Door noises!
Quickly but carefully at the same time, I open the door and my mind goes white right after that. My vision was the one that went white that is. A bright white light eats my vision away for brief moments. Once it's gone and my amazing sight is back, my eyes decide to open wide and for some reason my mouth does the same thing, but just a little bit. I once again was teleported to another place but this time around, it's far more different than all the previous ones. Yes, the mystic library is different from the living room and bedroom, but this one however takes the cake. But let me explain it to whoever is listening to me. Although I hope no one is…
The place itself has a mystic feeling to it just like the library from before. The sky is somewhat covered with clouds, but the majority is clean. From this alone you can guess that I am outside but not the real outside of course, otherwise I wouldn't be saying this. Anyway, the sky has a pinkish colour to it, but with a few shades of what I think it's a golden colour. It is beautiful and with said mystic vibe to it, it makes a sight to be seen. Behind me I have a wall, one that follows the same colour pattern as the sky; however, the pink colour not only is slightly stronger, said shades of golden are much less noticeable. A soft red is also mixing with said pink, or blending is the better way to describe it. To my right the same happens, a wall that goes all the way down this rather long corridor but one that is not only that. The corridor has a ceiling, but this one is in an arch way, coloured in the same way as in the walls. A few columns along the corridor are present, but that is to be expected as they are helping support the arch ceiling.
To my left, there is a half wall that only goes up to my waist I would say, making it a meter or so tall. At the top you have a small railing that increases the total height up to my chest level. Right below the ceiling there is another small wall, but looking better at it, it seems to be the beams that help out support the ceiling. Thanks to this half wall I can see the sky that I described before and if I walk up to said wall and lean my face against the railing, I can see the vast empty area. The sky is all around me, from above as normal, from the horizon, something that can also be expected but also from below me. There is no ground and I have no clue how this "building" is being supported. From everything that has happened, it does not surprise me at all if this thing is floating around, although it does make me wonder how everything works.
"Well, no point in trying to figure out how things work here. Let's just keep moving."
And so, with a new goal in my mind I keep moving forward towards the end of the corridor.
Step!
My footsteps somehow are echoing, they are loud and noticeable because of it.
Step!
The floor below me, the one that is making my footsteps a bit louder than normal, it is a simple tile floor, with a checker pattern to it. Rather than being black and white, instead it is a soft pink colour, really soft and a golden-ish colour.
Step!
"From how it feels I would say that it is made of marble but from its shine maybe it's a Crystal type of material? Either way, it must be quite cold for the touch."
Step!
After walking from what seems to be 50 meters, I'm at the end of the corridor. This time, it has walls in all directions and the arch ceiling ends, from this point on, it is a normal ceiling. Even though I'm not in that section of the corridor, I'm right at the end of the arch ceiling. I can tell you that the corridor continues to my right. Before proceeding I use my Magic Sense skill, after all, there might be a trap right around the corner. To my relief there isn't anything of that sort, although there seems to be a door a few meters past said corner. A moment or so later I decide to keep moving, stopping only once I'm in front of said door.
The door is much different from the previous ones and I can actually sense something behind it, enemies in other words. The door itself is as tall as the ceiling, close to it to be precise, maybe 15 centimetres shorter? It has the same colour pattern as the sky, but now with a snow-white colour around some places. The door has an odd shape to it, a leaf shape. It starts just like a normal door and halfway through it, it starts to curve just like a leaf would do. It's almost as wide as the wall itself, having only a small distance on each side. But enough of me describing a damn wall, let's just get in.
I open the door as carefully as I can, so much so that I even surround myself with a barrier. I kind of do not want to get blasted with magic the moment I open the door. Though to my surprise my opponents decides to wait for me, allowing me to fully enter the room without too much worry. This is an open room and quite the wide one at that, easily 100 square meters. A nice small arena, making me believe that these monsters are here on purpose.
Only two- no, at least five monsters are here to tango with me, while only two are ready to go. There is a reason for why I say this, but first, the two in front of me are the main targets. Nothing out of this world, but they are at least B rank. They are the humanoid Crystal monsters, Crystal Knights in other words. They are a bit bigger than I am in all ways and with a sword and shield ready to take me on. Of course, said sword and shield are also made from the same "materials" as themselves. Opah, getting a little distracted with my descriptions, here they come!
I ready up my hands as they run up to me. I'm not cocky or anything like that (I am), but with the barrier that I deployed earlier, there's nothing that they can do to hurt me, so I don't see any point in summoning my trusty sword for example.
Swoosh! Swoosh!
I did mention before that these monsters work really well together and that's exactly what they are currently doing. One of them runs up directly at me while the other tried to get behind me. The moment my eyes are on the one getting around me, the one in front of me does a thrust attack, he's nowhere near me to do a normal swing, and with a thrust swing he will easily cover the remaining distance, even with a sword. However, he is rather slow so I easily dodge it by moving my body sideways. Then with an upper swing and directed at me, he quickly tires to cut me in half, but I also dodge it quite easily and form there-
Bam!
With a clean straight punch on its chest, I easily crack its upper body, so much so that my hand went right through it. He couldn't do anything about it and since he still was recovering from his previous attack, he ended up in a good position to get hit as his shield was a bit to the side leaving its upper body exposed. Here comes the other one.
Swoosh!
This time it was a simple down swing, he got behind me as expected and from there he tried to cut me down. With Magic Sense I could easily tell where he is, allowing me to dodge his simple attack without much effort.
Pam!
Before he could recover, I did the exact same thing as before, but this time I hit his shield right in the middle. It did crack a bit of it and it also sent him backwards a few meters thanks to the impact. Another thing about them that I didn't mention is how well they seem to learn. As you just saw he was able to defend himself from my punch simply because he knew it was coming, and he knew that because he saw me do it to his friend. In a sense it's amazing but it's also terrifying, a monster that can adapt this quickly is more than dangerous. This time I decide to wait for him instead of pursuing, just like I said there are more of them but they still have yet to come out of their spots. Three of them on each wall, though I still can't tell you what they are waiting for. Something that the monster in front of me does not do once he was fully recovered from the recoil, he quickly dashes towards me with all of his might.
Clink! Bam!
Instead of a thrust or down swing, this time around he did a diagonal one, from left to right and mind you, his sword is on his right hand. If the first two missed, try a different way, I guess. I didn't dodge it, I parried it with my hand, with the palm of it I hit the "smooth" part of the blade sending it upwards and alongside it, his arm, leaving himself wide open for another clean straight punch. Just like before, my fist easily goes right through his chest, defeating him in the process.
"Well then, three more to go. I'm ready whenever you are!"
I decide to say this out loud as the monster in front of me crumbles into small pieces and mere moments later, disappearing into small magic particles that go with the wind. Though, maybe 10 seconds later, said opponents do appear and they do so in a rather interesting way. I mentioned that, on each wall there is a monster there, the only one that does not have is the one that I came from. On each said wall there is a rather badly placed mirror, a fancy looking one that has quite the decorations at the bottom of it. This mirror then transforms itself into a monster, one that I have never seen before, but from its magic energy I would rank them at the same level as the previous two, B rank.
They are weird looking; their face is similar to one of a turtle but with sharp teeth. They also only have their upper body and towards the end it's filled with sharp Crystals, one big in the middle, surrounded by smaller ones, but they all seem equally sharp. They have arms that for some reason are disconnected from the main body, but they do seem to be working as if they are connected. With hands that are for the big size and claws that are even bigger however, each one of them is carrying a weapon, one has a great harmer, other a damn club while the last one has a halberd. As you can see a nice variety of them. Since they don't have legs, they are floating around and to be honest, they are rather slow not only that, they don't seem to know how to work together as they are hitting each other as they come towards me. Yes, hitting each other as they move sideways, up and down, back and forth, almost as if they have poor balance or something like that. Maybe they are drunk on power? Who knows? Either way, they will take a while until they are near me, so I guess I have to take the lead and see how they fair one on one. With this in mind I dash towards the one to my left, as anyone can expect, the moment he saw me coming he got ready to intercept me.
Swoosh! Bam!
I decide to let him strike first, or at least let him try to do so. With his sturdy club he takes a clumsy down swing at me, only for me to easily dodge it and since he couldn't keep his balance after the swing, he ended up falling to the ground, hitting face first in the cold tiles. Well, with a simple head smashing, I smash his head with my foot. To my surprise it was sturdier than I expected but nonetheless, I was still able to destroy it without much effort. Next one.
I turn around and unfortunately the other two are now shoulder to shoulder basically, either they stumble into each other or it's a tactic, although the first one seems to be the correct one. Whatever, what I have to do is the same, defeat the two of them. Now, what should I do? I can easily defeat them with a magic spell... Now that I'm thinking about it, I could try to see their magic resistance as these are a new type of Crystal monster. Yep, I will be doing that then.
"Let's start small and increase as we go on. Firebolt."
I don't have to incant anything, spell out any words into the world, wait for a magic circle to gather magic energy, nothing at all. I simply raise my arm upwards and point the palm of my hand towards one of them. The very next moment a magic circle appears in front of my hand, one that has symbols written on it, indicating several things with it, but that is for another time. It has a red colour to it, telling anyone that sees it, that the element of said magic circle, that in this case, it's Pyro or Fire in other words. The magic circle is slightly bigger than my manly hand and a fraction of a second later a ball made of fire appears, one that is exactly the same size as the magic circle, a Firebolt.
Woosh! Fire noises!
It's a simple D rank spell. I launch said Firebolt at the monster in the right, my right to be precise. Of course, the stronger you are or simply, the more magic energy you have, the strongest the spells in general will be or can get. Though in this case I simply match the spell strength to their level, B- rank roughly. I did say that they were B rank but upon closer inspection they are far weaker than the Crystal Knights, making them B- rank. The Firebolt hits the monster square on its chest, he's unable to dodge or do anything really, seriously, those guys have barely any balance at all, so much so that he tried to move sideways only to move forward leaving himself exposed to the Firebolt. But what follows next picks my interest.
Blast!
The Firebolt hits him however it does not explode or go through him, instead it pushes him backwards until he hits something, in this case the wall behind that was easily 10 meters from him. The moment he hit the wall then, the Firebolt exploded and with it, destroying the monster completely. As you can probably expect, I was not expecting this reaction, this is too many "expect" in a single sentence but I was expecting it to explode upon first contact, as I would expect. The monsters are made of the same Crystal material as the previous ones and I can attest to that because I crushed the skull of one of them. Weird reacting but nothing that I cannot experiment more on it, I do have another one left to deal with after all.
With the same hand, I point it towards the other one. I once again gather a bit of my magic and focus it on the palm of my hand, mere moments later another magic circle is formed. The same element as before, though the magic circle itself is much bigger than the previous one indicating a stronger spell will come out from it. Another Pyro spell, a Fireball to be precise. A Fireball is also a ball made of fire, but much and I mean much bigger than the Firebolt. Its power as anyone can expect is also several times greater, raking the spell at C rank. If I increase it to B rank, it will probably consume the monster with its flames in mere instants before anything else happens. The temperature of the Fireball should be around 700 degrees but what makes it even more dangerous is the explosion that follows the impact. One that is somewhat powerful at that. If for some reason these 700 degrees do not consume you the explosion will surely blast you away. The monster is no exception.
Blast! Whoosh!
The sheer high temperature seems to not do anything to him, but the explosion surely does, exploding the monster into small pieces. Since I increase the Fireball power until it reaches B rank a small shock wave follows the explosion. Well then, everyone has been taken care of. Just to be sure I use my Magic Sense skill to see if someone else is hiding and to scout a bit, in this case, I'm seeing which door will lead me forward. From where I came from, the wall in front of it has two doors, one to each side. One of the monsters came from a mirror that was right in the middle of the doors.
"Now, which one will lead me forward? With magic sense I can say that, the one on my left has nothing behind it, literally. The one on my right is filled with monsters."
Now I have quite a dilemma, don't I? Not really, I'm more than forced to go to the right and face all of those monsters. From here, I can say that they all might be the same type of monsters as the ones that I have just defeated.
"Welp, not much of a choice, now do I?"
Having accepted my undeserved fate, I decide to keep moving, walking up to the door in my right. I forgot to say but I still have my barrier up, not for much longer but it will last for another 2 minutes, a little more than that actually. Anyway, I enter the room and I'm greeted by four of them this time around, four of the Crystal Knights to be precise. I don't have much time to think about anything as two of them quickly run up to me. They still have the same setup as the previous two, a shield and a sword. The other two however, have a different set of weapons. Still weapons for closed combat but purely focused on offensive. One of them has a longsword while the other has a great axe, both of these weapons are made of the same materials as themselves. Once again, I'm yapping about stuff that I shouldn't, at least for how close those two are to me. Like, they are really close.
Swoosh! Swoosh!
Without any hesitation at all both of them take a swing at me at the same time. Another brilliant display of teamwork, not only they give each other enough space to do so, each one of them is somewhat covering each of my sides. The one on my right is about to cut my right arm off while the left one is doing the same thing but to my left arm. If I dodge to any side, I will get hit right in the middle of my chest, probably getting killed in the process. Thank god I know what I'm doing, in other words, I simply jump backwards a bit dodging everything in the process. But with this I now have my back against the door and yes, it's locked. Hmm, I'm starting to think that this might have been their master plan and I have felt for it. This is amazing actually; these Crystal Knights really work well together and they are smart per say. Not that it matters in a face of this much disparity between our powers. Rather than waiting for their next move I instead dash forward, going past them and getting closer to the other two at the back. I will dispose of these two first then I will worry about the other three, yes, there is that odd mirror badly placed in the wall in front of me, still a bit away from me though.
Bam! Bam!
I didn't give them any time to react. With two quick, precise and somewhat powerful jabs, I destroyed their heads with them. The first one was the one on my right. I dash a bit forward towards him and then I hit him right between his eyes, if he has any, my fist goes right through its face, cracking the rest of the head with it and of course, defeating him in the process. The other one I basically do the same thing, the only difference was that he was somewhat ready to intercept me however, I was a bit too fast for him. Just as I finished this spectacular 2 combo, the monster in the mirror decides to appear, this time however, it has gravity magic all around him. Because of this, he is floating around with much more control and balance. Did he improve with our last encounter? Is that even possible? Well, it is, if these monsters are created by someone rather than being created by the world itself. Now I have more questions. Moving on, it's not like they are going to answer them.
Pow! Bam!
This one also has a halberd and although he has much more control over his movements, he still is quite slow. Yep, I don't have to worry about him at all, just those two running up to me. Nothing has changed, a second or so later both of them are up in my nose but before they try to do anything I hit one of them with a clean uppercut destroying his head in the process. Then with a quick spin I lift my right leg and as I do so. I hit the other one with the back of my shoe right on the side of his head and as you can guess, I decimated his head. With this, only the floating one is left.
While I was occupied dealing with these two, the floating one got close enough to me. Since he has more control of his movements this time, I wonder how he will attack. And so, with this brilliant and not dangerous at all idea in mind, I let him take his swing.
Swoosh!
He lifts up his halberd as high as his weird arms allows him to, then from there with all of his might he takes a down swing. Two things with this, the first one is the speed at which he does so, it was much faster than I anticipated. The second one is the power behind it, it's a little less than what I was expecting. I do say this because I actually caught the tip of the blade with my two fingers, stopping everything with it. Don't worry, with the barrier up I simply modified it in such a way that allowed the blade to get stuck between my fingers and without physically touching them, hell, it didn't even touch my armour. However, even after witnessing this, there is no surprise on his face, no fear, despair, nothing at all. He tried to remove the halberd backwards but it only ended up being a useless struggle and even then, I didn't feel a single drop of emotions from him.
Fire noises! Blast!
I quickly raise my left arm towards him, my right hand is a bit occupied so that leaves my left-hand empty. From there I face the palm of my hand towards him, a fraction of a second later a magic circle appears and from it, another Firebolt is shot towards the floating guy, hitting his face dead on but this time it went right through him, exploding at the wall behind him. I used a bit more magic with this Firebolt, ranking it at a B+, however it ended up being too much as it didn't even explode once it hit him, going right through him in this case.
"I see, so the floaty one magic defence is between B rank and B+ rank. A little more than the Crystal Knights."
What a nice conclusion to reach if I say it myself. Not that they are that strong but that is only against me, for your average adventurer the story is much different. Moving on. I once again use my Magic Sense skill before making any decision. This time there is only a door apart from the one that I came from and this time around, there aren't any monsters past that door. It does make me a little suspicious about traps but once again there isn't much of a choice so I walk up to that door.
From there I go through it, the moment I do so I am met with a set of stairs that go down, once they are done there is a bit of a path that goes forward a few meters until it changes, making anyone, myself in this case, turn left since the path keeps on going. Unlike the first corridor, the ceiling for this one is normal and not in an arch. This corridor this time around is a little more fancy per say. To my left there still is another half wall, however instead of having railings at the top, there is a bush that goes all the way until it hits a normal wall. This bush is roughly 20 centimetres tall, but it's extremely well taken care of, flowers, beautiful ones at that, are present here and there giving out a gorgeous look to it. Even though there isn't an arch ceiling, columns are still present, spaced between each other with a decent distance. They are, however, decorated quite elegantly. Even the walls to my right are also decorated quite elegantly, with still the same colour pattern as before. Seriously, what a massive difference from just a room ago. But, why is that the case? The space here also feels wider, well, it is actually. The question, however, comes back again, why?
"I will never get an answer by just standing still. For now, there aren't any magic signatures close to me, so in that sense, the coast is clear."
Well then, with this perfect plan in mind I get my feet moving. The stairs are long, the steps itself that is. My feet are around 43 centimetres long, with my shoes on I would say they total 45 centimetres or a little more? Around that, however the steps are well above that, I would say around 75 centimetres? Just what type of monstrosity walks by here? Or am I the one that is small? Now I'm getting conscious about my own feet size. Whatever, I will not question something that I cannot change about myself. I keep on descending the stairs, walking forward once they are done and taking the corner once I'm near it. Not to my surprise, there is another massive corridor one that easily stretches up to 100 meters and once again to my left there is that half wall. This time around, the view that I have because of it, it's something else. So much so that I even walk up to the half wall to see it better.
"This looks so surreal and breathtaking even. The sky, the environment, everything seems like it was created by a fairy, or should I say an artist? An artist expressing his art into the real world. Yes, a painting that has painted itself into the world."
I am speaking to no of course and I repeated myself right at the end but in a different way. My thoughts are forcing their way out of my mouth, nothing that I can do to stop them nor I want it to, to be honest. Do you remember the floating Crystal sharks that I have mentioned before? Those monsters are something else to look at, a floating catastrophe and a terrifying one at that. But right now, there is something that somehow is even more amazing than those sharks and of course, more terrifying.
"A Floating Crystal Whale."
It's right in front of me, but several meters at the same time, easily hundreds of them or maybe even a kilometre. But thanks to its sheer colossal size, it seems that close. Let me describe this majestic monstrosity, breathtaking, fear inducing monster, one that will haunt you down until your very last breath on this world.
It looks like a typical blue whale, but one made of the same Crystal materials as the other Crystal monsters that I have just faced and talked about. It's coloured mainly in white, snow-white, with a few details here and there with what seems to be a golden colour. The amount of magic energy on that thing is also something else, I would say it could touch the rank of SSS, one tear below myself and the Demon Lord. I don't want to even imagine what type of continent shattering magic spells that thing must have on its arsenal. Just as I mentioned that thing is massive, I would say it has around 150 meters of length and another 250 meters of width, although 200 meters are for the fins, 100 meters for each one to be more precise. In other words, a floating horror ready to sink down a whole nation with a single spell.
Kict! Kict! Kict!
Then as if it heard me, or it actually did sense my presence, the Crystal Whale sings its deadly sound. It's a ticking sound, one that is as deep as the abyss itself. A sound that even shakes this mysterious world down to its very own core. If it was in the real world, it would shake the ground just like an earthquake would. Its massive eye, a single one as the Crystal Whale is sideways, it shines with a golden like colour, one that anyone can easily spot even in the abyss itself. A shine that you would easily mistake it as the sun itself from how bright it is. It's looking towards my direction as it sings that beautiful song of life, proving my theory that it actually sensed me. But I was joking, I actually shivered with the damn sound, it's more like the sound of an angel- no, it seems more like the ticking of death itself rather than the angel's melody. Either way, now I have to worry about a massive floating whale as I walk around here. Great! My life couldn't get any better! Ah fate, why do you play with me like this?
Whatever, with this new threat in my mind, I decide to keep on moving, and while I do so the whale does the same, slowly floating around this whole area, acting like a guardian of this place. Wait, a guardian? Now that is a rather interesting theory and if that is the case, I wonder how strong is what he's guarding. Moving on, after a minute or so I'm down at the end of the corridor and wouldn't you guess? Yep, another door ready to be open. Who could've foreseen such a thing? I think this sarcastically in my mind as I quickly use my Magic Sense skill to see if there is someone up ahead. Not to my surprise really, but there are more monsters up ahead, three of them to be extremely precise, and these ones seem much stronger than the previous ones.
"Now, how should I tackle these ones? I don't think they are strong enough for me to even draw my weapon, but at the same time I don't want to be caught off guard."
I say this because I don't want to waste stamina and magic energy. If for some reason I have to fight that Whale I will need just a tiny itty bit of magic energy to defeat it, and if the goddess of luck for some reason has something against me, whoever the Whale is guarding is as strong as it or more, then I will need all of my magic energy to defeat both of them. Yes, things are not looking good for me.
"Let's take this seriously then."
It's better if I do so, but I still won't be using any weapon, just my hands, Martial Arts in this case. Thank god I've learned those, or more got them shoved into my brain thanks to that Oni of a teacher. Anyway, time to go in. Without any hesitation at all I carefully enter the room, mind you that my barrier is long gone so getting hurt is now a possibility. I can use that barrier spell again but once again I want to minimize my magic usage to the very minimum.
The door opens by itself, as if it knows that I want to get in. This time it's an open room, a massive one at that. I would say this one has around 400 square meters, just four times more than the first one. Ah, a good arena in other words, now, let's see what we have here then... Three of them just as I said before, but these ones are once again another type of Crystal monsters that I have never seen before. They seem like an upgraded version of the Crystal Knights. They are taller, larger and of course, they have more magic energy than them. I would rank them at A- in terms of magic energy, so their strength might be at that level. Does not seem much compared to me, but in reality, it is, especially if we compare with the Crystal Knights B rank. The difference between then just to get the idea, is that these new ones are tenths of times stronger than the Crystal Knights. Yep, tens of times, that is how much of a difference it is from a B rank to A- rank. Opah, while I was yapping at how strong they are, two of them are quickly running up to me. They both have great shields and long swords. A deadly combination to someone that is unarmed like myself.
"They are fast though and just like the Crystal Knights they seem to work together quite well as the third one is preparing a magic spell. What! A magic spell!?"
Swoosh! Swoosh!
Two simple swings back-to-back, the first one was a downswing followed up by an angled one, where he goes from up to its left as far as his arm allows, then with a diagonal movement he does another diagonal down swing. I dodge both of them with ease however I did so by simply moving sideways slightly with the first one and the last one I backed off a bit, putting myself in an open position for the next one to strike me.
"Not so fast!"
Swoosh! Clink!
This time, with a thrust attack with his long sword, he tried to pierce me through my stomach. This would've connected if I didn't parry it with my bare hands. Not really, not only do I have gloves I also have armour on them, in other words I'm using gauntlets. I parried it to the side, to my left and thanks to the added momentum from the thrust attack, he kept on going forward for a bit, putting himself in a good position for yours truly to counter attack.
"Martial Arts – Quick Punch!"
Swish! Bam!
It was faster than any of them could see, let alone process what happened. The only thing they were able to see was the monster flying, I should name them now that I think about it, if the others were Crystal Knights maybe we should name these ones Royal Crystal Knights? There is a reason why I choose this name, but enough of me jabbering. I sure like to talk, no? Or think in this case… Anyway, my punch was quick as I said, so much that they only saw the Royal Crystal Knight flying with his body shattered. However, they did hear the sound of my fist traveling through air, creating that "swish" sound as it basically breaks the speed of sound. This one, from the resistance that I got from the impact, I can tell you that their defences match their magic energy, A- in other words. Not enough to resist my skill allowing me to go right through its Crystal body. I hit him right on his side, just below where his rib cage would end. However, the punch was more than enough to make a decent hole in it and the shockwave that followed it, it cracked a little more of his body and shattered the rest of it. He went flying a few good metres until it collapsed completely and disappeared. Two to go and that's a Fireball coming at me.
"A Fireball!? What the-"
Swoosh! Fire noises!
I narrowly dodge it but from how close it went flying past me, I can tell you that these flames would be around 975 degrees or so. Hot as hell in other worlds, matching once again his magic energy, a spell with the strength of A- rank. Anyway, time to take care of the one close to me as it seems it's mere moments from doing something to me, or at least trying to do so.
"I will be the first one this time, Martial Arts – Shattering Punch!"
I shout this towards the Royal Crystal Knight, the one that was ready to test his luck at me. Maybe it was because of my previous attack, or it was instincts telling him to block it, either way, he lifts up his great shield and puts it in front of him. I was ready for it though, that is why I decided to shout, it was an attempt of putting fear into him and I was successful at doing so. My fist shines brightly with a white colour to it, while Martial Arts are skills, they don't consume magic at all, just stamina, and in that department I'm more than confident that I have more than enough to keep going for a few days.
Bam! Shater noises!
I connect the punch right on the middle of the shield, you would think that area is the strongest part of the shield and you would be right but I simply didn't care about it. My fist goes right through said shield, decimating that area and whatever was left of it, it ended up shattering and collapsing. This was not enough to stop my momentum at all.
Pow!
I hit him right in the middle of his chest and as you can guess, not only my fist went right through it as this Martial Art skill is that much stronger than the previous one. The shock wave that follows it, it blasts away his upper body and even a bit below it. Another one down, one last to go and this time it's a damn Hydro Bomb…
"Really!? Now it's a Hydro Spell!?"
Swoosh! Water noises! Blast!
Seriously, this is ridiculous! Just like the Fireball I was able to dodge it, this time more comfortably, however mere moments later said Hydro Bomb hits the ground a few meters past me, exploding on impact. Let me tell you, it was a decent explosion at that, so much so that the ground even shook with it. The shockwave that followed it was strong enough for me to feel it too. If the Fireball from before surprised me, this one shocked me. Almost back-to-back not only this Royal Crystal Knight used two spells, he also used spells from different elements and as anyone can guess, that's not an easy feat at all. Normally a human being is proficient in a single element while a small percentage is proficient in 2 and so on. The more elements said human is proficient to, the rare they are to come by. Even as the Hero, I'm "only" proficient in 4 elements. This monster is made of Crystal that's why they are named as such, how come he is able to use so "many" primal elements? It does not make sense but I will explore this later as I still have to deal with him.
Woosh!
I dash towards him and as I do so, he prepares another spell or he was about to if I wasn't too fast. He quickly changed from preparing another spell to a defensive stance and while he did that, I noticed something that might answer my question from early. Since I was too occupied with the other two, I never actually saw this one prepare said spells. I also didn't notice if it was his magic that did them or if it was something else. Now, what do I mean by this? Quite simple, Magical Swords, or in his case, Magical Longsword. Before I dashed, he had his longsword pointed towards me and that's when, at the tip of the sword a magic circle appeared for brief moments, but since I was too fast as I mentioned before, he switched positions and with it the magic circle disappeared. If he did really use the Magical Longsword to shoot those two spells at me then it explains everything, as he does not need to be proficient on said elements to use them. Just pour some magic into the Magical Longsword and let it do its thing per say. I leave the explanation to how it works for another time, seriously I need to stop jabbering between important scenes! Just get moving!
"Martial Arts – Sonic Punch!"
Swish! Bam!
Similar to the previous attack I shout the name of my move mere moments before hitting him. Just like the other one from before, he puts his great shield in front of him allowing me to hit it dead on. I do this because I want to know and see if the great shield also has magic on it. Not to my shock, it does have magic on it, but there is more to it. Since they are made of that Crystal material that alone makes them have magic infused on them. What I want to know is if said shield is also in the same category as the Magical Longsword. It's a simple jab, but as fast as the speed of the sound itself, the only thing that he was able to process was the speed of my fist hitting the speed of sound and the impact from the hit. I hit him right in the centre of the shield and of course it was more than he could handle or it was supposed to be. He was sent backwards a few meters, the shield blocked close to 80% of the impact, making my theory right as it is a Magical GreatShield.
"First the Magical Longsword and now the Magical GreatShield. How did you get your Crystal hands on them? In fact, who created them?"
I don't expect it to answer of course, until now the only Crystal monster that made a sound was the Crystal Whale. To be honest, by itself is enough to send down terror to anyone that listens to it so I guess it's better if none of them makes a single sound. Anyway, although the Magical GreatShield of his used a barrier to protect the user from my punch, I can tell that he was thrown off by the impact. You can block the hit directly but the shock wave that follows said impact it's completely different. Think of this way, you grab a normal sword, then for some reason you decide to use it to hit a normal stone. If the sword is able to cut the stone, then not much of recoil will be felt. However, if you hit the same stone and your sword bounces back, your hands will feel the recoil from the impact just as much as the stone even though it didn't break. It's the law of physics and although I'm not much of a scholar, if any at all, thanks to all of my previous experience I can use all of this knowledge to my advantage, one that I will use right now.
"Fireball!"
Magic noises! Fire noises!
I don't leave him any time to recuperate, I quickly raise my right arm and point my hand towards him. From the palm of my hand a magic circle appears, one that is bright red, easily telling anyone that sees it that I'm going to use a Pyro spell. I have used this spell before however, against this foe I will have to increase its strength by using more magic, powering up to the upper A- rank realm. The magic circle consequently is also bigger, I would say with 30 centimetres of diameter. A fraction of a second later a ball made of fire appears, one that this time around is around 1045 degrees, more than hot enough to melt almost anything that comes in contact with it.
Roosh! Blast!
The Fireball is dense, so much so that when I shot it towards the Royal Crystal Knight, not only a small shockwave follows the initial "bam", a deep sound travels with the Fireball, one that seems to be gripping into the air itself having a "Roosh" sound to it. However, the speed at which this thing travels is for the rapid side making that sound even louder and closing the distance between me and the Royal Crystal Knight in a blink of an eye, in other words, he had no time to react, getting hit dead on. The explosion is more dramatic and powerful than any one that the Royal Crystal Knight threw at me previously and as you can guess, the shockwave from the explosion is also for the violent and strong side, reaching me mere moments later. The ground also shocks somewhat violently, however while it did shake, it didn't crack, crumble or get destroyed with the explosions. Hmm, the floor sure is sturdier than I could ever expect it to be.
Fire noises!
Rather than a smoke cloud emerging with the explosion, instead a sea of flames just shy of the blast radius of the Fireball emerges. The flames there, they are as hot as the flames of the Fireball itself, close to 1000 degrees, consuming and or melting anything that is inside of them and of course the Royal Crystal Knight is no exception. He tries to put off the fire but it's nothing more than a futile struggle as mere moments later he crumbles down into the ground, pieces of his body crack and then shatter as the flames melt his body. A situation like this for a human being, the sound of said person would make can and will terrorize you for the rest of your life however, this thing didn't make a single sound as he was being basically burnt alive. In a sense it's quite scary as you see him struggle to survive without making any sound at all.
"So, your heat resistance is way less than the temperature of those flames. However, while getting hit dead on by a spell whose power should be in the upper A-, you still were standing at the end of it. I don't think it makes you at A rank in terms of magic defence but it sure makes it close."
Another brilliant conclusion if I say it myself, but with this all of them were defeated. Since peace has been forcefully conquered, now it's a good time to explain why I named them Royal Crystal Knight. Just like I said before they are overall bigger in size than the Crystal Knight. Just like them they also seem to use armour, if said armour is not their body itself since they are made of that Crystal material. The armour seems fancier, it has more curves to it, elegant ones at that, they are smooth and seem to be just aesthetic rather than functional. Something that a noble would use, putting these Crystal monsters higher in terms of status than the normal Crystal Knight. If that alone is not enough to portray the idea of nobility at the very least, what I will say next it will put them in the Royal category, somehow. They have a cape, one that seems similar to one that a King himself would use but with much less volume to it. I don't know if the fabric that the cape was made of is the same material as the Crystal monsters themselves, it's thin, extremely so at that however at the same time it's also flexible as it moved around with ease with the movements of the Royal Crystal Knight.
Is this enough to give the Royal vibe? No? Then this will. On their helmet, one that covers everything about their faces, they have a spike that comes out at around the middle of the top of the helmet. However, when I say middle, I don't actually mean the "middle", it's more so a bit towards the back rather than the top but still in the middle. This spike is completely straight and it's pointing somewhat upwards, more so in a diagonal way. It starts thick with a diameter of roughly 10 centimetres, descending down in thickness until it hits close to 2 centimetres of diameter at the tip. This spike is close to 30 centimetres long, in other words not short at all and something that is quite easy to notice even at distance, although this is more so because of another reason. This spike is covered with fabric, one that is similar if not the same as the cape. Combine this spike with the fabric with the cape and you straight out have a so-called Royal Crystal Knight.
While how they look is important, their strength on the other hand is even more important. I can say that they rank comfortably at A- rank, right in the middle. I might have made them seem easy but they are a force to be reckoned with, not only they seem to work extremely well together, they can adapt well to the current battle situation and they can also handle magic. The one with Magical Weapons I would rank him at the upper A- but that is only because of the weapons as his strength, defence and magic energy, I didn't notice any difference at all from the other two. For example, these three alone could take out by themselves a whole medium city. If that alone does not tell you how strong they are I really can't say much about it. Either way, I've yapped for far too long, time to move on, for whatever is coming next.
I mentioned before that this room is close to 400 square meters. While it did not change anything about it, I had the battle with the three of them close to the entrance that I came from, to progress further I do have to walk for a few seconds until I stop right in front of a door. This door looks exactly the same as the previous ones in terms of design, that is. Its size for some reason is larger and taller than the previous. I would say that it is close to 20% bigger. None of the Royal Crystal Knights are that tall so I don't understand the necessity for this. Unless something bigger than them comes through this of course. Sigh… what in tarnation will I face? Before doing anything, I used my Magic Sense skill and of course, as anyone could guess, I've picked up a few magic signatures past this door.
"Hmm, this next "room" is several times the size of the one I'm in and while there are a few magic signatures there, none of them are at the level of the Royal Crystal Knight."
That's odd, you increase the difficulty by several times only to decrease it in the same way. This makes me believe that there is more to the next room that meets the eye per say, so I have to be careful. It's not like I have much of a choice to be honest, but it's good to have the guard up there in an unfamiliar place. With this in mind, with my anxiety in check and of course, with my guard up as I mentioned before, I go through the door and I'm immediately met with quite the sight.
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