92. Close-Quarters Brawl

Close-Quarters Brawl

He was two meters taller than me and weighed more than twice as much.

He was still not the most physically oppressive enemy I had faced.

The power of multiple demon warriors had been condensed into him by magic.

His armor had shattered from the changes to his new body, and the leather-like loincloth barely covered him, while his anatomy was complete in a way the previous ones had not been.

Because the equipment of the warriors Chi Li had completely destroyed had not been absorbed, his weapon had condensed as well, finally becoming a three-meter-long rod one and a half centimeters thick. In his hand, it looked like a toy club.

Only minutes earlier, he had teleported in front of me so quickly I could not react.

But the additional strength made me much faster, and my superhuman Agility let me easily dodge the thrust of the glowing green rod.

Then my knee and elbow struck his side with dull, heavy impacts.

He did not stop. Midway through my punch, he teleported behind me.

My newly improved Spatial Distortion forced his attack to miss, then bent space back the other way, letting me deliver a charged punch.

But space and timing were under my control, so the blow struck him squarely in the chest.

He stepped back once, then again. He flinched slightly, but otherwise showed no reaction to the heavy hit.

Then lightning struck my abdomen, the current grounding through my lower body and making me convulse.

Unlike before, when these warriors’ magical or physical attacks struck me, the improved Defensive Counter activated, reflecting a large portion of the lightning back to its source.

He twitched too.

Less than I did, but it was still hopeful.

The Mavis people had seen my Defensive Counter before.

That was why, after that, they had stopped trying to attack me with their towers. But they were a civilization centuries ahead of Earth in magical tradition, so it was only natural that they would find counters to my skills.

Counters, however, were often specific.

So when I upgraded, I chose Constant Force as the new defensive ability whose blocked damage could be reflected, a defense specifically aimed at magic.

I had been saving that for Mort.

But if you save every card for the final battle, there may never be a final battle. At least in this fight, I could rely on it to give me an edge.

The next several exchanges were too fast for me to do anything except react on instinct.

My instincts were supernatural now.

But this big bastard was genuinely skilled, with the skill of six warriors combined.

The black-glowing rod stabbed into my left hip, stealing momentum, heat, and stamina. It affected him less, not only because the strike was not fully reflected, but also because of the enormous difference in size.

That gave him a chance. He tried to trip me in the gap between Spatial Distortions, but that was only to distract me so the lightning that made both my arms seize up could strike.

I teleported around him, dodging his attacks while countering.

It became increasingly clear that my ranged kinetic attacks were not very useful. He was strong enough to endure most of them and regenerated fast enough to repair injuries nearly as quickly as I inflicted them.

Changing force-field bubbles and making air explosions had almost no effect on him.

For a while, we were evenly matched.

Then, because of my lack of experience, I made another mistake. His feint made me guard my head, and the green-glowing rod wrapped in lightning slammed into my chest.

My lungs stopped breathing for an instant. My heart skipped a beat. Every nerve ending at the point of contact overloaded.

It nearly dropped me to the ground.

Not quite.

He seized the opportunity anyway, using one hand to wrench my arm behind my back while the other slammed the rod into my chest.

Then, to his surprise, I tore free of his grip and began hammering him with a chain of punches and kicks that grew stronger and stronger, no matter how many times he stabbed me with the rod.

Focused Invulnerability.

It was a difficult skill to use, and it had to be specified clearly.

Trying to completely nullify attacks from his weapon did not work.

Trying to define immunity against his weapon disabling me did not work either.

But specific colors?

Those worked.

So from now on, I was immune to lightning and green magic.

By the time he realized why his attacks were far less effective than expected, he was already on the back foot, a dozen bruises forming across his body.

My regeneration had handled most of my injuries, and my overall strength had grown a little more.

So naturally, he cheated.

Chains suddenly grew from the floor and tried to grab me, but I broke them before they became too numerous or too thick. Then I drove him backward.

Eventually, I saw an opening and struck him with a fist wrapped in compressed air, similar to the force-bubble trick I had used before, but much more focused through my enhanced ability.

He did not dodge.

He took the hit head-on and sprayed red mist into my face.

I found myself back at school, beating the hated girl from class until she became a bloody ruin under my strength.

I won an important fight for the first time in spectacular fashion and saved my friends in the process.

After a very strict selection process, I earned a spot on the basketball team.

During my sophomore year, after the school team won their first important match, I had my first more intimate experience in the school bathroom.

Then I realized that the arm around my neck definitely did not belong to an athlete, and it was trying to choke me.

My head was not clear.

I tried to push it away.

Then a burst of pain tore through my right armpit.

That dragged me out of the illusion. The emotional confusion remained, but compared to the burning cold and the dark magic draining my strength, it barely mattered.

My right arm clamped reflexively around the painful intrusion, basically becoming useless. Though the enemy had to use one arm to choke me, he had better leverage and was not affected by the mental attack.

I struggled, trying to teleport away, but the dark magic easily drained my low-level ability.

The big bastard was definitely being hurt too, but he resisted the magic reflected back at him better than I did, and he could afford to outlast me.

I shifted Focused Invulnerability to immunity against black and white magic.

For one instant, relief flooded through me.

Then he changed his weapon back to lightning and green light, and the pain became worse.

Then he sprayed that red energy into my face again.

For a few seconds, I was back in the school bathroom, kissing the athlete.

Pain snapped me out of it quickly, but he used that hateful red magic again.

The third time I came out of the illusion, I was on my knees, and he was already spraying another cloud of crimson mist.