He stood on a wartorn hill, covered in craters and corpses. In front him and behind him, warriors fought with legions of beasts, killing and dying in turn. Most of them were mere F Rankers, but Sam could feel a few more powerful auras in the distance, and he set his eyes on the strongest of them.
A mighty bear, easily a hundred feet long and thirty tall, was rampaging through Granthar’s forces, each strike from its paws absolutely obliterating everything it touched. Three E Rankers desperately fought to fend it off, but it was ultimately useless. The creature was at least Mid E Rank, if not slightly higher. Its body was covered in fur that gleamed like metal, and each of its claws could have been used to slice down entire trees. Its eyes glowed with a metallic light, and every step it took sent tremors racing across the surface of the world.
The three E Rankers facing it found their weapons and techniques simply bouncing off its obdurate defense, ricocheting back towards them. Although the fur didn’t appear that durable, it most certainly was. Sam smiled, and teleported. It was quite clear what his mission was now.
Appearing next to the almighty battle, he expanded Terra’s Will, and with a whoosh, flames burst out along its edges. A charge of purified mana and elemental energy coalesced around its head, and like a meteor, Sam brought it down.
The bear looked up, only for the hammer to slam into its forehead with a noise like a nuclear strike. A pillar of energy exploded up into the air as the strike was initially deflected, then, with a crack, the metal broke apart, and the monster’s legs splayed out. The entire battlefield shook as it was blasted down into the ground, its entire head coming apart in a shower of gore.
With a growl, the monster sent a pulse of elemental power up through its body, drawing upon the earth below. A false head of pure metal replaced the ruins of the old one, each feature moving as smoothly as if it were the real thing.
Sam spared a glance to the other fighters, who were staring at him in shock. To their credit, they regained their composure soon enough, and started to pepper the monster with their own techniques. Sam could see that it was doing nothing, but he let them help. Any little bit of distraction was useful.
Another charge of his Primal Skill’s energy matrix slammed down into his hammer, and with another teleport, he appeared beneath the monster’s shiny jaw. His hammer arced upwards like a rocket, and impacted the beast in the center of its chin. There was a boom, and then, improbably, the multi hundred ton monster was lifted off its feet, and up into the air. A nova of crackling energy buoyed it into the sky, the ground around Sam exploding upwards with it. He stood there, suspended by the power in midair, his hammer poised at the peak of its arc.
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Then he whipped it around, and into the monster’s gut. The sound barrier snapped in an instant, and the huge monster skipped across the battlefield, out of the way of the main conflict. It crashed into a nearby hill, utterly obliterating it with its bulk alone.
“Who the hell are you?” One of the other E Rankers asked, her sword poised as if it could do anything to the man who had just utterly outclassed them.
“I am Sam Atlas. Your king sent me to aid your forces. Now, who are you?” Sam replied, his hammer still dripping with blood.
“My name is Ashandra,” the woman answered, before pointing at the others. “Marcus doesn’t speak, and Alonar can’t. I know, an interesting group, is it not?”
Marcus seemed to be the mage, holding a staff tightly in one hand. Robes draped his form, and he gazed at Sam with shockingly deep eyes. The man simply nodded once.
On the other hand, Alonar was massive, an armored behemoth that must have weighed at least a ton with all of the metal strapped to him. Somehow, Sam wasn’t surprised by the man’s taciturnity. Even if he hadn’t been able to speak, he seemed like the kind of person to be of few words.
Sam gave them all an approving nod, and then teleported once more, heading towards the bear, who even now was getting to its tree trunk like feet. The monster let out a roar of pain, turned tinny by the metal that had replaced its head. With a screech, it ripped its claws down across the air, and a series of metal razors exploded into existence, heading towards Sam. They continued up into the sky for almost a mile, and down into the ground for the same, leaving canyons etched into the surface of the world. Below, F Rankers scattered, but many were too slow, and the waves of force surrounding the blades crushed them into paste.
Sam was unable to teleport past the attack, as it covered most of its horizon, and was replete with Dao energy, enough to occlude his vision. Instead, he teleported up, vaulting over the top of the attack, and plummeting down the other side. The monster glared up at him with eyes that looked like pools of molten steel, and stomped the earth. The world buckled, and spikes of ore shot up, seeking to transfix Sam. They were coated in layers of elemental energy and the Dao, so thick that he could barely see the actual metal beneath the conceptual metal.
Sam weaved around the pillars with his teleportation, shocked at how fast they were. They not only shot up at immense speeds, but tracked him as well, the rocky substrate of metal and earth making them up turning like a tentacle to find Sam. He was forced to use his hammer to cancel out the attacks, which propelled him backwards, eating away at his momentum.
Eventually, one struck him full in the gut, and with a sonic blast, he was set hurtling up into the sky. It felt like a bomb had gone off next to his chest, and his armor was dented around it. There was no heat, but his flesh was compressed down, tearing and spurting blood. Though, it was hardly the worst pain he had felt as an E Ranker, and it was hardly fatal either. Instead, he simply soldiered on, teleporting his way out of the momentum’s embrace.
