AA. 168

“Where the hell is he?”

It wasn’t two but three Wilson Ludus fighters that entered the abandoned temple. They had approached from opposite directions, probably hoping to catch Nil as he fled from the duo.

“Are you sure you sensed Godpuncher?” 

“Did you forget I kicked his ass once?” The only man in the trio asked. He was the one who moved alone and entered from the back of the building through an entrance Nil didn’t know existed. “I felt his energy as soon as the match began. He’s here, and I’m not going easy on him again.”

Nil had watched several recordings of the man, and he appeared familiar, but Nil had failed to identify him. Eli-Mental had an interesting ability that had won him the online nickname ‘Element of the Day’—no one seemed to like the name he had given himself. In his early videos from several failed Iron Gauntlet qualifiers, he conjured and commanded either earth, fire, water, or air. He never used more than one of them in a day, and never the same in events on consecutive days.

Eli qualified for the Iron Gauntlet just a month before Nil. His ability had changed. Many assumed he had ascended it. The man displayed more complex conjurations like steam, ice, clay, lightning, and, on a couple of occasions, sand. Things became even more complex at Bronze. One match especially horrified Nil, where Eli conjured and manipulated liquid glass. It seemed that at the start of each day, the man picked a single element or a cocktail of them to create a compound product and used it in battle. He needed a short break before he could use the same again which forced him to rotate through them.

Now, as Nil saw the man up close and heard him speak, the pieces came together. Eli’s Pits persona involved horrid cosplay. He called himself Burning Sands and used heated sand as his weapon. It was possible Eli had other personas for when he was forced to use something else, but Nil didn't follow the illegal fighting events. Involving Andrew in the opponent analysis task might’ve produced different results. The now soulsmith had a lot more experience with the Pits and had even worked with them indirectly. The unpredictability made it impossible to prepare for fights against him. Some days—the ones where he mostly relied on physical force—seemed manageable. Others terrified Nil.

“What makes you think you'll be the one to take him down?” The shorter of the two women asked. 

Nil recognized the woman. She was stocky and muscled in a way that would make most assume she was a Brute. The warhammer and kite-shaped buckler she carried only sold the ruse better. But after watching endless match recordings, Nil knew better. He had seen her tweak, modify, and repair her tools during longer events with a finesse one would expect of an Artisan. Whatever energy powered their strange powers seemed to come from within her instead of an external power source. If it was magic, then she had Arcane Warrior qualities too. If not, that made her more of a knight. It was another example of why Earth’s categorization didn't hold up as one ascended the realms.

A constant flow of energy moved between Petra the Paladin and her equipment. The hammer appeared to convert it into a cold aura while suppressed sonic waves radiated from the buckler. 

Am I overthinking things, or did she switch away from lightning just to counter me?

Pietro was the only opponent that had brought Nil to near death. It wouldn't surprise him if Wilson Luduses had closely analyzed the match to narrow down on his weaknesses. Petra had faced Selia in the last tournament finals. Her hammer swings had created lightning whips, and she had spawned a localized blizzard with her buckler. Unfortunately for Petra, neither proved effective against the phase shifter. Besides her weapon alterations, Petra also had a mechanical-looking insectoid creature following at her heel. Nil couldn't tell whether it was a spirit companion or a construct, but it radiated energy that was not too different from its master's.

“Adrian said he'd prefer me in the Cleansing over you,” Eli replied. 

“The key word is prefer,” Petra said. “And that was before you lost a ticket to Shawn. You know the rules. Whoever scores the ticket gets to go.”

“And that whoever is going to be me. I can take you out, claim your measly three, and then find Nil if you want to try me.”

“You arrogant, little bitch,” Petra snarled. “You only have two more than me, and that’s only because you stole my—”

“Godpuncher was here,” the third member of the group said. While the other two argued, she analyzed the Cursed One. “I've never seen anyone else cut their foes so cleanly it looks like disintegration.”

Familiar Frieda was the only one in the group without secrets—or so she liked to portray. The young woman had leveraged her looks, flashy power, rising fame, and the ludus's name to break into action and fantasy films. She also had multiple spirit companions that Nil's senses now struggled to find. They were one of the reasons behind her title and currently the most concerning variable. 

Nil carefully studied her while purifying the dense Cursed Energy in the room and cultivating the remnants. His tiredness slowly faded, and he felt more focused. 

“We stick to the predetermined rules,” Frieda declared. “First to find him gets first dibs. If intervention is needed, it's anyone's game. Then, if his points aren’t enough, we can figure out how to proceed amongst ourselves.”

“That’s assuming Nil doesn’t have enough points to push the winner through or the Arab doesn’t—”

“You can’t just call him that!” Petra hissed.

“The Arab—” Eli emphasized defiantly, glaring at his temporary ally. “—doesn’t have enough points to win using however many token holders are left.”

The conversation suggested all three individuals below him had five points or less. The numbers didn’t add up. It meant that several challengers had been eliminated by the Cursed Ones. Given the mess of limbs he had found around the fake monster monk, it was safe to assume the creature had defeated at least two fighters. 

The Source Sphere and Energy Instinct gave Nil an unfair advantage against Cursed entities. He guessed people with strategies similar to him had accumulated points by fighting other challengers and a couple of Cursed Ones before falling to one of the monsters. Since the non-human entities didn’t win their human opponents’ scores, several tokens were removed from the fight. 

When Nil tapped Meatball, she released her hold on the wall, withdrew her spikes, and coiled herself into a ball after nestling in his arms. The regular scaling of Onyx Dragon Mountain had made Nil a skilled climber capable of hand and footholds where most would struggle. The Bronze Realm Might and Finesse helped even more. He had no trouble carrying himself and Meatball using nothing but ten toes and five fingers. Nil took a deep breath in and slowly exhaled before dropping.

Absorb ensured Nil didn’t make a sound, but Frieda jumped to attention, eyes darting to the dark patch where he had landed. He sensed a minute energy signature stir just behind him. It was one of her spirit companions. Nil ignored it and poured a third of his maximum stores into Expend and supercharging speed before launching Meatball at Eli-Mental. A storm cloud appeared to manifest out of nowhere and rose to defend him, but Nil didn’t wait to see the results. He sped toward Frieda while Petra’s power flowed into her boots. She slid over the ground in the same way Nil did, moving to intercept him.

Expend, supercharged strength, and Anti-Friction Lattice hastened his approach toward Frieda. He used hand blasts to alter directions and avoid Petra’s charge. They also got him out of the way of a fiery dragon head that appeared in his path. It was made of arcane energy rather than solid. However, Nil was sure he would’ve suffered blunt force trauma on top of burns if he were to run into it. He tried approaching the woman from another angle. 

A child-sized muscled rabbit burst from the darkness, occasionally blurring as it moved. The beast came at Nil with a spinning roundhouse kick. Its attack missed, and the spirit beast suffered an empowered punch to the face. The knuckle-dagger of Chaos disintegrated what remained of its pulverized face. Nil poured more energy into the weapon, restoring it to its maximum size before adding electrified Balance to the mix. 

Crimson Lightning danced around Nil’s right arm as he continued toward Frieda. The broken floor rose and blossomed like a flower. A stone bear rose, ready to defend Familiar Frieda. The woman had earned her name because all of her spells—or abilities—manifested in bestial forms. She also relied on two spirit companions. Nil had already removed the rabbit from the fight and kept his senses sharp for the second.

Petra caught up to Nil just as he evaded the bear. A wave of intense cold accompanied her hammer swing. Even though he ducked under the attack, just about getting out of her reach with a blast from his left hand, the shockwave almost threw him off balance, and the cold bit at his skin and eyes.

After the initial confrontations, none of Nil’s clothes but the trousers gifted by Master Seer’s students remained. He had worn it under the rest of his clothes. He had nothing to protect himself from the sudden drop in temperature.

Instead of only focusing on Frieda like a horse with blinders on, Nil changed target. The energy weave around his feet remained strong, and two quick hand blasts got him behind Petra. She threw her buckler arm back just as Nil slashed. The crimson lightning burned and singed her armor but inflicted no other damage. A sonic attack exploded from the buckler as it met the Chaos blade. The force behind it threw Nil backward, knocking him off his feet and deactivating Anti-Friction Lattice. 

Much to Nil’s relief, Petra’s sonic attack wasn’t as fine-tuned as that of the bat he had faced not long before. It rattled his bones and head, but his inner ear remained unaffected. He could barely hear a thing but successfully switched to Absorb. The decision proved invaluable as Frieda’s bear had found him. The crushing attack barely fazed Nil and helped restore Brutal Battery’s store. His ears rang, and he couldn’t hear a thing but was sure blood-curdling screams filled the temple. Frieda’s mouth hung open, and her eyes were open with horror. Her toned neck was tense, and veins pushed against the skin and her forehead.

The Chaos blade and buckler had only met for a brief moment, but Nil’s attack penetrated Petra’s defense. He had vivisected her arm from between the middle and ring finger all the way down to the elbow. Nil doubted there was any repairing it. The arena backroom’s healers would likely have to amputate and regrow if Petra didn’t resort to the Fountain of Pyrene. Much to the woman’s credit, she didn’t teleport out straight away, denying Nil the points he needed to win. She slid away from him, out of the temple, and into the rain. Her mechanical insectoid companion clamped down around the injury, trying to stop the blood flow just before the pair disappeared.

Finesse has progressed to Bronze 9!

A swan-sized bird of the same azure energy that Petra’s hammer had emitted sped toward Nil as the bear tried to pin him down. Brutal Battery had just over half its maximum capacity. Instead of trying to flee, Nil threw up an Order barrier. The bird exploded against the silver wedge while the temperature around him dropped rapidly. Meanwhile, the stone bear had him in a hug, and its giant head tried to clamp down on his shoulder, but it had gained no ground.

An Expend blast exploded from his back, destroying the construct. Nil changed targets again. Frieda’s second ‘familiar’ was a serpent and refused to try his luck with poison again. He shot out of the cold mist that now surrounded him, teeth chattering. It took him a moment to pick up speed, but he was at his top-manageable velocity before long.

“Eli!” Frieda yelled from behind him, but it was too late.

Meatball had done an excellent job of keeping the man occupied. Recordings suggested he needed a moment to concentrate before conjuring more of his power for the day and minimal interruption to control it. The necessary time and focus were minimal with glass, sand, and stone but increased with water, snow, and most with things like fire, lightning, and storms.

The dark clouds swirling around Eli made him near-impossible to see in the arena’s dim natural lighting. The luminous storm provided some visibility outdoors, but in the temple, there were little but dim arcane lights. Fortunately, Nil didn’t rely on visibility. Eli-Mental stood out like a beacon thanks to Energy Instinct.

Galvanized and supercharged toughness helped Nil withstand the lightning that burst from the clouds as he passed through them. The energy arced toward the mental on his gauntlets and the second skin encasing his lower legs. A numb tingle annoyed his skin. The primary detriment was the frigid temperature that accompanied the storm.

Cold had the power to shut down Nil, but none of what he had faced thus far was as bad as Pietro’s scarabs. Everything after the Frost Emperor's summons took far too long to kick in. Eli was still distracted when Nil reached him, trying to fend off Meatball as she bounced off the ground and whatever surface she could find before shooting at him. A faint silver aura surrounded her, and scorch marks covered the light grey-brown carapace. Nothing seemed to stop her. She was sufficiently insulated.

Scratches, cuts, and fresh bruises covered Eli. He just about dodged the incoming attacks, occasionally launching bursts of frigid air to redirect the drakeling. By the time he noticed Nil, it was too late. Supercharged strength struck Eli in the gut, folding him in half. A chop to the back of the neck followed. Before Nil could go with the surrender tattoo, the announcer’s voice rang in his ear.

Anti-Friction Lattice has progressed to Iron 8!

“Godpuncher Nil has scored five tokens, pushing him well past the required ten! This couldn’t be closer, ladies and gentlemen! Omar of the Dunes also just reached ten tokens within milliseconds of Godpuncher. Less than a hundredth of a second would’ve won Omar the Hunt, but Mistress Luck doesn’t smile at him today. The final Cleansing ticket of the world goes to Godpuncher Nil!”