บท 16: Ten Seconds
What the heck?? This is actually an earth-shattering battle!
Will was baffled by what was happening. The ground near him and everywhere around him had been completely upheaved, the reason? The wolves were raining down a storm of what Will called wind bombs.
These were sphere like objects, made up of wind that detonated on impact. The two remaining generals were the attackers. The king did nothing. He just remained still, observing Will the entire time. This made Will very uncomfortable like he was under the scrutiny of a microscope.
This long distance attack was quite effective. At least it allowed the wolves to see what Will could do. The bombs had a large concussive blast radius of about five meters, and they moved quickly as well. Although their trajectories were much easier to predict than the wind blades, they did far more damage.
Due to the massive blast radius, Will had to change the direction the moment a wind bomb was released because he was also paying attention to both wolves constantly. He was only able to do this due to his dual mind skill, allowing him to split his concentration. Will had tried his best to increase the distance between him and the wolves, but the wolves would just move closer; since they were faster than him since this was easy for them.
They also avoided getting closer to Will, much to his dismay. Will did not have any good single target long-range attack, all he had was a water blade, which was too weak to deal with the wolves.
Thus, all Will could do the entire time was to dodge the attacks from the wolves. To the wolves, it seemed as though Will was fighting for his life, but Will, on the other hand, was merely pretending to struggle. Yes, he was struggling somewhat under the rain on attacks, but it didn't tire him, nor did it pose any threat to him.
Will's previous performance had made the king wary, so he had instructed its generals to keep a certain distance, and attack Will with wind bombs continuously. This distance made it easier for Will to dodge, and also made the bombs slightly inaccurate.
The result, was a destroyed wasteland, filled with chunks of large rocks or earth lying everywhere. This made the ground completely uneven, which then made it harder for Will to move around.
Surprisingly, he still chose to stay around that debris filled area. The reason was simple he had come up with a strategy.
It was one, which would allow him to take care of at least one of the generals if performed well. It was a rather audacious plan, and it needed incredible precision, concentration, and timing. Due to the dual mind, Will had the first two parts down. Now all he had to do was calculate the
timing.
The way he decided to do that was simple, at least to him anyway. All he did was to jump around, running from the mound to mound. He actually was secretly infusing water into the cracks. He did this continuously for about ten minutes until his storage ring was about to run out of water. The generals never noticed a thing. Although the king found Will's movements rather odd at times, he still didn't suspect much.
When the water went through the cracks, it would turn into water blades, cutting and chiseling the stones underneath the earth into random shapes. Each mass of water was like an extension of his body, Will could roughly feel what the water was doing. Once a stone was cut, he would run to the area directly above it and get wind bombs blasted on top, clearing the path for the stones and allowing his water masses to push the stones up little by little.
Regardless of the fact that the rocks were heavy, Will's yuan reinforced water would easily be able to lift them up, especially with Will close by.
The rock lifting went on for about an hour until the entire area was covered in large rocks, as far as the eye could see. The wolves did not suspect a thing; they just assumed this was a result of their constant wind bombs. They failed to notice how most of the rocks, had flat surfaces like they had been cleanly cut...
Once Will thought he had enough large rocks, he initiated the second stage of his plan. He would go near a rock, pick it up, and throw it at the wolves.
The rock would be met by wind bombs; blasted to the point where it became dust, or at least that's what the wolves saw. Will wasn't really throwing them with his bare hands; he was not that strong, yet. He was merely throwing the boulders, using the blobs of water hidden underneath the rocks, after the wind bombs hit the boulders, the blob underneath would turn into vapor, which he would bring back over time, slowly turning it back into the water.
The wolves were surprised by how strong Will was, they were not expecting him to be able to throw boulders the size of a house with ease. This only reinforced their choice of not getting near Will. No one in their right mind would want to face someone with such herculean strength at close range.
This cycle of Will, throwing up rocks and the wolves blowing them up continued for almost five hours. The king was losing his patience and was getting more nervous. Meanwhile, Will continued throwing rocks like he was throwing peaches. He never slowed down and he never seemed to tire. Not to mention that the number of boulders didn't seem to decrease. It was as if Will had an endless supply. The generals were beginning to run out of energy.
The constant wind bombs were not a drain normally, but they had to maintain a high firing rate for more than six hours straight. Their minds had actually taken a lot of fatigue. Having to aim and fire at a constantly moving target for six hours took a large toll on their minds. Unlike Will, they didn't have dual minds and dual mind propagation. They only had one mind, and they were at their wit's end.
Their wind bombs had started to decrease in power and accuracy Will could clearly see this, yet he didn't make a move.
Not now, they still aren't tired enough.
He continued his boulder game, which used up as much yuan as he could replenish instantly. He was waiting for the generals to tire. This went on for two more hours. Until he saw one of the generals shiver slightly, he was trying to put on a show, but Will saw through it.
There she is. Let's do this.
As the hours went on, Will started decreasing the speed at which he was throwing the boulders, trying to get the generals to get used to a slow pace. In their slow state of minds, they could barely remain conscious.
Surprisingly, the king did nothing to help. He was far too proud to assist.
Will was counting on the King's pride.
Then at some point Will brought out a massive blood mist cloud, this cloud was quite big, it caught the wolves by surprise. It was also a bad omen for them, because in the past whenever this occurred, one of them would die.
This shock caused a momentary pause in their barrage, which was exactly what Will was looking for. Then a short moment after the mist came out, an extremely large boulder came out, at an incredibly fast speed.
This one was much faster than the previous boulders by quite a bit. This boulder was aimed at one of the generals, the one that had shivered slightly. The wolf's reaction was slow, allowing the boulder to get quite close. Fortunately, a wind bomb managed to blow it up in time. The relief caused the wolf to relax slightly, yet unknowingly to it, from behind the first boulder, a slightly smaller one was coming, and it was much faster than the previous one. Mastering all the mental and physical energy it could, the wolf released a wind bomb to destroy the incoming boulder.
To be honest, these boulders were not much of a threat in terms of damage, but the psychological damage Will had done to these wolves was not light.
This time a third boulder, which was quite small compared to the first two, and again much faster, approached the wolf from behind the second one. It again, like its predecessor, was hidden behind the body of the boulder in front. It was too fast and too close to attack with magic, so the wolf destroyed the boulder with its right claw. As it destroyed the boulder, it was met with an incredible sight.
A basketball-sized Suijin no Ikari was moving at top speed. Just behind the third boulder. If the wolf had not been mentally fatigued, it would have been able to hear the loud screeching noise that seemed to be behind the third boulder; unfortunately, it concentrated too much on its sense of sight and could react in time.
Lack of energy, physical fatigue, a weak mind; lead to the wolf receiving a super-fast Suijin no Ikari straight into its right eye. The eye was a weak spot, one that was easy to penetrate. The sphere-like ball of water reached straight into the general's brain, and it exploded. This resulted in the general's death. The other general could not step in to assist, because right at this instant, it too was facing a crisis.
Right in front of the last living general, was Will Chamberlain, holding his sword above its head.
...
Ten Seconds
This seems like a short amount of time, and it truly is, but to a skilled warrior, one second can be an eternity. It is said that if two masters at the pinnacle of the martial path were to meet, then one of two things would occur: either they battle for eternity or their battle would end within an instant. If we are taking the latter into account, then ten seconds is far too long, but that was all the time Will needed to kill the generals.
When Will activated his blood mist cloud, he set his plan into motion. He threw three boulders in order, at varying speeds and sizes. With the first being the largest and the slowest, and the third being the smallest and the fastest. The second boulder was medium sized and launched with corresponding speed. Then right behind the last boulder, was a Suijin no Ikari.
The moment Will threw the first boulder at the first general, gaining his attention; he soon swiftly threw a number of medium to small sized boulders in the direction of the second general. He had not aimed straight at the second general, but instead, guided the boulders to travel a number of a random arc like paths, pouring down a shower of rocks towards the second general.
The generals had a gap of about three hundred meters between them, making it more difficult for one to be able to focus and help the other. They were far too tired to be able to divert their attention. Will used their weariness to his advantage. The second general burst out with many wind bombs as he could, to attack the boulders, but there were just too many and some beyond the scope of his vision, resulting in a number of misses.
Nonetheless, he still focused on destroying some of the boulders, which was exactly what Will had predicted.
Will continued to launch the boulders at the generals, but now at the same time. This had been mentally straining for him. It was at best, the most demanding act among the list of Will's feats. It required him to put all 64 parts of his mind into overdrive. The moment he launched the Suijin the Ikari, he began the next step of his plan.
The point of the linear moving boulders attacking the first general was to hide the Suijin no Ikari, taking advantage of the varying sizes and speeds. The point of a large amount of boulders randomly lunged forth at the second general was also to conceal something within. Will himself!
The second general gave up on blowing up all of the boulders and decided to focus on targeting the ones that were coming near his body. The majority of the ones that were left would miss anyway, so this was no difficult task, but just when the first wave of boulders was about to pass, the second general failed to notice the blobs of water underneath and didn't see them change into a vapor. Some of them contained concentrated amounts of blood mist, so the vapor had a tint of red in it. The wolf was momentarily stunned. He would have never expected that the boulders would turn into a blood mist.
Since the beginning of the battle, the wolves had been struggling to understand what Will's ability was, Will made sure to keep this secret because his greatest weapon in the battle, was the fear of the unknown trump card he possessed. The only thing the wolves knew for certain was that when the blood mist would come out, death would accompany it.
Therefore, when the second general saw the blood mist again, he momentarily froze out of fear, because he was surrounded by it. After snapping out of his stumped state, the general decided to blow away the mist to kingdom come. Right then when he was about to open his mouth to blast it away, a boulder came straight for him from above. The general looked up and acted quickly, launching a wind bomb from his mouth. Exhaustion beckoned on his body, limiting his wind generation to only his mouth.
Once the boulder exploded, the general relaxed and looked down, only to see Will right in front of it. Will had timed this perfectly, using the first boulder to distract the general and then jumping in from the front.
The barrage of boulders wasn't to attack the general but had 3 uses. First, they were used to encase the general in another mist, the second was to use the flying boulders like stepping stones, thirdly, they were used as a supply to distract the general at the required time. Will had left one blob of water intact, attached to a boulder, ready to move it down at the right time.
Will had also launched some of the boulders slightly slower than others, to allow him to have some stepping stones in mid-air. By concentrating yuan in his feet, Will was able to jump explosively. Although as a result, every boulder he jumped from was destroyed instantly.
The moment he arrived in front of the general, he brought his sword out of the ring, lifted it, and activated bloodlust. What happened next was obviously held no suspense. The general was bisected cleanly, in an instant, leaving no stains of blood at all on Will's sword.
Will had met with the ground before any blood could gush out. During the moments to landing, he steered his body toward some boulders he could feel in the mist, absorbing the blood mist as he went along. Once his feet had touched the ground, there was no mist anymore. The mist that had surrounded the second general was connected to the first mist Will had made on the ground.
By the time Will had landed, virtually the entire vapor was now in his storage ring. The sky only had a few boulders falling, two lifeless corpses following suite, and a king who was so shocked that he kept blinking. As if something was stuck in his eye.
The entire process from Will launching the first boulder at the first general, to when he landed after finishing the job was no more than Ten seconds. Within Ten seconds, Will had wiped out the strongest of the generals, and the king couldn't even see how.
The king was a few hundred meters behind the generals, and the angle in which he stood was high, making it hard for him to see exactly what happened. In regards to the death of the first general, all he saw and heard was the first general destroying a few boulders and a loud screeching
noise.
As for the second general, the moment he was covered in blood mist, the king lost all visibility. He already couldn't see Will and now he couldn't see his servants. Due to the angle, he didn't even notice that Will had moved at all. All he ended up seeing was the eventual receding of the mist, a bisected second general and Will who was standing in the same spot on the ground.
The king was stumped; he had no idea what had just happened. He was the most intelligent creature in the sector. He had been part of thousands of battles, but yet his precious Storm wolves that weren't born as variants and evolved over time were defeated.
The king had been alive for a long time and had far more experience in battle than Will. He had faced individuals beyond the strength of Will, but yet here, right before him, a weak looking human had decimated his forces, and he had no idea how this had happened.
As far as he was concerned, he had seen only mist, mist, and more mist. All he knew was that Will was dangerous. The king then made a resolution. He would not allow Will to bring out that mist at any cost. The best way to do so would be to kill him instantly. The king had a powerful movement technique that he could use to get to Will very quickly, but this move would use up most of the king's energy.
This was a gamble for the king. If his opponent were to evade him, the king would practically be screwed, because he would only have a small amount of energy left for combat, but after seeing how being indecisive had cost the lives of his generals, He decided to buck up and do it. These thoughts that seemed like heavy contemplation had only lasted less than a second.
From Will's point of view, he had gazed ahead at the king's position, only to see a silhouette flash. An immediate sense of danger-filled Will's mind. If he did not act within the next instant, he would definitely die. It had taken him hours to deal with the generals, yet the king brought him near the gates of death in an instant.
Will had met his match. Without a single shred of hesitation, Will encased himself in a body of water, as much water as he could bring out within a fraction of a second. This wasn't much, but it was enough to save his life.
The king suddenly appeared next to Will, and launched his huge jaws, in an attempt to finish off Will in one bite, even eating some soil along the way, only to be met by water, that was reinforced by Will's yuan. Will used all of his remaining yuan to keep the body of water stable.
Now began the tug of war between the king and Will, both parties were exhausted and tired. Both were strong and smart, and both only needed one moment to conclude the battle!
...
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