The Primal Hunter

Chapter 1397 - Chosen of the Malefic Viper vs Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord (3)

Jake was really good at dodging. In fact, he dared venture that of all B-grades at his level, he was the best of the best. However, there were instances when even he couldnʼt avoid everything thrown at him, and this was one of them.

The Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord could attack him from all sides with a variety of methods that made responding nearly impossible, forcing Jake to prioritize. When faced with a dragon of steam and a rain of spears, Jake chose to face the dragon head-on, forcing himself towards it as fast as he could despite space being squished around him.

That certainly didn’t help, as Jake preferred for space to act normally when he was moving through it. He pushed Pride of the Malefic Viper to its limits, trying to forcibly stabilize space, and while it worked to some extent, it was far from enough, and he clearly burned through far more energy than his opponent.

Even so, it wasn’t enough, and while Jake managed to blast himself through the drake of steam, he still suffered several burn wounds that only got worse due to the powerful sunlight trying to roast him. The rain of spears also didn’t stop falling, but at least Jake could avoid them after being free of the steam, though the feeling of space pressing in around him still made it difficult.

The Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord didn’t give Jake any space to rest, as all the fallen spears that had gone past him suddenly all bent and flattened, turning themselves into boomerangs in the blink of an eye, naturally making them spin and fly back towards him.

At the same time, the other Chosen held up her hand towards Jake and spoke.

“Repel.”

Jake immediately felt the invisible force from the Word of Power as he was launched down towards the spinning boomerangs that were already quickly moving in his direction. Twisting and distorting his body in the air, Jake managed to safely pass by a few, but several left deep cuts before he finally got through, only for the boomerangs to all turn in the air yet again, flying back toward him.

“Attract.”

From being pushed away and flying towards the ground at high speeds, Jake was suddenly yanked in the opposite direction and dragged back toward the other Chosen and right into the swarm of spinning sharp boomerangs yet again. Fortunately for Jake, he had slightly more time to react, and with both katars in hand, he managed to avoid taking any major blows while even propelling himself towards his target, wanting to take her by surprise.

He stepped down the second he was free of the boomerangs and teleported, appearing nearly right in front of his opponent, ready to strike. Yet he didn’t.

Instead, Jake blasted himself backward just in time as a small beam of light passed right where he would have been if he’d followed through on his attack. Without his danger sense screaming at him, there was no way he would have avoided it either, as it had been a sneaky one.

The steam that had once been a river, then a dragon, had risen into the air, and once sufficiently far up, the Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord had formed it into a lens of water that caught the sunlight, shooting down a concentrated beam of light towards him. She had effectively formed a magnifying glass and tried to fry him like some ant, and as much as Jake hated to admit it, he probably would have had a hole burned straight through whatever it had hit.

His opponent looked a little surprised that Jake had managed to pull back, something he immediately took advantage of by summoning his bow and shooting several quick arrows. He was hopeful for a brief moment that he would hit her, which he technically did, but it didn’t exactly do much.

Right before his arrows struck her, soft padding covered their arrowheads, making them all blunt, leaving only small blue marks at best. His attempt to make them explode also failed, as the padding she’d added allowed her to utterly suppress any of Jake’s control over them, causing the arrows to disperse mere moments later.

Having accomplished nothing with his one brief opening, Jake was fully forced back on the defensive again as she’d been given the chance to mentally refocus and continue her onslaught. Nearly a hundred different weapons were summoned, the one lens in the sky turned into four, and beneath him, the ground warped as the many trees started sharpening into spears ready to be launched upwards.

There was so much to deal with at the same time that Jake simply couldn’t keep up both physically and mentally. The unpredictable nature of the attacks also became an even bigger problem as the weapons randomly teleported, the edge of an axe randomly switched sides, a sword grew in length, and spears randomly transformed into chains mid-attack to wrap him up.

Trying to understand everything was a losing game, so Jake simply didn’t. He went so far as to close his eyes and focus only on his sphere and danger sense while trying to get in the zone and read everything happening. Despite the unpredictable nature of the many attacks, there had to be some kind of pattern. Not to the attacks themselves necessarily, but to the thought process of the one controlling it all.

It was impossible to avoid injuries, but Jake lessened them as best he could, dodging and weaving in between everything, even trying to get ahead of what he believed his opponent would do next. It sometimes worked, but even when it failed, that was one more piece that brought him closer to reading the other Chosen.

He didn’t even think of attacking, as it wasn’t at all a possibility while under the pressure he was dealing with. Usually, Jake wanted to claim momentum, but that simply wasn’t an option. Despite it all, though, he wasn’t entirely panicking yet... because he only needed one solid opening.

The Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord had a hyper-specialized Path, and thus also hyper-specialized stats. Her mental stats were incredibly high, and her Willpower was naturally at a stupidly extreme level, with her likely having a bunch of skills increasing the stats effect or even the stat itself, similar to Jake’s Malefic Viper Legacy skills.

This meant that her other stats naturally suffered. They were still pretty high, courtesy of her being a human with balanced stats, and just having high stats in general as a genius, but it was unquestionable that her defensive stats were incredibly lacking. Jake had found the disciple from the Sword Palace to be a glass cannon, but the Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord was even worse in that regard. That was also why she’d consumed a potion despite seemingly not really needing it. Just the few small arrows from Jake and Caleb’s efforts had damaged her significantly.

The problem was actually hitting her, though, especially now that he was caught within her Domain. Summoning defenses was effortless, and she could even blunt Jake’s arrows, which she appeared capable of doing right before they even struck her.

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Likely because of her fragile body, she was extremely skilled at defending herself with her abilities. She had practiced never risking being struck directly, knowing it could be lethal, and, based on how she’d made it to B-grade, she was clearly skilled at avoiding being hit and knew how much to commit to her defenses while pacing herself.

Even so, Jake was waiting for her to slip up or for him to create his own opening. He had been fighting a lot that day already; his resources were burned through, but he also had plenty more to show, including an arrow within his quiver with the Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord written on it. One opening, one good Arcane Powershot, and everything could be turned around.

Now he just needed to figure out how to get that opening, and despite surviving her onslaught while minimizing damage as much as possible, he didn’t see any. At least not one large enough to take advantage of. In fact, things were getting worse as time passed.

Jake had hoped that the immense energy drain of the other Chosen’s domain would result in her being put on a timer, but evidently, he’d severely underestimated her. That, or he’d overestimated how much it actually took for her to keep Jake trapped within this world of her creation while constantly unleashing attacks.

This can’t continue for much longer, Jake thought as he parried a flying spear before barely dodging a sword that turned into a whip halfway through a swing, only to get a burn across his arm as another lens in the sky had formed and shot down a concentrated beam of sunlight.

He was constantly taking damage, and while no single attack did anything major, the sheer volume was becoming a problem. Jake had realized that he had overreacted to some attacks, as while there were a lot of weapons swinging at him at the same time, the power behind each of them wasn’t always worth blocking or even dodging.

In fact, as Jake blew apart a boulder with a blast of arcane energy and blocked a sword, seeing it nick on his katar, he started to realize that the material integrity of all these items summoned by the Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord wasn’t that sound.

It made sense in retrospect, seeing as she was the one who’d summoned it using her own power. The durability and offensive power of anything she summoned was determined by how strong she was, meaning that while a sword swinging for him appeared dangerous, compared to one swung by the Sword Saint or the disciple from the Sword Palace, it really wasn’t worth writing home about.

That didn’t mean he could just take them, though, and she was also clearly aware of this perceived weakness of her Path, which was why some of her attacks were far more powerful than others. Ten spears could fly for Jake, but only two of them were truly dangerous, with enough willpower and energy poured into their creation to pose a genuine threat.

Even with this realization, and Jake’s ability to read her pattern increasing, he was still having a bad time, and it only got worse when she stopped simply throwing out the same kinds of attacks and went back to using her damn combos.

Right after Jake dodged away from two spears and blocked a third with his foot, using the leverage to kick himself away and make some distance, the Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord raised her hands and spoke.

“Wind.”

Jake was ready to be blasted by a massive gust of wind, or perhaps to deal with a giant blade of wind energy, but instead the wind simply formed a sphere of revolving energy around the Chosen of the Daolord as it spun at high speed. He wondered why, as it appeared so defensive, and he got even more confused when she spoke again.

“Fire.”

The revolving wind got set ablaze as Jake was slightly pushed back by the torrent of flames that spun around her at high speeds, forming an orb of fire that he didn’t even want to try to break through. It still appeared needlessly defensive, and Jake made distance and summoned his bow to try to shoot a few arrows to test the sphere as a third word echoed throughout the world.

“Lightning.”

With a crackling sound, the burning wind was electrified, significantly increasing its destructive potential. Like a massive burning thundercloud, the sphere effortlessly blocked Jake’s arrows, which exploded on impact. While he still had no idea what she was planning, his intuition told him it wouldn’t be good for him, and her fourth word more or less confirmed it as Jake’s eyes opened wide.

“Swap.”

Jake felt a powerful pull, and while he tried to resist, he barely managed to do so for a few moments before he suddenly found himself surrounded by a raging, burning thundercloud. He was entirely enclosed, and sparks jumped between his body and the cloud immediately, making Jake react instinctively by pushing Pride further and summoning an arcane barrier all around his body right in time for a fifth word to echo.

“Implode.”

The spinning sphere of destruction started closing in on him immediately, making Jake’s eyes open wide as he poured all the mana he could into his arcane barriers while summoning more. His wings were flayed and unable to defend him, forcing Jake to rely on his scales and arcane magic only, but even then...

This is bad.

Jake usually relied on Moment of the Primal Hunter for tight spots he saw no way out of, but in this instance, would it even work? He was surrounded on all sides, and even if he used the skill to slow time, what would it let him do?

An idea suddenly sprang to his mind as Jake prepared to force Moment to activate by lowering his defenses, intending to use the slowed-down time to channel an attack to break through the wall of wind, fire, and electricity. Diving through it seemed unwise, but if he made a hole first to go through, he should be able to get out while minimizing-

“Barrier.”

His plan was killed in the cradle as a powerful barrier formed around the sphere, which continued to implode and push through his layers of arcane barriers one by one. Even without making contact, his scales were sizzling and getting overwhelmed, and Jake felt his skin burn and start to flake off anywhere his scales couldn’t keep up.

Despite his best efforts, the sphere continued closing in on him, with Jake doing everything he could to save himself. Pride of the Malefic Viper was pushed to its absolute limits as Jake tried to fight back and destroy the sphere somehow, but it was far too powerful. The thought of taking out the staff from the Cyclops Magi suddenly appeared, but a part of him resisted the idea.

He hated the concept of having to rely on an external item to overcome this. Was he facing another Chosen? Yes, but that was no excuse. To Jake, this wasn’t a fight he should even have the option of losing. It was an incredibly arrogant thought, but while he’d recognized the Chosen of the Heartsoul Daolord’s Path as powerful and interesting, he’d never viewed her as someone he could truly lose against if he went all out.

Yet here he was, still having several skills he hadn’t used yet, and his danger sense was warning him that things were getting perilous. His skin was peeling and tearing as the wind closed in, the fire starting to break through his final barriers and licking his body, instantly searing his flesh.

Even as reality was starting to set in, and taking out the staff from the Cyclops Magi seemed like the only choice unless he wanted to do something even riskier, Jake refused to do any of it. Instead, he focused on pushing back against the magic, relying on nothing external nor pushing his Bloodline beyond its limits.

It was foolish, but it was a matter of pride... and Jake was very prideful. So prideful he utterly rejected the very notion that he couldn’t stop this attack, and as his will was pushed to its limits and his demise appeared imminent, the spinning sphere suddenly started losing steam as Jake’s eyes gleamed.

His heart was beating loudly, echoing in his mind and body as his innate pride pushed his will further than he’d perhaps ever taken it before. Vaguely, he felt the resonance between his partly Bloodline-caused innate will and Pride, utterly ignoring the splitting headache that was threatening to knock him unconscious.

Instead, he gritted his teeth hard enough for blood to pool in his mouth as he let out a silent roar of defiance, the imploding sphere suddenly starting to be pushed away slightly as his pride won out, and in between the sound of heavy heartbeats and the roaring flames and crackling electricity, a notification sounded.

[Pride of the Malefic Viper (Mythical)]”>[Pride of the Malefic Viper (Legendary)] --> [Pride of the Malefic Viper (Mythical)]