Chapter 116: Chink in the Armor
Chapter 116: Chink in the Armor
‘We face the enemy head-on.’
Marla’s voice was still guiding Eren’s actions.
The enemy tank felt an unprecedented level of danger after he saw that butcher was approaching him. He quickly cast an earth armour spell on himself that made his body get coated with a rockish layer of earth.
The coating was almost done when Eren reached the tank. He had already drawn his katars. Although he wasn’t great at handling them, his experience and expertise in weaponry were enough for him to handle a teen.
Katars were called punching daggers for a reason. They came with exceptional penetrating capabilities that would get unleashed when the user just punched at their opponent wearing them. Their hack-and-slash performance was only subpar at best. But their piercing lethality in close combat range was unmatched.
Eren punched at the opponent’s torso which the latter defended by bracing his arms in front of him to form an X. one of the katars pierced the layer of earth armour and lodged itself into the victim’s folded wrist.
The tank cried loudly in response. Eren knew he didn’t have a lot of time before the dual berserkers returned to take care of him after knowing about their team’s situation here.
And yet, the butcher didn’t slow down his assault. He targeted the tank’s lower waist with his other katar. He pulled out the lodged katar from his opponent’s wrist and was about to bend a little to inflict injury on his waist but by then his opponent had cast another spell.
This spell was a small version of what the tank did after the butcher was standing over the edge of the wall he climbed. Another earth arm appeared right in the middle of the two students and it tried to grab Eren.
Eren’s first instinct was to retreat and think of a counter move. But he was fighting against those instincts to continue his attack. The close combatant needed to find an opening in any case it was possible to find an opening for.
Eren activated Sedated Perception at this time!
Earlier, he was using Sedated Perception as an experiment to see how he can use it at the right time. Thanks to his experiments, he had learned that activating the time element spell at the beginning didn’t give him maximum benefits.
He needed to wait for the right moment. He needed this spell the most when he was thinking about the next move while fighting his berserking instincts. He thought to himself as he saw the earth arm closing in on him slowly:
‘Let’s look at the facts. This guy is an earth element user. So my lightning element attacks won’t deal him good damage. The lightning effect damage would just get neutralized by his earth element mana. At least most of it would.
Out of all the element users, this guy could have been, he just had to be an earth element user, a type I’m naturally weak against. Guess, I need to start collecting spells that belong to other Great elements to at least cover my weakness.
For now, if my lightning element spells are not that effective, I’ll just save my mana for those two numbnuts. That means going completely hand-to-hand against the tank.
A close-combat expert finds a chink in the armour, huh? Let’s do that. This guy’s earth armour spell is strong in defence. I could only lodge the tip of my katar into his wrist after applying so much pressure.
But that armour also makes him slow to move in a fluid motion. I, on the other hand with my higher BTP, Blitz Steps and Sedated Perception, can dominate him.
If I can only lodge the tip of my katar with this guy’s armour activated, I’ll lodge it to a place where it’d matter the most.”
The tank was already on guard against Eren by this point. He had already made the area around his groins and joins extra protected by deploying a thick layer of earth armour at the places. Only his face was partially covered in earth armour.
With his speed advantage still by his side, the butcher used his katar again to punch at the tank. This time it wasn’t the lower waist like his opponent was expecting an attack to approach from.
Eren punched the guy’s face with his katar and the tip of the Diceros Right pierced the left cheek of the tank without almost no resistance before coming out from the other cheek.
Thanks to Eren’s controlled piercing, the katar had only pierced the cheeks while keeping the insides of the tank’s mouth in a relatively safe position.
The guy was about to shout horridly but was stopped by Eren’s uppercut that the latter had given him with his other hand after retracting the katar. But contrary to his belief, the uppercut was meant to lessen the damage not increase it:
“Keep quiet or your cheeks would be torn some more than they already are. You’d require more potions, more resources, more care, and more recovery time if you shout now. You’d have to retire from the match should you get released by me without dealing you more damage, of course. Nod if you understand?”
Eren had stopped the execution of Sedated Perception by now. He had dodged the earth fist coming his way easily and found an apt angle to attack the guy’s cheeks. This was the most vulnerable spot he could find to attack on without getting penalized for injuring a student with malicious intentions.
Eren always had malicious intentions regarding his enemies. He just didn’t like to suffer himself because of it.
The guy looked at Eren angrily after listening to his demands. He didn’t even let him register his pain by shouting his heart out.
But the tank still had some sense left in him. He understood what the butcher said was true. There was no point fighting this demon. Even with his agile earth hand spell acting as an offence and diversion at once, the small-statured and weak-looking butcher could dodge his attacks at point-blank. He was just a superior fighter than him in every aspect, except maybe for his element.
Therefore, the tank sighed and nodded his head. Eren looked at the referee after hearing the tank’s confirmation. The referee was paying attention to these two. He just nodded his head and hinted at the tank to step away from the ring’s active field.
Just when Eren turned back to look at what his teammates were doing, he saw Dino heading his way at full speed. He was just a few meters away from him. Ron Valencia was still engaging with Steve, Jake, and Becky who had opened a combined front against him.
The duo must have observed by now that Eren had ploughed through their side. If he comes and joins his team, things would get extremely one-sided. That’s why Ron told Dino to handle Eren and Renita both.
The dual berserkers had already emptied the berserking potions inside their systems. They were stronger, faster, sharper, and overall more lethal than their usual selves.
Renita ran towards Eren after seeing that he was going to fight with the berserker. Normally, a close combat expert would be at a disadvantage when it came to a close-range fight between them and a berserker. Therefore, she wanted to support Eren on time.
She had already taken care of the ninja she was fighting with. The girl was left unconscious on the ground after Renita shot a dull, close-range wind bullet at the back of her head and dispersed the same right after the impact was made.
Of course, the girl now had a blunt wound and the blood had come out. But the referee had observed that it was not a serious wound simple recovery potions couldn’t treat. Plus, the blood loss could be covered with a few specific mana potions too. So there was no worry.
“You fokin bastard, what did you do to…?”
Dino wanted to diss Eren while they were about to engage with each other. But the latter wasn’t interested in the same old “you threaten me and I threaten you” chitchat. He used Sedated Perception straight away along with Blitz Steps and almost vanished from his position.
Dino wanted to find Eren using mana sense but he quickly dropped that idea after seeing Renita had sent a volley of wind bullets his way. The ranger didn’t hold back this time the way she did with the ninja. She couldn’t afford to.
Eren approached Dino from his left side. He had already waited long enough to teach these numbnuts a lesson. Now it was time to act.
Dino’s element was copper metal. He had coated himself in a layer of copper metallic armour. And there was a copper greatsword resting on his right shoulder. The sword’s edge had Sharktooth-like protrusions that looked like they were spinning. This was a custom-made, rune-carved artefact specially made to be used in conjunction with a particular elemental spell.
Despite the heavy-looking appearance, Dino was pretty nimble on his feet. It seemed that the metal armour granted by the guy’s spell didn’t restrict his movement.
‘Aaah, I forgot. Dino has a copper metal affinity and Ron has an affinity for iron metal. That’s why these guys stay together after all. They could attack their enemies without worrying about each other’s safety. Plus, their spell combos work well when they are together.
These numbnuts are looking for people who are experts in casting armour spells on themselves. That tank must be one of their permanent recruits.
Time to show them that the numbnuts can still be crushed even when they are made of metals.’