Chapter 71: A race is run in an alley before the first step is taken

Bron Gilder, the level 50 Bishop of the church of Granesh clicked his tongue as Hiro Tomaki walked out of the arena into the contestant’s area, his body stiff and trembling with shame as he struggled to blink the sand out of his eyes without damaging them.

“Send someone with a skin full of water to tend the boy’s eyes. I’d rather not Granesh lose a Paladin Archetype over this. Hopefully this will serve as a reminder to him that Climbers are a different beast altogether.”

“Yes, bishop.” His aide said before turning around and relaying the instructions to one of their healers on standby, swiftly returning.

“And make sure our priests are attending every match of Mr. Oh from this point on. If he is severely wounded in the course of the tournament, that would present a relatively simple way to remove this particular Deceiver from this world.”

“…What if he wins?” his aide asked, to which Bron turned to face him, raising a brow.

“Nevermind. Right away,” his aide began sprinting down into the bowels of the arena to haggle with the other churches while Bron watched the next few matches of the day.

If he wins the tournament…then he’s a much bigger problem than I gave him credit for.

Youth who won the tournament often went on to become Lords, with the help of the Baron. It was the unspoken reward for victory. If William Oh won the tournament, he would be under the wing of the Baron, essentially becoming untouchable on the 5^th Floor.

I guess at the very least we’ll find out if the loss of our operatives was because of his powerful Party members, or if this Deceiver actually has the potential to become a Lord.

Throwing sand in someone’s eyes and pushing them out of the ring was infuriatingly uninformative, which Bron supposed was the point.

Maybe William oh was very weak and using the sand trick to bypass what would’ve been a difficult fight.

Or maybe he was overwhelmingly strong and didn’t want to reveal it quite yet.

Maybe there was an extra ingredient in the sand/ice combo that needed to remain hidden…

I suppose we’ll see in due time.

As Bron was considering, the matches continued.

The next match was between a rotund Climber with a sickly green appearance, while the other was a tall, muscular woman with vibrant blonde hair tied into a simple ponytail and reinforced with a headband.

The rotund climber bore a wicked looking hooked blade seemingly meant for cutting branches or gutting enormous fish, wearing greens and browns, with swamp-stompers and ranger Relics.

The tall woman bore a massive quiver with a single javelin resting inside, slung over her shoulder in a way that couldn’t possibly be easy to draw.

She moved like a person who had a tremendous amount of Strength and Kinesthetics, the way her toes seemed to grip the floor to keep her from flying away. A common trait for archers.

The announcer went over the rules again as the two contestants stared each other down.

“Fighters, Begin!”

In the blink of an eye, the woman’s hand whipped up and then down again, producing a javelin as if by magic. The six-foot missile cut through the air where the rotund man’s heart had been.

The squat fellow dropped even lower, the javelin passing above his head as his palms hit the ground.

Without missing a beat, the woman drew another javelin, which had magically replenished itself in the quiver. An Ability or a Relic? Bron had no clue just yet.

The next javelin whistled through the air, aiming to skewer the man as he crouched in place.

Before it even landed, the javelineer had another one in hand, cocked back and waiting to be thrown wherever the man might dodge to.

He didn’t dodge.

A tree trunk apparated out of thin air as the arena turned into a swamp, interposing itself between the two of them. an instant later there was a loud wooden CRACK as the javelin buried itself in the wood, nearly splitting the stump in two.

Interesting.

The spectators could see the man dive down into the surrounding water, his body flattening as he passed through the standing water without so much as a ripple.

The javelineer, however, her view was blocked by the stump and the low grasses that had appeared in the arena.

Seemingly acknowledging that she needed a better view, the javelineer jumped up onto a twisted tree, balancing in its swaying branches without any visible sign of strain. It was only seven feet or so tall, but it gave her the view she needed to locate her prey and resume her assault.

The man, knowing this, burst out of the water, having travelled a tremendous distance underwater without revealing his position, he was effectively flanking her.

The man seemed to deflate as an oversized tongue shot out at his opponent, aiming at her throwing arm.

The Javelineer interposed her off-hand, and an instant later she was drawn at neck-breaking speed towards her opponent, plucking her from the tree like a frog might pluck a dragonfly off a blade of grass.

So he got a wetlands Gulper as one of his Sacrifices and really leaned into the gimmick, Bron thought. He’d seen Builds like that before.

On one hand, animal and environment-based builds were excellent at medium to low levels, since they had a cohesive build that leveraged the synergy that nature had perfected over uncountable generations.

On the other hand…

The javelineer met the frog-man’s hooked blade with one of her javelins. She was at an awkward angle, flying through the air so she didn’t have ground to brace herself against…

And yet…

CLANG!

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The frog-man staggered backwards as his hooked blade was nearly torn out of his hand by the javelineer’s sheer Strength.

Despite having all the advantages of natural synergy, animal Builds did not have the unnaturally concentrated singular intent of purpose that made for an unstoppable PVP Build.

As her legs skidded to a halt in the thick mud, the frog man let go of the javelineer’s arm with his tongue, aiming to dive back under the water, but he jerked in place, drawn back up as the muscular woman’s off-hand clamped down around his slimy tongue and reeled him back in.

Bron thought he saw the frog man say something before he was mercilessly riddled with javelins.

‘Oh crap’, perhaps?

The fight was called the very next instant as priests of Andover leapt into the ring and drew out the half-dozen spears perforating the man’s body, bringing him back before his soul could cross to the other side.

It was a close thing.

“And the winner is Karryn by pincushioning! Short fight, but longer than the last one, and entertaining nonetheless. Let’s hear it for Karryn and her brave vict- er…opponent!”

William will go against her in the third round, should she continue on.

“Bishop,” his aide panted as he arrived.

“Yes?”

“The priestesses of Holdna have already claimed responsibility William Oh’s matches and refuse to let us heal him!”

So they already know. That damned goddess and her damned fascination with snakes.

How the good-aligned thousand-eyed goddess of prophecy and hunting wound up marrying the evil embodiment of Chaos incarnate, they would never know.

It was a difference in opinion.

The scripture of Granesh stated that only through stability and strong, just systems of government, could humanity build the strength of arms needed to conquer the tower.

Holdna believed that the answer lay in a roll of the dice. A change in the status quo so drastic that it broke the stranglehold The Tower had on humanity, and so the thousand-eye goddess aligned herself with Ouroboros, the embodiment of the endless, ever-expanding nature of The Tower.

Bron was old enough to have shed a bit of the blind zealotry of youth. He saw the reasons behind both sides, and felt that the two deities hindered each other, causing both their plans to become fruitless.

If progress was to be made, one would have to go.

Bron had made the rational decision to support Granesh, because it did not require chaos as a catalyst. Chaos meant heroism and nobility in the face of adversity, but it also meant death and destruction as a staging ground for that heroism and nobility.

Bron would rather have order. A system that did not rely on heroes, but rather a unity of purpose.

And for that reason he would do everything in his power to tear down the Church of Holdna.

They could not both exist and save humanity.