The Legendary Fool

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If Aleph had not been used to Tom’s uncanny ability to pull critical information out of thin air and if her own survival instincts were not held at bay by the many close encounters and battles that had shaped her, perhaps she would not have been able to react to Zeth’s teleportation as well she did.

Fortunately for her, Aleph understood the value of the opening that was being offered to her. She waited, her honed senses stretched to her limits as she primed her body to react to the slightest change.

She felt a heaviness in the air after what could not have been more than a second and Aleph didn’t hesitate as she lashed out in that direction with her Rare Artifact. She felt her sword bite into a sinewy exterior, as her gaze locked on to her target a moment later.

Zeth’s eyes had gone wide with surprise, but even then, the master of the Shadow Guild had instinctively shielded his vitals from harm by using his free arm as a shield. Aleph’s blade had penetrated his arm deeply, but even then, she was two-thirds of length away from severing it.

Zeth shaped a dagger formed of shadows in his injured arm and Aleph immediately caught onto his intentions. Grimacing beneath her vizor, she tugged away her blade and instead of following through with another strike, she pulled away with the enhanced speed her Rare artifact had granted her for landing a successful hit on an enemy she had already marked for the next five minutes or until she attempted another strike.

An obsidian metal dagger whizzed past the spot she had just been standing in, even as Zeth’s cloak of shadows reformed around him. A vicious snarl now clouded his otherwise placid features as he didn’t stop there, unleashing a barrage of obsidian daggers in pursuit of Aleph’s flitting form. She squeezed every last drop of the 50% speed boost that had been granted to her, desperate not to get caught by even a single obsidian dagger.

While it was unlikely for any one obsidian dagger to possess the sheer, devastating force one of the talons did, the daggers were much faster and would pin her down much quicker if she let up in her retreat. More than that though, Aleph had first hand felt the sharpness of the obsidian metal and it was hard for her to entirely shake off the instinctive fear it prompted.

Thankfully, Tom had no intention to allow Zeth to continue his rampage.

Mirror World released the final obsidian talon it had been holding onto, unleashing it in Zeth’s direction after Greater Reflection had further amplified its momentum.

Zeth let an annoyed grunt escape him as he pivoted, shaping a curtain of shadow before giving it form to let it chip away at the momentum long enough for him to get clear of it.

And get clear he did, sprinting forward with a spring in his step.

Only to find that Tom had used the break in Zeth’s line of sight to cover a large portion of distance that separated them, before he angled his momentum to intercept Zeth’s retreat.

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Caught off-guard, Zeth didn’t have time to shape his shadows as Tom came crashing down upon him. Instead, he finally drew his one-handed longsword that appeared way too unwieldy to be used by anyone lacking a high Physical stat.

If they actually crossed blades, there was a good chance that Tom would die. Not because Zeth’s Rare Artefact was invioably strong, but because it’s specific effect put him at a grave advantage. The kinetic energy generated from the clash of their blades would be converted into frost energy and Tom was well aware of how strong he was.

Zeth swung his blade to meet Tom’s own, but the clash never happened.

Tom’s blade vanished as he threw himself forward into a roll, ducking the sweeping longsword that had too much momentum behind it to halt mid-stride.

He willed the mimicked blade to reappear and used the short window of time he’d bought to slice across Zeth’s left shin with as much force as he could muster from the poor angle.

Then he was forced into a retreat as a shadowy spear given form leapt at him from Zeth’s shadow cloak, mirror world absorbing the blow.

“Aleph, don’t engage him in a clash of swords!” Tom called out as he backpedaled, evading the flurry of daggers Zeth was barraging him with. Each individual attack was too weak for it to be worth absorbing with Mirror World and it seemed like the master of the Shadow Guild knew that.

“Why?” Aleph asked as she peppered Zeth with crystals of her own, forcing him to erect a thick bulwark formed out of shadows to guard himself.

It was clear that Aleph’s crystals paled in comparison to Zeth’s obsidian metal, because a crinkling sound kept sounding out on impact as the barrage she had unleashed shattered against the thick metal.

“His artifact converts the physical energy behind a clash of blades into frost energy. If you don’t expect it coming, it can be deadly,” Tom called out, as his attempt to close the distance between himself and Zeth was foiled after he erected the bulwark and resumed his barrage of shadowy daggers.

“Who are you?” Zeth’s composure finally cracked a little, his tone somber and just a little, if Tom’s intuition could be trusted, shaken.

“Someone you shouldn’t have messed with,” Tom called out, once again channeling his bravado, even though he wasn’t feeling anywhere near as confident.

The longer the fight continued on, the more he was confronted by his own weaknesses. He was physically strong, but his strength didn’t mean all that much if the opponent didn’t let him close the distance.

On top of that, his long range attack methods were pretty limited. Mirror World’s reflection ability was very unique, but once his enemy had seen the ability, countering it was simple if his opponent was close to him in rarity and level. Lifeblood’s augmentation didn’t do nearly enough for him and blood scion had become useless to him because the types of blood he could access were too mundane and the ability’s scope was too limited.

His common cards would do him no good either, he was pretty sure that Zeth’s physical stat was high enough to just shrug off something as mundane as a ball of fire or a jet of water after his armor cushioned their impact. .

“We’ll see about that,” Zeth snarled, his sprit undamped by the wounds he had suffered so far.

He ceased his barrage of shadow daggers and tapped his uninjured foot on the ground. A weave of shadows expanded outwards, blanketing the floor with inky darkness.

Tom retaliated with the shadowy spear he had borrowed from Zeth while he was unguarded, but he teleported even faster this time.

‘Fuck,’ Tom thought.