Chapter 420: The Oldest Adage

Kael could not keep playing Akrab’s game. As long as the creature remained underground, it decided where they fought, when it attacked, and how little warning he received. He could keep dodging for a while, but the scorpion only needed to catch him once. Sooner or later, he would land badly or move in the wrong direction, and all that effort would end with a stinger through his chest.

The ground trembled beneath his boots again. His legs tightened, ready to carry him away, but this time he resisted the urge. Akrab was treating the arena floor like water, moving through dirt and stone with almost no resistance. Kael had been trying to catch it during the few moments it surfaced when the real advantage lay beneath his feet.

He dropped and slammed both palms against the ground. Stone activated, drawing internal energy through his arms, but he pushed its influence beyond his gauntlets and into the earth. The red dirt hardened beneath his hands, individual grains pressing together as the effect spread outward.

Loose soil became dense enough to resemble solid stone. Kael pushed farther, feeling the resistance build through his palms as the hardened section widened. Beneath him, the smooth vibration he had been following abruptly broke into violent, uneven jolts.

The entire patch of ground shook. Akrab was still trying to move, but the material around it no longer yielded as easily. Its struggles sent cracks running across the surface, giving Kael a much clearer idea of where the bastard was than anything it had done during the last several minutes.

He grinned and forced more energy through the Rune. The creature had enjoyed an entire battlefield in which to hide, yet it suddenly seemed very interested in leaving the small portion around him. Kael would have been happy to make that portion considerably larger if his reserves had not chosen that moment to remind him who was paying for this.

The drain climbed sharply. Reinforcing his own body required him to affect a comparatively small amount of material. Now he was hardening enough ground to interfere with a creature many times his size, and every additional meter demanded more energy.

Kael stopped extending the effect. At this rate, he could turn a respectable section of the arena into paving and then collapse on it, leaving Akrab to appreciate the improved dining surface. Keeping the creature buried until it died was well beyond what he could afford.

Fortunately, it did not need to die down there. It only needed a reason to reconsider going back.

He held Stone for several more seconds, following the increasingly violent tremors through his hands. Cracks widened ahead of him as Akrab forced its way upward. When the movement came close enough to the surface, Kael released the Rune and pushed himself back.

The earth softened just before Akrab burst through it. Red dirt sprayed across the arena as the creature emerged at an ugly angle, several legs flailing while the rest of its body dragged free. One claw struck the ground, followed by the other, and its tails whipped overhead as it struggled to recover its balance.

Kael rose and backed away. Akrab stumbled sideways before steadying itself, then shook hard enough to send dust spilling from between the plates along its back. The furious rattling that followed was considerably more satisfying than the sound of it moving beneath his boots.

"You didn’t like that, did you? I wasn’t particularly enjoying being hunted from under my own feet either."

The scorpion hissed and lowered its body. Kael kept his hands ready, hoping he would not have to demonstrate the trick again quite so soon. Its claws scraped across the dirt, but it made no attempt to dig.

That was what he had needed. Akrab knew the ground could become dangerous, but it had no idea how much energy Kael had spent making it happen. For all the creature knew, he could do it every time it tried to disappear beneath him. He intended to let it keep that impression for as long as possible.

The scorpion remained above ground, watching him with both tails raised. Kael had persuaded it to fight where he could see it. Unfortunately, getting a good view of the enormous armored bastard did very little to solve the problem of hurting it.

He flexed his hands and examined the black plates covering its body. There were no spare stat points waiting for him, no forgotten reserve of Strength he could throw into his next punch. He had already seen how little his fireballs accomplished. Spending more energy repeating them would leave him tired, frustrated, and facing a slightly warmer scorpion.

The shell reminded him of the spiders from the earlier Floors. Their chitin had resisted blades and direct attempts to pierce it, but a surface being hard did not make it impossible to break. Diamond could scratch almost anything and still shatter under the right impact. The question was whether Akrab’s armor had a similar weakness, and whether Kael could create the conditions needed to exploit it.

Akrab shifted forward, its claws opening. Kael watched the rigid plates move against one another and thought about Frost, then Fire. He might not be able to punch through the shell in its current state, but rapidly changing its temperature could stress the material before the second blow landed.

It was an idea, which was an improvement over waiting to be stabbed. Testing it would require getting close enough that failure became considerably more personal.

The scorpion charged before he could spend any longer considering that part. Kael lowered his stance and watched the first claw sweep toward him. He ducked beneath it, stepped around the second, and saw both tails begin descending toward the space where he would normally retreat.

He had avoided that sequence enough times to recognize it. The claws forced him to move, and the stingers punished the direction he chose. This time, he stepped inward, passing beneath the extended front limbs while the tails swept through the space he had left.

His right foot struck the ground and held. Kael settled his weight through the leg, turned his hip, and let the movement travel through his torso toward the shoulder. His master had spent far too long correcting that sequence for him to forget it now. Throwing his arm harder would accomplish very little if the rest of his body arrived late.

[Demon Fist]

[First Stance: Demon Descends]

Heft activated through his left gauntlet, followed by Stone and Frost. Internal energy compressed into the movement as Kael turned, bringing his fist around in a hook driven by his legs, hips, and shoulder. He committed everything he could gather in that instant to the point where the gauntlet met Akrab’s face.

The impact boomed across the arena. Frost spread from his knuckles in a sudden white burst, racing over the black exoskeleton as the creature’s head snapped sideways. Two legs lifted clear of the ground, and its enormous body staggered with the blow.

Akrab screeched. Kael felt the difference through his arm before he saw it in the creature’s movement. The strike had done more than glance off or force it to brace. For the first time, he had hit the thing hard enough to hurt it.

Cold clung to the plates around the impact. It had not penetrated far enough to freeze the creature, but the shell had contracted beneath it. Kael had an opening now, and he would lose it if he backed away to admire his work.

Both claws rose above him. He saw the double slam beginning and planted his left foot instead of retreating. The recoil from his first punch carried him into the next movement as he turned from the opposite side, bringing his other shoulder forward.

Heft surged through the right gauntlet. Fire followed, and Kael drove the heated fist into almost the same patch of shell before Akrab could bring its claws down.

Steam burst across his vision. Beneath the hiss came a sharp, violent crack, and the creature’s head jerked backward hard enough to spoil the attack. One claw slammed into the dirt beside Kael, while the other scraped across the floor as Akrab struggled to keep its balance.

Kael left before it could recover. He jumped backward, landed, and pushed off again, putting enough distance between them to see what the combination had accomplished. There was a difference between committing to a strike and remaining underneath an angry scorpion after finishing it. His master would have made that distinction extremely painful if he forgot.

Akrab stumbled away from him, shaking its head. One claw scraped across its face, followed by the other, and another screech rose over the arena. Kael kept his fists raised while the steam thinned between them.

A narrow line had appeared across the shell. He watched it carefully, refusing to mistake a mark on the surface for damage simply because he wanted the attack to have worked. Then green fluid seeped through it, and a second crack became visible beneath the first.

A droplet fell onto the dirt. Nothing smoked or dissolved where it landed. More followed, running down the damaged plates beneath an eye that remained half-closed.

Blood, or whatever Akrab used in its place. Kael had finally reached something inside that fucking armor.

He backed away another step and drew a fuller breath. The combination had cost him: Heft twice, Stone, Frost, Fire, and the internal energy committed to the Demon Fist. Added to his attempt to harden the arena, it was enough expenditure to make him very interested in ending this rapidly.

But now he knew where to spend what remained. He had been burning energy against a defense he barely understood, hoping sufficient damage would eventually appear. There was a visible wound in front of him now, and the creature kept touching it as though struggling to understand how it had gotten there.

Kael watched the green fluid gather along the broken edges. The cold had stressed the rigid shell, and the heated second blow had struck before it could recover. His master’s training had allowed him to deliver both punches properly. The Runes had made them something the armor could no longer shrug off.

Akrab lowered its claws and faced him again. Its tails remained raised, and it still had enough strength to tear him apart, but it did not immediately charge. Kael noticed the hesitation and felt his breathing begin to settle.

He brought his fists together with a heavy clang. Fire flickered across one gauntlet while frost crept along the other, and the scorpion shifted its weight without closing the distance. For the first time since the fight began, it seemed less certain about getting within reach of him.

Kael smiled beneath his helmet and lowered his fists into position. He kept his eyes on the cracked armor as Akrab’s tails lifted higher. And saw the blood under it. It may have taken him a long time to deal significant damage, but he came to know the ultimate and oldest adage.

"If it bleeds, it dies."