Swipe, swipe, grab. Miss, miss, miss. With growing frustration Rain found his attacks thwarted again and again and again, his paws avoided or batted aside by the twirling twisting spear.
The crowd moved with them as Adlen retreated under Rain's ferocity, backing up through the market. Lyra watched with concern, suddenly a lot more worried about how this was going to go. It didn't matter how strong Rain was if he couldn't touch the damned leveler. She caught the blacksmith out of the corner of her eye, he was looking at her with a raised eyebrow, 'I told you so' practically radiating off of him in physical waves.
He was right of course, to Lyra's irritation. Most levelers who took on larger monsters had specially prepared tactics, it made sense, no point being caught under a large monster's weight advantage, far better to avoid and poke and use Skills. She just hadn't expected it to work quite this well against Rain, Adlen's Class was clearly built for speed and it was paying off.
"Fitz! Don't let him wear you down!" she cried out.
Adlen smirked as he dodged Rain's lunging claws once more, his feet deftly moving across the ground keeping him just out of reach.
"Your silly bint of a master just lost herself a slave it seems. I am curious how she controls you, she looks like a low leveler, maybe tens at a stretch. Let me guess, she has some spawn of yours locked up somewhere, or wait, perhaps it's an enchanted implant designed to pierce your heart? I've heard they save that for the most feral ones."
Rain snarled and lunged for his throat, paw grabbing. Adlen turned to the side, evading, and brought the spear up to slice open Rain's stomach, Rain threw his weight at an angle, diving out the away, just dodging the blade. He rolled on the cobble, his back to Adlen and Adlen took the chance, charging in with his spear lancing forward, ready to skewer Rain.
Exactly as Rain had planned. Rain spun as he came up, holding himself up with his paws and kicking out his leg. His foot hooked around a burning brazier and he flung it around and straight toward the charging leveler. Hot coals and a spitted chicken fell from it as it tumbled through the air and Adlen had to abort his charge and back up, holding up his spear to fend off the flying hunk of metal. The crowd behind cried out as they were showered with sparks and fire and burning coals and an entire roasted chicken.
Not even pausing Rain slammed his paws down onto the cobble, spreading his digits and digging his claws in, then using his outsized strength he powered his arms forward, ripping his paws through the chunks of stone and earth and shovelling them up in an under arm swing. Adlen had barely fended off the brazier before dozens of fist sized cobble stones were hurtling toward him. In an instant he set his feet and spun his spear. Flashes of light left after images in Rain's eyes as light sparked at both ends of the spear and the spear vanished, no, not vanished, just spinning in Adlen's hand so fast it was a soft blur audibly fanning the air.
Stone cracked and ricocheted again and again against the spinning metal as Adlen fended off the projectiles, less fortunate were the crowd behind who howled as heavy cobblestones thudded against exposed flesh. Rain recognised a Skill when he saw one and wasn't about to let Adlen press him with it. He was already lunging forward and scooping up the fallen brazier, the squat cast iron rods still hot to the touch he drove the thing into the spinning blur of the spear.
CLANG!
The brazier did its job, the spear was stopped with an ear splitting noise, the metal crashing together violently causing the spear to visibly wobble along its length and for Rain's paws to sting from the vibration that shook the brazier. Adlen flinched and nearly dropped his weapon, leaping backwards out of surprise. He continued to retreat until he found himself by a large round fountain over a dozen feet wide, ringed by a thick knee high wall. In the middle of the pool was a statue of the original founding Ranker of Lynthia, worn and mossy with age, water burbled down its suface.
The fountain was near the top of the market, the fight having moved them there. The crowd had been following along, although having just been caught by Rain's impromptu projectiles they were a lot more wary of coming close and the space around the two had increased greatly.
Adlen jumped up on the pool wall of the fountain and gave Rain a wary look before examining his spear for damage, seeing it was fine he checked over his hand, rolling his knuckles and squeezing his fist tight. He was clearly discomfited, though he tried to hide it.
"You know something about Skills monster?"
Rain remained silent, his eyes carefully watching the leveler. This seemed to bother Adlen more than a reply.
Adlen stepped backwards around the rim of the fountain, his feet perfectly placed to keep his balance. Rain stalked around it in turn, following the wall and Adlen. The leveler kept him at a distance until Rain suddenly rushed forward, reaching out to grab at him. This time Adlen was not content to let Rain have it all his way and he stabbed at his paws, slicing at him, cutting at his paw pads, using the fountain to his advantage, sending flicking lines of blood into the air to patter down on the water with each strike. Rain's increasingly desperate attempts to grab the spear thwarted and countered in blood.
Rain slowed, clearly getting frustrated. He watched with narrowed eyes as Adlen danced backwards twirling his spear.
He sneered, "Stupid monster, know your betters. You are nothing, just fuel for my leveling or a trophy for me to parade around, a dog I will put to heel."
Fuck this.
Rain turned, stepped up on the pool wall, and booted the statue in the middle of the fountain as hard he could. He expected the statue to break halfway up, instead the entire fountain ripped from the water and exploded through the side of the pool's outer wall straight where Adlen was standing. Adlen was blown off his feet as half a ton of stone crashed into him, sending him rolling across the cobble as broken chunks of statue showered and clattered down around him.
Rain blinked. That... had worked a little better than expected.
