Chapter 18: Capra Demon's Punchout

Although I did accept this straight-up insane challenge of fighting a 3+ meter jacked man wielding two giant blades with the skull of a goat on its head. I wasn't going to go in unprepared. I'm stupid, not suicidal. Ok maybe I am but that's beside the point.

I had plenty of souls on me to level up so I warped back to the bonfire and started thinking. What stats would help me take that brick shithouse down without weapons? If I had weapons this fight would be trivial but without them, it's a whole nother can of worms.

First vitality and endurance are out. Getting hit more than once will be KO no matter how much into vitality I pop right now. And while more stamina from endurance might seem good I'm fairly certain I have enough stamina to last until either one of us gets their shit kicked in.

The magic stats other than faith were basically a joke for me right now. And I could buy spells from Griggs over there but I don't have the patience to study magic right now. Plus I think catalysts count as weapons. And upgrading faith for a slight boost in heal's power just seems like a waste currently.

I already have sufficient strength to hurt my enemies right now. And there is also a problem with Increasing strength right now that I noticed. It's that my body can't handle this much strength.

Or should I say use it efficiently?

I noticed that whenever I use my full strength my body starts breaking apart. The prime example being deadman's blow. When I first used it in the asylum it didn't hurt me as much as now. My guess is this is because of the disparity between strength and my other stats.

I am basically a glass cannon that shatters itself when it shoots. And while I could ease that with estus it is still a very big problem.

My solution to fix this is a stat that I overlooked and even mocked. The most useless stat in all of the souls series. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you:

Resistance!

You know, the stat that increases your defense? Because it was useless in the games I assumed it would be useless here as well but I was wrong. This stat makes my body tougher and increases my body's natural defenses. It was because of the gap between this and strength that I was taking so much self-inflicted damage.

Does that make me too strong or too weak?

Anyways now it was time to level up!

---

[John Moore]

[Soul level : 19] -> [Soul level : 25]

{Vitality : 12 }

{Attunement : 11}

{Endurance : 12 }

{Strength : 20 }

{Dexterity : 13 } {Dexterity : 15 }

{Resistance : 11 } -> {Resistance : 15 }

{Intelligence : 11 }

{Faith : 11 }

<[Souls required: 18,007 ] Confirm: Y/N>

---

'Yus.'

The moment I confirmed I felt the familiar sensation of the energy inside me turn into stats. My body got tougher and more dexterous. To test I went up to a wall and punched it hard.

*Crack!*

And Instead of my fist completely breaking, it was only slightly bloody while the wall was cracked. It seemed that resistance also came with the benefit of making my punches slightly stronger as I wouldn't be able to crack this wall with my fists before.

Enough stalling. I made my way over to the lower undead burg while swiftly erasing any unfortunate undead in my way and I arrived before his arena. And kicked the fog wall open.

''hey there, demons, it's me, ya boy!''

'Fuck.'

It seems that I have underestimated the Capra demon. He was nearly twice my height, jacked as shit, and wielding two machetes my height. But my fears were soon overrun with feelings of rage and anticipation as I raised my fists.

(Image)

His two attack dogs charged me while he slowly walked toward me. But the dogs didn't manage much before I broke their neck with a punch each but as I disposed of the second dog my instincts flared up.

/Duck!/

*Swish!*

I narrowly ducked a swing from the demon's oversized blades. But I knew a chance when I see one so as soon as the blade passed over me I grabbed the demon's wrist and twisted as hard as I could making the demon drop his right weapon.

Which I sent to the shadow realm(Inventory).

But as I was still grabbing his wrist he grabbed my forearm and lifted me up before launching me 10 meters away and out of the doorway of the arena into the streets of the undead burg. After rolling a bit I regained my balance and saw from the looks of things that the Capra demon was pissed.

I quickly righted myself and took up a defensive stance. Now wasn't the time for offense. My main goal right now was to disarm his other machete. As I did this the Capra demon shifted his machete to his right and started charging at me.

Fast!

I quickly ducked under his diagonal swing and reached for his weapon but it seemed like the smart bastard seemed to realize that and pulled away and kicked me. I was able to react to it by raising my leg in response only getting launched away without getting a direct hit. Though I'm pretty sure my leg is fractured.

Once I got on my feet the relentless bastard started swinging his blade at me with concerning speed. If I don't get rid of it soon a single swing will disembowel me for sure.

The moment I dodged his vertical swing which dug into the ground like it was tofu I made my move. I sent out a jab toward its skull head. And just as he reacted to that I pulled back, I had sent that as a feint. I instead switched that action into a punch at its right wrist. Making him drop his machete which I promptly gobbled up.

He really didn't look pleased with that as he stared me down after I had jumped back with all my strength after that blow. And suddenly it charged at me speed unbefitting its frame and punched toward my face. I barely had time to react as I raised my arms in a cross pattern in front of my head.

The moment the punch made contact with my raised forearm I felt a sharp pain as my bones creaked from the pressure and I was flung meters away, crashing into a poor wagon just minding its own wagony business.

I hurriedly reoriented myself cue my acrobatics and moved myself to a more open area as the Capra demon approached me menacingly. I took up a boxing posture as he started speeding up toward me.

I could swear I heard the original punchout music playing.

I ducked under a wide swing of the demon's right arm and delivered a swift jab to its unguarded stomach. And much to my chagrin, it didn't accomplish much, managing to only slightly make the demon flinch. Normal attacks won't cut it, I need critical blows to deal any real damage.

Deciding to get used to his patterns first I got into a more evasive stance as I ducked and weaved under the Capra demon's slow and telegraphed blows. Though I word it like that it wasn't stressless by any means as any of those blows landing could put me in a very bad situation without my estus.

As he threw a heavy haymaker I knew it was my chance, I ducked slightly barely dodging the fist and putting myself in perfect ball punching height. I shifted my weight forward and delivered a brutal straight to the demon's family jewels.

[Critical!]

< Your skill {Boxing lv.8} has leveled up! >

< {Boxing lv.8} -> {Boxing lv.9} >

< Your skill {Critical lv.7 } has leveled up! >

< {Critical lv.7} -> {Critical lv.8} >

''RRRAAAAUUUGGGRRR!!!''

But I wasn't one to leave his glaring opening from his recoil from the immense pain as I followed up with several powerful punches to his midsection as he was paralyzed from pain. When he recovered from the pain and swung his hand down at me I slightly jumped back and spun on the ball of my foot and delivered a spinning heel kick to the demon's elongated skull mouth thingy.

Although my foot hurt, it seemed that the demon felt that kick more even though his head was a damn skull. If it wasn't for that I would be throwing hooks at his mug but alas. As he staggered from the kick I crouched down low, aligned my body, and threw out a {Deadman's Blow} at his solar plexus.

[Critical!!!]

< Your skill {Deadmans Blow lv.2} has leveled up! >

< {Deadmans Blow lv.2} -> {Deadmans Blow lv.3} >

My first dug in a solid inch into his solar plexus as I somehow managed to make the demon slide back a meter or two. But it seemed like a fire had been lit inside the demon with that punch as he started sprinting at me with its unbefitting speed once again.

I could barely raise my arms and brace for impact once again before I was rammed by the Capra demon. With power comparable to the mightiest swings of the asylum demon I was launched with such strength I broke through a wall and ended up inside the living room of a small house in undead burg surrounded by rubble.

My arms were bent the wrong way and my back felt warm, wet, and unimaginably painful. I managed to push myself but the sight I was greeted with was the palm of the Capra demon grasping around my head. And once he had a firm grasp he ran toward the wall of the room with me in hand and smashed me through it headfirst.

*SMASH!!!*

He then let go of my head and grabbed my ankle. I could barely register it as I was desperately hanging onto my consciousness despite the immense headache and the broken skull. But that was short-lived as I was flung like a flail, hard. I flew several tens of meters before crashing through yet another wall and remaining still.

I could feel my body starting to turn into ash.

The darkness began to overtake my sight as the first flame tried to claim my soul.

But as it was happening I remembered something I had learned before. Even without a talisman, I should be able to do it right? I mustered up all my willpower and remembered the excerpt I put my faith in myself to the test and willed my skill to activate.

'Heal'

And my broken bones, skin, and muscles started putting themselves back together as the yellow light drained my focus again and again. The demon who was walking away noticed the noise and light, turning back to see the nth undead he had killed standing back up.

But what had given an unfamiliar feeling of danger to the demon was his eyes. His eyes were glowing, but unlike the yellowish orange of the usual undead, his were a hollow bluish purple that struck an unknown fear into the demon. The thing in front of him was neither human nor hollow. That thing looked at the Capra Demon like it was prey.

I didn't know much about this feeling in my body that was both foreign and not at the same time. I also got some notifications but that didn't matter either. /What mattered was tearing the demon in front of me apart./

Before the demon could start to sprint I took the initiative as I pumped the muscles in my legs with such power that I had unknowingly used deadman's blow on them somehow and launched myself like a bullet toward the demon and tackled him with such power that the impact sent us both through the wall. But even though I was damaged I felt that my combat capability did not drop the slightest bit.

I threw a punch at the demon's throat which hurt it. But it grabbed me and just as it was about to slam me again I coiled around its arm and twisted it making him drop me. And the moment I touched the ground I started my onslaught.

I first started with a devastating punch to his liver which made him buckle then I started throwing a multitude of kicks, punches, and headbutts. Not caring about the damage I incurred unless it reached a critical level.

<Your skill {Boxing lv10(max)} has...>

But regardless of how much I pushed my body, I knew that the Capra wouldn't fall to punches and kicks. Although he was battered and bruised he still had plenty of stamina to play with while I was running on fumes. It was time to end this.

I ducked under and ran between the demon's legs and gave a soccer kick to the back of his knee which made Capra fall to his knees. I jumped on his neck and held on for dear life as his hands dug into my arm to pry me off to no avail.

With one last hurrah, I removed the glove on my right hand with my mouth and dug my right hand into his neck while he thrashed around to get me off but with his injuries, he couldn't muster up as much strength. I on the other hand even though much more injured was somehow fighting at full capacity.

Mustering up all my strength I put my leg against his shoulder, gripped my hand tightly, and pulled with everything my body had and more. And I ripped out his jugular along with a decent amount of his neck.

*Fshhhhhhh!*

I hopped down from the faltering body as the blood fountain rained down on me covering me in its blood. And just as he was about to fall I turned around and spread my arms open as I walked forward slightly, showering in the blood of the demon and my win as I hit my dying foe with the ''Well, what is it''.

[VICTORY ACHIEVED]