Aaron had to admit, Orrigomo was extraordinarily fast. He was quite strong, too—and one hardy bastard. However, compared to Yendal, he was weak. He didn’t have Yendal’s casual precision, and while he was fast, Aaron could tell he was pushing himself to move that fast and was on the verge of losing control, making him very predictable. Even without being able to read the threads of fate, Aaron felt he could have seen where his enemy would be.

  Sonic booms echoed out across the land every time Orrigomo burst off into one of its rampaging attacks, and explosive shockwaves cracked, crumbled, and rippled through the ground when it landed. It was quite devastating. But if Aaron was careful, and he read fate correctly, he could avoid direct hits and unleash his own counters.

  But the black beetle was far more than just a speedster. When he first hit its onyx carapace, his incredibly powerful tungsten spikes didn’t even pierce it, but that only caused a smile to crease his face. He had worried slightly that this level would provide little practical experience he could use against Mo’han. But seeing his armored fist bounce off Orrigomo's formidable shell filled him with delight.

  This will do just fine.

  Of course, Orrigomo was far less impressed and returned fire with hundreds of lightning-fast strikes. Aaron did well to avoid much of the initial barrage, but the attacks were simply too fast to dodge them all, even with near-perfect coordination and knowing where they would land.

  Bladed arms slipped through his defenses, cutting his body up with deadly efficiency. Once upon a time, a single one of Orrigomo’s serrated strikes would have completely shredded Aaron and left him for dead. But now he was surviving the onslaught surprisingly well. Though, in truth, he wouldn’t last long if he wasn’t able to dodge the majority of strikes coming his way. Toughness and Vitality were definitely doing some heavy lifting, but he wasn’t at the point where he could be considered a real tank when skipping a tier and going up against a D-grade.

  But it was enough to keep him alive long enough to counter with his own attacks, and when [ Soul Shattering Strike ] was combo-chained into [ Turbocharged Haymaker ], not even a D-grade monster like the formidable Orrigomo could shrug off his assault.

  The beetle staggered on the first soul-crushing strike and was thrown back with a spray of black ichor when the haymaker landed.

  “You hurt me! One of the Thirteen. Impossible!”

  The beetle’s hardened brow bent, and it shot straight back toward him with a sonic boom, clearly unimpressed.

  It wasn’t a D-grade for nothing, though. And what followed was a display of incredible Skills. First, a deadly miasma filled the air that choked up the lungs and slowed its prey down. That was followed by a blanket of thorns that covered the landscape and burst into thorny shrapnel whenever Aaron stepped on one. And to top it all off, the beetle summoned an angry storm that lingered above the battlefield, and periodically sent lightning crashing down, which would have been a deadly combination if Aaron couldn’t see the lightning strikes before they landed.

  Not only that, but Orrigomo seemed to grow larger and angrier as the fight went on. It unleashed incredible amounts of power, although still below what he expected of Mo’han. And it was made even deadlier, as its sonic booms started to carry poisonous barbs that shot out in all directions whenever it sent one of the booms bursting outward.

  The fight must have been absolutely annoying for the beetle, because the poison in the barbs was really very deadly. But Aaron had a method of surviving the horrendous attack—dying.

  He was actually very impressed when he first got hit by one, as he watched his HP drain away before his eyes. It was very fast, and he figured few could survive it without some kind of cure. Unfortunately for the beetle, death was but a minor concern for the mad human before it.

  A burst of energy rippled out as Aaron resurrected himself, sending a wave of the miasma fleeing, and he even managed to catch the beetle off guard, returning to life with a clean combo chain against the unprepared Orrigomo.

  The beetle likely wouldn’t be surprised twice by Aaron’s dying act, but he didn’t need cheap tricks to win a fight anymore.

  However, the battle was far from over, and like all strong enemies, the beetle could kickstart its energy organs back into gear and get them going again. Nonetheless, [ Soul Shattering Strike ] both drained a massive amount of its energy and at least temporarily disabled regeneration.

  Taking a single hit wasn’t fight-ending, but it did risk a snowballing effect that benefited Aaron.

  This was a massive problem to overcome, and it was made so much worse for his enemies, as Aaron’s bulbous form was drained of energy slower than ever after eating the meat pie. But worst of all for the beetle was the fact that the poison effect was disabled on his death.

  Not all status effects were treated equally when Aaron died. Whilst his food buffs did reset when he was returned to the hallway, for the most part, they lasted through his aether-powered resurrections. There appeared to be some kind of cooldown that affected how long a status effect could last during death, and it seemed to be relative to the effect's total duration. An effect that would last a day could last over ten seconds during his death, whilst something that had a duration of a minute wouldn’t even last a second.

  And the deadly poison from the barbs had a very short life. Not that it would have needed a long one under most circumstances. Most people struck by the attack would be doomed to their fate, especially if they didn’t have powerful cures or heals with them.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

  Still, despite neutralizing one of Orrigomo’s most powerful attacks, the battle was still extremely difficult. And thanks to its incredible speed, Orrigomo even pushed Aaron to use [ Gorgon’s Time Dilation ], which was quite the accomplishment, since he rarely used the Skill unless being ganged up on by many enemies.

  However, for every challenge he faced, there was a monstrous cheat his enemies had to overcome, and it was only getting worse. The 2% energy leech he had gained from his gauntlets wasn’t anything amazing against weaker opponents, especially when striking them with mediocre attacks. But when hitting a D-grade like Orrigomo with an extra powerful combination? Well, it provided quite a nice energy boost to himself.

  Enraged as the battle tilted in the wrong direction, Orrigomo screamed, and energy burst all around it. In a flash, it was on him, smashing him so hard he skimmed across the landscape, and followed up with a series of lightning bursts that turned skin to ash.

  But again, Aaron was back to his feet in seconds, having resurrected for the third time in their little back-and-forth skirmish.

  However, his persistence did not dissuade the beetle, and it gave him no time for reprieve, attacking with barbs and blindingly fast attacks. But this was Aaron, and he was more than just too stubborn to die, and he placed his feet perfectly, as he counted. Like an oracle, he weaved a path through the impossible myriad of attacks smashing down upon him, eating only grazing strikes as he returned a [ Soul Shattering Strike ] below the beetle’s chin, and followed up with a haymaker to its mid-section. A kick across its face followed, and then another soul strike to the body, and in quick succession, haymakers blasted across Orrigomo’s chin.

  The flurry of attacks all happened in a flash, far too quickly for ordinary eyes to follow, and the result was pieces of shell and onyx ichor bursting across the land, and Orrigomo being tossed like a child into rocky rubble.

  The D-grade monster tried to recover, but could barely stand on shaky legs, and it was all too easy when Aaron followed up with another combination that crushed it back into the earth, and a fountain of black ichor spirted up.

  “H-how?” Orrigomo spat black blood. “Your level… how are you so strong? Is this the might that enslaved our people? Or is it an illusion? More tricks from the System? You can’t be E-grade… It’s not possible. Those fools! I told them not to take that damn quest!”

  Suddenly, Aaron was reminded of the circumstances that had brought him to the trial. The damn System had imprinted him as their enemy into their minds somehow.

  “I swear, I’m not your enemy. I’m just some bloke trying to get stronger.”

  “Bah! Lies! Invader! Enslaver! Murderer! But it won’t be so easy for you! You see, I’m only the weakest of The Thirteen. You’ll see. They’ll make you suffer for everything you’ve done! It may take a millennium, but our people will have vengeance against the great monster. The great enslaver!” the beetle coughed up a chunk of crystallized ichor and groaned in agony. “We’ll have our vengeance against you!”

  With another gargling choke, it coughed and died.

  Aaron sighed. It seemed he had yet more enemies. It wasn’t an ideal outcome, but there was little point in worrying about it now. He doubted there was a single thing he could do to overcome the tricks imposed by the System. But he did wonder who this monster really was.

  After all, Orrigomo at the very least seemed aware and conscious. Surely the System couldn’t trick the beetle so easily, unless this monster character was truly real, and the System had simply tricked them into believing that Aaron was this monster.

  That thought also begged the question as to whether or not Orrigomo was even dead. Perhaps the beetle would awake from this dream, and if it did, would it come looking for him?

  Chain Quest: The Shadow Trials

  Stage nine of [ Trial of Dominance] COMPLETED!

  You have tested yourself against the countless enslaved of Hellfire world #330037 and emerged victorious.

  Quest Rewards: Obelisk of Dominance [ Epic ], Unique System Store upgraded to level 9.

  Experience rewarded for completing a quest stage!

  “Well, at least it’s done,” Aaron sighed as he reappeared in the hallway. It was kind of bittersweet. He was used to killing things by now, but he didn’t want to be known as a slaver.

  Nothing to be done about it.

  His attention turned to the quest reward, and he curled a brow as he inspected it.

  Obelisk of Dominance [ Epic ]

  When placed on a settlement’s throne, the Obelisk of Dominance claims the settlement for the dominator. Unlike normal territory conquest, the obelisk drains energy and resources from the subjects and channels them into their overlord’s primary territories.

  Okay, that sounds just delightful.

  Aaron realized he was probably going to have to do some trading before the trials were over. He also had the Waypoint he wasn’t intending to use, and now this… Well, at least he could hang onto the obelisk and potentially use it in the future. Still, if he found himself in a situation to take over another settlement, he wasn’t sure this was how he would want to go about it.

  He also wanted to figure out what his plan for the pot was. He could use a helmet. However, he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to eat while wearing it, and had made the decision that at least for now, eating mid-fight was more important than whatever buffs it might provide.

  Looking around, he took note of the crowds. The hallway was as busy as ever.

  Time was running short, and whilst there were a few other things he wanted to get done before leaving, he turned straight back for the dial, but not before stuffing his face.

  There were certain priorities he had in mind, and first came first. He needed to finish the Trial of Dominance as soon as possible. After all, his bare minimum desire for the trials was also completing the Trial of the Challenger, and he wanted to have as much time for that as possible, just in case Yendal made him really work for it.

  Making his way to the dial, he slapped down on it and went to select Yendal for his godly companion. If dominance was anything like the Trial of Endurance, he thought it might be fun to see a scene from her ascension, like he had Oozagh’s.

  But his brow crinkled as he looked at the display. There was no option to pick a shadow avatar.

  “What?”

  Curiously, he continued through the prompts and started the trial. In a flash, he was standing in an arena, but the shadowy figure standing before him was not what he had expected to see. The robed figure was sporting a fade that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a football field, and was standing before him wearing large, chunky, oversized, and very spiked gauntlets. It was also incredibly fat.

  “Wait, is that supposed to be me? I’m not that big, am I?”

  Patreon!