Chapter 24—High Stakes PvP.
Chapter 24—High Stakes PvP.
The ethereal scythe sliced through the air with a razor-sharp hiss, leaving a weeping trail of black fire in its wake that instantly corrupted the ancient timber of the rafters.
Kaelen snapped his torso backward in a razor-thin dodge, feeling the freezing, corrosive draft of the blade brush against his cheek.
The impact of his opponent’s weapon against the floorboards blew the wooden planks into a shower of dark, cracking sparks.
Without wasting a microsecond, Kaelen planted his boot onto the shaft of the scythe to launch himself skyward, driving a spinning roundhouse kick directly toward the red-eyed player’s jaw.
The rival leaned his head back with infuriating nonchalance, letting Kaelen’s boot slice through empty air before countering with a lightning-fast elbow strike loaded with kinetic energy.
[ WARNING: IMPACT DAMAGE ABSORBED (35%) ]
[ SKILL ACTIVATED: Shadow Veil/Impact Reduction ]
Kaelen crossed his forearms to absorb the blow, but the raw kinetic force blasted him backward against one of the bell tower’s massive stone pillars.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the masonry upon impact. Spitting a thin trail of blood, Kaelen wiped his first crucial piece of data: his opponent’s class combined the stealth of an assassin with the offensive power of a Soul Reaper, but his reaction speed relied heavily on the cooldown of his phantom phase.
"Is that really all the great Kaelen has to offer? "The red-eyed player taunted, spinning his heavy scythe with one hand like a wooden staff.
His crimson orbs burned with manic delight in the gloom of the tower.
"You fight like an optimized NPC, Kaelen! You think, you calculate, you move in predictable patterns. But a real player plays with the environment, not just his skills."
In another terrifying burst of speed, the rival lunged forward, his scythe dragging along the floorboards and carving deep gouges into the wood. But instead of bracing for a black or an evasive roll, Kaelen dived directly forward, ducking beneath the sweeping reach of the long blade.
[SKILL ACTIVATED: Mana Drain (Level 2)]
Kaelen’s left palm slammed directly onto the rival’s chest. The violent suction of the Void Core ignited instantly. For the first time since the duel began, the red-eyed player’s arrogant expression shattered.
The crimson light in his eyes flickered violently as a surge of dark mana was ripped out of his magical circuits to fuel Kaelen’s E-RANK core. Caught completely off guard by the brutal pain of the siphon, the rival attempted to trigger his Phantom Phase, but the instability of his mana interrupted the skill mind-cast, leaving him physically vulnerable for a fraction of a second.
Kaelen took immediate advantage, driving a surgical knife strike into the rival’s flank, slicing through his leather coat, and drawing the first drop of his opponent’s blood. The red-eyed player grunted, releasing a dark shockwave to blow Kaelen back before executing a backward acrobatic flip to re-establish distance. He touched his bloodied side, staring at his crimson fingers with a mix of disbelief and morbid excitement.
"You can absorb mana..." the rival whispered, a dark chuckle escaping his throat.
"A Void Assimilation build! No wonder you could steal Tsubaki’s core without killing him! But while you were busy siphoning me, you forgot to look up."
Kaelen’s eyes snapped upward. Above them, the heavy iron chains retaining the massive central gear—where the registry had been tossed—were beginning to snap under the lingering black flames dispersed by the scythe earlier.
The multi-ton bronze mechanism listed dangerously to the side, threatening to plunge into the Void and crush the document under mountains of debris.
[ SYSTEM COUNTDOWN: 40 Hours 41 Minutes.]
The choice was immediate and cruel:
engage the second round to eliminate the rival or abandon his guard to scale the collapsing structure and save the only physical evidence against Malakor before the gear plummeted.
"The clock is ticking, Player," the rival whispered with a sadistic wink, already priming his next offensive skill.
"What are you going to prioritize? The quest... Or your survival?"
The heavy vibration of the fractured stone column still resonated through Kaelen’s spine, sending fine gray masonry dust raining down onto his blood-stained shoulders. His cold, unblinking eyes calculated every single variable in the room. In a high-stakes PVP engagement against a fellow system holder, losing line of sight for a single frame meant instantaneous defeat.
Yet, Kaelen’s mental processing speed remained entirely unbothered by the agonizing ache in his cracked ribs.
His internal interface flickered vividly across his vision, recalibrating his physical parameters as his E-RANK Refined Core circulated the newly stolen dark mana through his meridians to forcefully dull his pain receptors.
He recognized that the red-eyed player was not merely relying on raw class attributes.
His hybrid Soul Reaper and Phantom Blade build operated entirely around kinetic momentum Channing-meaning every time his dark-flame scythe connected with a solid surface, his damage output and skill execution speed scaled exponentially.
The rival shifted his stance, pacing in a slow, predatory circle while the heavy iron head of his weapon left a thin, smoking trail of black embers along the ancient oak floorboards, corrupting the timber into crumbling ash beneath his dark leather boots.
The smell of burnt leather and fresh, iron-rich blood hung thick in the freezing air, signaling that the rival’s untouchable status had been permanently shattered by Kaelen’s surgical dagger strike. The red-eyed player’s arrogant smile twitched with genuine malice as dark blood soaked through his pristine coat—his pride as a high-tier contestant bleeding out onto the rotting stone.
High above their heads, the structural integrity of the old clock tower deteriorated at a catastrophic rate as residual black flames devoured the ancient support beams holding the central pulley assembly together.
With a deafening metallic report, a second massive iron chain whipped through the air like a dying serpent, shattering a floor-to-ceiling stained-glass window and showering the room in the lethal fragments of blue and gold glass that reflected the glowing crimson numbers of Kaelen’s countdown interface. The three-ton bronze gear listed heavily at a dangerous forty-five-degree angle, its rusted teeth grinding violently against the stone pillars while Delegate Malakor’s leather-bound registry slid helplessly toward the yawning dark chasm of the subterranean shaft.
The rival’s tactical intent was painfully transparent: he was using the critical quest item as psychological bait, attempting to force Kaelen into a panicked, uncalculated leap that would leave his spine completely exposed to a lethal, black-flame execution thrust.
Yet, Kaelen’s pulse remained dead steady at sixty beats per minute. He subtly redistributed his weight onto his back foot, feeling the gravitational hum of his fully charged Void Core vibrating through his muscles like an anchored spring.
He didn’t view the collapsing environment as a hazard but as the final, unpredictable variable necessary to break a superior opponent’s skill rotation.
With dark, serpentine mana gathering along the curved edge of the rival’s scythe for a fatal lunging strike, Kaelen locked his eyes onto the falling gear, silently synchronizing his internal mana burst with the exact microsecond the central support beam would give way.
The air inside the dying tower grew unnaturally dense, heavy with the metallic tang of blood, ozone, and burnt wood.
Every breath felt like inhaling shattered glass, but Kaelen’s expression remained an impenetrable mask of absolute composure.
He didn’t offer his rival the satisfaction of a vocal answer, nor did his gaze flicker with panic. In the cold, unyielding reality of a high-stakes PvP match, verbal exchanges were nothing more than psychological white noise, a tool weak players used to hide their hesitation.
Instead, Kaelen shifted his fingers along the leather wrapping of his stolen guard dagger, feeling the subtle pulse of his siphoned mana humming beneath his skin. His system window hovered silently in the corner of his field of vision, its crimson digits pulsing like a slow, steady heartbeat.
[ MANA CORE CAPACITY: 100%]
[ ACTIVE BUFF: SYSTEM OVERLOAD/ KINETIC ABSORPTION]
[ WARNING: STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY OF ZONE AT 12% ]
The red-eyed player’s smirk faltered for a fraction of a second, unsettled by Kaelen’s eerie silence. He had expected a desperate plea, a frantic maneuver, or at least a visible flicker of fear from a contestant backed into a corner. Instead, he was staring into the eyes of a man who looked less like a victim trapped in a collapsing tower and more like an architect executing a calculated demolition.
" Silent to the end, huh?" the rival muttered, his tone dropping its theatrical flair, replaced by a dark, razor-sharp focus.
Dark, serpentine wisps of mana coiled tightly around the length of his scythe, turning the weapon into a vortex of localized destruction.
" Then let’s see if your Void Core can absorb a blade through your spine."
With a brutal kick against the stone floor, the rival exploded forward, transforming into a blurred streak of shadow and black flames. At the same microsecond, high above their hands, the main timber beam snapped with a sound like thunder, sending the three-ton bronze gear into a total, free-falling plunge.
The trap had sprung, the floor was giving way, and Kaelen finally moved...