Chapter 145 - Axe man - II

The count down from ten began as soon as he accepted the new bet. Balthazar was sure that he could take down the mage with a couple of hits once he came close to his opponent. The only issue was how much time it would take. The arena was a simple one and not too large. So, it was just a matter of time for him to get close with his high movement speed.

But there was one thing that the members of Foedus Rex would think from now on. He had to act as a swordsman player due to his high speed attribute and not a guardian any longer. "It doesn't matter, I just need to maintain high movement and avoid brutish behavior so that they don't think I have an unnatural defence value," thought Balthazar as he readied himself for the fight.

At the same time, Balthazar's reluctance followed by Purple Destruction's tease to forfiet the match sparked another conversation among the spectators.

"You still want to have a bet?" asked a player beside Ward looking at Brick and Slaine. Slaine decided to act afraid to have them bet higher. It helped that Brick didn't want to actually bet this time as he already knew of Purple Destruction. They have both been known of Purple Destruction as they had gathered information of the other top players in other guilds.

"What don't feel like it anymore?" added Ward mocking Slaine and Brick.

"Wow! You suddenly are into gambling now?" asked Slaine in a low tone. "Fine, if you are interested, I got four hundred combat points and a bronze weapon design on me. Match it," he continued at Ward with an instigating look in his eyes.

"What?" asked Ward a bit nervous with the sudden change. "Is he hiding something from me?" thought Ward and became wary of him.

"What you lost your courage again?" goaded Slaine. He failed to instigate Ward but the ones beside him were angry enough.

"Why would we be? Come on," said the guy who first asked Slaine.

"The design is a level 15 bronze, at least 100 combat points," added Slaine.

"Good, 500 combat points," said the player but suddenly stopped.

"What happened now?" asked Slaine rolling his eyes. He was getting irritated by the way they kept stopping just before the confirmed the bet with the system.

"I don't have enough combat points," said the player in an embarrassed manner.

"You can share it or bet what you have or replace the points with resources or so," said Slaine shaking his head at the stupid reason he gave.

The player went back and in a second, he had two others support his bet. "Finally managed to get something from these guys," thought Slaine.

"Any other takers?" asked Slaine. As Balthazar had dared to already bet more than 300 combat points, he was sure that Balthazar would be winning. Slaine's confidence slowly increased as Balthazar kept surprising and he was sure of Balthazar's capabilities or at least the ability of analyse his own chances after the fight with Boris. So, he daringly continued to instigate the others to bet against Balthazar.

The three had put in their bets, but Ward being the suspicious one didn't allow anymore of his peers to bet with Slaine or Brick. Even Brick didn't want to bet anymore. He knew that Slaine won quite a bit of combat points in the colosseum today, but still couldn't believe that he bet it all for someone else's match.

As the countdown ended, it was Balthazar's turn to cover the distance between him and his opponent. They were separated by about 30 metres. He ran towards him with his best speed. He had a quick movement skill on his boots, but he didn't want to use it before the mage used his movement skills. It was best to use them at that time.

Purple Destruction started to release fire balls as soon as he saw his opponent sprinting towards him. The fire balls were slow but had a larger coverage than frost bolts and decent damage were the most basic spell of elementalists. They used very little MP compared to others and a large amount of them could be fired quickly. It was similar to normal strikes of the physical combat classes, but these had a longer range and used MP.

It was the most common strategy for elementalists to get a handle on the capabilities of their opponents. It wasn't the same as an AOE skill where the attack covers a larger area at a time. The attacks though can be covered over an area, the attacks would be released one after the other and the time difference would allow a person to evade if one is fast enough.

Balthazar who boasted a high speed didn't have much issue with it. He just needed to step aside for every fire ball which came close to him. It took less than 20 seconds for him to reduce the distance between them to 15 metres.

"The f.u.c.k," said Destruction as he realized that the fire balls were useless. He immediately started to run backwards and changed his method to frost bolts as they were faster than fire balls, but in a few more seconds, he realized that it was still a waste. Balthazar was still able to evade quite a few of them and those that were too close due to the faster speed, he used his axe or shield to deflect or block them. Elementalists got a new spell at level 10 by default, but it was swamp trap. It is directed at the ground and takes a couple of seconds to setup during which an opponent could easily step out of the area. It wasn't suited for this kind of PvP.

Though Purple Destruction didn't realize it, Balthazar was feeling discomfort as more frost bolts were blocked by him. It was quite straining to evade projectiles continuously while advancing. It was consuming of his stamina, but he didn't worry and persisted as he could see that he would be beside the mage in a few more seconds.

Suddenly, wave of wind which light blue and almost transparent in color flew out of the elementalists scepter as he came to a distance of two metres to him. It was an uncommon spell called Air Ripple that spanned about 3 metres wide and was very quick had a very strong blowback and stun effect. Purple Destruction was sure that he succeeded in pushing Balthazar back off his feet when he saw that Balthazar was stuck in its range. This was the best time for him to pile up more damage on Balthazar.

Balthazar had been expecting such a spell which covered an area as he got close to the opponent. He had used the void state effect of the void mantle that he had equipped to remain impervious to the attack. It allowed him to pass through the attack. The attack passed through him and raised dust resulting in formation of a smoke screen. This was a common drawback of almost all AOE attacks. They tend to block the vision of the players involved.

Unaware of the situation, Purple Destruction decided to close in due to the smoke to at least use swamp trap on him and continue with frost bolts. The frost bolts were the best option as they would cause a freeze effect slowing down the opponent. As he moved forward with that idea in mind, he suddenly found Balthazar sprinting towards him at a distance less than a couple of metres.

His mind went blank with shock for an instant before he realized his position and started firing frost bolts. But Balthazar didn't care is those hit him when he was so close. He blocked a couple of them with his buckler and one of them even hit him squarely on his chest. He didn't care. The only thing important to grab a hold of the mage.

Mages mostly wore cloth armor and though it was low weight, one of its biggest disadvantages was that it could easily be grabbed by an opponent. Balthazar simply used that to his advantage as he grabbed Purple Destruction's armor and pulled him close to strike at his head with the axe. It was always best to deliver a strong blow to the head to stun a monster or a player.

Destruction who wore a complete cloth armor wasn't able to avoid the blow being stunned by Balthazar effectively. Balthazar wasn't one to lose his chance and proceeded to cripple his opponent's limbs as soon as he got the chance. Once, in his hands, the mage being a low defense clothe armored player was killed in half a minute despite his attempts to escape. Balthazar let all the spells that the mage had cast in these 30 seconds to hit him but never let him get out of range.

The fight showed all the spectators that the Axe Man had high speed and moderate defense. It even showed them that the guy had some kind of invulnerablility skill that he could use in a dire situation.

"At least, we know that he focused mostly on speed and would have low strength due to it. But his equipment seems to be quite good, might be top class," thought Ward. "It was a good plan to have you test it before I fought," he said to Walt who had already joined them in the spectator area.

"It was a good fight. We now know a few things that we could expect from him now," he messaged to Purple Destruction to comfort him.

"I will go to fight him, now. I will get back all those combat points and more," said Ward as he got out of the spectator area.

"Finally, decided to step up, huh?" asked Slaine. "You guys better contact Epoch. Ward might not have it easy too. By the way, does he have enough combat points to bet enough to get back those from the previous losses?" he questioned the others of Ward's team among the spectators who continued to glare at him without saying anything.

"Ok. Up for some bets?" he asked but there was still no response from the others. "I guess I won't be able to get anything else from these guys," thought Slaine as he let it be.

Ward was already down at the arena. "I bet 450 combat points. I am going to take back all that you took," he said in an angry tone. He also told his teammates to bet with Slaine to take back the points that they lost, but they weren't sure and decided to spare themselves some points.

"You wan't to bet 400 combat points? Fine. Why would I deny such a generous gift?" said Balthazar sarcastically as he started the countdown. As the fight started, Ward slowly moved towards Balthazar who didn't move an inch. Balthazar had no idea about Ward other than the fact that he was a tank and carried a sword and a big round shield that was about 3 feet wide. It would be hard to evade any of the moves of the shield.

His only option was to make more strikes to get into what would be considered his personal space and quickly take care of him, if intended to keep the momentum. He had the walrus throwing knives which he could use. He only wanted to use them to get close to the shield guardian.

Golden Ward who was approaching him slowly and cautiously saw him put the axe onto this belt. He was sure that his opponent would use some kind of trick or skill than is unexpected. So, he kept his shield in front of his body covering everything except the head and legs. He kept his head low and kept peeking above it.

"Damn! Does he really need to move like that?" asked a player beside Slaine and the members of Foedus Rex.

"Epoch! When did you come here?" asked Walt who noticed that the player whom he thought was mocking them to be one of them.

"Destruction told me to get myself here. That some player challenged us and defeated him already," replied Epoch.

"Ya, he defeated me too. He is quite powerful skills," said Walt.

"What is so strong to have Ward be so cautious?" asked Epoch.

"Actually, we only know about an invulnerability skill. All his attacks were manual mode attacks and not actual skills," said Walt and he also began to explain how it all started.

In the arena, Balthazar was getting bored of waiting for Ward to get close. "You going to come to me anytime soon?" he asked. "You can't attack me from a distance like that mage."

"Why don't you come close," said Ward. He was now sure that his opponent was waiting for him to come close to spring some kind of trap on him.

"Ok," said Balthazar contrary to his expectations and started to walk towards him. "Was he just fooling around with me?" thought Ward as he saw Balthazar simply walk without a weapon in his hand.

"You know what?" said Balthazar suddenly stopping after a few steps. "I don't need to get close to attack you," he said pulling out Walrus trowing knife and flung it towards Ward's head. Ward who heard his words put his head out to check what his opponent would do, but immediately lifted his shield a bit higher to cover his head out of instinct causing the knife to strike the shield with a clanging sound. The next second he felt an arrow strike his feet.

"What the hell?" exclaimed Ward as he looked at Balthazar finding him holding a crossbow in his hand. "You! Didn't you say that you wanted a close combat," shouted Golden Ward his eyes almost bulging out.

"Really?" asked Balthazar rolling his eyes. "You think you get to say that after you sent that mage over?" he continued as he fired another arrow.