Reaper's Resurgence - Book 6 - Chapter 5 (Patreon)

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Alexia

The one that doesn’t get erased looks genuinely annoyed when I teleport right up to him and grab him by the neck. Then I proceed to drill quantum lightning into him both from my body and the skies, making him grunt in pain before the expression on the body completely changes.

I feel a metaphorical vein on my forehead throb in genuine anger as I use Quantum Collapse on the body and it gets erased this time. Proving that the Balancer has already changed bodies.

Well, at least I’ve managed to injure his soul. Unlike my previous attempts at this battle.

That’s one bright side about fighting against a Quantum Being.

Our mana and health are combined into soul. So it’s a lot easier to injure a Quantum Being’s soul than a regular person.

Of course, a regular person’s soul wouldn’t just go regenerating right away like a Quantum Being’s soul does. But in this situation, this is better.

Because, according to Zal, the damage doesn’t reset when he switches bodies. Whatever damage I dealt to him here will follow.

At least, in regards to his soul.

He’s also burning soul to constantly control this many bodies and change between them. So he isn’t almighty or anything like that.

I continue to use Quantum Collapse over and over again while hunting for the Quantum Balancer. But I only manage to find him four more times before I’m killed in the trial. And even for those four times, he is more prepared than the first time and doesn’t take as much damage.

The only relief is that he doesn’t seem to be able to transfer bodies immediately.

Still, I find myself studying him again in the first part of the trial for my next attempt. Because there has to be some sort of sign.

It’s just unfair if there isn’t.

So I repeat this process over and over again. Going through the first and second parts of the trial attempting to find signs of the Quantum Balancer’s presence before hunting him down in the third part of the trial thanks to Quantum Collapse.

But all the way through to the sixth trial attempt, I at most manage to push the Balancer to a point where he gets pissed off and starts forcing all of the bodies attacking me to overload somehow. Burning away at the bodies’ lifeforce and gradually disintegrating them to make their attacks stronger.

He’s done that twice to me. Once in the fifth trial attempt and once in the sixth. And neither time have I made it very far after that.

I grit my teeth as I appear in the first part of the seventh trial attempt. Just pondering how the hell I’m going to beat that.

How I’m going to beat him at all, for that matter. Since I haven’t even started fighting with his true body yet and am already at the seventh trial attempt.

I only have four more left including this attempt.

Then I’m dead.

There’s only one thing I can think of for dealing with this little shit of a Quantum Being. And that’s using up all of the massive amount of energy I’ve built up with Observation Effect Absorption and blasting it out all at once to wipe out every body he has stored away. Then I can use both Quantum Rip’s and Quantum Vampirism’s built up energy to direct one massive attack at the Quantum Balancer himself after he’s revealed.

But the problem there is that I can only do these once per skill.

There’s no do-overs.

I only have the energy built up for one attack each.

What’s bothering me the most about this though is the fact that I have new defensive skills I’ve never used before this battle. Both of which are incredibly good. And yet, I’m still being killed over and over again even with them activated.

I glance at the skill descriptions.

{Charybdis Shell: You may create a shell around your body that can move at your will and has defenses far surpassing your true body’s defenses.}

{Ancient Barrier: Your body passively generates a barrier that absorbs 20% of all magical damage directed at you. The absorbed damage may be used to create a powerful active barrier that can defend against opposing attacks.}

At the very least, I haven’t used the active barrier from Ancient Barrier yet. But it should still be decreasing the magical damage I take by 20%.

I grit my teeth before focusing on the other skill that I’ve kept in reserve until later battles. Which should at least give me an upper hand then.

{Energy Restoration: Allows the user to completely refill their energy tank twelve times a year at no cost.}

I’ve used Energy Restoration once during this trial, and I haven’t used it any other times than that. So I still have eleven full energy restorations left.

The skill also doesn’t have a cooldown. Which is good, since my items that can reset energy are still on cooldown.

I stare at my skills for a few seconds before taking a deep breath and fully focusing on the first trial. Using every means I can to examine the Quantum Balancer.

And right as I’m about to move onto the second trial, something catches my eye.

Specifically, I sense a strange fluctuation in the Balancer’s chest. Where a heart would normally be.

The fluctuation is so small that I never noticed it in any of my previous attempts, and it’s made purely out of soul. So I make sure to make sure I didn’t just imagine it during the second part of the trial.

But nope. It’s still there.

I look at the other people here in the trial, but none of the bodies he’s using have this small fluctuation.

Did I finally find a sign?

I certainly hope so.

Because the third part of the trial doesn’t take long before it arrives once more, and I’m left trying to test this potential sign out.