Supreme Swordfiend

Before the fireball could emerge, a flash of movement happened alongside a glint of blue steel, the tyrant’s head beaten upwards by a last-second reversal. The blistering hot fireball sent skywards through the opportunistic strike.

The swordsman stood, his sword’s edge dulled, his blow one made to prevent harm, not to inflict it.

Purging the toxin had taken Leon more time than he’d expected, the concentrated dose slowing his efforts. Had the Woods Tyrant chosen to snap his body in half with either claw or jaw, he would have been powerless to stop it.

The beast’s intelligence granted it higher thoughts- a desire for more than mere survival. It had both a capacity for and a willingness to inflict cruelty.

Its enhanced intellect, which had given it the upper hand, which it had used to gauge Leon’s strength, had now backfired, allowing Leon to fight back.

Sheathing his blade to restore its edge, Leon followed up on the stunned beast. A quick horizontal slash broke through a row of teeth, the entire bottom set shattered by Leon’s might.

Retreating backwards, Leon couldn’t help but take advantage of the situation. He’d curtailed his impulses and taken his fights seriously. Now that he was cutting loose, it was time to go back to his roots- plus, if his taunting kept the beast in place, what went up would come down.

As the lizard nursed bleeding gums, Leon met its baleful gaze, one hand on his scabbard, the other outstretched, fingers curled as he beckoned the beast towards him.

“So what, you’re like some greatest hits compilation, taking the abilities of all the other overgrown geckos? Not a bad concept- though you’re disappointing me. I thought this fight would be fun, but you’re starting to bore me! Bring the heat or get the hell out of my Proving Grounds.”

The monster’s slit pupils narrowed further as it let out a strangled roar, which morphed into a scream of pain as a white fireball burst open upon its back. Its own attack brought down on it.

Leon took advantage of the blow, dashing in to carve more wounds upon the beast’s face.

Then the feet, stomach, tail, chest and chin.

No matter how many beams of concentrated flames, jets of poisonous fire or attempts to use active camouflage to ambush with a fireball.

The swordsman kept cutting, kept bleeding the beast as his own power grew.

Back and forth man and beast fought, each injury they inflicted forcing their opponent to burn more precious energy, a dance of blood and steel, Leon’s laughter ringing out as he cut through his foe, each strike cutting deeper until he was at the peak of his power.

His tendons began snapping with every swing, his ligaments screaming as they tore, his muscles ripping with every movement, and his energy began dwindling rapidly just to keep him in the fight.

This use of Ebb and Flow was different- he was hurting more than last time. The greater the difference between his Power and Speed and his Constitution, the stronger the strain his body would come under.

If the trend kept up, one day using Ebb and Flow would break his bones.

A bridge to cross on another day, a problem for future Leon to resolve.

Even as his own body tore itself apart, even as his focus stretched beyond his limits, keeping his circuit under control and even while this chimaera-esque tyrannosaurus attempted to burn him to cinders, Leon felt one thing above all the pain and stress.

Pure joy.

After five days, he was finally having one.

Not a good fight- a great fight.

As they fought, the dynamic shifted, the beast foregoing venom and camouflage as they accelerated their race to the bottom, no longer a war of attrition but of annihilation.

With smoke and ash choking the air, monster and man clashed endlessly, storm clouds forming overhead as they fought.

Front flipping over a fireball while cutting through an eyeball with Low Tide, Leon felt his world spin, the beast having thrust its mass into him in a crude tackle, sending him bowling through the ash.

An embarrassing end to his fun- he’d been attempting to blind it permanently before killing it, a cruel irony in having a monster that could use invisibility, killed by an enemy it wouldn’t be able to see once his work was done.

Healing the fresh burns and broken ribs, Leon took stock of his energy and internally sighed.

A shame that’d he have to wrap up here- he’d been having fun.

His Speed had firmly crossed baseline human capabilities, allowing him to move faster than the beast could track. His Power let him leave truly heinous wounds behind, his every step leaving deep imprints on the dirt.

As his energy reserves dipped to below ten per cent, burnt skin sloughing off like a snake’s shedding, Leon remained disengaged. His opponent took this as an opportunity to heal, digging into the corpse it had carefully preserved, taking pains not to incinerate it as they fought, eyes locked on Leon prepared to begin the fight anew should the swordsman move.

Leon began taking up a stance that would have struck fear into the tyrant, had it only known what it had preceded.

Right foot forward.

Left foot back.

Hands upon scabbard and hilt.

Facing the beast side on, the rampaging energy flowed into Leon’s right arm, skin bursting open as the blood vessels exploded under the pressure.

He spoke one final time, a mark of respect for a foe he’d enjoyed beating.

“Great fight, I’m done now”

The Woods Tyrant saw only a flash of movement and a glint of blue metal.

Then the world vanished.

The explosion of energy destroyed everything. The ground, the trees, it reduced even the tyrant’s [G] Grade flesh to meaty chunks.

Leon leaned against his sword, panting from the exhaustion that Tsunami had caused.

In the crater the move had formed, the storm breaking overhead, a series of pop-ups demanding his attention.

“You have slain the Level Twenty-Five Woods Tyrant!”

“Level up! You are now a Level One Sealed Swordfiend! +70 Power, +70 Speed, +70 Constitution +70 Intelligence, +70 Wisdom!”

“Capstone Quest unavailable- please complete all prerequisite quests!”

Leon would have appreciated the insane gains- were he not in extreme pain.

He’d not lost his right arm, though he couldn’t feel it or move it.

The parts of his body that he could feel were incredibly sore. Leon felt pain in muscles he hadn’t known existed until today.

Rainfall began pouring down, warm summer rain falling alongside blood and meat as the Woods Tyrant’s remains fell back down to earth.

He’d wanted to eat the monster- though that was off the cards now that bits of it were all over the place.

He’d also lost out on the bloodline- a bitter loss though one he could live with. There would be other opportunities.

Mustering the courage to look at his arm, Leon saw one of his bones bent the wrong way, with part of another bone poking out his elbow.

Dropping his blade, Leon used his good hand to withdraw a special treat he’d prepared for his post-fight meal.

A plate of triple bacon cheeseburgers. No lettuce, no tomato, no ketchup. Just a seasoned burger, rich cheddar and rashers of bacon.

It took fourteen burgers before he was full, all eaten in that crater, with blood, water and mud soaking his feet.

Leon didn’t care- he knew there were at least two Infernal Rex out there and he wasn’t moving until he’d recovered. Here, in the Woods Tyrant’s land, he would be safe from any marauding predators- at least until they realised the king was dead.

Pushing his bone back in, Leon focused on repairing his arm, burning half of his freshly recovered stores to do so.

Clearly normal food was losing its efficacy, with Leon needing to eat more for his healing- a sign he was closer to [G] Grade, perhaps?

With his wounds treated, the swordsman swapped his blue blade for his crimson one, not forgetting even in the highs of victory that his bloodline was as much a curse as it was a blessing.

Climbing out of the crater revealed a flattened landscape.

The ash had been blasted away, leaving the area mercifully clear, the smoke blown skyward and any trees not obliterated outright were toppled and maimed.

In the centre of the bloodstained patch of land that the tyrant had died upon, there lay a small white orb. Curious, Leon plucked it from the ground, his Sealed Fiend Eyes displaying the orb’s information.

“Woods Tyrant Core- The core of the Woods Tyrant.”

A suitably cryptic description, the appearance of a core reminded him of the slimes he’d fought.

Storing the orb away, Leon belted his blade to his back, looking at the devastation he’d wrought during the battle, lightning crackling overhead as the storm truly broke.

Fixing his gaze on a chunk of the dead tyrant’s leg, a thought crossed Leon’s mind.

He’d analysed the monster incorrectly.

The beast hadn’t been the greatest hits- it had been a one-hit-wonder.

Chuckling to himself, Leon began making his way back, navigating via the trail of corpses he’d left, storing the stronger specimens and leaving the weaker ones to rot.

Leon mulled over his gains, his hands moving on autopilot.

He no longer felt human- his stats after the boost from his last level-up placed his capabilities in the realm of superhuman.

To test his might, Leon punched a nearby tree, his fist leaving a firm imprint on the wood, his knuckles unhurt by the act. It felt like punching a cushion or a pillow, soft and easy, the material moulding around his hand.

The revelation that he could punch his way through a tree did little to change Leon’s mood.

This feat of strength was a consequence of his actions, not a goal he had aimed for, and such a minor consequence hardly merited any congratulations.

The fight Zerasos had promised him at the beginning of his days here was now over and done with.

Leon wondered what he would fight next.

Hopefully, that was the end of the dinosaurs.

They’d had a good run, in his opinion.

Though variety was the spice of a good fight.

His journey faced no impediments- in fact, he hadn’t seen a single living beast since killing the Woods Tyrant.

A strange occurrence.

One Leon didn’t dwell on. Arriving back at the house, he chose not to enter.

He hadn’t had time this morning to complete his training.

Closing his eyes and drawing the Sunlight Greatsword, Leon sank into meditative exertion, varying between thrusts, chops and slices.

Seeing the world only through the movement of the raindrops deepened his appreciation for his Air’s Pressure Insight, allowing him to see without sight.

While training, Leon simultaneously refilled his mana reserves, his breathing relaxed and controlled, the water mana resting in his chest, the energy paradoxically cool and warm simultaneously.

A shift occurred as a raindrop splattered against a haggard form to his left, on the edge of his perception. Leon opened his eyes to see another human.

A dying human.

Mike’s right arm was gone, the stump freshly healed.

The man’s face was disfigured- horribly burned,. His once-groomed hair had suffered a similar fate, every strand presumably consumed by the same flames that had marred his once handsome visage.

He bore no arms or armour, his sword lost, his clothes in tatters, his steps shaky.

Lowering his blade, Leon spoke first, the shivering husk of a man that had once been so confident and self-assured, making no move to open a conversation.

“What got you?”

Mike met Leon’s eyes as he replied, Leon noting the change in them.

The spark of life inside Mike was dead- though the biological machine still ran, forcing him to cling on to his pitiful life, burning what little energy he had to heal himself.

It was a hoarse reply, devoid of any emotion.

“An Infernal Rex. Caught us before we could wake up. Everyone else is dead, Leon. That monster wiped us out and we couldn’t even scratch it. Then it vanished.”

For all the man had schemed, manipulated and been wrong in his approach to the Tutorial, Leon couldn’t bring himself to hate Mike as he was now.

“Why are you here, Mike?”

“I’m tired, Leon. Tired of this place. I’m scared and I’d like the pain to end. Will you make it stop?”

“I will Mike- stay still.”

Leon had once happened upon an injured rabbit in the middle of the road, just outside his house. A car had hit the poor creature, its back legs crushed and useless. He’d known the rabbit was dying- so he’d fetched a shovel and made it quick.

Better to die quickly than to die in agony, ripped apart by a vicious predator.

A lesser cruelty to prevent a greater one.

Mike Hamilton died with a ghost of a smile on his face and a crimson blade buried in his chest.

Leon Knox stored the corpse of his fellow human in his storage ring, resolving to give him a burial once he returned to Earth.

A courtesy he hoped would be extended to him when he died.

Then he stepped inside the small house, to confer with Zerasos, his mentor- now with one challenge surmounted and an endless hunger to dominate what remained in these Proving Grounds.