Chapter 1418 - The Hunter, the Swordsman, & the Monk (4)

Jake immediately recognized the sword, though the last time he saw it, the weapon had been far larger and wielded by a cyclops. A cyclops known as the Blademaven.

“Where did you get that?” he asked, genuinely wondering how the fuck the monk had managed to steal it away from the Blademaven. He had stolen the staff from the Cyclops Magi himself and knew just how precarious doing so had been.

“A gift,” the Eastbound Monk answered. “From my fellow disciple. A man we both know who’s notoriously difficult to kill.”

Furrowing his brow, Jake immediately had a good guess who he was talking about. “Eron.”

The monk nodded in confirmation as he admired the large sword. “Those creatures were interesting. On the one hand, overwhelmingly powerful, while on the other, incredibly limited in what they could do. While the Blademaven could blow most to smithereens using his sheer physical prowess, Eron weathered his blows after obtaining the sword and managed to reach the sewers in one piece.”

“A bit shameful using borrowed power, isn’t it?” Jake asked, getting a perplexed look from the Sword Saint. This made him realize that the old man likely had no idea about the special functions of these items, making Jake quickly inform him. After which the old man asked a very pertinent question:

“How do you know that?”

“Because I also have an item stolen from the Cyclops Magi. A staff,” Jake responded, deciding that if the monk was going to use his, there was no reason to keep it a secret that Jake also had one. It was still unclear whether he would use the staff, though time would tell depending on how great the effect was.

“Perhaps it is a little shameful, but in the end, there are worse options if I desperately want to win,” the monk smiled as he held up the sword. “And you must admit you’re curious to see the result of these items. So am I, as this is truly something one can only experience within a simulated world where the rules of the soul and existence are a bit more lax.”

With those words, the sword turned into wisps of energy that rushed into the monk’s body, and immediately his aura grew. As the monk had said, this was truly the kind of thing one could only experience within a simulated world. Under usual circumstances, suddenly getting a massive temporary influx of stats would lead to the soul collapsing or at least severe soul damage, but within the simulation, the rules allowed it.

The monk took a deep breath and closed his eyes, allowing the energy to rush through his body and thoroughly settle. Breathing out again, he opened his eyes and looked toward Jake and the Sword Saint.

“I’m coming now, and I warn you... the effect surpassed my expectations.”

Jake didn’t even need to be told, as his danger sense immediately exploded with warning as the monk nearly instantly appeared in front of him. He considered dodging, but once more the three outlines manifested, ultimately forcing him to block using both katars.

Before, when Jake blocked, he’d been sent flying back a bit, while occasionally getting bothered by the shockwave from a palm attack, but it hadn’t been an issue. This time, the result was far different.

His arms buckled under the pressure of the fist, and his wrists would have suffered severe damage if not for Fangs of Man, resulting in Jake getting blasted backward as a shockwave of force also rushed through his body, hurting a fuckload compared to before.

The monk didn’t follow after Jake, but turned his attention to the Sword Saint who attacked from the side. This time, the monk didn’t even bother using his dodging skill but easily deflected the blade and kicked the old man in the stomach before proceeding to land a follow-up kick, sending him flying into the distance.

Jake had already taken out his bow and unleashed an Arcane Arrow Storm, but the monk simply raised a hand and made a barrier appear to block it, though it was quickly blown apart, confirming that while the monk’s physical stats had experienced a massive increase from consuming the Blademaven’s sword, his mental stats remained unchanged.

Still, physical stats clearly also included Toughness in this case, allowing the monk to quite easily shrug off the many explosions from Jake’s arrow storm. He immediately gave chase as he stepped down and disappeared, appearing in front of Jake instantly once more, confirming something else.

He has a skill similar to One Step... not surprising, considering he’s from the Dao Sect, Jake mentally noted, knowing that many of their members had the skill or at least a variant of it.

Jake could also teleport, though, as he stepped down right before the monk appeared, only for the other guy to teleport after him yet again. Like so, the two of them teleported across the sky a dozen times before the monk finally caught up, now faster than Jake due to his massive stat increase.

Snapping his fingers right after appearing, the monk unleashed a shockwave of sound that stopped Jake in his tracks and allowed the monk a chance to attack. Jake dodged as best he could, successfully avoiding three blows despite the odd outline skill, only for the fourth blow to be a smidge too fast.

Forced to block, Jake once more felt the pressure of an attack that was, quite frankly, too powerful for him to consistently block. He tried to borrow the momentum of the blow to retreat, but the monk had no desire to let him escape as he spoke.

“Attract.”

Fortunately, with his mental skills unboosted, Jake could resist with Pride of the Malefic Viper and even took the chance to summon a barrage of arcane orbs that exploded, temporarily obscuring the monk’s vision and allowing Jake to create some distance.

He teleported several times into the sky while shooting arrows in between every teleport, making them fly down erratically towards the monk. The monk looked up and smiled as he raised his hand and caught the first one with his bare hands just before it struck him.

“I apologize, I couldn’t resi-“

Before he could finish, Jake made the arrow explode in his hand, making it pretty clear that even if one could catch an arrow, maybe it should be avoided if said arrows could explode. The blast even seemed to hurt the monk while making it harder for him to deflect the subsequent arrows, though he still managed to do so relatively effortlessly.

Jake continued shooting arrows as the monk looked ready to pursue, only for a telepathic message to sound out in Jake’s head. “I would avoid getting too close to the monk for now. Well, unless you want to get caught up in it.”

“Caught up in-“

“Scorching Summer.”

A rush of heat washed over Jake’s body, and the words also made the monk turn his head as the Sword Saint appeared in front of him. The monk looked surprised and snapped as a shockwave of sound flew toward the old man, but before it could even reach him, it was burned away by the heat, showing it was not simply “hot.”

It was more of a conceptual representation of heat, capable of scorching anything, even the intangible.

Quickly getting his bearings, Jake continued flying upwards while shooting arrows down at the monk. At the same time, the Sword Saint swung his sword with speed far surpassing what he’d displayed earlier, and from the looks of it, the monk didn’t even dare to block as he avoided all the slashes.

Unfortunately for the monk, his dodging skill wasn’t very good when dealing with multiple attacks at the same time, resulting in Jake’s arrows striking him in the shoulder and chest. Jake’s arrows were affected by the Scorching Summer, but between Unblemished Arrows and the inherently stable nature of his arcane affinity, they made it through.

Seeing as his arrows were affected in the first place definitely meant the Sword Saint didn’t have full control over his skill. The Scorching Summer seemed to affect everything equally, as the monk was clearly feeling pressured by it even while avoiding every attack. The most affected one appeared to be the Sword Saint, though, as he was already sweating profusely and looked like the skill took a lot out of him.

Understandably, seeing the power of it. The sword swings left small trails that lingered for a few moments, and it was only after several seconds that Jake realized this was effectively melted reality. He even cut through and melted the environmental mana, showing just how damn scorching his sword was.

The monk managed to keep up due to his massive stat increase, though even without it, Jake wasn’t sure his pretty damn overpowered dodging skill wouldn’t have allowed him to still survive it. In either case, stat increase or not, he couldn’t deal with both Jake’s arrows and the Sword Saint’s blade at the same time, and he wisely chose to get struck by arrows rather than the sword.

All three of them knew the current situation wouldn’t last forever, and all of them wanted to take advantage of it. The Sword Saint was already reaching his limits after only a dozen seconds, and while the monk’s boost looked nowhere near over, that, too, would run out way faster than any of their regular boosting skills would exhaust them of power.

In the end, the result was the monk getting struck by half a dozen arrows while dealing with everything else rather well, though he had lost some time of his boost. The Sword Saint looked utterly exhausted and started slowing down, something the monk saw as a chance.

He dodged under a swipe from the Sword Saint as his hand pierced forward into the chest of the swordsman. It penetrated deeply, and the monk grasped hold of something within the Sword Saint as he spoke.

“An absolutely wonderful skill.”

Weakly, the old man raised a hand and grasped the monk’s arm that was currently inside his body. With blood trailing from his lips and listless eyes, he looked up at the Eastbound Monk and smiled.

“Decaying Fall.”

The Sword Saint’s body slowly turned into brown fluttering leaves, with the monk immediately getting surrounded by them as several made contact with his body and faded into it.

Alarm filled the monk’s face as he quickly retreated, only for the Sword Saint to appear alongside a whirlwind of leaves behind him, the wound on his body gone. Quickly pivoting to defend himself, the monk clapped his hands together and unleashed a mighty shockwave of golden energy, pushing the old man and all the leaves away from him.

Right then, an arrow also struck him in the back, making him stumble forward when it exploded, giving the Sword Saint a chance to swing his sword and scatter the golden energy wave, pushing him back.

With his swing, many of the leaves now filling the area followed the movement and flew towards the monk like rain, making him summon several golden barriers to defend himself. Evidently, his dodging skill wasn’t that great when dealing with thousands of whirling leaves at the same time, and his magical defenses also proved inadequate as they were rapidly worn down by the many leaves.

The Sword Saint stayed on the offensive, flying through the sky followed by a storm of leaves that bombarded the monk constantly, merging into his body whenever one got near. At the same time, Jake tried his best to land arrows, though, once again, whatever the Sword Saint did was indiscriminate, meaning his arrows destroyed the leaves, and the leaves sapped energy from his arrows.

While the effect of the leaves wasn’t immediate, Jake could feel the energy of the atmosphere declining with every passing moment, and the aura of the monk started slowly decreasing. It was as if the concept of life were slowly decaying, which would make sense given the ability’s name.

Still, even if the monk was getting pressured, he didn’t fully back down as he fought back against the swordsman. He went on the offensive, finding he could destroy the leaves with his sound attacks, which prompted him to unleash a barrage of punches, each sending a sonic boom as he continually pushed the leaves away.

Things were a lot easier for the monk when he only had to deal with the leaves summoned by the Sword Saint in melee, though the arrows still caused him trouble; soon, his back had a dozen sticking out of it, every single one just leaking poison into his system.

They all likely knew that the smart move for the Eastbound Monk would be to target Jake. If he did that, both of them would be caught in the Sword Saint’s technique, and he would be able to deal with the arrows far more easily, yet the monk didn’t do that. Likely for the same reason Jake had wanted to fight the monk before; he wanted to experience what the Sword Saint was capable of.

In that sense, Jake and the monk were very similar. Both evidently viewed battle as a brilliant way to improve, though their approaches were certainly different. Jake liked battles because they pushed him to his limits and truly brought his instincts to life, while the monk seemed more entranced by learning what others were capable of, taking a more studious, thought-filled approach. In retrospect, most people probably had approaches that primarily revolved around thinking, with just Jake being a little special in that area.

So far, Jake believed all three of them had learned a lot, and things were far from over even if the Sword Saint was starting to look incredibly tired again. Jake didn’t at all understand the ability he was using, but it was clearly extremely powerful while also draining a fuckload of energy. He also assumed it had to be related to his Transcendence, given the reference to seasons and whatnot, though there was definitely way more time affinity mixed in compared to something like Glimpse of Spring: Stormcut.

The leaves in the sky were slowly decreasing as they were repeatedly destroyed or successfully merged with the Eastbound Monk’s body. Breathing heavily, it was clear the Sword Saint had little energy left to keep going, and once more, the monk sought to take advantage, even if it hadn’t gone super well for him last time.

He had learned a little, though, and avoided getting too close, also in part to avoid the remaining leaves. From several meters away, he pulled back both his fists as the energy surrounding them turned golden before the monk proceeded to unleash a barrage of fists into the empty air in front of him.

Behind him, dozens of large golden fists manifested and flew toward the Sword Saint like a hail of cannonballs. The old man tried to defend himself, but the fists were odd in that they seemed somewhere between tangible and intangible. They clearly had physicality to them, but when the Sword Saint blocked them, the fist would pass through him while only slowly pushing him back.

The sheer extreme stat increase given to the monk by consuming the Blademaven’s sword made it so that the Sword Saint could only struggle to hold on, and as his life energy waned and seemed to near its bottom, the old man took a deep breath as he spoke, unleashing what many would agree to be the deadliest of the seasons.

“Silent Winter.”