Jonathan left the fight, satisfied, and headed towards the other two leaders. All around them, the rest of the army charged, ignoring the high level conflict brewing in their center. Many of them simply jumped over the trench that the earth mages had built earlier, or charged across bridges of elemental power. It had been a good effort on their parts, but the secondary wall that the Uthraki had made would be a lot more useful here.
Jonathan watched the tide of silver course by him, marveling at how weak the majority of the army was. He could have defeated them all had there been no Tier 2s. As it was, more and more Tier 2s started to come out of the woodwork, some of them heading towards the city, and others forming a circle around the duel between Jonathan and their leaders. Jonathan ignored this, and his fists started to crackle with dark flame.
“Finally we meet, Jonathan Harlowe. I have been looking forward to sinking my blade into your flesh. Your disrespect of my master has been inexcusable.” The enemy leader twirled his sword as he said this.
Jonathan was not in the mood for banter. He did not care who this man was, or why he was here. All he wanted to do was to remove the taint from his city’s territory.
Jonathan surged forwards like a ballista bolt, his fist cocked back and ready. The other man chuckled and whipped his sword around. The blade flickered in and out of reality again as it moved, causing Jonathan to be hard pressed to track it. He threw himself to the ground as the weapon passed overhead, and then surged upwards, trying to land a hit on his enemy.
The other man drew back his sword, meeting the strike with one of his own. Jonathan’s fist clashed with the blade, struggling against the strength of the other fighter. Although the man was probably thirty or forty levels higher than Jonathan, he was inhibited by the mana density of this world, and seemed to be having some trouble fighting against him. Jonathan spotted a strange medallion on the man’s chest, out of which a steady stream of concentrated mana was pouring. Frowning, he realized that the artifact was able to slightly offset the mana inhibition.
“Ah, you noticed my most prized possession,” the man said. “My lord gifted this to me many years ago. With it, I am one of the strongest beings in this world. Only three others are stronger than me.”
As before, Jonathan ignored the banter and pushed the man’s sword aside. However, it did not go the way he had planned. The sword phased through his gauntlet, and he only had the presence of mind to whip his hand back at the last moment. The sword flickered back into reality a moment later. If that had been a second sooner, it would have appeared in his hand.
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The battle all around began to heat up as the other Uthraki arrived. The female mage peeled away to fight them, and some of the other Tier 2s from Granath’s army lent a hand. However, the main fight was going down right now, between Jonathan and the enemy leader. Jonathan knew that this man, with access to strength beyond the mana inhibition, would be a deadly threat to the city. However, they did seem evenly matched, at least in terms of strength.
Jonathan surged in, sending a barrage of strikes towards vulnerable parts of the man’s armor. Hissing nothingness crackled on the tops of his fists, ready to carve through armor, flesh and bone. However, none of that mattered if none of the attacks hit.
The fighter weaved around them like a wraith, none of the blows hitting home. It almost looked like he was moving in and out of space like his sword. As Jonathan began to grow acclimated to the fighting style of his foe, he realized that was the case. The warrior was making small movements to conceal it, but more than once he should have been struck by one of Jonathan’s attacks.
With a bellow of rage, Jonathan began to up the level of his attacks. In between a series of punches, he suddenly loosed a bolt of Void energy at the other man. Unprepared for this, he was struck full on by the blast. A detonation of purple light lifted the warrior off his feet and straight into the path of Jonathan’s fist. This time, he did not dodge. He was sent flying backwards, crashing into the line of Tier 2s like a cannonball.
Jonathan raced after him, but was too slow to catch the man before he recovered. The warrior rose, spitting out blood through a slit in his visor, and grabbed his sword in a two handed stance. With a growl, he rocketed through space, seeming to occupy every point between himself and Jonathan at once. He arrived almost instantaneously, thrusting his weapon towards Jonathan’s neck.
Jonathan leaped over the strike, bringing a devastating hammerfist down on the other fighter’s head. The man raised his sword, using the hilt to block. His weapon moved like it was made of nothing at all, able to bend to his will with ease. Then again, he possessed the strength of a Tier 2. Manipulating a sword like it was made out of air was par for the course.
However, there seemed to be a little more going on there than just that. He had some sort of space manipulation abilities, ones that allowed him to move both his body and his weapon in improbable ways. He could phase through reality, and could move though things like they were not there. However, all elemental energy had a weakness, which was the effect of other elemental energy.
Jonathan summoned his aura to the world, imbuing it with the concentrated power of the Void. The other fighter stumbled for a moment as his abilities were suppressed. Then his own aura rolled out, fighting against Jonathan’s. The two men struggled, but unlike the enemy leader, Jonathan did not need access to his elemental energy as an integral part of his fighting style. Without his space manipulation however, the enemy leader was far weaker.