Universe's End

Chapter 279: Architect of the Precursors Vs Spear of the Precursors Pt. 2

Flair felt like a child again, staring in enraptured awe, the dust cloud fading only to reveal the Spear standing there, a crater around her as the crowd filled with people he’d never seen went wild.

Wow.

This… This was the peak.

No, not the peak. Not yet. It’s just a glimpse at the peak.

The start of the battle had been exciting, but Flair had seen enough to know that something seemed off; the two Founders seemed more concerned with some sort of verbal exchange, but it had finally escalated as the tempo picked up. Flair still wasn’t tier eight, though that mountaintop was ever closer by the day. While some mistakenly believed tier eight was tier eight, that upon stepping through, they would have ‘caught up’ with the greatest alive, Flair knew better.

Having defended herself against the Lord Founder’s signature arrow attack, the Spear launched herself forward as Flair leaned closer, trying to immerse himself fully. Reaching the Lord Founder in an instant, rather than an opening, she was the one pushed back. Bow vanishing, the Lord Founder had struck out with a fist circled by several floating rings, the same ring-style that Kai Rong was famous for, the echoed strike taking the Spear by surprise.

I know what that one feels like.

He had been on the receiving end of Kai Rong’s strikes enough times to know what a close-quarters echo punch could feel like. Still, the Spear seemed to roll with the strike, pushed back only to flip backward completely, turning the motion into a dynamic cartwheel that ended with her launching her spear directly at the Lord Founder, using the built momentum to her advantage.

A three-layer conjured defense appeared, red-crystal shields that were reminiscent of the petals of a flower catching the spear, only to begin shattering one by one as the Spear clenched her fist while pushing it forward, like she was physically shoving the spear even from a distance.

The Lord Founder didn’t simply accept it; he grabbed his left wrist with his right hand and flared the fingers of his left hand, the ‘petals’ reinforcing themselves as the two Founders clashed.

Finally, the two forces exploded, the petals shattering in a rain of red crystal droplets, and the spear launched backward as the Spear caught the weapon for which her moniker was derived.

A boom rang out, like a struck drum, as the Spear suddenly slammed her spear into the ground, before pulling back on it and flinging herself forward as Flair frowned.

That shouldn’t be possible.

The spear had bent like a reed in the wind, far more spring than a solid metal weapon should possibly manage.

The Lord Founder switched back to his staff, an upward swing sending an intercepting stone spike toward the Spear. Rather than dodge the stone projectile, the Spear kicked off the stone spike, as it literally bounced her forward like a springboard, Flair’s confusion deepening.

Again. Stone doesn’t just flex like that.

Clearly, there was something off about the Spear, but if Flair had figured that out, he knew for a fact that the Lord Founder had as well. Swinging two crescent blades that had appeared in his hands toward the Spear, the Spear kicked off not any specific object this time, but the air itself, again springing around from an impossible direction. Even the Lord Founder was taken off guard as she drove an axe kick into his side, blowing him away.

Is that her power? She can… bounce?

That didn’t seem right to Flair, but it also didn’t seem wrong given what he was watching.

Launched away for only a moment, the Lord Founder flickered, appearing in the air as he stared down at his opponent, a clock appearing behind his back as he did.

Oh!

Any of the top-level fighters of Ehkorrus knew about the clock. It was a part of ‘parameter magic,’ though it wasn’t technically magic in itself. Speed, strength, velocity, timing, and location were all viable parameters for altering magic and even skills. Now, parameter magic tended to require skill with freeform magic and manipulation that ‘skill-fighters,’ those who relied purely on their gained skills and never expanded, severely lacked.

Ironically, it was crafters who were known for being better with freeform magic and manipulation; the best crafters all seemed to understand that without the finesse and repertoire expansion it granted, they’d plateau extremely early on.

Or that was what Flair had learned from casual conversations with some of the crafters who had gone to the Reverse Mountains with them years ago.

Whatever the case, the oversized clock that appeared behind Lord Founder was something of a signature modifier to the Lord Founder, a temporal parameter that he used to make things such as domain establishment actually feasible.

Is that what he is attempting right now?

Whatever the case of the clock, in the air above the Spear, he pointed even higher above as a giant magic circle appeared, and a massive stone bust of a draconic head projected from the magic circle began to descend, almost in slow motion at first. Falling downward, the Spear stood her ground, apparently unfazed as she again took the stance she’d taken earlier when she’d withstood the Lord Founder’s massive arrow attack, except this time angled upward.

Unfazed until the second draconic head followed the first. Even the Spear likely realized having two oversized meteors dropped on her head was probably not in her best interests. Kicking off like a cricket, the Spear put as much distance between herself and the impact site as possible, springing off of solid air that seemed to jiggle for a moment before returning to normal.

Crashing upon the arena, their view of the fight was momentarily obstructed by the explosion of dust and debris. Nearly twenty seconds later, it was at last cleared as the World Spirit’s authority took hold, pulling on loose radicals back to the arena floor and revealing the current state of things.

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A crater, two miles across, had appeared in the arena, the magical nature of the space they were in once more showcased as the interior had somehow expanded, as if it had always been that big. Only loosely connected to the arena that actually existed within Ehkorrus, Flair didn’t even bother trying to understand how that worked; it was the World Spirit’s doing, or E.O.N, or something that was above his pay grade.

The fight hadn’t simply halted either. The Spear had her arm cocked impossibly far back, as if things were stretching in a way that didn’t quite make sense; even the air surrounding her seemed to bend to her whims.

Lord Founder, meanwhile, had overlaid fifteen red crystal petal shields in front of him. Power was radiating out from both of them; the two Founders were clearly putting some elbow grease into this one.

When the Spear launched her spear, Flair couldn’t even register it, and that was as an elite-tier seven nearing tier eight. One moment, she had her armed cocked back; the next, the weapon had vanished.

The Lord Founder had vanished from the air, now back on the ground. His helmet had shattered at some point, and blood was pouring from beneath his eyes, but their Lord was far from defeated, a grin on his face as his arm shook. The petal shields were nowhere to be seen; the launched spear had evidently shattered them.

But, most impressive of all, and the reason why their Lord Founder had a satisfied grin on his face, was that he had caught the Spear’s spear.

Taking a moment, the Lord Founder turned the weapon over in his hands, nodding or shaking his head before at last sighing. Flair couldn’t make out exactly what he said, but it was clear he’d spoken to the Spear, who cocked her helmeted head before inclining it a moment after.

Apparently satisfied, the Lord Founder tapped his head as a new helmet appeared, covering his face, red promethium with a hardened black visor that hid his face entirely. Stabbing the weapon into the ground, what surprised Flar was when the Lord Founder took up a stance that he recognized as a modified version of Kai Rong’s stance. The Spear, likewise, took up her own stance, arms raised in a forward position and her right knee lifted like she was about to launch a forward snapping kick, the entire stance one that Flair had never seen before.

Switching from flashy shows of power, the two Founders clashed once more as Lord Founder flickered, appearing in front of the Spear as he unleashed a flurry of palm strikes and forward jabs. The Spear dodged and weaved, and even without seeing her face, Flair was certain she felt at home facing the onslaught. Finding her own opening, she returned the favor, launching back a barrage of quick punches, snapping kicks, and joint drives, knees, and elbows used just as much as feet and hands.

Flair had interacted with the Lord Founder more than ninety-nine percent of people, which was to say, not that much in the grand scheme of things.

But.

But from what he knew of the Lord Founder, the man, possibly demigod depending on who you asked, wasn’t exactly a battle junky, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy a good fight.

And given how the Lord Founder seemed to make no point in changing the flow of the battle, a melee of competing styles, Flair reckoned he was probably having some fun, whether he admitted it or not. The Spear seemed confident in a brawling but not unrefined technique, throwing in several grapples to vary things up. In contrast, the Lord Founder still preferred the somewhat defensive and precise style that he’d adopted and adapted from the Rong clan.

Things only got more interesting when the two began re-adding their own powersets. Stepping back, the Lord Founder swept his arms through the air in a circle, his fists beginning to glow blood-red, crystal hardening over his armored gauntlets as blood-red fire steamed from small cracks within the crystal carapace.

He wasn’t alone, as the monochrome black and white color strips began to radiate up and away from the Spear like a vortex of power was pulling things up and away.

When the two collided once more, the Spear’s style showed its true worth, her snapping kicks now bending as if her leg was made of rubber and springs rather than flesh and blood, punches rebounding off the air and connecting at angles that weren’t originally expected. Even her defense, the way she accepted strikes, and her body seemed to flex oddly, like it was also bending.

The Lord Founder’s style hadn’t ‘changed’ in the way the Spear’s had, but it had simply grown stronger. His fists, clad in blood-red crystal, struck that much harder, the blood-red smoke seeping from the crystal looking as if it almost ‘stabilized’ the air the Spear’s aura had made rubbery.

At one point in the exchange, the Lord Founder brought down a chopping palm, as the Spear snapped her knee upward, the two forces colliding. Pushing one against the other, the contest held for a moment longer until, with a titanic crack, the red crystal covering his armored gauntlet shattered, as the knee shattered through the attack and continued forward, into his chest and launching him a mile away in what seemed like an instant.

Flair couldn’t say he was too surprised. Most people had assumed that between the Lord Founder, the Architect of the Precursors, and the Spear of the Precursors, the Spear likely had an edge in melee combat.

That didn’t mean Flair didn’t inhale sharply, as the Lord Founder pulled himself free from the rubble a moment later, shaking his head and dusting himself off. All the while, the timer behind his back had continued ticking down, nearly complete.

Snapping his fingers, magic circles began to appear by the hundreds, as daggers were projected and launched instantly, a rainstorm of steel. Intermixed within were other weapons as well, slower to appear but clearly carrying denser, more potent pneuma during their projection. He wasn’t done just yet, either. Switching back to the staff, the arena floor turned hostile as spikes began to erupt at random.

Bombarded from above and below, the Spear was penned in, forced to defend herself with maximum offense, a blur of sweeping and striking limbs as she shattered through the stone spikes or otherwise deflected the descending daggers. Her offensive defense wasn’t perfect, though, as several of the heavier projected weapons managed to strike her, at worst merely pushing her off balance, at best, striking weaker points within her armor and drawing blood through the cracks.

The entire time, the background sound of a drum continued to hammer away, growing stronger the longer the fight lasted, a matching percussion to the crowd's growing energy.

Reaching out with her hand, the Spear yanked back as her spear suddenly flew toward her, the Founder grabbing hold of her trust weapon and sweeping it outward in a wide circle, a wave of air pressure blasting aside the falling storm of steel.

And then, the projections cut off entirely.

Surprised, Flair turned his gaze toward the Lord Founder. Standing there emotionless thanks to the obscuring visor, there was no way to make sense of what was going on in his mind. Flair held his breath, waiting for the domain to expand outward, and yet, it wasn’t a domain that manifested itself.

No, instead it was as if a crack tore open above him, and reaching up, the Lord Founder slowly retrieved a weapon of his own, a glowing, golden spear.

Flair wasn’t certain what he was looking at.

No, that wasn’t true. Flair knew exactly what he was looking at.

It was a spear projection. Not any spear. It was a projection of a Spear.

It was odd how both made complete sense to Flair, and none whatsoever. He wouldn’t pretend he was an expert at projection magic or how it worked, which, for the most part, was fairly limited in its users, with the Lord Founder being the most famous case.

But at the very least, Flair could tell one thing.

The weapon the Lord Founder now held wasn’t just a weapon projection.

It was a concept projection.

The Spear stared for several seconds, nothing happening, before the growing drumbeat instantly turned into the hammering sound of war drums, her aura exploding in response to seeing the Spear that the Lord Founder had summoned, projected, whatever had truly gone down.

Her exploding aura instantly shrank back down, tightly contained to take advantage of every last drop. The woman, her armor, and the air around her were completely drained of all colors except for the monochrome black and white.

This… This is the peak.

The appetizer had been had, the main course digested, and now, it was time for just desserts.

Whatever way the battle would end, there was no doubt in Flair’s mind as he looked between the black and white Spear of the Precursor and the Lord Founder basking in the golden glow of the Spear he held.

This fight wouldn’t last much longer.