A man was performing a complicated and sophisticated set of movements, each of them straining his muscles. He had been doing such exercises for around three hundred lays now.
His physical improvement was slowly coming to a halt, especially today. He felt as if he had reached the peak muscle strength he could obtain without sacrifice.
He sighed in disappointment before walking towards a tower of dead bodies. The tower was holding a single, skinless, and bloodless body as if it were holding a sculpture.
Elias took out the body and held it in his arms. The body did not have any skin or blood, looking like a sculpture to study Chinen's muscles rather than a corpse; it even had its fat removed.
Elias started moving it in a set of movements which would cover his offence, defence, speed, and nimbleness with the help of the skinless body. He wanted to have movements that would grant him maximum strength, as they would use most of his muscles.
Movements which could completely utilize each muscle to the fullest and have multiple muscles to strengthen him.
Interestingly, the wounds he had to absorb the river water with — which he did time while taking breaks — did not weaken him; rather, they acted as if they were not present.
Elias believed that once he made and learned a good combat style he would be able to fight the horror on the peak.
That was because he sincerely believed that the horror was a grade one beast or a grade one Requim beast, but it was an essence beast, thus was much more special than any beast he had encountered in his life.
Elias remembered what he had read on the black cube about mystic powers as he continued practising sophisticated movements.
There were mundane beasts or normal beasts like sheep, goats, and Chinen. All beasts could evolve into Requim beasts.
Combat warriors were grade one Requim beasts, while priests were grade two or higher. Elias's strength was merely that of a combat warrior, while he himself did not have the power of the lights.
Even if he was at the peak of combat warrior strength, it was nowhere near the raw strength of a priest.
Even dreaming of killing an essence beast was hard for him; however, to survive he would have to pull off the impossible
…
A few days later… or hundreds of lays later
A young man was climbing a mountain of corpses as his purple hair swayed in the strong wind. His hair was roughly cut, reaching his back. If he had not routinely bitten them off and used his teeth to keep them in check, his hair would have gotten as long as the mountain. Well, at least that was what Elias thought.
As he climbed the mountain, he felt the murderous pressure on him increase — he felt weaker and more exhausted the closer he got to the peak. His olive skin glistened with sweat as he persevered.
He did not let the pressure weaken him; he could not let the pressure weaken him. He wanted to survive, but moreover he wanted to win.
He could see the top of the mountain now; his eyes shone as he thought.
What should I call my fighting style?
I make use of every muscle… so white muscle? White corpse?
His rough hand was now at the peak as he used his hands to raise his head to peek at the top.
His eyes widened as adrenaline hit his veins — if not for that, he would have fallen from the mountain in surprise.
"How absurd…"
A huge dark blob of blood was concentrated in the middle of what seemed like a creator on top of the mountain of corpses.
On the peak of the mountain of corpses there lay an arena of some sort; the sole champion of it was a blob of blood concentrated in its centre.
It was not what was supposed to be on the top the mountain. The black cube did not mention a blood beast!
Before Elias could even blink, the blob disappeared from in front of him. He turned his head and saw faint afterimages in his periphery before it appeared right beside him.
In the next moment, Elias was falling headfirst from the mountain of corpses. He felt excruciating pain in his hands. He instantly brought his hands in front of him as he jammed his legs into the mountain — the days of training every muscle in his body were going to benefit him now, even if it did nothing to help him in the fight.
Both of his arms's entire forearm was blown away; his torn muscles hung from the sides.
He used most of his muscles in the legs and muscles on his back to slow down his fall considerably.
He looked upward once again and saw the harrowing blob of blood falling towards him.
He had assumed that the beast could not come down from the peak because of some unknown reason, but was spectacularly wrong.
Now that Elias had purposefully slowed down his fall, he was like a fish in a net. He panicked momentarily before calming down; using his remaining hands and legs to dig into the mountain of corpses.
His pure strength and application of muscle were refined to the pinnacle in the hundreds of lays, thus digging out corpses did not strain him.
No matter who is faster, everyone falls at the same speed.
Come to think of it, if the creature is a blob of blood, then is it staying on top of the mountain of corpses to stay away from the river? Wait, if it is a blob of blood, then how does it sense me?
Elias stopped digging corpses as suspicion struck him. He quickly changed his plan and took some corpses out and started tearing them apart.
The blob of blood could ambush him at any second. Thus, he was extremely vigilant and alert.
With every second passing like an eternity, he tore and connected as many muscles as he could.
As soon as the horrid stench of blood entered his nostrils and assaulted his mind. He took a deep breath and jumped out of the small cave he had dug out.
He was completely bare except for the thick sheet of muscles and tendons stuck to his hands and legs. At least whatever remained of his hands that is.
He knew that he could not see the movement of the blob clearly and was too slow to hit it, thus he decided to use gravity to protect himself.
He glided for a couple of seconds before the sheet of flesh tore into chunks of white muscle. However, that few seconds worth of gliding were enough for him to gain distance from the mountain.
He was falling at an impeccable speed as the river churned around him; he was constantly looking around to get a faint glimpse of the blob before it hit him.
Here it is!
Since he was escaping, the blob had no choice but to take the risk and fight Elias mid-air with its doom underneath.
Elias caught an afterimage of the blob and prepared himself — the blob appeared at his feet but instead of Elias not moving like the last time he dove his leg into it.
He used every muscle to implant his leg as deep inside the blob as he could, for he had assumed that the blob had a core as a weak point
Something has to be keeping this thing together!
Elias felt his leg faintly touch something before he slammed into something.