Dimensional Descent

Elorin's machete pierced forward, his gaze expressionless as he suddenly unleashed his Blade Force. Without fail, such an attack would shred a person's inner organs to mush.

Despite the fact he had just killed someone, he didn't feel very much at all. The exchange was quick, but he had expended quite a bit of energy, all he wanted to do now was to rush forward and end this battle as quickly as possible. Since the Cloud Race was such a disappointment, he would have to do everything himself.

Elorin pulled his machete back, but just as he was doing so, he froze. His blade didn't budge at all, even when he pulled harder.

Elorin's eyes narrowed.

James' head was lowered, but he suddenly shook it.

"Shit, that hurt," James mumbled.

Elorin's heart couldn't help but stir. He hadn't felt his Blade Force being blocked, so where had it gone? It wasn't that easy to trick him, he wouldn't have made a foolish mistake like assuming his opponent was dead without reason.

Suddenly, Elorin released a low hum and his body seemed to vibrate, becoming blurry. Several causalities stacked atop of one another and he pulled, finally, releasing his blade from James' shoulder as he slid backward, extending some distance between them.

To his surprise, though, James' shoulder didn't gush with blood even though the wound showed no signs of closing. If one had to describe it, it was as though he had poured epoxy into the hole in his shoulder, leaving a glistening and clear gap that stopped his blood from flowing.

James shook his head and exhaled. He had to admit that he had bitten off quite a lot this time, but he didn't feel very much fear at all. In fact, he grinned.

His head rose and a malevolent color exuded from his irises, his broad shoulders trembling.

No one really thought about what those with the Energy Shield Ability Index used to form their shields. It seemed to just happen, and most often it was nothing special, just a condensing of neutral Force. However, James had realized that his ability wasn't so simple.

If the Energy Shield Ability Index was broken down, its fundamental strength was in solidifying Force so that it could be used as a defensive measure. A step deeper than that, and it was a Force Manipulation type of Ability Index, with a thought he could force Force to act as he wanted it to. A step deeper than that and he could change the fundamental structure of Force itself to make it sturdier. A step deeper than that and he could change the structure of Force to make it do whatever he wanted it to do.

Neutral Force, as Leonel had long since learned, was the perfect balance of all Forces in existence. No, more accurately, the usual Neutral Force everyone was used to wasn't quite a perfect balance, it was rather Pure Neutral Force that could be considered this absolute perfect balance.

And it was precisely this Force that James had learned to control.

No matter what Force it was, he could assimilate it. He had taken the Tier 4 of his Ability Index to the absolute extreme... Allowing him to...

James pointed forward with a finger and a great surge of Blade Force manifested and shot out in a concentrated beam, more concentrated than even Elorin himself could make it, more concentrated than maybe anyone on Earth could make it.

BANG!

It shattered the sound barrier no more than a centimeter from the tip of his finger, accelerating so fast that it appeared before Elorin before he could blink even once.

Elorin's heart skipped a beat. He pushed his time acceleration to 3x, just barely managing to dodge to the side.

However, as he did, a fist appeared before his face. Elorin realized for the first time that there was no lane to dodge and he didn't have the time to raise his machete.

BANG!

Elorin's face twisted and one of his teeth cracked. His neck spun to the side and his body was sent flying backward, the harsh winds he experienced almost twisting his pristine white tracksuit to pieces.

James landed nearby, looking down at his fist. Even in that situation, he had felt that his knuckles were on the verge of cracking. It seemed that Elorin could use his Ability Index even for defense despite the situation. It was versatile, indeed.

Elorin spun through the air, landing harshly on his feet and leaving two deep trenches in his wake as he was forced to retreat again and again.

James shook his head, then looked down at the wound in his shoulder.

"Do you think that this is enough? Or do I need to let you stab me a few more times?"

Elorin pupils constricted.

ws

"Forget it, if I let anymore of this happen, they'll think I went Hollywood and forgot my roots."

James looked up from his wound and stretched out a hand and a small vortex of Force formed before wildly spreading. Elorin couldn't even react before the spreading dome of energy passed through him, but when he looked down, he didn't seem to be harmed at all.

There were five Tiers of the Energy Shield Ability Index. Partiality, Misdirection, Nullification, Reflection and Amplification. As usual, the last Tier was restricted to Savants only.

The first Tier partially blocked attacks, the second could misdirect them, the third could fully nullify them, and the last could reflect them.

With James' level of control, he even directly absorbed Elorin's Force, only releasing it when he felt like it. He had brought Reflection to its utmost limits.

However, this wasn't his limit in the slightest. His ultimate defense couldn't even be called reflection any longer. Instead, it was more accurate to call it absorption.

When he applied absorption on his body alone, any Force attacks would be directly swallowed up by him, unable to cause any damage whatsoever and even allowing him to use it in his next assault.

When he applied absorption in a domain... well...

Elorin's pupils constricted into pinholes. He suddenly couldn't sense any Time Force whatsoever, and without atmospheric Time Force to observe, there were likewise no causalities to observe.

Suddenly, Elorin froze, a fist suddenly appearing before his face.

"Don't look distracted now, I still need you to make this look like it's difficult."

BANG!

Elorin was once again sent flying.