Chapter 3: The Spring Newbie Spotlight and the Drama Cannon
Chapter 3: The Spring Newbie Spotlight and the Drama Cannon
Cheers rained down upon me as I stepped into the circular stadium.
Whoa, this place is packed! Aww man, I’m getting fired up!
“Heeey, Takashiro! You better win!”
“Good luck, Takashiro!”
I looked over to see Yano and Maeda yelling from the VIP seats in the front row. The two of them could watch and learn from the best seats in the house, thanks to Yukino.
“Yeah! I got this!” I waved back at them, a big smile plastered on my face. “Just you wait! I’m gonna win this whole thing and bring back one heck of a prize!”
“Ooh! This guy’s just brimming with confidence!”
At that moment, my first opponent appeared before me. His whole body was covered with blue armor, and I could only see his face because of his raised visor. At a glance, he didn’t seem to feel one way or another about this. Perhaps a little jittery, if anything.
“I get that you want to look good in front of your girlfriends, but you’re gonna seem like a total loser if you fail after all that bragging,” he said.
Hayato Nomura (2-F)
Level 30 (Restricted) Armor Knight
Guild: Peacemakers
A Peacemaker, huh? I know that guild. They enforce the rules, kinda like a student council. The guild master is probably something like the student council president. Thanks to the level restriction, he’s level 30 like me.
“I do want to look good, yeah... but not for the girls out there. As a symbologist, I wanna show everyone what the king of the Bummers can really do. This class is like my baby, and you know how it is; a father has to love his child, no matter how weak they are.”
“Hey, man, whatever you wanna do in your free time. Sorry to say, but, uh, I don’t think being a symbologist is gonna work out for you here.”
“Oh, really? Well, we’ll just have to see.”
“Heh. Don’t come crying to me when you embarrass yourself. I’m representing my guild in this fight, so I won’t hold back.”
A loud voice—the announcer’s—interrupted our conversation.
“Our next match is between Nomura from 2-F and Takashiro from 1-E! Nomura is an armor knight, while Takashiro is the only symbologist in the whole tournament. It’s the vice president of the Peacemakers up against the MVP of the first-years’ first competitive mission! Here as our player analyst is our very own Yukino Yamamura! Anything to point out?”
Yukino’s doing commentary too? Come to think of it, that announcer sounds really familiar...
“Yes! Like you said, Ren is the only symbologist competing in today’s event! As a back-line class with low physical capabilities, symbologist isn’t especially suited for PvP. How he works to overcome this weakness will be very important.”
“Wow, how insightful! Seeing as Takashiro is one of my students, I must say I’m very excited to watch him fight!”
No way!
I looked up toward the stands and spotted the two announcers.
There she is—it’s Ms. Nakada! The heck’s going on here?!
“Hey, Ms. Nakada! What are you doing up there?!”
“One of my GM duties is commentating on player events. This one has been a blast!”
Welp, if she’s having fun, more power to her.
As always, she was as giddy as a kid in a candy store.
“Are the contestants ready?” Nomura and I assumed our positions, then nodded in unison. “All right, here we go! Let the duel begin!”
At the same time, the sound of a gong reverberated through the stadium, and the crowd went wild.
“Hope you’re ready for this!” Nomura lowered his visor, now fully protected by his armor. With a quick wave of his sturdy lance, he activated Challenge. It succeeded, giving me the Provoked affliction.
Challenge is a taunt skill inherent to armor knights. Against monsters, it increases aggro, but when used in PvP, it forces the foe to target you. Healing and buffing skills require you to target the player you want to use them on, so this effectively disables those skills.
Furthermore, a Provoked enemy can’t move away from you, so they can’t escape until it wears off. It’s a very powerful affliction, but it can sometimes be resisted. With a cooldown time of only thirty seconds, Challenge can really mess up your front lines—it’s no surprise that this skill is A-rank. This Challenge seemed to have an even higher range than usual, though; otherwise, it wouldn’t have been able to hit me from so far away. He must have a talent or some kind of equipment that increases its range.
I get it. Now that I’m Provoked, I won’t be able to heal myself or leave his taunt range. He’s essentially forcing me to fight at close range.
Armor knights have the highest durability of all classes, thanks to their class-specific armor trait that cuts physical damage by a whopping 50%. It’s pretty much like they’re always guarding with a shield. The only real threat to armor knights is magic.
Nomura wasted no time in closing the gap between us. He dashed forward in a straight line, focused on bringing down a direct attack. I couldn’t increase the distance between us, so even if I were to cast a magic circle, he would reach me eventually. On top of that, armor knights had ridiculous physical strength, so even if we hit each other at the same time, he would deal much more damage.
He wasn’t going to defend—only attack! That’s the rational strategy against most back-line classes, after all.
Unfortunately for him, headstrong charges like this are perfect for me! If he cuts damage by 50%, then I’ll just have to overkill with an attack that deals damage equal to 200% of his health!
I cast an Enervating Circle with a wide range, erasing my MP bar.
“Skill Set B!”
Thanks to the Equip Ring, my main weapon instantly changed to the Canesword.
“Haaaaah!” Finally, Nomura stepped within range.
All right! Time to chow down!
“Ultimate move! Dead End!”
Smaaaaaaaaash!
The flash of purple light from my sword knocked the fully armored knight off his feet.
“What! Aaargh?!” Nomura flew away like a ping-pong ball, then smashed into the wall and got stuck to it.
Ooh! That’s a neat little bonus!
Ren activated Dead End. Dealt 1,311 damage to Hayato!
Ren has slain Hayato.
Duel complete! Ren is the winner!
Ren’s duel record is 2W / 0L.
The log communicated my victory.
Phew! Look at that 150-yard home run! I always knew my hit distance was something to be proud of! Go on, cut my damage in half! I’ll still one-shot you without breaking a sweat! Man, I’m so proud of myself. He was pretty much the perfect opponent for me. That charge pretty much put things on easy mode. If I were a plumber in this scenario, he would be nothing but a little walking mushroom for me to stomp on.
A short moment of silence followed as the crowd registered what had happened. Then, the Arena was filled with thunderous applause.
I’m just glad I got to show them all my drama cannon right off the bat. Hopefully this piques their interest.
“Takashiro has won the duel! Everyone here is astounded at the sight of a symbologist one-shotting an armor knight—the pinnacle of defense and HP! What are your thoughts on the match, Yukino?”
“It all came down to that ultimate. Even though it’s a shocker to see an armor knight taken down so easily, it makes total sense. There was no way for Nomura to know Ren could unleash so much firepower. With his level brought down to 30, he couldn’t match that blast when it came to offense or defense. That ultimate move really came out of left field. With Ren behind the wheel of the symbologist class, it’s clear that it may not be the weak, back-line Bummer everyone thinks it is. I’m glad we got to see a little bit of its potential unleashed here today.”
“Very interesting. Thank you, Yukino! Now, let’s move on to the next match!”
I headed back to the waiting room as they continued their commentary. Akira jogged up to me, grinning from ear to ear.
“You did it, Ren! Good job!”
“Thanks! But that one was pretty easy. You’d better win your first match, too, Akira!”
“Yeah. I’ll do everything I can to win!”
Homura walked by us on her way to her match. When our eyes met, she swallowed hard and forced an awkward smile.
“N-Not bad! You’ll be a worthy opponent for me!”
“Hah! Look at you, acting tough. Ren’s going to one-hit punch you into oblivion!”
“Oh, if it isn’t Yukino. Are you taking a break?”
“Yeah, since my battle is coming up soon. I wish I didn’t have to keep going up there, though. It’s really not my thing.”
“I mean, you are Mystic Arts’ guild master,” Akira said. “Comes with the leadership, I guess.”
“Nah, if that were the guild master’s job, I’d give the title to someone else real quick. Ms. Nakada told me to do it, actually. She was the first master of this guild, so I can’t just say no.”
“Really?! Hmm, she did say she graduated from this school...”
“Yeah. I bet she’s enjoying being an announcer for her old guild’s tournament,” I said.
“I do appreciate her helping out, though. So hey, Ren, that was a great match! The crowd was going nuts for you.”
“Heck yeah! They must’ve loved the sweet taste of meta-redefinition!”
“Hahaha. Your style is kind of like, high-risk, high-reward, since you’re reducing your HP to up your damage. Your HP bar was only a fraction of an inch long after you let your ultimate loose. If you got so much as poked, you’d have keeled over.”
“Well, that’s the only way to unlock the symbologist’s hidden damage potential.”
“You always take things to the extreme, Ren. But I’m gonna find a way around it so I can take you down!”
“I’ll hold you to that!”
“Hmm... Ooh, so that’s how it is. In that case...” As she listened to our conversation, Homura was deep in thought. “Heheh. Not so fast! You two won’t even get the chance to fight against each other because I’m gonna defeat you first!”
“How about you shut up and get to your battle? I don’t have time to deal with small fry who can’t do anything but grind for items.”
“Hah! If that’s all I can do, then I’ll rely on my items. Just you wait!” Homura left us with those words as she made for the stadium.
“Now that she’s gone... Ren?”
“Yeah?”
“Being a symbologist might be working for you right now, but things will get harder down the line.”
“Why’s that?”
“Well, we definitely didn’t overlook experimenting with Knifer on symbologist. We’re a guild full of PvP fanatics, remember? But, um...” Yukino was struggling to convey her thoughts, but I knew what she wanted to say.
“I see. It lost heat, I bet, huh?”
“Right. Between the constant money loss and the forging requirement for hidden weapons, it gets to be too much to handle. The stronger you get, the more you’ll be spending on mats for your weapons. You need to increase your crafting level, too. The hardest parts for us were fundraising and grinding crafting levels.”
“Hmm...”
“As you get to the higher levels, people have more ways to protect themselves. For example, they might have resurrection abilities or skills that guard against OHKOs. In these cases, a once-per-battle attack is at a huge disadvantage. For us, winning just got harder and harder. Your ultimate move may be strong, but the symbologist’s basic attacks are pathetic, so their overall damage output is pretty low. In short, it’s just not a good enough attacker to justify the cost.”
“In other words, it works at lower levels but falls behind at higher levels, and that’s why it’s not popular?”
“Yeah. Sorry, I don’t mean to rain on your parade.”
“Oh, no. Heheh... This is actually great. There must be an even greater awakening beyond this wall, right?! Nice! I’m getting more and more excited!”
I’m gonna rise up and show those quitters who’s boss! I’ll go above and beyond what everyone thinks a symbologist can do... Man, I can hardly contain myself!
“Hahahah. Guess I didn’t have to worry about you, Ren. You’re such a character.” Yukino grinned.
“That’s Ren for you!” Akira piped.
“By the way, Yukino... Are you sure you can only use hidden weapon arts once per battle?”
“Yeah. What about it?”
“Well, after your weapon is broken with Final Strike, you can actually make another one with Efficiency and—”
“What?! I had no idea. Then... No, wait. Your skills would still be on cooldown, right?”
I patted Akira’s shoulder proudly and slung a thumb in her direction.
“Oh, right, sword dancers! She can really boost your damage, huh? I bet Akira’s the reason you’ve made it this far with symbologist. Yep, you two might just be able to pioneer a new path for that class. I don’t know of anyone else who’s tried it with their sword dancer girlfriend at their side!”
“N-No, no, no! Umm, we’re not dating or anything!” Akira waved her hands around in denial, her face quickly flushing red.
“Oh? My bad. You guys just get along so well, you know? Well, in that case, how ’bout you and I go out sometime, Ren?”
“Huh?!” Akira and I blurted in unison.
Suddenly, I felt a menacing aura radiating from beside me.
“Kidding, kidding! Hahaha! Didn’t mean to ruffle your feathers. I just love givin’ you guys a hard time.”
Akira sighed. “Ugh! You really had me going there!”
“Sorry, girl. I guess it was kind of a rude prank. Honestly, I’ve never felt the need for a boyfriend. Gaming is just too much fun!”
That’s so like her. She’s just a simple, honest gal.
“Hey, all that matters is that you’re having fun,” I said.
I would know, because I feel the same way! My parents always told me to pursue my interests, so that’s what I do.
◆◆◆
Akira, Yukino, Homura, and even Akabane won their first-round matches with ease. Unfortunately, Kataoka lost. Akabane looked at him as though he were walking garbage, but he didn’t seem to mind. Heck, he almost looked happy about it.
I’ll never get that guy.
Also, Akira was very popular with the crowd! She was embarrassed about her appearance, of course, but the male audience members were in heaven.
Since Akabane was also a sword dancer, she was met with the same warm reception. Unlike Akira, however, Akabane seemed used to it; she didn’t even bat an eyelash at all the attention. Either way, both of them had a tight grip on the hearts of the audience.
Now that the first round was over, the tournament moved on to the second. It was almost time for my battle with Homura.
“The next battle is about to begin!” said a guild staffer. “Homura Yamamura and Ren Takashiro, report to the ring immediately!”
“Finally! Be there in a jiffy!”
“Good luck, Ren!” Akira cheered.
I was ready and raring to go, but Homura was another story.
“Wait just a second, please! I’m not ready yet! I just need a little more time to prepare!”
“Today’s schedule is tight, so sorry, but we can’t allow that. If you refuse to come to the ring, you’ll be disqualified.”
Hmm...
“Ouch! Ow, ow, owww!” I moaned, clutching my gut. “My stomach! Sorry! I’ve gotta run to the bathroom!”
“A-Are you okay?! Try to hurry!”
“Sorry! Be right back!”
The staff member accepted my lame excuse without disqualifying me. I logged out of the game and waited for a few minutes. Akira probably understood what I was doing; before long, a private message from her appeared on my screen.
“It looks like Homura was waiting for some gear to arrive. She’s ready now!”
Back in I go, then.
“Sorry again! I’m okay now!”
“Good. Then get to the ring, both of you!”
As we walked up the stairs toward the stadium, Homura spoke up.
“Thank you for stalling, even though your acting sucked.”
“Huh? Darn, I thought it was really convincing.”
“Haha! You’re not bad for one of Yukino’s friends. But I’m still not gonna go easy on you!”
“I wouldn’t dream of it! Hit me with your best shot!”
I noticed that Homura’s winged robe had gone from black and scarlet to pure white. The new one had a cool, luxurious feel to it.
So that’s what she was waiting on? Must be special equipment for use against me specifically. I wonder what she’s gonna do...
The two of us stepped into the ring.
“Now, on to the next second-round match! It’s the one-hit wonder himself, Ren Takashiro, versus the guild master of Grand Museum, Homura Yamamura! Grand Museum is one of the top ten guilds, and today, the guild master herself has joined the fray! Your thoughts, Yukino?!”
Once again, Ms. Nakada was delivering the play-by-play.
“She must be here for Libra’s Brush. All Grand Museum’s guildies care about is items, you know? But because of their tunnel vision, they lack PvP experience, making them kinda weak. Ren may be a first-year, but his skill is undeniable. Homura doesn’t stand a chance, so she might as well just eat a Dead End and be done with it.”
Homura was clearly offended by this.
“Hey! Either offer some fair commentary or shut your trap! Emphasis on fair!”
“I see! Will Yukino’s predictions be prove to be accurate? As for me, I’m rather interested in that robe Homura wore to the match. What could it be?”
“Giving a robe like that to Homura is like casting pearls before swine. That said, it will make things very difficult for Ren. I’m sure everyone here will understand what it does before long.”
“Hmm, all right. Keep your eyes peeled, everyone!”
What does it do? I’ve got a bad feeling about this.
“Okay, fighters, let’s begin!” cried Ms. Nakada.
“Heheh... I do appreciate you giving me some extra time, but in doing so, you sealed your own fate. Now that I have this, I can’t lose! It’s just a shame I had to don such a rare item! There might be a level restriction, but using super-rare items isn’t against the rules!” Homura cackled, clearly pleased with herself.
“Now, Phoenix Cloak!”
Immediately after she uttered this, Homura was enveloped in a pale green light. Over the course of a few seconds, the light gradually faded, leaving a halo icon in Homura’s status display.
“Ooh! This is...!”
The auto-revive icon!
When you die, auto-revive brings you right back to life. It only works once, though. There was a number one to the right of the icon, meaning this skill was level 1. Level 1 revives bring the user back with 30% HP. Normally, when a player is brought back from the dead, they’ll be enfeebled, which greatly reduces their stats... but auto-revives in duel mode don’t enfeeble you. It’s a special measure taken to ensure that revival isn’t too useless in duels.
So this is her countermeasure, huh?
Like Yukino said, I was naturally weak against foes who could revive automatically because they could essentially bypass my first big strike and force me to come up with a second one. After Homura’s auto-revival, I’d be in a lot of danger. Not only would I be on the verge of death, but I’d also be stuck waiting for cooldowns while avoiding her attacks. If she could somehow recast her auto-revive skill while I was waiting for my second ultimate, then I would really be screwed.
“There’s the enchantment! Homura has set up her auto-revive! This is the only way to auto-revive if you’re under level 30; even Clerics don’t learn auto-revival magic until level 35! It’s all thanks to the Phoenix Cloak, an item as rare as the illusory sword, Skyfall! That’s Grand Museum for you—they’ve always got some rare gems to pull out in a pinch!”
Homura smirked. “I had this brought over from the museum, so it took a while. Now that I have it, though, you don’t stand a chance! Get ready to eat dirt!”
With her auto-revive status ready, Homura began casting a spell.
“Skill Set C!”
Here’s my newest equipment set:
Main Weapon: Iron Staff
Subweapon: None
The Fanatic’s Staff may have high poise, but it does have certain drawbacks.
Fanatic’s Staff (O)
Effects: INT -60, MND -60, MAX MP -50
It’s convenient to be able to block any and all physical attacks, but the Fanatic’s Staff just isn’t made to take magic. Its stats make the user’s magic resistance way too low. Plus, poise doesn’t do anything to help against magic; for that, you need INT and MND. Performing the actual guard motion will also cut the damage you take somewhat, so I went for the INT- and MND-boosting Iron Staff.
Finally, Homura completed her cast animation.
“Blazing Cowl!”
Her body was enveloped in bright red flames.
That must be an elemental safeguard. A fire type, by the looks of it.
With this sort of magic, the user can absorb elemental attacks—fire, in Homura’s case. When someone attacks from point-blank range, the fire surrounding the user will also perform an automatic counterattack.
For example, if I tried to use Dead End, I would kill her in one hit. As soon as she revived, I would take fire damage from the counterattack, and then I’d die.
I’d better not be too brash here. For now, I should just watch and wait. If I don’t figure this out, I won’t get a chance to attack.
Homura wasted no time in following up with another spell.
“Split Flares!”
She pointed her palm in my direction, shooting out three tiny flaming bullets. They were smaller than Maeda’s fireballs, but they came out in quick succession, and the bullets were much faster. This spell seemed more suited to proper battles.
I guarded against all of the bullets. They broke through my guard a bit, but I wasn’t too worried about it. I did have some HP potions, although they took some time to use. I could’ve even dodged the bullets if I’d tried, but I wanted the AP gain from taking damage.
“I’m not done yet!”
She cast Split Flares again, and I guarded just like before. Between rounds, I started casting Stupefying Circle at Homura’s feet—this magic circle lowers enemy INT. As long as she stood inside it, her magic would be less dangerous.
“Hmph!”
She abruptly stopped casting so she could run outside of the circle.
Well, that’s obvious. If you can run out of it, just run out of it.
After that, she fired off a bunch of Split Flares.
Homura activated Split Flares.
Ren guarded the attack, taking 40 damage.
Homura activated Split Flares.
Ren guarded the attack, taking 41 damage.
Homura activated Split Flares.
Ren guarded the attack, taking 40 damage.
The damage was really starting to pile up, but at this point, Homura’s Blazing Cowl had worn off.
About two minutes, huh? I’ll remember that.
At that moment, she began casting Blazing Cowl again.
I took the opportunity to chug a potion and recover my lost HP. I didn’t have many left, so I was sad to see this one go.
Once Homura had finished casting, she spotted me and decided to do the same with her MP. She clearly had a much faster potion-drinking animation; I figured she had a talent that sped it up.
At this point, we had pretty much restarted the battle. Homura resumed launching Split Flares, but if she really wanted to defeat me, she needed to try something different.
This time, I ran to dodge the incoming fire. Not only did the bullets fly in a straight line, but there was also enough distance between us that I had ample time to react. As long as I wasn’t standing still, it was pretty easy to avoid them.
Maybe she’ll try something else if I keep dodging?
Or so I thought, but she just kept on shooting Split Flares... and missing.
So, uh, she doesn’t care, I guess. Is she just trying to buy time? If so, why?
“Split Flares!”
I dodged them and followed up with my own magic.
“Repugnant Circle!”
This one lowers CHR. Honestly, there isn’t much point in lowering this stat. Homura seemed to know this as well, as she didn’t even bother stepping out of it.
She recognizes that this one’s pointless, so she’s gonna ignore it. I see, I see.
With that out of the way, I continued thinking.
When I considered Homura’s actions, one thought came to mind: Phoenix Cloak’s effect probably had a cooldown time. If she were to die before the cooldown ended, she would still resurrect, but she would still have to wait for the cooldown to end before casting it again. Until then, she’d be painfully defenseless.
From Homura’s point of view, she would want the auto-revive to be ready at all times. With that in mind, she was acting carefully, probably on guard as a result of seeing my Dead End in the first round. If she changed her pattern anytime soon, that meant she was comfortable enough to charge in—and that was a sign that the cloak had finished its cooldown. I decided to wait for this to happen so I could figure out just how long the cooldown time was. Knowledge is power, as they say.
“All right. Final Strike!”
I activated Final Strike independently rather than as part of my ultimate combo. It would make my next attack stronger at the cost of breaking my weapon. However, there was actually a lot of leeway regarding how long I could wait until my next attack. According to my experiments, that leeway was about thirty minutes.
How did I experiment, you might ask? First, I’d activate Final Strike. Then I would wait X minutes and activate Quickdraw. Each time, I increased X by one, searching for the length of time after which Quickdraw didn’t break my weapon. It was pretty simple, really... though I guess that means I broke 30 Caneswords, huh?
As a result, I learned that Final Strike stays active for 30 minutes, while the cooldown is only five minutes. That meant I could perform a two-hit sucker punch by activating Final Strike, waiting five minutes, attacking, and then activating Final Strike for another attack. The first Final Strike activation puts the skill on cooldown, even without attacking. The ability to put off the actual attack is this skill’s specialty.
Maybe I should call it Double Strike or something.
If Homura wanted to wait for her cooldowns, then I’d gladly wait with her. For the time being, of course, she continued attacking with her long-range magic. Soon we passed the five-minute mark from the start of the match.
“This is going nowhere! I guess now it’s time to turn up the heat!”
Great, she’s finally getting serious about this!
“All right, I’m comin’ at you for real this time!”
Homura cast her next spell.
“Volcanic Flame!”
I’d never heard of this spell before. It wasn’t even in the UW Guidebook. When the spell activated, a huge lion’s face made of fire materialized in the air above my head. The lion looked fierce, baring its fangs my way.
“Ooh!”
So cool! It’s like Maeda’s Diabolic Howl!
“Attaaaaaack!” Homura cried.
The flaming lion rapidly descended. Simply guarding would be too lame, so instead, I decided to figure out how the spell worked. For the sake of learning, I ran diagonally away from Homura.
Can I escape it completely if I just keep running as soon as it’s cast? Or is it a guided missile like Soul Spear?
I moved as fast as possible, keeping track of the Volcanic Flame as I went.
The flaming lion fell straight into the ground.
Groooooaaaaar!
With an ear-splitting howl, it exploded. The fiery explosion spread out in a wide range from the epicenter, torching the ground as it went. Naturally, I was within that range. Unable to guard in time, I took the full brunt of the spell.
Homura activated Volcanic Flame.
Dealt 422 damage to Ren!
“Ngh!”
Ouch! It took just about half of my health! I never saw that coming. I’d better guard next time. After such a huge explosion, the aftermath would... Oh, no.
When I realized what could happen next, I quickly put up a basic guard.
Just then, Ms. Nakada cut in for some commentary.
“What a feast for the eyes! Volcanic Flame is a rare magic drop from a limited-time event monster! Homura’s gear is just perfect for this fight!”
“A level 30 wouldn’t normally be able to obtain magic like this, but fortunately for her, the required level to learn it is 30. This is probably one of the strongest magical abilities you can get up to this level,” Yukino said.
“One more time! Volcanic Flame!”
I’m not just gonna stand here and take this!
When I saw that Homura had begun casting, I dashed toward her. Since Volcanic Flame’s radius is so large, I could make it hit her, too!
Groooooaaaaar!
Homura activated Volcanic Flame.
Ren guarded the attack, taking 343 damage.
Homura activated Volcanic Flame.
Homura recovered 322 HP!
“What?!”
Aww, man, I completely forgot about Blazing Cowl! Well, I guess it’s not that big of a deal.
By this point, I hadn’t even given her so much as a scratch. Her battle plan was simple, yet effective. She maintained her auto-revive to avoid any nasty surprises, put up a flame barrier, and used explosive magic. She didn’t even have to be careful about her attack placement since it would just heal her.
Normally, I would counter this with a quick one-shot, but she would just revive. While her battle strategy relied a lot on brute force, it was deliciously simple. That simplicity made it more versatile, so it could pretty much be used against any given enemy. Don’t know how to handle this foe? Just kill it with fire! Simple as that.
Very impressive, Homura!
Instead of reading her enemy’s movements or changing tactics on the fly, she’d come up with a solid plan that could be plugged into any battle.
My HP was now below 100. I might have been backed into a corner, but I still had some tricks up my sleeve. It was the perfect time to turn the tables. The computer in my brain had calculated the perfect route to victory!
“This next one will be the last!” Homura said, starting to cast Volcanic Flame again.
“Not so fast!”
As soon as I stepped into firing range, I activated Shadow Dart, finally unleashing my saved-up Final Strike.
“Ungh?! Zzz...”
Ren activates Shadow Dart.
Dealt 75 damage to Homura!
Homura has fallen asleep.
It worked!
Once I was sure that she was asleep, I rushed to craft another Blowgun.
“Whoa! Homura has fallen asleep! This is Takashiro’s big chance! Is he going to unleash his ultimate move?!”
Nope. For now, we wait!
If she took even one point of damage, she would wake up from her slumber. At this point, Final Strike had just come off cooldown.
Okay! Time to activate Final Strike again! Just gotta wait five more minutes now... Hurry, hurry, hurry! Come off cooldown before she wakes up!
As if the game had answered my prayers, it did.
“All right!”
I immediately moved to the next stage of plan.
Everything’s in order! Let’s do this!
“Skill Set C!”
My long-range equipment changed to the following:
Ranged Weapon: Blowgun (OEX)
Ammunition: Sleep Darts
Now I’ve just gotta wait for Homura to wake up.
“What’s this? Ren isn’t making a single move. He’s not using this opportunity to attack or heal himself! Is this part of his plan?!”
Sure is, Ms. Nakada!
I lay in wait for a few more moments until finally, a message appeared in my log.
Homura woke up!
“Huh?! Whoa! What’s hap—”
In no time at all, I began casting.
“Repugnant Circle!”
I set the circle to its maximum range, encompassing Homura as well. My MP bar fell straight to zero. The debuff worked—not that it mattered, considering it only lowered CHR. Just like last time, Homura didn’t budge. I hastily moved on to my next action.
“Ultimate move! Soul Spear!”
Psheeeew!
A purple ray of light shot out of my Blowgun.
“Wha—?!” Homura flinched at the sight of the laser zigzagging her way.
But Soul Spear didn’t enter the magic field. Instead, it started tracing a circle around it, just as it had when I used it on Akira. Soul Spear was treating the circle as an obstacle. It honestly seemed like a bug to me, but hey, why not use it to my advantage?
Entranced by Soul Spear’s bizarre movement, Homura could only stare at it as it whizzed around her. To the soccer players out there, she was pretty much just ball watching.
I took this opportunity to craft a Canesword and then dashed straight toward Homura.
“Hmph!”
As soon as she realized what I was doing, she began casting Volcanic Flame. Since I had just used my ultimate move, I was down to 1 HP. If I were to be so much as licked by Volcanic Flame, I was toast. I’d guarded against every Volcanic Flame so far, unable to escape any of them unscathed. In other words, from Homura’s point of view, this one was sure to hit. And that’s exactly what I wanted her to think!
The spell finished, and another massive, flaming lion appeared. Just as it began to near the ground...
Now!
“Windmill!”
This was a staff art that sent the user leaping upward while striking with the staff. This upward attack was pretty similar to one beloved move from a famous fighting game.
Groooooaaaaar!
Volcanic Flame’s impact caused only the following to pop up in my log window:
Homura activated Volcanic Flame.
Dealt 326 damage to Homura!
My Windmill leap helped me escape the explosion, leaving me unscathed. Every guard so far was meant to draw her attention away from the idea that I could perform this last-minute maneuver. If I had used Windmill even once before, it would have revealed my trick.
“Nnngh! Darn, I forgot about my cowl!”
Homura’s Blazing Cowl had just expired, and it was for this very reason I had waited patiently while she slept. I launched my assault the moment she woke up so that she wouldn’t have time to erect the barrier again. Volcanic Flame then hit her alone, dealing damage instead of healing her.
“Grrr! I’ve gotta heal!”
She tried to use a potion, but before she could, I had already landed next to her, Canesword in hand.
“Take thiiiis!”
While still barely alive at 1 HP, I unleashed my hidden weapon art, Quickdraw. A silver flash seized Homura.
“Eeeeek?!”
Ren activated Quickdraw.
Dealt 452 damage to Homura!
She eventually hit the ground after being blown away by the attack. Thanks to Quickdraw, her HP fell to 0, but she still had the auto-revive. A soft, pale light enveloped her body, bringing her slowly back to life. Level 1 auto-revival only recovers 30% of the target’s max HP.
“Not bad!”
After standing back up, Homura immediately attempted to reapply the auto-revive. Since she’d been blown away by the Quickdraw, Homura was now standing far away from me. She was free to enter auto-revive mode again.
But wait... notice anything strange about where she was standing? Perhaps the plain ground, devoid of any patterns of magical light?! That’s right: Homura had flown so far away that she was now outside of my Repugnant Circle.
Psheeeew!
In a split second, a purple laser pierced right through her. My Soul Spear was too shy to take the stage before, but now it was finally putting in work!
“What the...?! How?!”
Ren activated Soul Spear.
Dealt 251 damage to Homura!
Ren has defeated Homura.
Duel complete! Ren is the winner!
Ren’s duel record is 3W / 0L.
“Woooooo!”
The crowd exploded with cheers.
“And it’s oveeeeer! Takashiro is the winner!” Ms. Nakada’s announcement reverberated throughout the arena.
“Aww yeah! I won!”
That was close! I was so on edge, but that made it even more exciting!
The only way to keep Homura from reapplying her auto-revive was to attack twice in quick succession during a very small window of time. I used Soul Spear’s strange circle-avoiding quirk to my advantage, delaying it until after I had already attacked once. Thanks to the auto-revive’s low recovery percentage, I figured Soul Spear was more than enough to finish her off. With Soul Spear handling the cleanup, I just had to use Quickdraw for the initiating blow. Even a Quickdraw at 1 HP wasn’t enough to one-shot her, though, so I relied on the power of her very own Volcanic Flame.
Anyway, my beautiful thinking machine had come up with this perfect sequence. And I have to say, it went off without a hitch!
“Wow! What an incredible turn of events! What are your thoughts, Yukino?”
“Incredible is the perfect word to describe it. In no time at all, Ren carefully calculated that entire chain of events. He’s capable of balancing quick thinking and accuracy, along with bold execution... Ren’s got a natural gift for PvP. He’s certainly worthy enough to face me. I look forward to our match.” Despite her cool analysis, Yukino looked really excited.
My next battle was shaping up to be even more fun and challenging than the last.
I’ll probably be fighting Yukino next... All right, I’m gonna give it everything I’ve got!