Path to Transcendence

Julius managed to find and hunt down another three groups of trolls before the sun started to set. They were unexciting fights for the most part. Julius would launch his assault from a distance at a group of unaware trolls and every time he would kill them before they could even get close to him.

There was only a single time when a leader had noticed the attack before it reached them. It had activated its enhancement skill before the spike landed, but it didn’t make much of a difference. Julius killed it all the same.

He never felt any pressure or danger during these fights, so he didn’t receive many level-ups. However, his newly evolved skills were still low level so they naturally didn’t take much to rank up.

[Arcane Construct lvl 2 -> lvl 3]

[Pure Compression lvl 1 -> lvl 3]

[Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal lvl 2 -> lvl 3]

[Kinetic Reinforcement] still hadn’t leveled up even after he had been using it the entire time during his hunt. However, he could feel it was close. It was right about to cross the threshold holding it back. All it needed was a little push.

He had given himself a day to eliminate as many trolls as he could. He had done well on that front, taking down over two dozen trolls in a few hours. However, now that he was running out of daylight, he wouldn’t be able to hunt down many more without attacking the camp directly. Therefore, he permitted himself to play around for a little bit.

With an excited smirk, he dashed off again to find one more group.

The next group he found was making their way back to the encampment. It was a large group of six with a larger troll at the head of them.

Perfect, Julius thought with a smile.

He created five disks and sent them shooting toward the group. Like his past fights, they didn’t have time to react and were dead before they noticed the attack. The troll leader on the other hand was completely unharmed. Julius hadn’t sent any attacks at it.

The remaining troll had gotten its bearings back quickly and immediately activated its skill, covering it from head to toe in a red gleam. Then it took the axe strapped across its back and bum-rushed Julius’s position.

This troll seemed stronger than the other leaders he had fought earlier. Its red aura was more solid and released a pressure that the others hadn’t. Its higher physical prowess was made apparent as each step it took exploded the ground. It was faster than the other troll leaders and Julius estimated it was at least as fast as himself.

Julius began to feel the normal sensations of fear, anxiety, and excitement course through him. The adrenaline started to make his heart race and he could feel [Savage Dance] activating, retraining the overflow of these emotions. He had learned that while [Savage Dance] could effectively mute these sensations, he couldn’t extinguish all of them. Finding a delicate balance of passion and rationale was imperative. Not enough passion and he found his attacks lacking in strength and creativity. Too much passion and he found himself getting lost in the moment with no control over himself.

That was why he allowed himself to feel a small amount of each emotion, even negative ones like fear and pain. They kept him on his toes, honing his focus to heights beyond what he thought possible.

The troll was almost on top of him, bringing its massive axe around it a crushing blow. Julius hadn’t released any of his techniques at it while it charged him. He wanted to put this thing down the old-fashioned way. With his two fists.

He took a quick step back, avoiding the axe blade by a few inches, and then ducked under the ensuing backswipe. He got into the guard of the troll with a single burst step and uncorked a crippling blow to the thing’s chest, knocking it off its feet and breaking several ribs in the process.

Julius tried to capitalize on the opening but had to avoid the kick from the downed troll. It had quickly regained its footing and the wound on its chest had already healed by the time it got back up.

The troll looked at Julius with more caution than before. It wasn’t attacking recklessly anymore. It started to examine him and waited for him to make another move. This was the first time Julius had seen such intelligence from a troll and subconsciously upgraded the monster’s threat in his mind.

The two of them just shuffled around each other for a few moments, getting a feel for one another. But it was Julius that made the first move. He created a large curtain of flames and sent them right at the troll’s face, taking away its line of sight. Julius couldn’t see the troll either, but he didn’t need his eyes to fight. [Spatial Perception] was keeping track of the troll better than his eyes ever could.

With no vision, the troll wasn’t able to see Julius coming in from the right. Using [Arcane Construct] and [Pure Compression] he created brass knuckles around his fists. Then as the troll lost track of Julius, he delivered a crushing blow to its kneecap, blasting over half of it right off, dropping the troll to one knee. Julius took advantage of its limited mobility and released a combination of strikes at the troll’s skull.

Its skull was much harder than any other troll he had fought. It felt like he was punching a solid piece of steel. However, he wanted to try to do as much damage as possible, so he didn’t let up even as his arms started to hurt. Unfortunately, he got greedy and one of its frantic swings clipped him in the side and sent him flying away. It wasn’t following up on its successful strike, as it was still staggering to its feet in a drunken stupor.

Ironically, that small hit had done more damage to Julius than what he had managed to do to the troll. It had broken several ribs, and his collarbone, as well as damaging some of his organs. [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] which was passively running throughout the fight, cranked up to maximum output. Flames weaved up and down his torso, healing him just as fast as, if not more so than the troll.

He got back to his feet within a blink of an eye and charged right back at the troll. It was still slightly wobbly on its feet and was retrieving its axe which it had dropped. It was bent over and its back was turned to Julius, so he decided to run as fast as he could and leaped feet first at it. Both of his feet, supercharged with kinetic energy, smashed into the troll’s back. It was tossed right off its feet and tumbled a dozen or so paces away. Leaving a big puff of dust in its wake.

It got back up to its feet and stared menacingly at Julius with its blood-red irises. For some reason, Julius got the impression that the troll was really pissed off. He couldn’t imagine what he had done to receive such a look. Then Julius directed a large toothy smile at the scary gray monster.

It seemed like that pushed it over the top. The troll roared and dashed right toward him, all of its previous composure was gone.

Taunt successful, Julius smirked.

In its rage, its swings were much easier to predict and avoid. Julius allowed it to continue to attack, just dodging and occasionally absorbing any kinetic energy he could. Absorbing kinetic energy from an opponent while it was attacking up close was always hard, but it had slowly become more manageable with diligent practice.

He wasn’t sending out many of his own attacks. He would counter with an occasional punch or kick, but that was more to get space. Instead, he was using this opportunity to train kinetic absorption in close combat.

As Julius continued to evade and absorb the kinetic energy of its strikes, he was using that kinetic energy to charge his entire body. Charging his body with kinetic energy didn’t do much other than allow him to store more than his core’s capacity. Typically, when he used kinetic energy he would only use it for specific parts. If he needed to run fast he would send it to his legs. If he wanted to punch, he would send it to his fist. Rarely would he ever charge his entire body with kinetic energy, it was too wasteful otherwise.

Wait, Julius paused for a second and almost got his head taken off in the process.

When he threw a punch, he didn’t just use his fist. He used his entire body like the rotation of his hips or the contraction of his back. So why was he only sending a burst of mana at the point of impact?

If he wasn’t busy avoiding a giant troll’s axe, he would have slapped his forehead in exasperation. He wanted to try it out immediately. He had more than enough kinetic energy from absorbing the troll’s attacks, if anything he didn’t know what to do with the excess.

Julius released a burst of kinetic energy from his hips, then from his back, and finally released from his arm. Aiming at an opening the troll’s swing left for him. Unfortunately, it didn’t work like he expected and his timing was way off. He ended up looking like he was having a seizure instead. The troll hadn’t expected Julius to attack out of the blue as he had been playing defense for most of the fight, but it still managed to bring its axe back around for a quick swing.

Julius didn’t have time to dodge this strike, so he formed a thick plate of mana as condensed as he could in such a short time using [Pure Compression] and [Arcane Construct]. The blow slammed into the impromptu barrier. The plate of mana held for a moment but quickly shattered under the force of a physically enhanced troll. Luckily, the strike wasn’t close to a full-powered swing and the slight resistance it was met with had deviated its path enough so that it only left a deep gash in his chest.

His spontaneous experiment had almost killed him again. It was becoming a bad habit, one that he should probably fix.

But that was his future self’s problem. For now, he decided to double down. He was going to try again. This time he wasn’t going to do the same thing. Releasing multiple bursts of mana like that was way too hard to time, and didn’t feel like it would work no matter how hard he practiced with it. It was too disconnected. What he needed was to seamlessly transition the burst of mana throughout his body in one strike.

His body was already charged with too much kinetic energy and [Kinetic Reinforcement] was running as it supported his body from breaking down from the energy. What he needed was to release a single continuous surge of kinetic energy that flowed from the legs to the hips, to the back, and then funnel into his limb, where it would release into his target.

Once he had envisioned the process and felt like he had a good idea of what he was going to do, he waited for an opportunity. The troll was still all over him, not slowing down for a second.

There, he saw an opening where the troll had overextended and would not be able to protect itself. Julius released a burst step and found himself right in front of the troll’s chest. Then without hesitation unleashed a monstrous strike right into its ribcage.

The force of his punch dwarfed his other attacks. If his previous strikes were like a toddler’s punch then his new one hit like a hydraulic press. It was fast but it wasn’t even the speed that made it so powerful. There was a titanic force behind his fist. As a result, it was too much for his brass knuckles and had completely shattered the constructs around his hands. It also nearly disintegrated every bone in his arm, which practically exploded from the force. There was also extreme tissue damage and hairline fractures running throughout his whole body.

On the bright side, the troll had taken the worst of the exchange. Its entire chest had imploded leaving a massive hole in its chest. It wasn’t making any moves to get up, but it was still alive if the regenerating tissue was any indication.

Julius hobbled his way over to the troll, [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] at full throttle healing his injuries. He focused on healing everything except for his mangled arm, planning to take care of it later, it would take too long to fix it anyway.

He walked toward the still form of the troll and released another strong surge of kinetic energy through his entire body, stomping down on the troll’s head, and splitting it open like a watermelon.