The Mad Doctor looked livid: his face was completely red like a tomato, and veins were throbbing on his forehead.
However, what Daneel found strange was that he wasn't laying any traps for his opponent.
Daneel had no idea exactly what level the Mad Doctor was at, but he knew for sure that he was not a Peak Exalted Champion like the Sect Leader.
Thus, he was the weaker side. With his level of cunningness, wouldn't it make sense to set up traps put the enemy on the back foot?
As he voiced this question to the Ancient Dragon, he got the answer.
"Young King, I cannot tell you much due to the rules laid down by the Emperor. But I can give you a hint. If this man did arrange traps, no Champion would be foolish to march into such a place. The only traps he can use are those at the Hero level, and apparently, he is not in possession of such means. Anything below that would be futile, as he would just tip off his opponent."
Right!
The Mad Doctor was only calling the Sect Leader here to convey some information. If the Sect Leader managed to detect something like a trap, he would definitely be tipped off.
Of course, the Mad Doctor didn't know that the Sect Leader was also coming with hostile intentions.
Exactly one minute later, the Sect Leader of the Sect of Hedon appeared in the air opposite the Mad Doctor.
An expression of eerie calmness was on his face, and his arms were folded behind his back.
He was wearing a high-collared gold robe, while the Mad Doctor was garbed in black robes that covered his entire body except for his face.
"Sect Leader, I wanted to-"
"Cut the crap. Do you deny your crimes?"
"Wh-what crimes?"
What the hell? This wasn't the script!
By now, even the Mad Doctor could tell the Sect Leader was here with some other motive.
"It's just like you to feign ignorance. Enough!"
Saying so, the Sect Leader took out a trinket shaped like a strange hourglass.
As he broke it, the hourglass disappeared into the air, instead of breaking into pieces and falling down.
Instantly, Daneel felt as if he had just taken a cold shower.
"A rare Hero level trinket. I wonder where he found it."
"Oh? What does it do?"
"It distorts the time for whoever is watching him. At this instant, it will appear to them as if these two are just standing there. After two minutes, what has really happened will be transmitted to them. Basically, they will not be able to appear instantly to break up the fight. By the time they understand what is going on, it will be too late."
Hearing this, Daneel's eyes widened.
Such a miraculous trinket existed?
However, Daneel got a query.
"2 minutes? Isn't that too short for a fight, though?"
After a brief silence, Drakos replied, "Young King, a single second is often enough to decide the victor, especially when the fight is at the Champion level. 2 minutes is a stretch. I suspect that he plans to use the rest of the time to change the scene to appear however he likes."
A second?!
Daneel couldn't believe his ears, but he realized that it made sense.
Even Warrior level fights rarely stretched on for very long, but for some reason, he had assumed that the stronger one was, the more time would be required to breach their defenses and land a fatal attack.
Wherever did he get that idea?
As he asked himself this, he realized that he had been using the animated fights he had seen back on Earth to compare, which was obviously, not very wise.
But what was so special about the Champion level?
From the system, he knew that the key lay in Magerootless spell casting, but he didn't know anything further.
He already knew that there wasn't much information in the system about it: most of the journals and data that had been recorded pertained to the Warrior level, with Champions not even having residences in the Central Tower. Even if they did, he didn't know where they might be storing their most secret information.
All in all, Daneel was due to get his first clear view of what the Champion level was right now, and he was ready for it.
As soon as the trinket dissolved into space, the Mad Doctor got a ferocious look on his face.
"So you knew why I called you. How did you have the audacity to-"
"Oh, just die."
As Ashahell cut him off in this way, the elementary particles around the Mad Doctor started fluctuating wildly.
Random flashes of lightning, fire, ice, and earth started to appear around him.
The lightning was in the form of snakes which would pierce through any Warrior easily, and the fire appeared in the form of clumps of such high temperature that any Warrior would be roasted alive if they came into contact with them.
Along with ice pricks which threatened to destroy everything they attacked, and massive boulders of earth which were ready to crush anything to oblivion, it was as if nature itself was showing its wrath.
These were only the visible elements: through his elementary vision, Daneel could tell that so many more elemental attacks were also appearing at random, such as drops in gravity, space rips, and ultra-sharp wind blades.
In a way, it was as if nature had gone…mad.
Yes! That was it…nature had gone mad!
Each attack varied in intensity too, but at minimum, they could kill a Warrior.
As Daneel focused his eyes on Ashahell, he was surprised to see no change take place near him.
He had been expecting some kind of impressive change in the area around Ashahell, but the Sect Leader of the Sect of Hedon was just standing there idly.
Compared to the maelstrom of furious destruction that had sprung up around the Mad Doctor, he seemed weak. Powerless.
[Champion level display of powers being analyzed. Consolidating hints from thousands of sources using analyzed metrics.
Champion Paths identified.
'Mad' Champion Path analyzed.
'Mad' Champion Path: Those who choose this path come into touch with their inner madness, projecting it outwards through their Mageroot/body to make the world transform into a deathtrap where random elemental attacks with high frequency and power attack trespassers.
Current Form of Champion Path On Display: Domain/Projection
Note: It has been written that this Domain must not be confused with a Hero's Domain, which is something that all Heroes possess. This Domain is a projection of one's path into the world, which is a Form of attack as opposed to attacking in different Forms.]
Huh. So the system did know quite a bit about Champions.
As Daneel asked the system to repeat the information, he realized that a few journals that the system had recorded from the Central Tower might be from Peak Exalted Warriors who must have been doing their own research into the Champion level.
Discarding these idle thoughts, Daneel was about to completely focus on what he had just learned, but he stopped when he saw Ashahell move.
"Come! My Madness Domain has made many Champions flee with terror! Show me that 'Sense Distortion' Path that was touted as that which can only be trained in by one in a million!"
As the Mad Doctor shouted this, a small smile appeared on Ashahell's face, which made Daneel's skin crawl.
This man had been creepy enough with his intense expressions, but this smile took that to a whole other level.
It wasn't the meaning of the smile which made Daneel feel this; no, the meaning was clear: Ashahell was scoffing at the Mad Doctor.
Most of all, it was how unnatural that smile looked, as if it was something that had never graced that serious face for years.
Even the Mad Doctor felt a chill creep into his spine when he saw the Sect Leader's smile, but he just focused on his rage.
He knew for a fact that the Sect Leader was notorious for being able to kill someone without them even realizing anything. He was capable of taking away their sense of pain, touch, sight, and hearing, and then returning it to them after he was done.
No one knew exactly how it worked, but the Mad Doctor had long prepared himself for this battle using an obscure phrase he had read somewhere about this Champion Path.
"Cut off a few senses and focus on the ones remaining, and no Sense Distorter can affect you."
Slowly, Ashahell began to walk toward the Mad Doctor idly.
At the same instant, the Mad Doctor felt a vague fog encroaching on his mind.
However, he held firm because of his preparations, and when he did, Ashahell frowned.
This made the Mad Doctor rejoice.
"Hahaha, your Sense Distortion is useless! I've cut off my own feeling of pain to take full control of the others, so you cannot do anything! Come, Sect Leader! Die to my Madness! Haha-No…what?!"
Toward the end of his speech, just when he had been about to laugh again, the Mad Doctor was interrupted by something rushing up his throat.
Making gurgling and coughing noises, he spit it out, before seeing that it was blood.
With an expression of extreme alarm and shock, the Mad Doctor looked up to see that the Sect Leader wasn't in front of him while walking toward him, as he had thought.
Instead, as he looked down to see the massive hole in his upper body where his organs used to be, he heard a calm voice from behind him.
"Hmph. You were mistaken, Mad Doctor. It is not just your 5 basic senses that I can distort. You forgot about your sense of time, and your sense of space. Goodbye."
Meanwhile, Daneel was gaping at the scene, with his jaw hanging open.
He had been able to witness what had truly happened.
When Ashahell started to walk toward the Mad Doctor, everything had looked normal, up until that frown on his face after which the Mad Doctor had begun his gloating.
After the first word had left the Mad Doctor's mouth, it was as if time had…completely slowed down for him.
His body movements were very, very slow, and each word that he said was stretched out, almost as if…time was passing differently for his own body.
After seeing that whatever he had done had taken effect, Ashahell simply strolled forward again, before being attacked by the wild elemental attacks.
Here, he faced a little difficulty: hundreds of attacks bombarded him, reducing his trinkets to dust, making him resort to defending himself actively, and he was also slightly injured in the process.
However, the Mad Doctor was still staring at some distant spot where Ashahell had been a minute ago, and his speech was still coming out slo-o-o-o-wly.
After reaching the Mad Doctor, with one punch, Ashahell caused a large bloody hole the size of a man's waist to appear in his chest, before quickly leaving that domain under the attacks and standing behind him with his back turned.
After he replied in this way, the Mad Doctor finally seemed to come back to his normal senses, looking down and wondering what the heck had happened.
Seeing this whole thing, Daneel's back drenched with sweat, and he could only think of one word to describe both of these Champions.
Terrifying.
Utterly, insanely, terrifying.