'Ding' You have heard the roar of an existence far above your own.

Rafe wanted to ask what the actual fuck was happening with that, but his jaw was shaking, his whole body was shaking.

You have been afflicted with the status effect 'Fear'.

Your body shakes. The effectiveness of your stats is reduced by about seventy-five percent.

"Shit," Rafe said.

He couldn't move his body. And yet he could see Lupa-stione prancing gracefully towards him. He was going to die in a few seconds, and he didn't even know how he could prevent it.

Lupa-stione of starry Nights has randomly been set to level thirty.

Rafe was sick and tired of cursing by then. Still, there wasn't much he could do as the larger than life bear barreled than toward him, faster than any train he'd ever seen.

He threw himself bodily down at the last second, using his body weight to try and throw himself as far as he could, as he had no strength.

He took the opportunity as the bear's charge barely missed him to study his spirit. Aside from making sure the wounds on his soul did not close up, he now had a status effect to deal with.

He checked the stats side of the curtain, seeing something he'd experienced before. On the aura floor of this very tower, he'd had his stamina and mana pools frozen the way the rest of his stats were now frozen.

He did not know how to fight the effect.

There was no finesse filled method he could come up with just then. Therefore all he could do was brute force it.

He had to think. Think of a way to blow the restraints to kingdom come. Everyone loved a good soul bomb. And was there a method he could come up with to start a fire in his soul?

"Igniting my mana pool!" he shouted.

"Shit! That's gonna hurt," even as his body, out of his control as it was, violently crashed into the ground.

There was a crack as his shoulder popped. Rafe let it distract him for no more than a microsecond. Then he shrugged and went to ignite his partially blocked mana pool.

Lupa-stione turned and growled in his direction. Then it was running towards him again. He only had three microseconds until it arrived, if that. His coordination worked in overdrive, the extra points he'd put in it paying off in dividends.

With a mini explosion of spiritual pain, Rafe blew the fog from his stat pillars. Lupa-stione arrived, a paw slash coming down on Rafe's prone body.

Rafe surprised it when he kicked off the ground and sent himself floating backwards. With a thought, he summoned his sword from his soul realm. It appeared amid a burst of black void flame, freezing him with pain for an instant.

He was taking his stance in a moment, waiting for the slash from his enemy. He saw it with aura sense and his racial ability.

He knew he could not deflect it head-on as he was attempting to do. This one was too strong for him. Rafe wanted to curse his life, but this was the perfect opportunity to train his two new techniques.

With a thought he had pieces of his aura scatter throughout the range of his extended racial ability. Then with a few careful steps, he was a full two feet away from his starting spot. And the bear could not see him.

He caught its attack -which it had been too over committed to abort- on the side of his sword and waited. There really had been no way to fight the beast head-on. He only had to wait a moment for Lupa-stione to attack one of the random spots he'd sent an aura clone.

And then he deflected the attack to that spot with a considerable amount of effort. Lupa-stione turned to him too fast. He was sure the beast had five times his coordination stat. Still, it ate the attack head-on. Rather it received the attack straight to its face.

Rafe saw the blood of a calamity beast for the first time. A lot of golden blood that burned through the floor of the tower they stood on, leaving deep holes in the ground. Rafe gulped.

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He dived left before his brain could catch up with his battle won instincts. Lupa-stione crashed into the place he'd just been standing. Even before Rafe got to his feet a slash was already coming for him.

He took a stance and deflected it, starting to back track while almost dancing to avoid Lupa-stione's direct line of sight. With a shout Rafe dived with his sword aimed at the furthest corner of the room he could see.

A beam had appeared out of nowhere behind the beast and tried to take him down. On this their second fight, Lupa-stione had yet to use magic and so Rafe had forgotten what kind of fighter it was.

The beast pushed him to the brink of death using a single star. Somehow Rafe knew he wouldn't be surviving hours against it. What had he been thinking in taking this challenge. With his spiritual pain no less.

"Still an interesting challenge though," Rafe whispered to himself.

And then he charged in using his movement technique. His sword was pointed at the monster so he appeared next to its thick forelimb. An attack to that would hardly cause any major damage, so the veil shouldn't activate.

Still, Rafe bounced off amid a shower of sparks. He was up in an instant, this time using the original earth shattering technique to fly. And then he descended and the bear sent up a paw to swipe him into oblivion, and their weapons clashed with sharp impacts.

Rafe was outmatched and was always pushed back. But he was not instantly killed by a calamity beast more than four times his level. He didn't even last two minutes, as evidenced by a quest timer on his quest screen.

***

He was on all fours when he respawned, breathing heavily, and not only because he was still afraid of the beam of power he could not dodge. His spirit was aching, and there was no adrenaline to mask it this time.

'Ding' A Calamity beast, Mecha Primus, First son of the Machine god approaches.

"Huh?" Rafe's head snapped up.

The system did not acknowledge his question, instead continuing its introduction.

It has been set to level 15.

Twice his level, and a whole new calamity beast he had never faced before. With powers unknown. For some reason, he had been expecting to fight Lupa-stione again. He had hoped to train against it enough times that he would eventually win.

Rafe wanted to slap himself for that thought. Sure, he hadn't slacked in the last fight, but was his intensity as strong as it could have been? After all, he had known he had another chance. A mistake for a warrior.

"There are no second chances, Rafael Kingsley. After this floor, you will get back into reality. Where you can die."

He slapped both his cheeks, a satisfying clap echoing through the room. Only the slow plodding footsteps of an approaching juggernaut interrupted the sharp sound.

Name: Mecha Primus

Race: Calamity beast (lvl-15)

Strongest stat: Wis, Str, Agi, Cunning, Int, Coord, Per, Reg, Erudite constitution, ???, ???: 350

Strongest skill: ???? (User level too low to access this information)

Traits:???? !!!!

He turned off his skill when a sharp pain knifed through his skull. He was too low level to see anything here. He was just going to cause himself grief if he tried.

The last question marks were both a declaration and a warning. There was more information to be had. Only he was not strong enough to get it. He was not enough. Yet.

"Tch, calamity beasts, huh?"

A giant hunk of rusting and dented and scratched metal. Silvery for the most part, with a blue core in the center of its chest. It was ten feet tall, and it was horrendous, and it was barely shaped like a humanoid.

One hand was humanoid and thick, and the other ended in some kind of tentacles made from metallic wires below the elbow. It had a red visor, probably covering its eyes. It had a hump on its back, and indeed it looked badly proportioned.

He was sure the hunch had a function though. And he was proven right when the beast flew towards him using some kind of rocket booster attached to its back.

He was taken by surprise, but he had his sword out already.

It was fast. Faster than him by a mile. And even when he got a hit in could only elist a clang and at times a shower of sparks.

And the beams it shot from its chest core. A kind of ionic mana, is what Rafe decided to call it. It had explosive qualities, but metal was one of the strongest components he could see.

And then the eye Lazer beams. And the tentacles he had to deal with in normal time.

Even if it was a new opponent with very different tricks from those he'd seen so far, Rafe had to fight. And fight he did. For more than ten minutes this time.

He was sure he hadn't seen even half of the beast's capabilities, but he was able to hurt it with its own mana using his newest sword technique. And he had gotten into its guard almost a hundred times by the end. Never stopping to run. To charge, to dodge, and to swing. That was all he could do in the end. All he could do was keep fighting.

'Ding' Your class warrior has reached level 8. Stat points obtained. Spec points obtained.

Your pseudo-class skill Mimic has reached level 8. Stat points obtained. Spec points obtained.

Your race human has reached level 8. Free stat points obtained.

Your skill Aeon's Sword mastery has grown to level 770.

Your skill Aeon Warrior's trance has grown to level 124.

Your skill Skyholm's fighting Proficiency has grown to level 40.

Your skill Dodge has grown to level 20.

Your skill Dash has grown to level 34.

Your skill Heavy blow has grown to level 255.

Your skill Blade intent has grown to level 79.

Your skill Puppeteer's Rubber Body has grown to level 58.

Your skill Sword's man's footwork had grown to level 293.

Your skill Steady footing has grown to level 315.

Your skill Ambidextrous has grown to level 125.

Your skill Parry has grown to level 220.

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