The Transmigrated Author
Chapter 59: Round Of 32 Knockout Stages (3)

The crowd's noise hit me like a physical force. 989th. Was it really necessary to announce that bit? I was here, doing my best, the same as anyone else.

haaah...

A frustrated sigh escaped me as I faced Sergio Vex across the cold stone floor. A sea of confused and jeering faces blurred in my vision. Did a low rank really matter that much? Before I could dwell on it, the starting signal reverberated through the stadium. It was time to move.

Pulling out my crossbow I could see Sergio already had his sword and shield, a standard combo favoured for both defence and counterattacking. At least he wasn't underestimating me because of my ranking. Good.

TAK!

I let my first bolt fly to gauge his reaction rather than inflict damage. Sure enough, Sergio batted it away with his shield, but with less effort than I expected.

"Seriously, dude?" He fixed me with a sceptical face. "I faced tougher opponents, but shooting directly at my shield..." He trailed off, shaking his head with disappointment. "Are you by any chance R****ed?"

I gave a dramatic shrug, feigning offence. "Hey, just checking it wasn't an illusion or something. A little etiquette before the actual fight, you know?"

The crowd wasn't buying my excuse. A ripple of hate replaced the earlier amusement.

"Who does this rando think he is?" someone snorted.

"Trying to get into the opponent's head? Pathetic."

"Really Rel?" Jan looked at Rel confused.

"...!" Valencia tilted her head trying to understand what just happened.

Now I just made myself look like a fool. But only enough for this Vex guy to feel the need to beat me by a landslide.

"I'm gonna kill you" Sergio surged forward, fueled by anger as much as a need to regain face.

The glow around his shield intensified – time for brute force. He feinted a slashing attack with his sword, then lunged low, clearly aiming to knock me off balance.

[Evasiveness (Passive) has been activated!]

Instead of retreating, I took a quick step forward feeling a boost in speed, I forced him to either commit to the lunge or pull back.

He wasn't prepared for that audacity. He pulled back but lost momentum and balance in the process. His hesitation made him an easy target.

I drew two bolts. My first wasn't meant to inflict damage – it struck the stone platform near the heel of his boot, sending shards of chipped stone flying in his direction.

I've been practicing for a bit on how to use this ability so let's hope this works. Focusing my mind on the chipped stones I used my right hand flicking my pointing finger and middle finger upwards.

SHAK!, SHAK!,

The unexpected stones had gravitated upwards grazing the upper right cheek of his face.

"...!"

His reaction was reasonable, I knew precision control was broken the moment

I learned the ability. Although it hurts my head trying to control the ability it works just like the system said.

As long as anything touched by me or touched by an item owned by me means the property of the object would be considered a projectile as long as it has a moving force of its own, allowing control over how I can manipulate the object. It wasn't easy but it was small steps to getting better at it.

After his reaction to my precision control, I already had my second bolt thudded into his raised shield. Not a powerful strike, but precise and forceful.

With his focus solely on blocking the bolts, I gambled. Closing the distance in a heartbeat, I struck the lower edge of his shield with a solid kick. The echo of metal upon stone rang through the arena.

Ow, dammit! Should've aimed much lower and braced better – his shield rebounded a bit of that force right back into my knee. Still, that wasn't what he was focused on.

SLASH!

With his sword scraping the lower side of my knee a jolt of pain quickly rose from my legs feeling the burn of his slash.

"What did you expect? you kicked a shield and felt the force bounce back at you, you idiot." He mocked lunging once more going for another slash.

Slash!

With his sword touching the ground he had missed my body just by a millimetre. The miss felt like a win. But his smirk told me there was more...the entire platform beneath me rumbled.

I saw that his foot was glowing with mana and he was constantly tapping the ground with a rhythm.

RUMBLE, RUMBLE, RUMBLE,

"RISING ROCK!"

Sergio roared, swinging his sword at me. With sharp spikes erupted from the stone, forcing me to leap backwards to avoid being impaled. Two bolts flew past him as I jumped, firing more out of instinct than aiming.

But as I flicked my hand up, I wasn't giving up on those shots.

DODGE!, DODGE!, DODGE!,

It was about redirection, not power. The mental focus was everything. With a groan that felt like a spike in my skull, I willed those bolts to change trajectory...

TAK!, TAK!

It seemed I'd missed. But wait...he flinched! No explosion, no sound. It made me realise what if a 'deactivated' bolt wasn't pointless after all?

"...WHAT?..."

It was then Vex had stumbled forward from a mysterious force pushing him towards Rel. The confused look in his eyes hadn't registered the fact that the same 2 bolts he had regarded as missed targets didn't make a single sound after Rel had seemingly missed.

But his body couldn't process as fast as his mind and as a matter of fact, the bolts had no energy and no element within them.

They were attributeless arrows, or so they were and the burning sensation that had erupted from behind rose.

"AHHHHHH! IT BURNS!" Vex screamed dropping the sword from the pain. that split-second confusion cost him dearly. In a rush, I closed the gap, five meters turning into zero almost instantly. Before he could fully react, my crossbow was ready to force surrender him...

But he reacted faster, he knocked the crossbow out of my hands and seemingly enough I knew this would happen somehow, for what he rejoiced through his annoying grin was met with my fist.

SHAAAAA!

[Critical Hit!]

A Burst of black lightning completely erupted from my right fist and with a powerful force, he was sent flying to the very edge of the platform. One more inch and it would have been an automatic forfeit.

KEUKKK!

The agony in his cry told me my punch had left its mark.

______________________

Authors Notes:

- Precision control: The ability allows Rel control over objects that are considered 'projectiles', For Rel to use this ability requires a lot of mental strength as it is a task of manifesting the movement first and controlling the speed of how fast it goes.

- Force surrender is essentially pinning your opponent into a spot where moves are considered 'finishers' meaning that if a weapon is pointing straight at your head there's no way out of it. By the rules, you have to Force Surrender, giving up.