Wish upon the Stars chapter 355

Three days wasn't nearly as long as it sounded. Each of the days was  its own project, and exhausting in its own right. The first day I  finished granting Rime's wishes, and got Jessie her last twenty five  Vitality worth of elixirs. She also got another eight Might, bringing  her Might to ninety five, her Vitality to three twenty eight, and her  total points to five hundred and eleven.

The same day I  also managed to upgrade my Cloud Step to Ripple Running by synergizing  it with my Minor Swimming Mastery Skill. One step became ten, and  combined with State of Grace, I became a much more mobile and dangerous  combatant.

Day two saw me going back to working with  Benny. He traded me five triple strength density shifted attacks for  twenty points of Focus, bringing himself up to two hundred and three. I  also managed to upgrade Kidney Blow to Heavy Hands, my first passive  subskill. By using my Minor Boxing Mastery as a sacrifice to add armor  penetration to every single one of my blows (albeit not very much of  it).

On the third day Benny paid five triple strength  tranq blows for twenty points of Might, bringing it up to two hundred  and nine and his total up to five hundred forty three. My final skill  was created by merging Boiling Cloud (a skill I barely ever even used)  with Minor Archery Mastery (another Skill I almost never touched) to  create Steam Arrow. Which would give me a usable ranged attack among my  options, something I was sorely lacking up to this point, leaving me  only my divination skills and Sucking Mud to go before I could rank up  the skill to intermediate.

Training with these new  abilities took up the rest of my time over my three days off, and by the  time the morning of the ninth match came along, I'd officially gotten  as far as possible, even scheduling in some downtime the night before to  allow myself to enter the match at my absolute best.

Jessie  drove me to the arena again, though it was strange going without  Callie. Rime tagged along, as she would when Callie had her own match  (we were in different rounds). As I entered the waiting room under the  new arena, I couldn't help but stop and take stock of what was  happening.

It felt...weird, being here alone. Knowing I  had an opponent coming up who I would have to deal with all on my own,  and that said opponent would be a member of a team that made it just as  far as we did. When they called me out onto the sand, I stepped out of  the tunnel and groaned aloud at the person I found there.

Of  course my first round would be someone I knew, who was strong as hell.  Wren grinned wryly at me, offering me a cheerful wave as his giant bone  spear sat over one shoulder. "Morning Solomon. Lovely day we're having,  don't you think?" My friend's amber eyes were twinkling with amusement,  but they were also twinkling with something else. Eagerness.

I  felt my pulse pick up. I'd wanted this rematch as bad as he did, and  I'd put in a lot of work in my training. I'd beaten him last time, but  that was with Callie, and I hadn't forced him to use his ability. "Seems  like it." I replied cheerfully. "You must be pretty confident. You know  what I can do."

He waggled his free hand. "Yes and no.  Logically I know you're much less of a threat without your partner, but  you have a habit of doing the impossible. I'm not stupid enough to go  into this underestimating you." He started to spin his spear slowly,  passing it back and forth hand over hand, letting the metal coated tooth  atop it drag in the sand. As he did, I could see water start to gather  from the air around him, coating his palms and flowing down the bone  haft of the spear.

"Fair enough." I said casually. "I  won't gold back either." The water thing wasn't ideal. It meant even if I  was willing to expose my Moonlit Night skill the option was off the  table. That said, I'd made plenty of other preparations. I triggered  Ripple Running and State of Grace, then knelt down to coat my arms in  toxic magma. I half expected him to come at me while I prepared, but he  didn't, he just kept spinning up his spear.

As he passed  it back and forth, the water accumulated along the spear, turning it  from a wet stick to a pillar of liquid. I could sense some extreme power  from that thing, and I was kind of looking forward to seeing what it  could do. Knowing any more talking would be pointless, I used Double  Trouble, appearing behind Wren and triggering Flurry of Blows,  increasing the rate of my already massively enhanced movement speed as I  unleashed a flurry of sharp punches at his back.

The  spear, which was still being passed slowly, sped up, the water shifting  around it, and suddenly I was faced with a fucking shark made of water  bearing down on me, it's gaping jaws surrounding the head of the spear  as it chopped down on my arm. I used a triple strength density shift on  my left arm without thinking, massively enhancing the density and power  of the magma.

There was a loud clang and I bounced  backwards, skipping off the air like a rock across a pond, using the  mobility of State of Grace to enhance the speed and distance I was able  to travel with Ripple Running so I could withdraw nearly instantly.

I  sucked my teeth, shaking out my left arm, which hadn't been cut, but  had been smashed pretty heavily by the damn spear. My armor was probably  the only thing that had saved me from being disarmed in a much more  literal sense than when I lost my cane.

"Impressive.  You're faster than I remember." Said Wren as he went back to spinning.  The longer that went on the more water was condensed. I was pretty sure  that shark would get bigger and nastier as it did. Which meant I needed  to break that buildup. The burden of initiative was on me, not on him.  Joy.

I shrugged, trying not to let him see me sweat. "I'll  be honest, I thought I'd have to earn that ability. I'm honored I  impressed you enough to pull out all the stops."

His smile  was predatory. "Did you think you were the only one who went to see a  friend's match? I've seen what you can do Shane. I came here to win, and  I'm not holding back. Seems like you're not either. I'm curious though.  Exactly how many tricks do you have up your sleeves? Are they enough to  make up for not having your partner? Your teammates? You're a scary  guy, but I'm not exactly a pushover myself."

Reaching into  myself, I unleashed a series of techniques. Double Trouble, a shadow  clone, and a stored Stealth attack from Callie. I stepped back and  vanished as a doppleganger took my place and a dark copy appeared behind  Wren. As I did, I bounced off the air with Ripple running and circled  around to the side as Wren seemed to detect the clone. I wasn't sure how  he was doing that, but it was something I'd counted on.

I  triggered Double Trouble again on myself, and I saw Wren's shoulder  stiffen as the shark spear tore apart the clone, dispersing it into  darkness as I appeared behind him. Before he could attack me directly, I  triggered my new Steam Arrow skill, spitting a boiling steaming jet of  water right at his face. His eyes widened and he stumbled back, bringing  up his spear defensively to deflect the attack.

With all  the water concentrated in one place, I triggered Afterburner to  massively increase my power. Then Mercy Kill, then a gravity attack to  slow him down before finally releasing a fire attack combined with a  Balam empowered punch right at the water around the spear.

A  massive roaring cloud of toxic fire enveloped my punch and when it hit  the water steam exploded out, but I kept up the attacks, using up both  of the other fire attacks the same way to take advantage of Afterburner.  Seven attacks left, I grabbed the spear in both hands and channeled a  gravity attack directly into it, combined with e density shift as I  jerked it out of his grip and sent to spinning away.

Continuing  that whirling motion I lashed out with a series of punches all six of  them imbued with triple strength tranq attacks. Wren grimaced, arms  coming up to tank the punches, and winced as my magma coated arms imbued  with tranquilizing poison, smashed into his forearms as he did his best  to tank the attacks.

Which he did, unfortunately. Even  with all the tricks his Might was much higher than mine, and I was  forced to rely on Ripple Running again to disengage, two more steps  ending the skill and forcing me to recast it. I was about twenty feet  from him now, and I was panting as Afterburner faded, sapping my  strength. My head was pounding from the massive repeated skill and  attack usage, but I wasn't the only one who was unsteady.

Wren  was wearing a hauberk from what I could see but he hadn't been  protecting his arms, probably to prevent anything from slowing down his  spear. His arms were coated in poisonous cracks as the toxic fire burned  away at him imbuing the tranquilizer into his system even faster. He  was barely standing, eyes starting to flutter, but I saw him haul back  and slap himself hard across the face, which seemed to temporarily stave  off the effects.

We were both weakened by that last  flurry of attacks, and as he spat his blood on the sand he gave me a  wide grin. "That...was sneaky. A double decoy. And you'll have to tell  me how the hell you disarmed me after this is over." He shot a glance at  his spear, but I'd tossed it across the arena pretty hard. He wouldn't  be able to reach it before I could reach him. The water had been boiled  away, and though I saw him try to condense some more, the droplets  wouldn't stick for some reason. Maybe the lack of concentration.

I  didn't respond, waiting for any sign of weakness. His eyes fluttered  again, and when they were closed for a second I triggered Double  Trouble, then blitzed him with another barrage of punches from behind.  He spun, somehow detecting me again, and put his arms up, but I dipped  back, allowing the punches to peter out as I put a bit of distance  between us, and kicked a cloud of sand right up into his face.

Unlike  the Steam Arrow, there was no way to clock a cloud of sand. He panicked  and inhaled, sending himself into a coughing fit, and as he dissolved  into hacks and wheezes I dove forward and ducked under his flailing  arms, smashing a right cross into his jaw and sending him stumbling back  before I followed it up with a stomping kick to the face, finally  laying him out flat on his back as the damage combined with the tranqs  to knock him out cold.

I doubled over, panting, head  blazing with pain, but I grinned down at my friend as I let the skills  fade. Leaning down, I put a hand on him and triggered a heal burst  before turning to stagger out of the arena. No way I would be able to  carry him in my condition. Besides. I wanted to look cool after my first  victory. I couldn't be more pleased with how it went down. I couldn't  wait to see who I'd be fighting next.