The man who sat in the centre of the hall just a moment ago, was now running at Runar and Yamada with an agility that was wholly unbecoming of his physical appearance. Sure, the system's stats usually superseded things like physical decay to some degree, but not to such extremes. This person looks like they have been starving for weeks, or maybe had even succumbed to their hunger long ago already. At this point, usually, the true 'value' of their stats had to have gone down by some degree.

  But this person moved as though he were at absolute peak physical condition. So this meant that, either, his physical condition came from some magical means that transformed him to appear like this, or that his stats were simply so overwhelming that they were able to make up for this man's physical decay.

  Either option was somehow equally terrifying to Runar.

  The man came running at the two, swinging the swords made from his own rib bones. They had grown into disgusting, jagged blades, similar to one of the daggers that Ryan had shown to him, named 'Ripper', that had appeared as part of Maximus' gear in the amusement park dungeon. While this may not be the most effective weapon to kill someone right away, it was made to inflict as much pain as possible on the way out, and was maybe even more lethal if even just a small wound was received.

  Runar didn't hesitate for a moment, writing a series of runes into the air. He needed just a moment to think about the next course of action, so the runes that he wrote translated roughly to a command of 'increasing the space between these two points'. And as if the room itself elongated for a few moments, the man was pushed away, giving him time to think.

  It wouldn't be too hard to defeat this man. He could also figure out a way to entrap him. But there were always some risks that came with that. It simply wasn't always possible to simply stop an opponent non-lethally, especially when they came at you with the full intent and capability of murdering you. While Runar knew he was stronger, even a bee can kill a giant.

  So, he needed to think. This room had only one direct entrance or exit, which was the one that Runar and Yamada had just come through. Surely, this place was more like a checkpoint, and the true destination was somewhere beyond here. With the level of control these people seemed to have over space itself, being able to set up a series of almost impossible to notice spatial distortions.

  Judging from the subtle glow of mana in some of the stones on the ground, similar magic was placed here, but there wasn't anything about this in the info he forced out of either Hargrave or the guy that came with that 'offer' earlier.

  So, Runar had to get that info out of the gatekeeper himself. He quickly signed over to Yamada, "Rubber rounds. Plan R-Zero."

  The demon immediately nodded her head, taking out her twin pistols. The magic inscribed onto their sides lit up immediately as Yamada released the magazines currently stored in the guns, then spun them around on her fingers. As the magazines falling down disappeared into nowhere, new magazines fell out of mid-air and slotted right in by the time they were back in the proper position.

  In the time she took to do that, Runar wrote a circle of runes into the air, which Yamada immediately shot through.

  The small, round rubber bullets shot through the runic circle, and the moment they passed through, their size increased many times over. The formerly regularly 12 millimetre bullets now grew to the size of a fist, keeping up their momentum as they shot through the air. Due to Yamada's skills, her bullets almost completely ignored air-resistance, so they barely slowed down either as the barrage was aimed right at that half-dead man.

  He, who has approaching through the space distorted by Runar, was dodging them masterfully, however. Like it was the easiest thing in the world, he simply bent to the side, or positioned his swords in a way that they were simply deflected away, shooting straight out of the large open spaces between all of the massive pillars.

  "An act of sheer folly, believing that something of this nature is enough to overcome one blessed by true death," the man continued to approach, so Runar let out a long groan.

  "Seriously?" he clicked his tongue. The worst part was that he couldn't even risk destroying any part of this place. The patterns engraved here seemed to hold a specific type of magic that he wouldn't be able to replicate on the spot, so while he should be able to redo any physical parts of the patterns that were destroyed, he couldn't risk accidentally locking himself out, "Whatever."

  Runar was writing some runes onto his palms and fingers, and quickly wrote some specific ones right onto the underside of his boots as well.

  And so, as the man finally came close enough, traversing the enlarged hall, Runar pushed himself to the side and right in front of the runic circle in the air, jumping upward. Yamada shot two bullets forward at the same time, and Runar quickly used them as a foothold. The runes on his boots activated, stealing the bullets' momentum. So while they fell to the ground, shrinking back to their normal size as they did, Runar got a forward boost.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  The enemy, instead of dodging, twisted his blades to cut right into Runar as he was approaching mid air. But Runar, right before he got there, pushed his palm forward. The tiny metal ball bearing that he had tucked into his hand was given all of Runar's momentum as he cancelled his own out.

  The ball bearing moved so fast that even this living mummy wasn't able to dodge, and a small hole appeared in his cheek.

  There was no blood. Instead, it was more like if Runar shot the ball bearing through a piece of paper. It didn't seem to come out on the other side either, instead being swallowed by the deep abyss that was underneath the man's skin.

  "Urgh," Runar almost pulled away instinctively, though this really wasn't the most disgusting thing he had seen, by far. But instead of pulling away, Runar just continued on. It wasn't like the man in front of him seemed bothered by it. Not that the ball-bearing was meant to be an attack anyway. It was just a pretty effective thing to transfer his momentum to.

  Now that Runar had stopped, he planted his feet solidly into the ground, "You like it? I learned about this sort of technique from a little bastard that tried to kill my nephew."

  Using the momentum-transfer ability of the runes placed onto his hands and feet, Runar practically locked himself perfectly into place. It was like he was magically glued to the ground while channelling magic into the boots.

  Which was good, because it was hard to go all out in a punch otherwise. The returning reactive force of one of his blows could be enough to throw him backward, too. But now, he struck at the man in front of him, and it seemed like he instinctively knew that he had to avoid taking that attack head-on.

  Runar's fists impacted straight into the front of the two blades crossed in front of the man's face. The small bone spikes placed into random, jagged directions on their front shattered almost immediately. And while the rest of the blades stayed intact, since there was no further edge, the man was just thrown back while Runar was still stuck in place.

  The monstrous-looking figure stared down at his swords. While his face didn't show any sort of expression, it was clear that he was confused.

  And so, Runar just scoffed, "What, did you think some bones were strong enough to pierce my skin?" he asked. Of course, he did boost his resistance in his hands with some runes, but even so, with physical stats as high as him, something like that was nothing.

  "... A man blessed in life, I see," the man said, "How lucky you must have been to have such power bestowed upon you. The great lord must have pitied you."

  Runar raised his brow, confused, "What are you talking about? Do you genuinely think your god has anything to do with Awakening? Fuck, even real gods don't have anything to do with the system, and definitely not yours."

  "... Even to those who refuse to see the truth, ignorance is naught but a curse," the man slightly readjusted his swords. He ran his fingertips over the bony, shattered surfaces, and as he passed over them, they changed their shape and instead turned into sharp edges instead of the jagged ones from before. Also, through the special glasses that he was wearing, Runar could see that the man was infusing quite a lot of mana into those bone swords, clearly strengthening them far more.

  Wordlessly, the man began to walk forward again, but this time, he already started swinging his blades. And then, something else poured out of them. It wasn't mana - it was aura.

  A straight blade of aura shot at Runar, and he was barely able to dodge it by releasing the lock he had on the ground, "... What?"

  Was there a swordsman class that possessed both aura and mana?

  "What are you? An Enhancer with a preference for swords? A Magic Swordsman who awakened to aura, or a regular Swordsman who awakened to mana?"

  The man continued silently walking forward, swinging his swords. His aura was cutting into the ground, tearing it apart. But even so, each attack was aimed so precisely that it wasn't damaging the magic on the ground.

  "Okay, okay, I get it, you don't want to speak. Just give me a hint, yeah?" Runar asked, as he leaned slightly forward, jumping up and forward into a large front-flip until he was just two or three metres above the man. Yamada shot two bullets forward and through the runic circle, ricocheting one off the ground and the other off the ceiling, so that they hit each other at the right angle. One of them hit the underside of Runar's foot, and he quickly stole the momentum and shot downward, quickly kicking down toward the man.

  He, of course, decided to cut upward right at Runar, and as the blades enveloped in aura were swung at him, he shot out another ball bearing to stop his momentum. By then, his vertically outstretched foot was hit by another bullet that had been ricocheting around this room. He was pushed back, and pushed away one more ball bearing, twisting around his body while shooting it away to land on the ground with his hands.

  The man glanced around for a moment, as though he was waiting for another bullet for Runar to ricochet off, but instead he just pushed himself off the ground and kicked the man on the underside of his chin to throw him upward.

  "What, did you think I had to use that?" he scoffed, looking down at the ground. A few cracks had appeared there from the pressure that he exerted, "I'm just trying to be a bit careful. This place seems pretty old and fragile. But, different to you, it looks like it actually is that fragile as well."

  The man, whose caught himself pretty soon, readjusted his jaw that had almost ripped off its face. As he did, the skin of his cheeks regenerated and regrew.

  The man seemed to start growing quite annoyed, and once again ran forward at Runar. But this time, something felt different. He was... moving differently. Swinging more wildly, as if he had lost his composure.

  With every swing of his swords, aura blades were shot out at Runar, but he was able to block all of them easily with a bit of assistance from Yamada. He continued counterattacking, whittling down on the man in front of him. The regeneration seemed to slow pretty fast, and the man kept moving slower and slower. And more importantly... he began to grow more sloppy. And that change in particular was happening far too fast.

  "... What's going on?" Runar was completely confused. He had never had a fight with another Awakened like this, "This is the worst fighting I've ever seen from someone with both Mana and Aura."

  The man stared back at Runar. His deep, sunken eyes that were once emotionless were starting to fill with anger.

  "Those that were born blessed can never understand those that were not," the man replied, his voice shaking out of bitterness.

  "... What?" Runar replied, slowly catching up to what was happening, "Are you trying to tell me you're not an Awakened?"