Ability Wielders - Chapter 155 Darakth

Suddenly, an emotionless, approaching robotic, voice reverberated inside Hayden’s mind. “Selecting environment… Environment selected. Block 3 will be competing in the Harsh Ice Wasteland.”

As you can see, the preliminary free-for-all isn’t as simple as putting all contestants in a plain arena and making them fight each other. It put all competitors in a randomly selected simulated environment that was as big as 150 acres (Approximately 600,000 meters).

All participants will enter the environment at the periphery, each spaced out at least 4,000 meters from each other. When two minutes passes, there will be a boundary that will slowly push to the center, and in eight minutes, the match will be limited to an area of 0.5 acres. It was pretty much the standard free-for-all rules in FPS games.

The environment is simply to test a young wielders’ combat adaptability and has no adverse effects as it is akin to real-life environments, making wielders resistant, immune even, to the effects of any environmental damage, including heat and cold.

The voice in Hayden’s head counted down from 10 to 1. The second it finished verbalizing the last syllable of zero, the wall in front of him slid down, revealing a marvelous sight of a… Well, Harsh Ice Wasteland.

Unlike what one would imagine, there was no snow or cruel weather. Conversely, the sun hung up high in the cloudless blue sky. Although the sun was red in color and appeared either much smaller or far more distant than the Sun.

As for the general environment, it was deserted and was riddled with glaciers that imitated trees. It was a literal ice forest. Not a snowy taiga biome It was a veritable ice forest. In the horizon, there were dunes of what appeared to be ice alongside a large ice mountain.

Hayden stepped on the icy ground. It wasn’t slippery as there was no liquid buildup on its surface due to the temperature of the surroundings. Licking his lips, Hayden discarded his white shirt. shifted into the full form of Indestructible Devil, his selected Ability to use all throughout the Quasilix. Minus the wings of course.

At the end of the day, Indestructible Devil was a transformation Ability, reinforcing every attribute that he has. Despite it really not holding a candle to Divine Perception when it comes to augmenting his senses and mental faculties, it did enhance the two by a bit, at twice its normal capacity.

Hayden advanced to the forest of ice spikes, activating his essence energy sensing. He ran around and, soon enough, he found two people duking it out. One of them was holding a gigantic greenish hammer, the other was some kind of bear with water swirling around them.

Estimating from where the arrows originated, Hayden ran towards it at an extreme velocity, giving no chance for the archer to escape. Hayden pierced the right eye of the archer with his right claw, killing her without resistance.

Out of the blue, the ground shook. Somewhere in the distance, outside of the ice forest, near an ice dune, a woman grew to the size of the Eiffel Tower. Unfurling his four wings and using his Empyrean Power’s 50% augment, Hayden rushed to the woman’s head and punched it. With the power of his punch, the woman’s face curved backwards and was ultimately crushed to smithereens. The sound that Hayden’s punch produced was akin to a cannon shot.

On the way there, Hayden has already seen that there were a few people down there that was fighting it out. They all stopped clashing when the boom of Hayden’s punch resounded. Needless to say, there was the factor of the dead giant woman falling backwards as well.

They all looked up and witnessed the most horrifying sight. It was Hayden, with his demonic king at full blast. Hayden flew down, landing Terminator style. People solely caught a glimpse prior to Hayden disappearing.

Without a warning, every wielder on-site was killed by a perforation on their right eyes, blood spurting out of it. Just like that, Hayden has killed a total of 16 people in this free-for-all.

Exiting the scene, Hayden shook off the blood on his right hand’s index and middle finger. He spat on the eyes, disappointment in his eyes. “These wielders are weak. What kind of training did they put them in? What a waste of time.”

By that point in time, everybody behind him was revived and exited the stage out of dismay. They couldn’t believe that Hayden slaughtered every single one of them in a span of a second. It was insane.

“You think this is a waste of time?” A woman with a beautiful figure and face asked him. A golden halo was conjured up above her, her eyes glowing gold. “I’ll show you the strength of a Foris.”

Hayden raised his right hand up and beckoned at the woman. “Show me.”

The woman’s figure flickered, traversing the distance between her and Hayden at a moment’s notice and then she threw a fist towards Hayden’s face. Hayden caught it with his right hand, greatly surprising the woman. ‘He can keep up with my speed? What in the world is this?’

“Is that all?” Hayden asked with nonchalance. “Come on, give me your best shot.”

The woman retracted her hand, twisted her body, and twist kicked at Hayden’s right temple. Hayden received the blow with his right arm. When that exchange was done, the woman groveled in pain and sat on the ice.

Hayden’s toughness was far too high! The attack actually broke the woman’s leg instead of damaging Hayden. It was an absurd occurrence that nobody would think is possible.

“That’s your best attack?” Hayden’s countenance, which was full of detestation, annoyed the woman to a great degree. As a result, she accumulated golden light on her right hand and blasted it at Hayden.

The ray of light struck the area between Hayden’s right shoulder and chest. Unfortunately, the light… Only tickled Hayden. It made nary a dent on him, feeling as if an ant bit him.

“W-what?” The woman gaped at Hayden. “You… How… Devil!”

Hayden’s entire person transformed into a jet-black curtain of darkness, with the location of his eyes only having red with white wisps surrounding it.

Hayden put her out of her misery by piercing her heart. With the commotion settling down, Hayden tapped the essence formation on his Qewtyour and the map was projected. Meanwhile, in his mind, the list of the remaining participants poured in. Amongst the 73 remaining people, Darakth was still there.

Hayden focused on the map. He noticed that there was a boundary closing in. “It’s been that long already?”

Hayden shrugged. He didn’t care for the time and rushed to the center of the map, which was a flat sheet of ice. Hayden sat cross-legged in the very center, waiting for his opponents to come.

In the next few minutes, there were challengers here and there that Hayden killed effortlessly. By the time four minutes has passed, Hayden’s body count rose to 37. Every spectator watching in the stands was in utter disbelief.

Hayden was a natural-born cold-blooded killer! He would strike for the weakest point of somebody as fast as he can, not giving them the slightest chance to resist. During the past four minutes, they’ve watched Hayden kill with a single attack: Thrusting his index and middle finger to the target’s hearts.

What’s amazing is that Hayden didn’t stand up for most of the wielders he defeated. He let them attack him and he countered by inserting his index and middle finger into their chests. He stood up exclusively when there was a long-ranged wielder that he couldn’t beat without standing up, taking a single second to beat them.

By the time the clock struck eight minutes, there were two people left. It was Hayden and… Darakth, whose full name was Darakth Zijul.

“That guy is strong, yet he’s unconfident.” Hayden felt pitiful for Darakth. “I wonder what his Ability is.”

Somewhere faraway, Hayden saw the silhouette of Darakth, approaching him. Hayden rose, licking his lips. “Don’t let me down, Ro-Darakth.”

Darakth didn’t cease his advance. Hayden chose to observe Darakth for the intervening period of time. When Darakth was 20 meters away from Hayden, Darakth’s body was engulfed in white flames.

Hayden observed further and noticed that Darakth’s body was that of a fire spirit’s, except that the fire that flowed within him was white.

Darakth’s figure started to hover above ground. He raised both of his arms, two white fireballs being materialized on it. Darakth motioned his hands to Hayden, in what Hayden assumed the command for the fireballs to be hurled to him.

The fireballs traveled at a fast pace. Still, it was no match for Hayden’s own speed. Accelerating forward, Hayden dodged the fireballs effortlessly. Before he can arrive, Darakth split into three figures. Scanning over the two replicas, Hayden couldn’t differentiate them at all.

‘I miss Divine Perception.’ Hayden was not fond of any kind of unknowns. Divine Perception helped him with that. ‘Well, in this situation, it’s best to go with the straightforward approach.’

Hayden conjured up his infernal flames with the intention to attack for the first time. He conjured 10 blazes, one for each of his fingernails. He focused part of his Devil Force into his arms and legs. To his surprise, Hayden could increase the enhancements of his arms and legs without needing to redirect everything on those four.

Right now, the strength of his arms and legs are at 11 times, whilst the rest of his body was merely at nine times heightening.

Brandishing his claws, Hayden instinctively knew how and released ten flame razor that quickly moved to Darakth. The three Darakths seemed to panic and plopped down atop the ice. Hayden took advantage of this and knocked the three down with a punch on the face.

When Hayden knocked the rightmost one, the two other Darakths merged into it as Darakth fainted. Hayden felt a stinging sensation on his right fist. He checked it and was stunned of its state. His right hand was frostbitten.

He triggered Endless Regeneration, the frostbite gone in an instant. “That will be a pretty handy power in the future.”

Hayden was going to exit when he heard groaning. It was Darakth, back in his regular human form, waking up. “W-was I beaten?”

“Yes.” Hayden left this one word before he exited the arena.

He exited to the closest exit. Hayden was met by Likoria. Hayden was tired by Likoria’s persistence on sticking to him. “Why do you keep on following me?”

“What if I told you I like you?” Likoria raised her right eyebrow at Hayden, speaking in a solemn expression. She shortened the distance between her face and Hayden’s to millimeters away. Hayden didn’t back away. “I am madly in love with you.”

Hayden stared at Likoria in the eyes without a change in his expression. He blinked rapidly, “Is that your idea of a joke? You should really socialize more.”

“Tsk, always so serious.” Likoria rolled his eyes at Hayden. “I’m going to be around you often. I already have my Filipina identity. You can’t shake me off.”

“I know.” Hayden pushed Likoria away and walked to the direction of the nearest stands. “You just have to stay out of my way. Or else.”

Hayden turned around and released his demonic king and killing intent, implying that he was being completely serious. Likoria gulped. She mentally noted to not get on Hayden’s bad side in the future.

She then trailed after Hayden, bugging him like there’s no tomorrow. She buzzed similar to a fly on his right ear. It was very annoying. Especially for Hayden.

‘Endure, Hayden. Endure.’ Hayden kept his emotions to himself. ‘Her Void’s Edge and whatever her second Ability is will be useful in the future.’

“Oh, yes, what’s your second-” Likoria thwarted Hayden from finishing that sentence by pushing him into the wall and covering his mouth. Hayden’s eyes widened, signaling that she should stop what she was doing or she will regret it.

“Nobody knows, huh?” Hayden materialized his white shirt and put it back on as he continued to walk. “Why are you keeping this a secret? Let me guess, your status is intimidating enough as it initially is that nobody wants to befriend you. Furthermore, when you beat a Level 4 wielder up, by probably catching them off-guard with your Ability, they were threatened of you. And your persona is rather standoffish, making people unconsciously avoid you.”

“Couldn’t have worded it better.” Likoria was genuinely impressed by Hayden’s Ability to deduce everything with a single look. “How do you do that?”

“It’s the power of observation.” Hayden answered as short as possible. To avoid other questions, he said, “Read the all-time classic Sherlock Holmes once you get out to the outside world. It’s a good read.”

In due course, the two reached the stands. Sitting in the back, Hayden and Likoria tapped the essence formation terminal in front of them. A hologram of the typical loading screen popped up.

A mental announcement diffused all throughout the Requasi. “Block 4 commencing. Selecting environment… Environment selected. Block 4 will be competing in the Red Dunes.”

In front of them, Hayden witnessed a spectacle of the arena downstage being engulfed in a virtual sphere. When the sphere evaporated, the map has changed to that of a desert with red sand.

Hayden couldn’t believe that essence formations can come this long of a way. Yes, this environment, to map transformations, to the mental announcements, to everything else, were essence formations. Foriast’s essence formation technology was remarkable.

‘Millions of years of refinement.’ Hayden gulped, in admiration of Foriast. ‘Doesn’t pollute the environment in the slightest, and is 100% efficient… Now I’m wondering how that Conversion Nucleus works…’

Hayden stared at his hands, utilized his Breathing Technique at the right amount so that it wouldn’t disturb anybody, and released gases of harmless essence energy.

He remembered that, during his first research on Essence Manipulation Arts, essence energy can be converted to other types of known energies, such as mechanical energy, and even chemical energy. Hayden simply called this technique as Energy Transmutation.

The thing with Essence Manipulation Arts is that it is temporary. For example, if one whips up a solid material, it will dissipate in a given period of time, which was dependent on the amount of life force it is infused with, once it loses its source of fuel, in other words, when it is disconnected to the wielder.

‘Mental energy. It has been mentioned in a couple of Liqiri.’ Hayden thought. ‘But there’s no mention of how to manipulate it… Tsk.’

Hayden threw this matter at the back of his head in the interim, choosing to observe the magnificent effects of essence formations.

The hologram shifted to the map of the Red Dunes. It was circular and was red all around. There were modes of spectatorship that can be selected to the left, such as displaying the elevations of the map and free navigation, while the list on the right was the name of the participants.

On the map, there were white dots that entered the arena from all sides. It was a pity that Hayden couldn’t use his Danger Sense from someone’s name alone to scout their power level.

A few minutes later, Darakth joined them, sitting at the empty seat on Hayden’s left. “You are indeed powerful.”

“Your Ability is top-notch, you know?” Hayden ‘complimented.’ “If I wasn’t your enemy, you could have beaten everybody.”

“I couldn’t possibly have.” Darakth meekly replied. “There are strong contenders out there that can beat me without lifting a finger.”

“The world is big, Darakth.” Hayden encouraged taciturnly. “Don’t waste your potential and brainpower on dwelling on your supposed ‘weakness.’ Set your mind forward and focus on what can be beaten.”

“Who the hell are you?” Likoria threw a jab at Hayden. “Why are you encouraging someone? Where the hell is the man that goes around threatening to kill everyone?”

“You know, I already have Daniel to make those kinds of remarks for me.” Hayden felt a small headache. He understood that Likoria didn’t have that much friends that she could poke fun at, but damn. Why did she have to choose him? “To answer your question, one of my dislikes is seeing potential being wasted. Darakth here has a powerful transformation Ability that is being wasted by his timorousness of ‘strong’ people whereas he can stand on level ground with them, or even transcend some here and there.”

“You really don’t pull your punches, do you?” Darakth wryly coughed. “Anyway, thanks for the ‘encouragement.’ I… I don’t deserve it.”

Hayden exhaled sharply. He was getting annoyed by Darakth more and more. That kind of wimpy nature wouldn’t get him anywhere. “You really don’t think your Ability is a mighty one, don’t you?”

“Not at all…” Darakth answered with a bleak tone. It was frustrating for Hayden.

“Fine, tell me the powers of your Ability.” Hayden’s cold and analytic persona jumped out, forcing Darakth to spill the beans.

Darakth’s Ability was the Ice-Flame Spirit King. With the modifier ‘king’ alone, one can tell that it was a wild one. Its Level 1 Ability is that it allows Darakth to transform into the Ice-Flame Spirit and is able to produce and manipulate ice-flames, a special flame that has temperatures nearing absolute zero.

Its Level 2 Ability is much ‘simpler,’ or so Darakth described. It bestowed Darakth the capacity to conjure up Null Ice, an ice so cold that it feels hot and has the properties of Turaka. On top of that, he can become a will-o’-the-wisp, conferring increased movement speed and evasive maneuvers.

Lastly, the Level 3 power of Ice-Flame Spirit King granted Darakth the ability to clone himself up to five times with the usage of purified essence energy. These clones has 90% of Darakth’s power and is a replica without any fault, able to follow commands and intentions immaculately.

“You… You think this is weak…?” Hayden hit a new peak of rage he never knew existed. He was angrier than when his parents were abducted by that son of a bitch, Bayrak.

“Relative to the others? Yes.” Darakth admitted dispiritedly. “Some of the true powerful ones can-”

Hayden punched Darakth in the face with his right fist. “Get your head out of your ass, you fucking trash.”

Hayden poured the worst of the curses in the Roshist dictionary on Darakth. Darakth, Likoria, and the people around them who heard this gasped.

“If you have time wallowing in depression, you have time to train.” Hayden calmed down and said. “There are weaker people out there that are contented, and you’re not? Jeez, wake up, you son of a bitch.”

Darakth gripped his fist. Although this wake-up call from Hayden wasn’t that much of a wake-up call, it made him rethink his whole ideals of what strength is. For the remainder of the time, Hayden, Likoria, and Darakth didn’t voice out anything.

Until the Block 11 match in a battlefield packed with mountains of corpses and craters. Likoria tapped Hayden on the shoulder. “I advise you to observe that Yora Ulthax. She is a fearsome Level 3 wielder. As smart as you.”