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Of Arms and Arcane: Chapter 123
🕑 Added 2024-07-25 13:51:45 +0000 UTCWith the first lizardman lying on the ground and the second lizardman crawling out of the dirt trap, I decided to take inspiration from my previous life, with all the cartoons and anime I watched, and also put all those martial arts lessons I learned to some use.
I started slow, going through the different forms I could remember, infusing every strike with instinctive magic being slung out. I continued with wind instinctive magic for a while but soon decided to switch things up.
I whirled my arms in circular motions as I pulled moisture out of the air in the alley, which to my disappointment, did not amount to much, maybe ¾ of a cup, but I was not going to complain, I could still do stuff with this.
I spread my fingers out and the small ball of water I gathered separated into multiple floating marble-sized blobs of water and they froze over, with my ice marbles at the ready, I shot my arms out in rapid succession sending the ice marbles shooting at both the lizardmen, and to their credit, they blocked and parried every single one of the ice marbles as they shattered on their sickles.
But I was not done yet, all that shattered ice was lying dormant at their feet, and I was not going to waste this opportunity.
The moment the last ice marble was smashed, I raised both my arms in an X, and the ice fragments around them melted, reformed into ice needles, and flew up at them from below.
The both of them let out hisses of pain as they both jumped back and got into a more defensive stance. But after taking a closer look, the ice needles did not seem to do much damage because normal clothes seemed to mitigate most of the damage, so it kind of sucked for the first lizardman because he was half naked, so came out of this taking more damage than the other guy.
“What is going on, brother? Why are our weapons not absorbing these spells?” the second lizardman half shouted.
“I don't know, the more important question is how is he casting so fast? This feels more like we are fighting a Magic Beast instead of a mage, our weapons did not work on their magic… either…” As the words left the first lizardman’s mouth, the color drained out of his unburned scales, and the second lizardman’s reaction soon followed.
“Ascended Beasts.” the second lizardman said as they both stared at stared at me with wide eyes.
“But how? I fought him before you arrived. While strong for his size, he is well within the realms of humans!” The first lizardman exclaimed.
“He was clearly just toying with you until I went for the other two boys.” the second lizardman said with a grim expression.
As for me, I was having a hard time schooling my face into a look of indifference and I almost blew out a laugh when he called me an Ascended Beast.
Ascended Beasts are Magic Beasts that are old/wise/powerful/intelligent enough to take on the form of the civilized races at will. Currently, there are no known cases of weak Ascended Beasts, it is more or less common knowledge that when faced with an Ascended Beast, it is better to run or beg for your life.
There were even some records I had read about, kingdoms who needed to put down a single Ascended Beast for whatever reason, had to be prepared to lose a few knight orders, or up to a battalion of normal troops, or the third option if the kingdom/empire had the connections, hire or bribe a neutral Ascended Beasts to take care of the problem.
And I could see where the lizardmen’s fears were coming from, Professor Sageira could also be classified as an Ascended Beast and I would not want to fight her even if I was ten times stronger than I was now. But these two idiots think I am an Ascended beast because I am throwing around instinctive magic.
So I made an impulse decision and played into the role they accused me of. I brought myself to my full height and released an exaggerated sigh, “So you found out… you know what this means, don't you? Now I cannot let you leave here alive.”
The two lizardmen visibly shivered at my words. “But I would consider it if you tell me who sent you, it is the least you could do after inconveniencing my stay in this kingdom.” I said as a way to give them an out and get some info out of them at the same time.
The second lizardman bowed to the ground, followed by the first lizardman, “We are sorry Ascended One, even we do now know who sent us. Please spare our lives.”
“Oh? You know not who sends you to your death?” I said with as much pomp I could draw out in my voice after being called ‘Ascended One’, “Not even a hint of where I can find someone who would know such answers?”
The two of them pressed their heads harder onto the ground, “Apologies, Ascended One, we cannot say, while our lives may be forfeit, us leaking this information will condemn the lives of others.”
I sighed, in other words, they were most likely given the job via multiple intermediaries to protect the identity of who is targeting us, and if word gets out that they snitched and someone up their line of hire got hit, their loved ones will be targeted.
That meant they no longer had any use to me, and I was not about to turn them over to the authorities for them to learn I can use instinctive magic, which means I will have to kill them, but with them bowing with their heads on the ground, I could not bring myself to just execute them. If it were up to me, no man should die on their knees begging, the best deaths are those that go down swinging.
Although these two may be kidnapping bastards, they are still skilled warriors, and a warrior’s death is the least I could give them. “Be that as it may, you have borne witness to me, and I cannot let you live. So rise and ready yourself, the best I can give you is a warrior’s death.”
From their kneeling position, they looked at each other, nodded, and faced me with resolve in their eyes as they stood and readied themselves, while doing so, they reached in their pockets and took some kind of paper sachet and a small vial each.
After tearing off the top of the paper sachet, they downed the powder inside and chased it with the liquid in the small vial. A few seconds later, I saw the sclera of their eyes go blood red, steam started pouring out of their nose and mouths, and the inner part of their scales started turning a shade of red contrasting against their original greyish-brown scales.
The two lizardmen then straightened, crossed their sickles across their chest, and bowed to me. In response, I picked up my sword, brought the flat of the sword up to my face in a salute, and once again planted my sword on the ground beside me.
The two lizardmen rose from their bow and took their stance, and I did the same, it was time to end this.
