Chapter 63: Turning friends against each other.

Chapter 63: Turning friends against each other.

Cerion and I stood before the entrance to a large amphitheater, as my knowledgeable friend called it. We were located on the outskirts of the city, on a hill near the city walls of the city of tears. After deciphering the code on the barrier around the clocktower, Cerion and I had made it our mission to find and conquer the remaining two bosses, which had led us here.

Finding this place hadnt been easy. Our plan consisting of find strange place hadnt been quite as thorough and well thought out as it had appeared at first, because we spent nearly six hours just walking around the city streets, in search of any realistic buildings and cautious of any monsters and traps. Apart from the empty city however, we hadnt found anything. Thus, we decided to get on top of the rooftops and taller buildings to look for landmarks.

In the end, we marked the two most probable locations on Cerions map. One was a large arena that must have been used for sports and the like. The other was this very theater that we had seen from a distance, by virtue of its size.

The entrance was decorated sparsely, which had originally made us write it off as just another building in the city, but one detail that Cerion had noticed told us otherwise. On the door, the same music note as before was carved. At least, that was what Cerion assured me.

This must be the place that houses the musical boss!, he exclaimed.

I snickered.

Dont make the mini-boss sound so unintimidating, Cerion. Youre ruining my serious mood., I complained.

He flicked me on the forehead and opened the wooden gate of the entrance.

Cerion and I headed through the corridor to the actual theater itself, though it didnt lead to an indoor area, like I had expected. Instead, we found ourselves in an open-air theater, where the forest outside of the city was visible behind the stage.

Amphitheaters usually use the natural environment as decor for plays, and are also usually outdoors, like this one., Cerion explained.

As we walked out into the open, I took in the sights. The arena had a large arrangement of seats, that were carved into the hill itself, rather than held up on stilts. The arena could easily have seated thousands, and it would have, had this been part of an actual city.

The stage itself was just a raised wooden platform, with some stone archways at the back, presumably to act as decor and a background, though most of the stage opened up into the wide forests that were visible below the cliffs.

Do you think well have to deal with hordes of ghosts again?, Cerion asked.

I dont know about hordes. How about we start with that one, I replied, pointing to the stage down below.

From behind one of the walls on the stage, a small blue ghost appeared. It looked like a miniature lady, wearing a long blue, somewhat transparent gown. She headed to the front of the stage, apparently not noticing us, and started to sing.

A heavenly voice echoed around the stadium, somehow just the right tone, the right volume, the right everything for us to hear. I couldnt believe that a ghost could make such beautiful music, just for us! How generous of her! I had to reward her? No wait, that was wrong! Was it though? As far as I could remember, that was right. Right? NO!Visit no(v)eLb(i)n.com for the best novel reading experience

I grimaced and started to overload mana, though I turned off [Dark Form]s pain nullifying property with some effort. The immense pain of my body continually destroying and reconstructing itself flooded my senses, making my vision turn black and my legs sway. I held onto the balustrade to keep myself upright, but eventually, I was relieved of the strange compulsion that had taken over me.

For a moment, I deliberated relieving myself from the pain as well, but the risk of falling into compulsion was too great, so I didnt.

Turning over to my right, I found Cerion, staring at the little figure on the stage in a daze. He had a bright smile on his face and was murmuring something about repaying her. I cocked back my fist and threw a haymaker in his face, sending him sprawling.

Cerion bared his teeth and charged at me, swinging his sword in a mad flurry of attacks. I met his blade with my own and blocked his haphazard attacks as best I could, though I noticed that the weight behind his blows had significantly increased.

It was as if his strength stat had grown exponentially at the cost of his intelligence and dexterity. Unfortunately for him, for a swordsman, this wasnt necessarily a good thing. The main advantage humans had over monsters was intelligence, after all.

I met him blow for blow in a dance of blades, which tore apart our surroundings because of the sword arcs we each deflected. Quickly, I started to gain the upper hand. My [Berserker swordsmanship], paired with superior skill and tactics was too much for the enraged Cerion to counter using just his improved strength. Usually, I had the opposite problem, because Cerion had practically grown up around swords. That meant that to win our spars I usually had to keep my distance and outlast his mana supply. Of course, there was one crucial difference besides the stat imbalance in this fight. In this battle, we werent fighting for first blood. That meant that my dark form could keep me alive as long as necessary before Cerion tired.

Like this we continued our clash for a few more minutes. I always kept the upperhand, but I couldnt seriously wound him, since that might have killed him. Then again, small wounds werent bound to keep him down for long, so he always recovered just in time to save the little ghost that followed him around.

Eventually, though, our stalemate was broken by a change in Cerions tactics. He jumped back to make some distance, before lifting his sword to the sky and summoning a giant tidal wave, larger than I had ever seen him create.

Oh crap. That little bitch was giving him mana, wasnt she? I summoned Revan and told him to try and block the wave for me. Hopefully, he would be too heavy to be swept away.

Right as I had this thought, the theater was filled with the massive wave, which crashed into Revan and me and threw us into the stone walls and seats down below, pulling us down with the current. With a scream of rage, I activated overloaded maelstrom, cutting into his wave, tearing it apart from the inside. After the mana holding it together collapsed under the assault of my dark mana, the wave lost its shape and collapsed as well.

Like a wet dog, I stepped onto the stage again, only to be faced with an enraged Cerion, charging up skill after skill and sending all manner of water projectiles at me. Most I could block with my maelstrom, but I was still left on the defensive.

Unfortunately for the little ghost, Cerion wasnt the only one with a nearly unlimited mana supply and varied ranged attacks.

I stood steadfast, and stopped blocking the incoming projectiles, instead diverting all of my attention to counter attacking. I could heal through the pain, while my opponents couldnt. With a smirk, I started my berserker, overloaded sword synergy, sending arc after arc at my opponent. Right as I did so, Revan reappeared from the crater he had left on the theater floor and ran at Cerion, swiping his claws at the little ghost on his shoulder. Momentarily, Cerion was forced on the defensive as he had to protect his mistress. Sensing a chance, I apparated right behind Cerion, in mid air. As I fell, I rematerialised and slashed into the little ghost, separating it in two. As the little woman shrieked, it turned into water, which splashed to the ground as my sword dug its way into Cerions shoulder before I could redirect the swing.

Shit!, I shouted in fear.

Revan and Cerion separated from their clash, and my friend slumped down to the ground, like a puppet that had its strings cut.

Shit, shit, shit, I murmurred, as I took out a health potion and force-fed its contents to Cerion.

Quickly, his wound stopped bleeding. I put down a bedroll and laid him onto it, before checking my system notifications to make sure the battle was over and there were no further threats.

Ding! Combat finished. Congratulations on reaching [Overloading Death Knight] level 47!

Reach level 50 to advance to tier 3.

Stat points allocated. 5 free stat points per level up awarded.

Satisfied, I breathed out a sigh of relief and sent Revan to scout out our surroundings and act as a guard. I fed Cerion another two health potions and silently watched as his wounds slowly knitted themselves together.

Hopefully, he would be himself again when he woke up