Chapter 1579 (1/2)

The streamlined Randidly wasn’t just good at training; his mind also adapted quite quickly to fighting. His attention was a razor that would cut to the issue at hand, no matter what the situation was.

Even against these strange creations, Randidly initially had quite a bit of confidence. However, it quickly became apparent that Randidly had chosen his foes poorly.

Should have fucking stuck to bullying Nether Beasts… Randidly’s senses scrambled to keep track of his foes in the surroundings.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

Randidly’s left arm struck against the approaching slam of out of the porcelain automatons which forced him through the air sideways. Without leverage, he could only retreat before their overwhelming power. At the same time, he couldn’t reflect on that attack for too long; his right arm shot upward to lash out at another automaton that approached him, whirling like a helicopter propeller. He twisted to avoid the spinning clubs and half-lunged forward. As long as he could strike in that small opening-

Crack!

Randidly’s pink finger snapped as his blow came up just short and was then blasted away by the rotating automaton. His hand throbbed in pain as he rapidly retracted his arm. Before the impending counter-attacks could arrive, Randidly twisted around and shot himself downward-

BOOOOOOOOOOM!

Randidly was struck directly in the jaw, dazing him for a split second. The bone of his jaw fractured and he painfully pulled a muscle in his neck as he was twisted around. His instincts contracted his body, bringing his limbs together and guard his torso. As he did so, he finally realized the largest problem with continuing this fight.

It’s my sense of direction… not only do I sometimes dodge a different direction than I intended, but as soon as they create the slightest bit of distance, I forget where they were… are these things fucking invisible at all, or am I just-!

BOOOOOOOOOOM!

Right on cue, one automaton gathered both of its massive arms together and slammed them down on Randidly’s side. His right arm blocked most of the damage, but he still grunted in pain. His skeleton creaked as he was buffeted sideways. There wasn’t a single part of Randidly’s body that didn’t ache from being treated like a rubber ball during a children’s kickball game over the past ten minutes.

But even though he was battered, Randidly’s mind continued to furiously process information. The longer he fought against these things, the clearer it became that they weren’t truly trying to kill him, only drive him deeper into the shaft. Perhaps, as he theorized earlier, these things were designed to keep powerful Nether creatures from escaping upward and he had attracted their attention completely by mistake. But either way, they behaved predictably, which gave Randidly a chance to strike back.

Mentally, he reached out and seized his emotional tether. The deeper he went into the shaft, the more difficult it was to ‘grip’ the emotions that stretched like a lifeline upward from his current position, but Randidly was able to steady himself after a few seconds of struggle. He was barely able to detect hints of their movements, but Randidly knew that his sudden deceleration had the automatons repositioning themselves.

Let’s see how you can handle this… Randidly thought with a grin.

Immediately, his skin began to tingle; his Grim Intuition was sure that the automatons were approaching, to continue driving him downward. Once more, Mana flooded out to the microbes in his skin and he became a vine amoeba, floating in the dark. His tentacles lashed out widely with thorny edges.

Those thorny vines hit the automatons and did not one lick of damage to the approaching opponents. The thorns were silently repelled by their porcelain exteriors. But the swelling plant matter once more gave Randidly a picture of three automatons in the surrounding area.

What he saw made his eyebrows rise upward; all three were in the helicopter mode, cutting cleanly toward Randidly from his lower right, behind him, and directly above. It seemed that these things possessed some sort of collective intelligence, which allowed them to adjust their tactics after fighting for a time.

Still, it wouldn’t be enough.

Even if the spinning increased the automaton’s power, Randidly could take advantage of it. He activated the Grim Chimera and displayed a burst of speed. His image was immediately wiped out by a pulse of energy that enforced the dull reality around him, but he had already shifted around to the side of the nearest automaton. He moved past the dangerous hoop and struck at the core with all the venom of a rattlesnake.

CHIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPPPPP

CHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPPPPPPPP

CHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPP

The destruction of one set off the piercing chain reaction of noise through the surrounding automatons. Even though he expected the response, Randidly felt somewhat alarmed as blood spurted out of his nose; there were more gathering than he had guessed. Their combined volume inflicted more damage than he had been expecting. But although the noise made him dizzy, it did rather directly reveal the locations of those automatons in the surrounding space.