A Black Market LitRPG

Chapter 175: Duel (II)

Before Kyle could figure out a way to circumvent his power, his exosuit was suddenly lifted up again before being slammed back down into the rubble, the force of the hidden human hand made out of arcia energy holding him down.

“Don’t you know who levelled Section A of your frontline?” Ares chuckled as he floated towards Kyle.

Kyle didn’t need to hear the answer, knowing it was Ares who had destroyed the entire block. Telekinesis was unique to the Orisians, and Kyle had seen the option during his race selection.

No known race has unlimited telekinesis. Kyle was sure that Ares didn’t actually have such an ability, more like a different manipulation of ambient arcia energy in the air. He could see with his Arcian eyes that Ares was now floating on another disembodied human hand holding him like a giant avatar, who gently let him down onto the ground.

One weakness that Kyle knew about the Orisians was that they were extremely physically weak, something that could be exploited if you could get past the telekinesis effect. However, a single glance at Ares already told him that Ares had long account for that weakness, able to handle melee combat anytime.

“No more tricks?” Ares grinned as his eyes flared once more, controlling the two disembodied human hands to crush Kyle, threatening to flatten the exosuit completely into the rubble.

The reactive armour engraving triggered continuously, healing Kyle and nullifying some of the pain. However, the energy storage of the Advanced Arcia Crystal was dropping rapidly the longer Kyle waited. Do I use Negation Field now?

Kyle was hesitant to use it – defeating Ares was far from the end. He still had to contest with Sebastian’s elites and Sebastian himself, who only Yual knows what powers he had hidden as well. Using the Negation Field now meant that he would not be able to use it for the rest of the battle unless he retreated.

Instead of relying on the Negation Field, Kyle gritted his teeth and channeled the point defence engravings, firing a stream of green arcia bolts right into the human hands holding him down. The disembodied human hands dispersed, a seeming war of control over the ambient arcia energy as the green arcia bolts shot towards Ares.

The hands quickly moved to form a skin-level shield around Ares, blocking all the incoming shots. So that’s why my spear couldn’t make it past. Kyle finally figured out that Ares was created a compressed layer of arcia energy around his body so dense that nothing could pierce it.

With the pressure of the hands gone, Kyle leapt out of the rubble in his exosuit, fighting against Ares with arcia-infused punches once more. This time, his own Arcian eyes looked out for the incoming human hands, dodging them before Ares could grab onto him.

“Oh ho, you can see arcia?” Ares exclaimed. “Impressive.”

“I can do more than see arcia.” Kyle grinned. Intimidation Aura!

The ambient arcia energy suddenly came under Kyle’s influence, restricting the movement of the disembodied arcia hands and even reducing their sizes as it became a battle of control over the arcia energy. Kyle could only liken it to a robot receiving two separate commands of equal authority, unsure of which one to execute first.

Instead, the arcia energy became a mismash of commands, becoming a turbulent flow that buffeted them. Kyle took advantage of the chaos, pummeling Ares before the disembodied arcia hands could form a compressed defense layer again.

This time, Kyle’s armoured fist hit home, the arcia-infused punch slamming right into Ares’s white buttoned shirt and ripping it apart in a devastating twist, the skin below ruptured as Ares was sent flying back through another building, causing the three floor aboves to collapses shakily.

Before Kyle could follow up, the air suddenly shifted once more, his intimidation aura suddenly unable to control the ambient arcia energy once more. Ares rose up from the rubble, levitating as his eyes and capillaries burnt blue with arcia energy surging, dominating the area.

Looks like he is really an Orisian variant. Kyle continuously dodged and weaved as Ares’s strengthened arcia hands slammed and threw large pieces of rubble at him. Any onlooker unable to see the arcia energy battle would only see Kyle seemingly fighting against ghosts, dodging invisible monsters that threatened to flatten him.

He can’t cast that forever. Kyle decided to buy time, skirting around the edges of where Ares could still see him, hiding behind building covers. The hands continued to chase him, even as he ran into the alleyways. Pipes, drains and leftover bricks were torn to shreds as the hands bulldozed everything in their path, almost invincible.

Kyle could not think of anything that could damage nor destroy the hands. Even if he sliced the arcia energy apart, Ares could just take control of a new batch of ambient arcia energy around, controlling it freely. Such a pain in the ass.

He looked around for options, still seeing his troops battle against the Cretins. Their duel space had now enlarged thanks to the destruction wrought by Ares and Kyle, both sides not wanting to interfere or be killed in the crossfire. He spotted Sasha fighting Sebastian’s elite knights nearby, one of her elite squad soldiers still carrying a bag of Detonation Spears. “Sasha! Spears left?”

[Only two!]

“Hand them over!”

A spear was flung through the air, allowing Kyle to catch it out of midair before tumbling and avoiding another crushing grip of the arcia hands. As he recovered and took bearing of where he was, he noticed the withered vines and demolished building, marking the place where he fought the mage hunters.

His eyes landed on where the first mage hunter was supposed to be, obviously carried away to safety. However, the black coffin that threatened to drain arcia energy was still there, giving Kyle an idea.

Despite the dangers of losing his own arcia energy, Kyle ran straight for the coffin, picking it up and throwing it right to Ares before the coffin could drain all of his energy away.

“Idiot, you think that lump of trash will-“ Ares’s words were caught in his throat as his arcia hands failed to catch onto the box, the ambient energy unable to hold together the moment it came into contact with the coffin. The coffin hit Ares head-on, causing him to fall with the coffin from his levitating height towards the ground.

Now! Chance! Kyle gripped his Detonation Spear tightly, using the exosuit’s last movement burst to cross the distance before Ares could hit the ground. Calculating the falling location, Kyle himself leapt up high into the air, before mustering all his strength and flinging the spear towards Ares with everything he had.

The spear exploded in mid-air as it hit Ares straight on, the blue arcia flames bursting out in a brilliant ball of flames, sparks spat out and soaring across the sky with tendrils of smoke.

Before Kyle could celebrate, the arcia flames were suddenly sucked in, absorbed by the coffin who vibrated violently, attempting to consume all the energy around. The coffin filled up in an instant, the ambient energy returning to normal as the crystals embedded along the side of the coffin was glowing brightly again.

Ares landed with a soft thud, tossing the coffin that he had used as a shield to the side before summoning yet another arcia hand to lunge at Kyle.

Kyle cursed under his breath as he could no longer avoid the hand in midair, his exosuit running out of impulse engravings. The cooldown is in ten minutes, I just have to hold on! Kyle braced himself as the hand slammed him onto the ground, before dragging him through the broken buildings and crushing him into concrete walls over and over again in a circular pattern.

This is My Turf!

The invisible forcefield forced the hand away from Kyle, allowing him to tumble to safety before rushing at Ares, charging it once again for a round of melee combat.

However, Ares was no longer playing around, instead expanding the hand to be large enough to pick up Kyle’s forcefield like a ball. Despite the invulnerability of it, the forcefield did not attack anything that got close to it, allowing Ares to toss him around.

While he did not take any damage, the disorientation of being flung about wildly and the high accelerations forced him to steel his brain, fighting to stay conscious. His high-gravity turn training from the Dynasty kicked in, allowing him to retain awareness even as Ares’s hand shook him violently.

Kyle suddenly noticed that Ares had only summoned one hand instead of two. He’s weakening! He could feel the hand slowing down in motion as well, no longer as vigorous as before.

Seeing his chance, Kyle cancelled the skill and punched with his fist outwards, breaking apart the weakened hand. Ares could be seen panting, his forehead dripping with sweat as he tried to muster another hand, but Kyle was already fast approaching him.

Kyle delivered an arcia-infused punch to Ares, right in the stomach, Ares unable to summon the defensive layer in time. The punch lifted the half-giant’s body by nearly half a meter in the air, before Ares crumpled to the ground, struggling to get up.

“For all your muscles, it looks like you need work more on your stamina.” Kyle remarked as he grabbed Ares by the head, slamming his face into the ground. But instead of hearing the satisfying crunch of the nose and face along with a blood squish, Ares’s face stopped just a centimeter off the ground, a smile on his face.

“I got you.”

Kyle quickly backed off, realizing Ares was feinting. But it was far too late, with Ares having conjured six hands that sealed off Kyle in all directions in a cage. Kyle threw punches and kicks at the disembodied arcia hands to no avail, the hands density stronger than ever.

“Thought I could only use two?” Ares taunted as he stood up, patting the dirt off of his shirt as it became apparent that the punch to the stomach barely made a dent, though it did damage the shirt and buttons. “That was fun, but playtime is over.”

The hands tightened, blocking off the flow of air as well into the space within as Kyle began to feel breathless, oxygen failing to reach his lungs.

“Everyone needs to breath.” Ares laughed, his eyes still focused on holding the cage in place until Kyle was unconscious due to the lack of air.

Kyle could feel his vision swirling, but unlike the other times in the Galactic Era when he had truly lost air in his space exosuit, he could still feel energy entering his body in the form of arcia energy, delivering power to his muscles, organs and even brains, keeping the human body functioning. However, it was slightly inefficient. Seems like eventually I might not even need air to survive.

“Last chance to surrender, Kyle. I’m willing to keep your men alive in respect of your strength.” Ares offered, stepping closer to the cage.

“Fuck you.” Negation Field!

The flow of arcia energy suddenly reversed, no longer stable. The hands immediately dissipated, with Kyle charging right into Ares. Ares was truly caught off-guard, unable to understand why he could not summon the hands any longer. Defensive Layer!

But it was far too late, as Kyle this time grabbed Ares’s face with a tight grip and threw him to the ground with force. Kyle bellowed as he delivered a raging course of punches unlike anything he had delivered before, but it was unable to fully damage Ares’s strong physical body as well.

Power! I need more power! Kyle instinctively drew more energy from the Advanced Arcia Crystal into his fist, infusing it stronger than ever and far beyond even his own internal MP capacity. His veins glowed hot yellow like a fists of a god before slamming down into Ares.

The Negation Field wreaked havoc within Ares’s body, which had been long used to deriving energy from the ambient air. His body weakened significantly, disrupted by both the Negation Field and the strong arcia punches delivered by Kyle. Ares tried to fight back, using his muscles to fend off Kyle and push him back.

Despite Ares’s sheer muscular strength, Kyle had the clear advantage with the Negation Field, able to still rely on his armour and skills to fight. They clashed again and again, but over the minutes, Ares was clearly weakening, unable to keep up with Kyle’s punches and kicks.

With a final battle cry, Kyle punched in Ares’s face as hard as he could, before following up with a brutal kick to Ares’s shin, bending his knee inwards and causing Ares to fall to the ground.

Before Kyle could stomp on Ares’s face once again, a loudspeaker suddenly blurted out from the forces of Cretins, even reaching Kyle’s ears.

[The Ardent Cretins surrender.]