Rematch and Vials

Zach remembered his last fight with the taken, Erik Ornn. He remembered the fire, the melting of his armor burning of his flesh, his hand ruined and scorched to the bone. Erik hit hard, he was powerful, and both of them knew what each other could do now. This was not going to be the same fight. Zach had been filled with willpower, that was no longer the case. He was still powerful, close to what he was, but the… churning ocean was now calmer, more controlled. He had overwhelmed the three taken before, but something told him that this time it would not be so easy.

*  *  *

Vitor inhaled the gas from his concoction through the delivery device in his mask, he had set it so that he would be dosed slowly, to prolong the effect. His stats rose in preparation for the fight. He wasn’t as confident as Zach seemed to be, but Vitor was from the sects, he knew how to fight. It seemed that the enemy and Zach had already decided on how they would fight, the minotaur seemed focused on Vitor. It was a shame, Vitor would’ve rather fought the fire user, he had some very powerful fire resistance concoctions. He had made it a point to focus on them after he narrowly survived a few alchemical fires. Those were… nasty.

The fire dragonlings roared, and somehow that announced the start of the battle. The minotaur charged, his hammer swinging. Vitor inhaled and jumped to the side, his muscles burning. He ran in between the buildings as the ground where he used to stand got cracked open by the massive hammer. Before the minotaur raised his hammer again, Vitor threw the two vials in his hand. They spun through the air, but the minotaur noticed them and jumped out of the way as they fell. The impact cracked the vials and the liquids touched air, then ignited, sending a concussive blast out. The minotaur was caught off guard and the blast made him stumble back a step, and Vitor jumped through a wooden door, shattering it to pieces as he crashed inside. It was a small building, a home, but he noted the back entrance.

He heard running behind him and prepared. His techniques were meant only for alchemy, mixing and preparing ingredients, not combat. But for most things, he didn’t need them. He was in the Eternal Realm, he was naturally stronger than most. His storage was filled with vials, elixirs and potions, as well as various powders and concoctions. He pulled two, one in each hand. He hit two of his fingers together, activating a ring and creating a spark that ignited the fuse, then he dropped a skin bag to the floor. He ran out of the building through the back door, just as the minotaur entered the building. His bag exploded, and black smoke filled the room. The minotaur didn’t even slow down as he crashed through the back wall.

Vitor opened the vial in his other hand and threw the contents out. Droplets of acid fell on the minotaur who stopped and summoned a shield to protect himself.

The minotaur hadn’t cared for the smoke inside the building, had ignored it, even though it would have torched his lungs if he had inhaled it, and it would’ve burned if it had touched his skin. That meant that his armor was completely a closed system. He had some sense that could track Vitor, because he followed after him, though he crashed through the wall and not the door, so the smoke had impaired his vision. Whatever sense the minotaur had it didn’t give him an exact picture of the world around him, only locations of people—Vitor assumed.

He ran into a small alleyway as the minotaur dealt with the acid. His hand reached for his mask, and he turned the dial, increasing the dose to its maximum. He inhaled and his body bulged beneath his robes. He unscrewed the spent vial and threw it in his storage, then screwed in a new one. On the right side of his mask he opened a slit and poured a potion into storage and immediately started to drink through his straw.

The minotaur roared and then glowing cracks spread across all buildings around him. Vitor cursed and jumped into the air as every building around him exploded in a shower of debris and light. Big pieces of stone flew all over the city, hitting everything, toppling other buildings, a dozen blocks were turned to rubble. He saw a flash of light in the distance as one of the big pieces of debris pinged and ricocheted away from a dome shield, one of the slave blocks. The fighting was doing too much damage, he saw waves of fire coming down and melting stone back where Vitor came from. They couldn’t let the fights threaten the cities. Where was Naha? He wondered, she should’ve been just behind them, ambushing them. It didn’t matter right now.

The minotaur looked up from the ground, then pulled his hammer back as he prepared to attack. Vitor pulled out a large round bottle, that flashed with yellow light. Before the minotaur could attack, Vitor cracked the bottle and pointed his hand at the man on the ground. A bolt of lighting crossed the distance instantly, turning day into night, followed by a thunder that shook the world. Where the minotaur used to be, now was a crater, but he could see light from deep within it.

Vitor grimaced as he shook his hand, trying to stimulate his numb fingers back into life. He fell from his jump, and landed on a rooftop, immediately, he set out in the direction of a wall. He had to take this out of the city.

*  *  *

The fire dragons melted the stone where Zach stood just a moment before. He stepped through space, with his Evading Through Space and onto a roof nearby, evading the attack. He could only use that skill perk if he was actively evading an attack. Conveniently, Erik followed up the attack immediately with more waves of blue fire that kept coming at him, forcing him to evade again. The buildings that got hit melted immediately, as if they were made of ice. In just his opening attack, Erik had turned an entire block to slag.

The heat permeated the area, he could feel it even through the armor. He used Telekinetic Armor over his equipment, layering a bit more protection. He could even see Erik inside the flames, all he saw was a ball of churning blue fire that spat out streams and waves of it in his direction. Zach, jumped back, moving away from another attack, and then heat and light fell from above. Zach hadn’t even noticed Erik gathering an attack above him, he herded him where it was. Trapped him for a great attack that couldn’t be evaded. Zach remembered the sensation of having his armor melted over his skin, remembered the stench of burning flesh. It was his fault for getting in this situation, he was… too slow. Naha had warned him, she told him that he took too long to get into a fight, to fully commit to it. It was a consequence of living such a long life with no stimuli but his own actions. When he was faced with others, he liked to think, and more often than not, he could afford to be less decisive. His connection to Time just exasperated the issue. He could afford to take it slow, could allow himself to think and not just act.

The door to the Plane of Time pulled open, just a tiny bit, enough for his perception of time to become even more slowed. He thought, and made a plan.

He raised a hand and froze space around him with |Perfect Field of Frozen Time| buying a few moments of time. Fire surrounded him, it burned even while frozen in a moment, he could see it trying to move slowly, burning his skill, burning space itself to prevent him from stepping away through it. He could feel the traces of Soul Essence in it, the fire would burn more than his flesh.

|I Focused And Saw All Flaws|

[Aspect True Sight]

He moved toward the frozen fire reaching for the time all around him. He felt the connection with the Plane of Time, a sight of a river filled his mind. A river filled with currents, he felt at one of them, understood its path and purpose. With his will he reached out, channeling his manipulation of Time through his skill.

|Of Time, Movement, and Space|

A wall of frozen fire trembled, then moved back, the stream of time that carried the flames halted, then reversed, a tiny amount, but enough. A path was open through the inferno, and Zach stepped through it. He landed on a rooftop hundreds of meters away. The moment he was out of the area of his influence, time resumed, a ball of fire engulfed everything. An entire section of the city, dozens of blocks, all turned to melted stone. A giant hole filled with nothing but steam and red liquid stone.

There was no way that he could allow this to continue in the city, the defenses that they had put in place could not survive something like this. A glancing attack, perhaps, but this was… beyond them.

Zach turned and jumped toward the walls, heading out of the city. He sensed fire behind him as it swallowed wind currents, introduced flaws that weren’t there in the nature’s design. He evaded, stepping through space until he landed on the wall and then jumped off of it. Mid jump, he turned, and looked at the blazing sphere of fire coming after him.

[Arsenal Wings: Wind]

[Last Sovereign of Terra]

[Ancient Heritage]

[Phantom Avatar]

[Lord of Grace and Woe]

Wings of wind appeared on his back and he blasted toward Erik. A moment after he achieved his fastest speed, he blinked close. The heat was immense, he felt his will shudder at the sudden pressure, but Zach didn’t slow at all. He swung his blade and activated Shattering Song. The fire was blasted away by the wind and vibrations, and his blade passed through the center of the inferno—and found nothing.

A blast of fire engulfed him, and he felt his Telekinetic Armor crack, nearly falter under the assault, in the split moment it took Zach to beat his wings and blast the fire away as well as fly up. He turned and saw Erik floating a bit away, now clearly visible, but the fire quickly building up around him to shroud him in it again. Zach blinked again, exiting the teleport next to Erik.

He was swinging his blade before he even finished the move and found only empty space. He frowned and turned as he sensed an attack. He stepped away through space and got altitude with his wings. Erik had his hands spread, and fire and the heat from the city were rising, moving toward him in one giant wave.

Zach blinked again, this time pulling on the Plane of Time. He arrived almost a moment before he left, the space trembled and time whined. His mind was moving faster, and he clearly saw what happened. Erik flashed to fire the moment Zach used his blink. Somehow, he was detecting it, but… it was too fast for even someone like him. It also felt… almost automatic. An item? A power that he didn’t know about? Either was possible.

As his blade missed its mark again, Zach realized that it was his blinks that were triggering it, which would mean closing the distance the old fashioned way.

Arsenal Infusion: Wind. His wings and blade dissipated as the perk made all his wind powers unavailable. But the Wind itself… calmed around him. Instead of falling, Zach found himself gently held in the air. Erik turned the great wave of fire from the city into a dragon the size of entire city blocks, it roared, and the air heated up, the forest beneath Zach caught fire, the grass on the plain, the air itself turned hazy.

Zach manifested his Time Blade, and then flew straight at it.