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---
Running through the 37th floor, Yang is with Welf in the rearguard as Tiona and Thalie cut down everything in their path.
As they mow through hoards of skeletal soldiers and skeletal sheep blocking their path, the amazon finds time to speak up between strikes.
"So...we made it all this way... and you didn't lift a finger. Aren't you strong?"
Nobody had to wonder who she was talking to. On the way down Yang hadn't made one attack, only hung back and let everyone else fight the monsters.
"It's not his fault we asked for this," Thalie steps in to explain.
"Huh?"
"This is training, he's already so far ahead of us, we need to work extra hard to catch up," Welf adds from beside Yang, the young man looked all sweaty from the constant running and fighting, pushing himself extra hard just to keep pace with the strolling level 5s.
"Oh, so he's letting you practice on the monsters that are useless for him? Kinda like how we let Raul take command on the highest floors for practice..." she realizes.
"Uh, yeah basically, best not take Excelia from Welf when he needs it from these floors more."
"And here I thought you were just lazy hehe my bad," she gives him a sheepish smile.
"It's whatever, lets get to the middle of this floor quick, we should have a few hours left."
At his command, Welf rejoins the fray, done taking his rest and ready to increase his stats just a bit more.
As they battle through the white stone walls of the 37th-floor labyrinth. Nothing is able to so much as stall them. Tiona hits harder than any of these monsters with just her greatsword. Thalie quickly disables monsters before finishing them with precision strikes, and Welf cuts through everything like a hot knife through butter.
After another half hour at Welf's top speed; always moving at the top speed of the slowest person, they find themselves in the throne room of the white palace. The Monster Rex Udaeus's room.
"Alright everyone rests up, we made good time. We've only been going for around a day non-stop, that gives us a few hours before it spawns," Yang places his palms on the ground, stone benches and a picnic table rise out of the ground for them to use.
"Wow, that's awesome!" Tiona cheers as she takes a seat on the bench, happy not to have to sit on the rocky floor.
"Yeah, his magic is the best. Both of them..." Welf takes out his forging tools and casually begins to sharpen Tiona's greatsword without her even asking.
"So, you guys really gonna fight Udaeus?"
"Hmm, you getting cold feet there Amazon?" Thalie teases the girl.
"You don't have to use my alias ya know, Tiona is fine. But yeah I dunno how I feel fighting it without my full team. Udaeus is kinda intense..."
"C'mon, don't trust us to handle it?" Welf fakes his best hurt voice.
"Well..."
"Wow, that hurt. But relax we aren't fighting it," Thalie tells her.
"But... then why are we here?"
"Oh, he's fighting it, not US," Welf explains as he nods toward Yang, the man in question sitting opposite Tiona at the table.
"ALONE?!"
"Mhm," Yang hums his answer as he withdraws a book to read.
"That's insane, you'll die!"
"You're too loud. And relax, I've got a plan."
"To solo Udaeus, wait, you did solo the other two monster rexes... can you actually do it?" She asks skeptically, only receiving a sly look from Yang as he shifts his attention back into his book.
"Here, try to quiet down already," he withdraws a box of chocolate for the girl.
"Uh-huh, give HER sugar, thanks a lot genius..." Thalie groans as Tiona is already stuffing her face.
"She's your roommate not mine anyway," he shrugs.
"You're the worst."
"I try..."
A few hours later, Tiona lays across the table at the back of the boss room taking a nap while the Trifecta have a small chat. Waiting for Udaeus to spawn.
"So what's the plan?" Thalie asks while moving into a yawn.
"Hit it really hard," Yang shrugs.
"Please tell me you're joking," Welf pleads with his friend.
"Mostly."
"Don't you have a cool weapon like those two?" Tiona asks as she rolls onto her side, now facing the Trifecta as they all look toward Yang who's standing a few feet away from the table looking at the boss room.
"Nope, I only have a regular greatsword."
"First class adamantite greatsword," Welf corrects him.
"Hm, guess that's regular when ur rich huh..." Tiona mutters.
"I spend more time in the dungeon than the surface since I came to Orario, I'd be surprised if I wasn't rich, but yeah I won't be using that. It'll probably just break. I just need to take out his joints after he accepts my challenge."
"And how're you gonna do that since he's so resistant to magic, it takes Riveria's artillery elf squad a few volleys just to bring this thing down with our help," Tiona informs him.
"My hands."
The way he says that with such certainty almost sends a shiver down her spine.
"Wait, challenge?" She finally catches on.
"If you duel him he draws a sword, that's what I'm after," Yang casually mentions.
"You just, told her so easily?" Thalie questions.
"Didn't feel like knocking her out and dealing with her familia breathing down my neck, besides, doubt anyone is actually dumb enough to fight Udaeus solo for a hunk of metal."
"You are," Welf points out.
"Yeah, but I'm unreasonable and abnormal. I expect better from other first-class adventurers," he shrugs.
"That... yeah that's fair," Thalie can't help but agree, "so what's the actual plan?"
"Trade blows till he draws the sword, if I feel too threatened I'm tearing this entire room apart. Udaeus is super resistant to magic because he's the king of all Spartoi monsters on this floor but he isn't immune. Between that and me hitting him really hard, I should manage. If the worst happens don't get between us, especially if I get too into the fight," he gives them a basic rundown.
"I thought you went into the dungeon to train THAT, didn't work?" Thalie questions.
"Not exactly, I can kinda control it, I can at least aim it," Yang admits with a forced smile.
"That new skill is a serious problem man, just don't look our way."
"It won't make me attack my friends, I just really like to fight, it's like me but turned up to 11 out of 10," Yang shrugs.
"Mhm, let's get back."
"Uh, am I missing something here?" Tiona asks.
"Nah," Thalie says while dragging the girl closer to the doorway of the room.
"Hey Welf, if I crack these you can fix them right, I wanna see how much they can take in this fight..." Yang asks while showing off his Elementalist Gauntlets.
"Yeah I can repair them, assuming you win so I get more of the sword to work with, I wanna see their limits too so I'll be watching, good luck man."
After another hour, everyone just about got comfortable waiting. Yang sat at the small slope near the doorway while staring out to the middle of the room. His party was back in the doorway waiting to see the fight.
The floor and walls suddenly began to rumble. The loose small stones scattered around the room were dancing in place as the sound of the ground shattering echoed around the room.
A massive block of stone rises out of the ground. Immediately ten claws, no, skeletal fingers black as the night sky protrude out of the side of the block facing the entrance to the room.
With one motion the block is split in two and both halves slam against the side of the room as the monster rex frees itself from the stone.
The massive monster is finally revealed. A jet black humanoid skeleton, two curled horns on its head reaching out to its sides, red orbs in its joints everywhere on its body and the eyes. The monster crystal protected by the sturdy ribcage and located where the heart would be.
Though it had no legs, the pelvis being anchored to the ground in the middle of the room, this monster had the ability to raise jet black bone lances out of the floor to skewer enemies. Even without legs, its head is still ten feet above the monster rex of the 17th floor, still larger than the goliath.
"Hmm, kinda dramatic huh, no sword... guess we'll have to go a few rounds first," Yang lifts both his hands, flames in his right and wind around his left.
"Tiona, make sure you're wrapped up tight, heatshield up Welf," he commands as he rapidly builds his magic for the first attack.
As he stands out of reach of Udaeus, white skeletons begin to rise out of the ground, legions of white Spartoi, the level 4 monsters all snap their heads toward Yang, toward the challenger.
As they begin rushing toward him, bone swords and spears in hand ready to kill, he doesn't move.
He stands in place preparing his magic.
"Just because magic isn't super effective doesn't mean I can't tear you up if I build enough, I'm taking your crown Udaeus."
'FIRESTORM!'
As the soldiers were merely 20ft from reaching Yang, a sudden torrent of wind-blasted them back, the stream of wind was nonstop.
From his other hand, the flames erupted forth and merged with the wind, moving directly toward the center of the room, directly toward Udaeus.
As all of the soldiers were tosses around, the wind rushes round and round making a whirlwind that pulled them all toward their king as the flames raged on and on.
The figure of Udaeus can be seen in the blue flames, tossing and lashing out as he tries to get his soldier off him. Tries to fight the magic storm he's being burnt by.
Even Yang wasn't spared from the devastation of his attack, thankfully not being dragged along by his winds but the heat and flames engulfed up to even where he was standing. The entrance to the room was spewing out flames causing his party to distance themselves rather than take the unnecessary risk of using Welf's shield.
As the attack finally stopped a few long moments later, Yang had poured quite a bit of mana into raising the intensity of the heat in that first hit, and the results showed.
The entire room was...leaking... the stone walls, floor, and ceiling were dripping chunks of molten rock, effectively the room was a big game of 'The floor is lava', at least for people that couldn't handle it.
"Wow!" Tiona yells out as she peeks into the room, seeing the damage and the charred Udaeus in the middle, still looking healthy and unarmed.
"Get back, I'm not done..." Yang takes a deep breath, slamming his hands onto the molten stone.
'Jötunheimr!'
A wave of pure cold, no ice, just cold, washes over the entire room, extending down into the adjoining hallway. The molten stone of the room hardens and cools into a more brittle solid form than before as he pours more and more magic into this attack, trying to weaken his opponent however he can.
Leaping to the left and canceling his attack, Yang narrowly dodges some of the bone spikes rising out of the floor in a line from Udaeus toward him.
"Fine, hands it is..." he mutters while flying toward Udaeus.
With no hesitation, he flares his full mage armor, focusing extra magic and fire into his hands, into his new gauntlets. The grooves on the equipment glow bright blue to match his flames as he strikes out at Udaeus's.
As he's approaching a quick right-hand swats him out of the air, ragdolling him back and preventing him from reaching the shoulder joints.
"ACH! Fuck it... let's see how strong you are first, I'm supposed to challenge you to get the sword, so I'll give you a head-on challenge," Yang changes tactics, noticing Udaeus intentionally protects his own weak points.
Using his feet instead of flying, he sprints up to Udaeus, narrowly avoiding lances on his left and right, eventually being forced to simply punch through them to reach his goal.
As he arrived in front of the monster, Udaeus already had a hand cocked back to punch forward.
Yang understood how fast Udaeus striking speed was, one fist would instantly be followed up by another, but he wasn't gonna back down.
As Udaeus brought his fist down, Yang punched up, a massive fist the size of a car met a human hand clad in metal, flames, and magic. The force of the collision shatters the floor below Yang, he has to push magic into his legs and the ground just to prevent himself from losing his footing and leverage.
Neither combatant backs down, Udaeus draws his right arm back only to strike down with his left, met again by Yang.
The echoing shockwaves tear through the room and resound down the connecting hallways.
Their fists met, again and again, countless times at absurd speeds.
Though they may be level 5 Tiona nor Thalie could keep up with this exchange of blows.
Both combatants had versatile arsenals.
Yang could fly, he had long-range spells, he had the elements at his side.
Udeaus had his spikes, he had his soldiers; although they were destroyed by the previous attack.
They only chose to use their fists, it was idiotic, it was barbaric, it was far from efficient, but it's what they both wanted.
A loud cackling could be heard across the 37th floor at this moment, the monster rex was laughing with every punch. He was having fun, enjoying the fight.
Yang tried his best to keep calm, to keep a level head. But he couldn't, he liked to fight too, and his new skill certainly wasn't helping. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest, the pain in his arms just kept getting him more and more pumped.
"HAHAHHAHHAAHAHAHAHAAH!" he breaks into a burst of mad laughter matching the floor boss as his mouth formes a manic grin.
HE was having the time of his life.
THEY were having the time of their lives...
END CHAPTER---
Udeaus X Yang?