Chapter 69: Named Region Boss

Jaxir raised an eyebrow at the deep-gold screen hovering over Grimm, mostly because Named Region Boss meant absolutely nothing to him.

He studied the Village Head for another moment before looking toward Nick, deciding there was one question that mattered considerably more than whatever obscure boss classification he had just stumbled into.

"Does this at least mean that I’ll get Experience this time?" Jaxir asked, earning a long groan from Nick before the shorter man dragged both hands over his face.

"This isn’t the fucking point, we’re cooked. Region bosses connected to settlements get boosted by their title, their territory and the citizens living inside it, so he’s probably buffed to all hell right now." Nick gestured violently toward Grimm before looking around Glimmer Village as though the buildings themselves had personally betrayed him. "A tutorial village shouldn’t even have something like this. You find these things guarding major cities and important territory, not places where people come to figure out which end of a sword goes in the other guy."

Jaxir glanced toward the expanded map still floating at the edge of his vision, where hundreds of faint dots filled nearly every corner of Glimmer Village. Now that Nick had explained what he was looking for, Jaxir could make out wisps of golden mana bleeding through the streets and buildings toward Grimm, so thin that he might never have noticed them without the enormous boost to his Mind.

But... didn’t that also mean everyone was busy siphoning their mana to this guy so they wouldn’t be adding to the assault? That sounded like good news to him.

Grimm stepped forward before Jaxir could study them further, and the movement brought enough pressure with it that Nick finally stopped talking.

"You have stained sacred ground with the blood of those who protected it, villain, and dragged another into your corruption. The blood upon your hands will be washed away by your own."

Jaxir pursed his lips while the words settled, then tilted his head and looked Grimm over with renewed interest. "That was edgy as hell for absolutely no reason. Have you ever considered lightening up a bit?"

Grimm answered by summoning a spear and shield into his hands, both of them wrapped in golden light that immediately began leaking into the air around him. His body followed, expanding until he stood nearly a foot taller, while Glimmer Mana poured from his armor in wavering streams that shifted so violently from one point to another that Jaxir couldn’t settle his eyes on any one pattern.

Twinkle Mana had always possessed a strange elegance once Jaxir understood what it was doing, with its tricks built around bending light and manipulating gravity along paths that could eventually be predicted.

Glimmer Mana looked like the opposite, scattering itself across the battlefield without any obvious structure before suddenly condensing somewhere else, as though every strand had been given the freedom to wander until something called it home.

"Support me from the side if you can." Jaxir rolled the Staff of the Light through one hand and shifted his stance, keeping Grimm centered in his vision. "I’ll try to end this as quickly as possible."

Nick stared at him like he had just announced the intention to headbutt the Village Head to death. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean? We need to run and get outside the village’s territory as fast as possible. People bring entire parties to kill territory-linked bosses like this."

Jaxir waved one hand without looking away from Grimm, already tracking the strange movements of gold around the man’s spear.

"Yeah, yeah. There’s no running from this and you should know that."

Nick opened his mouth to argue, but Grimm moved first, disappearing from where he stood with enough speed that even Jaxir’s enhanced perception barely kept track of him. The spearhead reached his chest a fraction later, forcing Jaxir to kick sideways with the Weightless Boots and let their reduced weight carry him several meters just before the weapon stabbed through empty air.

The road exploded where the spear landed, throwing stone and dirt outward in a violent ring that struck Jaxir hard enough to shove him farther through the air.

The power shocked Jaxir. Grimm hadn’t hit the ground with anything close to the force needed for that result. But then his eyes landed on the spear tip.

The mana compressed around the spearhead, an enormous amount of power being forced into one tiny point before erupting all at once.

"So that’s how you’re doing it." Jaxir landed on one foot, but Grimm was already attacking again, forcing him to trigger Double Jump before his second foot ever touched the road.

His body changed direction in midair, carrying him above the sweeping spear as Nick darted in from Grimm’s blind side with both daggers. The Village Head turned his shield without even looking toward him, and the Glimmer Mana crawling over its surface collapsed into an area no larger than a fist before exploding the instant Nick’s blades made contact.

"Shit!" Nick was launched backward, but Jaxir barely spared him a glance once he saw the man twisting to land on his feet.

That exchange had told Jaxir more than the first.

Grimm wasn’t just accumulating mana and releasing it. He was packing mana, force and something that felt suspiciously like weight into tiny regions, storing far more potential than those spaces should have been able to hold before releasing everything the moment he needed it.

The next spear thrust missed Jaxir entirely, yet Glimmer Mana condensed beside his ribs anyway, forcing him to kick off empty air and throw himself sideways before the golden point exploded. The shockwave still caught his robes and sent the white fabric snapping against his legs, while the stone wall behind him folded inward under the same force.

[-31]

"So you don’t even have to hit me." Jaxir watched Grimm rotate the spear and felt several concentrations of mana begin forming around him at once. "That’s annoying."

He moved before they detonated, using the Weightless Boots to turn every step into a long glide while Double Jump let him break the natural arcs Grimm kept expecting him to follow. Explosions chased him through the street and shredded stone behind him, but with each one Jaxir spent less attention on where they landed and more on how the mana reached that point in the first place.

He fired Cast whenever Grimm left an opening, testing different angles while keeping most of his concentration on the Glimmer Mana moving through the battlefield. Simple shots either struck the shield or clipped Grimm’s armor for almost nothing.

[-18]

[-22]

[-15]

Jaxir barely cared about the damage. Every time Grimm prepared an attack, Glimmer Mana scattered across a broad region first, moving with such apparent chaos that trying to follow individual strands was pointless, but after watching several repetitions Jaxir finally stopped trying to track the strands and started tracking what they collected.

Momentum. Pressure. Weight.

Glimmer Mana wandered, but it wasn’t wandering without purpose. It absorbed tiny pieces of potential from everything it touched, accumulated them across its movement, and then compressed all of that gathered force into one location before Grimm released it.

Jaxir’s grin began to spread as the concept settled into place.

Grimm swept the spear across his middle, and Jaxir ducked beneath it while gathering Light Mana through his staff instead of releasing another quick Cast. He continued moving while Channel held the growing spell together, paying attention to how the mana accumulated through each change in direction rather than treating the ability as nothing more than standing still and stuffing more power into one attack.

The difference was immediate.

―

[Channel Lv36 > Channel Lv37]

[Channel Lv37 > Channel Lv38]

[Channel Lv38 > Channel Lv39]

―

Jaxir’s grin widened as the notifications vanished. He could feel that he was close to something larger even if the thought hadn’t finished forming yet. Grimm raised his shield and compressed another mass of Glimmer Mana across its face, clearly expecting Jaxir to retreat from the explosion that would follow.

Instead, Jaxir moved closer.

He Double Jumped sideways at the last moment, slipping around the shield while keeping the Channelled Cast compressed within the Staff of the Light, then released everything through the narrow opening beneath Grimm’s arm. Light Mana stretched into a thin lance as it left the staff, carrying the accumulated force of the entire movement straight into Grimm’s side.

[-184]

The Village Head slid several meters backward, boots cutting trenches through the road before he finally stopped, and Jaxir felt a flash of satisfaction when a health bar appeared for the first time.

That satisfaction only lasted just long enough for him to read it.

―

HP: 99,816 / 100,000

―

Jaxir’s lip twitched as golden light flowed toward Grimm from every direction, the same faint threads he had noticed connecting him to the village thickening now that the man had actually taken damage. His health began climbing before Jaxir could even think about following up.

99,842.

99,901.

99,967.

100,000 / 100,000.

Jaxir stared at the completely restored bar for another second, then slowly looked from it to Grimm.

"Well... fuck."