Chapter 266: Mako's Treasure

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Whew boy! Ares was taken aback when three of the runes fired a Thunder Shock at him at the same time. This must have been a pretty rare occurrence given the random nature of the art so Mako, although his attention was elsewhere, had pretty much hit the jackpot here! In fact, Mako had never seen this art strike four or more times at once ever since he learnt it. Other than pouring water into it from above, or creating rain himself, there was no real way of manufacturing a specific result and so your best bet was relying on pure chance.

Rather than bust out the dodges, Ares had already pulled out some block rocks in preparation for this exact moment. He pulled out five, just in case his luck had been truly awful, but only ended up needing three. Honestly, two block rocks could maybe do the job here, as they were effective in their own right, but there was no reason to risk it all pointlessly so Ares chucked the trio of rocks up into the air above him without a care in the world. It looked like he was tossing trash over his shoulder but these little things were incredible. One man's trash is another man's treasure so, although Ares had Not Even Light in his arsenal, which was basically just an upgraded version of these rocks, everyone in the crowd was going to 'ooh' and 'aah' at these puppies. Some people in the crowd had done some dodgy backroom deals with disciples of the sect to get a hold on Shock Beads themselves and give them a whirl and, without fail, they always came back looking to buy more. There had actually been a couple incidents in Red Sun involving the Beads as of late but Hans was quick to punish anyone blowing up the town and the punishments weren't light either. Hans was having none of it because he knew just how deadly Ares' toys could wind up being if left unchecked. People got the message pretty quick and did their testing and / or ambushing of fellow cultivators out in the wild instead. Luring out their prey became harder but it was worth it not to piss off old man Hans who was notorious in Central Land in his own way. Plus, according to some rumours here and there, Hans had a metric ton of work on his plate and he was not in the mood to get distracted by upstart cultivators making noise so he was being particularly aggressive in his silencing of troublemakers.

Anyway, point being, now that some new rocks were on display a large portion of spectators watched on with piqued interest. Some of the simpletons in the crowd tuned out because the black hole that spawned from the rocks didn't look offensively superior to the shock rocks and so they lost interest. These people just wanted to do all the fun stuff involved with cultivation, like killing people and blowing stuff up, this defensive oriented tool wasn't up their sleeve. These were the type of prideful fools who died quick deaths in this world. There was a reason these block rocks were likely to sell more overall units despite being purchased by fewer individuals as a whole. As a general rule of thumb, for every one shock bead a professional bought, they would likely wind up buying two block rocks at bare minimum. Defensive tools were just more versatile overall and experts valued them properly as opposed to the ignorant riff raff turning their noses up at high-quality goods. Their loss! When they got into a fight with someone who had both shock rocks and block rocks, they would be the one whose attack was stifled by a block rock and left high and dry. They'd maybe even have the nerve to curse Ares shortly before death took them, that was just the kind of people they were. Nothing was ever their fault and their poor decision making was irrelevant in their minds.

Oh well! Not Ares' problem! Hell he wasn't even the one selling these things in the first place so they could take up their issues with someone else! Speaking of, as the thunder was swept up into the black holes, curving into the miniature abysses despite their best effort to scramble away, Onno had already gotten up alongside Esme and started handing out samples... When did Esme get up there?! She was supposed to be down in the arena but had clearly left at some point... Chances are, she and Li Li felt like their presence was wholly unnecessary. Even if it devolved into a fight with the whole team throwing their hats into the ring they wouldn't really contribute much of anything, compared to Enyo and Aejaz, so they understood they weren't needed at all and left. What was the point of sitting around in the danger zone when they could potentially end up getting involved in the fight between Ares and Mako? Hell the scrapping duo hadn't even noticed the absentees yet, that was just how little they really mattered. It was a shame but at least they could spectate from a safe distance now and still get the rewards later if Ares won! Well, Esme had been spectating up until this very moment but now it was time to work a bit and hand out the block rock samples! Of course if anyone wanted more than one they would have to fork over some good old stardust but, coincidentally, and very fortunately for the purchasers of his fine goods, Onno was offering all sorts of rascally promotions.

'You're the tenth customer!'

'I feel like I knew you in a past life!'

'Don't you remember me? We went to school together!

'You give me a good vibe!'

And Onno's personal favourite, 'You're the tenth customer!'

Astute viewers may have noticed that last one crop up more than once. This evil little conman couldn't care less how many people he sold to! Exact numbers meant nothing to him so he was just making this garbage up on the fly which is why that specific lie was his favourite. It was just easy to throw out without having to memorise how many people you'd sold to previously. It's not about what you, as the salesman knew or believed, but what the other person understood as the truth! They were happy to get a deal nobody else had, as long as you ignore every other tenth customer they weren't aware of anyway, and Mako was happy to make the sale to this 'prestigious' and 'one of a kind' customer. Nobody lost out here so it wasn't even really a big lie, just a small white one that enabled the smooth transfer of stardust and product.

Esme was also doing her part and raking in the sales at a decent pace. Spending time with Onno meant some of his despicable means had rubbed off on her and now the woman who really liked stardust knew how to get a lot of it in legal but also most definitely underhanded ways. She was working hard so that she could one day live a life in which she was hardly working. She wanted to retire with bundles of stardust to spend at her leisure and she was on the fast track to living exactly how she wanted. Esme wasn't a gold digger but she did accidentally strike the jackpot with Onno so she wasn't going to complain! Hell even Li Li somehow got roped into this nonsense and was handing out samples too. She could earn some good wages working for these two and had the connection already established so why not? She couldn't convince Dirk to do it to, though, as he kept muttering something about having a shred of pride and not stooping so low... He was right in a way but he was also not making any moolah clinging onto such worthless pride! Boooooo! Though it's not like he didn't have a good bit of stardust to his name anyway; he was the son of the patriarch of his clan and was a solid cultivator who could plunder riches pretty consistently without losing out on them to other competing cultivators or putting his life at risk. Most prodigious cultivators were rich if they'd been around for a while and weren't literally just starting out, it kinda came with the territory.

Back down in the arena, Ares was firing up his Perish Wheel. He was very interested to see what manner of creation Mako had lying up his ass that he could pull out and defend himself with. The creation pillar not having any aspects really made it hard to tell what was coming next with this thing. But, then again, that was the kind of adaptability and surprise factor that came with being the only pillar in existence without any aspects... Well, technically the technical pillar didn't have any either but there were people with unique aspects under the technical pillar! It had happened before, rare though it was, so that did count! Regardless, Mako needed to do something about Ares' strongest attack in his arsenal. If Ares charged up a large pressure attack, and combined it with some annihilation magic, he could maybe outdo Perish Wheel but, right now at least, it was his staple 'big bang' art and so Mako was under some serious pressure here. Grand Annihilation was good for moment to moment usage but this was the art that finished fights and pushed enemies to really go all out with whatever means they had at their disposal. While the Thunder Strikes were slurped up into the three small black holes, Ares had already started gathering the necessary ingredients, AKA mana types, to formulate the Wheel. Mako was too busy flopping about with Rox to stop Ares and the Charge Discharge runes could no longer affect him as once Ares started gathering streams of disintegration magic above his head nothing was ever going to pierce it.

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Not that the Discharge runes weren't still trying, of course, it's just that the Thunder Strikes crashed down into the base of the Wheel and vanished on the spot. The disintegration alone was enough to stifle their attempts and that wasn't even mentioning the nothingness or annihilation that were also more than capable of halting these attacks should they need to. The wheel was slowly filling in with the red nothingness web growing more complex by the second and the annihilation liquid resting atop it steadily increasing in quantity. The razor sharp disintegration edges of the Wheel were becoming more and more pointed until eventually the Wheel was mostly complete. There was the tell tale low hum of inevitability and all Ares had to do was chant the name of the art, to really pull it all together and activate all the silently churning mana, and then throw the thing. Fire and forget, Ares really didn't have to do much work to summon one of these things. It took a short while but the actual process was quite simple compared to something like a Not Even Light, the mana manipulation of which required many complicated twists and turns through Ares' internal pathways in order to create the desired effect. The most hassle Ares was put through when creating a Perish Wheel was not mixing the mana too early inside of him and only joining it all up outside which was hard at first but only ever got easier the more he practiced it. Being able to wield multiple mana types at the same time without contaminating one another was somewhat of a basic skill all cultivators were expected to learn at a beginner level anyway so, although some people weren't great at it, there was no one completely incapable of it. If even brand new cultivators could do it then naturally Ares could with his hands behind his back if he wanted.

Ares shook his head and stopped thinking about such trivial matters. He held within his palms destruction incarnate, a pulsing blend of everything that ruin was at its very core. He almost wished he could hold onto that power just a little longer because the small buzz numbing his hand just felt so right. Still, this fight had to move onto the next stage as some of the more high-ranking tools and tricks were starting to come out. Ares couldn't slow down in the arms race otherwise Mako would overtake him and leave him in the dust so Ares wanted to be at the forefront of as many developments during this match as he possibly could. Rather the aggressor than the aggresse. Much rather.

"Perish Wheel!"

Ares made no effort to elevate his position and get a better angle because dodging the Wheel in this compact arena was a struggle as is, he didn't need to go the extra mile to aim the thing precisely as that was overkill. Plus he would need to start dodging the CRACK... Thunder Strikes again now that his disintegration cover was sailing towards Mako. It was just easier to dodge on the floor than in the air even with Voidwalk. He had his full range of movement available to him in the air thanks to Voidwalk, sure, but there was no way of replicating the feeling of his feet on the cold, hard ground so it just felt different. It was like living your life the same way every day for fifty years only for something incredibly minor to change and feel so off you didn't want to do it anymore or, at the very least, you felt extremely uncomfortable whenever you put up with it. Maybe like a familiar restaurant getting a new cook, a new neighbour moving in next door, or a piece of clothing no longer fitting even though it had been with you for years. All minor inconveniences but could lead to rather off-putting feelings depending on the severity of the change. Voidwalk was sort of the same for Ares because he loved the art, it elevated his options to a whole new level that broadened the scope of his combat by a wide margin, but he would almost always rather just be on the ground. His footwork was better on the floor even though there logically shouldn't have been a difference.

Maybe that solid platform feeling made a very real difference to his tactile-based performance and losing that feeling threw off his timing.

Maybe it was all just a placebo and he was being a whiny baby.

Maybe he was actually better at Voidwalk footwork than he even knew and he was complaining about something that was actively making him better without him even realising it.

Either way, no matter what the truth of the issue was, Ares valued comfort over functionality and he was in charge here! He'd make whatever he was doing work until it no longer could and then, and only then, would he resort to other means that were better but he avoided for whatever reason, illogical or otherwise. As of right now, Ares was very capable of dancing around the Thunder without Voidwalk so that was precisely what he was doing. And doing well, mind you, as his movements almost made it look as though he were performing a rain dance of some kind. His intricate movements were always enough to position him no more than an inch or two away from the incoming Thunder. His manoeuvres looked like an electrical slalom with flashes of brilliance from both his sudden alterations to his movements as well as the actual Thunder itself shining a spotlight on him. It wasn't the main attraction here, as that title went to the incessantly buzzing Perish Wheel, but that was still mid-flight and so Ares was providing a brief period of entertainment for the onlookers before the regularly scheduled programming continued.

Over on the other side of the arena, Mako was getting sick of Rox! The slippery mimic was shifting his body into other forms to slink out of the way of attacks. Whenever a rocket was about to take his head off, Rox would transform into one of the kickas from the tomb and slide under it before kicking off the jet on the rocket's rear and boosting himself around. He would then transform into one of the spiders from the tomb, that Ares thankfully never saw as they were about the size of a terrier, and climb around the rocket wreckage to find a good vantage point from which he could fire off ranged Echoes at Mako and be a pain in the neck.

Rox didn't really have much magic, he had Blink, Echo, and some other technical / weapon pillar arts that he copied from others, but he was incredibly good at using the few tools he did have to keep a steady fight that didn't go in anyone's favour. His pressure could deflect small attacks, his shapeshifting could dodge large, heavy, and slow attacks, and he had measures to fight back at most ranges so he could stall a fight very well... But Rox wanted more! He'd been used as a sacrificial pawn for Ares' gambits how many times now?! He wanted the kill! In this situation his plan to kill Mako was, once again, suicidal, but that was only because it was unavoidable. Rox wanted to tag along with the Perish Wheel and leap at Mako to become a double layered threat. Basically, Rox wanted to lunge at Mako slightly ahead of the Wheel and force him to either focus on Rox or the Wheel. One or the other would kill him and Rox was hoping that Mako would make the correct decision and see the Wheel as the superior threat. It was and couldn't be ignored but that was when Rox would rush up to Mako and cast a unique art!

Rox had invented one that not even Ares knew about! It was an art that combined Echoes with pressure deflects and shapeshifting in a neat way. Simply put, the Echo was moulded inside Rox's shifting body so that the final shape of the Echo could be altered to suit his desires. Rox would twist and bend his limbs to forge an Echo in the shape of a tiny mole! It was a cute fella too! This mole had sharp, drill claws that could penetrate with ease and the goal was to use it in the same way a regular Echo was used, planting it inside the victim and watching it bounce. This was where the deflects came in to spice things up. however, as the deflect was applied to the mole's body in advance. This way, when the mole was inside the victim, it could bounce around even faster than a regular Echo and did way more damage as it could pierce bones and organs with its claws instead of just whacking them hard with blunt damage. To boot, as the Echo was shaped and had some life to it, it would last a lot longer than a regular Echo and the victim would likely not outlast the rampage, they needed to remove it themselves which was also a complex matter! The deflect enabled the bouncy mole to dart around inside the victim but it also helped defend the mole by rejecting any weak magic trying to remove the tiny guy! In other words, it was a fast art that dug inside a person's innards at lightning speed and was hard to remove.

In many ways, this was actually just an upgraded form of Echoes and could also even be mixed with pressure just like an Echo. It was something that only a select few people could ever pull off due to specific requirements most couldn't ever meet. Ares could shape his Echo via his annihilation mana, and the deflect imbuement was possible with Omniscience, but most other people would find this to be an impossible art to replicate. Rox's unique shapeshifting capabilities, and his profound expertise with deflect, was what allowed him to create this strange art and he wanted to do a bit more showing off! No wonder Ares liked doing it! Showing off to humans was generally more fun than killing them and so Rox wasn't as vicious as he was before; he'd become a lot more sentient in general and wouldn't murder random people if left alone in the town. He might even learn to become a regular citizen at this rate and Ares felt comfortable letting him be a bit more independent. Rox was hard to kill so letting him go off on an adventure somewhere at some point, maybe when Ares returned from Xasca, would be beneficial for him as he could learn more about the world and pick up some resources here and there. in fact, Ares would recommend he go visit Bhorashka. There were a lot of non-humans there and the chances of coming across fellow shapeshifters, as well as monsters that were capable of it, would be sky-high. Rox could get some inspiration for how to use that power, amongst other things, better there.

None of that mattered at the moment as it was a plan for the future, right now Rox had started charging at Mako to unveil his new mole friend. There was a slight problem, though, in that he was being outpaced by the Perish Wheel as it was catching up to him from behind and, at this rate, he wasn't going to beat it to Mako... That would complicate his plan significantly as whatever Mako used to defend against the Wheel would inevitably be strong enough to indirectly stonewall Rox too so he needed to arrive first... Rox thought long and hard but wasn't coming up with any answers. He was tempted to give up but then a spark of embarrassment flashed through his brain... Dominus would be so disappointed in it if it just gave up here and didn't try and prevail in this situation. It wasn't about having a plan, as Ares had told it on occasion, it was the exact opposite. It was about coming up with plans on the fly that sounded batshit insane but could plausibly work and then trying to make them a reality. Being prepared was not a more important skill than being clever and adaptable and this was similar to what Dominus preached regularly.

Combat was supposed to be freeing, not restrictive, so Rox started letting his wildest ideas come to the forefront of his brain and he very rapidly generated many plans, all of which completely crazy, for how to solve this issue. As the Perish Wheel caught up to him, more and more ideas had to fade away into the realm of impossibility due to time constraints, but one glowing idea kept calling out to him much like what happened to Ares in similar situations. Rox had well and truly taken after his master right here as everything just sort of clicked. HIs idea was ridiculous... Extremely so... But who cared? It was only ridiculous if it failed to work and that couldn't possibly be decided ahead of time! If he put in the necessary effort he could do it and Rox really believed that so, in a jaw dropping series of events that left even Ares gobsmacked, Rox took a running leap. Where did he jump to exactly?... Well, he hopped on top of the Perish Wheel and was riding it like a damn surfboard! he was constantly maintaining a reversed deflect on the sole of his feet, which caused a magnetising effect and glued him to the art, and holding a posture that prevented him from falling off... Show-off! Even Ares had never pulled of a stunt like that before and it was his own art! Now he really wanted to give it a go and was admittedly a little sad he hadn't come up with this idea before the mimic did... Also, Dominus inside Ares was clapping his hands together and giving the mimic praise for this accomplishment, he would be sure to reward it with some more training at a later date.

Still, Rox's joy was short lived and Ares stopped envying him soon after his success as it was rapidly followed up by a failure. It wasn't really Rox's fault, as there was nothing that he could do about it, but Mako had seen enough of the damn mimic for one day and took an action that couldn't be predicted in a million years. Mako's method of defending against the Perish Wheel wasn't strictly a close range affair, hell it wasn't even an art, so although Rox was riding high he happened to be directly atop the target of Mako's next major unveiling. Mako was finally bringing out his special treasure and so Rox was just sort of doomed, unintentional though catching him up in the mess was. His own genius play had screwed him big time so it was a rather anti-climactic end to his life that followed. Well, anti-climactic for him. His mole art would have to have its five minutes of fame at a later date. As for everyone else in the coliseum, what Mako was about to do was incredibly exciting, more so than even Rox riding magic like a pro. One second Rox and the Perish Wheel were fine and, the next...

CCCCCCCCCCCRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHH

SSSSSSSSSPPPPPPPPPPPPPPLLLLLLLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTTTTT

... Both had been crushed into dust and disappeared completely. There was no longer a trace of mimic or magic present as they'd been flattened under the weight of Mako's treasure that had come crashing down from orbit. No, Mako did not summon this thing from a spatial ring, it was a personal treasure so it could be summoned from any distance and keeping this thing on his person would be cumbersome given its massive size. Rather, after signalling to this treasure he wanted it to be present, it had jetted through space and crossed Vraizon in around a minute or so. Mako didn't quite need it earlier, so it just hovered above the atmosphere of Sheryashka for a while, before descending like a mini meteor when Mako ordered it to. A streak ran through the air where the treasure had come sailing down but nobody's eyes were on that because everyone was currently gawking at the kneeling treasure itself. Sleek and pure white with some cube-shaped features and a whole host of advanced weaponry. It's design was spectacular and truly a thing of beauty... At a conservative estimate, at least 95% of the men in the crowd had just become jealous enough of Mako to try and kill him for this treasure and, honestly, Ares wasn't much different. He stared blankly at the treasure and muttered to himself in a dumbfounded and dazed voice, "... Is that a fucking PILOTABLE MECHA?!" 

Wrist mounted lasers.

A giant core on its chest that could fire a massive, charged laser too.

Shoulder mounted rockets.

Compartments on the wrist containing energy swords.

Jet boosters under the feet and on its back.

Landing gear on the feat that could convert it from a walking mech to a roller blading one.

A neon visor with scanning technology.

A comfortable compartment for the pilot with all sorts of ergonomic designs and voice activated programs.

Oh yeah, this thing was cool personified and no one could deny it... Ares wanted to trade! He got a stupid sword and this bastard got a whole mech suit?! Where was the justice in this damnable world! While Ares lamented his loss, Mako rested his hand on the chassis of his pride and joy that he'd worked on tirelessly ever since he received it. The 'Genesis V1' was about to make its first ever mark.