Jonathan used every last point of his newfound strength to dodge the incoming club, and as the weapon slammed into the ground, he was already outside of the blast radius. Turning around, he leaped onto the weapon, and raced up its length. This one had been stronger than the last one, which meant that it had not shattered. He reached the monster a few seconds later, ready to strike.
The creature cleverly let go of the weapon, but he leaped off the last part in time to close the gap, streaking towards the golem’s head. It swatted at the air, but it was a hair too slow, and Jonathan reached its more vulnerable face.
He brought his fist whipping around, straight into the cracks that spread across the monster’s face. It staggered backwards as a large chunk of its face broke off, revealing the hardened core underneath. Jonathan was unable to get ahold of the Ashwalker however, and he fell to the ground as it retreated, landing lightly.
Despite the over a hundred feet between him and the ground, he did not take even a single point of damage from the landing. Without any sort of magical interference, or gravitational potency, he was simply too powerful to be harmed by any sort of falling. It was counterintuitive, but there was a maximum to the amount of speed that any object could build up. Seeing as this planet, or realm, or whatever it actually was, had a gravitational field similar to that of Earth, his terminal velocity was a bit under 200 miles per hour, and that was if he was trying to maximize it. With his current level of durability it was akin to a normal human striking the ground at a few miles per hour. Obviously, that would do little to no damage. With his armor, he was basically immune to fall damage.
However, it still left him exposed to his enemy, and the golem steadied itself a few seconds later, heading towards him once more. Smaller tentacles of rock rose out of the earth, trying to grasp at his legs, but he shattered them with rapid kicks. Although the stone that made up the golem was supernaturally tough, the tendrils of rock were only made up of standard earth.
As he smashed them apart, he slowly made his way towards the main bulk of the monster, beginning to coat his fists with energy once more. Although the creature was not that dangerous to him in terms of damage, it was starting to wear down his energy reserves with its prodigious durability, and if he was to defeat it, he would need to target the same place over and over again, which was a lot harder than it looked when your opponent could move to thwart you. In addition, the large stature of the monster made fighting it a lot more awkward than it would have been normally, as every time that Joanthan wanted to target its relatively vulnerable face, he would need to climb up its body in some way or another to reach it.
His projectile skills were not powerful enough to damage it significantly from this range, which meant that it was down to his fists. At this point, he was down to about half of his total energy reserves, and he knew that he would need to end this before he started to take serious damage. With a hiss of effort, he leaped dozens of feet into the air, clawing into the side of the golem’s leg. Using his hands to create holds, he climbed up the bucking leg of the monster, and weaved around its clumsy attacks. Soon it would probably engage the same skill that its smaller brethren had used where it coated its skin in lava. However, Jonathan was ready for that now.
As soon as he felt the creature starting to grow warm, he would leap off. Better to set back his progress than be burnt to ashes. It was strange how the lava that the monster produced was actually able to hurt him, given that he was mostly immune to normal lava at this point. Perhaps the System allowed for a being to increase the temperature of an object beyond what it normally would be able to reach, for the purpose of damaging another creature. Presumably, the same thing went for extreme cold as well, as there was only so far that a temperature could drop under the normal laws of physics. With Jonathan's current stats, he would barely be affected by temperatures even hundreds of degrees below zero. Such an immunity would render all sorts of ice related magical classes completely useless, which meant that there had to be some sort of way to increase the power of temperature related skills.
As Jonathan thought about this, he reached the bulbous head of the Ashwalker, and began to pummel it into splinters of rock with his enhanced fists. As he tore deeper and deeper into the creature, he waited until he spotted its harder true body before letting his power loose. Twin explosions of purple and red expanded outwards from his gauntlets, fracturing the rock, tough as it was.
The monster roared in rage, the vibrations causing Jonathan’s bones to shake, and started to rampage, bucking wildly in an attempt to get him off. Jonathan held on grimly, continuing to pile drive his fists into the weakened surface of the creature’s second skin. Eventually, it had enough, and as its skin began to warm, Jonathan vaulted off it, landing softly by its leg.
The outer skin of the golem started to glow with heat and it turned to liquid, rushing over its skin to repair the gaps. As a result the coating was thinner than it had been before, but as it cooled, it would be intact again.
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Jonathan waited until the lava had cooled down to a black rocky substance, and then launched himself upwards again. This was starting to take a toll on his stamina pool, a problem that he rarely had. Most of his superhuman feats were only possible with the aid of superhuman endurance, as otherwise his muscles would simply tear themselves apart after a single leap of that magnitude. As it was though, he was able to accomplish such feats easily enough.
The monster's skin was harder to sink his fists into now that it had cooled, but he still managed enough to pry his fingers into a crack, and from there he was able to haul himself upwards with his superhuman strength. He was so strong that his body weight was almost negligible. It was like pulling a balloon up the side of the monster rather than a six foot tall man clad in full plate armor. Back on Earth, he would have barely been able to move in a set like this. Here, it was like he was wearing nothing at all.
He clambered up the cooled volcanic rock and scurried around the grasping blows of the monster’s ponderous fists. It was still too slow to grab him, as he was too agile to be caught by the wide sweeping blows that the monster preferred. As he ascended however, one of its strikes finally caught him as the creature revealed a speed that it had never shown before. Its hand blurred towards him, and it shed its rocky coating, allowing it to move far faster than normal. It slapped Jonathan off of the creature’s leg, sending him into the air.
The gimlet eyes of the monster, burning with lava and rage, eyed him up as he fell, and another titanic strike crashed into his side, shattering bones and tossing him hundreds of feet into the air. He roared in pain, and righted himself, wincing as his broken bones were jarred by the fall. Pain that would have had any normal person screaming by now as only a minor discomfort to Jonathan at this point.
He landed heavily, falling over as his broken bones were jostled by the impact. A massive foot almost took his life as he monster stomped down, but he rolled out of the way just in time and got to his feet, having narrowly avoided disaster. The only thing for it was to start climbing up the monster once more. In his current state, he needed a level, and some time to heal himself to the point that he would no longer be easy prey for some of the stronger monsters of the wastes, and this creature was already damaged, which meant that it was his only real option for a monster to fight.
He climbed up its legs, this time watching out for its blows. The monster seemed to be enraged by the fact that he was still at it, and the creature bucked and rolled, trying to dislodge him. However, Jonathan held on with a single minded determination that allowed him to fight past the pain and the adversity, the determination that would one day lead to him finally completing his quest. For now however, he had far more mundane concerns.
Scrambling up the creature’s side, Jonathan started to hit a rhythm, and he grew faster and faster as he rose, having mapped out the landscape of the creature’s leg with his mind. He reached the top faster than ever before, and thrust his hands into the cracks, empowering them with the pure destructive energy of the Void.
A bubble of empty space formed around his hands as he used his strongest skill, and the monster staggered. A moment later, he detonated the runes on his right fist, sending shockwaves of power through its rocky skull. A few more strikes began to send a massive fault line across its head. Within a minute, made longer by the fact that he had to avoid the Ashwalker Golem’s increasingly slow strikes, he finally killed it.
The monster fell apart into a storm of shards, and essence rushed into him, knitting together some of the damage that had been dealt to him. As he fell, he smiled. The energy was more than he expected, and he realized that the monster had been a lot higher level than he had thought. All of this meant of course that he was about to reach Tier 2.
Congratulations, Jonathan Harlowe! You have reached Tier 2!
Prepare to be reborn.
Only that ominous message prepared him for the sudden searing agony that engulfed his body and soul, causing him to fall screaming to the ground.
Hours later, Jonathan awoke, slowly opening his eyes. He looked down at himself, noting the subtle changes to his appearance. His armor was a bit tighter now, which meant that he had grown, and he felt strong, stronger than he ever had before. Jonathan got to his feet and felt a surge of power course through his body, propelling him up a dozen feet into the air. He would have to get used to this new level of power. A few notifications waited for him, and he quickly opened them.
You have reached Tier 2!
You have gained 25 points in each stat (accounting for multipliers).
Your body is naturally more durable, and able to use a greater fraction of your total strength.
You have gained 5 points in Divinity.
You no longer need to sleep, eat or drink.
You now need a higher concentration of mana, proportional to your level. Current inhibition is 1%, as you are using Tier 1 mana to operate. Maximum inhibition is 75%.
You now have access to Tier 2 classes.
He had gained a lot from ranking up, but he could sense that the true boon was the ability to claim a stronger class. His current one was already strong, but whatever was to come would be even stronger. However, that could wait.
He did not feel comfortable engaging in such an activity out here in the wastes where any passing monster could devour him. He could sense that he had been left undisturbed during his ascension on account of the roiling energies surrounding him, but he was now vulnerable. With a sudden surge of hope blossoming within him, mingling with his new power, Jonathan started towards the city, ready for everything to come. During his time in the Ash Heaps, he had achieved heights of power that were utterly alien to him, defied a being with almost unfathomable levels of power, and had become a host to a god. Although he had reached Tier 2, this was just the beginning of his journey, one that would take him to the very heights of existence.