Chapter 77

The Fate of the Thief (III)

Cain Blinked to the side, appearing forty feet or so from his previous position, dodging a blazing ram that ran through there, ripping open the gash in the ground. He immediately charged Water and Frost, surging a tidal wave from beneath his feet that rose to nearly twenty feet into the air, swelling toward the skeleton while bolts of frost dripped like rain toward him.

The skeleton charged Earth and ripped a massive column asunder, tossing it against the tidal wave and neutering it. The debris flew about like scattered flocks of birds, the two silhouettes dancing in its midst as flashes of coral and golden clashed, ripping sounds booming out and scattering the dust as the new surge emerged behind it.

An involuntary smile stretched on Cain’s lips as he began to gasp for breath, streaking to the side and avoiding a barrage of flaming arrows that dug a good few feet into the ground. It’s been a while, he realized, since he last threw down the gauntlets with another great Elementalist. Rather, in his past life, he tended to avoid other Elementalists due to the fear of his own weaknesses being explored and exploited. In many ways, he avoided one of the best avenues for his personal growth... entirely due to his ego.

However, the happiest and most exhilarated he’d been during a fight was when he fought either another Elementalist or a creature inside the Tower with the Elementalist-like battle style. There was something otherworldly in trying to match and outmatch the firepower of someone else fighting the exact same way as you. Trying to outwit them, outpower them, outsmart them, all while surviving the best they had to throw at you.

Cain Blinked back again, noting the three remaining charges on the spell, avoiding a frosted fist that appeared above his last position, slamming fervently into the ground and digging out a crater. At the same time, he charged Creation, Earth, Fire, and Aether, slamming his palms together as a raging inferno dug out a spearheaded earth column, tossed forward at the skeleton who rapidly cast a spell similar to Amnesty Shield. The clash resulted in yet another explosion, a torrential inferno ripping out in a ring-like fashion, fires consuming the room.

From them, a dark-dotted silhouette emerged, the crown on its head flickering in incandescent lights, its bony arms repeatedly flaying back and forth. Each flay ringed out a bolt of lightning targeted directly at Cain who charged Body, Wind, and Aether, pushing toward the skeleton instead of trying to gain more distance while dodging the bolts of lightning that began kicking up yet another dust storm. One... three... ten... by the time he closed-in on the skeleton, he’d evaded good twenty-four bolts, with only two grazing him, and one landing squarely on his shoulder, digging through and forcing him to forcibly close up the wound.

He slammed his fist forward at the skeleton who tilted its head sideways, dodging the direct strike yet being slammed by the aftershock of flames that landed squarely on his chest in the form of a fist. The strike tossed the skeleton into the air like a kite without its strings. Yet, even midair, Cain quickly realized that there wasn’t really an opportunity to ‘finish off’ the man as the latter immediately charged Creation and Earth, wrapping himself up in fifteen layers of dirt-laden shields.

Cain fired off dozen or so bolts of lightning himself, managing to land a few though most either missed or were suffocated by the layers of defenses beforehand. The skeleton landed nimbly on his feet as both paused for a moment, staring at one another as the dust began to settle.

The entire Throne Room had long since turned into a ruin -- there was barely a whole foot of the floor that hadn’t been dug up, craters decorating the place everywhere, the open sky mocking the once grand hall of the King. The only thing left intact was the Throne itself that seemed wholly immune to damage.

Cain’s breathing was rapid and shallow, sweat dripping down his forehead, but the look in his eyes was fiery. He never truly went this all-out since returning. Most of his previous fights either ended right after he ‘got serious’, or without him ever needing to go that far. This one, however, had freed him. He was fighting just like he did on the higher floors in the previous life, where it was impossible to simply concoct a single spell and kill a boss.

What made it even more fun was that it was a mirror match -- it was as much about the firepower of the two Elementalists as it was about finding the correct Elements to attune and use at the correct times. The fight was pushing every part of him to its current limits, not allowing him to rest or get brazen.

“Can you match a higher pace?” the skeleton asked abruptly.

“I’ll match whatever you want,” Cain replied. “Can you, though?”

“...” though Cain knew it was impossible, he would swear he saw the skeleton grin for a moment there.

If nothing else, he grinned. This was him -- the unabated, unhinged man who didn’t care for what surrounded him. He’d buried it ever since returning from fear of driving others away, but there was no reason to hold it back anymore. There was no reason to hide himself behind the plastering smiles and silly jokes and empty bragging. He could come undone.

Two silhouettes flashed, disappearing and appearing right in front of one another, fists ablaze, slamming squarely into each other. Both were tossed back, yet even as they were flying, seemingly out of control, they threw boulders of frost and fire at each other, ripping the spacetime itself asunder with each collision.

Cain landed squarely and spun, reaming out a roundhouse kick charged with Creation, Fire, Earth, Aether, Wind, and Blood, executing a hexa-attunement the fastest he did in his life because he used the backlash his body underwent as the fuel for Blood.

The heel of his leg slammed into the ground as a roar of a seemingly ancient beast cried out in mockery, the ground ripping apart in a zig-zag sort of a line, fire bursting out like beams of light accompanied by tendrils and tails coated in a sheen of blood. It all coalesced into a berserk torrent of indescribable shapes, ones that seemed to defy the context of dimensions.

The skeleton retaliated in a similar fashion, performing a hexa-attunement of Creation, Fire, Frost, Wind, Body, and Nature. An elemental behemoth that similarly seemed to defy the laws of physics ripped itself from underneath the world and stood upfront as a shield, the clash of two impossibilities sucking in the spacetime into a singularity for a moment, ceasing all sound and freezing the contents of reality for just a brief moment before collapsing, impossible to sustain.

The explosion rippled out and dug out a massive trench underneath, tossing both Cain and the skeleton into the walls of the arena, on two opposite ends. Cain, despite charging Body into his back, still vomited a mouthful of blood as he felt his inner organs rattle, bones creaking, on the verge of breaking.

Charging Wind, he landed gently and stumbled, nearly toppling onto his knees. He was a bloody apparition by now, his left eye closed due to the severe backlash, bleeding profusely. He could barely feel the fingers of his left arm as the numbness began to settle in. He knew that he was reaching the limits of his current body -- even performing a single hexa-attunement so quickly should have broken him down to the point of no return... but he managed to endure. Any more than this and his body might genuinely collapse.

“Well, no time like the present...” he mumbled through a partially-closed throat, taking as deep of a breath as he could. He saw that the skeleton had stood up as well, and it looked like it had amped itself up further -- as Cain sensed something he only sensed once before... someone charging hepta-attunement. Seven-charged beast that marked the grounds he’d never been able to raise himself to.

Chuckling bitterly, he settled his nerves and emptied his mind. Though he was a cerebellar fighter more so than an instinctual one, sometimes... things happened at speeds that mind couldn’t process, no matter how trained it was. Moments would come when planning and schemes and all the countermeasures would flatten and fall to the wayside. The hallmark of those who rose above the occasion was that they didn’t collapse, that they didn’t give in to the sensation of being overwhelmed by something that could not be ‘computed’.

He dreaded moments like these in his previous life; he'd research everything until he was 100% certain of success, never leaving it up to chance or fate or luck. He knew, however, that he would never become more than just a solid, consistent Conqueror if he kept at it. And, in this chance... he knew that just being his past self wouldn't be enough. People far more talented than him would eventually catch up and blow past him. While in the past life he simply shrugged at it, he couldn't in this one -- not with twenty-five years head start over each and every one of them.

If they still somehow managed to surpass him... what was the point to his advantage? There was none.

He smiled at the sensation of danger, at the alarms ringing out in his mind, warning him of the impending doom. It was a sensation he feared, yet couldn’t escape anymore. He clasped his hands together as elemental surge bathed him, the touch of the elements almost electrifying. He sensed it, the core where the Mana rested within his body... he felt it shudder and shake. His veins expanded, his mind turned silent, and his sight exploded into an array of colors and lines that witnessed reality beyond its base structure.

For the first time since returning, he activated Elementalist’s trifecta -- Avatar, Singularity, and Mana Burning. The three skills augment one another, effectively creating a whole new one -- though technically nameless, most would come to call it ‘Cosmic State’. For one minute, every aspect of what made an Elementalist an Elementalist was augmented and heightened far beyond its base prowess. In this state, Elementalists themselves became raid bosses -- one-man armies that could collapse the world if they so willed it.

White-dyed sheen drifted gently from the surface of his skin, covering him. A mixture of black and white dyes slowly began to remove his features until he was a 'blob' -- a humanoid-shaped silhouette of two colors, edgeless, shapeless, wordless. Spacetime rippled outwardly around him, seemingly too terrified to stay.

“... well then,” even his voice changed, dropping in pitch until it hardly sounded human. “Let’s dance the dance of elements...”