Chapter 12: This is a shooting game.

After the explosion there is a thick layer of smoke blocking the line of sight of Crimson Crisis. He feels victorious but that feeling last less than two seconds, "Wait a minute, the match hasn't ended!" He quickly stands up and tries to retreat a few steps.

*Thud, thud.*

Little by little a silhouette takes shape with slow steps. I survived the explosion but now my left arm is only hanging by two cables, obviously it is disabled. My flank isn't in better condition, it is charred and there are some sudden little sparks. My left leg suffered little to no damage, at least I can walk without problems.

I walk holding the Advanced Piercing Plasma Saber in my right hand and only stop until I am about seven meters in front of Crimson Crisis, he immediately deployed his Assault Rifle again and tries to hold it with both hands. Since his left shoulder has a huge hole from my previous attack clearly the system will not allow him to move it freely.

In the last moment Ana concentrated all the remaining energy shields in my left arm and at the same time I pierced the sticky bomb with my saber, damaging it and inducing an early explosion greatly reducing the damage. However the remaining blast was enough to damage me so badly, right now I only have 53% energy shields left, since a Silver Battle Droid needs at least 40% energy shields to be operational, one hit more and it is game over for me.

"It's my win droid, even if you survived that explosion I don't think you can close the distance between us before I finish you off." For the first time Crimson Crisis tries to speak to me. I can see that he is trying to bluff but I will not pick the bait. I fix my gaze in him and start to think how to finish this ridiculously hard battle.

‘I have enough ammo in my riffle to shoot three bursts, if somehow I miss and have to reload…’ Crimson Crisis thinks and fixes his gaze on me with a worried look. Normally it would not be a problem to reload, but his attempts to use his left arm are fruitless, his arm is partially disabled and reloading with one arm would not only be nearly impossible, I will probably kill him before he finishes.

"If you are so sure then I should give it a try, shouldn't I? Maybe I can surprise you." I stand still and answer his bluff. I extend his right arm showing my Advanced Piercing Plasma Saber and then I adopt a running start position moving the Advanced Piercing Plasma Saber in front of my chest.

After the explosion I had to shut down the Full Dive mode and now I am relying once again in the system, trying to run with one arm by myself could be troublesome.

One heavily damaged Battle Droid versus a Hybrid with and injured arm, this is the final showdown. Clearly Crimson Crisis has the upper hand since my performance, as any other Battle Droid, depends on my energy shield levels and I have sustained a lot of damage, but in the lobby no one dare to guess with 100% certainty who will win and who will lose: We have showed that neither of us should be on the amateur category.

'Can't miss or I will not be able to defend myself anymore,' Crimson Crisis abandons the idea of using his left arm and with just his right arm he rests the butt of the Assault Rifle in his chest. Although that is not the ideal position to fire a weapon and he has never tried to use an Assault Rifle with just one hand, he has no other choice.

'No more fancy tactics,' I am ready to rush at any second.

"Ana, do it now!" I yell and immediately start to advance towards Crimson Crisis. While rushing I’m making waves with my saber in the air and the saber is now flashing brightly. Wherever the saber slashes there are some afterimages.

*Ba-ba-bang.*

The first reaction of Crimson Crisis when he sees me moving towards him is to fire. Since the distance is short the bullets will impact me quickly, the problem is that instead of impacting my body the bullets impacted the afterimages left by saber.

'Crap, it's an Advanced Saber!' Crimson Crisis panics and fires a second time. His shot is parried again by the afterimages of my Advanced Piercing Plasma Saber.

Sword Shadow is the advanced function of the Advanced Piercing Plasma Saber. By decreasing the damage of the saber by 80% and consuming 2% energy shields per second, it creates up to 20 afterimages wherever it is waved. Those afterimages can block up to medium sized bullets. I was reluctant to use this function until the last moment because this was my last ace and in my current condition I could only use this function for a very short time.

The Berserker class has 3 weapon slots, 1 of them for a heavy weapon and 2 of them for medium weapons, while the Pacifist subclass restricts the player to only use light-ranked weapons. The Plasma Saber is considered a light weapon, nonetheless, I used 2 suffixes to add special properties to the Plasma Saber: Advanced and Piercing. By adding a suffix to a weapon the slot it requires upgrades too, since I added two suffixes the Advanced Piercing Plasma Saber requires a heavy weapon slot while being a light weapon.

The Plasma Carbine normally is a medium weapon. I used the Light suffix to downgrade the weapon decreasing slightly the damage output and accuracy but allowing me to equip it without penalties because it is treated as a Light weapon while using a medium slot. Obviously the same thing goes for the Small Titanium Shield, however, I used Small instead of Light for the Shield because Small only reduces the size while Light reduces the durability and resistance, I didn't want a big shield with poor defense.

After the 3rd burst is parried by me, Crimson Crisis starts to retreat. He has another sticky bomb and he just has to find the right moment to use it. He is not sure if the Sword Shadow will absorb the power of the sticky grenade but he doesn't want to take the risk.

I am a bit slower than Crimson Crisis due to the low energy, even when I started running first there is still a gap of five meters.

Crimson Crisis doesn't dare to be full confident of his speed and constantly watches back to look at my position. Since he is being pursued he thinks that I will change at any moment to my Light Plasma Carbine, moment he will exploit to reload his Assault Rifle and put an end to the duel.

After running for a bit, I finally realize why he is not shooting back at me, his weapon must be empty and he can’t reload with one arm. I cancel the sword shadow allowing me to shift up a gear and I begin to move a bit faster.

Crimson Crisis seeing that now I am running faster grew impatient but it didn't last for long, he sees as I throw his saber to the air, 'An aerial assault!' He immediately recognizes the move.

Battle Droids are known by having a deadly aerial assault thanks to the increased gravity of the Seismic Strike. Even a punch can easily kill a player if executed correctly.

Crimson Crisis is an experienced player and he knows that there is only one way to avoid certain death in the situation he is right now: to intercept the saber in the air. Even if he is not successful on stealing the saber, he could plant the sticky bomb on me in midair.

Without hesitating, he changes slightly his direction and steps on a nearby tree, making half a spin and launching himself towards the saber that is 5 meters in the air. He catches easily the hilt of the saber and although he knows that he avoided the aerial assault and has to feel good about it, the problem is that he finds that he is the only one in the air.

"You know, this is a shooting game after all..." I say while standing in the floor and holding my Light Plasma Carbine with just my right arm aiming to the defenseless airborne Hybrid.

*Pe-pew, Pe-pew, Pe-pew, Pe-pew, Pe-pew.*

"Headshot, bodyshot, bodyshot, bodyshot, armshot, bodyshot, headshot, bodyshot, you have killed player Crimson Crisis."

"It would be silly if I won with a melee weapon." I finish my sentence after seeing Crimson Crisis transformed in a flash of light.

♫ ♪ ♫

"Congratulations. Player Kortef won the Juggernaut Duel!"

"Bravo!"

The spectating crowd explodes in cheers seeing the magnificent ending of the duel. This kind of shows can only be seen when two players in the Pro category has the same level of skill, seeing this in the amateur category is unprecedented.

"Ha-ha-ha, not only you owe me half a million but I found another team member! Excellent, excellent!" Mr. Smith let out a heartily laugh.

"Well, good for you." Although Mr. Ackerman lost the bet, he doesn't feel bad for it. He recognizes that his son misjudged a book for the cover. In fact, he is just mentally blaming his son. "Wait a moment... A team member? Don't you mean a substitute? Don't tell me not only you don't have substitutes but the second team is incomplete." Mr. Ackerman glances Mr. Smith with discontent.

"*Cough, cough.* It's now complete! It's now complete, don't worry about that." Mr. Smith says without looking at Mr. Ackerman.

"It's just the second team but still it will represent BME, you can't just pick random players." Mr. Ackerman rebukes.

"It will be fine, it will be fine, ha-ha-ha." Mr. Smith laughs awkwardly and then hurriedly makes a hand gesture to a beauty with a white dress not far from his seat. "Jasmine, let's go." Before leaving, he turns one last time towards Mr. Ackerman, "I'll be waiting for the check Mr. Ackerman. See you."

Mr. Ackerman just nods and sees as Mr. Smith parts with Jasmine at his side. Then, he glances sideways to his son, "There's nothing you can do, change that face," He pauses for a moment and with a sigh he continues, "I'll forget about this if you win that tournament, otherwise you'll have to pay me four times what I lost today." Mr. Ackerman grins and slowly leaves Gamer's Corner.

Alfred shakes his head and parts too.

♫ ♪ ♫

When I stand up from the VRD I see as a group of people are clapping and cheering at me. Some even approach and stretch my hand as if I am some kind of celebrity. I feel awkward but try to act cool.

After winning Ana wanted to hug me but she would be embarrassed of doing it in front of so many people and there are some that are approaching her too while asking if she truly is the one who operated the Carrier Orb of Kortef. The reason that many people discovered that I am Kortef is simply because Crimson Crisis and I were the last players still in the VRDs, half people rushed towards the other player but he quickly said that he was the one who lost.

Time passed and I have to politely answer some questions the crowd ask me and even give some tips. I am starting to feel anxious but after a bit more the crowd start to slowly disperse. The problem is that when enough people move so I could see the rest of the hall... I notice that everybody is leaving Gamer's Corner!

"Ana, why everybody is leaving?" I go near Ana and whisper in her ear casually.

"Everybody?" Ana looks around and sees as there are less and less people. "Why everybody is leaving?" She says in an alarmed tone.

"Don't tell me you don't know." Someone who was near heard Ana and turns toward us chuckling a bit. We look back at him both with a confused look.

"Hehe, it seems you truly don't know." He puts an air of mystery but before Ana or me could say something he continues, "Today was the preliminary rounds, the final round will be held tomorrow."

"WHAT?" Ana and I shout at the same time.

END OF CHAPTER 12.