Chapter 13: Priest (1)
The Chief Priest wore a tall head guard, beautifully decorated in all sorts of bright feathers and fabrics. His chest was bare except for the cape that hung across his collarbone with finely polished jewels and precious metals. His lower body was covered by a skirt which first wrapped around him like a loin cloth before extending into two long pieces between his legs that stopped just below his knees.
He had no weapons aside from the crude sacrificial dagger that seemed formed of obsidian. However, he still felt like the most dangerous opponent he had ever come across.
The Priest began to speak words Leonel had no ability to understand. Still, the latter's nerves remained tight, whatever senses he had honed to this point being pushed to their upper limits. The strain even caused blood vessels in his eyes to burst, coloring his whites in red.
With little more hesitation, Leonel knocked another atlatls dart. This time he used more power, pulling back with as much as 50% of his strength.
Out of habit, he hadn't gone all out with the first strike because the physical stats of the Priest were so low. But now he knew this wasn't a normal enemy.
Seeing that his attempts at communication failed, the Priest's brows furrowed as he raised his dagger once more. But this time, he aimed it toward Leonel, chanting with a calm rhythm.
The nude young lady strapped to the table watched on blankly, her gaze, once filled with fear, turning dull. She seemed to believe that no matter how this all ended, her fate was already sealed.
Leonel's spear shattered against an invisible barrier once more, but this time Leonel could faintly feel it condensing. It wasn't a feeling as sharp as his touch, sight or hearing, but it was there.
'A sixth sense?'
Suddenly, Leonel dropped down at his fastest speed. A moment later, a loud boom shook the Sacrificial Room's wall, leaving a deep impact.
A cold sweat matted Leonel's back as he hopped up, sprinting to the side as he knocked another dart.
He dove forward, sliding his arm across the air sideways and causing another dart to whistle across the air with a sharp sound.
'Dammit, I thought I would only have to fight normal humans in this place. Could it be that ancient humans found these awakened abilities too? Or maybe is it that these Sub-Dimensional Zones aren't as historically accurate as I originally believed?'
[Anomaly detected… Recalculating…]
[Sub-Dimensional Zone detected: Mayan Tomb. Spanish Invasion]
[Sub-Dimensional Zone grade: C]
[Clear requirements: Enter Chief Priest's Sacrificial Room (Complete). Save Chief Priest]
[Side Quest: Unable to detect. Scope of system too limited]
[Side Quest: Defeat 100 Spaniards (Complete) … Reward pending]
[… Recalculating…]
[Side Quest: Unable to detect. Scope of system too limited]
[Side Quest: Defeat 1000 Spaniards (Complete) … Reward pending]
[… Recalculating…]
[Hidden Quest: Defeat the Chief Priest]
[… Recalculating…]
[Reward Upgraded]
[Reward: Unable to detect. Scope of system too limited]
[It is recommended that subject, Leonel Morales, complete this quest with a minimum of three other individuals. Subject's D-grade ability is too low]
For a moment, Leonel almost forgot his rage toward the Priest. He wanted nothing more than to throw this broken watch across the walls till it broke. How was this considered a system? How could it be anything other than a jumbled mess?
Instead of telling him that he should enter in a team of 4, it waited until it was already too late to tell him. Instead of telling him what the side quests were, it waited until he had already completed them to tell him. And, it couldn't even get the grade of this Sub-Dimensional Zone right. What absolute bullshit.
'Forget it! Focus.'
Leonel's father's note told him that his father had to suppress his awakening during his youth. What if other people besides him had experienced this as well? The only problem with this theory was that his father had also said his constitution was different than others… But who was to say there weren't others like him?
Leonel's dart was blocked once more, but his sharp senses caught the fact the Priest was forced to slide back, albeit a minuscule amount.
With a flip, Leonel took advantage of his own centrifugal force, landing on his feet and not losing a single dart carried on his back.
'I only have 47 more darts. If I can't see any results by the time I have 25, I need to take the risk and get closer.'
Leonel maintained his strength perfectly, never using more than 50%. He realized that this Priest was entirely reliant on his odd energy. The old man getting on in years didn't make any large movements. Aside from shifting his feet every so often to face Leonel and raising his arms, he did nothing else.
'It can't be endless, I don't believe that he can do this forever.'
Suddenly, Leonel felt a strong sense of danger from his back.
Immediately he knew he had made a mistake. He dodged the Priest's last strike, but he hadn't heard a loud boom to his back like he had heard every time previously. He hadn't accounted for the possibility that the Priest could control the trajectory of his attacks!
Leonel managed to leap out of the way just in time, but his pack of long darts didn't survive.
The sound of splintering wood followed the ugly expression Leonel wore. Just like that, the 40 some odd darts he had left were shattered to pieces, leaving the Priest grinning an ugly yellow toothed smile.
Leonel sprung upward a moment later, running for his life.
Without having to divert his attention toward Leonel's darts, the Priest completely unleashed his strength.
Leonel dodged like a mad man sprinting around the room as though he was on a racetrack and not in a temple. His mind spun trying to think of solutions.
'First important point, every strike takes 2 seconds to charge and fire. Second important point, it only seems possible to control one strike at once. Controlled strikes take 5 seconds to charge but can be prepared as lesser strikes are being fired. However, a normal energy strike cannot be formed while the controlled strike is being maneuvered.
'Third important point, these strikes carry a strength of 0.82. I should adjust his strength before I figure out how to rank this seventh category. The speed of these energy strikes is at 0.89. The agility of the controlled strikes are only at 0.46.
'If I want to keep surviving, I need to dodge before he sends out his strike or I'm finished. Luckily I've overestimated the Priest's coordination. If his control over his energy strikes are factored in, it's dropped by 0.03 to 0.39.'
Leonel continued to run, taking out three silver rods he had strapped to his left hip and twisting them together, discarding his atlatl completely.
In a smooth motion, he shrugged off what remained of the box of darts, leaving about 20 pounds behind.
Gripping his silver rod, Leonel abruptly changed directions. The moment he ducked the most recent controlled energy strike, he leaped into the air toward the Chief Priest, his silver rod morphing into a bicycle before he landed on the ground.
The Priest was stunned for a moment. Where could he had ever seen such technology? Luckily for Leonel, his silver rod worked with folding technology and not electrical technology, or it would have lost its morphing ability long ago.
The Sacrificial Room was quite large, being about 200 meters in diameter. The distance between Leonel and the Priest was currently just over a hundred meters. Even if he ran full tilt, it would still take him over nine seconds to make it. However, with some momentum built up and his bike, he could cut it to eight.
'One second… two!'
Leonel tilted his bike to the side so far that his knee scrapped against the ground. Sparks flew as the metal fitting he placed over it skid.
With an abnormal feat of strength, Leonel slammed his palm into the ground, pushing himself and his bike back upright. He had fought with his life on the line for too long to feel the same shuddering nervousness. There had been nothing but him and his own thoughts for months. There was no way he was going to lose to the first person he consciously chose to kill.
'The next strike will very likely target my bike itself… two!'
Leonel's thighs flexed, his bike hopping just over meter in the air. His instincts from countless battles kicked in. All things considered, only having to account for just one opponent at a time was marginally easier despite the godlike abilities of this Priest.
'Here it comes.'
The controlled strike finished charging, shooting toward Leonel like a bullet.
Vaguely formed in Leonel's head, he could see the difference almost as though they were vibrant colors of their own. His eyes were slowly gaining the ability to see the shifting energy through the air, the pale fog circulating around the Priest.
Maybe if this was really a game and not real life, Leonel would get a notification achievement about awakening this level of sight before even gaining mastery over the energy.
The energy sped toward him. But this time, it was no longer a vague feeling Leonel got. He could see it cutting through the air from his right, curving for his head while slicing down in an arching path.
If Leonel jumped, it would destroy his bike. If he ducked it would take off his head.
The Priest likely realized that Leonel was previously only able to get a vague sense of where his energy was coming from due to the fact Leonel had taken more drastic actions than what was necessary.
Not only did he start taking control of the energy strike before it met Leonel this time, but he also actively dissipated its energy, trying to confuse Leonel about its exact location.
Unfortunately, the Priest could have never imagined that Leonel's senses would evolve once more at this very moment. Even more unfortunately, Leonel was well aware how low the agility of the controlled energy strike was.
Leonel suddenly skidded his bike to a grinding halt, the tail of his back wheel spinning to the front and whipping around.
His maneuver was perfectly timed. The controlled strike sped by his right side across his face and out into the distance toward the left.
The Priest's eyes widened as he quickly tried to control the energy strike to turn back, but Leonel's bike had already finished its spin and furiously sped forward. Though in a straight line the energy strike had a speed of 0.89 and Leonel's speed was only 0.51, there were two important factors Leonel had already considered.
First, the time it took for the energy strike to slow, turn around, then gain its top speed once more was long due to its low agility. And, second… Leonel's speed on his bike obviously just wasn't a mere 0.51 anymore.
The Priest was too late to realize this. Leonel was already 2 seconds away and he still hadn't abandoned his controlled energy strike. He didn't have enough time to prepare another strike.
In a panic, the Priest grabbed the naked girl on the table and threw her toward Leonel who had just unsheathed a sword.
Shocked, Leonel squeezed the hand-breaks of his bike as hard as he could catching the girl in the air.
'Dammit!'
Analyzing the situation, Leonel knew his time sensitive plan was ruined. He also realized something else. The Priest's strength was too low to throw a girl who must have weighed at least 110 pounds across 10 meters to him. That meant the Priest had another method of amplifying the strength of his body directly.
In that instant, the Priest's strength stat rose to… 0.97!
'The Priest still doesn't know I attacked him to protect this girl. If he knows this, he'll use it against me.'
Leonel recovered from his apprehension quickly, battle instincts he had honed for months kicking in as he apologetically dropped the girl to the ground without hesitation. It might have been cruel, but a drop of a less than a meter was better than whatever attack she would have to suffer from the Priest otherwise.
His plan worked just as intended. The Priest completely ignored the girl, believing that Leonel wouldn't care about her life one way or another. However, by now, he had already prepared another strike.
Leonel clicked the button on his bike, turning it back into a pole and rolling out of the way.
It was already too late to build up momentum with his bike again, he had to cross the last few meters himself.