The Asp was drifting above, having come out of the wall behind him. Axl grimaced at not having thought of this, expecting that the creature would have to go out of the same barrier segment of their corresponding wall mosaic, but that was clearly not the case.
The snake creature was coiling in the air, as if underwater, each segment of its undulating body twisting and turning as glyphs formed in front of its face. In contrast to the first trial creature, this one was barely as long as Axl's arm and only as thick as a finger. Unfortunately, that made it much harder to hit.
Axl threw two daggers at it, hoping to at least interrupt the spellcasting, but the Asp easily wriggled out of the way. Axl tried to use [Mana Shroud] to empower his Attributes, but the scarce Mana in the air made it slow to get going, and before he could barely start, the glyphs following the creature's face disappeared.
Sensing a surge of Mana beneath him, Axl ran forward, narrowly escaping a surge of molten rock bursting from the solid floor. He managed to make it to the wall and hastily collect the pair of daggers he had thrown before, and turned to aim at the snake, but it had now drifted further up, to the very edge of the barrier at the top of the arena, a good four stories up.
Trying to follow the creature's movements, Axl threw another dagger, but this one was even more fully dodged than the previous ones, the Asp having more time to react. Glyphs were again forming in front of its face, and Axl tried another throw, this time preceding the motion with a flinching feint at first, leaning hard into his Charisma.
The creature bought it and reacted broadly to the non-attack, but the real strike only managed to nick it on the side of its long body, having enough time to partially avoid the hit.
Another bloom of molten rock started beneath, so Axl charged forward again. The attack felt very feeble, the slurry of hot rock barely leaving the puddle it produced, but he noticed right away what the Asp was doing. The first molten strike was still roiling and red-hot, with no sign of abating, the arena ground being actively diminished with each attack.
Axl was still undisturbed, since there was plenty of ground left, and he knew glyphic casting drained your resources, not to mention that poison was already coursing through the creature, even if from a glancing strike. This was now a battle of attrition.
With this new mindset, Axl shifted to collecting his daggers, even re-dosing them with poison while avoiding the creature's molten rock strikes, trying to position himself such that those puddles would be where they would least affect his mobility. He still struck out and tried all sorts of feints and redirections, especially when he thought the spellcasting was at its most difficult for the Asp. But he got no further hits, even glancing ones, the creature wary of his tricks.
The arena started to fill up, and when it was nearly half filled with lava, Axl started to worry, sensing the creature could likely fill it up entirely and then just wait until the fire cooked Axl alive. He briefly thought if there was a way he could dispel existing puddles away somehow, but they had rather dense Mana that lingered, and it's not like he had massive barrels of water to throw on them in his dimensional pouch—an oversight on his part, as he thought about it, that maybe he should fill his storage space with random crap to help in situations like this. Slit, even a bunch of ladders could've changed the nature of this duel.
He turned to [Filial Deathshroud], ready to attack the creature's soul, but he found that he couldn't initiate the attack, the creature apparently not having eyes. Axl was afraid of this, the description of the stretch of cloth being very clear it would only be active on "any opponent that gazes upon the cloth", and that limitation seemed to be quite literal. He imagined a sentient being could even figure out that they just needed to not look at it to become immune to the attack. Plus, there wasn't enough ambient Mana around for [Attuned Drill Strike], even from the Asp's molten ground attacks.
Axl simply redoubled his attacks, a few times striking with several daggers at once, but still none landed. When he barely had a third of the arena left, the creature was now casting more slowly than before, its motions more restricted to only when it had to dodge, the small cut on its side glowing an eerie, sickly green Mana. However, it was clear to Axl that this wouldn't win the fight in time, and he needed an edge, something to let him hit the damned thing before it could dodge.
Grimacing, Axl dodged the next eruption, jumping right onto a patch of molten stone. Immediately, the heat started to seep through his Sheersilk boots and singe his skin, but he focused on [Mana Shroud], quickly absorbing every stitch of Mana he could from the attack. The stone Mana was too slow, as he expected, so he focused on the roughly other third of Mana available—fire.
As he had now been warned multiple times, first by Moxlin then in various forms of training at the longhouse, fire was dangerous and volatile, always a risk when using and in how it might shape your path. But with a lack of better options, Axl used [Mana Shroud] to suck it in, letting it empower his Attributes. Another thing about fire was that it was sure as shit powerful, his Attributes surging, as if his entire body was combustible flame itself, a sheer, pure destructive force.
Fully harnessing that feeling, Axl threw a pair of daggers, his muscles strained and pushed, and the Asp didn't even have time to react as one of the daggers tore into its head, the other bisecting its body. Quickly, Axl jumped out of the molten fire and eliminated the boosting of [Mana Shroud], his body feeling like it was burning up, searing pain coursing through him.
>>Challenge and Transit Rift: Greenhouse Crossroads
>>Update: Cornerstone Drifting Asp defeated, round two completed. Twenty minutes until round three begins. Leave the arena to finish the trial at completion 2/5, stay to initiate the next round.
Axl dismissed the message, at least glad that the break was increased to twenty minutes, because this time he could use it.
Moxlin approached at a rapid pace, and Axl lifted three fingers up to her, then, after a brief hesitation, changed it to two. A system they had previously set up to quickly indicate how injured he was, a single finger being the highest urgency he could communicate while still being conscious. He let the small spider remove his boots and start applying the salve to the burns there while Axl drank one of his healing potions, forcing the healing to drift evenly through his body, the fire damage being strongest in his legs, where the Mana came in, but also throughout where they had an effect, so from head to toe, unfortunately.
Still, it wasn't so bad, and Axl let the effect of the potion finish, rousing his Vitality and even Bilesong to help, also using the Attributes to somewhat help the salve's effect, then a second potion largely fixed him up to a mostly fully healed status.
"Guess I don't have long-range battle quite solved," he grumbled, sitting up.
"Mommy's hole, not this again. How many people need to tell you that it's literally impossible to cover everything when you're alone? Did Suliana nearly killing you with a bow and arrow three times not drive home the message?"
Axl sighed. "That was before I had the throwing daggers, and I never used the Deathshroud on her either."
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Moxlin gestured around her. "Oh, never mind, then, I guess this worked out just great!"
"Yeah, yeah," Axl started to get back up, readjusting his armor and getting ready for the next round. "I'm working on it."
"You keep saying that, I'm not sure it means what you think it means."
"Shoo, shoo," he pointed back to her assistant's nook. "We've got barely a few minutes left. This next one shouldn't be as bad."
With a resigned sigh, she shuffled back. "Not even any usable loot this time either."
Axl took a deep breath as the barriers went back up, the molten rock filling the arena melting away. The outside's heavy nature-attuned Mana filled the arena again, the even arena floor emanating a dense, multifaceted stony Mana. It created a strange clash of nature and life against the unyielding stone, the two forming a horizon a foot above the ground, almost like the undead mist in Piril.
>>Challenge and Transit Rift: Greenhouse Crossroads
>>Update: A kobold enters, round three begins.
A crossbow bolt charged through the barrier to the north, and Axl barely managed to deflect it with [Filial Deathshroud], and the kobold appeared right from where the attack came through.
Roken had encountered some kobolds before, even if they were relatively rare in Piril, but this one felt like an entirely different breed, with scales on its body like stone gravel, its eyes a deep green. He emanated Mana in a mixture of stone and wood, in very equal proportions, deeply synergized but not mixed, very much matching the arena's environment.
The kobold quickly reloaded his crossbow and set it onto a holder on his leg as he seamlessly swapped to a spear and shield. The movement wasn't just smooth and practiced, but too fast to be anything but a Skill. Axl barely took a step towards his opponent before it was done, even as he wanted to capitalize on the weapon swapping. Slitting versatility builds. But not that he could complain too much, as he was kind of aiming for a build that could fill any possible role as well.
The kobold held the spear with both arms, the left, having a buckler in place, and as he closed in, he rapidly switched the left arm to being in front, right in the back, switching to a left-handed stance with the speed of an activated Skill. Axl encountered some left-handed orcs like this in the longhouse, and indeed, it made the fight a bit different, but nothing like the weirdness creatures could use in a fight, so he stepped forward to meet the kobold, [Webcutter] slashing at the longer spear.
The kobold let the deflecting strike push aside his weapon and swung it back into an attack. Axl didn't have time to capitalize on the deflection, the range of the spear giving the kobold enough space to counter. Axl had to step back, deflecting the spear attack and then another. Unfortunately, the Kobold's Strength and Dexterity were a bit higher than his, but Axl figured this would be fair, since the trial should get harder with each round.
Axl had initially planned to fight as long as he could without Skills against this enemy, wanting to see how he fared in a purely martial contest. And it turned out that it was barely a few clashes, and Axl had his back against the barrier. The kobold's spear could easily keep Axl at bay, his shorter sword not even managing to reach the shield the kobold had as a defensive option. He didn’t even need to use his gear-swapping skill, just the standard spear form was more than enough to deal with Axl.
Axl was reminded of his battle with Puppy, where the werewolf clearly had higher Attributes than him, but his short-ranged attacks and the narrow cavern still put him at a strong disadvantage when Axl was using a spear. Looking back at the fight, Axl wondered why Puppy didn't use some ranged attack, even throwing a stone at him back then would likely cause a decent amount of damage or get him off-balance enough to close the distance.
Swallowing his pride, Axl stepped forward for a deflecting strike and activated [Filial Deathshroud], willing his soul to attack the kobold. He encountered a small measure of resistance, not an active defense like the elite mantis had, but something that felt more like a generalized resistance that would cover many different forms of damage. Enough to turn a complete debilitation into a deep flinch without Axl having to draw much of the deathshroud's potency. Still, it allowed Axl to follow up his deflection of the spear with a deep cut into the kobold's shielded arm.
The kobold quickly stepped back, recovering seamlessly from the soul-attack, Axl taking the chance to redouble the attack as his enemy was now on the defensive. However, the injury was not enough to turn the tables, and quickly, the kobold regained the fight's momentum, pushing Axl back again.
Wanting to conserve his use of [Filial Deathshroud], Axl instead started focusing on the boosting feature of [Mana Shroud], the dense ambient Mana now letting him quickly match the kobold's Attributes, then, after a few more deflections, readily exceed them. Axl's strikes started to more fully deflect the spear, and as he moved faster, he was able to reach the kobold before he could counter, the kobold now in a retreat. Axl carefully measured out his use of [Mana Shroud], keeping the boosting just as high as he needed it, trying to stretch out the use of the boost beyond a simple overwhelming burst as he frequently used it in the past.
Axl managed another deep cut on the kobold's forearm, and he jumped back, quickly switching to his crossbow, Axl barely able to dodge the bolt aimed at his face. Spear and buckler now at his back, the kobold threw a bomb at Axl, detonating it into a burst of ice shrapnel just as Axl dodged to the side in a set of retreating steps.
The kobold followed with another bomb, this one aimed at the space between the two of them, forming a small cyclone of wind that pushed both back, but did no real damage. Axl waited out the dying wind, which kept the two from attacking each other for a few seconds, puzzled by what exactly the kobold was up to.
The wind dying down, the Kobold fired another crossbow bolt at Axl, which he easily blocked with [Filial Deathshroud], and the kobold simply reloaded, not moving, then fired again. Axl now was deeply suspicious and slowly started to close the distance, left arm up, right holding his sword to the side.
Again, the kobold threw one of those wind bombs between them, pushing both fighters back. Was he stalling, for some reason? Oh, he thinks my boosting with [Mana Shroud] put me on a timer. Suliana and Soffal had been quite surprised about how [Mana Shroud]'s boosting didn’t put Axl in a weakened state afterwards, as most boosting Skills did, almost by definition, and told him that he should keep that part of his ability hidden, since enemies would usually assume this in battle.
Axl smiled to himself, once again thanking his evolved inborn Skill for being so utterly amazing. Still, he wasn't so used to dragging out the boosting function of [Mana Shroud], not really able to keep it up indefinitely, so when the kobold again threw one of his wind bombs, Axl dropped his sword and used all his empowerment to throw a pair of daggers, which easily cut through the cyclone.
One dagger was barely deflected by the kobold, who switched to a large kite shield, but the other pierced the side of his gut. In a flash, he removed the dagger and applied some paste to it, but Axl could see that a good portion of the centipede poison was delivered.
The kobold swapped back to his buckler and spear and charged at Axl, clearly realizing that the poison would likely not do him well in a battle of attrition. Axl gladly met his charge, refocusing his boosting as well.
Just as they connected, Mana surged in the kobold's body, and his strikes grew faster, Axl barely able to deflect it away as his Strength was matched, then exceeded. The strike grazed his leg, the weapon barely able to cut through his sheersilk armor.
Axl was again pushed back, even as he focused on [Mana Shroud], trying to match the kobold's surge in power, one clearly driven by a boosting Skill of his own. Not to mention that there was some poison on that spear, and Axl had to divert some of his attention to Bilesong and his poison-absorbing organ to deal with that problem, even if the poison wasn't as overwhelming as that of the centipedes.
Taking a page from the annoying snake from the previous trial, Axl took a defensive stand and simply tried to let the kobold tire himself out. He took a few more glancing strikes, but he was also getting used to the poison being used. Also, the kobold's boosting Skill would likely have a limited duration and be followed by a period of weakness, unlike his.
The kobold clearly noticed this after a half dozen exchanges, and redoubled his aggressiveness, taking more chances and even switching to a pair of shortswords, then a greataxe, but Axl kept a defensive posture and focused on not getting his back to a corner of the barrier.
The kobold paused in a moment of hesitation, the first in the entire battle, and then he started to charge forward, almost recklessly, the Mana in him surging even further, breaks in his skin leaking it out.
Axl realized what this was, having seen this before, when Olkan detonated his own core, even if the kobold's self-destruction seemed more like a final function of the boosting Skill. Realizing this could end poorly, Axl maxed out his own boosting with [Mana Shroud] and leapt back, every inch of his body and will focused on creating distance between them.
The kobold tried to close in, even dropping his weapons and gear, then collapsed to the ground as Axl kept going as far away as the arena's barriers allowed.
The ensuring explosion enveloped a good half of the arena in a roiling burst of conflicted Mana, Axl crouched at a far corner, barely having enough time to take out his slab of tungsten from his dimensional pouch to serve as a makeshift shield. [Mana Shroud]'s full attention was now on boosting the durability of his body, and the powerful surge of Mana washed over him, singing his exposed skin and cutting into his armor.