Chapter 75: Nothing Personal

“Frederick, Welcome to Akul.” Stephan said, offering a hand to Frederick Wyrd. The Thorns-build could probably kill him with a handshake, but Wyrd didn’t know that.“I’ve always thought it was childish to name a Stronghold after yourself.” Frederick said, glancing down at Stephan’s hand, but not shaking it. “I see you’ve found your own fountain of youth.” Stephan said, ignoring the slight. It was expected. He hadn’t failed to notice the gilded rod of bone that Frederick refused to let go of, either. “Indeed. You’re going to have to try harder if you want to outlast me, old man.” “Your seat is right here,” Stephan said, pointing at his own seat. “The seat of honor for a distinguished guest.” “How gracious.” Frederick muttered, staring at the seat with obvious paranoia before finally sitting down. “And Mark, I haven’t seen you in ages!” Stephan said, giving Wyrd’s son a great big hug. “It’s only been half a year,” Mark said, trying to extricate himself from Stephan’s grasp. “How’s Amanda?” Stephan asked, trying to maintain a straight face. “How’s my daughter?” Frederick scoffed, and got under Stephan’s skin, but he muscled it down, focusing his attention on his future son-in-law, who was significantly more tolerable. “She’s well, sir, I saw her less than a month ago.” Mark said. “They would be on honeymoon right now if Mark hadn’t botched the emancipation of Oilton.” “I’m sure.” Stephan said. He was sure ‘emancipation’ was code for ‘conquering’. He was also sure his hated enemy would never let his daughter escape, not even at the expense of his own son’s happiness. In fact, he was counting on it. The divide between Mark Wyrd and his father was a hair thin crack that a patient artisan could fill with water and let the changing seasons drive the two apart. Frederick’s view of his son as ‘his’ property, would not allow him to see that crack until it was too late. “Enough of your chatter. Let’s see this farce you call a tournament,” Frederick said, his feet tapping impatiently, glancing up at the other Lords as they filed into the viewing box. ṘÂNỘᛒĚȘ Stephan guided Mark to his seat and sat beside him. “I think you’ll find todays matches exciting. There have been many outstanding Climbers among this year’s contenders.” “This year’s cattle, you mean.” Frederick said, turning his gaze away from the empty arena and towards Stephan. “…Or do you not bid on them?” “The one who wins the bid may make the first ” Stephan clarified. “And the winner is assisted in seeking Lordship.” Frederick scoffed again. In a matter of minutes, the tournament was underway again, the fights more frenzied as the competitors struggled to reach the quarterfinal bracket, where the prizes began. Finally, the match Stephan had been waiting for arrived. “In our next match, we have the grandson of Baron Akul, Nephir Akul, level 25 Potent Detonator, darling of our city. He has…won every match thus far! The crowd cheered, and Nephir waved, but it just didn’t have the same energy as before. The cocky grin didn’t manifest quite as brilliantly, and the squeals of young girls weren’t quite so forthcoming. Stephan smiled and rested his chin on his fist. And his opponent, The level 24 Resourceful Climber, William Oh! leader of the Party of William Oh. So far he has won all of his matches without doing anything entertaining! Let’s see if his streak of boring continues!” At the mention of ‘William Oh,’ Frederick Wyrd’s knuckles went white around the rod he carried, eyes narrowing. “Slippery fish.” Wyrd whispered, just loud enough for Stephan’s immense Acuity to pick it up. Stephan saved that information for later dissection and turned toward Mark Wyrd. “You see, Resourceful Climber is a Rogue Archetype with an enormous amount of tricks-“ “I know.” Mark Wyrd interrupted, his lips downturned into a scowl. Stephan frowned and glanced between Frederick Wyrd and his son. Both of them too focused on the match to notice the unusual reaction they each had to ‘William Oh’. ***Will*** “So you’re the William Oh I’ve heard so much about!” Nephir Akul said, pointing at Will, levitating above him a bit to add gravitas. “I-I’m going to prove that the rumors about y-you are unfounded!” Nephir nearly choked on his words. He was looking a little anemic, having been healed from a near-corpse only a day ago. Even magical healing drains the body’s resources. Nephir was basically suffering the effects of being forced to clean the entire orphanage in a single day. He was young and could probably shake it off, but it couldn’t be good for his performance this fine morning. Additionally, the Nuker only had one day’s worth of Charge built up since Loth had tapped him out the day before. In short, he was in the worst condition that Will could arrange without ‘cheating’. “I want you to know…I don’t actually enjoy doing this.” Will said. The Baron’s grandson cocked his head. “W-What?” “Fighters, BEGIN!” A glow of fire began to glow between Nephir’s fingers. S~eaʀᴄh the Nôvel(F)ire.nёt website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality. Will slapped it out of his hand, causing a blast of fire to shoot off to the side, dissipating before it reached the audience. The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. Phantom Hand released the cannonball into Nephir’s chest at a small fraction of it’s max speed. Plus, even if he’d been asked to rough him up a bit, an accidental death by chunking would probably not ingratiate himself to Baron Akul. The Nuker didn’t move as the cannonball hit him, one of the petals of the rose of shield clustered around him crumbling fading away as the cannonball came to a dead stop. Will thought, retrieving the lump of iron. Nephir reached down and whipped a throwing knife out of a sheath on his waist. Will put the Phantom Hand at the end of his wrist action, knocking it aside and causing the throwing knife to go tumbling wildly off-course…before turning towards him, it’s trajectory corrected by a Relic of some kind. Will took a step forward and the knife whipped past him, trying in vain to turn and come after him again before it ran out of energy and clattered to the ground. Nephir tried to blast him again, and Will slapped it aside again. “do something ?” Will glanced over his shoulder at the announcer, who seemed to be disappointed with his lack of flair. “GAH!” Nephir reached forward, a diffuse wave of Charge flowing past Phantom Hand before resolving into a glowing bead of fire above and behind Will. Phantom hand, being able to travel at seven hundred miles an hour, whipped up and slapped it upwards before it even started moving towards him. When Will glanced back down, a shield-infused chakram was spinning through the air, most of the way to him, the pale blue of the shield seemingly crystalized around the weapon. Stevie emerged from the floor of the arena and grabbed the chakram by its inner ring in passing, whipping it back at Nephil before disappearing again. The Chakram was stopped by the shields, where the shield petal unfolded from the chakram and re-attached itself to Nephir, unspent. Will thought. “Shit,” Nephir growled. A flame appeared in both hands, and Will directed the Phantom Hand to slap them out of Nephir’s hands. The shield flower seemed to tilt forward, the petals stretching out and covering Nephir’s hands in layer after layer of protection. Phantom Hand was rebuffed by the layers of shielding, something Will didn’t even know was possible. Will’s eyes widened, preparing to dodge, but then something strange happened. Rather than the conflagrations shooting forward and exploding on him, they stayed in one place and the shield petals wrapped around the Conflagrations in Nephir’s hand and crystalized into pale blue crescent blades with white hot cores of pure fire in their center, radiating destruction. They began to spin of their own accord, controlled by Nephir. In Will’s imagination, Mason was furiously writing down new ideas for how to leverage his shields offensively once they matured. “Mental constructs are rare indeed, but I can do that too.“ Nephir said, the white-shot blades of force beginning to bob and spin around him, vibrating the air with their speed. “What’s this? Nephir has pulled out his ultimate technique, the Waning Moon! He’s used this technique to literally butcher a kaiju! Nothing can resist it’s power! William Oh will to do something now!” “Prepare yourself for-” Will shot his cannonball into Nephir’s chest. Again, the cannonball came to a complete stop, but this time, a dozen or so shield petals crumbled away to nothing, thinning out Nephir’s protection drastically. Before his opponent could blink, Will grabbed the cannonball and did it again. was With a single gesture from their owner, the two spinning crescent blades spun down towards Will, humming in the air as they seemed to form a full moon as they spun faster than the eye could see. For the first time in the entire tournament, William Oh was forced to do something. Will switched from the Wand of the Undead Retainer to the Stormfists, the finger housing the wand giving off a painful popping sensation before darkening, as if he’d popped the knuckle and it had suffered necrosis in seconds. The world seemed to slow down around him as his movement and attack speed were both boosted by about 26%, in addition to the eight points to every physical stat. Will slipped out of the way of the approaching blades, the arena itself cupping his heels as he accelerated at blazing speeds. Will drew his axe and tossed it up into the air at Nephir, while his hand unleashed another cannonball. The last of Nephir’s shield expired the instant before the axe reached him, and the wide-eyed Nuker dodged, mostly through sheer luck, as his shields no longer supported him, dropping him out of the air and causing the tomahawk to spin over his head. Will heard the humming buzz of Nephir’s shield-blades approaching behind him and dropped to the ground, rolling toward them to avoid their homing. “And Nephir tries for a-“ That seemed like what it might’ve been for, since Nephir didn’t exactly specialize in ranged weapons. Wasting a whole Relic slot for a chakram and some throwing knives made no sense, but using it to make his best technique do a bit of it’s own work without conscious effort was definitely worth it. The blades dipped toward him and missed him by a fraction of an inch, burying themselves deep into the arena, disappearing into the white-hot wounds they carved into the stone. Will was pretty sure they were coming back. Will caught his axe with Phantom Hand and triggered the AOE thrice in rapid succession. The three psychic pulses were essentially ignored by Nephir, given that the Nuker had a strong Focus, but the Stormfists triggered on the second strike, causing a bolt of lightning to shoot down from the Serpent’s Tomahawk and catch Nephir directly in the back. “And William Oh responds with a feint and blast of lightning from his axe!” Normally, Stormfists only added a ‘low’ amount of lightning damage, but this was nearly tripled by the Phantom Hand, making it much more potent. Enough to be considered an attack in it’s own right. “GAH!” Nephir shouted as his lungs began to contract against his will, the lightning knocking him forward with physical force. Will skipped to the side as his mental timer went off. An instant later, the white-hot crescents shot out of the arena floor, crossing past each other right where he had been standing. The crescent moons spun up and up…bisecting the Serpent’s Tomahawk where it was held by Phantom Hand. “And Nephir responds by disarming William Oh, targeting his axe in the fraction of a second Will spent dodging the Waning Moon.” Will stared as his Relic, the first he’d ever gotten, that he’d his to acquire, that represented his journey as a Climber…collapsed into a pile of Relic Dust and sprinkled down over the battle-torn arena. While Will was processing his grief, Nephir took the opportunity to shake off the paralysis and climb to his feet. “I knew if you expected me to only attack you, I would get an opportunity to disarm you.” Nephir said, pushing himself to his feet. “Let’s see how much of your Build I just destroyed,” he said, adopting a cocky fighting stance. Will looked at him. “…Uh oh.” “Congratulations, you’ve outplayed me!” Will said, cocking his head as he smiled/snarled at his opponent. “Here’s your prize!” Will charged forward, watching the crescent blades gather in front of Nephir to block his approach. Phantom Hand grabbed Nephir by the hair and yanked the Nuker with neck-breaking force directly into his own summoned blades. Nephir moved the blades away from himself, but not before suffering burns on his arms, throwing off his reaction time from the pain. Now that the blades were cleared, Phantom hand accelerated Nephir even further forward, causing the Nuker to reluctantly skid forward across the arena at a small fraction of the Hand’s max speed. Bringing his face to Will’s clenched fist at about eighty miles an hour. As Nephir screamed forward, All Will had to do was lean into the punch, feeling a satisfying coming from his opponent’s face. The Nuker went tumbling upside-down past him, his momentum carrying towards a ring-out. Phantom Hand caught Nephir by his belt and saved him from a ring out before slamming him back down into the stone of the arena. Phantom Hand proceeded to steal Nephir’s Relics. They were incredibly difficult to steal, writhing against Dimensional Storage like living things as he tried to sever their connection and store them without their owner’s permission. ? Still, writhe as they might, Will’s Rogue Archetype Abilities were heavily boosted, and his Acuity, which the Ability scaled with, was exceptional. He overwhelmed the squirming connection between Nephir and his Relics, securing both rings, amulet, and headband. The blazing crescent moons above them exploded into pretty shards of miasma as the shields were no longer able to contain the Conflagration. “Wai-“ Nephir coughed before Will got on top and started punching. Roughly every third punch in the dizzying volley of punches included an extra bit of lightning to his opponent’s face, keeping him nice and still. It wasn’t until the male priests of Holdna forcibly dragged him away from Nephir that Will realized the fight was over. Nephir wasn’t breathing, his body scorched, the scent of ozone and cooked blood lingering in the air. The priests of Holdna slammed a fist filled with divine radiance on Nephir’s chest, and the charred corpse drew in a gasp of breath. Up above in the Baron’s observation box, beyond Will’s hearing, Frederick Wyrd turned towards the Baron. “How much for that one?”