Spirit (Part 2)

After killing the mutated cat in front of him, Grant quickly disengaged from the fight and moved to a safe location.

[Sherlock! Will you shut it man? I'm trying to concentrate here. I was just starting to figure things out again!]

After Sherlock remained silent for a full minute, Grant started to truly get annoyed.

[Oh, NOW you don't want to talk?! It's fine to distract me during a fight but when I call you out on it, you keep quiet?!]

{Will you calm down? I was doing a deep dive into my database while you were fighting. I wasn't even paying attention to what you were doing.}

[Lies! I heard someone talking while I was fighting! You and I are the only ones in the area and it wasn't me talking so it could only be you!]

{Looks like I was correct in my assumption. You really need to check your notifications Grant, as I've told you 3 times already.}

[What are you talking about? What assumptions?]

{For the love of The Path. Either check your notifications or open your Status and you'll find your answer!}

[Fine.]

{Status:

Name: Grant Holmes

Level: 36

Race: Human

Path: The Unbound

Title: Unbound

Strength: 341 | Agility: 388 | Health: 401 | Stamina: 451 | Mana: 672

Random Rolls: 11

Credits: 989

Available Free Stats: 74

Spirits:

Maximus The Magnificent

Skills:

Unbound Stats (Active: Level N/A)

Jack of All Trades (Passive: Level N/A)

Unbound Rage (Passive: Level N/A)

Tectonic Slam (Passive: Level N/A)

Overclocked Perception (Passive: Level 5)

- To increase to the next tier: Dodge 100 enemy attacks without taking any damage. (38/100)

Terrorize (Passive: Level 5)

- Force ally or enemy alike to do your bidding for more than an hour without losing control. (0/50)

Basic Swordsmanship (Passive: Level 5)

- Master one aspect of the sword (0/1)

Heavy Strike (Active: Level 1)

-Kill 5 Enemies with Heavy Strike (0/5)}

Grant made sure to read through each line carefully, and when he came upon the Spirits section, he suddenly became confused at what that actually meant.

[Sherlock, what the hell is a Spirit and why is it part of my stats now?!]

{I knew I was right. Feels good to be vindicated.}

[Will you just focus please!?]

{Ah, my apologies. All you need to do is focus on it, and it'll pop up to explain more. I have records of it throughout my database but this is something that you are better of experiencing on your own. Best of luck, I'll be digging through the archives again, I'll check back later to see how it's going.}

Feeling somewhat abandoned, Grant shook his head to rid himself of useless thoughts before he focused on the spirits section of his status.

{Maximus The Magnificent: Born 5 years before The Path's emergence on the planet Romaneria, he had a meteoric rise to the top. After a thousand years of struggling and fighting, he managed to become the peak of what humanity had achieved.

Struck down before he was able to achieve his ultimate goal, he now chooses champions to train in order to achieve his goal by association.

Maximus the Magnificent can be summoned at the cost of 1 mana per minute.

Only the user will be able to hear or see Maximus The Magnificent}

[What the actual fuck?! Why is some thousand year old grandpa living inside my body?!

Get the fuck outta me!

Wait, it says humanity but planet Romaneria? Are there other humans other than the ones on Earth?!

Fuck it, lets see what this guy has to say for himself. Why does his name have to be so cringe worthy though... the magnificent? What a pretentious grandpa.

Summon: Maximus the Magnificent]

A moment later, a bright light shot out from Grant's chest and started to morph in the shape of a man that rivaled even Couzar in size.

While the light was morphing, Grant was frantically rubbing his chest trying to figure out where the light came from. When he found no wounds, he calmed down slightly but still felt uneasy about watching something shoot out of his body.

Nearly a full minute after the light began to morph into the shape of a person, the light faded and a hulking man mass of a man stood in front of Grant.

He had to be at least 7 feet tall, with platinum blonde hair hanging down to his shoulders and a massive beard to match.

His body looked as if it had been chiseled from stone. He had muscles in places Grant didn't even know existed.

While Grant was lost in admiring the pure specimen that was the man in front of him, while the man himself cocked his arm back and punched out, aiming for Grant's stomach.

Grant saw the punch coming but didn't try to avoid it because he assumed that since the man in front of him was a spirit the punch would just pass right through his stomach or something and he would remain unharmed.

How wrong he was.

The punch connected squarely in the center of his stomach and immediately made him keel over in a coughing fit while rolling around in pain on the ground.

Grant felt a sudden and intense urge to vomit out the contents of his stomach but forced himself to hold it back.

While Grant was tossing and turning, Maximus took a few steps forward, and while looming over Grant, unleashed a torrent of ridicule and insults.

"How can you call yourself a swordsman?! You fight like my little niece did when she was 5! I even subtly guided your hand during a fight and you STILL couldn't fight well!"

And on it went until Grant finally managed to recover from the pain that was radiating throughout his abdomen.

When he finally managed to compose himself, he had been ridiculed to such an extent that he didn't even know how he should react!

He felt pitiful and weak while simultaneously angry and determined to prove everyone who had looked down on him recently; wrong.

"What do you know?! You're dead and I'm alive! My future is still uncertain while yours is non existent!

To think I admired you for a moment when I first released you!"

Maximus just glared at Grant, "Look who actually has a spine. I thought for sure that you would start crying after that! Just because I'm dead doesn't mean I can't beat the shit out of you though!

How dare you let a mere skeleton from Renrarth speak to you the way he did! Where is your pride as a human?! We team with life while they thrive in death! It's disgraceful!"

Grant suddenly had a bad feeling, "You can see and hear what I do even when you're not released?"

"Of course! How else would I train you to be a champion of men if I can't observe you all day, every day?!"

[Get me the FUCK OUT OF HEREEEE!!!! Now I have not one but TWO leeches sucking the life out of me!!]

"Wait, train me? What? I thought you'd fight for me or something?"

Maximus looked at Grant like he was looking at a cockroach. A gaze filled with disgust.

"How am I supposed to fight for you? I can't even touch anything in the corporeal world!"

With pain still radiating throughout his stomach, Grant couldn't help but disagree with that statement.

Turned out the answer to how he was able to punch him was fairly obvious though.

"This form is a manifestation of your own mana. Of course I can use it against you. That doesn't apply to others though since their physical bodies have different mana 'signatures' if you will."

"Wait then how do skills affect people if they are created using someones mana?"

Maximus simply balked at the question though and didn't answer. He went on and on about how he wasn't a magician or something, so eventually Grant just gave up on that train of thought.

"So basically, you're a free loader who survives on my mana. Also, based on the description within The Path's system, you are trying to use me to achieve the goals you were unable to achieve? Is that not a bit sad and pathetic? You failed, move on to the next life and be happy."

Grant's sass and mockery was met by a swift punch to the side of his head which launched him flying through the wall of a nearby building.

After a few minutes, Grant suddenly burst back through the wall, furious. "What the fuck grandpa?! How dare you punch me! I'll just send you away and forget about you if that's what you really want!"

Rather than apologizing or trying to diffuse the situation, Maximus suddenly bounded towards Grant and prepared to strike him once again.

"You know nothing of the horrors that lurk in the darkness of The Path! I do not linger for my own benefit! I linger to save humanity and the rest of the planets bound to The Path!

We are running out of time before he achieves his goals and everything you know and love disappears!"