Recent events ended with quite a success for all concerned parties. King strengthened his position, Blackwater, and indirectly Blackwood family, gained some more power and renown, I got my second company – therefore Syndicate’s position was about to get a little bit better as well. If you would add to that the fact, that slavers got their butt kicked you would have the whole picture of the success that I am talking about.
How much of it was just a lucky coincidence thought? Arthur indeed is a smart hyena that can use every opportunity in such a way to abuse all the benefits he can get, but was he the one pushing the wheel of fate as well?
No, that’s something highly unlikely to happen. Even if he somehow turned a blind eye on slavery, letting it grow to a bigger problem that he could use later, there was no way he participated in creation of Kim. Or even if he did, there was no way he knew that Kim would follow after me and get indoctrinated by beast-men instead of, for example, turning into wild beast right behind the capital’s walls.
I shook my head casting grim thoughts aside. It was time for joy, happiness and party. King ordered a small festival in the city markets place as a way of unifying beast race and human citizens of the city (and to celebrate taking over the city into his power - forcing some lesser guild merchants into participating was a sophisticated way of showing his superiority, you know, like dabbing on someone's corpse or something similar). Blanka and Giselle were participating in drinking competition, Lanele was constantly chasing off young (and not only young) men (and not only men) that kept on asking her out for a dance.
Everyone was having a good time… except for me and Jeremy. Well, not that we were particularly troubled or anything like that, simply we used the first excuse we found to leave the gathering after hour or less since it started.
Right now, we were standing in front of each other in specially reinforced training room with weapons in our hands. I was holding a wooden training sword, Jeremy – a spear (or just a pole).
* “So, is mister-demigod going to show me how he treats, as you called it,
O-ho. Someone is going be showing off.
* “Sure, sure, old man. Better practice some dirt-eating.”
* “Jokes aside, kid, how do you think, can I go all serious against you?”
His usual joyful tone was nowhere present.
* “Please, do. I have to check how much stronger I become and which parts of my fighting style need priority in polishing.”
* “How long are we going to fight? Till first blood?”
* “No, either till I would give up or wouldn’t be able to continue fighting.”
* “Till YOU won’t be able to keep on fighting? Are you already presuming you would be the one losing?” oh, the taunt in his voice.
* “Jeremy. You have killed a royal dragon in one versus one duel. Until now I fought with two dragons – draconis vulgaris – zombie one, that I killed thanks to luck and due to sins that possessed my body and terra dragon – by luring a swarm of Giga mantis on it. If I would fight a royal class dragon I would lose, and that’s the fact.”
* “You are speaking about me from the day of my youth when I was in my top condition…”
* “Jeremy. Stop it. I can literally smell someone’s power… and race. You are no longer a human, Jeremy.”
Name: Jeremy Jericho Race: Asura [Deomonic Ascended Human - type] Level: 59 Attributes: ??? Skills: ???
"Smell"
His expression changed.
* “How long do you know about it?”
* “A year? Maybe two. I was always suspecting that you are far too strong to be a human, even as someone once called the strongest man alive… the thing is – you lost your title because…”
* “Yes. The Appraising stones in capitals of every city tend to rank creatures that are the top ten of their rank. I lost my position simply because I stopped being human.”
* “To truth is, you became even stronger than then?”
* “That’s quite possible… I didn’t have many opportunities to go all in. To test myself I think I would have to go to the Demon Continent… maybe spare with my teacher.”
He grimaced as if he noticed what kind of foolishness he just said. Oh, his teacher - the WOMANH must have been really hard on him.
We double-checked if the door was shut tightly, before our bodies started changing.
I became smaller, my backs cracked and bend making my spine turned into a perfect bow. With such posture moving as bipedal was almost impossible. My skin peeled and partially fossilized, turning into obsidian like scales. Nails on my hands and feet turned into slightly curved claws. All my joints snapped as my knees bent backward.
The assassin’s avatar perfect for fighting in narrow passages as well as darkened corridors. Well, the room in which we were going to fight was an empty space perfectly illuminated, so I couldn’t really use its power to its full potential.
Still, that’s the body that is the fastest of all of my avatars. Jeremy Jericho is a man that made a name thanks to his overwhelming strength, no matter how thick armor I would grow few strikes would bend it, few more crack it and next one would knock me out. The one way to last as long as possible was avoiding being hit at all!
I changed the grasp over the training sword, when I stretched my arm, the blade would hide behind it.
Supporting my twisted body with left hand touching the floor, I hid my armed one behind my back and look at my opponent.
He changed too.
He became paler and his veins became visible, as if filled with purple venom. There was something inhuman in his eyes, they became darker. No, not just black. It was as if they were sucking the light out of the room.
He dropped the upper part of his traveling clothes revealing his torso.
His muscles were abnormal as well, like a bodybuilder, or maybe even more! That’s impossible that his clothes were hiding all of these all the time! It was obvious he “pumped” himself up.
* “You are not the only one that can manipulate his physical form and pretend human,Zariel. Maybe these specific kinds of skills are far from yours, but I am still able to do this much…” he said seeing my surprise.
His pale skin started growing marks - as if grey tattoos - that would cover his body. Around his neck, hands, arms and over his eyes.
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His grey hair and beard turned completely white.
He moved his left leg to the front, raised his left palm in my direction while holding his “pole” behind him on his belt level.
We stared at one another for a moment or two, inspecting holes in defenses and possible blind spots. Then, Jeremy moved.
He was fast, faster than anything I saw before. He literally vanished for a split of second to appear in front of me trying to strike horizontally from my left. I completely dropped on the floor and slashed targeting his ankles.
Jeremy reacted as if the sword was a real weapon and not just a wooden toy. He jumped vertically flipping above my head, as he was in the middle of leap and his body was in an “up-side-down” position, he thrust his “spear” down – right on my neck. I twisted my body making a horizontal “turning” leap. My joints cracked and shifted, allowing me to bend my body to a surreal extent.
Jeremy landed and moved a little bit further from me gaining his distance.
Seconds ago he was checking if he could knock me down in one strike, now as this plan failed he decided to use the advantage of his weapon’s range.
Still, I looked on the wooden floor which was hit by the tip of Jeremy’s weapon. It was cracked. In midair he had no footing to use for strengthening his blow, all the power came from his arm alone.
It was devastating. I completely gave up on strength focusing on the dexterity and reaction time – I had a weapon, so this way I could still be a deadly opponent… but Jeremy… his speed was on a similar level to mine, maybe even a bit faster, atop of that, his strength matched it. And his mastery with a weapon was on a completely different level. With his skills and power he was towering above me in “food chain”.
In fair battle I could never hope to win against him…
… no, even playing dirty I would probably lose… But, let’s push myself to see current limits.
Jumping toward him in zigzag pattern I kept on touching the floor as if supporting myself during my charge. The truth is that each time my palm touched the wooden panels I would leave a fire rune on it. Invisible, emitting barely any mana. At the very end, when the distance between us was shortened I pounced, still, extremely close to the floor attacking his legs. Jeremy was quite a tall man so bringing the fight to this low level should be at least problematic to him…
… then again. His weapon. It wasn’t a heavy axe or a short sword. It was light, flexible multifunctional tool which greatly reduced his disadvantage.
Jeremy took a step back while swiping from the side using just one of his hands to handle his weapon. Normally, that would mean that he used just a percentage of his strength and that it can be easily blocked or countered, yet, I had no such delusions. This much strength was enough to send me flying and break few of my ribs.
I jumped up letting his staff pass under me, just to notice that his left hand was already raised to attack. His opened palm hit my guts. I felt as the power of blow ignored my scales and send the aftershock that spread inside of my body attacking inner organs.
I cough blood landing few meters away.
Was that Mana shock wave? The effects were the same, maybe even better… but I sensed no mana…
* “You recognize your technique, do you, Zari?...” he smiled “… this is why I love training with different people and watch them fight. I did copy that technique of yours from years ago. But, your technique has one flaw – you can't transmit its power into the enemy, instead, you are using it outside as force that pushes enemies back. You are partly a mage, so you can use the advantage of the range you gained this way… still, using it directly on the enemy organs can kill him instantly…”
If I am not mistaken I used that skill once in front of him, during one of our very firsts training sessions. Just one glance in the heat of combat was enough for him to understand its principle, copy it using no mana but pure physical strength and technique and then upgrade so it would fit his battle style?
… Jericho, which one of us is a monster here? Thought looking at your body now… Neither of us is one, huh?
This time it was me gathering distance. In close combat I stand no chance, his defense and reaction time are outmatching mine, so, I have to bait him in using magic and then attack dirty using Kim.
I clasped my hands together as I started praying.
* “Oh, the everlasting night that breaths out shadows so pale,
Show me the path using the blackened moon of the ail.
To you I pray, on your victims, I prey, your words I obey, you hunger I…”
* “You are aware I am not going to let you finish it?” He smiled as he vanished again.
But, he stepped on the rune I put on the ground during my previous assault, so he had to jump slightly to the side as he tried to avoid losing his momentum… just to land on another one. And another one, he was flying toward my last rune which I activated “manually”. This time his speed wouldn’t let him avoid it.
He took a direct hit. Still, it barely grazed his monstrous body. Ignoring pain he resumed his attack.
Using dual casting I raised a protective spell “cloak of the imp” which covered my body in heat, and by abusing mana usage I managed to cover my body in actual flames. But, protective and damaging nature of my spell was not what I wanted to use it for.
It was nothing more than a veil to hide my body from Jeremy’s sights, then I welcomed Kim to participate in this battle. Our body once again cracked and divided above belt-level creating two separate torsos which greatly disturbed our balance. Kim was to the left finishing the chant I started singing, I was on the right with sword, ready to attack.
Jeremy jumped from behind a wall of fire with a raised pole about to strike “my” heart, but he did notice that Kim wasn’t quite matching my appearance, after the split of a second later he also noticed me, or to be precise – the tip of my sword thrusting - aiming for his neck.
Jeremy spear hit Kim’s “heart”, our shared sensed informed me about displeasing pain, at the same time I noticed that Jeremy raised his other hand to block my sword, it stopped on his palm.
If our weapons were real, I would be now healing Kim, and Jeremy’s hand would be gravely injured with a sword piercing through the fragile tissue, barely missing his face for an inch or two.
But then, Kim finished our spell.
* “Book of Curses, Chapter I: Weakening! Verse 8th: Wither!”
Jeremy jumped back, but the curse already managed to infuse itself with his body.
* “… Zariel. You attacked me only to place traps, gathered distance to cast a curse knowing I would have to react, used traps to slow me down, which let me believe that casting this spell if your ultimate goal. That made me drop my defense and rush to strike you… raised a wall of flames to cover your shifting ability and set a trap attack, knowing I would target the source of the sound - your spell chanting whatever-the-fuck-it-is. Which ended with something that would nearly kill me… and in case of failure you would still land a curse and damage me?... That’s… that’s something that would kill almost everyone instantly. Kid, I keep forgetting how fast you grow… Zari… You earned my respect… I acknowledge, that in normal battle my position would be much worse and… well, could even lose… but know I know it. I can get serious as well…”
Thinking about it now - he didn’t use any skill except for that speed-up step and his version of the mana shock wave. Not a single spear skill, not a single body aura…
The air around Jeremy changed. I sensed as magic started rushing through his veins creating something like an armor around him.
Here he comes.
He vanished once again just to appear in front of me. Kim turned his whole part of the body into the scaled wall of muscles just to cover me acting like a makeshift armor as I started singing another song.
Jericho’s punch made a hole in Kim’s “body” reaching out for me, but my “little brother” responded with growing ribs inside of it with the intention of binding his movements. In the next second, he was also flooding himself with poison, venom, and acid.
But, because of aura body his arm got barely scratched.
* “… so last until moonlight fell on your gracious self!”
I finished a delayed chant
* “FORT OF ELDER EVERGREEN!”
The dark trees started growing, with iron-like trunks, covered in poisonous ivy.
I looked at my mana, healing Kim, casting spell after spell and now using one of the most powerful Nature spells were constantly depleting my mana.
The ultimate defensive spells that only higher druids could use was being torn apart by the raw power of Ashura equipped with nothing more but wooden pole.
Kim once again turned into humanoid next to me as we started singing six spells in total. Six, made into one.
Two spells of fire, fire lance and fiery serpent mixed into one powerful bolt which could crack castle’s wall.
Two spells of darkness, laying atop of it – one of a tracking class – which would keep looking for previous curse [The Wither] ensuring it will not miss its target, second one [Shadow chains] which would bind the target to its place ensuring he will last in the epicenter of the explosion.
Two spells of nature, which were nothing more but empowering its overall power: the [Sylph’s breath] and [Salamander’s Rage]
Trees were being cut down before they managed to fully grow, making Jericho approach me faster and faster.
No, this power won’t be enough to stop this monster!
MORE!
Jeremy started running toward me, trees grew from the side bolting in his direction. He didn’t even directly attack them, just ran past them breaking wood with nothing but share momentum and durability of his body.
Still singing I kept on jumping back, trying to get every second I could… Till eventually, my backs hit the wall of the training room. I had no more place to go.
Thorny vines started enveloping guild master’s ankles, and another batch tried to immobilize his torso as well. He took a stance and thrust rapidity making his moves turn into a blur.
Was that [Heart seeker] skill? No, it was something completely different. I could perform only three such thrusts in a row, and he “cut” twenty vines in a split of a second. The number of uses, speed, accuracy – everything was on completely different level.
Another Swipe of his pole released his feet as he resumed his mad march onward.
I had to think something, and do it fast! I have to come up with some plan to delay him for few more seconds…
… And then I looked at him, the war demigod breathing out steam. His eyes were focused, even though there was madness inside. Eyes, that were fixed on me…
You are under the effect of [Fear] status effects
Panic hit to my head, just barely I managed to stop myself from throwing not-perfected spell on approaching monster, but, my head became empty. All plans or schemes I was making to save so very important seconds vanished without a trace.
I had no time to deal with [Fear], so I focused on everything I had on that one last spell.
Jeremy ran at me, and when the distance between us halved, I throw the spear.
Long, blazing projectile flew across the room. Around it, like a spiral, the serpent made of fire was twisting opening its jaw toward Jericho. A link appeared between itself and ex-adventurer’s heart, ensuring it wouldn’t miss. To finish it, the purple mist covered everything forming chains that would tangle its prey on hit.
Spell passed via two magic circles which boosted its power. The sound the spell started emitting was deafening.
And so, Jeremy knowing he couldn’t dodge it took a stance preparing to block it as much as he could.
The explosion shook the guild despite all the countermeasures that the building had prepared.
Dust, flames and smoke covered mi vision. It kept on burning for minute or two, draining last bits of my mana, and when I thought the battle was about to end, from the smoke a poll emerged.
It flew toward me fast, faster than I could react hitting me directly in the forehead.
And that’s the last thing I remember.