Sam was trying to bait Hugo Mar, and it worked. The man snarled, and extended one hand, expelling a lance of pure energy out of his hand towards Sam. The ground beneath it turned to glass, but Sam was already out of the way.
The attack sliced through the Legion, but Mar did not seem to care. While his attack had slain hundreds of his own men, there were millions yet to die. Sam smiled and started to rapid fire his Anger’s Reach skills, using a minimal amount of energy for each of them. The spikes of energy shot through the air at Hugo Mar, who, in an inhuman display of power, caught them out of the air, using his magical power to keep them stable. Tossing them over his shoulder, they landed in the city, and exploded there.
Sam growled at this, but he knew what Mar was doing. He was trying to break Sam’s spirit, and cast him in a guilty light. This was as much a psychological battle as a physical one. In a battle of psychological forces, there were few concepts more powerful than Anger, and Sam had that in abundance.
His skin started to smoke as he pumped his power into himself, triggering his Fiery Justice skill. Layering his armor skill on top of it as well, he had boosted his power to far beyond what it should have been for his level, not that he wasn't far beyond it anyway. His power in this stage was like that of an average level 100, which was still below Hugo Mar. In addition, the man certainly was not average.
However, Sam did not feel discouraged, rather he was excited for this clash of titans, to show what he was really capable of. He still had his final trump card left after all, which would end the fight, one way or another. As the two generals faced off, their people watched, the Legion in glassy eyed disinterest, and the city defenders with hope in their eyes. Sam wouldn't let them down.
He started forwards, and Hugo Mar mirrored his motions, beginning to pick up speed as he went. Hugo’s hands started to glow with dark light, and he fell forwards, almost as if tripping. A glowing disk of light appeared in front of him, and he fell into it, appearing directly above Sam’s head. Sam raised his arms to block, but it was useless. Only his many enhancements allowed him to survive the attack, and bones broke.
He was sent ten feet straight down into the ground, which was a testament to Hugo Mar’s abilities. After all, he had passed through multiple boulders on the way there, and had been actively resisting the entire time. Sam gathered his remaining power, and exploded up out of the hole, landing on its edge, shaking slightly.
Hugo Mar was ready, and he shot off a telephone sized beam of dark energy at Sam, who was blasted backwards. Only a hasty application of his Dao and elemental energy across his skin protected him, and he quickly used his elemental shield ability as well, blunting the impact. The strike took him all the way to the city walls however, and he crashed into them, fracturing the rock.
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He pushed off of it, keeping his momentum, and almost falling into the lava moat. He landed on the edge of it, feeling the heat from behind as he did so. He launched himself forwards, creating furrows in the ground beneath him as he did so. He ran forwards at hundreds of miles per hour, keeping Hugo Mar in his sights. The man did not move, instead simply standing there and gathering power for his next strike.
He quickly released it as Sam neared, blowing up the ground in front of himself with an invisible scythe of energy. Sam jumped to the side and rolled to the side, narrowly dodging the attack. The bit that did hit him however cut straight through his armor like it wasn’t even there. Blood spurted over the ground from the wounds on his side, and he gasped in pain.
Hugo Mar laughed, and he advanced one more, purposefully going slowly as he moved, trying to cause Sam’s resolve to crumble. He had to admit, it was working slightly. He was starting to feel weak and pathetic in the force of such overwhelming force, and he suspected that there was some sort of Dao trickery going on here. In any case, Hugo Mar’s Dao was only about as strong as his own at most, but Sam wasn't exactly in the right state of mind to resist properly right now.
He kept trying to manifest his conceptual anger, but it didn't really work, with the amount of despair that he was feeling at the moment. Facing up against overwhelming force was quite an effective way to dampen one’s spirits.
Sam gritted his teeth and forced himself to keep standing, trying to keep his power up. He reminded himself of the reason that he was fighting, the deaths and pain that had been caused by the Legion. His spirit and Dao started to flare within him, and he stood taller, the energy of his power billowing out around him.
He stared down Hugo Mar, and he could feel invisible shackles being forced off him as Hugo Mar’s Dao was forced away. For the first time, Sam was showing off his Dao to its fullest extent, and Mar was surprised by how powerful it was. The man might have been far beyond Sam in terms of power, but the one field that he was not was that of the Dao. In that sector of power, Sam reigned supreme.
Sam glowered at his opponent, and forced his Dao towards Hugo Mar, pushing back the other man’s Dao in the process. The two men were locked there for a moment, neither of them willing to back down. Sam eventually reached Hugo Mar, and he forced the full weight of his conviction and Dao onto the other man. With such a devastating blow to his ego and Dao, Hugo Mar was briefly stunned, and Sam raced forwards, clearing the distance in a matter of seconds.
Raising his hammer above his head, Sam pumped everything that he had left into his next strike, stopping short of breaking out Dao Juggernaut. Bringing the hammer down with a roar, he piledrived Hugo Mar into the ground, cratering the earth for a dozen feet in each direction. He leaped backwards as the earth cracked open, watching as Mar was sent twenty feet down into the earth, with actual damage visible on his body.
His skull had cracked under the force of the blow, and it looked as if he was still stunned. Sam leaped down, with his hammer at the ready, preparing to strike another devastating blow. However it had been a feint all along. Mar flashed his left hand up and grasped Sam’s neck, bending his armor with his sheer strength. Pulling back his hand, he smashed Sam into the wall again and again, breaking bones and tearing flesh. The earth crumbled away, and eventually Mar tired of this, and threw Sam out of the hole, levitating up behind him. Sam was utterly broken, and he lay there, his consciousness coming in starts.