45 End of the First Task

His opponent's arrogance was the only reason why Fen was able to hit him with Death's Influence, and denying that would be insulting the amount of power the Chosen had. Years of complacency meant that Edmond lacked the experience in combat that Fen had from throwing himself into Scenario after Scenario to rack up points to bolster his odds of survival in one short month.

But did that mean that Fen had won the fight? No, if anything, it was the exact opposite.

To more accurately describe the fight now, it was like a bull fighting against an ant. At first the bull was just playing with the ant, until it somehow managed to cut off it's legs. Now, the beast was taking the opponent it thought to be weak seriously, no longer holding back.

To clarify, Fen was the ant.

Now that Edmond was taking the fight seriously and was now trying to kill him instead of simply toying around like before, Fen could finally realize the power of a Chosen.

A body physically powerful enough to dominate even him, a Vitul, and magic that could overwhelm him, spellworks that he'd never heard of even in the interface's Foundation records.

Fen was experiencing what it was like when people thought they beat the boss, only for a second HP bar to pop up out of nowhere. Except this time, the HP was MP, and he'd have to last the onslaught of powerful magic.

The magic missiles of magical energy chased Fen around the roof, and he barely managed to avoid them all, the missed missiles destroying the roof they were on. There were large holes all over the area, with the only spot left reasonably untouched being the area Edmond was on.

At the end, Fen was left panting about 10 meters (~33 ft) away from his opponent.

Granted, Edmond didn't seem that unaffected from sending out so much of his magical energy in that one attack. Expecting him to make another move, Fen tensed up his body to react to anything, but his mind was unprepared to process what he saw.

As Edmond turned paler and paler, a shimmering blue knight wrapped in armor appeared out the air in front of him, holding a massive greatsword in between two gauntlets. Just before Fen could react to disrupt the spellwork of, well, whatever it was, Edmond collapsed to the floor.

White foam frothed from the youth's mouth, and although Fen wasn't close enough to see, his eyes rolled to the back of his head.

Like a puppet getting it's strings cut, the blue knight finished materializing in the air and landed heavily on the roof, its armor cracking the stone of the building.

An ethereal cable connected the glowing blue knight to Edmond, with several golden particles flowing between the two beings.

"You... you really should've let me kill you quickly." It was a statement devoid of all emotions, one which came from the Mana knight in a very solemn and disconnected voice.

Swish!

The sound of metal hitting metal rung throughout the area as Fen barely managed to deflect the knight's greatsword, the weapon inches away from his neck in what was an unbelievably fast underhand swing.

His arm started shaking from the strain of holding back against the knight's strength, but, determined not to lose out in a contest of strength, Fen held his position and boosted his arm's strength with Vital energy to push the knight's blade away a few inches more.

With his other hand, he materialized a Flaming Spear and grabbed the fiery weapon, thrusting the weapon in between the armor plates of the knight's stomach area.

Now that Edmond's body was no longer a part of the fight, Fen doubted that the knight would retain his ability to absorb magic otherwise the construct would've attacked him with magic. The knight revealed a strange creaky noise when the Flaming Spear struck it's abdomen, but the magic merely went through after encountering a brief resistance, like a hot knife through butter. Fen was forced to release the spellwork before his hand too got pulled into the construct.

"That won't work on me. You think this is some weak magic, that'd be effected by a spellwork as weak as that?!" Edmond's cackle came from the magic construct. "You can't beat me, not with my Mana knight!" It seemed that his Chosen opponent hadn't learned from his earlier arrogance, but who was Fen to tell him what to do?

A frown appeared on Fen's face.

'Ethereal, huh... Damn it, then I can only aim for his real body,' he planned. He had no thoughts of making conversation with his opponent. Either way, one of them would be dead sooner or later. Ideally, the dead one wouldn't be him.

Having noticed the feeling in his hand when his Flaming Spear pierced the Mana knight, Fen believed he understood the reason why his attack did no damage, and why Edmond was so confident in his victory.

The construct had the ability to become ethereal. It could shift in and out of reality while still maintaining it's corporal form. Fen started sweating just thinking about the applications of that ability.

Once again, the knight swung it's greatsword towards Fen's neck. He raised his sword to block it but instead of hearing a *clang*, the great sword went through his weapon and was now barreling towards his head!

Fen threw his knees forward and bent backwards, his calves nearly touching his thighs as his body flipped backwards, narrowly missing the knight's weapon. A small drop of sweat went down Fen's neck.

He had wondered why Edmond hadn't performed that trick earlier, but he guessed the Chosen just didn't think of it until now. If Fen didn't know about the knight's ethereal nature beforehand, he might not have been able to dodge that strike.

The Chosen's combat experience, or rather, the lack of it was crippling the knight's combat ability. Every single one of it's strikes was obvious and full of mistakes in Fen's eyes, but the magic construct had Edmond's physical ability before his body was hit with Death's Influence. Fen had to focus completely on the fight to react in time.

"You like my trick? You can't dodge me forever. What do you think will run out first, my Mana or your stamina, because I'm more than willing to make a bet." Even with the knight's expressionless face, Fen could tell the bastard was smiling. Too bad his confidence wouldn't protect him.

Flicking his hand upwards, a Flaming Spear materialized a few meters above Edmond's body. With just a gesture, the spellwork flew downwards, aiming at the Chosen's heart.

The knight saw his gesture and immediately leaped backwards to protect his real body. Edmond turned the construct ethereal to move faster through the air than his Flaming Spear, and rematerialized on top of his body.

Instead of passing through, the Flaming Spear imbedded itself into his armor with a loud cracking noise, cracks spreading throughout the chest of the Mana knight. With a blue hue, the armor started repairing itself, replacing the broken segments as Edmond infused his magical energy into his construct.

Before it could finish however, Fen finally reached Edmond's body. The knight was much faster than him, but it's focus was directed downwards at that moment, allowing him to approach without being noticed.

Placing both hands on his sword, Fen stabbed downward towards the construct. Either way, his strike would hit Edmond or the knight. His opponent had to make a choice; to let himself take a potentially fatal strike, or to let his construct be destroyed.

That was the weakness of using a construct to replace the real body. In a situation where the real body was exposed, the construct would immediately be unable to show use it's full combat ability in order to protect it's real body.

Edmond's lack of experience made him think himself as invincible; he didn't place a shield or other protective barrier around himself, leaving himself exposed to long-range magical attacks, like Fen's Flaming Spear. Although it was a bit of a strain to create the spellwork from so far away on the roof, it was still doable.

In the end, the Chosen had the advantage in power, ability, and magic, but he still lost. Against any other Opfer, he might have won. But not against Fen.

Using all the Vital energy stored within his body, he sent a strike containing all his might downwards aiming at the knight's back.

With a sharp crack, the armor of the Mana Knight was torn apart, but the construct still lived. Tearing his sword back, Fen prepared for another strike but was punched from behind, throwing him away from Edmond's true body.

Glowing beacons of blue Mana revealed the presence of several more knights, crushing the floor beneath their feet as they marched forward. Two, six, twelve. Over two dozen of these knights marched through the blue beacons, before the light disappeared, leaving the armored constructs alone on the roof with Fen.

The damaged knight that protected Edmond's true body fell backwards before gingerly picking up the Chosen's body, turning back and running away from the roof, carrying the pale youth away. The glowing connection between Edmond and his construct knights flashed with golden light before snapping, the knights' eyes glowing red as they all snapped in place to look at Fen.

...Fen had underestimated the magic of a Chosen.

'I must be fucking stupid. No wonder he wasn't using any other magic in the beginning, he must have been creating more knight spellworks to summon them all at once. How much Mana does this guy have, to make something like this?!' Fen's eyes were constantly moving, glancing at each of the knights for any weaknesses. If all of them had the same strength as the first one, then he was in an extremely bad spot.

While Fen was distracted with watching the creation of these new knights, Edmond disappeared from the rooftop, carried away by the injured magic creation. Gritting his teeth, Fen hustled to get off the roof too; fighting so many opponents capable of hitting through each other was not advantageous, especially in such an enclosed space.

Storing his sword across his back, he leaped off the roof, aiming for another rooftop below. Rolling as he landed, he managed to displace most of the kinetic force although his legs were a little scraped. It didn't help that his clothes were ruined from the explosion earlier, but at least his Theoredian armor was still usable... Did 'in tatters' still count as usable?

The knights too jumped off the roof, following him on the way down. Except, instead of falling down, they all turned ethereal and started floating diagonally down to him.

Not looking back, Fen sprinted in the direction where he last saw Edmond's real body, hoping that they didn't get too far away from his position. The unit of knights followed, noticing the intent of his movements and rushing to cut him off before he could see a glimpse of the injured knight and Edmond.

Fen suspected that these constructs weren't connected to Edmond's real body. They didn't have the freedom that the injured knight had, and moved mechanically like there wasn't a person guiding their actions. That must be the price behind creating such a large number of magical constructs; the strain of controlling them all would be unbearable forcing the caster to impart a command onto the Mana knights.

The flash of light when the connection snapped off was probably Edmond giving a command to them, which was why they only started moving after the connection snapped off.

'Alright, think. Where would an injured Mage with no combat experience go? A place to hide so they can heal? That seems likely, but how far would they go?'

'Would they go somewhere close by near the unit of knights, or far away?' Fen reached an alley, hopping into it from the roof tops he was jumping on in the hopes that if the knights lost him in the maze of side streets they might go to wherever Edmond was hiding to regroup.

The only issue was how he was going to actually lose them. He didn't know how the magic constructs worked or even how their senses operated.

By going into the alleyways, he could figure out if they worked based of a visual system or not, and could then react appropriately.

Just like he predicted, ever after he went through several different alleyways, the constructs followed him like a faithful dog, passing through several forks and intersections without hesitation.

'Hmm, they're tracking me somehow... Is it my energy signature?' The entire time, Fen was constantly pumping his Vital energy around his body to improve his physical abilities. Stopping and relying on his own enhanced body would put him at risk of being caught by the knight constructs, but if he was right, then he might be able to lose some of them.

It was a risk that he had to take.

Just like before, Fen stepped off into another side street, but right when the knights lost sight of him he forcibly stopped his Vital energy inside his body, not allowing any of the energy to leak to the outside world where it might get tracked.

Now relying on his own body Fen dashed into another alleyway, and when he didn't see any blue light behind him he rushed into one of the abandoned buildings. His movements were slower than before, but it appeared as if he had lost them. Just in case, Fen calmed his breathing in the case that his gasps for air might give away his position if any Mana knights were listening.

He waited for a couple minutes.

Finally stepping outside, Fen pulled out his sword and held it front of him, focusing his senses to be aware of any construct nearby. Fortunately, they seemed to have missed him. With a barely visible smile on his face, Fen climbed onto a roof to see where the knights went in the hopes that they'd lead him back to Edmond's real body.

Some constructs were floating in the air, patrolling through the ruins, but most were heading in a single direction and then dispersing from there. Memorizing the location, he started walking over while resting his body and hiding from the constructs.

****

"Shit!" Edmond smacked his hand against a knight, the blow slightly stinging his weakened body. Cradling his bruised fingers, the Chosen sent out several more orders to the knights, who'd return back to him once they completed their assignment.

He hadn't expected the Opfer to notice how his constructs worked so quickly.

Now faced with having to track where Fen was hiding, he needed to be smart. Grinding his teeth, Edmond recalled what his instructor asked him before he entered the Task space.

'Just go in, and kill whatever rat you meet. Shouldn't be too hard for you, right Mr. Holden? I'll be expecting you back in the next hour, if you fail to reach my requirements then don't bother even coming back; if you can't kill an insect with all the power you have, then it'd be a waste to continue teaching you.' At the time, Edmond had accepted his words with arrogance, but it turned out that he had severely underestimated his opponent, allowing his body to be crippled for the rest of the fight.

Over three hours had passed since the beginning of the Task, and in that time Edmond had been forced to release the magic passed down from his teacher, Mana Legion. The spellwork fed off his magical energy to create as many Mana knights as possible until his mind started hitting his limits.

Creating the unit of thirty knights on the roof drained him of energy, but he used his recovering Mana pool to create even more knights as more time passed. But his efforts proved to be useless, as increasing the number of knights didn't do much to find his opponent. In fact, as more time passed, it seemed that the number of knights that came back for orders were less and less, almost like Fen was destroying them faster than Edmond could create them.

Just when he was regretting his own stupidity the knight standing guard over him exploded into pieces of Mana, the construct disintegrating from the result of a heavy blow.

Thud.

Like the devil, a cloaked person landed in front of him, holding three Flaming Spears in one hand and a sword in the other, the sound of sizzling flesh thundering in the quiet room.

Edmond stuck his hands in front of him, a pleading expression on his face.

"Wait, you don't have to-"

Fen didn't stop and listen to his plea for mercy, thrusting all three of his Flaming Spears into the Chosen's head, not waiting to see what he'd say. With the sound of shattering glass, the spellworks Edmond had been preparing in secret as soon as he saw him enter cracked into nothing as their owner died.

Having spent the past three hours steadily getting closer and closer to where Edmond had been hiding, Fen had avoided the Mana knights he could and destroyed the ones he couldn't.

Through his encounters with the constructs, Fen had learned the weakness of the magic constructs; their ability to become ethereal wasn't perfect, they could resist both physical and magical attacks but not both at the same time.

His act of destroying the knight earlier was done by throwing a Flaming Spear into it's chest, making the construct think that it was being attacked magically while Fen at the same time destroyed it's torso with his Vital energy filled short sword.

The weapon had performed admirably, but filling it with so much Vital energy was starting to backlash. The weapon was corroded in many places, but the blade managed to retain it's edge.

Now that Edmond was dead, Fen sank to the floor, rubbing his aching muscles. He couldn't remember the amount of times he'd run out of Vital energy and had to continue fighting. Right now, his body was screaming for him to rest.

Thankfully, the blissful golden light soon encased him and the familiar sight of the facility entered his vision.