As he locked eyes with his latest opponent, Leon began to think on his goal for the day- developing the Giant Slayer Style. A sword style with only one technique was clearly too shabby. Helm Breaker was a technique that relied on taking advantage of the opponent's momentum to fuel a powered up strike and while Leon trusted in the technique's power, it alone wasn't enough. If Leon wanted to develop the style in his fights today he would first need to decide on the core tenet of the style.
Overwhelming force? No, it made use of force but that wasn't quite right. Thinking about it, didn't Helm Breaker already offer him a suitable tenet to structure the style around? One of using the opponent's force against them, stealing their momentum and using it to boost your own blows. Obviously, the bigger the opponent the more momentum they would generate, meaning the style would excel in facing down larger foes.
"For a name I came up with on the spot it fits kinda well."
Now the hard part- how to leverage this carnotaurus' strength against it?
Leon's ruminations ended here, the beast giving him no more time to consider, as its charge took it right into the bulk of Bladeless, the rough iron slab serving its intended purpose, halting the dino's rush. Gnashing fangs closed around cold metal, the harsh scraping and screeching of tooth against blade resounding through the woods.
The physical force at play in their clash was all Leon focused on- the way his arms shook from absorbing the blow, as the momentum of the charge was transferred into his blade and up into his body. Facing a head on charge, like this one, what was the optimal move to retaliate with that would exploit the generated force?
The carnotaurus hadn't let up with the momentum, clawing at the dirt, forcing Leon back, the ground giving way under the force the creature was exerting. A stroke of inspiration struck, as Leon moved his blade to the side, leaping back and allowing the carnotaurus to continue its rush.
Lacking the intelligence to notice it was being played, the beast continued to charge, mouth open. This what was Leon was waiting for, exploiting the opening the lizard had given him, he leapt straight toward the dinosaur, twisting his body to the side at the last second while he jammed Bladeless through the bottom of the lizard's mouth, sinking the blade deep into the earth, trapping the dinosaur in place while he retreated.
The carnotaurus' momentum halted as it desperately tried to free itself from the iron stake that bound it, roars fading to subdued whines as the creature's thrashing tore open fresh wounds with every attempt to free itself, blood spilling from its open jaws onto the dirt beneath.
It then attempted to close its jaws, the action sending the hilt of Bladeless through the roof of its mouth and out its nostril, the foolish attempt to bite down on the foreign object eliciting fresh cries of pain, the animal too stupid to free itself from the predicament.
Wavecutter ended its misery, a use of Low Tide splitting the skull in two. Leon then spent a few minutes prying open the beast's mouth, retrieving Bladeless from within while storing the corpse in his storage ring.
"I really didn't think that one through- could've just went for the brain, went up through the roof of the mouth, held Bladeless up like a spear and let the big dummy kill itself with its own charge. Oh well, I'm sure there are more geckos to fight."
More geckos there certainly were, Leon had hardly travelled any distance at all before meeting another Level 15 carnotaurus. Going for the brain worked well, until it didn't, the blow killed the lizard easily enough but the position it put him in left Leon doused in sticky blood and gore, the carnotaurus' teeth closed around his gauntleted hand, damaging the thick leather, though failing to pierce through to the tender flesh it guarded.
"Level up! You are now a Level 12 Swordsman! +2 Power, +2 Speed, +2 Constitution."
Pulling Bladeless out of the carnotaurus' brain, wiping it clean of any lingering fluids, Leon decided to name his new techniques while doing his best to ignore the level up pains.
"Both of them rely on exploiting the enemy's momentum to skewer them, one for keeping them in place, the other to kill. So Earth Skewer and Heaven Skewer. One to bind them to the earth, the other to send them off to heaven. Figure that's all the moves I'll pick up against these geckos in a normal fight- their attacks are too simple, formulaic. I need real pressure to innovate further, a life and death struggle is the only way to stimulate my swordsman's creativity!"
Storing his kill in the storage ring Leon moved out, mentally preparing for the struggle to come.
The second folly of Leon Knox, near identical in shape and style to the first began, involving Leon racing through the woods drawing all the carnotaurus to him. A few raptors joined the hunt for the swordsman as well and within ten minutes Leon had gathered a sizeable train of geckos. Though he had no idea how he would combat them. Stopping was impractical, too many enemy's this time, yesterday's strategy of simply cleaving the horde apart wouldn't work either, the carnotaurus among them wouldn't go down in a few simple swings.
He needed an idea, something new that could be used to turn the tables.
The smaller velociraptors turned out to be the breakthrough point, Leon making use of them as platforms to leap off of, landing on any nearby carnotaurus before executing a Helm Splitter to take them down, whittling the train down as they competed to be the ones to kill the deceptively nimble human.
The act was difficult, he had to make sure he was up and running again after killing a carnotaurus. Any pause would allow the horde to descend on him and begin ripping him limb from limb. Momentum was key, he had to keep moving.
It was as he crashed into the forest floor for the third time, another carnotaurus corpse falling down beside him, surrounded on all sides that inspiration struck once more. He'd tunnel vision'd on taking advantage of the enemy's momentum. What of his own? A giant sword like Bladeless took a lot of strength to swing around and in exchange generated huge momentum once it was in motion. Why not put that to use?
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
With his increased stats, wielding Bladeless was easier than before, allowing him to pull off a risky move he wouldn't have dared try the day prior. Turning the blade so the flat faced outwards, Leon began sweeping the blade around him in circular spin, aiming to hit as many foes as possible.
As the colossal blade smacked the dinosaurs around they began to bunch up, the carnotaurus pushed into each other, flailing and flopping as they tried to regain their balance, the force of the blow having unsettled their footing. The raptors caught in the swing were bouncing off their larger cousins, many dead before they even hit the ground.
Now that they had grouped up, Leon unleashed his coup de grâce, throwing all his weight behind a pair of visceral uppercuts, executed in swift succession, breaking the necks of any carnotaurus they impacted. The few left standing fell to Leon's follow up, as he slammed his sword down on their heads, cracking necks and deforming skulls.
Fifty raptor and ten carnotaurus corpses lay before Leon, the swordsman freshly anointed in the blood of the slain geckos who'd dared to pursue him.
Panting Leon, stumbled to his knees. He'd overdrawn his muscles with that last combo attack and now he was paying the price. His arms and legs were protesting in harmony against the rough treatment he'd put them through. Not like he regretted it. The Giant Slayer Style had fully crystallised in that fight. A style all about momentum, halting the enemy's attacks to fuel your own, then leveraging that advantage into a powerful finishing combo.
The style still retained some weaknesses, being somewhat reliant on Bladeless- without the ultra greatsword's impressive reach and unique advantages, certain moves would be harder to pull off. The lack of an appropriate mana circuit that complemented the style's moves was also a point that needed to be addressed. Still, Leon felt he'd made all the progress he could on the style- for now.
Burning some of his limited energy, Leon lessened his body's pain, only to face a fresh wave of level up pains.
"Level up! You are now a Level 13 Swordsman! +2 Power, +2 Speed, +2 Constitution."
"Level up! You are now a Level 14 Swordsman! +2 Power, +2 Speed, +2 Constitution."
Pulling himself back to his feet, Leon remembered to name his new techniques.
"Circle Swing and Twin Fang. That last downward strike didn't really feel like a technique. Anyway, style developed- check that one off the list. Next up, using the circuit in battle."
Deciding to leave Bladeless inside his storage ring in order to improve his manoeuvrability, Leon first made sure he packed all the corpses he could see into his ring, missing a few heads here and there that he couldn't locate. Stowing the big sword meant his back lost some protection, the shredded part of the cuirass had been rotated, exposing his back, but this was an acceptable risk for Leon.
Drawing Wavecutter just enough to expose the barest hint of blue metal, Leon took in the blade's beauty, surrounded by gore and drying blood.
"Ooh yeah- that's the spice. Time to drop a tsunami on these geckos."
Sheathing the blade, he set off to fulfil his objective.
A second round of gecko hunting began, this time the hunter displayed a more cautious attitude. Leon was running on a timer. With his current mana pool of 160, if he invested all his mana into the circuit he could keep it functioning for just over an hour. He'd discovered during his testing that Ebb and Flow burned through his mana quickly. Each mana point invested only gave him thirty second of uptime on the circuit and he still needed to spend five points to create the circuit quickly.
Worse, he doubted he'd be able to properly control his breathing to absorb mana while fighting, meaning he couldn't replenish his mana without stopping. Losing control of the circuit would cost him his stat multiplier alongside another five mana to setup the circuit again.
In this hour he needed to build his multiplier as high as possible, ideally taking advantage of his increased stats to carve through as many foes as possible.
It humbled Leon, as he realised that a truly powerful swordsman would be able to keep his circuits running non-stop and would have no problem maintaining their mana breathing technique in combat.
It calmed his mind, the understanding that he was no more than a frog in a well within the context of the greater multiverse under the System. To the truly powerful he was no more than a slightly stronger than average ant. A curiosity, not a threat. His more bloodthirsty and arrogant thoughts were tempered by this train of thought, a precarious balance now maintained between the swordsman's rationality and his ego.
The carnotaurus he was tracking was unaware of this, the beast sniffing the air as it attempted to locate the source of the metallic odour that permeated the woods.
Engaging with his own bull rush, Leon aimed at the creature's leg muscles with a Low Tide, the repeated horizontal strikes tearing deep into muscle and bone, hobbling the creature before it could even comprehend that it was under attack.
Following it up with a High Tide to the torso, Leon cut two bloody gashes into the lizard's sides, a System pop-up distracting him before he could launch another Low Tide to sever the leg.
"Ebb and Flow boost activated: X1.03 to Power, Speed and Constitution."
The box vanished, Leon launching another Low Tide, successfully cutting through the leg and toppling the carnotaurus.
"Ebb and Flow boost activated: X1.06 to Power, Speed and Constitution."
A High Tide, through the neck to finish the crippled creature off.
"Ebb and Flow boost activated: X1.10 to Power, Speed and Constitution."
It was a noticeable boost. He felt faster, stronger. More physically capable. His cautious hunting style could be discarded in service of a much greater purpose. He needed to see how powerful a fully charged Tsunami was.
Selena emerged from the Slime King's hall a new woman. The weakness of slime's to fire based attacks was ironic, considering they were the reason she could even use [Arc Fireball]. The dungeon had posed little challenge to her as every enemy died in a single hit, boosting her [Novice] Class all the way to Level 3.
She'd expected Mike and his peons to be ready and waiting to ambush her. With no attack forthcoming after a few tense minutes of cowering by the cave entrance, she set of in the only direction that made sense- towards Leon's campsite. If anywhere was safe to hide out at it was the rank 1 guy's house.
That was when she'd spotted the carnotaurus through the trees.
Level 15.
Death on two legs, with snapping jaws and a terrible hunger for human flesh.
Mike's group were fighting it- they appeared to have been camped nearby, she heard him shout to his teammates, battered greatsword in hand.
"Come on, we've taken one of your kind down before- we'll do it again!"
An arrow pierced the creature's eye, a well aimed shot from Elizabeth, blinding the creature's left side. Timmy was clinging onto its underside, one hand firmly on a dagger embedded in its flesh, the other working to cut it open with a second dagger.
Francis was irregularly flinging fireballs, his staff amplifying his spell power, scorching scales black and charring the flesh beneath while Mike locked the creature down with careful and deliberate bladework. None of them were experts but they looked to be holding their own.
It all seemed to be going well, until Selena heard a man's shout as he approached.
"Mine!"
No one was in any doubt to the mans identity, all of Mike's party rapidly disengaging as a blurred man came out of nowhere, leaping through the air directly towards the dinosaur's throat.
A blue flash, perhaps two? Selena didn't trust her eyes to report accurately on the situation, obscured as her vision was behind the tree she'd pressed herself up against. The corpse of the carnotaurus vanished into thin air and so did Leon, an elated cheer their only proof that he'd been there at all.
"Yes! Finally! The double boost!"
Selena heard Mike's curse even from her hiding spot.
"Fucking Leon."