Chapter 48: The Trial Stage 15
"Congratulations on passing Stage 14 of the Trial. Please proceed to start Stage 15."
Mira was brought to a large open area after she cleared the last stage. She then heard the mechanical voice again.
"Welcome to Stage 15. This is the Titan Stage. In this stage, you will have to defeat the titan in order to proceed to the next stage. There is no time limit. Begin!"
Mira soon felt the ground shake and heard what sounded like large footsteps coming towards her. Mira then was able to see a massive creature coming towards. This thing definitely earned the title of Titan. It was about 100 meters tall. It had a similar appearance to humans but looked more like a golem than a human.
"Fuck! What is this thing? It doesn't even have a cultivation base! It seems its strength comes from its giant size and strong body. I bet I can't even survive 1 hit from that thing! I can only see one feasible way to fight this thing. I will just go for the legs in order to bring it down. I'd rather not try to jump to hit it. It might just smack me like an annoying bug if I start climbing it. This is also a good chance to test my strengthened Ice Dao!" Mira thought out loud as she took out her scythe and added the second blade to it.
Mira charged at one of its legs. All she has to do is avoid any direct hits from this thing. With the titan being so huge and her being so small, there are actually fewer options for the titan to attack her with. It'll be hard for it to hit her with its arms, so its main form of attacking will be with its feet. As long as she can take down 1 leg, then the battle will be in her favor.
When Mira got closer to the leg, she activated her Ice Domain and started created a bunch of Ice Needles to swirl around in it. These Ice Needles were much larger than the ones that she normally created. They were close to 1 meter in length. There was also blue lightning swirling around her domain.
The Titan went for a kick and Mira was barely able to dodge in time. This thing was much faster than she had thought it would be. Mira was going to go for the ankle first as joints are typically the weakest.
When she got closer to the leg, she started unloading her Ice Needles on it. They shot one after another as she tried to hit the same spot over and over again. All she needed was one of these to penetrate it.
The Titan went for a punch instead of a kick when it saw that kicking Mira may be annoying. Mira dove out of the day as the Titan missed and hit the ground instead. It caused a huge crater and a massive shockwave to reverberate throughout the whole area. Mira flew upwards from the shockwave and came crashing down. She landed on her legs when she hit the ground, but felt like her legs were injured.
Mira ignored this and immediately rushed back towards the spot she kept shooting Ice Needles at. She got close enough to the leg and started firing Ice Needles at the ankle again. After shooting around 50 Ice Needles at the ankle, one of them finally entered its body by about 20 centimeters. Mira decided to wait until the Titan made another move and then she would attack.
The Titan's other foot came crashing in, but Mira was already waiting for an attack and had already moved as soon as she saw it attacking. Mira dodged and knew that the titan couldn't attack at full strength right after that.
She charged at the Ice Needle that was still stuck in its leg and gathered as much momentum in her and her scythe as she possibly could. She got close enough to the Ice Needle and the back of the scythe came slamming into the end of the Needle. The force from this impact was intense, but with the Titan's massive weight and size, it didn't even move. This was actually good for Mira though as the force of the blow caused the whole Ice Needle to dig its way into the ankle of the Titan. Once Mira felt like the Needle drilled its way in far enough, she made the Needle start to condense on itself.
*POP*
The ice needle exploded in the ankle of the Titan as a massive hole formed there and completely disintegrated its ankle.
The Titan roared in anger as now just standing became extremely difficult. It wasn't able to kick Mira now because it would fall if it did. All that was left was to try and punch her, but even doing this was a near-impossible task as the center of gravity of a Titan is very top-heavy, so even just swinging its arms too hard may cause it to lose balance.
Mira was quick to react to this as she went the other leg and did the same thing! If the Titan couldn't come up with a solution, then why should she change her tactic?
The Titan tried to smack Mira several times, but was losing balance every time it did and also wasn't able to strike with the same power and speed as before.
It didn't take long before Mira obliterated the other ankle. The Titan now fell to its knees and started trying to pummel Mira with its fists!
Mira just ran behind the huge titan and started attacking its lower back, the spine specifically. The Titan couldn't do anything about stopping her as his movements were already restricted.
It didn't take long for her to sever the spin, causing the Titan to lose all movements in its lower half. Mira then jumped and shot several Ice Blades towards the shoulders. As the Ice Blades were flying towards the shoulders, Mira had launched herself at its neck.
Mira put more Qi into the blade of Ice on her scythe. She put around 80% of it in the blade, extending the blade to 2 meters long, as she slashed towards the back of the Titan. The Blade entered the Titan's neck and exited, leaving a 2-meter deep slash in the neck. Mira landed on the shoulder and jumped back for another strike to decapitate it. The Titan could no longer move any of its body at this point and could only accept death.
The Titan's head then dropped to the ground and the rest of the body followed after, signifying the titan's defeat. The Titan's body didn't seem to disappear into energy as it still lay there on the ground, dead.
"Congratulations on passing Stage 15 of the Trial. Please proceed to start Stage 16."
***
Maria was thrown into another place. This one is seemingly large and empty.
"Welcome to Stage 15. This is the Titan Stage. In this stage, you will have to defeat the titan in order to proceed to the next stage. There is no time limit. Begin!"
Maria heard the mechanical voice.
"Titan Stage? I've never seen a titan before, but I'd assume they are quite big! I really would like to avoid something like that if possible! But I guess these stages really thought and prepared for everything. I have no idea what the next 5 stages will be if this one is already a titan!" Maria said to herself.
She then felt the ground rumble. It felt like a mini earthquake happened every second or two. Maria looked in the direction that it was coming from and saw a ginormous human-looking thing in the distance.
As it got closer, Maria realized exactly how big a Titan was. It was around 100 meters tall and just looking at it made one feel like they were looking at a mountain. Maria also couldn't sense any cultivation from it, which was a good thing... I think?
Maria just nodded her head at this awe-inspiring being. Honestly, she thought it'd be much worse, like maybe an army of Titans or maybe a Titan in the Foundation Realm or something stupid like that. She honestly felt glad that it was only 100 meters tall as well.
Maria shook these thoughts out of her head and started trying to think of a viable strategy to deal with a titan. She honestly wasn't too good at coming up with strategies like this, but also knew that she needed some kind of plan in order to defeat something like this.
"Let's see. Mira would definitely go for the legs somehow as she does this with almost everything she fights. If something can't move, then it's a free kill. I don't think I can do that as well as Mira can though. Vital spots seem similar to humans, but the only problem is me reaching them as this thing is massive. I think the best spot for me to attack is the neck as that is the thinnest part of its body and most likely the softest as well. I also have just the thing to reach it!!" Maria analyzed a bit to herself.
She then started running towards the Titan. This Titan had rocks in its hands and started throwing them at Maria when it saw her running towards it. Mira dodged most of them, but also activated her Light Sword and sliced a couple of them in half as she continued to run towards the Titan. When she got close, a giant foot came down on her as if it was squashing an ant. Maria sped up as fast as she could and narrowly made it out before she was crushed. She was now able to make it behind the Titan.
Maria gathered strength into her lower body. Then all of a sudden she sprouted wings from her back! These wings were made of Light and were also something that Maria came up with when she was meditating on her Unfettered Light Dao. She loved that feeling of flying when she was in the wind stage and wanted more. She wanted to be able to soar through the skies! Of course, these wings can't have her fly just yet, but are similar to a flightless bird's wings. She will be able to gain some altitude from them, and if she gets a nice boost beforehand, then all the better. They can also partially be used for gliding.
The ground underneath Maria cracked as she launched off the ground. She shot light beams out of the bottom of her feet and was flapping her light wings. She activated her Light Sword and Triple Draws as she shot through the air towards the neck of the Titan. Once she was in range, she slashed at the Titan's neck, like she was trying to decapitate it. Her sword went in deep but didn't kill it or immobilize it. Maria landed on a shoulder but then the Titan smacked at her like a bug.
Maria jumped off of the shoulder as she wanted to try again. Maria dove towards the ground and accelerated quickly then lay flat in the air as she started to flap her wings when she reached 15 meters from the ground. She then landed on the ground. It was a bit of a rough landing, but she made it without any broken bones. She sprinted around the Titan as she waited for an opening to jump.
Soon the Titan attacked with its fist and Maria immediately gathered strength in her legs and shot up towards the neck of the Titan. This time she put her full power into this swing along with 90% of her Qi into her Triple Draws sword art. She soon reached the neck of the Titan and swung at full force. The sword went all the way through the neck and the force of the blow ripped off the titan's head.
Maria saw the head of the Titan fly and slowly descended back to the ground with her wings. She then noticed that this titan didn't disappear like most of the beasts or creatures in the trial and wondered if this stage was different somehow. Her thoughts were interrupted when the mechanical voice rang out.
"Congratulations on passing Stage 15 of the Trial. Please proceed to start Stage 16."
***