With a flick of its wrist two short swords appeared in his grip. With a long copper blade with fungal tendrils reaching out and acting as a grip for the blade.
In my left hand I had my dagger and in my right I had my club. As we circled each other I looked for any signs of hidden weapons or tricks but found none.
Then with a burst of motion the Ophiocord disappeared. [Knight's Intuition] flared and with step to side I saw a copper blade protruding from the spot where I had just been.
I felt Anastasia stir, and began to remove herself from my jacket pocket. Slinking out, she scrambled across the ground.
"Secondary parties are not allowed in this challenge, the youngling may stand beside me" Lord Armeant spoke, and she walked over and stood beside the fungal Treant.
Resuming the battle I raised a rock wall just in time to block an attack from the Ophiocord. As I stood patiently waiting for the attack, I felt a disturbance around my feet. Looking down I saw tendrils of mushrooms wrapping around my feet.
My fungal spores alerted me that the Ophiocord was closing in on me. With a burst of will and Mana I contested the Ophiocord on the control of the mushrooms holding me down.
I felt a wisp of the mushroom's consciousness and Intent permeanting it. Pushing my mana into them and activating my [Floramancy] skill I felt the Ophiocord's control falter for a moment.
Released from the shackles I managed to raise my club to block the insidious copper blades of the mushroom. The force of the blow pushed me back slightly and I retaliated with a slash of the dagger. A thin line appeared on its host's face along its cheekbone with a small bead of violet blood to appear. Backing away from me it reached running it's finger along the length of the scratch. Grabbing at something webs of red energy appeared in the Ophiocord's grasp.
"Haha good one, Usurper, unfortunately for you curses are my thing" and with a twisting motion the cursed energy reshaped bending under the will of the Ophiocord Mushroom.
"[Curse Weave: Fickle Hatred]" the voice of the Ophiocord's host spoke out and the cursed energy turned into a thin arrow before it rapidly started growing. Quickly I summoned a [Forcefield] as the arrow of cursed energy blasted towards me flaring an angry red.
Bracing, I watched in horror for a moment as the cursed arrow simply sailed through unaffected by my [Force Field] before it slammed into me. There was no force behind the arrow, although I could already feel it's power grow from the point of contact.
Reabsorbing the [Force Field] I stashed away my dagger and traded it in for a stone shield. Going on the attack I jumped forward attacking the host just for it to disperse. Anger that seemed to well up inside, more akin to a brutal frustration. Sending several tendrils of Mana I began to reshape the environment around me.
I felt probing from the Ophiocord but my dominion of the earth around me was solid. Raising up several floating walls I jumped up. Underneath me one of the walls blocked an attack from the fungi. As I bounced off another at were my fungal spores were sensing where the Ophiocord fungal cloud body was. This time I used [Floramancy] probing into the still wooden material of the club. It felt odd as the material of the club was dead. However it didn't matter as I had managed to strike the mushroom forcing it back into its host's form as it smashed into the ground. Maneuvering a rock wall under me I launched off and into the mushroom.
It had quickly recovered and dodged to the side before it reassumed it's cloud of fungi state. Then as I looked around trying to spot it's location, I saw sparks of red energy like neurons firing.
"[Curse Weave: Pestilence]" a voice spoke from several directions at once and swarm of curse energy made insects came into being and quickly I tried to summon a ball of earth to surround me. One had managed to sneak in, trying to crush it quickly it however began to multiply quickly.
I soon felt hundreds of pinpricks all acrose the open parts of my body. Quickly I fumbled around for a moment. Until I found it, a tightly bound roll of dried moss and roots. Next I activated the fire sparks of the jacket and as Bright flame burst to live burning brightly as I activated the [Flamekin] ability of the cloak. With a burst of will I opened the the earthen barricade and the flames burnt through the swarms of cursed insects.
Buying a few seconds of reprieve from the insects I summoned the spectral form of the bear.
A flash of heat spread through my body for a moment before it started burning intensely as the cursed energy inside me lashed out. My organs felt like they were slowly melting in my body as I spit up a small amount of blood.
The Ophiocord seized the moment and attacked, barely dodging out the way I felt the copper blades graze my stomach for a moment. As I felt a different 'flavor' of cursed energy slam into me, flowing from my stomach to my head.
"HAHA, ugh, HAHAAAAAA! a shrill voice frought with Insanity laughed out loud it's voice permeanting the garden courtyard. Then I halted as I realized I was the one who laughed.
"How do you like it, eh? Come on don't be like that I worked very hard crafting these cursed copper blades. You know copper is excellent at conducting curses." The voice spoke ringing in my head, for a moment before I lashed outwards and then I caught something. Like untying a shoelace I managed to unlace the cursed energy wrapped up around my mind.
"Awww, damnit you managed to unweave my curse it was rather weak but still, not cool!" The Ophiocord pouted. I was starting think that it might have nicked itself on its own weapons.
Then I felt a whisper from my skill [Fungal Spores] then I flicked my eyes over at the cocky bastard standing in the center. My spectral bear lumbered over, raising its paw it stuck downwards. Lifting its host's hands up I grabbed the spectral bears paw and halted it from moving and with a blur of movement the spectral form disappeared.
Launching off a earth wall I rocketed towards them and pulling out a new weapon form somewhere It meant my attack head on. Pushed back I saw that in its grip was a long root staff with long golden strands woven into the staff. Twirling the staff around it summoned a blast of red energy. Raising my shield I activated [Knight's Bulwark] blocking the cursed energy. The magical power pushed me back across the battle torn surface of the courtyard.
Slamming its staff down it resummoned the cursed energy bug swarm though much smaller. Out of convenient fire starter kits I instead opted for a hail of rocks. Negating both attacks we circled around each other, with me raising my shield just below my eyes and the Ophiocord walking calming.
With a flash of movement the Ophiocord raised its staff tendrils of reddish energy flowed from the bottom up collecting in a ball hovering above the staff. Blasting off trying to interrupt it I was stopped by a reddish barrier.
"[Curse Weave: Toll of the Dead]" As I raised my club desperately trying to break free of the cursed energy shield I saw the ball of cursed energy spilt several times. In its wake four forms appeared, a mole, a bear, a rabbit, and a tall humanoid.
Each were the forms of one of the hosts excluding that of the humanoid. Raising my shield Fully I felt the force of the rabbit as it battered on my shield. The mole disappeared underground, with bear walking towards me slowly. Meanwhile the humanoid stood vigilant over the frozen form of the Ophiocord's main host.
Fashioning spears of rock I battered at the bear and the Humanoid trying to get to its master. However I was quickly being pushed back only my ability to react quickly to the attacks ahead of time preventing me from being completely overwhelmed. Activating the booster of the [Fungal Exoskeleton] skill I opted for a more skirmisher hit and run tactic.
Reforming the earth walls that had fallen I began to battle the the three more active cursed summons. I would attack the bear, shield against the rabbit and dodge the mole that would erupt from the earth like whale breaching the ocean. This time I found more success especially when I used the Flora living underneath the courtyard to stagger and trio them.
Eventually I had managed to attack the rabbit crushing its cursed spectral form. This apparently freed up processing power for the Ophiocord as It began interfering with my control of the nearby Flora. I began to focus my attention onto the mole, as the bear was much easier to evade and kite around.
It took some time weaving between the various dangers and making sure to maintain distance from the Humanoid and the bear. As I played cat and mouse with the mole. Luckily for me these cursed energy made knock offs were a magnitude weaker than their host counter parts. Blasting off to the sky I saw the mole reaching up, seizing my opportunity I pivoted my body and launched my self downwards and attacked the mole. As my club smashed into the mole rocketing it downwards. As it struck the earth it sunk inwards as if it were water. I had to dodge out of the way as the bear tried to sneak up on me, seeing as it was ten foot tall colossus that glowed red it was not cut out for Stealth. As I did so I studied the Humanoid, and I recognized the weapons and armor in a manner of speaking. It was the Warrior whose body was hung in the tunnel.
"So I got to ask what's the story with the guardian dude?" I asked. As I ran about waiting for the mole to resurface.
"Oh, Lionel here, we'll see the fall of the Cave Folk as they called themselves took several generations, they were more wide spread then the ants at their prime for a time at least, he was the final champion sent to slay me the final hope" He spoke maliciously as a smile split unnaturally nearly splitting his face in half.
Hmm, well at least that assuaged my curiosity, I returned the favor flashing a cocky smirk as I finally managed to untangle the knots of cursed energy spasming through my body. The face of the Ophiocord dropped becoming in equally animated frown.
"You know you're a right bastard for that" the Mushroom spoke as I reached out know able to focus entirely on the task of routing out that mole. Summoning it to my hand I crushed it spectral windpipe dispersing it's form.
"Well yes and also a bit of the pot calling the kettle black, no?" I asked as I began to batter the spectral bear with rock spears and holding down it with roots arresting its already slow momentum.
"Fair, to being right bastards, eh?" The Ophiocord responded.
"To being right bastards" I responded