Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion - Chapter 50 - Like Some Berserker Warrior From Myth

Xavier kept a close eye on his health as he fought, but once he’d gotten into the thick of things, right up at the foot soldiers with their spears and shields, he wasn’t taking near as much damage as he had been when he’d been out back in the open.

And now, his health was actually steadily regenerating.

Xavier heard Sergeant Bradley holler for his soldiers to create a shield wall to receive him, clearly expecting him to be strong after he’d taken all of their attacks and kept running.

Would be good if I can stop and take these arrows out, though.

He looked like nothing more than a human pincushion. Half of those attacks had been arrow-strikes, and so he had about twenty arrows protruding from all manner of places. His arms. His legs. His chest. His shoulders. His Stomach.

Fortunately, none had entered his most delicate of areas, something he hadn’t considered as he’d been standing there ready to receive the enemy attacks.

I really need to get me some actual armour.

He couldn’t help but wonder if his skin would be healing aroundthe arrowheads. He may have to create new wounds when he pulled them out, worse than what the arrowheads themselves would create with their triangular, jagged edges.

When he’d reached the enemy, for a moment he’d worried his strikes wouldn’t be enough to get past their defences. The soldiers had their shields up, and many of them had Bulwark—or a spell similar to it—active.

But he should not have worried.

You have defeated a Level 12 Human!

You have gained 1800 Mastery Points.

You have gained 1800 Spirit Energy.

His barbell-heavy staff slammed into the enemy shields, breaking through their protective spells with ease. The shields were metal and wood. Dents formed and splinters flew, and all the while his Spirit Staff of Might remained in perfect condition.

I’m glad I spent so much on this staff.

His robes, on the other hand, were a tattered mess to the point where it barely looked as though he was wearing many clothes at all.

While his staff didn’t have much penetrative power except right where the crystal was, it had plenty of blunt force.

It was akin to a heavy foot soldier swinging a war hammer, except his staff was far faster and more agile. He struck about him with fierce accuracy, denting helmets and breaking skulls. When he struck a soldier in their shield, they went flying as though he’d hit them with Heavy Telekinesis.

Though they didn’t have far to fly, so they would slam into the soldier behind them—sometimes straight onto their spear.

Each of his strikes was a one-hit-kill, at least while Spiritual Trifecta was active.

Physical Damage has reached rank 2!

Physical Resistance has reached rank 5!

That didn’t take very long.

He got into a rhythm. He felt… absolutely unstoppable, fighting in the middle of hundreds of soldiers. Blocking, redirecting or simply taking their strikes because he knew he could. Bashing in skulls, knocking one soldier into another, hearing the metal clang, the wooden thwack and the sharp crack of bones.

Xavier only blocked and redirected enemy strikes when he needed to—when he was trying to let his health regenerate—but it seemed to have an advantage he hadn’t expected. When he’d struck down thirty soldiers, something miraculous happened.

Staff Mastery has reached rank 2!

Yes! Finally!

Xavier would have pumped his fist into the air if he wasn’t in the middle of an enemy army. He’d been waiting for Staff Mastery to reach the next rank for ages. Clearly, he hadn’t been fighting with his staff in the way the System had expected him to.

Do I only gain more ranks with the staff when I’m fighting against armed enemies? It sounded a bit ludicrous, but as far as he could tell, that might very well be the case. I wonder if I can gain Staff Mastery ranks simply through sparring.

Xavier revelled in the fight, taking down one soldier after another. He knew he could have taken them down far faster with a single Heavy Telekinesis spell, but with each swing of the staff, and with all the strikes he was taking, he was getting stronger and stronger. Tougher and tougher.

As though to prove that to him, a notification popped up in his vision.

You have gained +1 Toughness!

The notification took him by surprise at first. He hadn’t gained any attributes through training since he’d been running through the halls, hefting the vending machine over his head, and hitting himself with his staff.

Xavier smiled. He probably looked more than a little insane right now. His face and robes speckled and damp with blood. His clothes tattered to ruins. The dead piling up around him. His staff battering a path through his enemies. Like some berserker warrior from myth.

But this was what he was training for.

The invaders will have armies. And I will defeat them.

What he was doing here? Fighting in the middle of five hundred soldiers and winning? That was simply proof of concept. What he was doing was working. It made him desire, all the more, to get back to Earth and see how his world was faring.

This floor, then seven more, and we’ll be able to return. At least for a little while.

Spiritual Trifecta had worn off sometime during the fight. He’d been surprised at how long it had lasted—at least ten seconds, and he’d managed to do a lot of damage in that time.

He’d worried it was the only thing that had been giving him enough edge to go toe-to-toe in the middle of all these level 12 human soldiers, but—keeping a close eye on his health—he tested what he could do without the spell active.

He was able to kill another thirty soldiers, and his health never dipped down below 35%.

Xavier was getting closer and closer to his next level.

Spiritual Trifecta lasts for 10 seconds now, and its cooldown is 12. Which… effectively makes its cooldown 2 seconds, as the countdown starts the moment I activate it.

That meant that, soon enough, he might be able to keep Spiritual Trifecta active indefinitely. Assuming he had enough Spirit Energy to do so—but running out of Spirit Energy around this many enemies wasn’t exactly an issue for him.

Two more notifications popped up in his vision.

Physical Damage has reached rank 3!

Physical Resistance has reached rank 6!

Rank 6 already? He supposed the extra damage he was taking without Spiritual Trifecta active was making his Physical Resistance skill rank-up even faster.

As the notification came, something crawled all across his skin. Then it… burned and itched like nothing he’d ever felt before.

What the hell is happening to me?

He glanced around him, worried he’d been hit by some sort of spell, but none of the enemy Mages were yet in sight, and his health wasn’t going down.

It was going up.

Xavier gritted his teeth, blocking strikes left and right as the sensation further intensified. He looked down at the skin of his arm and his eyes widened.

His skin was crawling. Literally. Like there were thousands of tiny insects beneath it, skittering up and down across his bones.

He stumbled backward from the enemies in front of him and activated Spiritual Trifecta to bolster his physical defence against whatever the hell this was.

Snap!

One of the arrows in his arm snapped at the top of its shaft, up near where the arrowhead was embedded into his skin. His skin had healed over it, and had… eaten through the wood?

A chorus of snaps followed the last as all the other arrows around his body began to break, their shafts falling uselessly to the purple grass.

But the metal arrowheads were still inside him. They’d been healed over and were now trapped beneath his skin.

What. The. Hell!?

It was like his skin had grown twice as hard. He was taking hits even as he looked down at himself, the enemy melee soldiers parting to let the archers and Mages get in hits.

The new arrows that came for him… they were bouncing off him. They weren’t damaging him at all!

The itchy, burning sensation continued, and he began to realise what was happening. With Physical Resistance gaining so many rank-ups, he’d reached 100 Toughness, breaking through whatever barrier was at that milestone.

He looked at his health.

Your health is at 51%.

It was going up? Even as arrows and spells hit him, it was going up.

Unlike the arrows, the spells still did damage to him. Willpower was what gave resistance to magic, not Toughness alone, but his health had gone up high enough after breaking 100 points in Toughness that now the spells were only doing half a percent damage.

Magical Resistance has reached rank 4!

Well I’ll be damned.

Willpower was at an effective 91 now. Maybe he needed to push that all the way to 100…

Another notification popped up, one that made him raise his eyebrows.

Metal impurities detected during Toughness upgrade.

Attempting to purge metal impurities…

Metal impurities? The arrowheads!

A shock of pain ran through every inch of Xavier’s body, to the point where it took him to his knees despite his strong tolerance. The crawling sensation beneath his skin intensified to the point where it felt like nails were being dragged across the surface of his bones.

Error.

Unable to purge purities in an F Grade Denizen.

Attempting to assimilate metal impurities into muscular structure…