Caeden barely listened as Elune announced his entrance to the arena. He was staring at Victor's smiling face. The same smile he wore all through his match with Jared. The same cocky, confident smile as when he moved to sever Jared's neck. He was still smiling as if he were at a party or a carnival. Like this was all fun to him.
A broad grin covered his entire face but didn't reach his eyes. The second he looked at them, Caeden's attention entirely shifted. Those eyes… were empty, with no spark of life. It was like looking into the eyes of a corpse. They weren't human eyes.
"Well, I'm glad you came out. As soon as I'd heard there was another dual-shrouded at the Academy, I figured you'd show up sooner rather than later. The nemesis is supposed to menace the protagonist early in the story, you know? You kept me waiting for half a year! Now we can finally duke it out." Victor spouted off, teeth bared. The more Caeden watched his face, the less his expression looked like a grin, and the more it looked like the snarl of a rabid animal. At that moment, Caeden knew exactly what he was going to do.
He was going to knock out Victor's teeth and shove them down his throat.
Maybe he would learn to smile less. It wasn't a good look on him. Caeden kind of hated it. In fact, he hated it a lot. So he was going to make Victor stop.
He's powerful and cunning. There is no mercy in him, but he's also cautious. There's no guarantee of winning or even survival. He's shown a willingness to kill. Caeden acknowledged the thought, internalized it, and then discarded it. He wasn't concerned with winning right now. Stopping that smile was more important. It was upsetting to look at.
"AAAAAND BEGIN!"
"Rose Garden."
"Dyson Sphere!"
Caeden and Victor simultaneously engaged mnemonics the second the fight started. Caeden's improved rose garden produced double the number of thorns, 200. Despite that, it cost him the same amount as his last iteration. Additionally, with how much his shroud had grown, what had previously cost him a fifth of his shroud only cost a tenth now. The doubled size also meant half the recovery time. In less than thirty seconds, his thorns would bring his shroud back to maximum capacity before moving even higher.
Victor's mnemonic created hundreds of small square mirrors, only a few centimeters in length and width and thin as a sheet of paper. They rotated around him in a giant sphere, all equidistant from each other. Rays of light shot out of Victor and began to bounce between all the mirrors until they surrounded him in a brilliantly shining field of contained light beams.
Caeden guessed it was a defensive ability. He hadn't used it in any previous fight, which meant he considered Caeden a considerable threat. That was both gratifying and frustrating. Caeden was fine with being underestimated, but the idea that Victor feared him on some level was…amusing.
He couldn't guarantee it was a defense ability, so Caeden resolved to test it. "Lock." A single thorn out of the cloud surrounding him started rotating dozens of times faster than it had. When he had redesigned the thorns, Caeden kept this mnemonic in mind. He wanted to make the construct capable of surviving significantly higher forces than his original model. The new design could spin twenty times faster than the first iteration before the petals began to warp.
After a second of runaway acceleration, the thorn finally collapsed under the force of its rotational velocity and instantly stopped, locking all that kinetic energy into the construct as it did. "Release." Caeden had refined this portion of the two-part mnemonic as well. The petals that formed the thorn's rose shape all folded around each other, tightening into a long thin spike of crimson shroud. Three small protrusions formed at the back as guidance veins to stabilize the thorn's trajectory. Then it fired. The process took a fraction of a second, faster than Caeden could see. He only knew what had happened because he had designed the mnemonic.
The thorn, now looking like its namesake, created a muffled boom as it broke the sound barrier heading toward Victor. Once again, Caeden couldn't see it move. In less than the time it took to blink, the construct had crossed the entire arena to slam into Victor's creation, where it created another boom accompanied by a sound like glass shattering. Victor's field of light and mirrors appeared unaffected.
"Well, that was cool, but you're not going to bust through my Dyson sphere with something as small as that. C'mon, show me what you got!" Victor taunted through the wall of his creation.
Caeden could practically hear that smile. "Lock." He flicked his hand, and a dozen more thorns began to accelerate.
"Well, that might work." Victor chuckled. "Kienzan!" Out of his ball, a disc of silver lined with an edge of light flew straight at Caeden.
"Release." Caeden let loose three thorns, firing them off to intercept the incoming attack. In rapid succession, they struck the whirring circle with small metallic pings and knocked it slightly off course. While they did, Caeden drew Forged Infinity and shifted it into 001, the blade. Bracing, he held his shrouded weapon to the side parallel to the ground. As the deflected kienzan flew past him, Caeden's blade was there to intercept, cutting the creation in half.
Caeden had to hold fast and push back against the spinning saw blade. It packed a ridiculous amount of force and even Forged Infinity couldn't cut it easily. Combined, Caeden's enhanced strength and the attack's momentum managed to rip his blade right through it, destroying the shroud holding it together.
"What? I call hacks! The kienzan is supposed to cut through anything!" Despite his words, Victor's tone was still full of amusement.
Not willing to sit still, Caeden dashed across the arena, blade at the ready. He wasn't going to sit here while Victor threw out attacks from inside a bubble. "Release!" As he charged, he sent the remaining primed thorns blasting toward the faction leader. Each of them reached long ahead of him, flying past and causing the air to ripple under the force of their speed. Each hit caused that same glass-shattering sound he had heard the first time, all in rapid succession. It sounded like someone dropping a crate of fine china down a set of stairs.
Caeden's speed brought him within range moments later. Victor hadn't responded in those few seconds, confirming Caeden's hunch. He had to work to maintain that defense against Caeden's attacks. Lock/Release hit hard, and he couldn't shrug it off, no matter how much he faked it.
Up close, Victor's shield bubble was blindingly bright. Caeden relied on his investigative sense to see properly. His retinas were safe, just as enhanced as the rest of his golden body. But just because they weren't damaged didn't mean seeing through that brilliance was any more possible than before. Light was light.
Striking out with Forged Infinity, Caeden stabbed into the sphere. Or at least, he tried to. The second the tip of his crimson blade touched the wall of light and mirrors, it violently rebounded. His whole body jerked to the side under the force as the golden grip was nearly ripped out of his hands. It almost knocked him over. The level of power was surprising. More surprising, or perhaps enlightening, was the direction of the force.
All the light in that sphere, backed so dense it was physical, all rotated in one direction. Caeden hadn't taken the time to think about what that would do. The rotational force had impacted Forged Infinity the second it tried to slip through, pushing the weapon back out again. This was a much more effective defense than Caeden had assumed. Energy attacks might have been better, but Caeden didn't have any. Both his shrouds were purely physical.
With no better idea, Caeden changed weapons. From 001 to 006. After a few mechanical clicks and whirs, he held a golden-handled, red-bladed woodcutter's axe. Another click and a hydraulic hiss, and the dial shifted to 063. Now he had a two-handed axe with a half-moon blade the size of his head. WIth a massive heave, Caeden slammed the axe head into the light wall, angling it against the flow of light around the sphere.
Sparks flew. Caeden braced and pushed against the flow, resisting the force trying to throw Forged Infinity out of the light with all the might he could muster. Still, it managed to push him back. His feet scraped against the floor of the arena in an attempt to find purchase. The large surface area of the half-moon edge and the heavier weight meant he wouldn't bounce off like the thin blade.
"Strength form." Unwilling to give up, golden-purple smoke drifted from Caeden's lips. His body bulged, adding a foot to his height and doubling his muscle mass. His muscles went from large to herculean in size. Slamming a foot down, Caeden broke through the solid metal floor and stuck his foot in. He would not be dislodged so easily. Forged Infinity Ate away at the shroud holding the sphere together the whole time. He could feel it bleeding out, the momentum dying.
"Oh no, you fucking don't!" Victor wasn't going to stand by. He raised a hand inside his sphere, pointing at Caeden's leg. "Spirit Gun!" A beam of hyper-intensified light, an actual laser, fired from the tip of his pointer finger and burned into Caeden's leg.
Grunting in pain, Caeden kept going. His golden body was made of sterner stuff. A hit like that wasn't going to dislodge him. He dug his axe in harder, bushing deeper and letting the shrouded weapon eat up even more of Victor's shroud.
"Spirit Gun Barrage!" Victor didn't sound so amused anymore. Rapid-fire, ten beams of light lit up across Caeden's body from his legs up to his torso. They seared into his enhanced flesh. None penetrated deep, but they did get through his skin, burning nerves and muscle.
Still, he held on. This level of damage was nothing. If Victor thought he could dislodge Caeden that easily, he was delusional.
"Kienzan!"
Unfortunately, that wasn't something Caeden could ignore. The cutting power would be enough to take a limb off if he let it land. So, jumping back and disengaging, Caeden swung his axe at the incoming disk. This form of Forged Infinity didn't have as much cutting power as 001, so when the edge of his axe and the spinning blade of the kienzan met, they reflected, bouncing off each other.
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Landing once more, Caeden dashed forward, landing a heavy overhead chop onto the Dyson sphere. It bounced just as his blade had, but he expected that. Caeden just wanted to see if he felt a difference. Sure enough, it felt like the bubble had less of a kick, the force only a portion of what it had been before. His efforts had succeeded, if only in part.
There was no opportunity to start the same strategy again, as he could hear the kienzan coming around to hit him again. Work purely off aura sense, Caeden swung his axe blindly behind him, the hit connecting with the saw blade's glowing edge and rebounding it once more.
"Kienzan! Spirit Gun!" Victor wasn't content to let Caeden take his time and devise a way through that shield. Another spinning blade came flying out of the bubble, followed by a shot aimed at his face. Caeden blocked both shots with Forged Infinity, the kienzan joining its twin winging off into the arena before turning to circle back on him.
"Speed form." Caeden shifted tactics. His body shrunk and compressed, taking a sleek, aerodynamic form. Additionally, he shifted Forged Infinity over to 003, the dagger. He clicked again to 031, dual daggers. With his enhancements narrowly focused on speed, the two blades coming after him felt incredibly slow. He could dodge them easily.
He backed off. Something Victor likely forgot about, but Caeden had been planning on, occurred. The thorns he had left on the far side of the arena had completely restored his shroud. Now everything they made was pure profit. So naturally, Caeden made more. "Rose Garden."
There were almost 400 thorns in the arena now. Caeden would be at max capacity in fifteen seconds. The whole fight so far hadn't even reached a minute. Caeden had his new thorns join the old on the far side of the arena, out of the way. They were for later. Right now, he had to keep Victor's focus on him, which might be difficult. He wasn't stupid after all. The threat of that many thorns was pretty clear.
Time to be the most annoying asshole in existence. Caeden laughed internally. This felt nice, in a weird way. He doubted Victor would be smiling in a minute. Rushing forward, his speed blurring his form, Caeden slammed both daggers into the Dyson sphere at speed. Then he let the force of its flow bounce him off. He went with the motion, ejected from the bubble at an angle and with a significant push.
The instant he got his feet back under him, Caeden did it again. He was daring Victor to focus on the thorns, as it would give him an opening to brute force his way through the Dyson sphere. It was a catch-22. Either way, Victor got screwed.
Oh, come on! NOVA!" Unless he had something else up his sleeve.
A wave of white light erupted from within the sphere, slamming into Caeden and carrying him across the arena. The whole way, it burned into him, melting the skin off his body. Caeden's speed form had reduced defenses, focusing entirely on evasion. Area attacks were his one big weakness in this form.
Gritting his teeth through the searing pain, Caeden endured until his body was slammed into the wall. The wave dissipated against the barrier, finally letting him drop. He was in bad shape. His chest, arms, and legs had swaths of melted skin. The school robes, though undamaged, offered no protection. In one move, Victor had utterly reversed the momentum of the fight.
Glancing over, Caeden saw his thorns remained. However that attack worked, it hadn't affected his constructs. There was still a chance. "Defense form." Shifting over to his last transformation mnemonic, Caeden's skin thickened, and his whole body became more squat and rugged. This form amplified defense, turning his own body into a fortress. It also increased his regeneration. He needed to recover.
The two kienzans came at him again, but Caeden had an answer in this form. A quick switch from daggers to gauntlet, Caeden slammed his palm into one blade as it came for him, forcing it into the other. Then he slammed both to the ground, killing all their momentum, and broke them in half.
He needed a moment to recover. Considering the lack of attacks coming from the Dyson sphere, Caeden assumed that attack had also taken a toll on Victor. Taking stock, Caeden realized his biggest problem was Physical Enhancement. He would run out eventually. Probably sooner than Victor lost either of his shrouds. He was using it too much. All this healing was shroud intensive.
Victor finished his recovery before Caeden. A series of light beams shot across the arena, pelting his enhanced defenses. These minor attacks were nothing more than a nuisance in his current form, but they ate up resources he couldn't spare. So Caeden decided to resume his assault despite his only partially healed state.
"Speed form." He started to dash in, but Victor wouldn't let him.
"Point Defense System." A series of mirrors unfolded from the mass of the Dyson sphere. Dense beams of light shot out from the sphere and along the mirrors, which aimed the beams at Caeden's speeding form. He had to dash to the side to avoid them, but they continued unabated, tracing after him and burning the walls and floor of the arena. These light attacks were orders of magnitude better than the small shots Victor had shown him.
Caeden smiled a bit. It was a grim smile, but a happy one. He was hurt, but it seemed Victor was finally pulling out his truly serious attacks. He was being pressed, possibly for the first time today. All of Victor's previous matches were much tamer than this. No one had been able to get past his defenses, and he only ever stepped out because he was running low on shroud.
Now Caeden was pressing his previously invulnerable defenses, and he didn't like it. Unfortunately, Victor was good. His new mnemonic wouldn't let Caeden get anywhere near the sphere, always cutting him off if he tried to approach. Caeden was struggling just to evade, let alone close the distance. His previous strategies wouldn't work.
Checking internally, Caeden realized he was very close to his closing move. It was a bit early, but he wasn't sure he had a choice. He couldn't keep running like this. Retreating, Caeden fell back to his grove of thorns, hundreds filling the air on the far side of the arena. Hopefully, this worked.
"Rose Garden. Rose Garden." Dropping his reserves by as fifth, Caeden now had 800 thorns. Victor had to be feeling a bit pressed for resources at this point. Caeden was. Physical Enhancement was down to under half his max. However, Sharp was better than ever.
"Lock." Hundred of thorns, half his number, began to accelerate.
Victor noticed the change. "Great Wall!" Once more, a wall of mirrored bricks formed, separating the two and adding to the defenses of the Dyson sphere.
"Release." A storm of thorns exploded across the intervening space, slamming into the wall and shattering sections of it outright. It began to collapse under the force, and number of crimson streaks slamming into it at hypersonic speeds. Before even half the released thorns had impacted, the wall shattered.
Through the wall, Victor's Dyson sphere continued to spin. The second it was exposed, more thorns began to hit, and the sound of glass shattering increased to a deafening roar stabbing at Caeden's ears.
He wasn't paying attention. The thorns were to buy time, not win. Caeden had no illusions that even this number of attacks would take Victor down. Indeed, his aura sense told him that even though Victor was fully engaged with sustaining his defense and the Dyson sphere was weakening; it wasn't going to break.
No, he was working on his actual final attack. Crouching, one foot leading toward Victor's position, Caeden held cupped hands wreathed in red lines of shroud above his navel. The remaining thorns began to pour into the space between his fingers, overlapping each other and compressing down.
Caeden had learned from his misfire during the battle royale ranking day. It had taken months to create a stable version of the attack he performed on accident, but he had done it. It just took a long time to change up. Thus the distraction with the released thorns. Hundreds of thorns poured into his new construct, condensing further and further, the red of his Sharp shroud deepening in color to an almost purple crimson, like a violent bruise.
Before he was halfway done, the rain of thorns was stopped much sooner than Caeden would have hoped. The Point Defense System Victor had established turned back on, attacking incoming thorns and destroying them before they reached the sphere.
"Oh, so you're changing your final move, ehh? Fine, I'll play along." Victor dropped his defenses, smile gone and replaced by an animalistic snarl. "Let me show you an attack that is literally out of this world."
Victor took on a similar stance to Caeden, but with both hands touching, knuckles braced against each other. “KAAAAAAAA-”
His voice seemed to resonate, streams of light collapsing around his hands into a sphere. "MEEEEEEE-"
Caeden continued to charge his own attack. Once his mnemonic began, he had to continue, or the attack could backfire.
“HAAAAAAA-”
The streams of light flowing into Victor's attack grew thicker, brighter.
"MEEEEEEE-"
Caeden's attack was nearly complete, all the thorns, over four hundred, condensed down into a single one of deep purple. He was ready to fi-
“HAAAAAAAA!!!!”
Victor thrust his hands out, a beam of light as thick as his torso blasting straight for Caeden.
"ROSE CANNON!"
Caeden released his attack, the petal of the thorn in his palm opening wide to release all their stored energy in the form of a single beam of dark red power exploding into the distance, racing to intercept Victor's attack.
The beams met in the middle, colliding with a teeth-rattling boom like the fists of giants colliding. Their energy, white and red, spooled out at the point of collision, arcing into the air and floor, ripping into the arena, and throwing debris into the air. They pushed against each other, repelling back and forth.
Caeden's beam failed.
It lasted a few long seconds before giving out and crumpling under the pressure of Victor's larger attack. The white beam lanced through the remains of the dying red and slammed into Caeden.
{}
Victor panted, out of breath. Using the Kamehameha was exhausting. The sheer volume of shroud that went into it was staggering. After he formed the mnemonic, his respect for a particular spiky-haired martial artist grew. Still, worth it. The technique had never once failed to win him a fight, even against some of the military trainers that raised him in this weird, dystopian world.
Ha! That'll show him. Don't fuck with the protagonist, you side character. He smirked. He had been surprised to hear about another dual-shrouded in school and even more surprised when the arrogant dick hadn't shown up to challenge him. With a monicker like Golden God, the dude had to be a villain, right?
He had been way more powerful than Victor had given him credit. He was at under a fourth for both his shrouds right now. If this weren't the Ether Soldier's last round, he would be worried. Fortunately, the only other real threat on their team was that Meteoris chick that used ice. He could burn through her, then sit back and watch his team wi-...what was that?
Out of the dust kicked up by the colliding beams, Victor heard a steady thumping. He could swear it sounded like footsteps. His eyes widened. In his relief, he had let his investigative sense relax. A snarling face of gold and purple came flying out of the dust cloud, accompanied by a body to match, fist raised.
Before Victor could react, that fist slammed into his face, and he felt things break.
Stumbling, blind, and stunned by the unexpected pain, Victor reacted on instinct. Bands of mirror metal closed around his limbs, and he leapt into the air. Wiping blood from his face, he looked down at his supposedly defeated opponent. He was taking deep, gulping breaths and looked dead on his feet.
Some of that probably had to do with the chunk of his torso that was missing. The wound was cauterized, burned over. From his hip to his ribs, the left side of his body, nearly a half foot deep, was completely gone. Victor's attack had landed; how was he standing?
Victor scowled, several broken teeth dropping out of his bleeding mouth. Through the blood and broken mass, he spat, "Rasen-"
Before he could even finish the mnemonic for his pen-ultimate attack, the golden giant wobbled and slumped. He was obviously unconscious but still standing. Still undefeated.
"We…WE HAVE A WINNER! VICTOR OF THE ETHER SOLDIERS IS VICTORIOUS!!" Elune's stumbling, surprised announcement caused the crowd to roar their approval at the best match of the entire day.
Despite all the applause, Victor felt like he was the one who lost.