

A horrible metallic screech tore through his cockpit.

"!"

His eyes widened as the very tip of the drill began to deform, so slightly at first that he almost thought he’d imagined it. A tiny fracture appeared along the rapidly spinning point, only for that hairline crack to spread and the sharpened tip to suddenly splinter apart.

"?!"

Fragments of reinforced alloy exploded outward as the damage raced backward from the point of impact, each section buckling into the one behind it as though the entire thing were being violently crumpled from the front.

And it didn’t stop at the rotary drill.

The destruction reached the morphed foot and continued upward, the attached limb crumpling and fraying as the force traveled farther up the leg. Armored plating peeled apart and internal components twisted free, leaving Ivan to watch in disbelief as the attack meant to tear through his opponent instead systematically mangled his own mecha.

Everything around him violently shuddered.

"What the hell?!"

Warning lights erupted across his cockpit as the tremendous force of his own attack traveled back through the compromised limb and rattled the whole frame hard enough to nearly throw him against his restraints.

And everyone saw it.

They watched an attack that’d punched through countless opposing mechas practically destroy itself against one that had only just been built.

Meanwhile, the golden mecha remained exactly where it was.

"..."

"..."

For several long seconds, nobody seemed capable of making a sound.

Even Owen himself stared dumbly at the damaged mecha in front of him, his earlier screaming temporarily forgotten.

Ivan wasn’t doing much better.

He simply stared at the perfectly intact golden chest where his strongest close-range attack had landed, then slowly looked toward the mangled remains of his own leg.

__

But far beyond the Empire, inside the Federation facility where countless scientists and mechanics had been watching the demonstration with increasingly ugly expressions, someone abruptly shot to his feet.

The glass in his hand slipped straight through his fingers.

It shattered against the floor.

No one even looked down.

Every eye remained glued to the projection of that untouched golden mecha as the man stared at it with an expression that was no longer merely envious.

There was fear there now.

"Just what kind of monster is that?"