Please read the author's notes. (Examples and explanation of moves and appearance+ Monster Sources)
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pat.treon: Keanu_Eugene
CHAPTER START---
Standing at the edge of the doorway, a mere 10 feet from the 36th Floor main corridor, one massive valley formed between two sheer cliff walls made of smooth, almost porcelain-like stone, impossible to simply climb without assistance, the Trifecta look forward at the hoards of monsters.
"Well, as much as I hate to admit it, Yang's got a point, this looks pretty fun..." Thalie mutters softly.
"Fun? What part of being forced to fight hoards and hoards of monsters in a long hallway sounds fun?" Welf questions, sarcasm dripping with every word.
"All of it, don't you know, WE are what we OVERCOME, besides, I haven't gotten to stretch my legs properly and you two have done a lot, let me take this..." Yang says while casually walking forward.
"You heard the man, let's just check the drops while he does his thing," Thalie says as she watches Yang walk forward, retrieving a snack from her pouch and taking moment to relax.
'Alright kid, let's see what you can do, Mr. Expedition Commander' she thinks while honing in on all of Yang's movements with a trained eye, her life of training as a warrior coming into play once more.
Walking forward, a group of 11 Giant Apes, each standing between 20 and 25 feet tall, with thick brown fur surrounding their bodies and two large tusks extending from their lower jaws upward breaching their lips, visible for all to see.
Standing barely 20 feet away, further into the valley from Yang, two Giant Crocodiles lay still, eyes closed as their 30ft bodies from tip to tail slowly hum, eyes closed as their breathing is steady, completely asleep.
'Ooookaaayyy.... what the fuck is going on here?' Yang questions to himself as he observes the strange behavior of these monsters.
'The Apes aren't even paying attention to me and the crocs are... asleep? And how the hell isn't this valley in chaos with all these monsters here and me standing right here, none of this adds up,'
Looking around, once more, he sees no signs pointing toward an answer within the valley, until he cranes his neck upward.
Far above the hundreds of meters of the sheer cliff, even further above the upper level of this floor, Yang notices, leaves.
'There are plants up there, that's... a branch, right?' He ponders as he focuses his vision further upward.
"Fuck it, first things first." He says while shifting his focus toward the monsters.
As he steps forward, the moment he is fully within the massive corridor, the dull and even the closed eyes of the monster before him immediately snap open, blaring red, seething with anger are trained onto him as all heads snap in his direction.
"Fuck! Agro zone---" Yang immediately yells out as his mage armor flares to life, with blue flames and purple lightning matting his body he leaps a dozen meters vertically to get a good view of the area.
'Giant Apes, Giant Crocs... some kinda stone things?' he quickly assesses while glancing further ahead in the soon-to-be battlefield.
As Yang clears the height vertically with his great leap, he feels a weight on his leg.
A Giant Ape had leaped into the air and grabbed onto his leg as best it could.
"OOOH AHH!" The monster cries out as the flames and lightning damage its palm, immediately causing it to release its hold and plummet to the floor with a loud crash.
"Huh, honestly I forget that does that hahaha!"
"Is he serious?" Thalie questions, a look of disbelief on her face.
"Sigh, honestly I'm not that surprised, I mean... does he even feel it?" Welf questions with a raised eyebrow.
As they look at the fight, Yang suddenly raises his hands above his head into two closed fists, before propelling himself downward feet first, impacting the hoard like a meteor vengefully striking the floor below.
As the cloud of dust and bits of stone settle down, three of the Apes can be seen, or what's left of them at least splattered across the floor, burnt bits here and there as the scent of burnt blood wafts through the air.
"YOU MISSED SOME!" Thalie yells out as the remaining 8 Apes immediately rush toward Yang.
"RELAX I'M---" His words are cut off as he proceeds to duck and weave between multiple swipes, using a small push from a flame under his foot to reach up to one of the creatures and kick it directly into the face.
"I'M ENJOYING THE FIGHT!" He hastily yells out as the monster's head is caved in and burnt.
Using the shoulder of the falling corpse as a foothold, he steps on the body and points out with his index finger before waving his hand to his right.
'Water Cutter'
A jet of water slashes through one of the monster's hands as it made its way to grab him, severing the fingers before he waves his hand back and removes the entire wrist.
"RAARGH!" The Ape cries out as it clutches its wrist, desperately trying to cover the fountain of blood pouring out of its limb.
As Yang pivots off his self-made leverage from his flames, he swings his left arm at the same ape, dragging with it a gust of wind, tightly condensed and sharp as a knife toward the chest of the monster.
'Wind Blade'
The monster's chest from center to the right shoulder is divided, in two around a clear wound, the cracked crystal where the heart would be shattered as the body turns to ash and blows away.
'Shit!'
He suddenly raises his right arm, gauntlet at the side of his face as he spots a massive fist, the size of his body barreling toward him from his peripheral vision.
'Wind Wall'
A barrier of wind erects itself onto his defending arm and spreads out to shield his body immediately.
As the fist collides against the invisible barrier, the wall shatters easily.
"Argh!" He shouts out as the fist collides with his body as if there was never any obstacle.
*CRACK*
Yang is embedded into the smooth wall of the valley, sunk in deep enough to stop him from falling.
Before he can even get out of the wall, another fist is completely blocking his vision as it comes crashing down onto him.
"YANG!" Welf yells as he places a hand on his greatsword and makes to move forward, only to be stopped by Thalie placing a hand on his shoulder.
"Look..." That is all she says, motioning toward the Giant Apes' fist.
The trembling fist of the ape, shaking as if it were freezing cold, was slowly being pushed back.
Pinned between the fist and the wall, Yang can barely be seen with his back against the wall, his hands dug into the hard surface to give himself extra leverage as the soles of his feet are planted against the knuckles of the monster, a small grin on his face as he slowly but surely pushes the limb back.
"RAARGH!" The ape cries out as it places more strength into the attack, leaning with its full weight as best it can onto the small adventurer.
The moment the weight was pressed against Yang's boots, before either combatant could decide a victor, physics intervened.
The force of the relatively tiny boots against the massive fist caused Yang's feet up to his shins to sink into the monster's fist, splashing a bit of blood across the young adventurer as the ape reels back in pain.
As the instinct to retract its fist from the cause of the pain takes hold, the creature swings its arms outward and upward, not realizing Yang's feet were still embedded into it.
As the limb flails upward, the momentum dislodges the young adventurer and tosses him upward, now slamming him into the opposite wall of the valley.
"BLEGH---" Yang stops himself from losing his lunch as he exits the wall and hovers above the monsters once more, the taste of the monster blood that splattered into his mouth being completely new and utterly disgusting to him.
"Ok, my wind still kinda sucks, water isn't too bad, let's go old school," He says while dropping straight to the floor, with a shimmer of white light in his right hand, the simple blade Sarran had first made for him appears in his right hand. The weapon having only one part, a greatsword made of one piece of refined metal, from tip to handle free of any flammable materials by Yang's own request.
"Oh...this is interesting," Welf comments as he sees the change in style.
"Didn't know he could fight like... normal people" Thalie responds as she continues eating.
Squaring his shoulders, Yang places both hands on the grip of his weapon, looking up at the suddenly much more imposing hoard of Giant Apes before him with a new feeling bubbling in his chest.
'I feel, naked, without my magic...' He thinks while taking one deep breath, pushing forward with all the physical strength he has toward the monsters.
As he dashes forward, the entire hoard matches his energy, clearly excited to not have to deal with the dangerous magic or flying advantage he had before.
Pushing himself more than he ever has before, focusing everything he has on his own body instead of his magic, the world becomes slightly slower, nothing when compared to people such as the sword princess, but enough to throw Yang off for a moment.
Swinging his blade against an incoming fist, the metal shears through flesh and bone with ease at speed unnerving for a level 4. With his new understanding of his body's capabilities, before Yang can even stop he slams face-first into the fist of another monster.
Being ragdolled across the floor, he loses his grip on his greatsword while tumbling over himself, eventually skidding to a halt a few meters away.
"Ahh---"
His groaning is cut off by the urgent need to roll to his side, narrowly avoiding another fist striking his previous spot, immediately a shimmer of white appears in his left hand as his longsword appears in his grasp, rising to a crouch and leaping forward he slashes out, severing the monsters wrist.
As the Giant Ape reels back in pain, Yang quickly jumps and slashes the monster's chest, destroying the crystal within and turning the monster into ash with one swing.
Without missing a beat, he immediately rushes the other apes with his longsword, his speed and agility being too much for the large monsters to track properly and intercept.
'Focus the tendons and joints, slow and immobilize, then go in for the kill,' He chants in his mind, repeating Thalie's words over and over, with every slash, with every bone he slices through, with every tendon he severs, his confidence in his swordsmanship grows.
His hesitation subsides, his movements become more natural, his strikes grow more accurate, he becomes more deadly, and the smile on his face grows that much more.
As he stared up at the final Giant Ape, the other already fading to dust on the battlefield, Yang can't help the smile plastered for all to see across his face.
"This feels so amazing..." He says in a low voice, taking a deep breath, he rushes the final ape.
He leaps toward the center of the chest with one final swing, the monsters' crystal being his target.
As his blade arcs downward, diagonally to slash from shoulder to waist, blue flames burst to life, as he completes his swing. Bright red markings flicker to life on his body for barely a moment.
Instead of a dead monster, he simply throws molted liquid metal across the monster's chest as the weapon melts in his grasp.
His eyes shoot open, wide from the surprise of what just happened, a final swing ruined because his hand simply had no weapon.
A fist smashes into his left side.
*BOOM*
The monster slams him into the wall of the valley. Blood pouring from all over its body in the aftermath of the fight that was just about to finish, as it presses its now open palm into Yang however, a torrent of flame shoots out from his spot, incinerating the monsters' arm before a single firebolt destroys its crystal.
CHAPTER END---