Reflections on the Warpath - [An Isekai Progression Fantasy]

Jay stared at the Berserker's Bite embedded in the soil beside him and wondered why the hell he thought it would be a good idea to stab himself in the heart with a cursed dagger.

He buried that question deep inside his mind, answering it wouldn't help him right now.

The Three Legger charged towards the exit hub. Ezekiel had already escaped but the beast didn't know that, instead it chased blindly after its vendetta. It leapt forward, twisting its head aside at the last moment to avoid smashing its skull against the stone wall.

It crashed into the exit hub side-on, bashing the entire length of its body against the building before slumping to the ground. The stones appeared undamaged, unblemished even, as if they'd never been touched.

The beast limped upright before rearing into the air. It flailed its front two limbs and unleashed a mighty roar that Jay's burst eardrums thankfully couldn't hear. Sound waves reverberated through Jay's sternum, causing blood to spill into his lap.

The Three Legger twisted its neck towards Jay.

Ah shit.

Jay pushed Eye of the storm to its absolute limit. He remembered every second he'd spent traversing the Emergent Bloom. Every patch of hard ground he'd sought for good footing. Every decaying branch he'd avoided to keep silent. Every muscle twitch within his legs that he'd analysed, sifting through mounds of variables outside his body and in, opening his mind to true perception.

He remembered it all, and did the exact opposite.

His vision vanished, a veil of darkness enveloped Jay's eyes. His compromised hearing faded, and he no longer felt even a whisper of the dinosaur's roar. Thankfully, Jay's pain faded too. Eye of the Storm removed every distraction from Jay's reality, turbocharging his conscience and buying him every last millisecond he needed to think.

What do I need?

To kill the Three Legger? No, I just need to get to the exit, once I'm there the coliseum should heal my injuries. There's no other way. I'll bleed out in minutes if I don't make it.

Not that that means shit though, I'll bleed out in seconds once the dino gets his teeth on me.

Even within the deepest recesses of his mind, Jay heard another voice.

No…it wasn't a voice, but a sound. The pure harmony of singing metal.

Ping…yeah, she could help.

She's already dragged me out of deep water once, what's a few metres compared to that?

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Now how do I deal with the scaly fucker in between me and the exit? None of my remaining relics do shit.

Ping can't defeat the Three Legger on her own.

But she might be able to help…

Jay ran through everything he knew about the dinosaur, about Ping, about himself and every skill and tool he'd learned and acquired both before and during the advancement tournament.

The first sparks of a plan crystallised in Jay's mind.

It was a long shot, but it was all he had.

Time to fucking do this.

Reality smacked Jay in the face.

Jay's left arm limply fell by his waist, splashing in the puddle of blood that had leaked out of both his chest wounds. The thick crimson, blood splashed over Jay's forearm, seeping into the gears within the clockwork bracer.

He tried to twitch his fingers. They didn't move.

The same body that Jay had once been so proud of, that had carried him through countless fights over both his lifetimes, now trapped his mind in an unmoving prison.

Jay steadied his mind. If he let himself spiral, he'd get nowhere.

THUD.

The Three Legger took its first step towards Jay. It was barely five strides away.

Ping squirreled underneath Jay's limp forearm.

She pushed it above his shoulder and held it in the air.

THUD.

Ping rotated, suddenly flipping above Jay's forearm. It fell to the ground. Ping pressed against Jay's bracer. She pushed it down faster.

Jay's wrist slammed into the loose strap of Orivian silk dangling from his undershirt—the one that activated the armour's failsafe. Whatever the armour did to protect him, Jay hoped it was tougher than the Three Legger…

Accelerated by Ping's push, the Quicksnatch had dropped fast enough to activate. The tar-like substance clung onto the strip and attached it to the rope.

Step one.

THUD.

Jay tried to raise his arm.

He couldn't.

Once more, Ping flew to his aid.

She squeezed beneath the Clockwork Bracer and rose, lifting Jay's arm upwards.

But Jay's body was in worse shape than he thought. His arm fell from Ping's surface, dropping palm-up onto the soil beside him.

THUD.

Jay watched, motionless as his protector soared off into the sky, unable to pull the silk strip for him.

He tried snapping his wrist back to activate the firing mechanism.

Nothing.

Jay's battered muscles refused to respond to his commands.

THUD.

One step away, the Three Legger tore open its jaws.

Jay stared into the dinosaur's cavernous mouth, its yellowed fangs jutted out like shattered swords, a second away from piercing through Jay's skull.

He stared, and he smiled, because even if he didn't need to kill the beast, Jay really wanted to.

Ezekiel and Amaya had escaped him, but Jay was never that good at revenge. He'd meet them in the ring when their time came.

Until then, Jay would simply do what he knew best.

Because if there was an opponent before him, that meant he had to fight.

And if his body refused to obey his commands, then he'd just electrocute it until it did.

Jay channelled electricity through his left arm, forcing it into his own extensors.

They contracted.

Jay's fingers splayed apart.

His wrist jerked back.

The bracer activated.

THUD.

The dinosaur planted its final step just as the Quicksnatch rope flew out of Jay's bracer. A crystalline shield sealed Jay's bleeding out body, encasing him within a jagged prismatic sarcophagus that rose skyward like a buried spear.

The Three Legger charged forward, oblivious of its fate. Momentum carried it towards Jay. Its jaws unfurled. The crystal spike punched through its thin skull from inside its mouth, impaling its brain before piercing through the creature's scalp.

Entombed in a crystal shell, Jay could do nothing but watch, victorious smile etched across his unmoving face.