Wish upon the Stars chapter 478

"Abel." I said with a nod. "Surprised we ran into you. I thought  you'd be resting up for the next assault." Without the clue Callie had  gotten when she got the flag, I hadn't expected much competition before  the next round started, but it seemed like some people had wanted to  move out and eliminate the competition a bit. I probably should have  expected that from Abel.

He shrugged. "I'm less worried  about making it further now. I broke my heart shackle in the maze. I  mean, I'm hoping to fill out my soul a bit in green, but even if I get  bounced I can still make it all the way to the peak of green eventually.  That was basically all I needed here."

I cursed.  "Seriously? Lucky bastard." I paused, thinking over what I knew about  him. "Oh you asshole, you're walking around looking for someone to fight  to the death in here aren't you?" That was just classic him. Finish up  your business and then go out in a blaze of gory.

His grin  was answer enough, but Abel had no problem confirming it. "I mean, we  all have a free pass to live through anything. It would be crazy NOT to  take advantage, don't you think?"

"I do think you're  crazy." I said drily. "But what makes you think I'M crazy enough to  accept a challenge like that, instead of dropping you in a hole and  leaving, or tag teaming you with Callie? I have options here beyond just  doing what you want."

He shrugged. "I'd accept a two on  one fight. But I don't think you'll do that. See, I think you remember  how close you came to beating me last time. I think you want another  shot at taking me down, and being in here provides us with the perfect  chance to do that without actually taking too big of a risk. So, am I  right? Do you want the chance to beat me once and for all? With your  progression speed if you take me out I'll have trouble catching up  again."

My fists clenched. I...really wanted that. I  wanted to beat Abel, to take the spot of strongest member of our team  from him. I'd been SO close last time. I'd almost had him. And I'd grown  so much. I could beat him, I was sure of it.

"Idiots."  Scoffed Callie as she stepped from the shadows. "You realize this is  only the fifth trial right? What if we need him for something later?"  She glared at Abel. "And YOU stop being a selfish dick and only thinking  of yourself. You're part of a team, AND your girlfriend is in here.  There's no reason you can't have your big showdown in the last trial,  once we've sorted out all the details."

I deflated. She  was right. Fighting to the death this early was a bad tactical call. As  leader, it was my job to avoid that. I had to do what was best for my  team.

Abel looked annoyed. "I guess..." He bit out  grudgingly. "But I still want to test my new soul strength. How about  this? If you take one punch from me at full power. Just one. I'll  defect. Switch to team two and help you both get as many flags as I can.  Hell, I'll even play double agent and lure the others away from you if  you need it. You'll both be in charge."

That...was a  really tempting offer. I just had to survive an attack. Abel was strong,  but I wasn't a weakling either. Fighting him would have involved  tanking a hit too. And I did want to see if I could take him on with his  new soul level. "Deal." I said decisively. I glanced at Callie. "If we  didn't humor him he'd probably have chased us down until we had to try  to kill him anyway."

She shrugged. "He's a lunatic. No  argument here." She pointed past him. "But what about the two of them?  They heard this whole conversation. Couldn't they go and tell everyon-"

There  was a flash and a fist slammed into Vinnie and Simon from the side,  pulverizing them. Abel rolled his wrist. "Nope. No danger now." I  winced. Damn, that was a shitty way to go. I felt kind of bad for them.  Still, they HAD been on the other team, and they could always come into  the temple outside the trials and try to break their shackles then.

"Alright,  so what are the terms here?" I asked my mentor. "I assume there are  conditions? Even ones as simple as 'don't team up with Callie."

He  just laughed. "No conditions. Do what you want. Personally I think  it'll mean more if you tank it yourself, but hey, that's just me." He  adjusted his footing. "Just so you know, I'm not holding back. This is  going to be the strongest punch I can throw. You'd better get ready."

Despite  being in critical danger, I still felt a thrill of excitement there. In  my last fight with Abel, I may have come close to winning, but he'd  shown that he hadn't gone all out. This would be my chance to see if I  could take everything he could dish out. I kind of wished I had a  defensive stance. I put that on my list of stances to develop, third  after an explosive single combat stance like the one I'd been tinkering  with in my head.

I gestured to Callie to step back.  Whatever happened, this was going to be a fucking mess. I also mentally  noted the direction of the flag. This should be a pretty quick exchange,  and I didn't want to lose track since we wanted to get back on the road  right after if we were going to get there before the next round  probably.

Triggering Belial, I made sure my body was fully  magma. It was probably my most durable state at the moment, even if I  hadn't designed it with that in mind. Mountain stance, triple strength  density shift. I felt myself become heavier and stronger, the durability  of my body becoming massively higher as my density shifted, creating an  immovable statue-like state I could use to tank anything.

Well,  probably not anything. But I was insanely durable. My whole body being  magma made the density shift a comprehensive full body effect, and a  damn impressive once. Stacked with Mountain Stance it meant I was almost  tense times more durable right now than I was in my normal Belial form,  which included Stone Limb as a base and was already pretty damned  sturdy.

Adjusting  his feet, Abel pulled back his fist, preparing to strike. Above him, an  image of a person condensed. A full body manifestation. The image began  to move, taking on a series of poses, Ragam stances, a powerful series  of buildup movements to prepare a strike, but in reverse.

As  the image moved, the air behind it blurred, spatial lubrication linking  them together. The further along the stances he got, the thinner the  spatial warping, becoming weaker and weaker until the image stopped in a  specific pose. In front of it a series of differently posed images,  like a stop motion animation, and linking the first one to Abel, a trail  of spatial lubrication.

"Are you ready." Gritted my mentor. "Because I can't guarantee this wont kill you. You'd better be prepared to tank this."

I  was gaping. The sheer soul weight of what he was doing had to be  immense, he was essentially using Ragam ten times simultaneously and his  ability on top of it. Of course, I wasn't exactly doing nothing either.  Still, my defense wouldn't be enough, I had to meet his attack with my  own or I was going to get fucking shattered. As I nodded to him, I  prepared the strongest strike I could.

Not  being able to move my feet because of mountain stance was rough, but it  wasn't the end of the world. I wasn't using the attack to cancel the  blow, just to leverage it, like I'd learned to do. I triggered my  overlay, ignoring the impending doom Danger Sense was warning of, and I  prepared to deflect. Mercy Kill, Afterburner,  Flurry of Blows,  and I  thre in a gravity attack just for good measure.

I  launched that attack just before Abel did, and I was glad I had,  because when he released his, I was scared out of my fucking mind. As he  threw his fist, the lubricated space snapped taught like a rubber band.  The last posed figured blurred into the next, which blurred into the  next even faster, picking up speed as the figures traced out the attack  in order, combining this wind up attack with cicada stacking step and  with his lubrication ability to enhance the already devastating blow.

As  the image hit the last figure, all the power was dragged down through  the lubrication tether, a dozen plus times the power of Abel's normal  all out attack channeling through his body as he launched the most  devastating punch I'd ever seen from someone our level.

No  wonder he'd needed to hit green for that, I was pretty sure his soul  would have shattered otherwise. The fist came right at me, somehow  everywhere and nowhere, the space around me used as a medium to transmit  the power of the attack in a way that, without my overlay, I'd NEVER  had been able to track coming at me. The sheer power of the blow was  making my head split as Danger Sense wailed in warning, but I forced  myself to focus.

My  already launched attack was heading for the intersection point where  the blow would land, and I tried to process the feeling that his fist  was both normal and the size of a fucking train. My overlay showed me  the one tiny potential sliver of a chance I had, but I needed to use  Seek Hidden to narrow down which of the potential attack paths that were  being shown was the one that would actually work.

As  my blow landed, it hit the train sized fist presence at JUST the right  angle to move it SLIGHTLY to the left of me (the opposite side from  Callie). Even with an absolutely flawless deflection, the small fraction  of the damage from the blow drove my feet into the ground to the knees,  and only the perfect compatibility of my Path with the redirection made  it possible to even pull that off.

My  body cracked. Like...all of it. Downside of being made of magma, but it  didn't collapse. I triggered my heal burst, grateful it worked in here.  Abel lowered his fist, breathing hard, and grinned at me. His nose was  leaking blood and it dripped onto his teeth as he bared them at me in  respect. "Damn kid. Not bad." His eyes went over my shoulder, and I  turned slowly taking in the attack he'd thrown after I redirected.

My  corruption had been infused into the blow itself, and that had  obviously enhanced things, but still, the sheer damage I'd just avoided  taking made me lightheaded. Abel's fist had DESTROYED a mountain.  Punched through it like a fucking subway tunnel, drilling so far in that  it had come out the other side and continued into the sky.

As  I watched, the corruption continued to eat away at the stone, until the  entire fucking mountain (a small one, granted) collapsed under its own  weight. Callie raised a hand, letting the stones hit and then drop  through shadow portals instead of smashing us, and I just stared in  terror at the amount of destruction we'd just unleashed.

"So."  Said Abel as he shuffled over to stand next to me, clearly exhausted.  "What's the plan from here boss?" I rolled my eyes, reaching out and  triggering another heal burst as I put my hand on his shoulder. I didn't  really feel like talking to him right now.