"To our prodigal scion champion!" Nalpol bellowed. "Clearing the fourth battle in the trial after three hours of what must have been truly a clash for the ages!"
Alifren turned to their elven scout. "The time to recover between fights seems to get longer. Do you know how long this one is?"
"No," Brillhit replied. "I've been through this trial four times, each with different groups, and the most we ever reached was the third. Even that one, we barely managed to clear, with heavy casualties."
"Oh," Alifren shuddered. "I'm sorry to hear that, it must have been hard to lose so many."
"We overstepped our bounds and paid the price, a common peril to cultivation."
"No death talk!" Nalpol swung an arm around the reticent elf's shoulders and another at Alifren. "Our boy hasn't left yet, so he clearly is resting up for the fifth round, to claim the whole pot! We need to get real merriment going for his triumphant return!"
Brilhit chuckled, surprised that he was so influenced by the orc leader's bombastic happiness. "This reminds me of the story of the shield-hewn emperor, how he obtained his first Rare Skill in a challenge rift that had killed all that dared attempt it before."
The orcs sat around the elf in a practiced gesture, a long-held tradition reaching well beyond the longhouse. It was the storytelling of fellow warriors, sharing in their lore and victories, wisdoms and sorrows. Some said even the Deep System itself paused to listen to these retellings, offering moments of respite to hear tales of the challenges it crafted and the cultivators it developed.
"He was an elven boy from a noble family, but sickly and with a lackluster lineage, fated to obscurity. But he trained harder than all, sought out battle time and time again, almost dying multiple times in the wilderness before he even came of age. He eschewed parties or even gear, his body and spirit his only weapon, all he could rely on, having been neglected by all else and learning early on to rely only on himself."
The story was old and well-worn, a common one from Brilhit's distant homeland, but unfamiliar to his orc party members. Still, they reacted at the right moments with the expected laughter and cheers, shouting out when the boy claimed the rift's final treasure and stepped out into the lands that would now have to accept him as a cultivator of true power.
But Brilhit stopped the story short when he got the notification that Axl accepted the greatest difficulty variant of the fifth rift battle, the price of a loss being failure for the entire rift. The circle of orcs paused in apprehension as they all recognized the danger, a seam of doubt cutting through their previous confidence.
Without another word, Brilhit stood and returned to the treeline, remembering the final part of the story he was telling, one he never shared, but always kept close to his heart. The boy arose from the rift he had conquered, bloodied and near death, stumbling into the countryside, legs shaking. A farmhand slave working the fields chanced upon the newly ascended cultivator, and without hesitation, struck with his hoe, killing the champion in one strike. That was the story of how a mere slave began his rise to eventually become the shield-hewn emperor.
-x-
The simple hand-scythe was short, not even half the length of Axl's [Webcutter], a one-handed implement that looked better suited for trimming bushes than battle. But it struck his sword like a falling mountain, Axl pushed back as he hastily deflected the strike.
A Mana burst followed the attack, as if the air itself was joining in the gardener's hit. Axl had to keep [Mana Shroud] almost entirely focused on purifying the almost offensive Mana, as if he were back in Piril fighting against the green mist trying to burrow into his injuries.
Axl had barely regained his balance when the elf struck again, his physical Attributes clearly greater than Axl's, and by a larger margin than what the kobold had, as well. The attack was again followed by a burst of offensive Mana, forcing Axl to further backtrack.
The third attack was only partially deflected, a long, shallow cut left on his arm by the scythe, made worse by the Mana burst following it. Immediately, small clusters of moss and stems started to grow along the cut, and Axl had to additionally rile up Bilesong to fight off the invasive spores.
Axl tried to temporarily redirect [Mana Shroud] from purifying the invasive Mana to reinforcing his Attributes right as the elf slashed at him again, but invasive plants started to grow all over his body, so he quickly redirected the Skill.
Not wanting to stay in the defensive, Axl took out one of his daggers and threw it at the elf. He effortlessly grabbed it from the air and stopped to look at it.
"Venom?" The elf's fury slipped into a contemptuous scowl. "You think a G-Grade somatic venom can damage a garden keeper of Irialith?"
He held out his other hand, the scythe pointing to the ground, and stabbed a vein with the tip of the kunai. "My people have studied the ways of living plant life well into the D-Grade, you think we have no defenses against such crude concoctions?"
Axl would've returned the chatter, but he was too busy cleansing his body of the invasive plants, which strained Bilesong and his poison-absorbing organ, since the plants weren't quite a poison, dulling the effect of his Skills and organ. Not to mention that he was still keeping up [Mana Shroud], redoubling his attention on the Skill onto the large cut on his arm, where the sprouting was most substantial. As much as he wanted to capitalize on the elf's decision to monologue, even just keeping his body intact was taking most of his attention.
As the gardener elf threw away the now poison-emptied dagger, Axl lifted his left arm and struck with [Filial Deathshroud]. The elf had looked right at it with the motion, and the soul attack did nothing. It was as if it hit a brick wall.
"This is part of what I meant by fighting with honor," the elf said. "My soul is entwined with my child's, and your attack, impressive as it may be, cannot touch one that stands beyond the E-Grade."
Axl's eyes widened as his trump card was completely sidestepped. He had expected the gardener to have soul defenses, but nothing like this.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
Still, Axl needed to turn this fight around, so he threw a dagger at the elf as he charged, [Webcutter] ready to strike, hoping to force an opening. The elf simply let the dagger hit him, the weapon barely penetrating his arm, then struck the air with his scythe, a burst of Mana pushing Axl back, not so much from the force of the attack, but by how it riled up the growth of moss and tiny plants on and within his body, making him having to rally Bilesong and [Mana Shroud].
Without hesitation, Axl threw another two daggers, the gardener deflecting one aimed at his eye, but taking the second on his other arm, clearly confident that the poison within could do nothing to him. Axl lept forward, but again was unable to close the distance before the elf struck with his weapon again, causing a burst of Mana to push Axl back yet again.
Then the elf decided to strike again, another slash from the scythe cutting into the air, aimed right at Axl's face. Axl managed to throw another dagger before hastily defending from the attack, narrowly avoiding a cut to his face, the curved blade almost touching his cheek.
The expected burst of Mana assaulted his body, but this time, Axl did not retreat, but pushed forward, yelling in the elf's face.
The scythe overcame [Webcutter] and cut through Axl's head, but it dissolved into a cloud of Mana. The elf immediately looked to the side, away from the illusion array, where Axl crouched, focusing on [Attuned Drill Strike].
The Mana in the air was so thick and aggressive, it entered the drill faster than Axl's own internal Mana, surging with as much power as he could give the strike, for the briefest moment his body fully attuned, his every Attribute balanced to the peak of his will and what [Mana Shroud] could elicit.
Sprouting weeds and moss started to cover his body beneath his armor, one of his eyes closing as a small flower grew on his eyelid, forcing it shut, and then he released the build-up strike, aimed at the gardener's legs, to hopefully not kill him.
The elf closed his eyes briefly before the attack, not even turning towards it, the Mana in the air still for a moment, even the growths in Axl's body subsiding.
Axl's [Attuned Drill Strike] was unleashed, and the roiling cyclone of power tore through the air, pushing Axl back as his feet tore two tracks on the ground. The strike pushed against an invisible wall of sorts around the gardener elf, an unfathomable mass of Mana from the entire clearing descended and concentrated to defend the still figure. When the strike finally hit its target, it barely ruffled his robe.
"You think you can use Mana of my own Attunement against me?" the elf let out harsh, barking laughter. "How can any true cultivator fail in their own cultivation haven. You truly are a sheltered child, pitting yourself against mindless beasts and the weak, if you think this would work here, of all places."
Axl simply stared at the elf, for a moment, his concentration lapsed, not expecting such a catastrophic failure in his attack. Soul attacks wouldn't work, and apparently neither would [Attuned Drill Strike]. The gardener's taunting was right, he'd gotten so confident that his Rare Skill and Deathshroud-enhanced attacks could steamroll basically anything that he'd grown complacent. His other ongoing plan for slowly dealing with the elf now also felt tenuous, na?ve even. He needed something else, something more.
But the elf was upon him again before Axl could regain his bearings, unleashing one slash after another, never relenting. At the very least, the elf was clearly not a martial artist, his swings quite predictable and haphazard, not as refined as even some of the orcs that joined him in courtyard training, much less Soffal or Suliana. If only Axl could be faster, he could land strikes as well, and have some hope for matching the battle. If only he had a movement skill, not having waited for the best possible variant of the movement skill his Total centennial grounding achievement would’ve given. Arrogance, again.
>>Total centennial grounding (Consumable):
>>Obtain 100 Attribute points in every attribute while still in the G-Grade without using a Lineage inheritance.
>>Reward: A movement skill (Uncommon).
>>Upgradable: Mentorship (minor upgrade), boon enchantment (minimum of 2, middling upgrade), dao alignment (grand upgrade).
Well, he didn't have a mentor to help nor two boons to activate the achievement, and while he could simply activate it, a burning rage inside him turned to his Dao, to the glimpse resting in his soul. It hadn't done any work recently, and it was about slitting time that it started pulling its weight.
Axl thought on the memory of lightning from his vision, the frozen bolts in the sky, the deep purple one of his focus, and so much more than the speed of lightning, but even that concept was there, crystallized within its cutting, immovable form.
Like tearing half his flesh apart, Axl willed the lightning out of him, and a bolt coursed through his body, singeing him to the bone, a stray arc leaving from his hip and left hand, one hitting a tree in the distance, rendering it into ash, the other nearly striking the elf gardener.
The elf stepped back, eyes wide in surprise and apprehension, but Axl couldn't capitalize, as his body took heavy damage, needing to use the entirety of a healing potion to simply stabilize his wounds, then activate another to be able to even move again, emptying out the stores inside [Gastric Cauldron]. At least the lightning removed all the plants and spores in his body, even pushed away the aggressive Mana, that lingered just outside his body, as if the attunment itself hesitated to enter the realm of the Dao’s wrath.
Still no Skill, however, but Axl felt a resonance as the lightning coursed through his bones and muscles, the shaking at one point pushing his foot forward far faster than he could, even if he fully focused on empowering his Agility. However, the bulging dark clouds above looked ominous, the familiar pressure from when he obtained the chunk of lunar fulger returning with additional pressure. Even the elf gardener stared up at the billowing clouds streaked with lightning with open fear and stepped further back, trying to put as much distance between them.
Axl felt he had something here, and figured the tribulation only started mounting again because the lightning left his body. He'd noticed it before, when he used lightning for his alchemy within his [Gastric Cauldron], he couldn’t even feel any tribulation building, even after he started it going at the smith's metal garden. This perhaps meant that keeping it inside would mean less tribulation, hiding it from the heavens, so to speak.
Pulling another strand of lightning deep within his soul, this time smaller, more contained, carefully trying to channel it into his bones and muscles, focusing on the ones in his legs. Ignoring the mind-numbing pain, he used the lightning to leap forward, almost immediately closing the distance between himself and the elf gardener.
The elf was still staring up at the sky, clearly more afraid of stray lightning than Axl, so he took the opportunity, dropping his sword and punching the elf in the neck, using every iota of will and empowerment his body could manage.
This was the culmination of his previous plan. The elf gardener was very confident in fighting Axl's centipede poison, but he didn’t notice when Axl started attacking with daggers loaded with Calcium-depleting poison instead. After all, it wasn't a natural biological venom like the gardener bragged about being so good at fighting against. It was a synthetic Meft compound that the elf healer back in the longhouse adapted to deplete calcium in bone, not a stitch of natural or even stone-based Mana in it.
Axl's punch hit with a heavy crack as the elf's spine snapped, his body thrown aside like an empty bag. Axl hesitated, ready for a Mana surge in the air or something, but the aggressive nature of the ambient Mana was largely gone, the spine apparently necessary for the elf to even use his Cultivator's Core.
The elf sprawled across the ground gurgled for a moment, clearly trying to speak, and Axl rushed forward, taking a healing potion from his dimensional pouch and pouring it into the elf's mouth. After all, he now needed to capture the gardener alive to succeed. The bastard even tried to spit out the potion, stubbornly refusing to take it, so Axl had to lift the elf's head and hold his tongue down to force it down his throat.
Axl also looked up at the roiling, violent clouds above, and while they had gotten denser and more menacing, they at least had stopped building up, their edges already starting to fade away.
A few more seconds of this rather tense flailing at keeping the gardener alive, Axl finally got the message he was waiting for.
>>Challenge and Transit Rift: Greenhouse Crossroads
>>Update: Living stone elf captured alive, round five completed. Trial completed, stand by for return.
"It has been said, never bring a knife to a gunfight, but what happens when you bring a gun to a sword fight?"
Ozzy Irman had always considered himself something of an explorer. Never in all of his wildest dreams however did he think he'd end up in another world. Hell, he still hadn't made it to Yellowstone.
But when the unthinkable happens, and he finds himself face down cheeks up in a swamp full of monsters he knows something has gone terribly wrong with life. Armed with nothing save his rapidly fraying wits and *cough* an arsenal of magical firearms *cough* he must eke out a place for himself in a world full of magic, corruption, and Gods.
?? Great for readers who enjoyed He Who Fights With Monsters, Vigil's Wrath, The Ten Realms Series, and other isekai/flintlock fantasy stories.