On my rapid growth to Level 40, there were three evolutions made available to me. The selection at Level 30 was [Draconic Breath: Acid]. My [Acid Spit] was upgraded to include this wider, more pervasive ability. It hung in the air for a few moments like smog over an industrial city.
I intuited that a magical stat shift would provide me with the greatest impact; a field that would allow me to take the center of the battlefield and run my own tempo.
Senior Brother assailed the polluted cloud with a gust of wind, helping to relieve himself of the acrid air that burned his skin, but it did little to purge the infection that dug into the soil. The soles of his feet burbled and seared in the dirt that he tried to hold his ground in.
Made immune to my own toxins by virtue of [Lernaean Blood], I was not hindered at all. I hopped through the boiling soil at full speed. My tail swished through the dirt and sprayed a wave of it towards Senior Brother. He raised his fists to ward away the blinding soil, opening up his midsection to a maximum power punch.
The body’s trunk groaned and tons of toxic earth was dug into the ground, pushing the recipient several feet backwards. But, admirably, Senior Brother was not removed from his feet.
A flick of the finger blew the remaining soil away and Senior Brother met me in the center point between us.
The realm that we existed in was my favorite. Within it, there was only the hunger for a decisive blow; a convention of haymakers, the most potent punch that one could throw. My bone-rattling body shots were met with equally devastating body shots. Defense meant nothing in the face of overwhelming offense. Technique took a back seat to sheer force. It was my will against his.
“You are a beast hidden in a swamp,” Senior Brother insulted in between heavy blows.
“Should I take that as a compliment?”
“You invite better creatures into your domain and drag them into a mire that they can’t use their superior abilities in. All they can do is flail and kick and hope that they can wrench themselves free. Even if you stumbled across something good, our differences should still be insurmountable.”
“Yet, here you are,” I said with a smile. “Making excuses as to why you aren’t winning in the way you expect. Who are these words for? Me? You? Master? I can’t quite tell the purpose.”
A solid red color completely replaced the normally pallid white complexion that matched the ratty color of the charm nailed into Senior Brother’s head. He clenched his fist and excess energy exploded out of him like a frag grenade.
He opened his palm and aimed it directly at me. Cutting winds poured out in a directed line. A trench dug through the ground as it charged directly towards me.
I stepped to the side, but Senior Brother stepped inside of my stance. He pressed his knee against my knee, slightly bending my knee further than I wanted. His palm glowed red again, making a short journey to press against my center of mass. The feeling of mana drain wriggled its cold tendrils through my body.
Instead of forcing him away, I roughly pulled him closer into me until we were nearly pressed together. I could see a momentary look of surprise in his otherwise molten expression; that same emotion you feel when something you’ve been putting all your strength into breaks your way suddenly. But, my action was not that of miserable capitulation to the force.
It was the reversal.
“You are not the only one capable of healing.”
My teeth dug into Senior Brother’s flesh. The bite felt different in my mouth. Gone was the feeling of a clean, puncturing bite. In its place was a jagged, jarring bite. New notches on the teeth caught on flesh and muscle that they wouldn’t normally. When my mouth opened, skin and muscle fibers were ripped by the sharp new additions to my teeth. Even more copious amounts of blood poured from the numerous wounds dug into my victim.
Entering the stage was the Level 35 selection, [Serrated Teeth].
For the second time since I descended into this awful place, all of my teeth had fallen out while I flew, covering the mountainside in the old, obsolete enamel. What grew in its place was excruciating like I was teething chainsaws. Blow spewed from my mouth, but what arrived after enduring that suffering was a machine meant to rip flesh apart.
And I got to use it to its full destructive effects. I was fine trading my mana in exchange for health. Senior Brother was allowed to be healthy again, but, in exchange, his upper body would be nothing more than ground beef and innumerable bleeding conditions to drain that health right back down.
Senior Brother knew this. Angry or not, he was not blind to the fun new decorations to his health bar. It was in his best interests to force me away as soon as he could to progress to the next phase of the fight.
Except that he couldn’t.
Backing out before my full mana depletion would only give me the last bite and the potential to bite more. Save his limb or destroy my mana. Both propositions involved losing something in response. I wanted to see what a proclaimed martial artist would choose.
Unlike the lizard caught in the beak of the eagle, Senior Brother tried to choose not to sacrifice either of his tails. A balled fist smashed into my midsection to try to trip me away. But, I could always maximize my strength to stay put and deliver my own disgusting punch directly into his body.
Which is what I did.
But, that shift in stats caused the temporary abandonment of my magic. My mana disappeared as a result and, much to Senior Brother’s relief, my healing ended.
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That did not stop my death from being shaped the way that he wanted. Just because I stopped healing from it didn’t mean that I couldn’t continue to disable the left side of Senior Brother’s body. That did not undo the damage already done and it did not purchase the opportunity to use an item to reverse it. From now until the conclusion of the fight, I would not relinquish what I had gained in that exchange.
It was my battle to own through speed and tempo; through body positioning and heinous punches designed exclusively to bring this fight to an immediate conclusion.
That conclusion was yet to be reached. A wounded elephant was still an elephant. Despite the injury, Senior Brother was still able to dodge most of my attacks with patient deflection. Heavy handed strikes kept being pushed to the side. No counter-attacks, no limb was available to do that outside of a stray kick every so often. Other than that, it was my own assault.
Frustratingly, sacrificing my mana to reach this point of advantage made it difficult to bring it to a conclusion. Our roles were set. I was the attacker and he was the defender. If Senior Brother relented to try to heal, I would rip him to shreds. If I backed off to recover my mana, Senior Brother would be able to repair his arm. I had to break through his defenses and he had to use my power and flip it against me. The honesty in which we knew the conclusion of the fight made our next moves obvious.
I threw a heavy overhand with my right. My fist was caught in Senior Brother’s palm and pushed across his body to overextend my posture. While Senior Brother repositioned his own body to deliver a light jab to my racing form, I twisted to reveal another heavy left hand swing that occupied Senior Brother’s counter attacking hand so that I could recover from the overextension.
He was as frustrated with his lack of options and weak counters as I was with my overabundance of shit attacks. Time was marching onwards without anything that could even be considered as satisfying.
Any attack utilizing the Master’s style was pointless. Dozens of lifetimes went into Senior Brother’s training as opposed to my two years of practice. Even my best feeling punches were sent wayward by expert redirection. My most savage attacks were too rigid; the build-up and release far too obvious to catch someone of his caliber off guard.
Misdirection was the only avenue that I had to land any attacks whatsoever. I had committed my body to suboptimal positions to allow my attacks to accumulate any sort of damage on Senior Brother.
Even that wasn’t as effective as I would have hoped as my latest attack was adapted to and blocked. Sight wasn’t the primary way that Senior Brother synthesized information. There was something hidden within my mana, my innate intent that I could not obscure that provided Senior Brother with this annoyingly tenacious defense.
He threw another short punch, one that I could only try to flick away with a hand that I was about to use to string into my next attack. In my head, it was a nuisance; nothing more than a strike meant to slow me down further.
It wasn’t until it reached close to my body that I felt the dripping concentration of mana that hung off of his fist. I had been lulled into a procedural fight so that he could unleash this attack. He could have thrown it from a millimeter and it would have hit the same as if he had a mile to run up.
I twisted as quickly as I could and the punch glanced against me. It was still enough contact that I could feel the martial arts equivalent of an ICBM brush against me. The valley turned white with bright light and even the soil itself melted away. My scales closest to the strike zone were peeled off of my body like I was covered with an orange peel. An angry red wound stretched from my collarbone to my pelvis.
My vision swam with bright light and my ears rang from the mana bomb that was detonated atop me. I swung around blindly to keep Senior Brother from finding a decisive opening.
That did not stop me from eating shit in the meantime though. A mutual loss in vision only benefited one party. I felt punches all over my body. Anywhere that my sweeping defenses weren’t, a fist appeared to leave a stinging impact on my flesh.
With a quick shift into mana, I was able to emit another [Draconic Breath] in all directions. As the caustic mist tickled my gaping wounds and a gust of wind buffeted my body, I was able to blink a blurry vision back into my eyes just in time to see Senior Brother leaping towards me.
I flailed wildly, emboldening Senior Brother to finally commit himself to his own decisive attack. He reached full speed with his one good arm pulled back, exposing everything that I needed. Just as he smiled with joy, I whipped my head towards him; my eyes full of clarity. Senior Brother could not change his momentum in time to prevent me from spinning around and meeting him in center mass with my final evolution.
Something interesting happened after I chose [Serrated Teeth]. When I reached Level 40, I only had one option remaining. There were only nine levels of Transformation. What would happen at Level 50, I could not say, but, for now, I only had one option left. At the time, I viewed it as an afterthought compared to the obvious power offered by the other two. But, now, at this crucial time, I saw a place for it to shine.
[Axe Tail].
Twin half-moon blades that grew from either side of my tail dug into Senior Brother’s midsection. The speed that he carried himself with did most of the work for me as he split himself in two against the sharp edge of my tail.
Senior Brother’s body ripped in half from the amount of power placed against the razor sharp edge of the blade. His upper half floated through the air for a moment before falling towards earth.
But I would not allow it to hit the ground.
My body fully flexed and unleashed a punch that contained every scrap of power that it could conjure. As soon as I set my body, I felt it. My form, built by endless fights with myself locked into perfect position. My soul, alight from the joyous sight in front of it, buzzed with power. My body, strong and weightless, absorbed that power and concentrated it on the edge of its knuckles.
“Even at the end, you give him your blessing,” Senior Brother murmured.
The teaching of Master ripped through me as my fist connected with the nail that skewered Senior Brother’s forehead. All of the accumulated power in my body moved from my soul and into that nail.
It hummed and shook with power before finally freeing itself from the position it was stuck in. The nail tore through Senior Brother’s skull, collapsing his head and shooting out the other side like a bloody bullet. The metal stake whistled through the air before impacting on a faraway hill in an explosion that shook the pocket realm.
I took several exhales before I began to laugh at my triumph. What deep satisfaction I felt through the death of this stupid fuck. Cry about your Master all you wish, without your own unique strength, it was all meaningless.
I activated [Urgent News] and sent word of my victory and desire of payment to Charles.
Not even a second passed before a letter and a Portal carver appeared in my Inventory. The letter said one sentence: Good work, report back.
“At least he’s consistent,” I said with a sigh as I took the metal tool from my inventory and pressed it into the ground.
A lattice of runes and carvings extended from the little metal tool and light filled the dirt trenches. An orange color filled the middle and promised a return to Charles’ den.
I went to lift up Senior Brother’s body but stopped for a moment. Within me, there was an urge that wished to voice its desire. The stats that I gained through the victory and the further stats I would purchase through my reward was not enough. With a few bites, I could obtain so much more.
My eyes flickered between the portal and Senior Brother’s body. But, any hesitation was clearly for show. I wanted to make anyone that watched see that I at least thought about it before making the obvious decision. But, if that wasn’t enough, I would tell everyone that could hear my phony rationale, purpose built to offer me the smallest scrap of excuse.
“He never said what condition I needed to bring him in. It would be a waste not to have a little.”