Sydui

Apparently the next phase of the plan was to charge us with a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree flanking maneuver.

The sounds of combat appeared all around me.

If things stayed the same, odds were that we were all going to die.

I looked around for Andrew, but couldn't find him.

I decided that there wasn't anything I could do about the situation until I had killed my opponent.

I focused my attention on the newest threat.

[Oligog The Punctual]

Danger Level: Moderate Threat

"Combat has begun already, please kindly stop standing still and do something." Oligog taunted.

"You first."

Oligog cocked his head to the side slightly. "If you insist I suppose. [Domain]!"

A blue sphere suddenly appeared from his handheld clock, encompassing us both. After a moment, hundreds and hundreds of clocks of different sizes appeared in this space, however strangely each clock had no numbers on it, instead being replaced by a spectrum of colors.

And now that I looked, everything inside the sphere was also a different color than it usually was, including myself.

"Welcome to my very own sphere of solipsism, outside of it is reality, but in here, my mind is all that is sure to exist."

I tried to charge at him, but my entire body was moving so much slower for some reason.

"Oh, you're likely confused right now, you see, this slowness and these colors are how I experience the world; I have all the time in the universe to simply watch everything transpire around me, long enough to take note of everything that happens... it's maddening isn't it?"

I threw my knife at him, hoping to catch him off guard.

The knife flew threw the air at the same crawl I did.

He simply stepped to side at an average speed.

Oligog then picked up the knife and strode toward me. "Let's not waste any more time and get this over with."

A familiar voice said something, muffled a bit by whatever the sphere was made of. "This is a horrible idea."

Suddenly, a figure entered the sphere and rolled to a stop.

Hund stood. "Alright Sydui, let's kill this guy."

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Andrew

As soon as I saw the enemy champions charge, I ran to the ammunition depot.

Due to the fact that it was stored underground, it was fairly likely to still be intact.

I rushed below the missing house into its basement.

A few bladders of the tear-gas-like stuff had ruptured, causing immediate overwhelming pain.

Still, I did my best to grab as many bladders of one particular kind as I could... that and one of the other kind.

I poked my head out of the basement, giving myself some time to get as much of the tear-gas stuff out of my eyes as possible before continuing.

Once the pain became mere irritation, I looked around and found Rahyu.

He was in the middle of fighting several champions.

I threw one of the bladders at those champions during a moment they were all grouped up.

"Rahyu! use [Photon Gaze] on that thing I threw!"

He looked at me with surprise and then did as he was told.

The highly flammable gas in the bladder erupted out and engulfed the champions in a fiery explosion, killing two of them instantly, and lighting the other few ablaze.

I ran up to Rahyu and dumped the bladders into his arms, before taking the special one back. "Gather some Fifskae and have them use the red-labeled bladders on the champions, any sort of high-heat should work to make it go up."

"Gotcha!"

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I ran toward Hilrk, Hole Puncher drawn.

'Andrew! To your left!' The Great Stabbinsky called.

I looked to my left and jumped backward when I saw it.

I came mere inches away from a familiar jaw putting a hole the size of my head somewhere in my body.

[The Voracious Stalker, Nemesis Second Stage]

Danger Level: Certain Death

"Oh... that's disappointing~!" He called after he landed again. "How'd you see it coming?"

"Up yours asshole!" I replied bluntly. "You should be dead!"

He smiled, showing his multiple rows of teeth. "And yet, here I am!" He shifted suddenly backwards. "Hilrk, if you would!"

"Sure thing boss! [Hypernova]!"

I dropped straight to the floor as a concentrated beam of energy sailed over my head.

I jumped back to my feet and moved as The Stalker attempted another fatal blow on me.

"Oh, you're no fun~"

I kicked him in the face and jumped backward to create some distance.

"Hilrk, please gravitate him toward you."

Hilrk scratched his bald and blubbery head. "What boss?"

"Use [Supermassive] Empty."

"Oh! Why didn't you say so?! [Supermassive]!"

I was suddenly sucked toward Hilrk, as was everything around me.

I saw another fish bladder rush toward me by happenstance.

I grabbed it and let go of the other one.

I then aimed Hole Puncher at Hilrk.

"Max accuracy Hole Puncher." I whispered.

'Understood.'

"End [Supermassive] Empty!"

"Sure thing boss!"

Suddenly, I plummeted to the ground.

But before I did, I managed to fire.

"[Void]!"

The bolt landed next to his feet.

"Ha dummy, you missed!" He called back.

"Oh boy, you're so right! I can't believe how much falling threw off my aim!" I replied.

"Empty! Move!" The Stalker ordered.

It was about then that [Void] wore off.

Hilrk hacked and coughed as the empty parts of his body, such as his lungs, suddenly filled with tear-gas.

I raised Hole Puncher to finish off Hilrk, but The Stalker tackled me.

We wrestled on the ground, his teeth gnashed as I stabbed at his eyes with The Great Stabbinsky, never quite making my mark.

The Stalker managed to roll me onto my back, all hint of enjoyment lost as he reared back to bite off my head.

"Hole Puncher! Max power!"

The Stalker flinched, anticipating a massive amount of damage.

Instead I fired at Hilrk.

Both The Stalker and I were sent several feet away from each other, tumbling in slightly different directions.

I looked over for a moment to see that Hilrk was indeed replaced by a smoking crater.

The Stalker roared in rage, and then charged at me headlong.

"Rahyu! Think fast!" I tossed the bladder I had grabbed out of the air earlier at The Stalker.

Suddenly, The Stalker burst into flame, screaming in pain.

It didn't stop him for more than a moment though.

I suppose it's time to test a theory then.

I held the Gem Of Echoes in my hand and pointed at Rahyu. "[Ascend, Echo]!"

[Nemesis Promoted Nearby]

[Nemesis Promoted Nearby]

[Rahyu The Infernal Conflagrator, Nemesis Third Stage]

Rahyu's whole body suddenly burst into flame.

After a moment, the fire began to settle, and the flames above his eyes, mouth, and several of his more notable scars, changed to a different color.

The Stalker was stunned.

He was then tackled to the ground.

"Burn!" Rahyu yelled, causing himself to become a massive fireball.

I watched as The Stalker's regeneration tried in vain to keep up once it activated.

The Stalker managed a single word before he was engulfed completely. "Retreat!"

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Sydui

"How can you move?" I asked Hund.

He looked at me moving slowly and took a moment to think. He then glanced at his makeshift necklace and it seemed to click in his mind. "A gift from Andrew it would seem."

I had completely forgotten about The Gem Of Relativity that he was given all that time ago.

"It doesn't matter if you can move or not, it's not like I started the Deathworld Game with my [Skills]." Oligog stated matter-of-factly.

Hund held up his hand and fired a set of needles at Oligog.

They proceeded to crawl through the air, and Hund proceeded to look very disappointed.

Oligog charged at him with my knife. "We've wasted far too many precious seconds, it's time to be done with this!"

Hund dodged Oligog's incredibly precise swings, each expertly aimed at some sort of vital area.

Hund's colors started to change, and I started to see the outlines of shapes begin to form all over him.

"Hund! Look out! Something's happening to you!"

Hund looked down with two of his eyes, making sure to focus his other pair on the threat in front of him. "He's turning me into an anatomy chart!"

After that, the area around him also began to change colors, starting as red, and then becoming more green.

The patterns were something that was drilled into my very being after so many combats.

Oligog was marking down his movement patterns.

Hund started to only barely be able to dodge, and it was getting worse and worse.

"Crap, crap, crap!" He exclaimed.

I was about to say another word of warning, but then I noticed something else...

Both of them were slowly moving closer to me.

Hund started launching needles out in a fanned pattern to limit Oligog's movements, which definitely worked, as Oligog started to make sloppier cuts.

Hund then used his own knife to slash at Oligog.

Oligog sidestepped his strike, rounding to his side in moments. "Did you really think I didn't notice that we were moving toward The Ripper? I notice everything! You've exhaled two hundred and ninety-nine times since I've met you!"

Hund's eyes filled with surprise as Oligog slashed at him with a strike aimed at his heart.

Hund shifted slightly, causing his breastplate to take the brunt of the blow, his face still twisting pain even then.

He then threw his knife at me.

Oligog was confused for a moment as his follow up strike didn't hit.

Oligog turned and looked at the knife as it embedded into my shoulder. "The necklace!"

I reached up and grabbed the knife and the gem that was dangling from it.

"I'm sure you could have thought of something better than that you prick." I scolded, putting pressure on my new wound.

Oligog charged at me, going for a vital strike.

I punched him in the stomach, causing him to double over. "You'll find that I'm a much better fighter than Hund."

I reached out with my right hand toward Oligog.

"[Prodigy, Void]!"

I grabbed his arm and tried out [Slaughter] for the first time.

His eyes filled with surprise, and then pain, as I ripped his arm off.

And to my surprise, it felt like my arm was ripped off too.

Out in the distance, a giant fireball caught all of our attentions at once.

Oligog looked at it and nodded. "That's my cue to leave it seems. [Prodigy, Translocate]!"

Oligog and his [Domain] were gone in the next instant.

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Andrew

After Rahyu made the prettiest fireworks I think I've ever seen out of The Stalker, all of the champions started running.

"Take potshots at the champions, but do not follow them!" I ordered.

Rahyu looked at me in anger and confusion. "Why can't I follow them?!"

I counted down from five on my fingers.

[Nemesis Demoted Nearby, as a Skill's duration has ended]

[Nemesis Demoted Nearby, as a Skill's duration has ended]

"That's why." I countered. "Trust me on these things, I have the [Skill] that made it happen after all."

Rahyu slumped. "Fair enough Andrew."

"Hey, don't beat yourself up, that was the coolest thing ever for that minute."

Rahyu smiled, still a little sad. "Yeah, it really was."

As soon as all of the champions were out of sight, I heard a dinging noise at my feet, kind of like a phone ringing.

I looked down and saw a mug full of something next to a letter.

I picked up the letter and read the outside of the envelope.

"To: Andrew The Unorthodox, From: Lviyr The Gamemaster."