Perseus vs Captain Maximus (II)

I felt the flow of time in the world around me decelerate and my vision sharpen. I could see everything. The swaying grass, the scattered pieces of armor and weapons around the battlefield, Captain Maximus's facial expressions and body language..

I could see it all…down to the utmost detail.

I immediately dashed to meet Captain Maximus head on and within seconds, I was directly in front of him. He wasn't that far from me anyways.

I slashed both of my swords at his chest and zeroed my sights on his arm movements, analyzing his every movement and predicting any future directions of attack.

Clang!

Sparks flew as my swords met Captain Maximus's. From the movement of his arms, I could see he was intending to push me back using his superior strength so I immediately took a step back and slashed both of my swords towards his exposed stomach.

Clang!

Captain Maximus was able to react to my sudden change in attack without issue, probably due to his superior agility. I felt like I was hitting a steel wall as my swords met his.

'Gotta go faster…'

I reeled both my hands back and thrusted my right sword towards his chest area. At the same time, I slashed my left sword towards his shoulder blade.

Clang!

Captain Maximus was able to thwart my attacks yet again, using his greatsword to easily block both of my attacking directions.

'Not enough…'

Clang!

Clang!

Clang!

Sparks continued to fly as I relentlessly continued my onslaught of slashes, attacking any opening I could find and reading his movements to prevent him from turning the tables.

We exchanged several blows, and Captain Maximus's expression was calm and steady as he blocked my attacks, seemingly unaffected by my never-ending flurry of attacks.

'Not fazing you huh?'

Seeing that my attacks were not disconcerting him, I decided to change tactics. My Cyclone Slash skill was off cooldown and I wanted to catch him off guard with it.

In order to do that, I would have to ditch one of my swords since Cyclone Slash was a one handed sword skill.

Since I was in a state of absolute focus, I didn't care about my reduced damage output upon losing a sword. If it was required to win the battle, I was not going to hesitate to do so. My thinking process was that singular…it was either victory or victory.

In a flash, I halted my attacks and backpedaled a few feet away from him. Once I was at a sufficient distance, I threw my left sword towards his head and dashed back towards him at top speed.

Captain Maximus was slightly startled seeing my sudden change in approach. By the time he was able to react, my left sword was already in front of him.

Clang!

And he deflected it easily, sending it spiraling a few meters away from us. Though by the time he did, I was right in front of him.

'Got you'

Without hesitation, I unleashed a Cyclone Slash on his exposed torso using my right sword.

-320! -450! -580!

[HP: 4150/5500 (75.4%)]

My Cyclone slash dealt significant damage to him and left large dents on his silver armor.

Captain Maximus merely grunted upon receiving my damage and slashed at my waist as soon as my Cyclone Slash ended.

'Not a chance.'

Clang!

Scoffing, I easily blocked his attempt at a quick counter attack, causing sparks to flicker in my vision. The force from his strikes packed a serious punch and my arms were starting to feel like noodles...Fuck.

My bloodied vision had also become less bloody by now, most likely due to my health regenerating by a little bit.

Captain Maximus then tried to kick my knees again, but I jumped back and evaded in time.

"It seems killing you will not be as straightforward as I thought. Seriously, why am I making so many false assumptions today." Captain Maximus shook his head and derided himself as soon as we separated.

I was about to capitalize on his monologue and charge at him but what he said next sent shivers down my spine.

"In that case, it's time to kick it up a notch."

Immediately after saying that, his zweihander lit up with a blue aura and he disappeared from my sight with a flash.

Whoosh!

'It's that skill again...'

I mumbled inwardly as I immediately moved away from my position, narrowly dodging his skill in the process. Also, what the hell was that blue aura? Is it another skill?

Because the world around me still appeared slowed, I was able to see the trajectory of his skill better…well, just the initial stages.

He was still too fast for me to completely see, though it was enough to dodge it. I suddenly got an idea…What if –

Clang!

Unrelenting, Captain Maximumus continued to pressurize me and kept sending attack after attack, all of which I kept barely blocking or evading.

As the battle continued with me on the backfoot I kept studying that blue aura he kept applying on his sword. It made his attacks significantly stronger and kept creating large gushes of wind wherever he slashed.

It made me speculate. Was it a skill? Maybe, there was no way of knowing– wait there was. All skills consume something – that fact is absolute in order for a game to be balanced.

In the case of physical skills like Slash, they consume stamina so this blue aura was definitely consuming something and it was obviously not stamina…after all, it looked like some form of energy…

…Wait energy, could it be? It has to be, there's no other possibility.

It's… mana.

I remembered having an Intelligence stat but no mana bar so could it be that non-magic classes have to manually unlock it? It's possible given this game's theme of emphasizing realism.

It's also possible that there was a tutorial for it in the starter town but since I skipped it, I probably wouldn't know…. Well, let's give it a shot, it may be my ticket to winning this battle.

As I continued to black Captain Maximus's attacks, I tried to divide my attention and 'feel' the mana around me…as ridiculous as it sounds….god I hope this works.

…Surprisingly, after a few moments of concentrating on my surroundings, I was able to faintly sense what felt like little particles around me. I was shocked feeling that, was it supposed to be this easy? Did my state of Focus make it easier?

Clang!

[Warning! Carbonium's sword durability has dropped below 10%]

I was greeted by a system notification as I blocked a thrust from Captain Maximus. I frowned, glancing at it. It was now or never.

I quickly leaped backwards, using the momentum from the clash and adopted a low sword stance. As I adopted the stance, I forced all the mana particles around me to concentrate around my sword with all the concentration I could muster.

[Battle Alert: You have unlocked «Mana»]