The Fusionist Book 2 -- Chapter 62

Chapter 62

Standing in front of the flag and looking outside of the entrance, Larek could see across the arena to the fortification directly across from him, but that was about it; he couldn’t see the other two to the left and right, but that didn’t really concern him. From the opposite structure, he watched as a trio of Martial trainees rushed out of the entrance and began sprinting directly across the arena – and right toward him. One of them was much faster than the others, based on how lithely she moved, and she carried a pair of blunted wooden knives bared in her hands. The two others were fully armored in what appeared to be steel plate, covering their entire bodies, holding mirror-smooth steel shields and wooden short swords.

Not exactly an expert in tactics, Larek nonetheless assumed that the two shield-bearing trainees were there to guard the faster one. He knew that any projectiles or other attacks blocked by a shield didn’t count as a hit, so if they were able to punch through the defenses they faced without being hit too much, the faster trainee could snatch the flag and run back to their fortification before anyone could react. A simple plan, and unless they had something sneaky also up their sleeves, it would probably work most times. That was, of course, if they had adequate defenses back at their own fortifications to prevent their flags from being stolen simultaneously.

Glancing up, Larek could see Nedira, Kimble, and Vivienne readying for the incoming wave of opponents along the walkway above. Once the trio of enemy trainees across the way reached approximately the halfway point, Bartholomew and Penelope moved from the sides of the entrance where they had been waiting, with the shield-bearing trainee planting himself directly in the middle of the cutout, where he simply stood there in a defensive position, his spear poised to counterattack if the opportunity presented itself.

“We got adds!” Vivienne shouted from up above – which meant absolutely nothing to Larek. “A Striker from 1 and a Stalker from 3! Looks like they’re going to try and take advantage of this initial assault to snatch our flag!”

Penelope shouted back up, “Got it! Let me know if the Stalker circles!”

The Logger-turned-Fusionist was beginning to catch the meaning behind some of what was being said, but overall it meant very little to him. He was going to stand there and block the flag like they wanted, but he wasn’t planning on doing much other than that.

Larek watched as his teammates on the walkway began to unload their spells and arrows toward the incoming attackers, and every projectile was easily blocked by a well-placed shield or dodged entirely by the quick-moving woman behind the shield-bearers. As they got closer, Larek got a glimpse of a few Fusions on all their armor, small in Magnitude based on the areas of ambience he noticed, but he couldn’t tell what they were exactly; he assumed they were stat boosts, though they could’ve been just about anything at that distance.

When their opponents were only about 10 feet away, Bartholomew and Penelope braced themselves as the two armored trainees suddenly rushed forward with a burst of what could only be Stama rushing through their legs. As the pair led with their shields to slam into Bart, likely hoping to bowl him over and push their way through, Larek winced a second before they hit; not because he worried about his teammate, but because he was fairly certain that his attackers were moving faster than 10 miles per hour.

And so it proved, as the moment their leading shields got within a foot of the Repelling Barrier Bartholomew was wearing around his neck, Larek heard near-simultaneous *cracks* as the shields were sent straight into the ground, breaking their arms with the violent force of the Fusion’s Effect. Their bodies somersaulted as a result of the abrupt change in their arms, and as their legs flipped toward Bart with great speed, those too were sent violently crashing into the dirt below, eliciting a few more *cracks* – likely from their lower legs or ankles breaking. Fortunately, most of their forward momentum was completely halted, which prevented them from being hit again, but both armored figures were lying on their backs, groaning in pain and not looking to be getting up anytime soon.

Ouch. At least they’ll be alright; most of those armored trainees have higher Body stats, so I don’t think anything serious happened to them. If it had been a Mage that did that, they might not have survived. He sighed. Yet another flaw in my design, at least when it comes to the Skirmish.

Shocked as much as the rest of the crowd in the arena, which had gone silent a moment after the two armored trainees were laid low, their teammate stood frozen in place as she stared at them on the ground. With them being incapacitated in less than second, her entire facial expression showed the incomprehension of the situation – which proved to be her undoing.

Nedira’s Binding Roots suddenly sprouted under her feet, trapping the young woman in place; while she immediately worked to free herself, it was already too late as Penelope squeezed past Bartholomew, jumped over the prone figures of the armored trainees, and began to lightly pummel the bound opponent with the superior range of her sword. The woman managed to quickly raise her left knife to deflect the sword, but unfortunately her movement was too fast as it entered the range of the Barrier that extended around the blue-haired trainee’s sword, as it was violently ripped out of her hand, breaking the woman’s wrist in the process. Larek caught a glimpse of the wooden knife and saw that it was buried up to the hilt in the dirt ground, having been deflected with enough force to make it push through the packed material. He thought that if it had been underneath their feet, the weapon would’ve likely shattered.

A scream of pain was quickly joined by the grunts of impact as Penelope used her boosted Agility to smack her sword lightly against the injured woman; even at a distance, he could tell that they were more taps than strikes, as there was no need to go all out. A few seconds later, Larek heard, “2C down!”, shouted by one of the observers up above and the woman immediately snarled in frustration; nevertheless, she slumped to the ground in faux incapacitation, having accumulated enough hits to be considered fallen. A second after she fell to the dirt, Penelope faked a stab to her opponent’s neck. “2C out!”

“2A down! 2B down!” Larek’s attention was pulled back to the entrance where, the two armored trainees were being bombarded with fireballs from above and light stabs by Bart’s spears. As they were “stabbed” through gaps in their armor near their necks with his spear, Larek then heard “2A out! 2B out! Pause near 4! Healers to 2A and 2B!”

There was a hush as all the noises of nearby combat stopped, though there wasn’t much to begin with. Whatever battles were being played out were out of his sight and were likely out of most listening range, but he could at least hear a little bit going on somewhere else. The crowd, as they had been for the last 30 seconds or more, was completely silent up until the healers were called for, where a murmur that slowly rose in volume began.

Looking around, he saw that those on the walkway were unmoving in their positions, prepared to attack or defend if necessary, but they were part of the “pause” that had been called.  He vaguely heard that this was so that anyone around the fortification would stop moving or attacking completely so that the seriously injured could be removed from the arena and healed. So it proved to be, as he saw four Martial trainees appear and lift the armored trainees away, where they would be taken away and healed. Since they were “out”, it didn’t matter if they were removed from the arena as it wouldn’t affect the match – other than removing them as obstacles, he supposed.

When they were clear, Larek heard the same person shout, “Resume!”

“The add from 1 is retreating but 3 is circling!” Vivienne shouted as soon as the match in their area resumed. Again, Larek wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but the others apparently did. Penelope shot inside of the fortification and ran around Larek, moving to the wall opposite of the entrance and drifting to the corner, placing her back against the walls. Craning his neck around was annoying, so he turned it back around, just in time to see a figure pull themselves over the left wall of the structure and drop down to the walkway. The leather-clad Martial blended fairly well with the stone around him, as it appeared to be deliberately dyed to be of similar color, but his movement was enough to catch his attention. Looking forward, he kept his peripheral vision on the invader, which is why he flinched as he saw a trio of objects being released that headed straight toward him.

A second later, three blunted, weighted wooden throwing knives were violently repelled into the dirt below his feet as they ran into Larek’s Repelling Barrier. Likely expecting his attack to land, the young man who had crept over the wall lithely jumped down and landed in a crouch, pulling a pair of knives out from sheathes located on his waist.

Larek couldn’t help a chuckle that escaped from his mouth as he looked at the extremely confused expression on the invader’s face as he looked up at the corner towers where the watchers were located. He obviously thinks he hit me and doesn’t understand why I’m still “alive”.

Despite the lack of success, the trainee was determined to see Larek incapacitated, which was evident in how he ran quickly forward, his speed almost a blur as he aimed to stab the lone Mage in the middle of the fortification. Unfortunately for him, Penelope – aided by the stat boost Fusion that essentially doubled her speed – cut him off by speeding out from where she had been standing in the corner behind him. Her sword slammed into him as he ran, making him practically fold in half as the breath left his body at the strike.

He recovered remarkably quickly as his feet hit the dirt and jumped backwards, ducking aside another swing by Penelope, causing her to overextend, before leaping toward her with his wooden knives. If it hadn’t been for the Barrier Fusion that intercepted both knives that he attempted to stab into her from multiple sides, she would’ve taken a hit; as it was, there were two more *cracks* that made Larek wince because it was so much closer to him this time, as the invader’s wrists were broken as the wooden knives were ripped out of his grip.

They must teach them to do everything they can to maintain a hold on their weapons, no matter what. Not the best idea against my Fusion, however.

Rather than scream out in pain, there was only a small yelp that emanated from the invading trainee, even as he threw himself backwards when Penelope retaliated. Unfortunately, he tripped and fell on his side, where he instinctively attempted to push himself up with his hands; that, of course, ended poorly as that made him scream for a second in pain, and he barely rolled aside as Penelope aimed another strike at him.

Strangely enough, Larek didn’t see a bit of frustration at her inability to hit the invader; instead, she just looked determined and expectant for some reason. That reason was revealed the next moment as she swung again, deliberately missing him by no more than an inch as he rolled away and got to his feet – only to be struck in the back by a trio of shadow-casted Fireballs that hit him one after another, a shadow-casted Ice Spike that came from Nedira, and three blunted wooden arrows that hit him within a split-second of each other. Vivienne was fast with her shooting before, but with her stat boosts she was incredibly quick.

While they didn’t do much damage, the abrupt attacks from behind caused the broken-wristed invader to stumble forward, right into the range of Penelope, who began moving much faster than she was just a few seconds ago. Her sword tapped a staccato rhythm upon his leather armor, one after another, until Larek heard, “3B down! 3B out!” It was over so fast that even the foreign team member barely knew what had happened, even as his throat was “slit” while still standing up. He grunted and fell to the ground dramatically, lying there as he cradled his wrists to his chest.

It apparently wasn’t enough to call for healers, so he was likely going to have to suffer until the end of the match. Depending on the “dead” invader’s Body Regeneration Skill, he’d probably start healing soon, but would need extra care to speed up the process later.

Turning his attention away from the injured young man, Larek looked out the entrance again to see how things were going, wondering when someone would finally break their way into the fortification and take their flag. As a few minutes went by with no sign of additional attackers, he began to worry that he might have been wrong.

We might not lose. In fact, I think we might win.

That… was not ideal. This was supposed to be a single match, in and out and then he could go on with his learning at the Academy. But if they won, they would have to face additional teams, any of which might be the ones that were designed to try and seriously injure one of them.  Granted, he’d tried to minimize the risk of actually being hurt, but the more possibilities of it happening, the chance that someone inadvertently got injured enough that Larek would feel obligated to heal them increased. In fact, he had already noted that it had nearly happened already, though it wasn’t someone on his team; those first trainees that had their arms and legs broken had gotten close, and if they had been Mages… well, they might not have survived such abuse.

This is definitely not working out like I had hoped.

Larek listened as well as he could over the murmuring of the crowd, and eventually he heard more shouts by the watchers located in the other fortifications. “2E down! 2D down! 2F down!” That was followed shortly thereafter by an actual announcement by the loud-voiced announcer. “Team Rumblesmash has been eliminated by Team Firestrike!”

With one team already eliminated, it didn’t take long for the team that was missing someone – namely, Team Silentkiller, whose sixth member was on the ground nearby Larek – to fall.

“Team Silentkiller has been eliminated by Team Firestrike! It’s all down to Team Firestrike and Team… Fusion!” For a moment, it seemed as though the announcer forgot the name of Larek’s team.

“Nice; it’s our turn! Barty, are you ready to go wreak some havoc?” Penelope turned to the shield-bearing trainee with a huge smile on her face.

“How many times do I have to tell you not to call me—”

“I’ll take that as a yes; let’s go!”

As they left out the entrance, the blue-haired leader shouted up to the walkway, where the three other teammates watched them take off. “Take good care of him while we’re gone! Be back soon!”

With a final wave in their direction, the two trainees turned their focus on Fortification 1, where their opponents had no idea what was coming for them.

Book 2 Chapter 63: https://www.patreon.com/posts/fusionist-book-2-84683878