The possessed knight glared at the android with greater intensity than before, not because of any idea that he was losing but because of how long he had let the fight needlessly drag on. What a waste this whole endeavor had been. What tiresome mockery of who he was.
Contemplating his current circumstances, the armored man grew angry at the situation. How could he be made a fool of? How could this stranger stall for so long, and keep victory out of his grasp for what felt like forever? He knew that he deserved to beat the shining adventurer down. He deserved to move up the tower. He could feel it. He felt a voice affirming him of such ideals. Victory was his. It was meant to be his. Was he just going to give up now? Was he going to let someone he barely knew surpass him and reach farther up the tower of Lemaerk than he could? No. Never.
He felt the adrenaline coursing through his veins. He felt the power. He wasn’t sure why, but he had felt stronger these last few minutes. It wasn’t just his armor enchantment. It wasn’t just his sword. He felt stronger. More capable. And he was not going to let anyone tear him down while he felt this… good.
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Riva, with Roman by her side, had more or less stopped fighting against the crowd. She and the moss-covered cat had both received small orbs of light above them, just as they had on Floor 2. Apparently, the rules of the floor had something to do with defeating a certain number of other participants on the floor, though she hadn’t bothered to keep track. Considering how many she and the mosstail had dealt with before she realized the lights hanging above their heads, which she admitted she could have noticed late, and the fact that they each would have had to earn one, Riva estimated that each floor participant was required to defeat 3 others on the floor before moving upward.
The woman thought about the witch she had met just a short while ago, Emirelle. She recalled how the red-and-yellow-garbed woman had possessed a similar floating orb when the two met. She had tapped the ball just as Leone had shown them to do on Floor 2, except instead of teleporting to a center area of the floor to walk through a door, she had simply disappeared from the room entirely. Considering how confident she was, she seemed to know what she was doing. Riva figured that on this floor, once you were done, activating the ball of light teleported you straight to the next floor. Or perhaps to a staircase between floors that wasn’t visible. Either way, once you decided to move forward, you couldn’t come back. Because of that presumed fact, Riva hesitated on activating her or Roman’s floating orb, as she did not want to move on without her companions. She looked down at Roman and told the cat-like creature it was because she did not want to leave them behind, to which the mosstail just stared at her. She finally admitted it was also for their own safety, but she had meant the first part, too.
Not needing to fight anymore, Riva stayed away from the other fighters as best she could, staying on the move to avoid new combatants as they popped in. She looked around for her companions and saw Leone lying on the floor up ahead. Frazzled, she rushed over to the young man, Roman only a second behind her.
When she finally reached him, she reached down to feel his neck. His head had been turned away from her, and when she came around to see his face, she panicked at the sight of his eyes closed. Putting two pingers just under his jaw, she felt him flinch, causing her to pull her hand back. “Leone?” she asked nervously. “Leo, are you alright?”
Leone grumbled at the woman’s attention. “All good,” he said weakly and unbelievingly. “Just… resting.”
“Can you move, dear? You look really beat up.”
“Mm… no, no… I’m good,” mumbled the young man. “Just had… a little scuffle, and can’t really move my muscles is all… ugh…”
“Aw hun’, alright, you just stay still and keep those eyes closed. You won’t draw any attention to yourself as long as you’re lying like this.”
“You know, I… I think I’m good with… that idea,” groaned Leone sarcastically.
Just then, Riva heard a small clink behind her. She turned to see a knife on the ground a few feet away from her, and above, a feliome hunter hanging in the air, wrapped in vines. The ropes of viridian wrapped around the feline woman’s neck, choking her as she clawed at the hold they had on her. Riva looked over to see Roman’s tail extended, just as it had been when Azim was pinned by the borc leader, spreading into several vines that held the feliome in the air. Looking back down at the knife, the woman realized the feliome had tried to sneak up on her, but the mosstail had intervened. She waddled over to Roman and gave him a partial hug, rubbing his forehead and whispering, “Good kitty, Roman. Good kitty.”
“Let her go now, though, okay?” continued Riva, calming the dark green cat down. “We don’t need to hurt her more than that.”
Listening to the woman’s words, Roman loosed the vines of his tail and dropped the feliome woman, who landed on one knee and paw. She looked up at Riva and asked in a jaded tone, “Why?”
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The fabric seller replied softly that she had no need to hurt anyone else, and understood there was no malice behind the feliome’s intentions. She simply wanted to move up to the next floor and Riva had seemed like an easy target. There was no need to get unnecessary revenge for that. The feline hunter was shocked, but did not let it show too much. “Well, don’t expect to get anything back from me,” she stated bitterly.
“I won’t,” replied Riva, who then held out the bone sword Azim had given her. “But why don’t you take this? It’s not really my style, so you can have it if you’d like.”
The feliome got up before responding, picking up her knife as she did. “I don’t need that,” she said curtly, before turning.
Unexpectedly, the hunter then paused. She turned her head back slightly, admitting, “It’s… not my style either. Thank you though.”
Without another word, the feliome ran off into the crowd, in search of another target. Riva saw her throw something to the ground, creating a cloud of dark blue and purple smoke that she then disappeared into. The woman turned back to Roman and thanked the cat for helping. She asked the mosstail to keep a lookout while she took care of Leone. Panicked, the woman then looked around for Azim. She was confused to see him battling the knight, though she soon noticed something weird about the armored man’s eyes. “Oh, no…” she mumbled.
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Still at each other’s throats, neither fighter was letting up with the other. Now carrying it in his exposed left hand, the possessed knight swung his sword rabidly, his right hand still free to make use of the enchantment to his armor. Every few moves, the armored man would follow up a swing with a reinforced right hook, and every time he did, he would miss. The closest he would get would be Azim’s large sword, which would dent upon impact from the knight’s reinforced fist.
The android, however, was still holding his own pretty well. The steely swordsman countered every swing of the knight’s broadsword, rolling out of the way of more complex attacks or blocking hits with his own sword. His weapon was starting to deform from all the damage, but it did not matter much to the android, for he could read that the knight was slowly losing his composure.
As time passed, the two fighters slowly wore each other down, Azim stripping away the possessed knight’s armor bit by bit while the man broke down the robot’s sword arm until it was barely functional. Trying again, the android found he still could not disarm the armored man’s sword from him, though the robot was not one to dwell on or get deterred by things he could not accomplish. Instead, his method was to wait until it was possible, often working to be the reason it became possible.
The slash took Azim by surprise. He knew his sword was damaged, he was aware that it was dented, and yet he still had not anticipated this. The robot had expected a few more seconds of use out of his weapon.
After having kicked the large sword so that it bent, the armored man took advantage of the weakened state of the weapon and swung his broadsword, aiming for the creased point of the robot’s blade. Azim tried to put up his guard in defense, but the knight’s sword cleaved right through the android’s. In a fraction of a second, the metal man noticed his opponent’s blade slicing through his own and jumped back, just moments before the incoming sword got any closer. With not much of a weapon left, Azim stopped trying to block the possessed man’s attacks with his arm, instead simply ducking and dodging out of range.
Azim ran through his possible options in his digital brain, simulating hypotheticals for what could potentially work. If the android had been human, or any other species in this new world, he might have been irritated at his forced change in tactics. The robot had been maintaining an intense pressure against the man in armor, yet now that his weapon, and arm, was half its size, he was not able to achieve as much. Normally, one would panic at the situation or even get physically frantic. They might get desperate, acting erratically or drawing a blank on what to do. Azim, however, did not think or react this way.
Despite his less than advantageous circumstances, the robot did not consider himself at a loss, or even inconvenienced. Instead, his composure and movement remained relatively the same, the only significant difference being less of a focus on offense.
Finally, the knight tried to jab the android directly forward, ramming his sword ahead of him with both hands gripping the hilt. This was his first real slip-up. Because of his altered state of mind and heightened anger, the possessed man in armor, or what was left of it, had become brash and impulsive. Those traits were revealing themselves in full at this moment.
Without enough of a blade to parry or counter, Azim made use of the unique feature of his weapon. He propped his arm up in front of him so that the hole in the sword was facing the knight. As the armored man thrust his weapon toward the robot, Azim guided the blade through the hole, trapping the sword in his own broken one. Before the tip of the blade stabbed Azim in the face, he twisted his arm so that his broken sword pulled on the knight’s weapon, forcing it to the ground and making him lose control of its path. As he did, the robot shifted his stance so that his right arm was back, pulling the stuck broadsword with it. Doing so, he flung his left arm down, bending the broadsword just as the knight had done to him with one clean chop. Following the sharp blow, Azim quickly brought his arm back up and slammed the back of his closed hand into the possessed man’s face, before then palming the collar of his remaining armor, knocking him back.
Regaining his balance, the armored man stared at the loosened weapon in his hand, now distorted beyond usability. He glared at the robot, who was already closing the distance between the two of them once more. Frantic and enraged, the possessed knight threw the warped blade at the metal man, winding it up with his right arm to add some extra power.
The twisted weapon flung wobbly through the air, to which Azim rolled to the side to avoid, not breaking stride. Due to the bent nature of the weapon and the awkward trajectory of its flight, the broadsword managed to scratch Azim across his armored exterior, though it did not slow him down.
Finally reaching the man in little armor, Azim paused, not really intending to attack. Already too worked up by the current situation, the possessed man threw his right arm forward, trying to blast the robot away. Employing the same move twice, Azim put his broken sword arm in front of his body, facing the hole of the weapon toward the knight as he flung his arm forward. As his arm slid through the opening in the broken triangular sword, the aura around his gauntlet bumped into the rim of the hole, cracking the weapon and almost breaking it apart entirely. However, Azim was sure of his strategy. He was sure of his weapon, and he was sure of his own constitution.
At that moment, the android felt a strange sensation run through his circuits and along his metal. It was as if his materials were getting thicker… getting stronger. The blade in front of him, while initially rattling and starting to crack, began to stabilize, a sheen glossing over the entire sword as it did. Something about his weapon, about his entire body, had improved, and the robot was ready to make the best use of it.