He was slightly vexed. There were a bunch of ways he could go about this. He could go for the cleanest possible kill, which would probably see him using his guillotine skill. Even if decapitating it didn’t kill it, he knew that he would have ample time to make a follow up attack while it was disoriented from its head rolling on the ground. At that time, he was sure that he could destroy its core. That was assuming it even had one.

He didn’t want to do any follow up attacks though. He wanted to end this in one fell swoop, even if that meant using most of the mana he currently possessed. To make matters more complicated, he was vehemently against settling this with some kind of beam or energy blast. It would’ve been relatively simple for him to modify his mana cannon and mix it with his mana bullet to make some super powerful long-ranged attack, but he absolutely loathed the way everything in fiction recently was either simple energy attacks or unnecessarily convoluted systems. He had magic and he intended to have fun with it, but he was worried that he might not be creative enough to keep it consistently fresh.

That didn’t mean he wouldn’t try, though.

He may have had the lowest technical stat value in wind, but it was still the easiest energy to control when it came to general movements for him. With a twist of his hand and a bit of focus, wind mana started to gather around him, spinning in the air like some sort of drill beside him.

‘Skill Generated: Air Piercer!’

He threw out a single firebomb, then launched the wind attack. The combination attack was mostly meant to create an explosive reaction, and it did just that. On its way toward the enemy, the drill pierced through the firebomb, which immediately ignited the ability and caused it to multiply exponentially in terms of size, speed, and intensity since the winds only served to feed the flames.

When it stabbed straight into the already distracted enemy, Amon was already walking towards the exits. He already knew that it would destroy most of the mage’s existence. What he didn’t know was that, after it ripped through him and hit the ground, the drill would suddenly explode outwards. Normally, this probably would’ve just erupted in a pillar of flames, but the rotation was still present in the magic so when it rose into the air it created a tornado that burned with so much intensity that half of the arena was covered in flames. The corpses had been rendered inanimate once their summoner died, but the flame still burned them to ashes.

Seru and Blue were both fast enough to dodge and follow Amon out. Even they were in awe, as was the crowd. Amon showed no signs of discomfort.

He was pleased with his display. He was still new to magic, but he had to challenge himself to combine it in as many interesting ways as he could think of. Thanks to his TDH, he didn’t even feel drained after using raw mana without the aid of skills. It recovered so quickly that he almost felt like he could keep fighting indefinitely.

The 3 star room was a quick fight. The arena changed slightly again, but this time it was filled with water and only had a few islands to stand on. His opponents were a shark that could control the water with its will and some kind of gator that used the spikes on its back as projectiles. Both of them were dealt with promptly by Seru, who electrocuted the water mercilessly and left them fried to crisps.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

It was just a bad matchup for them.

When he was entering the 4 star room, he noticed that there were already people there. He had no clue who it was though. Had Jack started going to 4 star rooms, or was this Nykal’s party? If so, what did it mean that he caught up so quickly? Were there other groups present that he was unaware of?

There was so much he didn’t know and he had no real way of finding out at the moment, so he focused on the task at hand. He was a little pumped up to know that someone else was also experiencing the same challenge he was about to step into, and since results were going to be tallied he knew he just had to do his best so that he would have a score that completely outclassed whomever it was that was in the room.

This arena had returned to the regular theme, but for the first time, his opponent wasn’t some kind of monster. No, it was a human being this time, equipped with an already drawn black katana with crimson engravings. There was something that was off about the guy though. His body was in a position for combat, but for some reason his movements were… Unnatural.

You two stay back.

He was just guessing, but the crowd’s reaction probably had a direct influence on his overall score, and he found that the crowd reacted best to brutal attacks and awe-inspiring displays of power. He had to keep raising the stakes, and he had already shown the crowd that he was a master of both hand to hand combat and long ranged magic. Next was to show them that he was a swordsman, even if he really wasn’t.

This was going to be great practice for him though. He had a style in mind, one that would make the best use of everything he had in his arsenal, but he needed to use it in live combat to really iron it out. A place where he could do that without the fear of death was a treasure.

That’s how he felt, but he would be lying if he said death didn’t come to mind when he stepped up to the plate. The foe was powerful, he could tell. He felt a familiar chill shoot down his back as the swordsman began to charge him and Amon summoned the blade he had recently acquired.

Their first clash saw Amon on the defensive. He received the overhead strike with ease, then shifted his weight under it so that he was able to maneuver to the side and take a horizontal slash at the man’s midsection. The recoil of the katana being deflected was enough to help shift the man’s momentum, but Amon noticed that he jerked rather violently away, putting some distance between the two of them before rushing back in with an onslaught of successive strikes this time.

Amon was able to keep up as they came in, managing to deflect each and every one of them even though he was slightly distracted by his circumstances.

Why the hell is he moving like a puppet?

He took his eyes off of his opponent for a moment to inspect his surroundings. Was he wrong? Was this not the true enemy?

In that brief window of opportunity, the man suddenly switched up his movements, defying all laws of physics in the process, and shot a roundhouse kick at Amon’s temple. It was all he could do to throw his arm up and block it, but he still found himself unrooted and flying away.

Luckily, he caught himself in the air and landed on his feet without taking too much damage. Still, it was the first time he’d really seen his HP take a substantial hit since he left his mother’s cave.

Minus 1200? Sheesh.

His spine crawled as his senses alerted him of something. He thought it was the enemy at first, but it was just Seru. She hadn’t moved from her spot, but she was staring at the swordsman with such intensity that Amon wondered if she were an Ackerman. Her veins were even popping out due to her fighting her every urge to join the fray!