Flying in a straight line turned out to be a mistake. The hunter lunged at him much faster than expected, sending them both rolling for dozens of meters. Claws carved grooves in his armor, unable to find a deeper purchase before he pushed them away.
Lev got himself under control first and thrusted Stargazer at the monster’s face. It leaned backwards in a fluid motion, so he forced the glaive to move downwards and launch a point-blank Fracturing Wave at the monster’s collarbone.
The sudden explosion violently jolted all of his senses, but the effect was muted. Lev was already prepared for the feedback and instead focused on the pillars.
Lightning rushed into them in spades. The constructs suffered mild damage, one that was absorbed by the now-useless concealment layers. Lev fixed them with a thought and teleported all of the reabsorbed lightning and rushed through the flames.
With his vision and senses impaired, Stargazer barely came up in time to block a swipe. The impact came and went, powered through with raw mental strength, and he kicked straight ahead with a ton of lightning in his limb.
The attack missed, but the wave of lightning that erupted from his leg engulfed the hunter completely. Much of it was soaked up by the pillars again, and he channeled it into his glaive while flying through the crackling blast.
This time, he made it just in time to land a clean punch on the monster’s face. Another blast of lightning followed, hurling it backwards with enough force to cause a shockwave.
A Fracturing Wave tailed its flight. Mid-air, it could do nothing to defend itself. The slash slammed into it hard, and even though it didn’t lose cohesion immediately, the attack carried it straight into a shieldwall.
Then it exploded, and Lev had to pause and reconsider his plan. Too much lightning had been used to power that skill for him to continue. Burns were showing on his leg from the earlier kick already. He had to be more careful.
All of the lightning and fire dispersed as an unholy shriek echoed in his sphere of pillars and cables. Lev winced, belatedly remembering that he hadn’t prepared any sound wards, only for his eyes to widen when a silvery-grey blur flew at him faster than he could react.
Claws punctured into his armor, causing deep cuts on his chest, but failing to dig deeper. Lev swiped with Stargazer to disengage, missing when the hunter took two steps back and lunged again.
This time, his brain was in overdrive. A wave of lightning shot out of his armor, slowing the monster down. Stargazer’s blade passed inches from its head as a thrust miss. Lev let go of the glaive and blocked a punch. Pain shot up his crossed arms from the sheer strength of the monster. Its speed, too, was higher than his absurd lightning imbue.
The monster’s knee grazed against his torso, still leaving a groove on his armor plating. He fixed it and grabbed the leg with his right hand, releasing a lightning bolt inside his palm.
With an agonized wail, it tried to tackle him. Lev let go and darted backwards, baiting it. It once again rushed in a straight line, and he spun out of its way. His right hand found Stargazer’s pole during the motion and brought it down in a diagonal slash.
The glaive landed on the back of the hunter’s head like a meteor. It crashed into the ground and slid forward, digging a groove in its wake. Lev was only a step behind, his leg loaded with lightning, slamming into the hunter’s chest when it tried to get up.
A shieldwall landed in the path of its flight, arresting the monster’s momentum. Lev infused a bit of willpower into a small Fracturing Wave and fired it before it could recover from the collision.
The slash, more stable than usual, pinned it against the construct while trying to dig deeper. That also opened it up just enough for Stargazer’s blade, which dug into its neck.
Unfortunately, its thin, wiry flesh resisted even the Superior glaive’s sharpness long enough for the shieldwall to shatter. Seeing that cutting it open was not really possible, Lev also released his hold on the fracturing wave, making it explode between them.
Much of the lightning was reabsorbed. Again, he formed a small Fracturing Wave and waited. Ropes dove down from his bubble, arriving just in time to trap the hunter in a net. Lightning erupted from all of them at once, searing into its skin.
Lev dashed inside the maelstrom, glaive at the ready. An overloaded bolt from his right arm led the charge, his Perception skills proving their worth when the attack landed on the monster despite the visual and sensory impairments.
Things took a turn for the worse when, amidst that chaotic storm, something silvery stood out in his senses. His glaive was bashed aside before he could prepare for the burst of strength.
His chest wasn’t caved in only because he mentally overcame the limit he had set on himself. Lightning charred his skin as a hand shining with immense infusion slapped the incoming punch. It was only partially successful, though Lev used the rebound to move out of the way.
Then, after making sure the monster was watching, he reversed the momentum of his arm. The last thing it saw was Lev’s smirk as it was backhanded across the battlefield, straight into a pillar.
Oh, it’s pissed.
Lev waited with bated breath as the Night Hunter’s aura was fully revealed and emboldened with mana. It possessed a strange hollowness, as if deprived of something vital.
That mystery was solved in the next instant as a pulse of willpower went out. Too morbidly curious, Lev didn’t interrupt and instead converted more lightning, watching as moonlight was influenced in a way he couldn’t hope to comprehend as he was.
Something more than class and willpower was at play there, an ability that simply wasn’t meant for humans.
The amount the creature was trying to control was too much, however. Moonlight resisted fiercely, and it almost seemed like Night Hunter would fail in its endeavor.
It then displayed an unnatural degree of intelligence and shortened the radius from which it was trying to pull moonlight. The heightened sphere of influence overpowered the element as streams of it rushed into its body, and Lev knew that it was time to make use of his entire class now.
Arrows bombarded the hunter, yet they didn’t disrupt its rapid absorption. Lances flew at it next, aimed around it in a circle to bathe it in lightning.
That did the trick and cut off most of the moonlight. Lev swung his glaive first, launching another small Fracturing Wave, and then flew in.
His own element sought to fry him inside his armor. He pushed through the pain and focused solely on the monster. Gaze of the Marksman let him see that it was about to dodge the slash, so he utilized his latest general skill.
An orb materialized behind the hunter. Lightning infused it in a blink, faster than it could swat the orb away or prepare for the abrupt explosion.
Stunned, the Fracturing Wave also landed on its chest, dragging it along its path into a shieldwall. Lev was a split second behind, half of his focus on the ongoing thrust, and the other on the lance he was preparing above the battle.
Stargazer cut deep into the monster’s arm. Lev had already deduced that bisecting or beheading the monster wasn’t viable, especially not after it was steadily absorbing moonlight to empower its body.
So, he aimed for the next best thing. Guessing based on human anatomy, he slashed where he expected tendons in the right arm to be, though his gamble failed when the nearly torn limb moved just fine to grab Stargazer’s blade.
The Fracturing Wave exploded before Lev could be punched in the face. The shieldwall shattered, but this time, he ignored the spasms in his muscles and barreled through the explosion. Reaching the thoroughly stunned monster, he overloaded his arm with lightning and struck its chest with his palm. In the same instant, a lightning bolt rushed out of the limb, throwing them both away from each other due to the power packed inside.
Unaware of his own deteriorating state, Lev kept his eyes peeled. He could just barely see the hunter’s form flying through the air. His senses worked better than his eyes, and slowly, the feedback in his mind improved marginally.
Lev could see how the lightning clung to its form. Despite how thin the monster was, it still had blood vessels and a vital fluid that coursed through its body. The crackling blue element eagerly targeted that, digging into its flesh with a purpose amidst the immense destructive potential.
This is it, Lev held his breath, watching with wide eyes as time seemed to slow down.
Too much lightning had dug into the hunter for it to recover quickly. As it flew through the air, paralyzed from shocks, an overloaded lance tore through the air and landed on its forehead.
All of Lev’s being observed the result. The lance disintegrated as all of the mana stored inside found an outlet. Lightning tore through the barrier structure and enchantments without mercy, uncaring that the runes were only meant to make it more effective.
For a brief instant, Lev also got to see his enchantments running purely on lightning. A few compatible runes benefited greatly, but the rest were ruined immediately.
The explosion that followed was almost too fast to peer into.
In its usual fashion, lightning expanded rapidly. The excess power and heat were channeled into the ambient, neutral air, easily setting it alight.
As the two destructive elements approached, Lev scanned his mind. Two metaphorical doors existed in his head. The first, representing lightning as an element, remained tightly sealed. No amount of observation and testing was enough to nudge it open, so he turned to the second door.
Feeling his attention, it creaked slightly. It opened an almost negligible amount, as if inviting him to grab the handle and do the honors himself.
He knew that it wasn’t enough yet. There was still something missing, something in his path that he had been neglecting for too long now.
It was a long shot, anyway, Lev thought to himself with a long exhale. The blast slowly enveloped him, putting a tremendous strain on his armor. Heat, electric current, force, and many other things combined hammered into the barrier construct from every angle, causing cracks to form in a few places.
Regretfully taking his attention off the blue element, he instead noted how he was repairing his armor. The process was automatic, requiring barely a nudge to his willpower. Runes were also considered during the repairs, though that needed more input on his part.
He latched onto that feeling. His class made amazing use of runes, and combined with his general skills, they were the strongest amplifiers in his kit. Enchantments operated on all of his moves, not just improving them, but also adding special effects like the lightning bolt and fireball on his arms.
The purpose of each rune, too, sang to him. Wherever his mind scanned, the enchantments readily stood out, showing all of their inner workings and flaws. Combined with his Epic Crafter title, Lev knew that he had done more than enough in this aspect of his class.
Lightning is off the table, he mused, taking mental notes while watching the storm unfold. Runes are working as best as they can be at the moment. Not much to improve there. My offensive capabilities are also pretty much maxed out. The two recent evolutions to my Perception skills have also covered that aspect of things, which only leaves…
Stargazer. His glaive was the lacking component, mostly due to the lack of formal training. Lev had spent hours upon hours observing his friends and also all the other people he had met on his trips.
Some had styles more fit for shorter weapons, such as Elias and Aryan. Their footwork, especially, allowed them to almost fly on the ground, covering distance in a few steps.
Surprisingly, Melvine’s style also wasn’t as compatible with his as he imagined. Sure, it had all the power and flexibility he needed, but it was adapted to her element.
Wherever she went, a domain of the mist followed. It was an integral part of her fighting style, a fifth limb that she commanded with as much ease as her greatsword.
Lev didn’t quite have something like that, nor did he plan to shroud every battle in fire or lightning. That just didn’t make sense.
Zack fought without weapons, and while his style was admirable in its raw power and straightforwardness, Lev needed something more befitting a glaive.
That brought him to Viktor’s fighting style. A shield and an axe, the very definition of a stalwart warrior. Stable footing that focused on standing his ground, and a posture refined to absorb impacts and power through direct hits to return them.
His axe moved with calculated efficiency, just enough to shear through flesh and bone, but never too fast to unbalance the warrior. And yet, his moves always had potential for more, swung intentionally wide to be sped up or slowed as needed.
That wasn’t possible through just training and honing one’s instincts. The human brain could only do so much at once, which belied Viktor’s exceptional use of body enhancement and other active skills.
In comparison, Lev only had his Mana Manipulation, Arcane Barrier Authority, Fracturing Wave, and Glaive Mastery skills, none of which could compare to a proper melee class active skill by themselves.
Combined, though…
Inside that blast of lightning and flames, Lev’s mind considered many possibilities. All of his considerable brainpower was assigned to a single task, and in that decisive moment, he made his choice. Lightning had to take a backseat.
It was time for Stargazer to shine.