Novel Full Chapter 339: Something Stupid [I]
Chapter 339: Something Stupid [I]
I know, I know.
Lily had practically begged me not to do anything stupid. And here I was, doing something monumentally stupid.
But it wasn’t as if I had a choice. Like I’d said — we couldn’t back down now. We had to move forward, no matter the cost.
Not that I was calculating the cost at the moment. I was too busy being a projectile.
Fwoooo—!!
The wind brushed against my face as I soared through the air like a human arrow aimed at the heart of a multi-limbed, three-headed deity.
I was really about to do it.
I was really about to dive headfirst into what very well could be the final seconds of my life.
Now, I could lie to you. I could say I did it without a trace of hesitation.
I could say I wasn’t anxious because victory was already granted, because I’d concocted some masterful counter-play months in advance since I obviously knew something like this was going to happen.
But all of that would be a load of shit.
I was out of wits and fresh out of luck.
The odds weren’t just stacked against me, they were a mountain I was trying to punch through.
…And yet, I could feel the adrenaline flooding my veins, igniting a tingling sensation throughout my skin that felt like raw electricity.
It turns out that when you strip fear out of the equation, all that remains is calmness. A strange, lucid calmness accompanied by an almost intoxicating thrill.
People usually call it the flow state — a mental zone of intense focus and peak performance where every second you experience stretches far longer than it realistically should, making you feel nigh-invincible.
I was in that zone already.
I felt every single detail in my surroundings — the searing heat waving off from the flames wreathed around my Scorched Oath, the thunderous beat of my heart against my ribs like a funeral drum, and the way my instincts were yelling at me to turn back and not charge into this madness.
I also saw everything, especially the way the God’s three heads lifted in an eerie sync to track my approach with his hollow eyes.
Then, his central mouth distorted into what could only be described as an inhumanly wide grin. It sent a cold shiver down my spine, but I didn’t let it slow me.
Before I could close the gap, the fallen deity moved one of his six arms to pull back a massive warhammer. I did not even need to guess that he intended to swat me out of the sky like a fly the moment I entered his reach.
A bait.
The creature had baited me.
He wanted me close. Close enough that dodging would be a physical impossibility so he could end the fight with a single strike.
It might not kill me instantly, but it would certainly leave me as a smear of broken bones with no resistance left to offer.
That’s why he was welcoming me in with a warhammer massive enough to crush a small carriage like an empty tin can.
Fine then.
I decided I wanted to play.
The God’s central head tilted, his grin widening as the warhammer began its swing the moment I was close enough to get caught in its arc. So it came at me like the end of the world.
But instead of bracing for impact or trying to throw myself backward, I leaned into the momentum.
I tucked into a quick front flip, cartwheeling through the air to reach for the earth. My fingers must have only brushed the ground for a fraction of a second, but that was all I needed to use my innate power.
A towering pillar of stone, as tall as a ship’s mast and thick as a cluster of old oak trees, erupted from the ground between me and the God.
The Divine Mask was caught at the pillar’s rising apex before it could fall into the deity’s waiting grasp.
At the same time, the God was forced back, and that massive warhammer slammed into the stone with a bone-shaking thud instead of me. The impact shattered the newly erected pillar, ripping out massive chunks of rock as the entire structure began to groan and tilt sideways.
I didn’t stick around to admire the masonry or the destruction that ensued.
Using the momentum of my flip, I kicked off the vertical face of the crumbling pillar. My boots dug deep grooves into the stone, giving me the purchase I needed to propel myself upward.
I reached the summit of the stone monolith just as the God’s central head let out a frustrated, earth-shaking roar.
There, at the peak, I found the mask.
I snatched it up with a roll, threw it as far back into the valley as possible to keep it away from its owner, and jumped to my feet in that same motion.
Without a second of delay, I ran up to the rim of the platform and stepped off it.
Gravity did its job and pulled me into a free fall.
I’d hoped the God would be busy expecting me to circumvent the pillar and attack him from either the left or the right.
I’d hoped he’d be busy watching his flank and wouldn’t expect me to attack from directly above. Unfortunately, as I keep mentioning… the bastard had three
heads.
He could watch the left, the right, and the sky all at once. And he was doing exactly that.
His central head was staring straight at me just as the other two snapped in my direction as well.
“Eat this then!” I hissed, my voice lost in the rushing wind.
High above his line of sight, I conjured a blazing fire arrow in my free hand and whipped it downward — which was far more difficult than expected without solid footing.
The flaming projectile streaked through the air like a falling star, colliding with the God’s khopesh as he slashed it upward to intercept my attack.
Thwooom—!!
The arrow detonated in a blinding burst of fire and soot. I knew it wouldn’t hurt him, but that wasn’t the goal. I just needed to obscure his vision… which I did.
In the very next second, while still falling, I kicked off the surface of the collapsing pillar once again, changing my trajectory to alight right behind the God… which I did.
I landed in his massive shadow, and before the corrupted deity could track me, I pounced to swing my blazing axe in a high, murderous arc. I put every ounce of my adrenaline-fueled, B-rank strength into the blow, aiming for the exposed neck of his leftmost head.
My blade broke the sound barrier just before it struck.
Thack—
…But the sound was like hitting a granite boulder with a toothpick.
The blade didn’t bite into his flesh. There was no spray of ichor, there was no howl of pain — only the dull, jarring thack of steel meeting an immovable object.
The vibration rattled my teeth and sent a numbing shockwave up my arms.
The God’s leftmost head didn’t even flinch. It simply rotated a full 180 degrees to sneer at me with pure contempt, never once breaking the alien chant he was uttering.
In my periphery, a flash of silver caught my eye. The God didn’t need to turn his entire imposing body, he simply flicked one of the arms closest to me, bringing a ceremonial dagger down in a vertical thrust meant to split me like kindling.
My eyes widened in alarm as I threw my weight backward.
The tip of the obsidian blade whistled past my nose, close enough to shave the peach fuzz off my skin. No blood was drawn since no wound was inflicted.
But it still nearly threw me off my balance.
I was going down.
If that happened, I wouldn’t have the chance to parry or block the next attack. I’d die.
So I willed the earth to obey me.
My call was answered immediately as a crude, stony limb erupted from the ground and attached to my back, catching me before I could fall.
It bent from the middle like an elbow joint folding inward, supporting me as my feet lifted off the ground. Then, the limb snapped straight with enough force to launch me into a frantic, desperate backflip.
I soared through the air, clearing twenty feet of ground before landing in a low crouch, gasping for air.
The stony limb remained attached to my spine, now settling into the shape of a… functional hand.
Yes, I had three hands now. He had six! Why couldn’t I have at least half of that?!
I kept my gaze fixed on the God, waiting for the next move. But he just stood perfectly still.
…Until he didn’t.
Swoosh—
He didn’t run or jump or stride like I had expected him to. He simply vanished, his massive frame flickering out of sight at once.
I blinked once, my pupils dilating as I tried to track a blur that moved faster than my B-rank synapses could process.
In that millionth of a second, I felt true panic settle in my chest for the first time I could ever remember in a battle.
I realized I wouldn’t be able to react to him in time. If he closed the distance, it would be over.
But the very next instance, my calm returned. I didn’t need to react to where he was, after all. I just needed to control where he wasn’t.
As the air behind me curdled with the sudden pressure of his reappearance, I threw my arms wide.
The ground all around me shifted back in a circle like a high-speed treadmill, the stone slabs grinding and sprinting away from me.
The God, who had materialized right behind me with a massive obsidian needle aimed straight for my sternum, found his footing snatched away. The sudden terrestrial surge forced him backward, his lethal strike piercing nothing but empty air.
I quickly spun around to see that the God had already recovered from his failed attack and was now raising a crooked staff made of gold and bone in my direction. The air began to howl and gather into a vacuum at its tip that was aimed at me.
But before he could hit me, five colossal stone hands burst from the floor beneath the staff to shove it toward the fractured sky instead.
FW-THOOM—!!
A destructive cyclone discharged into the clouds in the next moment, booming like a cannon.