Chapter 368: Has to End

Without their faces revealed (even if it was, their faces were blank), the new puppet or the remaining, one fought Ned with increased strength, it might be due to the other puppet he just destroyed. Ned wondered if what would be the Tailor feeling now that Ned destroyed two of his puppet.

Ned checked the thicker thread of Mana in the puppet's chest. It was still there, thick, nothing changes. The Tailor was still inside the forest.

Five more seconds before the Overclock ended, Ned fought the puppet like a blader with him holding both his swords.

Even without thoughts, and only moved with a set of commands from the Tailor, the puppet was now wary of Ned as he all did was to evade the Butterfly, and parry the Krisalix with a knife. It wasn't just that, the puppet was somewhat reading Ned's movements, even with the Overclock on.

This is bad, Ned thought. For a puppet to read my movements, Ned better ends it as soon as he could.

Ned's hands blurred, but the puppet was able to keep his distance from Ned. And they fought with him eager to destroy the second puppet.

Not far from Ned were the other candidates fighting the worm-like beast.

A team of less than a dozen came along, their goal wasn't sure to Ned, but it seemed that they were trying to take down the worm.

Although struggling, they were able to stand their ground against the beast.

Knights, four of them, were standing in defensive line against the beast with their shields up and spells were being conjured. The beast was now even enraged with its set of eyes glowing on red while it was having a hard time taking down the knights, supported by three mages. Other archers were shooting down arrows as they positioned from behind.

The beast wasn't able to get past the knights with their shields up and was bestowed with thin layers of light. These lights were broken down into pieces as the worm rams its head but a mage was ready to conjure to reinforce their shields. But the pattern of their fighting went on like that, that neither side wasn't making any progress.

The air around Ned whistled while pursuing the puppet. The old puppet's body, or what remained of its body was laid scattered over the grass. The puppet was circling this body almost a couple of times already within three seconds of Ned following him. He must have a plan as he stopped beside the body once again. He tried scooping the limb but Ned was already beside him before he does. Kicked him, and rolled dozens of meters away from where the dead puppet was.

Ned focused his eyesight. Even though the puppet was already meters away from his dead ally, Ned was able to see fine thread slithering towards one of the limbs.

Seeing the perseverance, Ned cut down the fine threads and vanished.

Ned heard a grating sound from the puppet as soon as he appeared behind him.

The puppet suddenly ducked but was slow enough that his left hand was cut from Ned's slash of the Butterfly.

The puppet rolled and suddenly stood with every joint of his body releasing a popping sound. This time, its movements weren't human anymore. His every step was a snap, his joints were bent awkwardly from behind, and the sounds of his body were like gears grating. Under his hood, deep, hollow eyes brimmed with treacherous red. The part where his mouth should have been, let out a scream that was followed by an opening that slowly opens with saw-like ceramic white teeth. His left arm was then swallowed by a white liquid that came from his chest, a knife was then extended so much it now reaches a meter apart. Judging from his movements, the blade seemed to be heavy with the puppet nearly lifted it off the ground, but it was thin like a rapier.

He then dashed to Ned, his ceramic skin was visible under the milky light of the moon. His movements were zigzag but it was slower as Ned could follow it easily.

"Had enough running?" Ned said with heavy and steamy breath leaving his mouth and nose.

Ned met the puppet, now looking like an old man's scarecrow with a sword instead of a sickle.

As they made contact, the wind roar, while Claurette sat far behind Ned with his mouth popped in a big O. He could barely breathe with his neck still in the red. Markings of fingers were visible. But he was trying to stay conscious. He stood, barely, while supporting his left arm with the other. Bow slung behind his back and quivered entangled with his messy hair. But he was fine. His eyes could barely keep up from the fight between the puppet and Ned.

Seeing that Ned was able to keep up with the puppet, he closed his mouth and turned his gaze to candidates fighting the beast, he smiled.

Not soon after, Ned's Overclock was canceled and the battle has turned tides.

Ned, feeling all the exhaustion, barely able to keep up with the puppet.

He hissed and grunted as he could barely keep up with his enemy's pace. With less than a hundred Mana, and energy nearly 10%, he was losing the battle.

But he wasn't worried about himself, he was worried about something else. He was worried that when his mana falls to a bare minimum, and his energy plummeted to zero, his Core would be activated. It was his last resort if his body would fail as though aside from ICE there was something else that was keeping him alive, and he doesn't like that, he wasn't willing to commit to him. He wasn't willing to let Rassus be free whenever he was vulnerable.

But what else could he do? Nothing, except for the fact that he's got Mana stones left inside his ring. It wasn't enough to make his mana pool jumps to a thousand, but Ned hoped that it was enough to keep his sanity away from Rassus.

And so he did produce Mana stones after swapping the Butterfly with the stones. Although the Butterfly was needed to cut the puppet's hard ceramic skin, the energy it was consuming was way more than the Silk Road and Kurashinpi combined. He'd rather be on the defensive than lose it all.

As Ned evades the puppet, his free hand was producing Mana stones to slowly replenish his mana.

Ned slid after the rapier sword came into view his neck.

The Krisalix's grade and materials weren't enough to even make a scratch to the puppet, and so Ned did nothing but to put it back its scabbard and battle the puppet as a mage.

His left hand held a Mana stone, while the other conjure spells to attack the puppet.

The puppet screamed, revealing a set of white teeth, and throttled to Ned.

As soon as the puppet entered Ned's attacking range of spells, he went to conjure Fireball from his mana of not less than a hundred and fifty, then threw them to the puppet followed by a Windball which makes the Fireball spell travels even faster.

From the explosion, and thunderous cracking of the spell, the ground around them trembled.

Just like how Claurette was mesmerized with their fight, was how the new team felt. Even though they were fighting the beast, they can't help but throw a glance at Ned and be confused as to how he could even keep up.

The truth, Ned was barely hanging with his energy and Mana depleting. If Ned was fighting a hunter, the puppet's rank would be at the later stages of Gold Rank, a little push and they'd be near Diamond Rank.

Thinking about this while fighting, Ned can't help himself but show a grin as he could, somewhat, be toe-to-toe with Gold Rank Hunters.

Ned robbed himself of the thought and smiled and said, "This has to end."