Chapter 38: On Even Grounds

The pillar came down — a roaring wall of iron and impossible momentum. Axel rolled, his body rubbing hard against the ground as the massive weapon howled over him. It missed by inches, and the wind of its passing dragged at his tattered armour. The earth shattered beside him with a deafening boom, raining gravel and stone.

Is he trying to kill me or get me to talk?! 

Axel scrambled to his feet, only to see the Giant already turning, raising the pillar again. 

Another swing. Axel dropped low, sliding under the strike as it carved a trench behind him. Iron axes manifested in his hands as he swung for the Giant’s weak point.

The neck, armpits, and chest were too high for him to reach, but the thighs were just about head level. Axel swung, scoring bloody lines, but the metal barely sunk more than a half-inch into flesh before meeting heavy resistance.

Then came the wind.

The noise was monstrous: a howling whump followed by the crack-boom of impact, like the sky itself was breaking. 

The sensation of weightlessness took hold, and Axel was blown up into the air. His limbs flailed helplessly as he was kept suspended by the wind. Dust engulfed him. He couldn’t see. Could barely breathe.

Ymir pressed forward once more, the iron pillar raised. Axel could not move, trapped by the gales as he was.

Shit. No other choice, then!

He had not wanted to do this, but perhaps there was no avoiding it from the start. Gritting his teeth, Axel forced his eyes open and locked them onto Ymir’s.

Then, he brought forth his madness in howling screams.

[Trait Conditions met.]

[Reaper’s Tithe Activated]

[The Pale Eye of Death falls upon you…]

A dark paralysis seized Ymir. The iron pillar stopped mid-swing. The winds around Axel slackened enough for him to tear himself loose.

The moment his feet touched the ground, another notification came.

[Reaperbound failed]

The Giant moved again. Ymir breathed hard.

Then he roared.

A storm fell upon Axel. Miniature tornadoes and shrieking gales came for him, threatening to tear him asunder.

Dammit, not even that worked?! How strong is he? Even the Prince was at least stunned by that!

Axel cursed loudly. Having few options, he summoned a storm of his own, bringing a war horn from his inventory into his hands.

[‘The General’s Oliphant’ activated!]

[Blizzard summoned!]

[All Stats boasted +6!]

The sudden breath of winter’s fury came, clashing with the hurricane’s storm. Visibility was rendered to near-nothingness as the howling seasons of nature duelled for supremacy.

Within those violent winds, Axel made his final preparations.

“System! Everything into Agility!”

[Skill Point Spent: 8 (0 Remaining)

[Agility (Agl): 70]

From his inventory, he pulled forth every type of Skill-enhancing potion he had, some of which were his last.

He drank them all.

[Minor Strength Potion Consumed]

[Minor Dexterity Potion Consumed]

[Minor Agility Potion Consumed]

[Minor Perception Potion Consumed]

[Minor Endurance Potion Consumed]

[Class Boon Active! All Stat gains doubled! Temporary Skill Bonus duration doubled!]

[+8 Str, +8 Dex, +8 Agl, +8 Per, +8 End for 60 Seconds]

Combined with the boost of Heroic Isolation doubled by his Class Boon, his final stats reached a new high once more.

~~~

Skills

Free Skill Points: 0

Offensive skill

Strength (Str): 76 (42 + 12 + 8 + 6 + 8)

Dexterity (Dex): 51 (25 + 12 + 6 + 8)

Perception (Per): 51 (25 + 12 + 6 + 8)

Intelligence (Int): 49 (23 + 12 + 6 + 8)

Defensive skill

Endurance (End): 88 (50 + 12 + 12 + 6 + 8)

Agility (Agl): 104 (70 + 12 + 8 + 6 + 8)

Serendipity (Ser): 42 (16 + 12 + 6 + 8)

Wisdom (Wis): 43 (17 + 12 + 6 + 8)

~~~

Power overwhelming. The last time he even came this close to such power was when he destroyed the Siegemaster with a string of power-ups by ‘Killing Spree’, and that had barely lasted 10 seconds.

Now, he had a full minute.

“Come on!” Axel roared against the wind. “Let’s fight!”

The Giant obliged. 

No longer a titan of restraint fury, this time the Giant came at him with all the speed and ferocity that once made the Great General a legend. The Iron Pillar came faster than before, but this time, Axel could see it.

The movement of the swing. The dancing of dust and snow, clear as day. His every sense honed beyond the peak of possibility. He could finally see through the Giant’s attack, if only barely.

It would be enough. With this one minute of enhanced power… He would finish this fight!

“COME AND DIE!” Axel howled.

Somewhere far away, the chilling laugh of the Reaper rang.

[Bring me his head.]

Axel’s madness met the Giant’s rage. Strength flooded his limbs, giving him the necessary prowess to match his opponent on equal grounds.

The Giant’s roar split the tempest between them, the iron pillar coming down like divine punishment. Axel leapt over to the side and off a shattered boulder, axes slashing the Giant’s fingers as the ground where he’d stood exploded into a crater.

He twisted midair, landing into a crouch just as the second swing came back around from the side.

He’s even faster now! Axel’s eyes were wide and mad as a crazed grin took his lips. The soldier launched himself back, the air howling around him as the pillar tore through space where his ribs had been. 

The blizzard isn’t blinding him at all… Is he immune?

Not surprising, perhaps. The Oliphant he used to summon his storm was originally the Giant’s, after all.

Axel violently tossed his axes at the Giant’s head, the blades spinning end over end before embedding themselves into Ymir’s arm, who still possessed enough sense to protect his vitals.

The Giant tensed, awaiting the follow-up, but Axel was moving away from the Giant, zipping around the battlefield and picking up both the discarded moonlight lance and the golden halberd.

The Giant growled and charged.

Axel could see the attacks coming. Every twitch of the Giant’s shoulders, every shift in grip, every breath drawn before another swing… His eyes caught it all, and his body obeyed with terrifying precision beyond anything he had ever commanded. It was as if he had become weightless.

But he knew. One hit, just one, and it would be all over. That pillar would erase him from existence if it so much as glanced him.

Ymir twisted, bellowing in rage, though the Giant’s swings were not blind or driven solely by berserker fury. There was precision in his swing. Feints were mixed with wide sweeping blows. That frightening intelligence still gleamed in Ymir’s eyes, brought to a razor edge by his anger, rather than becoming clouded by it.

Axel was running out of time. He had maybe ten or twenty seconds left before his blizzard and potions wore out. Those stat boosts were the only thing keeping him on even ground. Once those expired…

He would probably be dead.

Well, that is fine too.

The weapon swept in a vertical arc, screaming through the snowy wind. Axel rolled beneath the blow, moonlight lance manifesting once more as he stabbed the Giant’s thigh.

That time, the blow landed true. Enhanced by his greater strength and precision, the lance was thrust deep into Ymir’s flesh. Axel twisted it and pulled. Hot blood streaked his armour as he evaded a kick, discarding his lance and summoning a halberd into a wide slash.

The front half of Ymir’s right foot came off, toes and padded bones severed.

The Giant snarled as he lost balance and fell to one knee. Axel raised the halberd once more, aiming to sink its blade into Ymir’s neck. However, before he could, the wind grew heavy as magic pooled in the air.

[Sky Titan Ymir Casts ‘Gouging Gales’!]

Axel tried to bring his halberd around for another strike, but a gust of malicious wind struck his eyes. It forced his eyelids open, heavy pressures snaking around his eyeballs, and pulled.

The soldier screamed a curse as his eyeballs were violently gouged free.

Axel could not see, but his instincts made up for his blindness. There was no time to think, only movement. Axel vaulted up against a slab of rock he knew was there, sprinting up its slanted surface before flipping off it and over the Giant’s next horizontal swing. The wing tugged at his legs mid-air, however, and the soldier lost balance and fell clumsily.

Blinded, off-balance, and completely out of options, Axel knew he had no choice when he heard the screaming of a return swing.

Manifesting the halberd, Axel roared and swung with all his might, his blade meeting the incoming iron pillar head-on, fruitless as his defiance was.

The collision of heavy metal deafened him. His arms went limp, then shattered, then were pulverised entirely.

Axel was blown away. His body bounced against the ground once, twice, and then came to a flaying, sundering drag as his skin tore and peeled against the rock-strewn surface.

He smashed against the corpse of the Fae Dragon. The air reeked of decaying venom.

[Warning! Health below 5%!]

[Potion effects expired!]

[Blizzard expired!]

Axel tried to move. He could not. 

Heavy footsteps closed in. The soldier, despite the horrid pain, chuckled.

“Ha… You held back… On that last swing,” he accused.

“I have already told you,” the Giant growled. “I will not kill you until I hear your tortured honesty once more.”

Axel could not see, but he felt the Giant’s footsteps stop a few metres from him.

“That was a dirty trick,” Ymir snarled, the anger in his voice warring with a begrudging respect. “That trait, Reaper’s Tithe… I see now how you defeated the Prince. Lune’s description of its effect does it no justice. And it reinforces the scales that I should kill you. Whatever dark sponsor you have attracted, it is an evil, twisted thing, no doubt drawn to your murderous bloodlust.”

At those words, Axel spat. “Don’t insult what you don’t understand. She’s not… It’s not like that.”

The Giant was quiet. Then, Ymir sighed. “Your years in murder have shaped your soul. I have seen the darkness born from such a life devour the minds of men; such are the trials the System gives us.”

There was a thundering crash. Ymir had tossed his iron pillar aside.

“The Path behind you has been long beyond words, yet the one ahead of you is longer still, should you continue the Great Game,” Ymir spoke solemnly. “If you keep moving as you are, that darkness will grow, and your strength shall grow ever more in bloodshed; what emerges at the end will be a shell, its demonic nature immutable from its will.”

Axel gave a wet, bloody laugh. “I… am already a shell.”

“No. Not yet,” the Giant disagreed. His voice was certain. “Because, somehow, after the years you have toiled for your God of Death, you still kept something of yourself alive. That precious treasure born of all sapient life, regardless of our origin. Do you know its name?”

“… Even if I do, what does it matter?” Axel rasped. “Saying it changes nothing.”

“It will give you peace.” The wind died down. The roaring in Axel’s ears ceased. “Not the temporary, fleeting tranquillity that your addiction to madness brings. If you do not allow that piece of you to speak, then even as you protect it behind your veil of insanity, it will die on its own. And then, all your paths will take you down the same road: a Demon at its culmination, forever drowning in the blood it spills.

Axel said nothing. The Giant continued.

“What nestles within you, fragile as an egg, that you have kept protected all these years… Free it now, lest you lose it forever.”

What did he have left? Nothing. His comrades were scattered and likely dead; his old purpose as a monster had been traded from one hand to another. There was little he had to live for.

What was one last confession? To liberate that worthless thing he protected in his heart all these years.

A heavy silence followed. Ymir did not rush him, nor did he raise a weapon in judgment. 

Axel lay there, blind to everything, his entire existence melting in pain.

Finally, he spoke.

“What I buried away… was empathy,” Axel choked out. Something burned within him, beyond anger or shame. “To feel the pain others suffer. To share in joy and sorrow. To weep when someone dies, because you know that you are witnessing the destruction of something unique, something that shall never come again.”

The loss of a person is immeasurable, no matter how young, old, or broken they were.

But it is unbecoming of a weapon to weep, especially for the lives of those deemed worthless by the hand that wield them.

And so I buried it all away. Yet each time I see someone die due to my hands or inaction, the mask cracks, and that damnable thing I kept hidden inside me peeks through the gaps.

Remembering their faces. Their deaths. The expression of haunting agony as the last light in their eyes fades. The torment of their tears when they watched their loved one die. I cannot stop carrying them. And so, I prayed…

I prayed to die. Because what I wanted was a world… where people like me did not need to exist.

[That is a foolish hope]

Time stood still.

Axel opened his eyes — no longer gouged — and stared into the abyss before him.

The abyss stared back, beautiful in its pale glory.

[Where sentience exists, so does greed, rage, and all the ugliness that is born with sapient thought. Our very intelligence is a curse. It is the source of all evil and the mother of all things monstrous. And you… You are the crowning product of that vile intellect. Seeded by the demands of atrocity and made murderous by the hands of unequal progress. You are the Stillborn Beast of Sapient Thought.]

[You will always be a Demon.]

“I know,” Axel said hollowly.

The Pale Rider smiled, and the world snapped back into focus.

He was blind again. His back was to the ground.

Something was being pushed into his mouth.

The soldier choked at the familiar sweet liquid, but did not resist it. The healing potion burned, tending to his most immediate wounds, before regenerating a single eye.

Axel first sight beheld purple eyes, looking down stoically at him.

“Why?” Axel choked out. The word was both question and accusation. “Twice now, you rob me…”

Why do you rob me of my death? Why can’t you just…

Let me die.

“If saving your life is considered robbery, then I’m afraid I’ll be robbing you a lot more in the days to come,” Lune spat, purple eyes blazing. “You and I… We have unfinished debts. And I aim to collect what I am owed.”