The moment the teleport deposited me in the center of the glade, I knew exactly where I was. The ornate carved scrollwork on the curving staircase that wound all the way up to the canopy was engraved in my memory from all the times I’d ridden down from the top on pillows. Even though all the paintings and detached decorations were gone, there was no doubt where I was. Twenty feet in front of me stood a hulking, black-armored, figure with an open helm revealing a scarred green face with tiny tusks in the corners of his mouth. He must have been eight feet tall if he was six, but his width was where I actually grew concerned. He was built like an overgrown dwarf in that he was more than half as wide as he was tall and he bore a massive black metal mace with a wicked flanged head and a spike out the tip at his hip. [Essence Reading] confirmed my suspicions and I would have recoiled if I could.

  [Name: Krark Skullsmasher

  Race: War Troll

  Class: Priest of Devourer - Rare - Rank A

  Level: 40

  Emotional Status: Confident/Bellicose]

  Dad’s dad had told me stories about War Trolls and they were bad news. Unlike their normal [Troll] cousins, War Trolls were recognized as a sapient species by the System and were therefore granted Classes and boons by it as well. Every single time a [Troll] outbreak threatened Ironhold in the last five hundred years, it was led by a War Troll of some sort, usually a [Shaman] variant. War Trolls were just as strong as their idiot cousins, but they possessed an unnatural cunning in addition that made them incredibly dangerous opponents.

  It looked like the only thing I had going for me was my speed, though at the moment of my arrival, I could only move my eyes. My eyes bulged as I tried to take in my surroundings, but from where I was placed, just before the door leading outside, I could only see the doors leading out of the foyer and the staircase I’d already spotted. I tried triggering [Flash Focus], but got an error message.

  [Warning! No active Skills may be used until the duel formally begins. Any further attempts to do so will be considered an official surrender.]

  Letting the Skill rest, I locked eyes with the priest before me. He cut an impressive figure, but I was used to that. Uncle Arlo taught me everything I knew about fighting that didn’t involve where to stab a dagger and he was nearly the same size as Krark.

  A new window appeared in the air between us and started counting down from ten. As it did, I felt the hold on my mouth release, and was immediately aware the same had happened to Krark.

  “We have been waiting for you, little Chosen.” His voice gave me the impression of a bag of nails and glass shards, rough hewn and as dangerous as it was slow and drawling. “I was told to offer you a chance to surrender, but you saved me the effort.”

  The moment the countdown reached zero, I regained full control of my body and immediately dove to the right to avoid Krark’s mace as it hurtled through where my head had been a moment before. He clicked his tongue and held out his hand toward his mace, which whipped back to him nearly as fast as it had flown toward me. He spun it in his grip as he and I circled each other.

  It didn’t matter how many layers of magical protection I had, if he crushed my head, I was dead and he knew it. I pushed a quarter of my Mana into [Mislead] and his glowing red eyes unfocused. Seeing my opportunity, I formed a quiver’s worth of [Light Arrows] and sent them screaming toward him. Individually, they weren’t worth much against a corporeal target, but I was just trying to figure out where he would subconsciously move to protect, triggering [Flash Focus] just as I launched them so I could observe his every motion in the presence of a threat.

  His right eye flinched and flicked down at his right side, maybe an old injury? I guess it could be–

  I was knocked out of [Flash Focus] as an obsidian ring on the [Priest of Devourer]’s finger let out a pulse of darkness before shattering. Pain wracked my entire body, but the worst spots were my extremities and my head. It felt like every ounce of Mana I had in my body was being pulled out through my pores in crystal form.

  “It is as my lord prophesied.” The War Troll laughed darkly. “This is meant to be a battle between champions, not a farce as you intended.” I slumped to my knees as he began to close the distance between us slowly, inexorably. “Those buffs you were practically glowing with are now gone, replaced by stacks of [Agony],” he flashed me a pointy-toothed smile, “a personal favorite of mine.” He stopped no more than a yard from me and began spinning his mace in a circle, generating a black aura as he did so. “It is almost a shame to waste such sweet torture on someone who will be dead within the next thirty seconds.”

  Inside, I was frantically trying to find a way out of this seemingly hopeless situation. You’ve been closer to death, now think! What can you do while your body isn’t working properly? [Arcane Cannon] is a possibility, as it can be commanded with my mind, but it’s too damn weak to kill someone like Krark. [Elemental Mastery] takes too much damn concentration, there’s no way I can focus hard enough to get off anything useful.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  My mind went blank for a moment as another wave of white hot pain raced through me. His preparations done, my opponent went for a massive downward swing and I suddenly knew what to do.

  [Elemental Pactlord]. Summon the most powerful [Earth Elemental] I have access to who will come willingly in between Krark and I. After that, summon a [Water Elemental] who can remove these [Agony] stacks.

  Just before the head of Krark’s mace was about to slam into my forehead, a gem encrusted sandstone hand stopped it dead in its path before crushing it in one hand with an audible crunch. My eyes widened as I took in the fifteen foot tall [Dao] standing between us. [Essence Reading] triggered and my jaw dropped.

  [All Dao serve as the personal guardsmen of the Earth Monarch. They are beings of stone and soil, but the older and more powerful they are, the more their bodies turn into previous crystals. They possess immense strength and endurance, capable of shaping the land with a mere touch.]

  The [Dao] turned to me and nodded before returning his fierce gaze upon the War Troll. “You are an annoyance.” His voice sounded like diamonds hitting a felt lined box, soft but distinct. Out of nowhere, he produced an enormous black stone hammer with an emerald core and went to work on the [Priest of Devourer] with sweeping blows that were so powerful the wind compressed on the head on the hammer between blows became projectiles that tore into him before the hammer even struck. To his credit, Krark didn’t give up as he backpedaled without his

  Meanwhile, a splash of water landed next to me and I blinked a few times before croaking out. “Nimbus?” I clutched my head as it revolted at my verbalization.

  The [Azure Hound] I’d helped evolve before entering the Tower stood next to me with the dopiest grin on his face. “Let me help you get rid of those pesky debuffs, Pactlord.” With a single lick to my face, I felt his [Azure Renewal] rip the [Agony] stacks from me in addition to refilling my HP and Mana.

  His head drooped low despite the goofy grin on his face. “I’m tired now. Call me again soon.” And just like that he turned into a puddle and disappeared.

  “I owe you, Nimbus. I’ll summon you again soon.” I struggled to my feet and scurried back against the wall to briefly watch as the [Dao] absolutely ripped Krark apart. His black plate armor had been shattered into tens of thousands of pieces, leaving him in black leather armor, not too different from what I wore beneath my [Cinder Robes].

  Checking my available Mana, I coughed when I saw that Bhoomi the [Dao] was eating a whopping twenty percent to maintain. He was well worth the cost, but it was still horrifying to see how much more powerful he was than what I was thinking of getting. I’d expected a mid-level [Earth Elemental] looking for a bit of time off, not one of the Earth Monarch’s personal guardsmen.

  Note to self: Send an offering to the Earth Monarch as soon as possible. Bhoomi might just be the reason I get out of here today.

  As I watched, I layered [Arcane Armor] over [Sun Armor] in a few motions and felt a bit less naked. The moment I finished, I began summoning [Arcane Cannons] all over the room, pushing a full two percent of my considerable Mana into each of them until I had two dozen of them.

  “System, this is outside interference! I demand arbitration!” Krark roared just before Bhoomi was going to knock his block off with the hammer, which stopped dead in its path as the pair of figures began to glow System blue.

  Less than five seconds later, Bhoomi appeared beside me with a sad smile on his face. “I’ve done what I could for you, Pactlord.” He patted my back, dropping a bundle of something down the neck of my robes as he did so. “Thank you for giving Arlian the freedom he wanted. He was a dear friend and comrade for many years.” A moment later he began to fade away mid salute. “It seems my time here is done. Call me again sometime, I’d love to talk about our shared comrade more–”

  All that was left to show of Bhoomi’s presence was the devastation he’d wrought throughout the room. Shards of black metal littered the floor amid green troll blood splatters, but the bleeder didn’t look much better himself. His whole body looked like it’d gone through the wringer, but I knew it wouldn’t be long before his natural regeneration kicked in.

  Raising a hand, I lowered it to point a single finger at Krark. “Let your god know I’m coming for him when you see him.” Twenty beams of concentrated force slammed into his body, spearing through his arms and shredding his under armor as they traced his body to deal as much damage as possible in a short period of time.

  “I’ll make you regret that!” The War Troll threw back his head and howled as he ripped his own armor and undershirt from his body to reveal a foot wide black crystal embedded in his chest. The second light hit the embedded gem, it pulsed with purple and black light before I began to feel a pull toward him. “Taste the void!” My barrage of [Arcane Cannon] fire stopped impacting his body as the beams seemed to inexorably streak toward the gem, so I cut off the feed of Mana, letting them fade away.

  As he screamed, I felt the pressure building from the crystalized [Void Vortex] in his chest and my feet began to slide toward him across the polished wooden floor. I hurried to reach a hand back and suck whatever it was Bhoomi left me into my spatial ring, but that motion required opening up my [Cinder Robes] which I felt give before they ripped right off me and into the [Void Vortex].

  “What the hell?!” I grimaced as I triggered [Air Step] to try and brace myself, but the moment I summoned them, they began to drift toward Krark and his vortex. “Shit, that didn’t work.” I muttered under my breath.

  All the blood had drained from Krark’s face, leaving him looking an unnaturally pale green. “You’ll never escape Devourer’s clutches!” The wounds on his body had stopped healing entirely and had in fact begun to grow worse as more and more of his blood was siphoned into the vortex.

  I tried summoning [Arlo’s Animated Buckler] to jump off toward the opposite wall, but the moment it left my arm it was ripped unceremoniously toward the vortex, just like my [Cinder Robes]. Damnit, that was a gift from Uncle Arlo! I have to be smarter about this. That [Void Vortex] is nasty, it’s even swallowing up the pieces of armor Bhoomi cracked off of Krark that ended up on the stairs above us. It’s almost like it’s trying to eat anything magic in the area… that’s it! Dominus, I hope this works.

  With a deep breath, I banished all of my magic items, even [Hydra’s Ward], – my legendary armor – and Jaegan’s staff, to my spatial storage ring and canceled [Arcane Armor] and [Sun Armor].