XelofBloom

7.7

Added 2021-07-10 07:18:14 +0000 UTC

Floating across the sands, Eve positioned herself on the starting stone dais before once more dropping as the anti-magic field from her opponent snapped on.

Instead of a full plate, her opponent wore a mixture of chainmail and plate. While that didn’t bother Eve, the fact that he glowed with multiple defensive enchantments was quite annoying. The light was slowly bleeding into shadow as night started to take hold. Eve wasn’t above playing dirty, quietly making Thirst slip into a full ninja suit outfit mode complete with camouflage pattern.

Fighting fair is for suckers and morons. So Eve thought, moving forward with silent steps.

If Vivien was believed, her opponent, Charles, took a moment before orienting on her stalking figure. Eve noticed the flare of mana that bled into his helm, giving a visor look in the mana. Clearly, some optical enhancement to allow him to see.

Eve unsheathed her Jian allowing the sheath to vaporize like before as she took a low guard once more. Unlike the previous fight, however, she chose not to lunge in. A shield made Savage Survival Mind wary when her normal method of teleporting was unavailable. So instead of racing to attack, she decided to let the enemy make the first move this time around. Defensive fighters tended to react in patterns based on their experience.

Every pattern has a weakness, though. So Eve thought as her opponent started to babble meaningless drivel at her. Does he think I’m going to be angry that he constantly comments on my tits, ass, and sexual preferences? I’m not the one wearing chainmail and hard plate in the middle of a sandy arena where the temperature has barely dropped.

Eve looked deeper at the enchantments, searching for what she knew had to exist. Tracing lines as she casually parried sword strikes and dodged shield bashes the face behind her ninja mask took on a cruel grin.

No matter the armor system, there’s always a cooling method. So Eve thought as her Jian whipped out like a striking snake. She could smell the delicious scent of terror as her opponent realized the meaning of her casual attack.

Eve wasn’t aiming for a quick kill. No, like her first fight, she aimed for the connections that kept the mana, keeping her enemy cool, not in the mental sense but the actual physical sense. The late desert heat was practically baked into the sands, and while she didn’t suffer from the heat due to Isa, others did.

Armor was extremely effective in Eve’s opinion against an Elemental fighter. However, if you were used to throwing spikes of ice, fireballs, lightning, or acid, then suddenly being unable to attack from range was an issue. Added to that, an opponent in full plate armor compared to a mage’s normal silk enchanted robes, and the outcome was pretty brutally in favor of one side over the other.

Unless the mage is secretly a ninja witch, who can see your cooling rune enchantments, and is a cruel, vindictive bitch. Eve thought her Jian striking out once more as the deadly dance continued. She brought Weakness to the top, watching as the fracture lines appeared on the enemy’s gear. There were few as the enchantments enhanced the chainmail and plate pieces, along with the sword and shield.

Eve took a two-pronged approach to attack. First, she would target fracture lines on the shield and then switch to the cooling enchantment’s weak points when they were exposed. It was a long slow grind of cut, thrust, chop, parry, and dodge compared to the knight. There was simply no quick way to victory in this battle.

The scent of despair slowly tickled Eve’s nose as the dance continued. Unlike her opponent, she wasn’t relying on physical stamina to move, a marked advantage in the dance of death. After almost fifteen minutes of fighting, her opponent was moving slower than before.

Savage Survival Mind decided it was time to step up the pace.

Eve’s blade began to cut and thrust with increasing vigor giving Charles no chance. Finally, a fracture line appeared on the shield at close to the same time one of the cooling enchantment runes met their end. The enemy babbled meaningless insults and taunts, but she ignored the increasingly desperate man.

The words of the dead meant nothing to Eve.

He favors his left foot quite a bit now. So Eve thought, parrying increasingly desperate slashes from her opponent. An old injury or a congenital weakness? No matter.

Shifting her weight, Eve struck with her left glove directly onto the weakened opponent’s shield. Shatter gave no chance for a comeback as the resulting blow lifted Charles from his feet and blew him back several steps. Then, without giving any leeway, Eve pushed forward, ruthlessly striking several unanswered blows to sever another two cooling enchantment runes.

It was only a matter of time now.

Without a comprehensive cooling enchantment, fighting in the heat was murder. Without a shield, Charles no longer had his left side covered. Both of these issues would be a problem against Eve, but they combined spelled doom. Another fifteen minutes passed before Eve finally let her opponent die. His death collapsed the anti-magic field, and she decided not to walk off this time.

Examples need to be made of people, sometimes. So Eve thought after she finished. People don’t get the point until you give it to them in a clear manner.

Eve turned from the cooling corpse flicking her Jian clean before creating a new sheathe for it. Then, saluting the crowd, Eve teleported to the ramp exit. Screaming cheers and chanting sounds of her name resounded behind her until she entered the waiting room.

“Food!” Bridgette said, now awake and aware.

“Excellent work, only three left, Boss,” Vivien said, her eyes glued to the book she had been reading earlier.

Eve threw some more dishes on the table from her inventory, switching up from the previous two times with bread, curry, rice, and grape leaves wrapped lamb pieces. Then, sitting down, she took a long look at Vivien before Eve said, “What should I expect for the last two rounds?”

“Nothing major, probably two-night predator species. Usually a cat of some type, and then a bigger cat. This place doesn’t have a wide selection if you get my meaning.” Vivien replied, sneaking a plate of lamb pieces over to her side.

Eve didn’t miss how the apple pie had vanished into Bridgette’s stomach in mere moments. She secured her chocolate cake and a bowl of curry rice before abandoning the rest of the battlefield developing on the table.

Thirty-six million Slots. An enormous amount to work with. Eve looked at the options the thought-stream dedicated to planning her build offered. The most prominent weakness that had been exposed so far was combat within an anti-magic field. Of course, her opponents were weaklings who depended greatly on the field, but Vivien’s comments from earlier made Eve think.

What if I was fighting a genius that could leech stamina? Or someone that threw bombs indiscriminately with no pattern? Someone who used poison acid gasses? Eve thought. The fact that the final humanoid fighter I’ll be against can stealth in the anti-magic field rings all sorts of alarm bells.

There were two ways she could handle the issue. First, Eve could ‘stack’ passives like Grace and such ilk. It benefited from requiring absolutely no brainpower while providing both a short and long-term gain in power. The second was to shore up the current weaknesses that the Arena had exposed.

The real question is, do I think the next battle will be another pushover? Eve thought.

“I think the next battle will be a pushover.” Eve said, “Which is why I’m going the utterly paranoid route to power. Walk me through the fight you had in the past with the rogue type up next, please, Vivien.”

Vivien looked confused before replying, “Nothing much. I was wearing a few silks and some cheesy leather armor that showed skin. The bastard kept popping in and out of the shadows like he was using teleport, shadow step, or invisibility. All of which should have been impossible with the anti-magic field up. I got lucky, caught him out with a stun, and then beat the ever-living shit out of him. Not much to tell.”

Eve frowned and asked, “Was it day or night when you fought?”

“Uh, late evening?” Vivien replied, her eyes narrowing.

“Describe the exact process in which you lost sight of the enemy, please,” Eve said, a terrible suspicion growing in her mind.

“Uh, he would move to a shadowy area, and poof, he was gone.” Vivien said, “What’s wrong?”

“Did he ever take a step forward before vanishing?” Eve asked.

“No, now that you mention it, he didn’t make any motions. It was like a switch was turned. One moment he was there, and the next, gone. It was peculiar. I couldn’t smell him, there was no sound, and there was no fluctuation of the mana field. It was like he ceased existing. Now that I actually look back, it was super bizarre. It was almost like he…wanted…to lose.”

Bridgette’s face snapped to Vivien as a horrified expression crossed both their faces.

“Wanted to lose? To take third? Almost like a sleeper agent held in place waiting for a huge payoff to arrive?” Eve said, her mind filling in the possibilities.

“Why?” Bridgette said, her eyes growing wide.

Eve took a bite of chocolate cake with a conjured paper fork and said, “This place is all about profit. The Arena doesn’t gamble. It can’t afford to. I suspect the loopholes in your contract were placed because the Arena doesn’t want to push you to a dead end. People with no way out, they have a way of making things expensive for their owners.”

“So third place is the cutout. A person placed in the perfect position to end a streak before it reaches us, who might choose to lose if it costed the place enough if we had no other options.” Vivien said with a grim expression as she took a bite from a grape-wrapped piece of lamb.

“Exactly. Then someone comes along from out of town. Unlike normal fighters, I have a specialist in business management to handle setting up wagers. We set up a massive series of wagers, and the Arena rubs its hands in glee.”

“Big loss, bad business,” Bridgette said with tears in her eyes.

“Exactly,” Eve said, her eyes scrolling over the Class Skill Spell List. Of course, she could just be falling back into the rabbit hole of paranoia, but what better time to do so than when she had millions of Slots to spend.

Matt always had that mantra about planning for the worst, but I prefer the one I learned in boot. Eve thought. Prior planning prevents piss poor performance pygmies! The Seven P’s were a well-known mantra from the depths of yore that any military mind knew by heart.

Eve decided if she was going to be paranoid, it was best to go all in. Slots were worthless if she was dead. Best to shore up weaknesses and plan for what she suspected the rogue, Mick, used to vanish. If she was wrong, it was a massive loss of Slots. She really hoped she was wrong. Narrowing her eyes, Eve pushed Bibliotheca Body and Mind to Rank V. Twenty-eight million Slots were used to purchase two additional Traits and empty her entire piggy bank again.

Eve took a look at her Status, focusing on the new Traits.

Race: Witch

Class: Witch of the Library

Profession: Talismanic Librarian

Level: 500

Health: 27,000/27,000 (2,700 HPs regen)

Mana: 27,000/27,000 (27,000 MPs regen)

Stats: Str 2,700; Dex; 2,700; Con 2,700; Wis 2,700; Int 2,700; Charm 2,700

Free Stats: 101,800

S/S Slots: 0

Skills:

Bond Familiar (25%)