"Thanks for showing me that potion masters could fight their battles too. Rest now. Byebye."
"Ronny said as his katar tore a hole through Edward's heart. He had killed one of his opponents using Alephee's help.
Had it been other real rankers, they would have changed their strategies after seeing that their miasma had failed to affect Ronny mentally. But there was only so much intelligence the apparitions could exhibit mimicking the real rankers.
The butcher had never seen that unique way of implementing potions in the traps. He wanted to learn how to use them too.
In a way, Edward had opened his eyes to the new possibilities. A potion-induced miasma can affect rankers' senses and hinder their mana sense. A potion that can put a ranker under the illusion mid-battle.
Lastly, those potion traps. If he could pair the potion traps with his potion bombs, they would work as land mines.
But all that would have to wait since he had a bigger fish to fry at the time.
As soon as Edward's apparition vanished, the miasma started losing its potency. Ronny created a distance between him and Dom, buying time to wear out the residual miasma. He wanted to fight Dom with all his senses working after all.
Ronny was still juiced from the potions he had consumed earlier. But he was still wary of Dom. The apparition had a way to surprise him. He had thought that he had the guy, but apparently, he looked fine now. It was as if all that beating he had received from the butcher was just part of the hallucination.
'What the actual fuck? I remember beating the crap out of that guy. Why is he looking all dandy again?
No. Wait, a minute, that woodpecker is actually looking better than before he was beaten up by me. This dungeon is acting shamelessly now.'
Ronny thought to himself and felt wronged about his luck. Alphee was there to clear the air:
'I kept tabs on them using my Soul Sense while you were busy dodging their long-range attacks and potions traps. The apparitions played their part to keep it as real as it can get. I saw a potion guy passing vials of potions to the wood guy.
The last vial he was shown to be using must be some type of body-stat enhancing concoction. Hehe, just like you, he has also juiced up.'
Only then did Ronny understand that the dungeon wasn't playing pranks on him. But understanding didn't help him in his current citation. He sighed before gripping his weapons tight in both his hands:
'I've gained a lot of insights into my elements while I was under that state. I don't think I can use them all with the same proficiency. But I have a few options to try now.
Reen, strengthen my body and make it look like I've entered anthrope transformation.'
The butcher started changing right in front of his audience. He used his anthrope transformation mimicry as an excuse to make Reen boost his stats with their fusion. Then he bolted towards his opponent using the spell combo with different effects he wanted to try:
'Blitz Steps
Sedated Perception
Fire snake'
Ronny executed the spell combo while keeping the Breath of Fire spell on hold for now. He was planning to use it differently.
Unbeknownst to the butcher, Layla noticed something when Rony used Reen to strengthen himself. She smiled cunningly and seemed to have informed something or someone about it.
Dom was ready to face Ronny with his swords drawn. Swords. Dom was also suddenly blessed by the dungeon's mechanism to become a dual sword wielder.
Clank!
But his opponent was way past the stage of being surprised anymore. A distinct metallic clank was heard as Ronny's katars made contact with his weapons.
**********
Dom had parried Ronny's attacks perfectly despite the latter using Sedated Perception to get a solid read on him. That meant Dom was supposed to benefit from enhanced perception as well.
A potion-induced enhanced perception would work in a different way than a time-element spell. By enhancing the body's natural image processing capabilities, the concoction would boost perception.
That meant if the ranker's eyes could only process 30 frames of images per second normally, then upon the consumption of the perception enhancing potion, that rate would increase as per the potency and rank.
The enhanced perception achieved the effects of a time element spell differently. This was the reason the butcher was interested in potioneering after hearing the field's vast applications from Nina.
*********
Clank!
Ronny used his weapon skills to handle Dom's counters. And so began their dance of weapons squaring off against each other at close range. The butcher was getting injured by his opponent's attacks. But thanks to the strengthening done earlier, Dom's attacks only rarely managed to break past his defensive mana layer.
He wasn't the only one to get injured though. The butcher was using every trick in his sleeve– from sneak attacks, low blows, to downright dirty plays. This was to get back at his opponent for every injury he had caused him-- with additional interest.
And yet, the butcher wasn't satisfied. He continued parrying Dom's attack. However, he made the fire snakes come back to life by sharing his mana sense in the same way he had done while in his delirious state.
'Spell animation.'
Ronny mumbled to himself as another two perspectives popped up in his head. He felt like he had six eyes now. The two belonged to him. The remaining four belonged to the two snakes that were looking at Dom with some hostility.
The fire snakes could now detach themselves from Ronny. They jumped from Ronny's hand and crawled towards Dom at breakneck speeds.
Dom tried getting away from the fire snakes. But Ronny didn't let him. He increased the pace of his attacks to keep his opponent busy while commanding his animated spells to attack.
Dom then tried to slash at the snake using one of the swords while he used the other to parry Ronny's attacks. The snakes remained unaffected when the sword made its way through their ethereal bodies.
But they did indeed freeze in their tracks for a while. That's because Ronny felt his headache worsening as soon as the snakes faced the attacks.
Ronny shook his head again and ignored the headache while carrying on with his assault. As a result of which, the snakes resumed their strides and reached Dom.
Each of the snakes climbed on Dom using one of his legs. At first, they wrapped themselves around the legs of their target and tried to burn away its defensive mana layer.
Some of the mana layers did get burned away, allowing the snakes to physically harm the wood user. But that was not why they were there. They climbed further on Dom's body.
Dom must have realized with his limited intelligence that something sinister was heading his way. Hence, he executed his defensive spell again and made the weird formation of wooden planks grow around his body to keep his vital organs safe.
They climbed to Dom's waist and wrapped their torsos around it. Both snakes raised their heads and looked at Dom's face. He was busy fighting Ronny, so he couldn't keep an eye on the stacked animated spell. But he must have felt their lifelike gazes on him.
Dom immediately tried to cover his face with his defensive spell. Alas, it was a bit too late. The snakes had already opened their mouths while tightening their grips on Ronny's waist.
"Breath of fire!"
Ronny said and smiled. Dom's vision changed as soon as he heard his opponent speak. A cloud of orange filled his vision.
As the Breath of Fire was cast by both the snakes at the same time, their damage output was doubled.
Dom gave out a sharp, inhuman shriek as his face was getting burnt away by the fire. But that's not all the damage he was going to suffer now.
Ronny used the fact that his opponent was practically blindsided to launch another set of attacks. He went close to the guy and started hacking through his body without any hesitation.
First to get chopped away were Dom's arms. His mana layer was in disarray trying to focus on the immediate threat his face was facing. So the mana layer around the other parts of the body got weakened.
That was all Ronny needed to show why he should be called the butcher. Arms were only the beginning. He hacked through Dom's guts next.
Ronny had to admit that the dungeon's mechanism was as real as it could get. Because he saw Dom's intestines out in the open when he operated on his stomach.
Picheeeek!
Dom's Adam's Apple was finally pierced by Diceros Right as he faced the cloud of fire generated around it. Only after Ronny punched a hole through Dom's neck did the snakes stop their execution of Breath of Fire before vanishing into thin air.
The snakes vanished quickly because Ronny couldn't keep the spell and shared mana sense active for any longer. His headache had gotten unbearable after he overexerted himself like that.
"My job is done here. I'm out."
Ronny said this loudly to nobody in particular.. But his teammates who had watched the last part of the battle got his message loud and clear.