Divine Luck: SSS-Rank Battle Maid Harem

Vera returned Zach's question with a glare and raised her hammer. Before Zach could pull his feet out of the holes made from the last collision, she brought it down again, using its unnatural weight to hammer Zach into the ground like a nail.

Zach gritted his teeth. He hadn't meant anything with his question, but he seemed to have pissed Vera off anyway.

He took a deep breath.

The world essence energy that was hugging his insides like jagged wire slowly relaxed. Instead of squeezing his meat and vessel tight and exerting pressure over his body, the world essence energy started flowing like a gentle stream, revitalizing and energizing his body.

The air around Zach steadily got heavier as the pressure he exuded grew with each breath he took.

Vera kept hammering away at him. At first, each strike made his knees tremble and pushed him deeper into the ground. With each breath Zach took, his knees shook a little less until he could finally straighten his legs and his back and stand tall and proud.

Vera was surprised to suddenly find Zach's eyes at her height again, but that didn't stop her from trying to hammer him down again.

However, this time, Zach just raised his hand and caught the hammer's head before it could reach maximum velocity. He grasped it firmly.

While Vera was staring at him in surprise, he reached up with his other hand and grabbed the shaft. Before Vera could react, Zach spun around and tore the hammer from her hands, flinging it away in the same move.

The heavy hammer tore through the air like an oversized, angry hornet. Yubo barely had time to throw himself out of the way.

Vera raised an eyebrow and looked at her empty palms before glancing at the hammer, trying to escape like a prisoner on death row. She held out her hand toward it.

Yubo raised his head and glared at Zach. Less than a second passed before he felt a chill run down his spine. He threw his face into the ground again, right as the hammer wooshed past his head, rustling his hair with the draft.

The hammer flew right back into Vera's hands with a soft thump.

Zach wouldn't disarm her that easily.

Zach pursed his lips and looked at Vera for a second before stepping forward, creating a third hole in the ground as he shot toward Vera.

Vera didn't have time to react before a tightly wound fist hit her in the side like a battering ram.

Zach felt like he had punched a solid iron wall, despite the fleshy thud.

Fortunately for him, but unfortunately for Vera, he had punched harder things than iron walls.

Vera held up well, considering she was taken by surprise. Her body was as solid as the weapons she crafted. Any ordinary attack wouldn't get through her defense.

It was just that Zach was far from ordinary.

Almost as if he had a personal vendetta against all the weapons he couldn't use, he had practiced how to break the weapons of his enemies.

One hit might not be enough to take down Vera. But she couldn't stop him from firing and hitting another.

Vera was strong. There was no doubt about that. The strikes she unleashed were devastating.

But that was her specialty. That meant she lagged behind in other areas, such as speed.

She did get faster when she transformed her hammer back into its travel-friendly size. Her attacks became fast enough to catch up to Zach, who also didn't specialize in speed.

But without the weight of the big hammer, she didn't have the destructive power to break through his barriers.

To top it all off, Zach only got better as he fought.

Vera caught up to him in speed when she first shrank her hammer. After ten exchanges, she noticed she was missing more often. It felt like Zach had gotten faster.

A little. Maybe.

But more than that, he had adapted to her swings. He had gotten used to the power of his own body.

He still had limits to explore and test, but it had been a while since he had unleashed this much of his strength. He hadn't fought properly since before he started his world essence energy exercises.

Vera soon had to admit that she couldn't catch up to Zach. Even if she could, she couldn't get through his ridiculous defenses.

He had blocked several of her strikes with the big hammer without breaking a single bone. He had barely looked like he tried.

Vera hadn't been able to charge up her strongest attack, but her confidence as a heavy attacker was still shattered. It was one of the things she took pride in. But some guy from nowhere, without so much as a hint of armor on him, just took her attacks head-on without budging.

It was bullshit.

Eventually, Vera's bruised hammer arm dropped to the side, and she sighed.

Zach stopped his fist right in front of Vera, the force behind it still enough to blow back her hair.

"You give up?" Zach asked, not a hint of dirt on his face.

"..." Vera, on the other hand, was bloody and bruised. Zach had no mercy.

She wanted to retort, but his fist was still close to her face, so she held back and just sighed again. The breath that left her mouth was raspy and tinged with blood.

Zach took a step back and gave an awkward smile.

He had been so caught up in testing his strength that he accidentally treated Vera as a target dummy.

"What do you want to know?" Vera asked after stabilizing herself.

The deal was information to Zach when he won. She wanted to get it over with as soon as possible and leave. She had already embarrassed herself enough.

"A lot. But first…" Zach trailed off as he turned around and glanced at the tunnel leading to Gjula.

"I think we should do something about that situation."