The battle against Arto, the Gate Guardian

The moment Clinton declared his will to fight, the entire battlefield trembled.

Arto, the immovable stone behemoth, raised its colossal arms, each one thick as a tree trunk and brought them crashing down with a force that could pulverize mountains not to talk of a skeleton.

BOOM!

The shockwave sent Clinton hurling backward, his skeleton body rattling as he barely rolled away from the impact.

The ground split open in a terrifying display of power, jagged cracks of molten energy snaking through the battlefield. Had he been a second slower, he would have been reduced to bone dust.

“Survival is meaningless,” Arto’s voice rumbled like grinding boulders. “You are nothing before me”.

“Give up your meaningless existence and fall to my blade”.

Clinton landed on one knee, his wooden spear already torn apart by that attack and so, he finally brought out his main weapon.

His skeletal fingers tightened their grip on Magedon, Light Slayer, the bone-crafted mythical weapon pulsing with ominous power.

And then, his sockets glowed with resolve. “Give up my meaningless existence?”

He chuckled which without vocal cords only sounded grating to the ears. “I think you’re not qualified to decide that”.

“I decide if my life is meaningless or not!”

With that, Clinton charged.

Arto also charged.

Whoosh!

The moment Arto charged, it was like a landslide given life.

Clinton barely had time to react before a monolithic fist came crashing down. He threw himself to the side, but the sheer force of impact once again sent him hurtling backward, his ribs cracking as he smashed into the ground.

Clinton’s vision was blurred by damage notifications.

“Ghh…!” He gritted his skeletal teeth.

Even with a mythical weapon, he was completely outmatched.

Arto was not just strong, the Stone Golem was unyielding, an unstoppable embodiment of stone and magic.

Every attack was like the wrath of the earth itself, relentless, crushing.

Still, Clinton rose.

He had not survived death itself just to fall here.

And then, he looked at the gate guardian, grinning. He grinned because after that attack, he discovered something among his system notifications.

Apart from the damage notification, there was something else…, a limit remover.

Since he was challenging a gate guardian, all limitations on his weapon were removed, including the lock on the Magedon’s active skills.

All of a sudden, he no longer felt as helpless and that was why he grinned.

Clinton took a step, and then he vanished. No, he teleported.

BZZZ!

The bone spear appeared mid-air above Arto’s back, and Clinton reappeared beside it, driving it down towards the guardian’s core.

CLANG!

The impact was laughable, like throwing a twig against a mountain.

Arto barely flinched, and Clinton was forced to warp away again before a devastating backhand swing could obliterate him.

“Tch. Figures”. He landed on a crumbling pillar, brain working at hyper-speed.

In that moment, Arto lifted its colossal foot and stomped, sending a shockwave of molten force through the battlefield.

The ground ruptured, an earthquake seemingly imminent as massive stone spikes erupted beneath Clinton’s position.

He teleported just in time, reappearing behind Arto, only to meet a massive swinging arm that sent him flying again.

He crashed hard, his bones rattling apart from the force.

‘This isn’t working!’ Clinton gritted his teeth.

Even with Magedon’s fortuitously unlocked active skills, his attacks were too weak to make a difference.

‘Come on, think!’ He snapped at himself.

And that was when he saw it.

Every time Arto swung or moved, the massive weight of its own body made it momentarily sluggish.

The molten veins running through its core pulsed rhythmically, revealing an exploitable delay.

‘That’s it’.

Clinton warped again but this time, he wasn’t attacking.

Instead, he broke apart in mid-air, using his bone assembling skill as his individual bones scattered like a thrown handful of dice.

Arto’s swing passed harmlessly through empty space and before the guardian could react, Clinton reassembled himself behind it.

And then, he struck.

[Corrosion!]

Magedon’s bone blade pulsed with unholy energy, and Clinton plunged it into the molten veins at Arto’s lower back.

Sizzle!

A sickening hiss quickly filled the air as high-tier corrosion took effect.

The golden glow of Arto’s veins flickered and for the first time, the gate guardian staggered.

But this only made it angrier.

Arto roared, spinning to swat Clinton away but he had already teleported out of reach. Now, a blackened mark burned on the golem’s core.

[Death Mark=]

Death Mark, this was the core of the crazy plan that Sam’s human ingenuity came up with to defeat this gate guardian.

It was a gamble, but Clinton was willing to take the risk.

All of a sudden, the battlefield reeked of death.

And death empowered the mark.

Arto’s movements slowed, the corruption spreading through its body. Cracks began to form, small but spreading like poisoned veins.

Still, it fought on.

But Clinton wasn’t done yet.

He breathed hard, not from exhaustion, but from calculated risk.

Arto was weakened.

The corrosion was eating away at it. The Death Mark was chipping away at its HP, but it wasn’t enough to guarantee victory.

He needed something more, something final.

Clinton gritted his teeth.

‘No risk, no reward!’ Thinking this, he raised Magedon high.

[You have activated Active Skill: Will of Magedon- Instant Death!]

BZZZ!

The air crackled, a pulse of doom spreading from the bone spear.

But the cost was steep.

Clinton’s HP plummeted, 80% sacrificed in an instant, leaving him hovering at the point of death.

Arto lunged forward, its molten veins flaring desperately as it tried to finish him before the skill activated.

The world froze for a moment.

A single second where fate trembled on the edge of a coin flip.

Then, Arto’s golden flames flickered, and were extinguished.

Arto staggered, its towering body cracking apart from the inside and then with a thunderous crash, it collapsed, molten veins extinguishing as the last remnants of its life force vanished into the void.

The battlefield became silent.

Clinton stood amidst the wreckage, his entire body trembling, HP dangerously low. He could feel his soul flickering, but he was still alive.

“Ha,” a dry, skeletal chuckle escaped him.

“Even gods gamble with death”.

The Ancient Gate groaned.

Then slowly, it began to open.

Beyond it lay the 2nd level of the Dungeon of Azarick.

Against all odds, Clinton had survived to see it.