Chapter 367: Mixed Blood Or Genetics?

"Even if this was just a regular set of plate armor, your spear wouldn’t have been able to do anything, bro," Adrian said casually. "You need a heavy hammer or some sort of blunt-force weapon to actually deal damage through solid steel plate."

The soldier didn’t have an answer.

Adrian could see the primal fear flood into the man’s eyes. The soldier dropped his spear, took a few frantic steps backward, and tried to turn and run.

Adrian just sighed, swung his staff forward, and smacked the fleeing man squarely on the back of the head. The soldier dropped to the ground like a broken doll.

Suddenly, a massive, heavily armored body crashed violently into Adrian from the side.

Adrian skidded a few feet across the field to catch his balance. He looked down and immediately noticed that the huge guy who had just crashed into him was actually one of his own Oresfall soldiers. The man had been thrown through the air.

Adrian quickly looked in the direction the soldier had been launched from.

Standing in the middle of the chaos was a man who was roughly the same size as the soldier he had just thrown.

The man was absolutely huge.

Adrian himself was relatively tall, but he wasn’t overly bulky. This Avarice soldier was at least a few inches taller than Adrian and exponentially more muscular. The guy looked like a walking mountain of pure, dense muscle.

’I’m pretty sure that there are no actual steroids in this world,’ Adrian muttered to himself. ’So how the fuck can this guy be this huge? This is crazy.’

Adrian’s eyes drifted down to the weapon the giant was holding.

It was a massive, solid iron war hammer. Just looking at the sheer density of the metal head, Adrian couldn’t help but ask a question.

"That thing has to be at least thirty or forty kilograms, right?" Adrian asked, his voice loud so that he could be heard even through the screams all around him.

The giant Avarice soldier paused. He looked down at his hammer and just slowly shook his head.

"This?" The giant pointed a thick finger at the massive block of iron at the top. "The head is fifty."

He then pointed a finger at the thick, reinforced metal handle.

"And the handle is five."

"Fifty-five kilograms," Adrian said slowly.

He just stared at the massive hammer in the guy’s hands.

"Swinging something so heavy... especially with all that weight focused entirely on one end..." Adrian pointed out. "That is just ridiculously impractical for a battlefield."

But the giant guy clearly didn’t give a shit about his opinions or thoughts.

He let out a deafening roar and charged straight forward. As he got close, he raised the massive war hammer high up over his head like he was trying to crush his enemy’s skull.

Adrian didn’t even try to block it.

He casually sidestepped to the right. The fifty-five-kilogram hammer slammed directly into the ground where he had been standing a fraction of a second ago.

BOOM.

The sheer kinetic force of the impact exploded the dirt outward. A cloud of dust and mud smacked against Adrian’s armor, and the ground actually caved in to form a small crater.

’Yeah, blocking that is a terrible idea,’ Adrian thought to himself as he looked at the guy. ’I would definitely be drinking my meals through a straw for a month if that thing hit my ribs. Well, if I wasn’t wearing this enchanted armor, that is...’

He pulled his own staff back and swung it horizontally. The sleek metal staff slammed right into the guy’s exposed side. It hit the armor with a heavy, ringing smack.

The giant stumbled sideways from the hit, letting out a painful grunt, but he didn’t drop. He angrily yanked his hammer out of the small crater and swung it in a massive, sweeping horizontal arc aimed right at Adrian’s waist.

Adrian ducked under it.

The heavy iron hammer whistled through the air right over his head. The wind pressure coming off the swing was so intense that Adrian could actually feel it pushing against his helmet.

Adrian watched as the hammer continued its arc and slammed directly into an Avarice soldier standing in its path. The metallic hammer head hit the man’s back, most probably snapping his spine in half since the soldier just dropped to the dirt and did not stand back up.

’This guy is pure brute force...’ Adrian thought as he smoothly jumped back up to stand. ’Kinda like a caveman... hmm, now this reminds me of Alexander. Heh.’

He decided he wasn’t going to use his telekinetic chakrams or his magic for this fight. He just wanted to test out his new C-rank physical stats and the new live-combat breathing method he hadn’t had the chance to use for the past few weeks. This guy was the perfect, oversized training dummy for it since he was just an F-rank knight.

As Adrian thought of this, he frowned slightly.

’I wonder how he can lift such a heavy hammer if he’s a mere F-rank...’ Adrian mused. ’As a C-rank knight, I’m finally comfortable using my staff for long periods of time, which I couldn’t do back when I was a D-rank. But he’s only F, so... hmm. I guess it’s genetics? Or maybe he’s a mixed blood? Man, I don’t know.’

While he was busy thinking, the guy roared again and brought the hammer back for a messy, diagonal smash.

This time, Adrian didn’t just dodge.

He stepped forward right into the guy’s guard. He raised his staff and angled it sharply. Instead of taking the massive weight dead on, he let the iron handle of the hammer strike the smooth, polished surface of his mithril staff.

The weapons clashed, but there was none of the expected ear-piercing screech of metal grinding against metal.

Since Adrian had angled his guard perfectly, it did exactly what he wanted. The hammer slid right down the shaft of his staff, redirecting the downward momentum right past Adrian’s legs and into the ground once again.