27 Splash

"Is this really necessary? You were already more than ten times my size. That little added height isn't going to help you much." I say, witnessing the even bigger Sandman in front of me.

My question is met with the enraged Marko slashing at me with his sword arm. I jump over it with a backflip and start fleeing at an increased speed. Now more than before, it is important to stay far ahead of his attack range as I have found out it doesn't take much for him to kill me, only two or three good hits would do it.

I recast the magic shield that I lost right away to soak up any damage I might take. This skill has really saved my ass during this fight. Without it, I would have long died from the continuous damage of the sandstorm and that one heavy hit I took.

"So you are still unwilling to stand and fight me?" Marko growls as he breaks out into a run to catch me.

"Did you think that giant hammer of yours would make me more inclined to pick an unwinnable fight as opposed to running away? Are your brains made out of sand as well?" I use taunt once more to keep him entirely focused on me.

Through testing, I have discovered that I don't need to use taunt together while insulting someone for it to work. As long as I mentally use the skill, I could say just about anything for it to work, but personally, I feel like the effect is stronger if combined with a direct insult.

After only a short time of web-slinging, I discover that I am no longer fast enough to comfortably stay ahead of Marko. Absorbing the surrounding sandstorm has increased his size enough that his steps are now much larger, yet the speed of moving his limbs has not slowed at all.

Before long, I am much more focused on frantically dodging attacks rather than trying to make my way to the final battle location.

I haven't taken any more damage, managing to just barely get out of the way of the two weapons, but it sure has been close a few times.

Narrowly evading another sword slash and pulling out of the way of a downward hammer strike that leaves a hole in the ground, I decide things can't continue like this if I want to survive.

He is feeling way too comfortable just freely attacking me, not worried at all that I might retaliate in some way. I need to put pressure on him in some way so I could catch a breather here, the question is how.

Physical attacks down work on him, I already know that. I even made an attempt on his newer form by kicking his hammer hand when it was on the ground after an attack, but it did precisely one damage and only made Marko laugh at me.

Water is a known weakness, and the great thing about New York is that water hydrants are everywhere. I've been pulling them with webs and breaking them to spray water on Marko whenever we come across one, but we move too quickly for it to really affect him.

Don't worry, Marko, you'll get a good hosing soon enough…

Here's an interesting thought. Magic.

I haven't tried out attacking him with my mana bolt yet, don't ask me why. With the skill being at level 19, I can currently fire out two bolts at once that, in total, should do just a bit over 250 damage.

Making the decision to attempt it, I do something that Marko doesn't expect. As he is still running forward at a fast speed to keep up with me, I do a U-turn and sling behind him, changing directions too quickly for him to stop and turn.

Once his back is fully exposed, I use a mana bolt and two projectiles manifest around me. The first fires off at his lower back and explodes upon making contact, leaving behind a hole and making Marko groan out in pain and scrunch up.

The second bolt follows quickly and explodes in the hole left behind by the first hurting Marko even further. There is now a hole that goes all the way through his stomach, but almost immediately, it starts fixing itself by re-absorbing the sand that was just blown away.

Checking his health with observe I see that the damage isn't as extensive as his reaction had me believe. It had dropped by 100 after the spells, which is a lot more than physical attacks, sure, but still not the full 250 I believed it would do. To some extent, he probably has some magic resistance.

Maybe he was just surprised that I was even able to damage him at all. He probably hasn't felt pain since becoming Sandman.

"What's up, Marko? Didn't you hear that people are calling me Magicman?" God, I hate that nickname.

I circle around him and once again take off with Marko, having recovered, hot on my heels. This time though, he is much more careful with attacking me as I fire off my spell every once in a while to keep him on his toes. Even if it does minimal lasting damage, it does hurt and stagger him, which is all I need.

"You are so lucky I don't know how to do water magic! I would have killed you ten times over by now."

As the chase continues and we are almost at the finish, I make a quick call to George, only saying that we will be there in a minute and ending the call. There is not much more that needs to be said anyways. Marko's trial to freedom is about to come to an end.

The battle site Geroge and I chose was a suburb still under construction at the edge of the city. The roads were all constructed, but no houses had yet to be built. We had all possible exit locations like the sewers blocked off, so Marko wouldn't be able to escape after being defeated, while George got an entire firefighting department to bring their cars over and get ready to blast Sandman with all they got.

Too focused on me, thanks to being constantly shot by mana bolts and the effect of the taunt skill, Marko doesn't even notice he is walking straight into a trap. He willfully ignores the dozen or so parked firetrucks ahead of him and all the ones creeping behind to form a circle that he couldn't escape from.

When I judge Marko to be in a good position, I run around his legs and web them together to the best of my ability while dodging more attacks. It won't hold for long, but it doesn't have to.

After a few rounds, a hammer comes down right next to me, leaving a crater. Sorry to whoever has to fix all of the damage he has done today, by the way, I hope you guys get overtime pay.

I jump on top of the hammer and ride it as Marko lifts it back up. Jumping onto his head, I yell out, "Firefighters use hydro pump!"

Most seemed confused, but a few understood what I said and opened fire, well water, not fire, and others followed after their footsteps and started hosing down Marko as well.

Being sprayed from every direction, it took literal seconds for Sandman's size to start decreasing. Thanks to the webs around his feet, he wasn't able to move in the initial stages either.

It was pretty fun sitting on top of the weakening Sandman. It's like an amusement park ride… OI! Who just sprayed water at me?! It looks like I have a hater among these people…

I jump down to the ground and watch as Marko is almost down to a normal human size. Checking his health, it is also going down at a rapid pace. His max health is laughable now.

[HP - 130/ 240]

"Alright, everyone, hold your fire!" I hear George yelling out, and all the firefighters stop their streams to reveal Marko cowering while lying on the ground. Yeap, he isn't looking all that good right now.

Before he could make an attempt at… well, anything, I shoot webs all over him and basically put him inside a cocoon. I don't think he can use the wet sand piles that are lying all around us, but I'm not taking any risks.

[Gained xxx experiences from the battle] (Its a big number ok, time to switch to % lol)

[Leveled up 16 times!]

[All implemented stats of host have surpassed 100, activating system update 0.3 during the next time host is asleep.]

Well, shit, I guess that's what happens when you defeat an enemy 30 levels higher than you. I cant wait to see what this system update will include, but if I'm getting nerfed in any way, I'm rioting.

Before I forget, I also touch Marko's cocoon to get his drops. Unfortunately, I still have to do it manually as there is no auto-loot feature, but hey, a system update is coming, so maybe I can get one. Pretty please?

What I gained is very, very exciting. In fact, if there weren't all these people around, I would be squealing out in happiness right now.

There is the money which absolutely everyone drops and has made me very rich but more importantly, a skill book!

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[Skill Book - Dungeon Explorer]

[Description - Enter and exit an infinite dungeon full of monsters and treasure at will.]

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I learn the new skill right away. This is going to be so useful moving forward as grinding experience on the casual thugs around New York is getting rather inefficient.

Looking around, the firefighters are packing their stuff up and preparing to leave as their job here is done. Most of them seem to be in a good mood. I'd imagine blasting water at a giant helpless sand monster is much more fun than fighting actual fires.

George, who was previously busy talking with some people, comes over to me. "Good job Spiderman. I have to be honest, I didn't like you much earlier, but you helping us has made our job today a lot easier."

He extends a hand, and I shake it. "All in a day's work for a vigilante. More importantly, how are you going to take care of Marko? Do you need me to bring him somewhere?"

George shakes his head and points behind me.

Looking over, I see a black van, escorted by several SUVs heading our way. They pull over right next to the battle site with the van parking in a way that its back is right next to Marko's cocoon.

Out of the vehicles come several men wearing suits and sunglasses. They all look like generic secret government employees. A few of them open up the back of the truck and start lifting the cocoon inside.

"We will take it from here. Good job, you two." As I was staring at the men working, one came up to us and spoke to us. I turn to him, and… holy shit is that agent Coulson?

I try to hide any reaction to meeting another mcu character in person, a trained agent like him would definitely notice that something is weird with the way I act.

"Thank you, sir. I have already sent everyone home and called Damage Control and let them know that they can start their work." George says, acting very respectfully toward Coulson. I guess he knows who he is and who he works for, at least to a certain extent.

Coulson nods. "That's relieving, I suppose everything will be back to normal by tomorrow morning then."

The men lifting Marko finish their job quickly. Still inside my webs, I see he is put inside a see-through box, which I highly doubt is made out of glass and lifted into the van, which is then shut.

"Spiderman, I have a feeling we will meet again sometime in the future. I hope you stay on the good side so we will never have to put you inside one of these containment cells." Coulson says with a smile before turning around and heading back into one of the SUVs.

That's something I would classify as a friendly threat.

I really wanted to do some trolling and say something along the lines of "Say hi to Fury for me" before leaving, but I got a feeling that would be beyond stupid with my current power, so I decided to leave that for another time.

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Note: God, I feel like I have no clue what I'm doing when writing action/chase scenes. It took me so many hours to write this chapter, and in my mind, some paragraphs just feel disconnected.

Well, the chapter is like twice as long as the usual one with over 2000 words, so maybe that makes up for iffy quality.