The shield wielder obviously felt the same about Reinhardt as he felt about it. It came forward in a surprisingly fluid glide, shield up, sword arm cocked, knees bent and weight balanced and evenly distributed. It was checked mid-step as Reinhardt simply kicked the shield . The shield twisted and turned the en garde, but was unable to swing or chop at him around the other

  Reinhardt slipped to the left, trying to keep the shield wielder moving in front of the zweihander. Instead, the shield wielder moved with him instead of circling, and the zweihander stepped to the left - its left, coming around the shield wielder. “” Just in the time they had been fighting, they had gone from marching straight at him to trying for a flanking manoeuvre. No matter. He had seen how the shield wielder would react. This time, he stepped straight in, blade held . He kicked, not at the shield, but in a futball style punt at the right shin greave. As they came together, a few things happened. As expected, the sword whipped around to slash at him, while Reinhardt bashed its shield with his. Coupled with the leg sweep, the besteigung, sweeping his blade up at the arm hanging in space. He struck the vambrace near the couter, the blade deflecting slightly before biting into the gap between the vambrace and rerebrace. The Magic animating the

  He expected a slash across his back, or a disarming chop in a mirror of what he had just performed, but the attack came instead as a thrust. It came from a and a lunge, the blade aimed at the now exposed joint of cuirass, rerebrace and pauldron. It pierced cleanly and drove though his body to impact the inside of the far side of his cuirass. The pain was unfathomably intense. The blade pierced his , and he felt every millimetre, drilling through the middle of his brain. His vision blurred and he found himself grinding his teeth to keep from screaming. “,” he growled in the recesses of his mind. “” He rotated his sword arm, already high in a variation of , and thrust it at the visor of the zweihander. It was an awkward movement, but the point only skittered for a moment before finding the occularia and sliding through into the helmet. The zweihander

  Whilst he could feel the channel that had been pierced through his , it did not hamper his movement as much as it would have had he been flesh and blood. He stepped as fast as he could, back pedalling and strafing to get behind the shield wielder, who turned in place to keep the shield facing Reinhardt. Once he had the further out of position.

  Reinhardt slipped past his opponent and wrenched his Essence flowed into the hole perforating his SoulSpirit together and soothing the spike of pain behind his eyes. The shield wielder moved forward with more caution, as if it realised that Reinhardt had re-armed and the danger had increased. As it came forward, Reinhardt stalked it, moving obliquely to its approach, waiting for it to take an action and expose itself to an attack. It obliged, punching up with the leading edge at his face. He ducked and twisted, thrusting the Spirit and the blade. Something about the Enchantment had triggered, and the secondary effect was hooked into that. The auxiliary structure of the Enchantment was also moving, but it was infinitesimal compared to what was happening with the Primary Enchantment structure. The shield wielder tried to move away, but Reinhardt stayed with him, twisting the Spirit was itching. “” He looked and the Essence seeped into his SoulSoulEssence also ran along the full length of the

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  “, at least you can,” he thought at the sword. It was not strange at all that Reinhardt was already talking to his sword.

  Reinhardt had a lot to do, and a lot to think about. He wanted to replace his left gauntlet, but something about that last fight had put yet another idea into his head. The halberdier, shield wielder and zweihander

  He laid out the pieces, trying to figure out how he would go about “equipping” each one. “” He winced. He had been able to swap his left hand gauntlet, but that was only due to having his previous one ripped away. He looked at the Soldier’s Gauntlet, with his already meshed with it. How would this work? Was he able to withdraw his from a Magical Item? He sat there, staring at it, trying to think of how to remove it from his “hand.” Well, that wasn’t it - he had no hand. It wasn’t the same as pulling it off of his hand, it would be more like “pulling his hand out of it?” That didn’t work, so he tried to think of it as cutting the threads - and immediately rethought it. What if it expelled that and , like when he lost his hand? He focussed on the Soldier’s Gauntlet, tried to imagine residing in his SoulSpirit and down his arm to the gauntlet. It was almost immediate - he could tell the gauntlet penalised

  Easy. He could feel, tied up as he was in the enmeshed with the item, the innumerable “threads” of "detach" and withdraw to the vambrace. The gauntlet went limp, but he could sense its presence with his .

  Meshing his with the new pieces was just as bad, he had to pause after each piece and wait for his to fully integrate the Magical Item before he could affix the next piece, and every time was the prickly feeling of a dead arm. After a good 10 minutes he had his left arm fully functional again. He concentrated on the arm as a whole, after engaging with each piece individually. The Halberdier’s PauldronRerebrace Zweihander’s CouterVambracegave him the impression of Man-at-Arms’ Gauntletmaybe 10% less “smooth” but almost matched that with a straight increase in power and a slight increase in hand mobility and finger dexterity. Overall he felt that was a good trade-off. He spent the next 15 minutes dismantling and reattaching his right arm, with difficulty. His brain was still the same one that he had in his physical body, so his co-ordination with his left arm was garbage. He remembered Magdi, too, was right-hand dominant to the point of being handicapped, but then suddenly became almost fully ambidextrous, as long as he had a weapon in both hands.

  Reinhardt faced his next challenge: tearing off one of his legs and creating a new one. He sat on one of the chairs. He had to work again from the furthest point and work his way up. Once he had gotten his left leg cuisse free, he picked up the first of the replacement parts - a Man-at-Arms’ CuisseMan-at-Arms’ PoleynHalberdier’s GreaveHalberdier’s Sabotonout of balance. It made up for it by splitting the difference in both the point of no return,” he silently joked. Well, he’d never know unless he went for it.

  Chromatic Grading Scale:

  : .

  : .

  : .

  : .

  : .

  : .

  : .