The next time the whirring appeared, Amari was ready.
He clutched the hilt of his sword and injected a steady stream of man into his body. If he was correct the next opponent would be an enhanced version of the archer puppet.
A second later, the whirring stopped and his next opponent had become evident. It was a puppet wearing light black leather armour that fell apart at the seams. It wasn't as tall as the swordsman puppet but it was much taller than he was.
Its eyes shone with a slight green light that reflected off the fairly large bow in its hands. And like the swordsman's sword, the bow was also in relatively perfect condition.
Not that it matters to him, anyway.
"I defeated your soldier companion. You won't be any more difficult for me!" He proclaimed, pointing the sword straight at the puppet.
"In other words, prepare to get fucked up!"
And without another word said, he shot forward as he activated Rush.
"Die!"
It wasn't as easy though. This puppet was faster.
It dodged to the side with as much ease as the swordsman and drew the string of its bow.
Three blinding arrows appeared in the notch and shot straight at Amari.
'Shit!'
He ducked to the ground a second too late, experiencing the searing sting of the last arrow.
The puppet let out an unintelligible noise from beneath its helmet, but to Amari it sounded too much like a disdainful sneer.
His teeth ground together and his veins popped out of his forehead, but Amari managed to hold himself back.
'It's an archer, meaning it exchanges defences for range, but its speed is unmatched. Meaning I have to stick to a balanced tactic. Pure range won't do me any favours and nor will mindless close combat. Just need to keep calm and minimise energy use as much as possible!'
With that he jumped back a few metres and assessed the opponent again. Unlike the swordsman's sword, this bow had no distinct features. The bow just looked like an ordinary, well-preserved wooden bow.
Meaning the key was in the puppet's energy reserves. That was where it got its arrows from at the end.
'Keep calm!'
He injected a small amount of energy into his sword and struck out once more. A dark line appeared from the blade of the sword and cut through the air straight at the archer.
Shadow Sword!
Having never used the skill before, he had to admit that it was quite interesting. It transformed the shadows into a sort of energy that enveloped his blade and was quite useful when cutting anything at all.
'Fascinating.'
But unfortunately for him, the attack didn't help much at all. The puppet just jumped out of the way and returned with a volley of glowing energy arrows.
This time, Amari had anticipated it and dodged easily. But now he'd figured it out. Not the way to defeat the puppet. No. That was still a mystery to him. He'd figured out the puppet's purpose instead.
"I get it now," he muttered. "You're here to stall the stronger opponents before killing the weaker ones directly. So unless I take it all out, I won't be able to deal with you completely."
Clearly, he was right to some extent since the puppet did not try to deny it.
"In that case, I guess I won't let you succeed. Because if you have noticed, I am in a bit of a hurry."
He clenched his legs as he shot forward, activating both Rush and Flash Step. He'd mostly gotten used to the spine-crushing pressure now, but it was still annoying.
"Die!"
A massive arc of shadows appeared once more, and before the puppet had the chance to react it slashed into the side of its leg.
"Hehe. That was easier than I had expected…"
Unfortunately for him, the crippled puppet didn't look intent on finishing so soon. It hopped back to the farthest end of the arena and pointed its bow straight at Amari. A large blinding white arrow appeared on the bow string.
Its luminescence couldn't be compared to anything else and it was ten times larger than all the previous ones combined.
Amari felt confident that he would be able to dodge it. However, he didn't know whether h would be able to protect himself from the sheer aftermath of destruction that the blinding arrow would cause.
The puppet didn't give him enough time to comprehend though.
A whistling sound emerged as the arrow zipped through the air, aiming straight at Amari's head.
He dodged to the side, activating Shadow Movement at the same time. A small flash of shadow appeared beneath him and teleported him to the other end where the puppet stood. He then stared at the arrow and back at the archer.
"I bet you never expected that did you?" he grinned stupidly, inwardly thanking his stars.
The archer did nothing but continue watching the arrow. Amari did so as well, anticipating the projectile coming into contact with a wall or something of the sort, but nothing like that happened.
'Oh, no…'
The smile on his face faded away as the arrow came to a halt and turned back to face him again.
Homing Arrow!
What kind of archer was this?
He activated shadow movement again, then Rush and Flash Step multiple times as fast as he could. He hoped to keep moving until the arrow lost its momentum.
'Jeez!'
But to no avail…
After a while, he gave up and let the arrow hit him.
It stung. A lot. But it didn't hurt as much as waiting so much mana while trying to dodge the arrow for so long.
The projectile crashed into the armour Fuller gave him, pushing him back a few metres. Its burning white light seared his chest with an unbelievable amount of heat until it ran out of energy.
He got up as quickly as he could and destroyed the archer, deliberately separating its pieces.
Later, he checked his mana points.
[700/1000]
"I fucking hate archers!