68 No Holds Barred

"You are indeed powerful..." remarked the Final Knight, its fiery blue eyes blazing fiercely as it asked, "But, tell me...why do you pursue even greater strength? We know of the events that occurred near what is today known as the Mushroom Rock Road. Even without Lord Alexander's blessing, you have no equals in this world..."

Shaking his head, Andrew answered, "I'm not interested in your Lord's blessing. I fight to protect the things I care about, prove myself, and push beyond my limits. However, if your Lord can help to safeguard the things I cherish, they would be a welcome ally..."

"Then, come forth, traveler from beyond the veil," said the Final Knight, brandishing their oversized silver, gold, and blue sword as they added, "Let mine Excalibur and I be thy final foe."

Following the Final Knight's words, a far more powerful magic barrier appeared around the arena, glistening with a holy aura. At the same time, the Final Knight charged forward, moving like a phantom to appear before Andrew in the blink of an eye, swinging its sword with a silvery white trail in its wake.

Deciding against blocking the sword directly, Andrew darted to the left, gliding less than a centimeter above the ground as he made use of Auto-Float and Haste to drastically improve his mobility. Beatrix's advice was still fresh in his mind, but there was a proper time and a place for training, and Alexander's Trial was neither.

Tracking Andrew with its eyes, the Final Knight slashed its sword in a diagonal arc, producing a crescent-shaped blade of white energy that moved at extreme speeds, narrowly missing its mark. In response, the golden-haired monkey man unleashed two homing streams of energy from the palms of his hand, one glistening with white particles and the other black. The Final Knight attempted to cut through them with two blindingly quick sword slices, but the energy invariably spread through its body, concentrating in its joints and leaving it feeling vulnerable.

"Foreign Magic..." muttered the Final Knight, placing its left hand against its chest to overwrite Andrew's Deprotect and Deshellga with one of the most powerful buff Skills, Lord of the Round, vesting it with Protect, Shell, NullAll, Haste, and the Ribbon effect. Thus, when Andrew subsequently hit it with Dispel, the Final Knight resisted it and leaped across the arena in a single bound, slashing its sword so quickly that it produced a cross-shaped crescent sword beam.

'This thing is fast...' noted Andrew, evading the attack by rushing into it, vanishing, and reappearing behind the Final Knight as it passed through his previous location. The Knight reacted quickly by spinning around in a blur, but not before a blinding light enveloped Andrew's body, his Magic Power skyrocketing due to the use of a spell known as Faithra. Then, like a character out of Dragon Ball, he blasted the Final Knight with a beam of fiery white energy, a channeled version of a non-elemental spell dubbed Ruinga.

Though NullAll granted them temporary immunity to elemental attacks, the Final Knight had no such resistance against the non-elemental variety. As such, Andrew's attack sent it crashing into the holy barrier surrounding the arena, the fiery white energy pressing down on it like a mountain as it attempted to resist with its sword. Fortunately, it didn't have to endure for too long as such powerful Magic siphoned the caster's mental energy like water passing through a sieve.

Feeling the torrent beginning to subside, the Final Knight sliced through the remaining energy with the intent to launch a counterassault. Instead, as Andrew was nowhere to be seen, it looked around with caution, hands gripping its oversized sword as it patiently awaited the next attack...

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While sipping an Ether through a straw, Andrew stared at the Final Knight using his Correspondence Menu's camera function, first focusing on Rikku and then manipulating it so he could see the situation in the arena.

'Even Ruinga barely dealt any damage to him...' noted Andrew, concluding the Final Knight had insane Magic Defense. Its sword, in particular, didn't have a blemish on it despite taking the brunt of the attack. However, with a name like Excalibur, Andrew wouldn't be surprised to discover it was the most powerful sword in the world.

Setting aside the emptied Ether bottle and picking up a fifth, Andrew felt increasingly focused and motivated. His next plan was to use Ultima, so he made sure he was sufficiently pepped and fully buffed before setting aside the final Ether bottle and returning to the arena, whereupon he was greeted by the edge of the Final Knight's greatsword obscuring his vision.

Evading the attack by blinking back to his Penthouse, Andrew reappeared almost instantly, this time raising his gauntlets to form a singular shield as he activated the Heroic Guard Ability, reducing all damage by 84% on top of his standard resistances.

Seeing Andrew endure its blow without moving, the fiery eyes of the Final Knight widened as the energy from its attack filled the former's gauntlets before condensing at the point its blade had impacted, repelling it with an irresistible force. Then, in the resultant gap, Andrew transitioned from a turtling guard to aiming his palms forward, drawing a monumental amount of energy from the surrounding Pyreflies as he shouted, "Ultima...!"

"Hmph. Well played..." said the Final Knight, closing its eyes as the swirl of magical energy bent the space around it, preventing its escape. Its armor granted it exceptional resilience to both Physical and Magical Attacks, but against Ultima, the most powerful offensive Magic, the thick metal plating crumpled like paper...

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"Is that it...?" muttered Andrew, breathing a little heavily and feeling a dull sensation in his head but otherwise no worse for wear. He felt like he had 'cheesed' things, but holding back and trying to improve while his life and everything he had acquired was at stake was just senseless.

As the barrier surrounding the battlefield disappeared, Yuna came running over, leaping the final five meters into Andrew's arms as she exclaimed, "I knew you could do it~!" as he spun her around a few times to disperse the force of her jump.

Before Andrew could respond, Yuna, compelling Lenne to do the same, linked her arms around his neck and shoulders, standing on the tips of her toes as she rewarded him with an intense, passionate kiss. Unlike before, Andrew immediately cupped her butt, lifting her off the ground slightly to make it easier for them to continue kissing as Rikku and Paine made their way over, the former pointedly remarking, "I would tell you to get a room, but it hasn't been that long since you came back..."

Setting Yuna and Lenne down, Andrew turned to Rikku with a smile and teased, "Don't worry. Unless you change your mind in the interim, you'll receive plenty of my affection in the future. For now, let's find the Sphere and wrap things up."

"Well, there's only one place the Sphere can be..." said Paine, directing her and everyone else's gazes to the Chamber of the Fayth. Since it was off-limits to anyone who wasn't a Summoner, only Yuna and Lenne could venture further.

"There's no need to worry. Lord Alexander is known for his benevolence," assured Lenne, adopting an awkward smile and speaking through Yuna as Andrew stared down at them with an expression of concern. She tried to play it cool, but because of Yuna, her heart skipped a beat, and a fluttery feeling permeated her chest when Andrew responded with a curt, "Just be careful..." before letting her go.

Following the duo's departure with his eyes, Andrew waited for the shield-like door protecting the chamber's entrance to close and seal itself before shaking his head and looking away to find Rikku and Paine staring at him.

"What's up...?" asked Andrew, causing Paine to look away with crossed arms while Rikku responded, "You've been acting super weird since you turned pink. You're still a massive pervert, but you're behaving a lot more 'lovey-dovey' than before..."

"Mmm..."

As the realization of his assholishness was still fresh in his mind, Andrew just hummed in response to Rikku's words. He had already decided that, once things wrapped up with Alexander, he would return to Alexandria for a long, heart-to-heart discussion with Garnet. When she initially gave him permission to court other women, he had presented it as a possibility, not something that was guaranteed to happen. Instead, it quickly became a goal of his to scout and recruit the characters he had fawned over or had a crush on in his past life, assembling a harem even though he could have been happy with any one of them...

Pulling out an Ether, Andrew chugged it down in a few large gulps, easing the negative sentiments that had begun to pervade his mind. At least now he understood why Black Mages were so gloomy and White Mages prone to depression. He assumed healing serious injuries placed a heavy burden on the healer, but the truth of the matter was that when their MP was low, pervasive thoughts came naturally.

Feeling much better, Andrew placed the empty Ether bottle in his Item Box before materializing a small sofa, occupying the central position, and asking, "Care to sit down...?" with a cheeky smile.

"I'd rather you take me to the Penthouse so I can shower," replied Rikku, feeling icky after exerting herself and sweating quite a bit. Paine felt the same, so Andrew escorted them to the Penthouse, leaving them to their own devices before returning to the battle-scarred arena to wait for Yuna and Lenne to emerge from the Chamber of the Fayth...

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With five hours passing since Yuna and Lenne had entered the chamber, Andrew managed to finish up most of his auditing work, leaving him tired and looking forward to the day Minfillia handled it for him. Then, as he had resolved to stick around until the duo completed attuning to Alexander's Fayth, he checked on them for the seventeenth time before defaulting to his habit of biding his time by peeping.

"Hydaelyn's crystal tits..." muttered Andrew, his eyes widening to their limits as he peeked in on Lulu only to find the buxom Black Mage shaking her hips atop, of all people, Tidus. He knew she was in Luca and was quite a fan of Blitzball, but she was also among the few that knew of Tidus's 'imminent' fate. In truth, Andrew had already found at least four solutions to prevent the Blitzball star's disappearance, but Lulu shouldn't be aware of that...

"Well, as long as they're happy..." muttered Andrew, closing the window and resolving not to peep at Lulu from that moment onward. At the same time, he was a little curious to see what Wakka was up to, so he checked in on the orange-haired Besaidian only to find him merrily celebrating with the Aurochs and a large crowd of supporters, presumably after winning a fairly important game.

"Seems like everyone's in high spirits," remarked Andrew, adopting a faint smile as he closed the display and scrolled through his increasingly long list of contacts. Tiny numbers next to each name showed if he missed any messages, so when he saw several next to the final two entries, he took a deep breath and opened them both.

Though he would have been over the moon if he had read the messages earlier that day, a moderately exasperated sigh emanated from Andrew's throat as Serah and Claire had discussed things and decided to share the burden of being a Proxy. Speaking objectively, this was a good thing. But Andrew couldn't help feeling like a jackass when he reminisced about his interaction with the two sisters...

"These will be the last two..." decided Andrew, unable to retract his words and actions without complicating the situation further. He could probably 'undo' his meeting with the two sisters using Etro's power, but as that felt even scummier, he decided the best course of action was to live with the consequences of his actions and make it up to the duo retroactively...

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