Chapter 595 – Small Lake Reforms 9 – Convoluted schemes in motion

Chapter 595 – Small Lake Reforms 9 – Convoluted schemes in motion

Most of the tournament was pretty boring.

Of course, this was expected. Statistically speaking, chances of John encountering someone who was a proper challenge were very low. Adding the realism aspect, the Small Lake Pact couldn’t produce someone like that out of nowhere, since their strongest guy hadn’t even been that hard to defeat for Aclysia. Indeed, the most difficult enemies around were those sent by the Amacat and the Lake Alliance.

That the Amacat was even participating was a bit of a surprise. Corith, a blonde martial artist, had sought out John in advance, however, so he didn’t need to worry about it. Basically, the Amacat wasn’t actually in the tournament. She, as a higher up in the security apparatus, had just asked to be sent over for the chance of owning an island in the area, even if it was for only one year. At level 91, she was pretty capable.

Still, the actual and only real threat around was Jeremiah. Level 212, he was a proper threat to John and guaranteed to have some sort of nasty ability beyond his capability to eat Artificial Spirits. ‘First I encounter Sigmund, who was a different flavour of my Achievements, and now this guy, who is a weaker version of Romulus’ god-eating,’ John thought.

Now, at first glance, being forty levels lower did put John squarely in the disadvantage. It was also likely that Jeremiah’s abilities could at least somewhat rival the bullshit that was John’s six elementals. The more elite his opponents became the more their unique abilities could keep up with John’s. It was logical, talented individuals often started with advantages.

On closer inspection, John’s situation looked a lot less dire. Said gap kept decreasing, but it was by no means non-existent. Six elementals and two Artificial Spirits that all scaled with him were still supremely above most people’s fighting power.

Then the level gap wasn’t even that terrible. For one, because the level system didn’t follow a standard RPG design idea where gaps above 3 could easily lead to defeats due to exponential formulas and steadily replaced gear. Instead, levels were just a short-cut to gauge rough strength. The real question was how Stats looked in relation to one another.

40 levels translated to 200 Stat Points for a normal person. Despite his high level, Jeremiah had not yet broken whatever ceiling increased that for him to 6 points. 200 Stat Points wasn’t nothing, but it wasn’t a massive advantage.

Especially since John wasn’t actually 200 Stat Points behind. He had himself unlocked the 6 and 7 point scaling at level 80 and 109 respectively. That gave him another 151 Stat Points (29 for the levels until the 7 points bonus, 122 afterwards), decreasing the gap by three fourths.

It would probably be worth calculating items into that as well, but John wasn’t naïve enough to assume that Jeremiah’s Base Stats would go unbuffed. If not All Stats, then at least the Stats that mattered. Best to plan with parity in that field in mind. If he was wrong, he would get a pleasantly easier fight. If he was horribly wrong, he would get wrecked. That was always a risk, sadly.

All of that planning was vastly more entertaining than the tournament brackets. Another thing of statistical nature. The closer they were to the beginning of the tournament, the more weak people were participating, lowering the chances to encounter anyone John couldn’t beat up on his lonesome. Most of the time, he didn’t even need magic.

Or he wouldn’t have needed, rather, if he hadn’t been fighting with his eyes open. Kickboxing, as it turned out, was a horribly inefficient way to fight if, halfway through a kick, his body suddenly compensated for a slant that wasn’t there and caused the Gamer to topple over like a domino. That didn’t make him lose, most people didn’t have the damage to chew through his Health Pool in a sensible time. The few he encountered in later stages of the tournament didn’t have the stamina to batter through both Mana Protection and John’s HP.

Stamina was also something Rave could have needed. “You doing fine?” he asked his girlfriend. The tournament had already progressed to the semi-finals. Fights had been going back to back since the morning, ever closer competitors grinding against each other, with minimal pauses in between. Everything was progressing as he had wanted, but he also hadn’t accounted for his girlfriend participating.

“Dunno,” she gave a bit of a worrisome answer, although her breathing was still controlled. Occasionally taking small sips of water, Rave wiped some sweat off her forehead. “Everything feels a bit fuzzy right now. In a good sense.” She gave him a light-headed smile “I like this.”

On one hand, seeing her like this was basically validation that his intentions when making the second phase of the tournament unnecessarily hasty were working exactly as he wanted. On the other, he couldn’t help but continue to be worried. “You got this though?”

Then the cloud of dust was suddenly pulled together into a glass spear that Corith chucked at Rave. Through firing up of her aura, John’s girlfriend dodged, using Shift, and consequently bombarded her opponent with laserbeams. ‘Huh, particle mage, haven’t seen that before,’ John thought, immediately recognizing the ability his girlfriend’s opponent possessed. ‘Wonder how long she could have controlled the spear for, considering it melted into a larger unit.’

‘Master, your answer, if you would be so kind,’ Aclysia nudged him along to keep him talking.

‘Right. Simply put, I am using the same strategy we used in New York. Bring the strongest or most likely leadership figure opposed to you to commit to adversarial action in order to have the rest of the enemy coalition gather around them. Difference this time being that I needed to give people a way to actually remove me.’

‘Given that they weren’t even able to murder Aclysia, it seems they aren’t naïve enough to try and assassinate you,’ Siena did come back to the conversation. ‘They should have simply approached me, I would have been really pleased to divorce your head from your shoulders.’

‘You don’t mean that, you adorable shadowlurker,’ John returned, half-mocking, half-flirting. ‘Anyway, this is where the Lake Alliance comes in. Of course, Zensie wouldn’t work with them without a reason. Before I came along, they were the great uniting enemy. I had to give him someone to hate. Granted, he made it pretty easy for me to piss him off.’

‘And what, Master, would you have done if he turned out to be a patient and pleasant fellow?’

‘Absolutely nothing,’ John couldn’t help but shrug, which would have looked pretty random to anyone watching. ‘It’s not like I lose anything if that plan fails. Would just be stuck in the same situation as before. See, the best plans are those where you don’t run into a risk of worsening your own lot in life.’

‘Very wise, Master.’

‘No,’ Siena disagreed in a raspy, still deeply sexy tone, ‘that is not very wise, that is about as basic as nail-ripping is to torture.’

In the fighting pit, Rave disappeared from sight again, this time by storming into a cloud of mist. That she voluntarily went in there made the thing a bit less tense. ‘Anyway,’ John continued on, ‘so far so good, I succeeded in making Zensie take the straw presented to him. Now, the question is which path he is going to take once the tournament concludes...’

‘Since he dropped out last round, he hasn’t been doing anything,’ Siena told him. ‘Just sat here brooding. So quiet. So... vulnerable.’

‘Probably mulling over his possibilities himself,’ John hypothesized as the fight below came to an end. Announced by a minor earthquake, which the Gamer felt pretty firmly in his buttocks, the mist cloud turned mud storm came to a sudden halt. A massive wave of golden light dispersed it further, and Rave came storming out a moment later.

The fight wasn’t decided by any great punch. Instead, Corith ran out of mana mid answer manoeuvre. Both women just stopped moving at that point, with the blonde representative of Amacat giving up willingly after a respectful handshake.

‘Well, whatever he chooses, I come out on top in some way, shape or form... as long as I win this tournament,’ John thought, this time to himself, as he rose from his seat. Both to greet his girlfriend and to get ready for his own fight.

Jeremiah rose on the other side of the arena.