Blacksmith Assassin

Forest of Trials VII

 Zeke’s eyes slowly adjusted back to normal. He can feel his whole world spinning and a ringing is left in his ears. Then came the tremors on the earth beneath him. Getting stronger by the second…tremors…TREMORS!

 Zeke’s senses came back sharply – making him move his body to the side just in the nick of time as an axe found its way digging deep into the soil where he was a couple of seconds ago. He should already be dead. But through some stroke of luck, he’s able to regain his senses just before his body’s cleaved in two.

But he can’t rely on luck to get him through this fight. In fact, if there’s one thing that he can’t rely on for this fight, it’s this very variable. That’s why he needs to think of a way to win. Fast. Because as far as he can tell, he’s being played by the monsters he needs to defeat.

“You guys are starting to piss me off you know that?” Zeke said as he got two more daggers from his inventory.

If there’s one thing that makes matters worse, it’s that one of the two ogres that tried striking him down earlier is now dead. The same one that he stabbed through the eye is burning with the same fireball that was supposed to hit him. A testament that the leader of these ogres wouldn’t hesitate to kill his comrades in order to secure Zeke’s own death.

This makes it even more dangerous because of how the ogres will still faithfully attack him despite these things. Nevertheless, the only thing that Zeke can do is fight. If he as much as decided to try and escape, then he’s sure that he’d die. With an axe splitting him from the back nonetheless.

“Man, you guys are intense.” A single drop of sweat ran down Zeke’s forehead.

The heat is inevitably getting to him. It won’t take long before he’s suffocated by this as well. Before it happens, he needs to secure his win. That’s the only way this can end well for him.

He looked at the wounds that he inflicted on the ogres. These are nothing but small wounds. But they are wounds nonetheless. And all he has to do to is to stack as many of these as he possibly can before the ogres figure out what he’s planning.

“Let’s keep this fight going shall we?”

Zeke dashed towards his enemies and the ogres did the same. The remaining axe wielder willingly matched what he’s attempting and Zeke answered in kind.

The two of them clashed with the axe wielder throwing one of these gigantic weapon towards Zeke. The human evaded it by stepping to the side. But as soon as he did, the same axe wielding ogre appeared. Right on the spot where he dodged and, with the monster ready to swing already.

The creature made a downward strike. The power behind it enough to create a shockwave and split the ground in half as another set of tremors filled the area. Zeke is nowhere to be seen and, for a couple of seconds, all of these ogres are blind.

That’s when Zeke stabbed the enemies at the back. One of the boomerang wielders screamed as it touched its leg that inevitably in pain. The sorcerer as well as the other boomerang wielder looked towards the ogre’s direction, only for this to be met by Zeke suddenly coming out of the smoke – stabbing the eyes of the leader of the ogres.

This quick movement isn’t something that the ogres expected because, it isn’t supposed to happen. It isn’t even supposed to be possible. The gap between where they are and where Zeke was is too far apart after all. It’s not something that should be covered in a couple of seconds. And yet that’s precisely what Zeke did.

Using [Lethal Tempo] he easily covered the gap where he is and where the enemies are. The extra boost in speed is all he needed to create the element of surprise and damage two of the three backlines. And now that the shaman is blinded, Zeke went and stabbed the third boomerang wielder. Now cutting a total of four ogres.

This action of his is met by a rampaging of the two ogres that are with the sorcerer. They swung their weapons down on the ground. Over and over in hopes of hitting the human with their attacks. But as for Zeke, he already got out of their range. Ion fact, he’s far form the range of any of these ogres now. Sitting comfortably back as he waited for his chance to strike again

Even before the dust settled however, he is struck with fireballs once more. The vicious orbs of fire went straight towards his direction even with the sorcerer already blinded.

“How is that even fair?” Zeke asked as he swiftly got out of the range of each fireball before they exploded.

Naturally, the other axe wielder tried attacking him while this went on. That’s why he used this as an opportunity to kill the monster. Seeing what the sorcerer ogre did before, Zeke dashed towards the direction of the axe wielder and, sure enough, a fireball followed him.

“That’s right! Come here!” Zeke shouted at the melee fighter that didn’t hesitate to close the distance between them.

Even before the gap is completely closed, the ogre sent one axe flying towards the human. An attack that Zeke dodged by sliding down. As he did, the axe wielder tried grabbing on to him so that both of them would die with the explosion from the fireball.

But Zeke’s [Lethal Tempo] cooldown has just finished. This allowed him to speed up even more. Getting out of the range and leaving the axe wielder to be the only one caught by the explosion.

[You leveled up.]

“Three left.” Zeke said as a grin spread on his lips.

This is the part where the boomerang attackers finally, well, attacked. They launched a strike from the right and the left, throwing their respective boomerangs which Zeke easily dodged. This isn’t the end of it however as, another pair is thrown at Zeke.

He also dodged this by a hair’s breadth. Buta s soon as he did, the first two that were thrown flew back towards him. Hitting his back and pushing him to the ground. With one of these sticking to his flesh as, the weapon is actually bladed.

Zeke is then left to fend off the fireballs that are launched towards him. All six of these that came without much interval. He forced himself back to his feet, taking off the boomerang that’s put into his body as, he began to run away.

Explosions happened one after the other. The fireballs continued chasing him down and as soon as they get close to him, these dangerous masses of heat would explode. Over and over this is what would happen. Until all six finally exploded. Leaving part of Zeke’s skin burnt to a certain degree.

He’s realized something now. The fight didn’t get easier with the death of the two axe ogres. Far from it, the fight actually became harder. A lot more than what he anticipated. And the root cause of this is, of course, the fact that the boomerang wielders relentlessly attack him while keeping a safe distance away. The same is true with the sorcerer.

With three powerful long ranged attackers ganging up on him, it’s difficult to find an interval where he can strike. Hence, he’s left to the mercy of these three. They continued attacking him over and over again. They didn’t stop with the strikes and, contrary to it, they actually sped up their chains – making it that much more difficult to attack – but he doesn’t need to. Not when he’s already won.

“UAGHHHHUUU!” The chieftain of the ogres creamed as it fell to its knees.

As mentioned Zeke hasn’t landed a single strike ever since the first attacks that he hit on these creatures. So there should be nothing that can cause the anguish of these monsters. But nothing can be farther from the truth.

“You’re feeling it now huh.” Zeke said as he got to his feet. He’s heavily injured, the same as the ogres. Yet he still mustered the strength to continue talking in a cocky tone.

Poison. This is something that he gained access to after killing the goblins. In the camp of these monsters, there are a lot of weapons that have been dipped in poison. Not only that but they even have a vial containing the said liquid. Experiencing firsthand how potent it is, Zeke decided to take the weapons and the poison along with him. And now, he’s putting it to good use.

“They say that it takes a small amount of poison quite the bit of time before it kicks in on an elephant. Thankfully though you’re not that big so I don’t need to worry much.” Zeke said as the other two ogres also began to feel the effect of the poison dropping down to their knees. Unable to fight back the toxin that’s now spreading in their bodies.

Zeke knew that he’d be no match for ogres as he currently are. There’s just no way that it would be possible without the right upgrades. So he has to use cheap tricks like poison and such. And with a passive skill of his [Cheap Shot] also being available, this means that both the damage and potency of the poison has increased.

“This is the end for the three of you.” Zeke said triumphantly. “I just need a bit more time.”

“GUUUAHHHH!” The chieftain roared violently and casted six new fireballs.

These flew towards Zeke the same way that they did before and, with these are the boomerangs that came from the two other ogres. Zeke activated his [Lethal Tempo] right away, dodging four of the five fireballs before the skill ran out. As soon as it did, he got caught too close to one of the fireballs again and, without time to get away, it exploded.

The two boomerangs have been blown to bits as well. Even before these could hit him, the explosion from the fireballs took them out. This left Zeke with nothing to worry about anymore, though the damage he’s accumulated has only continued getting worse and worse.

Nevertheless, he continued this little game with the ogres. Five minutes. For five more minutes, he endured the burning heat of the battlefield. For five more minutes, he continued running and dodging with all his might. For five more minutes, he allowed the suffocating heat. Forcing himself not to black out and, bearing all the pain in his wounds, he survived for five more minutes.

After this passed, Zeke is the only one left standing in the battlefield. All of the three other ogres are now on the ground. He’s won in this dangerous battle against creatures twice as strong as he.

Then Zeke got engulfed in a sea of flames.