Endless Evolution As A Skeleton In A Game-Like World

"Olivia. Can you wait a bit?" Ark asked her without looking back.

He could not afford to take his eyes off Thalia, not for a single second.

Olivia watched him with concern. "Are you saying you want to fight her alone?"

"Would you be mad if I said yes?" Ark chuckled.

"Ark... she is not some boss monster. Fighting a player is a whole different experience. Most of your strategies will not work."

Unlike monsters that could be easily deceived, players were different. They were not foolish enough to fall into obvious traps.

Ark already knew this, and yet, he pointed his weapon at Thalia, then said, "Don’t worry about me, Olivia. I simply want to see how far I have gone."

Thalia was not a regular player. She was a lamia, a rare race. How well would he fare against someone from a clearly superior race, and a far higher level?

It was foolish. She had been in Eden for God knows how long, and this was just his second day.

But Ark felt this was something he needed to do. This was a battle he wanted to win with his strength alone.

Besides, Olivia had not fully recovered from having her wings broken. There were no do-overs in Eden. Just one wrong move was all it would take to lose her...

"At least take your summons!" She begged. "Your Summons are basically an extension of you. Fighting without them is foolish!"

Ark gave it some thought before nodding. "Alright then..."

He had originally planned on fighting without them, but Olivia made a good point. There were even players whose entire skills were based on summoning.

It was good to keep his summons on the sidelines when he needed to improve, but it was just as important to let them loose in difficult situations, so that they could also improve...

"How touching~"

Thalia watched Ark with an amused smile playing on her lips, and then she rose, her serpentine body curling, her curvaceous hips swaying as she rose.

She effortlessly towered over him, and if she wanted to, she could likely stand even taller. There was enough of her serpentine body to ensure that.

"Are you sure you want to do this? What are you? Level nine? Ten?" She laughed as her eyes moved between Ark and Olivia.

"Even with the help of those your... toys, do you think you can handle a copper player at peak rank? Especially considering how beaten up you both already are...."

Ark honestly had no idea if he could. There was a noticeable gap in strength between ranks, and that strength gap grew even wider with each level up.

While he and Olivia were still copper rank players, having reached level forty, Thalia was at the peak of bronze, meaning all she needed to do was take the trial to advance to iron.

If they were to clash, then Thalia would be the most powerful foe he had ever crossed blades with.

"There is only one way to find out, right?" Ark said in a humorous tone.

"Besides." He added in a mildly annoyed tone. "It’s not like you’re going to let us leave this place."

"What?" Thalia frowned, sounding offended. "Of course I am going to let you both leave. I will personally carry you out..."

Tsssss—!

Her tail rattled, causing a low vibration to spread over the floor as she smiled.

"... in my belly of course!"

Thalia vanished. There was a flash of red, the sound of slithering, a rattle... and then a spark that glowed like fire.

Clang!

Ark was holding on to the shaft of the glaive that had formed, pushing the blade right into the claws that had suddenly sprung out of Thalia’s hands.

"Nice weapon." She teased. Then she suddenly delivered a barrage of blows, her hands moving so fast that each slash was followed by a sharp whistle.

Ark blocked each strike with the stalwartness of a master. Sparks erupted with each one, and each set of three strikes sent him sliding back a step or two.

Each blow felt like being hit by a brick, only that this time, these ’bricks’ were capable of more than blunt damage.

He was already adept at using a glaive, but Ark had to add his skill to his technique, serpent spear form, just to barely keep up with her blows, while attempting to launch a few of his own.

She continued her relentless assault, strike after strike filling the air with metallic shrills.

Ark forced his body to move faster, the two of them going faster and faster and faster, until their bodies became a blur, and the area around them had been filled with hundreds of marks.

They broke off for a nanosecond...

And then a wave of sparks suddenly erupted as her claws screeched over Ark’s staff, her fingers trying to slip over it and dig into his face—

Swish!

Ark immediately leaned back, watching as the black claw streaked through the air, just narrowly escaping his eye sockets.

Their eyes locked for a brief moment, and Thalia pleasantly smiled, just before she swung her tail at him.

But Ark reacted quickly. He jumped back two steps, then he rotated his glaive across his shoulders, the weapon spinning briefly, just before carving into her tail, spilling red blood into the air.

Like a worm touched by salt, Thalia immediately recoiled, nursing her wound.

She stared at him for a few seconds, then her eyes moved to the blood-stained glaive. She smiled once more.

"What inspired your weapon choice this time?"

Thalia had seen Ark change weapons for a while, and had soon realised that except for when he particularly hated a weapon, each one he picked out was well thought out.

"Nothing special really," Ark said in a mocking tone, letting out a cold breath. "You know what they say about snakes... You have to keep them at arm’s length."

She cackled loudly, holding her stomach and even coughing out of laughter. Then she wiped an invisible tear off her eyes.

Meanwhile, Ark’s eyes moved over to her wound. Although Thalia excelled at offense, she did not seem all that great at defending herself.

She poured her heart and soul into the strike, often neglecting her own body in the process.

This didn’t mean defeating her would be easy. But if he managed to draw enough blood, pile up the injuries... then it would not be long until she slowed down.

Ark took in a breath as the strategy solidified in his mind.

At first, he thought he would need his summons to take her on, but now, Ark realised that he might have simply overestimated her talents.

"Alright. I think that attack was enough to gauge each other’s abilities." Thalia said dryly. "Let us get started, for real this time..."

Her wound immediately snapped shut, vanishing as though it had never been there. If not for the streak of blood that still drifted down her arm, Ark would have assumed that his attack had never happened.

Her violet eyes suddenly shifted, her rounded pupils transforming into slits that eyed him like a primal beast.

This time when Thalia moved, Ark didn’t even see her coming—

BANG!

He raised his glaive on instinct, and that was what had saved him. He was suddenly blasted back by the explosive attack, and launched several feet into the air.

Thalia stood still, waiting for him to descend. But she was forgetting something important. Ark was also a mage!

Tzzzz!

Bang!

Lightning rained down from the sky above as Ark descended, carving black patterns into the floor.

But even as fast as the lightning bolts were, just like the snake she was, Thalia managed to snake her way through them all, making use of her monstrous speed.

Thankfully, that had created a pathway for him to land.

The moment his feet touched the floor, Ark was already swinging. The first strike met her claws, and Ark felt his feet wobble, the glaive almost slipping away from his hands.

"Urgh!" He grunted as his bones tightened around his weapon.

’She’s strong!’

Thalia then began speeding around him in circles to mask her attack patterns.

Ark’s eyes were shifting from place to place. North, south, east and west. He was trying to do the impossible, survey every single inch of land around him at the same time.

But Ark knew that it was a failed strategy from the moment he conceived it.

Clang!

He barely managed to raise his staff this time, the staff blasting back from the force of the impact.

What do you do when you fight an opponent that is far stronger and faster than you? Ark replayed the countless lectures they had taken in the academy in his mind.

Although he had sat at the back throughout, he had always paid attention to every single word the instructor and principal Harrison had said...

Number one.

You predict their moves. You enter into the head of your enemy, discover their attacks before they even fathom it, then move accordingly...

And number two. You bait your opponents. Minor body movements, the direction in which you looked, the way you moved your foot...

One thing you needed to know was that you were not the only one looking. Your opponent was watching you as much as you watched yourself. They too were trying to read your moves—

So all you needed to do was feed them with the wrong type of data. Make them believe in a fabrication that you have envisioned, or as principal Harrison called it, The Holy Art Of BULLSHITTING!

Ark immediately swung his glaive to the left, and Thalia catapulted forward, moving too fast for the human eye to comprehend.

But all of a sudden, a black figure materialized right in front of her, knocking her off balance.

Just as she was about to right herself, Ark was already upon her, his eyes taking her in—

His fingers tightened around his glaive with so much force that he probably left bone fragments behind.

And with one hefty strike, he swung it down, cleaving off her right arm, and sending it spiraling through the wind—

But before the limb could land on the cold floor, Thalia caught it.

And it was at that point that things took a turn for the worse...

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