Chapter 1630 (2/2)

Randidly’s master smashed and rolled across the ground for a full second before finding his bearings and hopping to his feet. Even then, Shal’s feet dug long trenches in the ground while he dispersed the momentum Randidly had imparted upon him.

Randidly adjusted his stance, but his eyes were drawn to his spear. He blinked. Perhaps because he hadn’t cut through one of the wiggling lines in his earlier blows, the number of such lines running around the tip of his spear had nearly doubled. In addition, the complex interactions between the lines had shifted. An entire whirlpool of ethereal lines clustered around the tip of his spear.

Of course… I can always splash around and create small ripples… but if I continue to gather my momentum before striking...

The brief shift in Randidly’s attention allowed Shal to reestablish himself. Of course, Shal’s pride took prickled at being given this opportunity. The three-eyed man’s face creased into a furious grimace. “Do you truly take me so lightly…?”

Randidly focused back forward. “Your image-”

“Is none of your concern.” Shal snarled. Then that stitched together image pulsed with power. As Shal forced his Willpower to intensify the energy in the image, the flaws became clearer and clearer to see. That heroic figure manifested in a flash of golden light, but the heroism slowly seeped out of the image. The snake undulated wildly, losing the organic flow of its movements. The ethereal nature of the Spear Phantom just made Shal seem weak and insubstantial.

The final composition looked cartoonish, drawn in an exaggerated manner for effect. There was no substance to it.

Yet still, Randidly had to admit that Shal’s Willpower was formidable. His master launched himself forward and his spear strike seared the air with its passage. His image reverberations were enough to quiet some of the surrounding battles. Randidly raised his spear, ignoring the accumulating lines of his Skill. Acri hummed in his hands and Randidly could sense the spear’s question.

Randidly shook his head slightly. Even if fighting like this makes me sad, I can’t flinch. Because… a fight against his pupil is not what Shal is fighting, right now. He seems someone or something else across from him...

Shal’s golden viper streaked forward, leading with its fangs. Randidly’s left foot and the head of Acri moved in tandem, shearing forward to meet the image.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMM!

With Shal’s mental reinforcement, Randidly was forced backward again as the ground beneath his feet was shattered. Before he could even reestablish his stance, Shal spun and brought the spear around in a diagonal slash. Randidly’s right foot pushed lightly off the ground and he moved forward and to the left, escaping from the slash my circling Shal. As he did so, Randidly could gradually sense the natural momentum he was gathering.

Shal’s weapon ripped apart the stone slope, sending debris flying. In the next instant, he surged forward and brought his spear upward, just ripping it through the ground in Randidly’s direction. While the golden viper rumbled up through the ground at him, Randidly unleashed a blindingly fast thrust to impact the shaft of Shal’s spear. The natural energy swirling around Randidly slammed into Shal’s image, forcing even the reinforced image to pause for a brief moment.

Randidly then used the rebound from the impact to instantly transition the attack into a thrust at Shal. Shal’s torso blazed with heroic energy, but before Randidly’s Grim Intuition and Fidelity of the Ascendant Moirae, it wasn’t enough. Randidly found the blurred stitching between his images and cut directly through with natural energy.

Even without utilizing one of Ripple of Amenonuhoko’s lines, he advanced with blades of wind howling in his wake. Shal jerked to the side to avoid Randidly’s thrust, but the wind smashed him backward.

In a remarkable display of dexterity, Shal planted his right foot and turned all that momentum into a pivot that brought the two fighters closer to one another.

Randidly raised his spear as Shal adjusted himself, but when Shal’s eyes locked onto Acri, Randidly simply let go of the spear with his left hand and jabbed. He felt Shal’s nose break beneath his metal knuckles, even as Shal’s neck snapped backward from the force. Randidly took another step forward, cutting the space between them to a fourth of a meter. The natural energy of his spear blasted outward at Randidly’s will, knocking Shal off his feet and sending him tumbling.

“Sometimes a spear isn’t enough,” Shal swayed as he rose back to his feet. For a second his image dimmed, but then it flared back to life, with even more intensity than before. Randidly’s mouth twitched to see that his master had abandoned the air of heroism around his person. In addition, the Spear Phantom took a backseat. Only the Spear that was a Snake remained as a blazing challenge. The golden viper slithered through the air, watching Randidly with black eyes. “Sometimes you need the right sort of life. And by the time you realize what life you needed, it is too late to live any way but through self-destruction.”

Randidly’s heart trembled. Somehow, he knew those words weren’t necessarily meant for him.

Shal’s image continued to change as the man’s shoulders heaved with massive, lung-bursting breaths. The details bled into the surrounding air. About twenty meters to their left, a rhinoceros crashed into a ticking clock, shaking the entirety of the stone slope. However, neither Randidly nor Shal reacted. Randidly tightened his grip on Acri, which now seemed to be wearing a crown of spectral lines. In his ear, he could hear the wind above him and the stone beneath whispering to him. He ignored those voices, focusing on the red eyes of his master.

“We are shaped, Randidly. And sometimes our makers are flawed.” Shal said solemnly.

Despite knowing that he should speak solely with his spear, Randidly allowed frustration to pry open his mouth. But no sooner had he done so than Shal shook his head in disgust. “Freedom is an illusion held by the strong. But come. Let’s both seek our limits.”

Yet at that last comment, Randidly’s head began to boil. His grip on Acri tightened even further. Following the steaming lines of his emotions, he growled at Shal. “Do you think you are the only one who was shaped? Get out of your own way and just fight me.”

Randidly could practically see the tiny capillaries in Shal’s sclera pop and burst at his words. By this point, the golden coloring had completely drained out of Shal’s serpent spear. But if anything, the blurry grey weapon was even more ominous than its radiant predecessor. The details might be obscured, but the purpose was not.

Even Randidly could only hiss and bring Acri frantically up to block Shal’s first thrust. And after the first one, he had to block a half dozen more.