Chapter 43: Not Backing Down

Numerous arrows lit up the moon. 

A bit too weak.

Arrows zipped around and curved through shields. 

There were over a hundred Hood members who were chasing me. Now there were a little less than sixty.

Some arrows pierced their necks or the cracks between the armour before exploding. Others just exploded on impact. 

I continually sent out the arrows, and they blasted through whatever measly protection they tried to muster.

Will the upper management should be here soon? 

My mana was still fine, and the [Solar Orbs] were absorbing the heat from my own onslaught to be feedback into my supplies. Starlight was still basically max, I was saving that for any actual difficult opponents.  

These goons clearly weren’t much of a threat. Of course, it did vary on the individual. 

Plenty of the ones that were now already dead, were simply the lower levelled members or those who were lacking in defensive skills. I’m not surprised so many fell–even though they had combat experience. It’s not feasible for most to handle a wave of individually powerful arrows exploding and stabbing into them.

While I was dealing with the shrinking crowd.

I could feel another individual sneaking up behind me using my passive soul pressure.

Invisibility really?

They neared enough for a ‘killing’ blow, but as they leapt, I spun around.

“Hi.” I smiled, which was hidden behind the mask.

I tore off the assailant's arm and then lifted the Hood member by the neck with my right hand.

“Let’s see how effective this is.”

I activated the cannon mounted on my arm and prepared to fire one of the basic shots.

Bang!

A beam of mana shot forth, piercing forward. Then, the body decloaked and flopped to the floor.

Nine shots remaining, that was effective enough. But the individual’s armour did feel weaker, so I should not overestimate the weapon's abilities. 

The cannon was definitely way more powerful than the average mana weapon. Which came with the downside of only ten shots.

Name: Ceella Stella (Celestira Luxpoir) | Race: [Human?]

Level 301 | Awakened

Mana: 51% Starlight:98%

Vocation: [Stargazer]

Skills:

- Blazing Solar (VI | IV)

- Starlight (V)

- Gazing Upon The Stars

- Disruptive Starlight

- Star Mapping

- Sleepless Nights

- Fortified Stomach

- Quiet Step

Bonded

- Primal Guardian Lord [Lv 141]

- Unleashed Awakening

I checked my status and nothing major had changed, however, I could feel my soul expanding, indicating I was close to levelling. After doing it over 300 times I knew what signs were indicating that it was near to happening.

Then I sensed and saw another attack with [Star Mapping] coming for my head. I stepped to the side, but then a beam of light blazed past me, however, it curved a fair amount as tried to adjust to my movement.

The beam of light grazed the shoulder of my armour, and I could tell it did some serious damage to it.

Dangerous… but, Light? That’s not a hard match-up.

More beams of light shot towards me, but each became more easy to dodge as I started to track the direction the shooter was attacking from. They were moving but [Star Mapping] made their repositioning efforts useless.

Then within a beam of light that shot beside me, a smaller cloaked figure emerged, and with light covering their hands they attempted to strike me.

“Wow,” I said, allowing my voice to be heard. It was distorted, which just made the situation more fun.

I sidestepped away from the strike and our close and personal combat began.

From quick observations, they were extremely proficient in close quarters and it was hard for me to dodge. Only with my physical advantage made it possible to keep up. I may have had a lot of skill fighting monsters, even humanoid ones, but skilled fighters were still a rare occurrence.

Let’s go to Third Point. 

The mana cost didn’t increase by much, as there was still a large amount of mana flowing through the suit. 

The individual’s actions didn’t seem to change because of my light show, and they just continued their attack.

Unlike mine with the bright effects, it was hard to tell with Hood’s equipment how much mana they were pouring in.

Their initial assault involved repeated blows against my heart, which I used my arms plates to guard. The light damaged the arm plates, but it was nothing too severe compared to the attacks from earlier.

“So,” I asked. “May you be upper management?”

They didn’t respond. All while I was still multitasking the [Fire Arrows]. The curtain of arrows still mostly pelted the goons, while I aimed a few for the back of my current opponent.

The fight continued in close quarters. I parried a few blows and dodged more. However, a few did land on my body, and I could hear quiet cracks in the plating.

Sigh… I paid good money for this. I should’ve dealt with him properly instead of feeling out their strength.

While the intensity of the fight increased and I was landing more blows, some people wanted to interrupt the show.

Two goons tried to get the jump from behind and stab me in the back.

“Get lost.” I fired two [Solar Bombs] at close range. Both perfectly impacted the two individuals causing both to be sent flying.

Then two [Fire Arrows] from the wall flew down to intercept the flying bodies.

However, at that moment my opponent used this as a chance to strike a devastating blow.

Their hands clasped together and blinding bright light emerged from the centre of their body, which immediately shot towards me from close proximity. 

I could dodge it but not without major damage if I didn't do anything else.

However, instead, I stabbed my arm into the light.

[Star Lance].

The sparkling Starlight formed around my arm and I poured Starlight into my armour which made it sparkle a purple light.

The lance pierced through the light into the centre of the Hood’s member chest. 

The light faded and I retracted [Star Lance] and Starlight energy from my armour.

“What…?” He coughed, as some of his internal organs were destroyed and blood started to pour out.

“Bad type match-up,” I replied. 

For the different energies that existed. Most didn’t have an advantage over each. Sun didn’t dominate Fire, and Earth didn’t cancel out lightning. There were a few expectations, in this case, Starlight was a complete counter to standard light.

He was still alive so I needed to finish it, [Incinerate].

A burst of fire engulfed the body, burning away any life that remained.

Humans are quite weak once you break their shell.

 (“ Which is why I find monsters… well the high-end ones a more useful fighting force ”)

I didn’t reply. My curtain of arrows finally reached its end and with it ending, I looked over to see just over thirty Hood members were still alive and kicking.

For some, they looked like they hadn’t reached a scratch, while others looked battered and torn. However, even with what I thought to be a higher-ranking individual dead, that didn’t stop them and they rushed towards me.

Wow, they aren’t backing down?

(“ Do you want them to? ”)

Of course not.

Ten minutes had passed since I started the game of chase and I only needed to stay fighting for another ten-to-twenty minutes before this whole rock went boom.

I laughed, “If they are that excited to run to death, who I am to stop them.”