[Observe]

[Name: Yr'Arl 

Knight of Atrenil 

HP: 1500/1500

Yr'Arl is a Knight of Atrenil and is one of many in a long line of Knights to join the Guard. He has since cast aside his goal of joining the Guard in favour of following Jacob Lyre, believing that the Human will do more good for the Galaxy than the Guard in its entirety. Hates Chile Con Carne.]

[Observe Lvl Up! 1 - 3]

I blinked away the observation pop up, it hadn't really given me any useful information, though the addition about the chile con carne was funny enough to force me to bite down on my cheek to stop myself from chuckling. 

Yr'Arl launched forward in a burst of blue lightning, bringing his sword around in a deft sideways swipe. 

[Item Enhance]

[Enhance]

I reacted in an instant, darting forward while bringing my sword up to parry. My manna resistant blade, forged from the claw of a Null Space Invader, ripped straight through Yr'Arl's own. The manna absorbing function of the weapon sucked Yr'Arl's blade straight inside itself, leaving my feline opponent without any weapons of his own. 

[New Ability Acquired: Basic Swordplay - Lvl 1]

But Yr'Arl had seemingly expected that to happen. 

With my blade safely out of the way, Yr'Arl burst forward in another shower of blue electricity, getting right up into my personal space. Even with my Enhance turned up to the max I was unable to stop Yr'Arl from landing a powerful two-fisted strike, sending me hurtling through the air and through the wall of the courtyard. 

-256HP

-14HP

I grunted as I staggered up, surprised by the amount of damage I had taken from a single of Yr'Arl's hits, even through my Corona Shield. If I hadn't been using my Enhance, which gave me an extra 200% to my resistances, that attack alone would have cleaved almost a third of my HP away. I was going to have to be incredibly careful because Yr'Arl clearly wasn't messing around this time. 

As if to punctuate my point, Yr'Arl was on me in a flash of blue, one of my old energy beams that he had stolen pointed firmly at my head, an almost dismissive look on his face. I wasn't going to go down that easily. 

Still enhanced, I applied my [Anti Gravity Fields] and launched myself at Yr'Arl with a heavy burst of propulsion. I tackled into the alien before he had the chance to let his energy beam attack loose and charged up my own [Manna Bolt], letting it hit him at point-blank range, sending him rocketing back down to the ground. 

Another burst of propulsion allowed me to keep up the pressure, and I slammed into him with a heavy right hook, the hit so strong it had practically sounded like a thunderclap. 

[New Ability Acquired - Basic Combat Lvl 1]

I launched another punch, this time coming in from the left, but Yr'Arl was ready, and with the sparking blue energy that denoted he was using the powerup that drained his HP in return for better stats, he was able to move fast enough to grab my fist as it came down toward his face. 

I started the charge for a Manna Bolt in the same hand, but let it go almost immediately, using the energy blast not to hurt Yr'Arl, but to startle him enough into letting go of my own fist. The ploy worked, and I slammed my fist into his face once again, resulting in another thunderclap of power from the hit. 

[Basic Combat Lvl up! 1 - 2]

It was dirty, it was brutal, and it was harsh. But I knew Yr'Arl wouldn't be able to keep up through too many hits like that. 

Yr'Arl clearly shared that opinion. As I reared back for another punch, Yr'Arl blasted me with a full-powered energy beam. 

-5

-4

-2

The beam itself didn't do much in the way of damage, but it did send me flying back up into the sky, well away from the feline alien. In a flash of blue lightning, Yr'Arl was gone, retreating back into the castle. 

[Anti Gravity Fields]

[Propulsion]

Using my tried and tested combination of anti-gravity and propulsion I soared through the air after him, hoping to try and make up the distance before he had a chance to do anything to turn the tempo of the fight in his favour. Unfortunately, I was just a little bit too late. 

Massive runes blazed into existence in front of me, surrounding the entirety of the castle. With a rocky clunk and the groan of aged metal shifting, the castle began to shift and change before my very eyes. The towers slotted themselves into the position of arms, and the great hall of the building itself moved upward to create a chest that they connected to. The building mecha was completed by an outbuilding that had been jammed onto the top of the construct. 

I blasted my [Propulsion] in the opposite direction, turning on the speed to avoid a mighty open-handed slap from the creation. The very same kind of slap that had defeated Boledo in a single hit. 

I had wanted to have finished dealing with Yr'Arl long before he got the chance to bring his castle golem to life, unfortunately, I hadn't quite managed it, and now I was going to have to deal with the impossible construction. 

"You could just give up, Jacob Lyre," the voice of Yr'Arl boomed from the head of the golem. 

"As if I would ever do that," I yelled back as loudly as I could, not knowing at all if Yr'Arl had been able to hear me. 

It was more than a golem, then, it was some kind of mecha with Yr'Arl controlling it from within the head. That was useful information. Information that I could quite handily use. 

I drew my sword from its holster once again. Things may have looked a little dire, but I wasn't about to give up without giving it my all.