The Collector's four red eyes glimmered with flickers of crimson as they zoomed in on the fighter's arm injury and assessed the damage.
This was an injury so grievous that the fighter could not simply weather through it. He had lost a sizable chunk of muscle mass and connective tissue in his right arm, rendering it useless biomechanically.
On top of this, because nerves and muscle fibers acted as physical anchors for spirit roots, the amount of magical energy that the fighter could exert on his right arm was now cut at by 64 percent.
The Collector clicked its mandibles in wariness, for the fighter still had another arm to fight with, and his strikes were nothing to underestimate either. In addition, the Collector could not afford to perform the maneuver it had to inflict this wound upon the fighter.
The Collector could not react to the speed of the fighter's throw, but at the very least, it could predict when it was thrown and how it would be thrown and attempt to counter attack during it.
The fighter was always wary of the Collector and threw it in such a way that its upper arms possessing the monomolecular blades never endangered him.
Thus, when the fighter threw the Collector, it had unsheathed its purifying light blades at the moment of the throw, causing them to skid across the fighter's right arm. The fighter's throws were so quick that even the fighter himself actually did not properly react to them.
Rather, he performed them with almost rote, mechanical precision, having memorized their movement to such a practiced degree that the throws were as natural a movement as breathing to him. This allowed him to massively accelerate the speed of his throws because he did not waste time thinking about them.
The combination of pre-programmed throws along with massive short term bursts of Flow acceleration allowed the fighter to surpass the limitations of his natural speed, but it also meant he could not adjust the mechanics of the throw once he initiated it. He relied entirely upon the fact that the throws would be too fast for anyone to counter as his sole defense.
The Collector, however, was perhaps the only living organism on this entire world that had the necessary processing capabilities to obtain the correct timing for a predictive counter. Its purifying light blades had carved into the fighter's right arm, and deep enough that their explosive effect registered, for the fighter could not react in time to use [Guard].
The fighter's primal density of 50% which allowed him to use mana in this environment now worked against him, dealing him a grievous wound.
Yet, the Collector was still at a severe disadvantage.
The Collector's mana reserves were running at 5% now. It only had enough for one good engagement. No more explosive regenerations. Only one strong attack. If it had to be thrown during this attack to sustain a severe wound, then so be it.
The ground rumbled suddenly, and the Collector and the fighter both turned their attentions further into the cavern where a sizable Glaciated Serpent emerged. A dozen times larger than the ordinary serpent quite easily. It was eyeless like its brethren, but it was engorged in primal energy, granting it a shimmering white and blue aura that emanated from its pale, smooth and snowy scales.
The serpent was easily twenty meters long, a creature of considerable bulk dwarfing either the Collector and the fighter, and it loosed a shrill, siren-like roar as it sensed two intruders in its lair. The serpent flitted out its dark blue forked tongue, getting a sense of its environment and the location of the two intruders, and then swiveled its head to the Collector, sensing its magical energy levels as being lower.
The Collector clicked its mandibles in annoyance at this distraction. A mindless beast that disturbed the battle the Collector had devoted itself to. And the fact that this creature thought itself capable of defeating the Collector just because the Collector operated on minimal magical energy was foolishness.
The serpent rushed towards the Collector, opening its maw while firing off a crackling bolt of blue energy that would flash freeze anything it came into contact with.
The Collector weaved through the chaotic arcs of the beam's movement, flying upwards until it was upon the side of the serpent's head in an instant. It then clenched its fist, powering it with its coilboosters, blood burst, and a minimal amount of chaos mana. Its arm muscles swelled up to nearly twice their size before the Collector slammed the engorged limb right into the serpent's head, sending it rolling through the cavern.
Cracks lined the side of the creature's scaled head as it squealed and rolled towards the fighter.
The fighter intercepted the serpent mid-tumble with its good arm, grabbing at a tendril-like white whisker protruding from the serpent's face. Then, the fighter performed its instantaneous throw again, his [Circling Storm] as he called it.
In the next instant, the serpent was gone, having been thrown through the tunnel that the Collector had drilled through when it was thrown here initially.
The sound of rock shattering as the larger bulk of the serpent broke through the tunnel resonated through the air before it disappeared, the serpent likely now flying through the open air before plummeting down to the depths of the mountain bases below.
The fighter exhaled calmly before he turned to face the Collector, his legs driving into the rocky ground of the cavern in a stance. Surprisingly, he managed to move his mangled arm, readying it in his usual stance, though this time, he had switched his forward hand to his left hand.
The Collector encased mana around one of its eyes to observe what was occurring and analyzed that the fighter was manually directing the flow of magically energy throughout his body. In essence, he created individual threads of magical energy that replaced the function of the countless muscle fibers and nerves he had lost, thereby manually moving his arm.
This was similar to how the Collector could utilize Sapia to create artificial blood flow to patch up a grievous wound. However, that was only possible because the Collector's exceptional processing power could mimic the function of the countless nerves and muscle fibers required to compensate for a severe enough wound.
"I apologize for the distraction," said Kui. "And though I may take my stance, I do so only out of caution. For I offer you now the chance to end this trial. If not, then we may continue to fight, but now that we have both been pushed to extremes, I can no longer guarantee that in a fight for our lives that either of us will survive."
The Collector knew that the fighter was right. The Collector calculated it had a 77% chance of inflicting another deadly wound on the fighter known as 'Kui' when he executed his next throw, one that would likely lead to his death, but at the same time, if the fighter performed a throw with the maximal amount of his magical energy instead of what he had been withholding, then the Collector had no guarantee it would survive either, nor did it have enough mana to reliably regenerate itself.
This was a stalemate. The first the Collector had ever encountered.
"It is prudent for both of us to end this altercation if we are to sustain our continued existences," said the Collector. "If there is no need for further battle, then I find it agreeable to cease hostilities. Provided that this 'trial' of yours has been proven satisfactory."
The fighter known as 'Kui' broke from his stance, resuming his almost lazy standing position with his arms dangling to his sides. "You have passed resoundingly. You are worthy of the shard that you bear. You are worthy of the fated destiny to bring forth the one True End."
"True End? Elaborate further," said the Collector, but the fighter raised up a hand.
"Later. For now, let us take the time to share a meal. It is only right after such a fierce battle. The likes of which I have faced only twice in my life," said the fighter.
==
The Collector watched as the fighter known as 'Kui' sat cross-legged in the snow, tearing off chunks of a large Glaciated Serpent he had additionally caught on the way back to the cavern where the goblins were. Unlike tinkerers, the fighter ate the meat raw, his sharp, bestial teeth chewing through the tough and stringy white flesh with ease.
"These creatures are quite ugly, and yet, their taste is quite profound. It reminds me of the Seashell Crabs of my home province. Ah, the memories of home do call to me sometimes," said Kui, his face still emotionless.
A distance away and visibly wary of him, the goblins sat in their own circle, eating the meat that Kui had brought.
They, however, preferred cooked meat, and they had improvised a way to make it in these frigid conditions by gently scraping the Collector's purifying light blades along the meat to gently sear it.
"Are you sure you will not eat?" said Kui as he eyed the Collector. The Collector sat in meditative pose in front of the Collector, restoring its magical energy reserves.
"No. I have already devoured that specimen, and the biomass that it provides is negligible enough that it is not worth time lost entering this state of enhanced mana regeneration," said the Collector. "Now that you are consuming sustenance, explain to me further the nature of this true End and what you deem a 'fated destiny' upon me."
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